Using magic against NPCs

[Symasta]

Hey there,
I don't come to the forums often but now read a little about magic but still want to start a discussion about it under a new aspect.
I have been away for a while and returned, now trying to do some training so I can make a roleplay story out of my absence. In order for that I need some progress in my characters skills. (As you can't degrade them yet...). Part of that was my idea to train one magic way to a very high level.
Now for that I have done alot of spell casting on the dlayos, and as the spell happens to attack more than one target, I could kill all 5 of them at one time.
Now I have to say:
First: It is really boring and not enjoyable, but I wanted to follow my plan.
Second: It only works thanks to sleep Glyph which I think is the first issue of magic: It is far to good for being realm one, on the other hand the only chance to enable someone to fight more than 3-5 opponents without drinking lots of mana potions.
Third: I am neither proud of it nor do I like it, but I fight the dlayos standing on the wall, never in danger to die.

That leads me to my issue:
I asked a gm to reinstate 3 dlayos as they were missing, the answer was that he could, but wouldn't as I was not fighting fair.
Now I do not want to complain about that, I can fully understand this action and might have done it the same way.
But my problem is:
At this stage of the game, how are you to use magic?
If you do not have a drifter, you can not use magic really running around as far as I know.
And with a drifter: What is the point??? Have you ever seen a game(finished game you bought) where the mage will shoot, run 10 times faster than the opponent to the other side of the "football field" to quote Marqsaynt and cast another spell, running again.
That makes magic just senseless I'd say. Especially as there are only opponents that either kill you with one hit, or that you kill with one hit.

I have to 1hit the dlayos, otherwise the lag kills me.

Same applies for sword fighting.

Now, if it wasn't for my plan, I would not fight the dlayos that way the whole time. But if I (or my character) was wanting to fight them, I would probably do something in that direction, as I OOOcly do not see a difference between standing on a wall, unreachable, and fighting in the pit, able to get far away within seconds. So how are we to use magic?
If you want to 1hit kill with magic you need to get yourself into a gm-event and get a lava glyph, or water, or something like that. Otherwise you will fail. I do not have an answer, but maybe we need to get away from one-hit-kills (they are unrealistic anyways). But that would require a far better fighting system, which I believe, has not the highest priority atm.
I am really interested in responses...

[Rigwyn]

I brought up the point once before ( in fact It was the first post I ever made ) and it ended up getting deleted.

In sum, this is what I took from the discussion:

You may not EXPLOIT the game, however I think it is fair to use terrain to your advantage.

If I stand behind an obstacle that an npc SHOULD be able to get around/past and attack him until he dies, then I am exploiting the game. The only reason why the NPC could not fight back in this case is because of some limitation to the game mechanics.

If I stand up on a high wall and shoot down at a creature and I am well out of reach then that might be a little different.

However.. Think about it from the enemy's perspective.
If you were a dlyao and you saw your brothers getting pelted to death by a weak magic user on a wall, what would you do ?
Would you stand there and wait to die or would you run out the the arena, go up the stairs, and destroy him ?

At some point you need to be reasonable.

Now, if a GM said that what you were doing was unfair or cheating then go by what he or she said. You could also ask them for clarification or advice on how to avoid exploiting the game while taking advantage of the terrain.

This is just my opinion.

One last point: This is a role playing game ( if you play on laanx ) , not a smash and bash game like doom or quake... ( or whatever today's equivalent is )

Some more thoughts about this:

Think about what would you do if you were actually in this situation. Imagine If you were a mage and perhaps lacked the brawn to wear heavy plate mail armor. Would you throw yourself into a pit of remarkably well trained gladiators knowing that you could not fend them off on your own given the time it takes to cast ? Hell no !

Would you just slump over and give up and perhaps earn a living as a basket weaver ? No way.

If it were me, I might try some of these options:

1. Get a a partner who can go toe to toe with the beast and attack it from a safe distance. Yes, basically using your friend as a meat sheild. He will gain armor training so it good for both players.

2. Team up with other magic users, surround it, and take turns attacking. ( Haven't tried this yet )

3. Beef up your armor skill so you can withstand the blows ( this is not possible for all critters )

4. Perhaps learn some sort of stun type spell ( I think dazzling light is supposed to do this ... not sure , don't use it )

5. I think its fair to run though the arena and *loose* the npc..... then hunt him down when healed...  as long as your not doing something like getting the npc snagged on a barrel or some other object.

This is really a grey issue since fair use of terrain and game exploitation based on game limitations overlap. It might be best to just use good judgment and avoid looking for a black and white answer.

Well, thats my 2 cents .. er eh .. tria.

[Earowo]

3. Beef up your armor skill so you can withstand the blows ( this is not possible for all critters )

thats the thing about dlayos, even with 100 Heavy armor, and full 50Q armor
they do over 1000 damage with one weapon, not that the duel wield and are hitting with both hands so thats 2000 damage every time they throw an attack at you, 1800 at the least, about 2200 at most for what i've seen, this is in no way realistic to me, back in 4.03 they did about 500-600 damage per throw they went at you, basically 250-300 per hand, and you could actually fight em duel style, But NOW, they will kill you one hit NO MATTER WHAT, and with how screwy the fighting system gets with the arena lag, its almost impossible to avoid them.
I DEMAND THE DLAYOS ARE FIXED
and on that note, if our weapon skills can only go to 100-150 [depending on weapon]
Why the Hell should a monster get to go higher then us?, i can understand somthing bulky like an ulbernuat, but when itsa player modle based monster, they should NOT be able to have higher skills then a maxed player..

[Rigwyn]

Why shouldn't they be more skilled than a player ?

Are we that high and mighty that nobody can defeat us ?
Not even the hydlaa guards ?


A do agree though that one shotting makes the fight no fun. It becomes a static win/lose kinda thing

[Shoraal]

...idf one takes into account that this is an RP-server, and you are already discussing "problems" of MAXED OUT chars - something that should not at all exist imho, since they are characters not demigods - obviously, some mobs are just overtly powerful...
so, unless this changes, and as this is obviously a system falure,  others such "failures" are to be used just as well imho... if one needs to make use of "tricks" to get something killed, so be it.
I guess that ight all change once balance gets implemented... far far away in the future.

[Koios]

When ranged combat gets implemented I do wonder on this given situation:

Hydlaa is being attacked by.. some monster / evil things or whatnot. We go Tolkien / Medieval style, barricade the entrances with spearmen etc and have archers on the wall and in the area behind the wall.
We've all seen the movies, many of us have even had archery as a hobby some time in our lives. Where is the realism in saying that "No, you can't shoot someone from the other side of the wall, or from the top of the wall. It's not fair to them."?
I agree, it's not fair. They didn't bring a bow. But then I say "No, you can't slice a dwarf into two equal pieces, or smash the kran into rubble in 1 swing. It's not fair to them." And it isn't, they only had a bow.

[kaerli2]

When ranged combat gets implemented I do wonder on this given situation:

Hydlaa is being attacked by.. some monster / evil things or whatnot. We go Tolkien / Medieval style, barricade the entrances with spearmen etc and have archers on the wall and in the area behind the wall.
We've all seen the movies, many of us have even had archery as a hobby some time in our lives. Where is the realism in saying that "No, you can't shoot someone from the other side of the wall, or from the top of the wall. It's not fair to them."?
I agree, it's not fair. They didn't bring a bow. But then I say "No, you can't slice a dwarf into two equal pieces, or smash the kran into rubble in 1 swing. It's not fair to them." And it isn't, they only had a bow.

Fairness isn't equality.  In other words, fairness isn't about making sure everybody gets the same thing, it's about making sure everybody gets what they need given their situation.

1. Get a a partner who can go toe to toe with the beast and attack it from a safe distance. Yes, basically using your friend as a meat sheild. He will gain armor training so it good for both players.

Ah, the whole tank/DPS/healer split.  I only rarely seen it done in PS; I've participated in one instance of this and it was complete improv at that LOL:

(this is back in 0.4.x)
Setting: akk-east, out by Jirosh's shop.  A Kran and a dwarf are attacking the Rogue there...and not making much headway w.r.t the amount of damage they are taking (the Kran was taking the bulk of the damage but not doing any at all, the dwarf was doing some damage but not enough to win the fight without some help).  So, Kaerli stands in behind them and starts dropping heals on the two; not long thereafter, the rogue slumps over, having taken one too many blows.

2. Team up with other magic users, surround it, and take turns attacking. ( Haven't tried this yet )

Possibly.  Also, dropping buffs can be of some help, it's probably possible to snag >150HP using Invigoration and Strength together.

3. Beef up your armor skill so you can withstand the blows ( this is not possible for all critters )

Indeed it is impossible for Dlayos, Onyx Daggers, and other such mobs

4. Perhaps learn some sort of stun type spell ( I think dazzling light is supposed to do this ... not sure , don't use it )

That, and Magic Sleep will be good for that once it's implemented, too.

5. I think its fair to run though the arena and *loose* the npc..... then hunt him down when healed...  as long as your not doing something like getting the npc snagged on a barrel or some other object.

Unfortunately this seems to be impossible, as the NPC seems to fall off the map after some point :O  However, on a similar note, what about ducking down some passage that the monster can't fit through?  *tries to jam an Ulber into a drainpipe*

[Durgrem]

You may not EXPLOIT the game, however I think it is fair to use terrain to your advantage.

If I stand behind an obstacle that an npc SHOULD be able to get around/past and attack him until he dies, then I am exploiting the game. The only reason why the NPC could not fight back in this case is because of some limitation to the game mechanics.

If I stand up on a high wall and shoot down at a creature and I am well out of reach then that might be a little different.

However.. Think about it from the enemy's perspective.
If you were a dlyao and you saw your brothers getting pelted to death by a weak magic user on a wall, what would you do ?
Would you stand there and wait to die or would you run out the the arena, go up the stairs, and destroy him ?

At some point you need to be reasonable.

That is exactly the point. It is not really allowed to just cast magic from up a wall at Dlayos, who are intelligent enough to run to you and attack. It is right now tolerated though, because the NPCs cheat, too ( Kill by lag )
This is of course an unofficial statement.

Durgrem

[Bonifarzia]

For quite a while I wondered how long it would take to read a thread about this topic here.
And as expected, the reactions are numerous. I am pleased to read about some good thoughts here, but there are some statements I cannot agree with.



About the main topic, I can understand when some GMs do not like it to see players cast magic from some save position without moving at all. But honestly, that does not make such a huge difference. Also without taking advantage of the terrain and when not riding a mount, you can hunt down just any mob safely. I would guess the technical main difference is to protect oneself against lag/ client freezes. I am glad my client runs smoothly such that i can always engage in a fair fight, still, the dlayo only have a chance to get me when i refuse to use offensive spells of any sort. But then it gets very difficult to time, such that defeating more than ten dlayo without taking a lethal hit is already a great challenge.

If you do not have a drifter, you can not use magic really running around as far as I know.

Only when using very slow spells against fast moving mobs.

Especially as there are only opponents that either kill you with one hit, or that you kill with one hit.

Dlayo, Expert Gladiator and other mobs with very high damage output usually have a rather weak defense.
Humanoid mobs seem to be a lot more offensive than animals in general. Some creatures can stand enormous amounts of hits while inflicting critical, but not always lethal damage.

So how are we to use magic? If you want to 1hit kill with magic you need to get yourself into a gm-event and get a lava glyph, or water, or something like that.

I doubt anyone will one hit kill a dlayo with such a spell, although the advantages can be outstanding. One hit kills are to be associated with close combat hunting techniques.

4. Perhaps learn some sort of stun type spell ( I think dazzling light is supposed to do this ... not sure , don't use it )

5. I think its fair to run though the arena and *loose* the npc..... then hunt him down when healed...  as long as your not doing something like getting the npc snagged on a barrel or some other object.

It would be nice indeed to have this sort of spells. Note that most (all?) attack spells do interrupt the mobs movement and that dazzling light would rather have the undesired effect to draw a lot of attention. Casting it by mistake in the dlayo pit can lead to funny situations.

It seems problems with NPCs getting  stuck at some obstacle got reduced by the fact that they try to sidestep now.

I DEMAND THE DLAYOS ARE FIXED

I remember in 0.4.3 you could simply stand next to a dlayo and and engage in combat without moving at all. I think it is much more reasonable the way it works now- apart from the well known problems with offensive magic.

2. Team up with other magic users, surround it, and take turns attacking. ( Haven't tried this yet )

Possibly.  Also, dropping buffs can be of some help, it's probably possible to snag >150HP using Invigoration and Strength together.

Indeed, it would be desired when the game mechanics would encourage team play more. However, mobs are perfect at switching targets, also when the hunters are not grouped, so you will hardly take an advantage here. Healing and buffs are nice to have, although not always useful, yet they do not really encourage teamplay either.

[Symasta]

I am happy to see so many reactions, so I figure I am not the only one with this problem.
Now talking about roleplay, I think it is nice if max lvls are not ath 1000 or anything like that, keeping it reasonable below 200 is good. Of course there will be people to exploit that, but anyways, it gives you the ability to have some knowledge in different ways.
For Example I never really trained Crystal Way, but as it is(was) THE way to heal yourself every smart character would use at least some of it, especially when getting the needed glyph on a low level quest. Now I am arround lvl 40 now, just from casting healing spells on myself and getting the pracitce from NPCs as I believe that you should improve (slowly) when using stuff often.
Now you talk about making magic fighting reasonable, using stunning spells. But all those spells start to work or even be able to trained at lvl 80 or the realm after. Now to get to 80 in magic you have to work alot, that wouldn't make sense, and now how is a mage supposed to use magic if he has only one way.
It might make sense to me, that at lvl 40 or what not, using the regular summon missile or healing spell should not give any more practice points as you have done this move a thousand times and it won't get better. Maybe you could also get better in spells when casting them often. More complex spells could give more practice points.
Or on the other hand: We once had about 15 new glyphs being sold by npcs. (Everyone who still buys glyphs, but doesn't sell anything once did)
Now if those Glyphs exist, why don'T give some out to the public so they can use them.
I just think right now you can not fight npcs that you kill luckily with weapons using any kind of magic. (And I did see someone killing dlayos (all five of them) with one spell, they lost energy for 10 seconds and then they were dead.)

To the other point of discussion here:
The dlayos are Gladiators, so they won't all attack you if you fight one of them. Ulbernauts should, though.

And further I know it is a low importance discussion, especially on the RP server, but after the post that magic has been redone so greatly...I don't know....

[Sarva]

I'll just note this. The idea of the arena is that is is a place where fighters come to engage in combat to test and improve their skills. The arena isn't really designed, or intended for ranged combat at this time. As Durgrem mentioned since some mobs are a little out of balance we are tolerating some wall killing but when the mobs are properly balanced wall magic killing isn't going to be acceptable in the arena. If you want to do that sort of thing to practice your magic then find a place out in the wilds to do it. Remember the idea and spirt of the arena is it is a place that fighters do battle with each other in the pit and some times for the entertainment of others watching form the stands. Not very entertaining watching someone standing on or behind a wall safely firing magic at a mob

[Earowo]

I DEMAND THE DLAYOS ARE FIXED

I remember in 0.4.3 you could simply stand next to a dlayo and and engage in combat without moving at all. I think it is much more reasonable the way it works now- apart from the well known problems with offensive magic.

i do not beleive that can be used as a legit statement for keeping the dlayos as they are now, back in 4.03 THE ONLY TIME you could stand next to dlayos to kill them, was when the monsters are about to go impervious, the rest of the time people would duel them like any other person, thats what i miss...now with my lag i cant kill anything higher up then a tefusang,

[Vakachehk]

this thread is stupid!! completely stupid!

it is like telling an archer to not stand on top of the wall and to be down in the warfare... its like dohh what do you think we are, stupid?! But I do agree Dlayos and Expert Gladiators should not get to a higher level than a player its just stupid it means that no one can be an actual hero or villain.

[bloodedIrishman]

this thread is stupid!! completely stupid!

it is like telling an archer to not stand on top of the wall and to be down in the warfare

An NPC in Planeshift does not have the ability to run up to that archer on the wall, so wall killing is unacceptable.


In a perfect Planeshift world...

A monster which a player cannot defeat (without cheating) would require a group. So...
Group benefits > Individual benefits

In Planeshift right now...

A monster which a player cannot defeat (without cheating) would require a group. But...
Individual benefits > Group benefits


I don't mind Dlayos, Expert Gladiators or an NPC monster being stronger or much stronger than any player. As long as it for group benefit. It isn't right now.

[Rigwyn]

Vakachehk,

Try to understand the problem.

The problem is that imperfections in the game mechanics can be exploited to make it easier to kill an npc.

Using terrain to your advantage is fine. Its logical and make sense from an ic perspective.

Getting an npc stuck behinf a blade of grass so that he cannot reach you on the other hand is exploiting the game mechanics and is cheating.
( This blade of grass exploit btw does not work any more. Npc's can now move around things better)

Her's the grey area:

There are times when you will want ti take advantage of the terrain legitimately, however doing so may cause the npc to get stuck.
In this case, you are not trying to exploit the game, however you cannnot help it.

Now if a GM says that you may not use this tactic because of the exploitive nature (unintended of course) then you'll feel like your being denied the right to use the terrain.
On the other hand, if the gm allows it then it may give newbies the idea that its ok to use exploits.

So pushing for a black and white answer at this point will dissapoint. ( Hey I rhymed ! )

the same logic applies to shooting from the walls. Its valid use of terrain however we all know that the npc's will be unfairly vulnerable.

So which side should a gm take ?

Given Sarva's post it sounds like they have been allowing it to a *reasonable* extent and using jugement to determine if someone is exploiting the game or not. That seems like a fair compromise to me.