Comments/Vote Section II Enrollment

[Admin]

II Game Play


1. Spoilers are strongly discouraged.
2. You may not PUG other than recruiting efforts.
3. Shrines are NOT to be used with the Eldarin Shrine being the sole exception.
4. No Power leveled groups in quests. Wilderness areas follow level as defined by game.
5. You are encouraged to complete quests once and never repeat at the same or lower setting or ever run on Casual setting.
6. Wilderness areas may be run to your hearts’ content but quests are preferred.
7. Challenges are not to be run in favor of quests that earn favor.
8. No "instant recall" you must recall from safe positions only. Use common sense.
9. Death without a resurrection by spell/ability or item "earned in game" is subject to penalties (listed later).
10. We may consider "alliances" with other guilds and you may group with them.


Please leave your comments and vote.

[Admin]

The reason I put the "you are encouraged" to run quests once in is because sometimes a guild member will need help - or a group in WW will call out n guild chat ----- we need help in WW. What promotes teamwork more? Saying I ran that already or...okay ... here I come with my Big hitting mace and a few potions for you.

SOS isn't that all about rescue missions?

[joseph]

(I think a lot of work and effort have gone into things here, and there is a lot of experience behind some of the decisions. Please read my comments with the understanding that I might not know why a particular rule is in place, so my questions are genuine in their interest in gathering information. Thanks - Joe)

Comments on each line item:

1) Sounds fine.
2) Sounds fine - should define this a bit more. *a
3) Sounds fine.
4) Sounds fine - should add that wilderness areas are not to be run once you are past the level they can be run at (whatever that challenge level is).
5) Sounds fine - as concerns your update - just change it to read something like: "You should only run and complete a particular quest once, unless helping a fellow guild member complete it for their first time. Remember to keep it challenging and without spoilers."
6) Possible concerns on this one... *b
7) Possible concerns on this one... *c
8) Maybe change this one to something like: No recalling from any area to avoid death. Either you make your own way out back through the entrance you came in through, you complete the instance, or you die and make payment accordingly.
9) Sounds fine here - will address in the relevant section.
10) Sounds fine, but maybe add: ... and those guilds will be listed as we make such arrangements (or something like that).

*a) What restrictions are there on the characters (our own characters) we pug with? It seems to me that we would be most likely getting members through running a pug at low level as opposed to higher level quests. On the other hand, if there is no one to group with, and we want to run some instances with one of our non-static characters, couldn't we make our own group - advertising in the LFM that it was a PD style dungeon crawl - no zerg - recall on death type dungeon? That would be better for recruitment efforts I think - as long as we are policing ourselves...
*b) If we can run wilderness areas endlessly (presumably within our level range) - then we could conceivably go farm the chests in sands to get items for our characters. Not saying that we would - but wilderness areas should at least have the note that they are not to be farmed for rare items, etc.
*c) Why can I run wilderness areas (and possible rares from there) endlessly, but I can not run challenges?

[vero]

1) good
2) good
3) Discussion needed. Physical Characters need not care, but this greatly hurts spell casters. Assuming the dungeons were balanced with the expectation of us being able to finish them using the rest shrines, it may be imbalanced for casters to not use them because they will simply run out of spell points. This is probably an ever greater problem for clerics and wizards versus sorcs and favored souls. and it is implausible and impossible to keep buffs up since they take up so much spell points. And with buffs runnign out, it encourages us to run faster so they dont run out. However, i guess you can say this makes it harder and so we have to choose which buffs to use or not use.
4) Define what is powerleveling, whats the limit?
5) good
6) good
7) i dunno what challenged are
8) good
9) if we have mature people with similiar interests in how we tactically play the game, i dont feel we need severe penalties since just restarting and the shame of dying i find for myself enought reason to try hard. Altough maybe others need more coercion. The important thing here is that if we do set a penalty, i dont it to deter others from joining our guild
10) good

Also one important question,
How big of a guild are we looking to become, because i feel that this is important.

[joseph]

In reading Vero's comments, I have to strongly agree with #3.

A spell caster actually doesn't contribute much without spell points - and the devs did say ages ago that quests were balanced around shrines being used for spell casters.

That, plus technically speaking, in tabletop D&D, we would get an area safe and rest before continuing so that our cleric had healing spells and our arcane casters had their spells ready. Using a rest shrine for this purpose (even the whole party resting) is not much different than resting in tabletop.

I'm interested to see the discussion on this one.

[Admin]

The no shrines is to develop economy in magic. At later levels endless firewall is a strategy that is used but the meta magic is so powerful for casters that there should be some limits. I agree that the rest shrines were incorporated to show a day of rest: on the other hand shrine use really makes the game particularly easy.

There are other ways that casters can contribute - tons of wants and honestly every spell elixir should end up in the Sorcs hands or maybe a few in a clerics as their spells are huge.

If the guild wants shrines - that is okay with me, but the challenge of each quest just got notched "way down".

Another way to look at the manna issue is that CC is cheaper in spell points and safer in a lot of ways than DPS. A hypno or Charm uses less energy than using attack spells and does not draw aggro. The game has been geared to a nuke em all DPS caster.

I ran a bard the other day and used Fascinate and Suggestion at least five times to have the mob take out each other. CP and Hypno do similar work.
If shrines would be allowed I would think hirelings and any type of trading might have to go. I understand that casters like to have lots of spell points to burn but abuse of shrines is very easy - as many have four and five per instance - which is a bit much.

Maybe one rest shrine per quest - but then it will be why not two or three or some formula. Again, I don't really care too much what the group decides - but the idea is to make the game challenging and shrines are one way to do it.

Thanks for the feedback.

[Admin]

Without a death penalty as the game had in previous versions there is not enough benefit (10% xp) to play tactically when you can blow through a quest - die - recall go back in and do it again. Is the issue a penalty outside of having to rerun the quest or is it the running at a lower level or is it the payment?

[joseph]

Actually (taking a break from work so I can comment) I think I was thinking old school (where you had to rest between every dungeon instance and did not auto fill). Apologies for that.

I'm tired from the baby, so forgive me if I ramble a bit I was thinking more along the lines of once we hit that level 10-14 plateau of character progression (where quests go from easy to crazy difficult in comparison).

The only real issue for me was that a spell caster (as in Wizard, etc.) has such limited ability to cast spells that it would discourage anyone from playing an arcane (especially at higher levels). An Artificer or Cleric or Druid is combat viable in elite (can hit things), but the last time I ran my wizard through a dungeon, he could not hit anything in melee on elite past about level 8 or 10.

I do not know if Update 14 changed that, as I have not played my wizard since then (I only play that character with my wife) - but I know that up to level 8 I could still hit in melee - and then around level 10 I just became utterly worthless at hitting things on elite.

In re-thinking, I would have to agree with you that at least on the lower level missions, we should be able to manage and conserve resources well enough to get through dungeons without shrines - I always forget that you get full hp and sp every time you exit between instances - just the old school in me where you had to recall out of WW between runs to heal up That is a huge bonus, and symbolizes rest between encounters.

The higher level content I am not sure about (just thinking of Rainbow, Dust, or the Lord of Eyes chain from the Coin Lords - the one with Hesstes or whatever her name is - that one was wicked hard on elite).

Do you have experience at that level in PD?

And of course I had forgotten the various PRE effects (Archmage, Pale Master) that allow for low spell point casts.

So - I guess I was looking at fixing something that isn't broke (and I am notorious for that, so stop me when necessary)

[Admin]

Joseph,

3. I agree with the Wilderness being run after level.
6. I agree that they can be used as easy XP farming and gear farming. Some of the Wilderness areas are needed for end game play. Particularly areas that yield tapestries which are typically very dangerous areas. Gianthold needs to be run as well as some other areas in order to run the quest.
7. Challenges from what I can see are solely for loot runs. Do they yield items that are needed for character advancement?
8. I agree that was the point. Who wants to run back through the desert or Red fens after it's cleared.

PUG Groups I think are fine for recruitment but some LFM would need to be put up. We also need to make our Guild distinct from other guilds - and I think the best way is to try to make the game challenging. Perhaps that is what we need to ask about each rule - does this make the game more challenging and encourage teamwork.

I am in agreeement in principle that wilderness can be exploited, how er some of the items are needed for end game play. Perhaps just those areas that yield needed items for end game development should be allowed to be "farmed". In principle I am in agreement that there is no need to run Tangleroot fifty times.
Perhaps this "general guideline" Explorer areas are to be run with the purpose of finding all areas, and then killing what you find with a normal route to a quest.

If challenges "are" part of a needed path to unlock quests and character development that is fine. I know that certain wilderness areas are or were part of the requirement for level 13+ quests. Do challenges offer the same benefit?


Vero,
I don't play a lot of casters but I have. I have found that if a group manages aggro, pulls properly to set up kill zones and uses skills such as bluff, noise pull, etc. spell points are easier to maintain. Here's an example - a level two spell - glitterdust is perhaps the best CC in the game through level 20. I rarely see casters using it even though it is likely the best CC in the game. It blinds all unless they save V. will and most monsters have horrible will saves. Why use Nyac's - which has a very easy save - and draws tons of aggro and when empowered as most do costs 3x as much as this CC?

Keeping buffs up - each character should be collecting gear or potions and/or benefits to keep up buffs. An arcane should never use points for buffs - a cleric yes - a sorcerer no. We also currently allow House P and House J buffs which are huge buffs that are cheap and are usually available to all at level 6 to 8.


When you add the number of scrolls that should be "stacked" in a wizard's or sorc's pack this becomes even less an issue, particularly at the low levels when collectibles from the Harbor and Market are heavily favored for Wizards and Sorcerers. Every collectible that gives out scrolls wands for wizards should end up in the hands of casters and not a barkeep. I have a Lvl 13 mix who has stacks of scrolls and wands. Why because I turn in collectibles. Many of the "tactically oriented guilds" are going to a no shrine policy. With the new mod spell points regenerate - albeit at a slow rate - but they do.

High spell point drainers (Nyac's, Firewalls)should be reserved for "boss killing" or really tough mobs.

There are more spell enhancement items that are dropping. Just taking the Korthos set allows regeneration. Also, the Eberrson Shards gave renewable spell point regenerators - like 20 full spell enhancement potions. Those dragonshards should "all" end up in the hands of Sorcs, wizards and perhaps Clerics - and not be used for healing - which is so prevalent it is sick (I have one adventurer level 8 Ftr/Ranger with over 150 cure lights and 20 wavecrasher cargos (cure mod wands) in his bank. Healing for the most part shoud be self sustaining with clerics only doing so in battle and with each member healing themselves between fights - with maybe WF being an exception as oils drop less frequently.

There are also way too many shrines in the game for the length of each quest. Even in our runs we've not pulled or controlled aggro particularly well in some quests - or in parts of quests.

In tabletop when I played and/or ran a campagin a day's rest never happened in a dungeon setting. DOes it make sense to stop what you're doing while assaulting Splinterskull and the boss decides on a truce? The only way to rest was to withdraw/recall from the quest - and although the force would be diminished they'd be waiting for you.

Shrines for the "most part" are for those who want to run/gun through quests.



A compromise I could see is allowing shrines in Wilderness just before entering a quest.

I've always seen wizards as crowd control types (same with bards) and some buffing - and sorc's as "boss killers" and then CC types. I know sorcs love to shoot fireball - lighting bolt etc. but a sorcerer traditionally is all about killing a tough boss that can't be hacked. It's not about using twenty burning hands to take care of a trash mob.

I've not played a LOT of sorcerers but the few I have always did CC and then shot the big bomb at the red named dude.

Sorry for the rant - but when I played PD as a cleric I was tired of using half of my rez's on a sorc who wanted to PK with empower everything in sight. This was in a PD guild and I told him he needed to chill out as I was a splash and had to use scrolls at 600 PP a pop to rez him. I warned him that he was dying too much by aggro he didn't listen. I told him I didn't have a stack and unless he wanted to pony up and buy them it was one rez per instances. He didn't buy me any - he died . His policy made me stop buying scrolls etc.


As far as a death penalty - I don't think that oops is enough. Death has to cost something - even if it is annoyance and should be something we can self impose and not be debilitating but more than oops. The game is designed that if you run a quest well you won't die too much. It shouldn't be "rare" but it shouldn't be frequent.

A penalty against death fosters smarter play. Burned hands are the best teachers; that's when knowledge of fire goes to the heart.