Teaching someone a skill

[CadRipper]

A few thoughts about learning and teaching. I\'m not sure I have seen anything like this in an RPG, only the usual NPC giving you skill points, or selling them. I\'ve not seen this discussed here either, but I may have missed it.

How do you think characters could teach ?

To give an initial idea, let\'s say every increase in skill level, or every period of time (or a combination of both), the teacher would be given an amount of learning points (LP) that could be used to help someone increasing the same skill level more easily. Like if he was teaching that skill to a pupil, or a disciple.

The more appropriate is probably to give a constant amount of LP regularly, i.e. every n hours the character has been online, once the skill is higher than a minimum value.

The way the LP are given are up to the teacher : freely or at a price. Of course, once given, the disciple can\'t do anything else but to use them to learn the skill (they cannot be given to another disciple).

The LP makes the learning faster and more efficient. If the disciple learns from a book (sorry Wedge ) or from actually doing an action linked to the skill, its level would increase more quickly and further than without LP. The skill level of the teacher is tagged on the LP, so that the gain is proportional to the difference of skills between the teacher and the disciple. Also, it would prevent a lower skilled character to sell LP to a higher skilled one. Once they are used, LP disappear.

Then why not using those LP to write a book ? The teacher could decide to use them this way instead. The problem with books is that they can quickly increase the skills of many people, which is not fair if used within a guild for instance. Ideally they should only be used once for every character, and writing them should use enough LP from the teacher to avoid abuse.

All that could be pondered by a teaching skill, of course, that would affect the efficiency of learning.

Any idea, opinion and feedback is welcome !

Ref 1 : Skill/Class System
Ref 2 : Training

[lynx_lupo]

I like it, especially the ref1. Either way, we need sth like it.

I just wanna add that training should take some time, not being just \"cash and carry\". And the higher you want to train the more time you\'d need to spend on training it.

[Wedge]

If the disciple learns from a book (sorry Wedge    )

What does that mean?

Anyway, I think the whole concept at it\'s core is faulty, and there can be no right way of doing it.  People can already learn things by other players passing wisdom of how to best play the game on too them, adding a statistical manner of doing it is unecessary and adds nothing to RP value.

[Ciry]

I agree with Wedge, I think that the PS developers aim to a system of game which have story that evolves in not linear manner.
The teaching and the learning should also directly come from the interaction among the players. A system of variables, data structure and process to do that would be limitative to the fantasy of the players themselves and would make the system rigid and bound to determinate schemes, even if complexes.

I consider be more interesting put at disposal of the players themselves the means thanks to which can model and have a virtual world evolved. Maybe I am a dreamer on this respect, and I can imagine what is complex and long to realize something of equal, but I think that implementing base iterations with the world system he can already test something of equal.

I have joined myself to BloodClaw guild, whose leader is Natrina, and it has many good ideas and projects for the future of the game, I only hope that the next versions can make them realizeable.  :rolleyes:

Hei Nat, I wonder if a day we will be able to build headquarter of BC!  

[CadRipper]

Wedge and Ciry : what you describe is guilds, I guess. So you think the skill system is not necessary, and doesn\'t add to RP, it\'s interesting...

I fail to see what learning or teaching has to do with the linearity of the story ? Could you explain that ?

lynx_lupo : yes, of course training should take time, the way it usually works is your level in one skill increase when you have done a certain amount of actions related to the skill. For example, your physical skills increase when you have run for a while. And it should become harder as skill is higher.

The learning is just a way to make this quicker, or for instance to reduce the odds of failling when you\'re learning to craft. It makes sense in guilds, where people gather to be stronger than individuals. Some guilds could also have a teaching role in PS, if they count skilled enough members.

[lynx_lupo]

Yes. I was talking about being trained, though...learning not training basically(if this makes any sense).

[Wedge]

Wedge and Ciry : what you describe is guilds, I guess. So you think the skill system is not necessary, and doesn\'t add to RP, it\'s interesting...

What?  I said a system for buffing your skill learn rate is worthless, not the skill system itself.

The learning is just a way to make this quicker, or for instance to reduce the odds of failling when you\'re learning to craft. It makes sense in guilds, where people gather to be stronger than individuals. Some guilds could also have a teaching role in PS, if they count skilled enough members.

All it results in, is a way for people to build their characters extra fast just by having a friend that has really high stats.  It\'s pointless, unecessary, and exploitable.

[CadRipper]

Originally posted by Wedge
Anyway, I think the whole concept at it\'s core is faulty, and there can be no right way of doing it. People can already learn things by other players passing wisdom of how to best play the game on too them, adding a statistical manner of doing it is unecessary and adds nothing to RP value.
[...]
What?  I said a system for buffing your skill learn rate is worthless, not the skill system itself.

Read again your post, you just said that, without much justification, which in fact makes your statement worthless. You just talk about \"players passing wisdom of how to play\", which doesn\'t sound really like RP to me. Are you taking about hacking ?  

It\'s as much about buffing as any other method to increase the skill, statistics have nothing to do with it. It is rather a system based on the same kind of rules as the other ones, it only offers more possibilities.

All it results in, is a way for people to build their characters extra fast just by having a friend that has really high stats.  It\'s pointless, unecessary, and exploitable.

I think you haven\'t read correctly.

[Natrina]

Ciry:I sure hope we can build Bloodclaw Inc.\'s HQ soon, but we have to wait to see

And, I think this system is good at it is, let us just wait and see