Spell/Skill Increase system

Eltsac · Post by **Eltsac** » Sun Jul 30, 2006 11:05 pm

And if the problem is that it favors the rping PC against the training ones, then it looks natural to me on a rp-enforced mud...

Just my think.

Eltsac

Rhianon · Post by **Rhianon** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 3:25 am

This is how I see this whole thing, mind you I have modernized it quite a bit.........You have two basketball players.......one goes out and practices daily working hard at perfecting his shots etc. (twinking) And you have another one who stands around talking about his sport, and discussing how things might be done or should be done (rping) And your telling me they should both be good at their skills???? Sorry I don't see it that way. Just a thought. I understand that this MUD is trying to go strictly RP, but for many RPing is almost as boring as spending time training. But getting good at something takes work, and dedication. If that is considered "twinking" then I guess we should all strive to be average.

Glim · Post by **Glim** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 3:46 am

Rhianon wrote:I understand that this MUD is trying to go strictly RP, but for many RPing is almost as boring as spending time training.

I dont mean to sound like a smart alec, or to sound insulting but...

If... erm... roleplaying is boring... and training is boring... then what do you do on the game?

Brar · Post by **Brar** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 3:54 am

Rhianon wrote:This is how I see this whole thing, mind you I have modernized it quite a bit.........You have two basketball players.......one goes out and practices daily working hard at perfecting his shots etc. (twinking) And you have another one who stands around talking about his sport, and discussing how things might be done or should be done (rping) And your telling me they should both be good at their skills???? Sorry I don't see it that way. Just a thought. I understand that this MUD is trying to go strictly RP, but for many RPing is almost as boring as spending time training. But getting good at something takes work, and dedication. If that is considered "twinking" then I guess we should all strive to be average.

Firstly, perhaps you should read posts carefully before answering, Dalvyn explained at least ten times the many different ways you can imagine for it to be 'realistic'.
Secondly, honestly, if you find roleplay boring, then you really have nothing to do on a rp mud, just go play some hack and slash mud... because you are quite on the far wrong side of this mud spirit.

Kirkus · Post by **Kirkus** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:30 am

My prudent side wants me to just say wow..... but those that have been here for more than a few months probabily can remember that my prudent side is far out weighed by my strong willed and opinioned side. Like when I used to vehemently defend some notion I liked. But amazingly enough I was never once told to go find a different mud. Probabily because That would go against this muds spirit, not the opposition to an idea.

Brar · Post by **Brar** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 9:07 am

Secondly, honestly, if you find roleplay boring, then you really have nothing to do on a rp mud, just go play some hack and slash mud... because you are quite on the far wrong side of this mud spirit.

I'm going to rephrase that because after reading your post, it sounds wrong and do not carry the generalness I wanted.

it should be more

Secondly, honestly, if someone find roleplay boring, then this someone really have nothing to do on a rp mud, just go play some hack and slash mud... because this someone is quite on the far wrong side of this mud spirit.

Just to be sure, this is still a strict rp enforced mud or this has also changed while I was away?
BecauseI fail to understand why people so vehemently protest when the imms comes with a system that would only give more to the roleplayers and not remove anything.

Lerytha · Post by **Lerytha** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 9:54 am

I would just say, Rhianon, not to be rude or anything. The RP is not always just about "sitting in the Square". It could be about sparring, about talking about magic, about discussing the dogma of a Church. No, it's probably not that realistic that you gain skillpoints, just like someone fighting does, but it does give the opportunity for people with RP-heavy characters to grow in strength, as well.

General Point:

Using my character as shameless propaganda: my mage is still only level 44. I mean, she knows quite a lot of spells, but many of them are still at inept level, etc. I absolutely hate, hate, hate, hate, hate levelling up by going out and beating up mobs. If there's anything more annoying and horrible, I have yet to find it. I mean, quests are nice, but I try and do that when I have people to do it with. It is just the idea of going to Hartsvale, with twenty fireballs memorised and scorching giants till I grow more powerful really doesn't appeal to me. That is why for almost six months I have lingered at this level, bored out of my mind by the prospect of "levelling up" and so instead deciding to roleplay.

However: if my character, who I consider to be RP heavy (no, not just sitting in the Square - she tries to teach young mages, tries to set up other stuff, etc), is able to gain skill points through RP, then it represents the way in which (I think Dalvyn has said it before) either during my offline times I am actively studying the Weave, and my magic, etc, and so would justify the skill points. The only problem is, we can't get skill points when offline, so we have to gain it when online. Hence the reason we get skill points for roleplay.

I used the example of my mage, but this could work for anyone. The skillpoints a priest gains through roleplay would stand either for the skill he gains in teaching a novice of prayers, OR if there is nothing in that particular RP to back up the skillpoints, it represents work during offline times. i.e, he communes in his temple, delves deeper into mysteries, etc.

For a fighter. If he is RPing a spar, fine. The skillpoints are easily justified. If he IS just sitting in the Square, though, then the skillpoints can be justified through offpeak training - press ups, parrying practice, training on "dummies", etc.

Personally, I think it iis fair enough for a character to gain skills through roleplay. As Brar pointed out (and I do think he meant to be more diplomatic - sometimes it is difficult to say politely what you mean on a forum), it is a roleplay enforced mud. Which means it is quite legitimate for skills to be gained through RP. It just means we need to think flexibly about where exactly those skill points are coming from.

Codewise, yes: skillpoints come through RP. But IC? They come through training, study, learning, etc... all the stuff that your character is assumed to do offline anyway. I mean, your character has been away for three months IRL (so, three years in the MUD?) what do you say he/she has been doing? Travelling. Studying. Busy on faith business. Running a caravan guard. If we can make up something that our character was busy with to explain an OOC absence, then we are allowed the same flexibility when explaining the skill points.

Personally, I think it is a brilliant idea. Because remember, this is not saying that training, etc, is going to be made obsolete. You will still need coin. You will still want that cool magic item from blahblahblah quest. You will still want the fun of killing mobs with new spells.

The RP skillpoint gain is in addition to "training".

(This was not singling out Rhianon, before it appears that I am flaming or showing disrespect)

Duranamir · Post by **Duranamir** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 12:12 pm

I think I generally agree with most Of Lerytha's point as far as what the characters are doing in their offline time. To me the current system is actually realistic in a way. You should get increase in skills for using them. If I was playing my character 24/7 I could role-play out his life training skills going to the bathroom sleeping for hours etc at the correct rate. It would be boring spending online time repetitively doing these things but in RL you don’t get to be a master at anything without actually practicing it a lot. However I do not want to spend all my limited playing time doing boring stuff. I want to spend my online time doing fun stuff like Role-playing and adventuring

. I get enough boring repetition in Real life.

The problem is currently there is no way of telling the MUD what our characters are doing when we are not playing them. A skill point system can work to overcome this as it separates the earning of experience (skill points) from the spending of experience actually gaining the skill. This separation also allows for a more flexible system of advancing the characters as earned experience can be gained in lots of different ways such as RP rewards/time and then spent in ways the player wishes even on skills the character has not actually used much. Though I have to say I personally think you should be made to at least use the skill a bit before allowing skill points being spent on it. I.e. no increasing a trade skill without using it a little.

Gaining skill points

Once we have separated gaining skill points from spending them we can implement different ways of gaining skill points. Below I am putting a few ideas for gaining skill points (some already discussed). Not all of these should gain skill points at the same rate to encourage certain types of play.

• Using skills. Don’t need to gain skill points as existing experience system will still work.
• RP awards from IMMS
• Time playing/interacting with other players RP based award.
• Time in general i.e. total time on the character on or offline.
• At increase of level gain some skill points.
• Other i.e. quest award

I think that characters should always gain some base level of skill points at level otherwise they will never have the skills a character of a certain level should have. However this should not be the only component of skill points and probably not even the main one. So a level 50 twink character will be a competent whatever of its class but will be outclassed by a well role-played level 50 who has gained the skill points to become a better (and probably more flexibly skilled) member of there class. This not a punishment for Twinkishness because such characters can still practice there skills up by solo adventuring. But the RP character can gain the same advantage without having to do all the boring practice online (the character is doing it when they are offline). They can also choose more RP friendly skills to raise for example GM cook anyone ?.

There is still an issue of balance as has been mentioned before in that it is actually very difficult for certain characters to RP when there is no one to RP with. The example I will give from lots of personal experience is Drow. It is a rare and joyous occasion when 2 + Drow are on at the same time. And this would penalize the players of Drow even more than currently. I don’t think the problem or answer to this is anything to do with skill points per se and I will raise a discussion post for the general problem at some other time.

Using Skill points.

Since we are playing a D&D based mud level is something we are stuck with. And one of the things that this means is that a level 40 character should always be generally better at there class skills than a level 10 character. It might be in the case of a trade skill that a lower level char could be higher as for example a specialist armour smith should be better at making armour than a warrior who is just doing it as a hobby. And as such I think there need to be limits on class skills to stop a complete imbalance. For example level 20 character puts every single skill point they earn into there primary weapon and becomes better than a level 50. It should be possible for the level 20 to concentrate on a weapon skill and become better than a more generalised level 20 or even perhaps a more general level 25-30 but not better than a level 40. In the case of non class skills such as trades and perhaps general skills like climb, swim etc. I see no point in limiting them if someone wants to RP a full time miner, armour smith or cook they could build a comparatively low level character and dump points into these skills to become a master. They may not be a great adventurer but that is the choice they have made. It might even be fun to RP such a character though they will have to put up with the fact that if they adventure they will be outclassed by other characters that have a more normal approach to the game.

• Class skills should be level limited in some way (no level 10 GM swordsmen).
• Trade skills should not allowing true specialists at a trade (Yes level 10 GM armourers

).
• General skills?
• There should be a requirement to use a skill at least once (per level/time?) before skill points can be spent on it.
• Skill points should use a graduated scale of some sort i.e. Level 20 of a skill should be harder than level 5 to gain.
• Skill point costs should vary by class, Warriors should have it easier gaining weapon skills than thieves.
• Skill point gain should be modified by intelligence/wisdom? (To balance the more skills/spells a wizard/cleric needs over a warrior?)

I do not doubt that doing this work will take a lot of time especially creating and balancing the skill point costs for all the different of combinations of skills and class. But I think in the long run it would create a more flexible and rewarding way of advancing characters without having to grind away at certain areas to get a skill increase (though you could still do this if you wanted.)

Duranamir

Brar · Post by **Brar** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 12:54 pm

Another thing could be time based experience, else, you would end up level 10 with tons of skill points unused for you won't have the level to learn the skills. Smehting like one level for 100 hours or something like this..
Just an idea,
Brar

Kregor · Post by **Kregor** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 1:44 pm

Duranamir wrote: • Class skills should be level limited in some way (no level 10 GM swordsmen).
• Trade skills should not allowing true specialists at a trade (Yes level 10 GM armourers ).
• General skills?
• There should be a requirement to use a skill at least once (per level/time?) before skill points can be spent on it.
• Skill points should use a graduated scale of some sort i.e. Level 20 of a skill should be harder than level 5 to gain.
• Skill point costs should vary by class, Warriors should have it easier gaining weapon skills than thieves.
• Skill point gain should be modified by intelligence/wisdom? (To balance the more skills/spells a wizard/cleric needs over a warrior?)

The mechanics of this have been worked out in D20 gaming for the skill point system. I would think, personally, we could adapt to that, and make the game even more 3E. There is already a level cap in place so there's no level 10 GMs, the mechanics to acquire points per class, per level (which, we could add the time and RP based awards, modified by intelligence, etc.

Gregal · Post by **Gregal** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:51 pm

Can I be the first to say, I am sorry but Miriel should be stronger than that. And me myself, I believe that there should be ways to raise the level of spells or song without having to cast it OVER AND OVER AND OVER. Yes that is how it is gained, but if you can discuss the properties of a spell and the incantations of how it works, and you have been studying magic and runes you can think of certain ways to cast a spell to make it stronger. I don't know how many times I play FK and think, you know if I could rp this out then I would have a reason to say my character knows this. I mean I have read so many Forgotten Realms novels that I have learned everything, but I know what I would know and what I wouldn't. I try to excersice caution when using it. So the point of this entire post was to say that there is many ways characters could gain power without mob bashing. Which I agree...I HATE EVER SO MUCH.

Rhianon · Post by **Rhianon** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 12:01 am

My my suddenly I AM THE ONE WHO IS BORED...sorry but I did not say one word about my being bored, just a general word about some people being bored by RP, how many times have you heard people sitting around complaining about how bored they are???? Well surely if RP was so exciting, then they wouldn't be so bored.......I am not naming names, just being general, and I am not attacking Dalvyn for trying to give something to the RP'ers, just that everyone says just because you want to go train something you are a twink, I think it is because they are trying to become good at what they do. If that offends someone then I am sorry, but I am also entitled to my opinion. I am not trying to say those that RP are not entitled to something also. Just using something most people can relate to to explain the difference between "twinkers" and "Rper's"

Glim · Post by **Glim** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 3:39 am

Rhianon wrote:Well surely if RP was so exciting, then they wouldn't be so bored.......I am not naming names, just being general, and I am not attacking Dalvyn for trying to give something to the RP'ers, just that everyone says just because you want to go train something you are a twink, I think it is because they are trying to become good at what they do. If that offends someone then I am sorry, but I am also entitled to my opinion. I am not trying to say those that RP are not entitled to something also. Just using something most people can relate to to explain the difference between "twinkers" and "Rper's"

Hmm, I think the word "twink" is being thrown around too much. Not just by you, Rhianon, but by others as well. Twink defines someone who trains and trains, wears equipment for their coded benefits, and doesnt roleplay. I think that the majority of people who train also roleplay, so I dont like to label them as twinks. It gives a negative connotation to a side of the debate in this thread that I dont think is needed.

What I meant with my earlier comment was that... training is almost ALWAYS boring, while roleplay can be boring, but usually only when there is no real roleplay going on.

Saying something is boring usually means you do not want to do it, so I interpreted your post as basically saying "Roleplaying and training are both boring, I dont like to do them".

Tired and just got off work, but hope that clears up some things.
Feedback is always welcome,

Thanks,