PlaneShift
Gameplay => General Discussion => Topic started by: Araye on November 09, 2006, 05:43:34 pm
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Hi Everyone!
First this is NOT an attack on any GM or Dev.
Recently one of my guild members was banned for running a bot. Using a bot, as everyone knows, IS cheating and deserves the consequences of their choice to cheat. (A bot is short for "robot" and is a piece of code that allows autonomous operation of an avatar and is not allowed in PlaneShift.)
However, after carefully examining the evidence, the guild member was not using a software script or program to cheat. The guild member (as best as I can determine) was standing next to an aggressive MOB (rogue in the Hydlaa/Oja Road LZ) and letting it attack him WHILE AFK.
There is a lot more to the story on both sides, but I think it is simplest to just boil it down to the above.
Now, while I agree that this could be considered "exploiting the game", it is not stated ANYWHERE (except now in this thread). Nor is there a stated punishment (which is a 7 day ban and the items in your hands are deleted).
It is a little shocking that an unwritten rule with an unwritten punishment can be enforced so hastily without warning the tester/player first. And it is this policy that I am a little upset with. Maybe the tester/player could have simply been kicked and sent an email explaining the violation and that a second offense would carry the FULL penalty?
I suggest that this becomes a written rule and that "auto-defense" is turned off. Maybe AFK characters are "sleeping" and can't defend themselves?
Please reply to this and tell me your ideas, but DON'T flame a GM or Dev! Feel free to flame me! ;D
Araye
P.S. Karyuu, if this is in violation of some rule - feel free to delete this topic!
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The GM consulted Talad, and was told that being AFK while having a character do an action is the equivalent of botting. I agree that mentioning this in the Player Policy would be good, therefore I will add it in now. However, people are very capable of making up stories (guild members and friends alike) and our policy on seeing automatic character routines without the player around is the same for everyone - 30 day ban. People know it's wrong and people know they shouldn't be doing it. Going AFK while your character continues doing an action for an extended period of time is definitely not a smart decision, and there are consequences. If you're not here playing the game, you are a waste of resources on the server.
I'm wondering now whether an AFK-mode may be useful, perhaps with some icon by a player's name - if it's not turned off within 5 minutes, they're kicked from the server. It would be a nice addition.
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That would have the added benefit of disconnecting multiclienting people if they stop paying attention to the inactive characters, although it might disrupt complex roleplays where some participant (helper) has to stand around for a while waiting for someone to find them. Were you thinking of some kind of auto-afk when no keystrokes or other input are detected or something manually activated?
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Manually activated, so that if you're actually AFK you need to have it on - then if the scenario originally posted happens again, no "I was AFK" line will be accepted.
*edit*
Needless to say the AFK mode will not allow combat.
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The auto-attack thing was discussed in this thread (http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=25777.0) not so long ago, btw. In my opinion, kicking someone out for being AFK for an extended period of time sounds logical. Maybe going all the way to ban them for 30 days and removing their items is a bit too harsh in this particular case since there may have been no intention to cheat or exploit the game mechanics (whereas there are other cases that do deserve this severity).
And I don't want to go off-topic here but I don't quite understand how the ban system goes. Is it the characters that get banned (let's say <Player> cannot use <character name>) or is it the actual players that should not log back in for the time specified by the GM (not using any of their accounts instead of the one where the character they were using when they got banned is)?
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Ok thank you for the clarification. If this would be a manually activated state would it be like stasis where you are in the game but cannot be affected by the game? What do you think of some kind of auto-boot device to keep people honest, so to speak?
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I just think that after this episode an unwritten rule should become written in order to avoid ambiguos behaviours in the future!
Everything just IMHO
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zhai: I believe for the first two days of a ban the player may not use any of his/her accounts (IP ban), and afterwards it settles around the account used at the time of the ban for the remaining period.
The 30 days in this scenario was scrapped out and 7 put in their place, so it's not nearly as harsh - but this wasn't an accidental "Woops I was by this rogue and ended up attacking" scene either. Nor was the player initially honest about what was going on, a large mark against him.
Whenever possible, GMs try to give players the benefit of the doubt in questionable situations. We hope players do not attempt to take advantage of this trust, and provide their full cooperation. However, if it is later found that an attempt was made to defraud a GM, the offending player may have action taken against them. Attempts to defraud a GM include but are not limited to misdirecting a GM's attention, withholding information, providing false information, and any attempt to "trick" a GM.
bilbous: Pretty much, although still having access to the chat window would be good. Concerning an auto-boot, did you mean players being kicked off after some period of inactivity? If so, I'd have to say I'm rather against it - for the reasons you mentioned, and because as a GM I would like to stand around and not have to move until someone calls for my attention, as it allows me to concentrate on tasks outside of PS at the same time. (The server kicks me off anyway after some time right now, so I've a lot of practice with this unintentional boot feature :P Pain in the arse.)
Ary: Done!
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I'm also against auto kick after a while of inactivity. Like Gms wouldn't like it because of practice issues, also Players would suffer. There countless of situations when you are afk not because you want to bot. Example: waiting on someone in the middle of nowhere.
I'm happy of clarifing the unwritten rule and making it writte =D, i can remember a forum discussion where many people claimed the exact situation wasn't against the rules, so completly fine.
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Yes that is exactly what I meant. To clarify, if all the traffic is from the server to the client then it can be fairly certain the client is being unmonitored. I am not entirely sure how it could be managed though. As far as you are concerned, well, GMs are not treated the same as players already, can be expected not to abuse the rules and could be exempted fron this functionality.
What I was suggesting was some means whereby if I have a few accounts online and one of them gets into a conversation so that the others just stand around, maybe on a mob spawn, doing nothing but discouraging others from fighting that mob, the inactive ones will be auto-disconnected. At least this way if you are going to multi-client you have to keep dancing between them.
You could combine the two ideas so that if you have to be afk you could be.
How about with that manual afk thing there be some sort of visible indication of your status such as AFK added to your name banner or translucency for your figurine?
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zhai: I believe for the first two days of a ban the player may not use any of his/her accounts (IP ban), and afterwards it settles around the account used at the time of the ban for the remaining period.
Thanks. Now, if a player gets a 30 day ban... they could still log in a week after from another account right? Any way to prevent this other that not allowing multiple accounts?
And yes, a 7 day ban punishment sounds fair. Not so much deleting the char's items though... I'd say that is a very harsh punishment. And come to think about it, the auto-kick thing after a number of minutes of inactivity will bring some problems so leaving it as a measurement a GM could resort to in case the person doesn't respond seems wiser, and the bans can take place if the player is camping on an agressive mob while AFK. It's more of a policy than a scripting thing, IMO.
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Is it necessary to write a rule saying again that using server ressources without actualy playing the game is wrong?
I think it is in the FAQ for years that PS will have limited bandwidth that is to be used in priority by roleplayers.
About those annoying RL stuffs that keep you AFK (it happened to me to be forced to change keyboard batteries while playing with friends ;P). There is no way to really prevent them without being annoying in a regular RP.
Any way to put your char in a visible /away state is a good idea. The MOBs could not attack /sit-ing or idle chars. But I would really appreciate not wasting my time greeting and talking to AFK players.
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Make botting and AFK fighting worthless and the problem is solved. Why do players use bots? Because it is boring for them to repeat the same operation over and over again. Why isn't it boring for our characters? How can they keep digging or fighting the same NPC for hours?
The mental stamina should drop much faster if the character keeps doing the same boring thing without taking a break or doing something else. Killing the same NPC 3-4 times in a row could drop it to zero and you would lose focus on what you are doing making it easy for the NPC to kill you in one good hit.
Restoring mental stamina should be very slow process unless you find something else to do. Talking and singing (not in tells nor on guild/group channels) could be one activity that helps you performing boring tasks, so I'm looking forward to see first singing bots in the game ;D
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The GM consulted Talad, and was told that being AFK while having a character do an action is the equivalent of botting. I agree that mentioning this in the Player Policy would be good, therefore I will add it in now. However, people are very capable of making up stories (guild members and friends alike) and our policy on seeing automatic character routines without the player around is the same for everyone - 30 day ban. People know it's wrong and people know they shouldn't be doing it. Going AFK while your character continues doing an action for an extended period of time is definitely not a smart decision, and there are consequences. If you're not here playing the game, you are a waste of resources on the server.
I'm wondering now whether an AFK-mode may be useful, perhaps with some icon by a player's name - if it's not turned off within 5 minutes, they're kicked from the server. It would be a nice addition.
Thank you Karyuu for adding it to the Players Guide! \\o//
Yes I agree that we are all capable of lying and did not press it any further. I am satisfied with the final ruling.
Also the "extended period of time" my guild member was AFK is unknown to me as I have never received a player's log. I do know that the total time between "/tell target are you a bot?" and "/freeze target" was four minutes and that "/ban target" occured after two more minutes. I'm not sure that qualifies as an "extended period of time" in my opinion.
But the rule being public solves that problem. I have also added a rule to my guild that if a gm finds a guild member guilty of botting, the offender will be kicked from the guild. I feel that if the guild leaders should be helping the gms as they are busy enough as it is.
@Hadfael: Yes it is important to specifically point out certain things. Not everyone understands what constitutes "using server ressources without actually playing the game". I do, but a lot of testers/players do not. :innocent:
Araye
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How can they keep digging or fighting the same NPC for hours?
Note that it is not the same NPC for your character. It is the same NPC for us, as we know how things are programmed and stuff. But it is OOC knowledge. A character doesn't know it. So you are trying to make IC rule basing on complete OOC and in this case it would be terrible mistake. First the spawning need to be developed, so that we can finally treat it as ic knowledge and furher develop other things like being mentally tired of constant fighting.
I hope you understand me.
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so I'm looking forward to see first singing bots in the game
Im quite sure that is exactly what would happen, you have your bot there mining away and every minute or so send the command /say "Hi Ho, Hi Ho, Its off to work we go......." :D
Im personally quite certain that this person was AFK-Training, if not botting aswell, any half-wit should be able to realise that gaining an advantage over other players while not actually being personally active in the game is cheating, be it botting or being AFK near a mob. I personally cant see why they would have their ban shortened. Maybe if his monitor had died or his keyboard had exploded ithey would have a decent excuse >:(
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I'm wondering now whether an AFK-mode may be useful, perhaps with some icon by a player's name - if it's not turned off within 5 minutes, they're kicked from the server. It would be a nice addition.
I'll park a character near Harnquist and walk away. I'll check back every so often to see if something interesting has happened. It would be a pain in the but if I was kicked off the server after 5 minutes of inactivity.
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Note that it is not the same NPC for your character. It is the same NPC for us, as we know how things are programmed and stuff. But it is OOC knowledge. A character doesn't know it. So you are trying to make IC rule basing on complete OOC and in this case it would be terrible mistake. First the spawning need to be developed, so that we can finally treat it as ic knowledge and furher develop other things like being mentally tired of constant fighting.
I hope you understand me.
Well, it is like having a hole in the wall from where rats are coming to your living room from the basement. So you just sit there and kill the rat when it shows up ... and kill again ... kill another rat ... kill more rats ... Until you get bored and lose your focus. And these rats are big and fat, they can bite you if you don't watch out :devil:
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I agree that this player FAICS was cheating. After all, is it not common sense to move into a spot where you don't run the risk of being attacked if you go AFK?
Additionally, there is the "/away <text>" command. If that was activated, then the GM would have known, because they send the suspects a /tell. And "/away <text>" replies to a /tell with "(auto-reply) <text>". So it was obviously not activated.
Yes, there always is the slim chance of going AFK due to urgent matters that don't even allow moving away. In these cases a client shutdown isn't always feasible, but that should be far rarer than usual, and the suspect didn't claim anything like this.
Thus it is conscious AFK training, and I don't see why that would not be treated just like external botting. After all, it is exploiting a bug (namely, lack of implementation).
The issue of some visual AFK indication, along with some "stasis", has been discussed before. The essential problem was the then possible abuse of it to get around dying, but that could be countered by activating the stasis for any MOB that would engage in combat after AFK has been turned on. This way, any fight that already started would continue as usual, but no new would start.
Unrealistic - yes. But it's an OOC solution to an OOC problem, so it doesn't qualify for realism, anyway. In fact, if we were to make sitting that marker, then there would be "RPers" who claim that sitting is a good way to hide...
Edit: I think it would be a good thing that whatever AFK method gets implemented, it should auto-activate after some time of inactivity (except a boot for reasons already stated). That won't prevent bots, but it would help legitimate players who unexpectedly go AFK. Maybe this feature could even be manually turned off, in the case of the RP-support alt doing the waiting routine. /Edit
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So if I wanted to advance in a high level of light armour, and I did it by parking my character infront of a rat and coming back 15 minutes later, I would get banned for cheating?
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I hope so!
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Interesting. I can't say that fifteen minutes of beating up a rat is a good use of my time on this earth, however. The only real problem with AFK leveling is that is is unfair in a number of senses to player with poor connections, shared computers, etc.
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What is AFK?
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It means away from keyboard. It indicates that you are not monitoring the game and will miss any attempts to get your attention
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(http://www.nofuture.org.uk/diary/images/i_will_use_google.jpg)
i couldnt stop myself ;P
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Both my short swords are at quality 0, time to repair them. This takes 675 seconds to raise quality 3.2 points. Being kicked after 5 minutes would be annoying, as I may not be watching my character standing in this remote spot for all the 6 hours it will take me to repair them fully. :)
(Of course I could just repair while running around, but that is abusing a bug ;) )
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You guys didn't read my comment on an AFK-mode too carefully. I mentioned an AFK mode that would display some sort of icon by your character's name, and would not allow you to do anything but have access to the chat. No fighting, no repair, mining, etc. Plus it would not be automatic, but manual. As I said, I have practice with an automatic boot from the server every time I log in, and it's beyond aggravating. Therefore if you know that you are going to be gone for a few minutes, it shouldn't be a huge effort to either type /away, or click on a shortcut for it, even if your pull away is urgent.
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I mentioned an AFK mode that would display some sort of icon by your character's name, and would not allow you to do anything but have access to the chat. No fighting, no repair, mining, etc.
So what to do with a 675 seconds repair (no joke btw), since that AFK mode is not allowed? Or the AFK mode would stop my repair and I have to start again? How to avoid being kicked when repairing in a remote spot where there is nothing to do than stand? What if this post takes me more than 5 minutes? :) Time to stop and check back at my repair :)
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To repair weapons, you must have something to repair. It's not a bottomless well of resources that you can tap over and over, unlike fighting and mining (most important point). Therefore if you go AFK while your character is working on a single weapon, it's no big deal, and in such a case a /tell away message may be all you need for the curious :)
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And, of course, nothing prevents you from having a conversation while you repair. Is moving around while repairing really a bug? I never thought of it that way but I guess it is possible. You cannot repair while you are sitting down which seems incongruous.
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To repair weapons, you must have something to repair. It's not a bottomless well of resources that you can tap over and over, unlike fighting and mining (most important point). Therefore if you go AFK while your character is working on a single weapon, it's no big deal, and in such a case a /tell away message may be all you need for the curious :)
I understand that me getting banned for this is unlikely, just wanted to add to the arguments against an auto-kick after 5 minutes. Besides, I was bored while repairing :)
And, of course, nothing prevents you from having a conversation while you repair. Is moving around while repairing really a bug? I never thought of it that way but I guess it is possible. You cannot repair while you are sitting down which seems incongruous.
The problem with having a conversation at the spot where I was, is that there was no-one to talk to. Walking while repairing may or may not be a unintended, being able to run while doing this is though.
To get a bit more on-topic, I agree that people should be punished for using scripts, or gaining from letting the game mechanics work for them (such as standing at a respawning NPC). Some remarks though:
- be aware that some of the signs of someone doing this may also be possible by someone temporarily being distracted doing something boring. For example /repair-ing. Or the example Zanzibar gave of training armor or swords on an npc that does not harm you much. Although I agree that you should not do this unattended, or blocking the npc for others for a long time anyway, it may happen that you get distracted (e.g., are reading forums in another window) and miss a tell in one of the other tabs or a 5 second red warning message by a GM in a few minutes of not looking. In such cases, a punishement as given here at least seems a bit severe. Which brings me to the following.
- I do not think deleting the inventory is a just punishment, as this will be a different loss for someone with an almost empty one (new player, or someone using alts/guild for storage) or someone carrying everything he collected (hopefully in a correct way) during a year (swords, (rare) glyphs, ...).
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I personally think that it is a good idea to strip the inventory, although to me a ban would be a bigger incentive to not cheat. Saying that, most people who cheat (I assume) are not in the game to meet people and have a good time chatting/RPing. They are there to make themselves really strong and have good equipment, (which is why stripping the inventory is effective) of course once they have achieved their aims they will most likey get bored and stop playing PS and go elsewhere. \\o//
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There is also the question of someone suddenly having to "run" to answer the phone or to answer the door. In a case like this, they might not have time to move their character to another location or actually leave the game since they are only going to be a "few" minutes. Should the phone conversation take a little longer or they are at the door for a bit, than their character will be unintentionally unattended for longer than the five minutes allowed by a GM testing to see if they are botting. A stripped inventory and a ban because of it does seem a little harsh.
If the inventory is stripped, and it is found that the person was indeed, only distracted away from the computer, is it possible to restore all that might have been lost?
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I am NOT claiming my guild member was not taking advantage of the mechanics. I really don't know and probably was.
My point was that he didn't know it was a rule or considered cheating (even if it is obvious to most).
- Karyuu has addressed this issue
And that the punishment for an unwritten rule was harse, simply because it was unwritten.
As Anfa has just stated, "what if..." I think she makes a very valid concern. That is why I suggested a GM kick the person off and send a warning in an email. Or maybe there could be a message displayed to the potential offender when s/he relogged in. Instead of, "there are udpates available" it could say, "you were kicked off by a GM, please send a petition to explain why you were XXXX". Something like that. And the kick would only be for "unwritten" rules. Blatant violations of rules should be dealt with according to their published punishments. There is no excuse then.
I would also like a review of the evidence. So that the accused atleast has an opportunity to explain or show proof to the contrary. I'm not saying "innocent until proven guilty", but rather a method for the accused to state their side before the punishment is enforced. I know GMs have better things to do than hold court, but this seems fair as a GM could make a mistake.
I also think that 6 minutes to respond is pushing it. An "extended period of time" needs to be defined, imho.
I like Karyuu's idea of an AFK function that can be visible to others. It could be as simple as changing the font text color.
In the initial example though, I don't believe my guild member would have been marked away - so his punishment was just (if it had been a known, published rule, which it is now).
Araye
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I like the idea of signalling AFK with the change of text color. That would be less intrusive and quite "RPG".
/me still dreams of a system of name recognition based on the knowledge of the characters with each other.
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I like Karyuu's idea of an AFK function that can be visible to others. It could be as simple as changing the font text color.
How about a big "Zzzzzz" next to their name tags and drool coming out their mouth? :woot:
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This is just plain silly. Everyone is so concerned about cheaters and 'getting ahead' of other players. What is the big problem?
Is them getting higher stats while they do something more important going to change how you play? If it is, then you should tell everyone to stop leveling right now so as not to interupt your little world. I don't understand what the issue is here.
Are players who do this getting to the end of the game faster? If that is what they think, then let them get to the end, then leave.
Are they going ooc? Hell, the entire concept of spawning is ooc, so that is shot right out the window. And since whan are you required to talk to anyone to play this game?
So, what are you taking from other players by AFK botting? Nothing.
What special rewards are you getting? None.
What secrets of the game are you unlocking? Zero.
How much RL time are you saving? Endless hours.
How bad are you tieing up the server? If that question even needs to be asked, you need a new server.
How much fun are you missing out on? Wait...camping is fun?
How much roleplaying (you know, the main aspect of the game) are you missing out on? Actaully, it adds to your time, as you don't have to waste those hours killing things when you are there.
Would I do this 'botting'? Absolutly. That is until combat has any other purpose than...well combat. And perhaps is interesting to do in the least.
Would I get banned for it? If you could catch me, which is very unlikely, yes.
One last question. Can you bot roleplaying? No.
However, I do like the idea of the AFK (call it meditating, daydreaming, unresponsive, etc) symbol for RP. There have been many times I have tried to talk to someone who ten minutes later gave a tell saying they had to leave for a bit. I have done it myself.
As for GM rules, if they are not written in public view, they do not exist. The thing that should have been done to that player was to give them a warning in tell, as it WAS an unknown rule, then watch for them next time they come online.
@AryHann: Working on it. ;)
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How bad are you tieing up the server? If that question even needs to be asked, you need a new server.
Donate thousands of pounds to the PS project and then you can have the grounds to start to complain about the quality of the server.
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Moon: I was hoping you'd be a better role model for the community. Your post is most disappointing.
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What parts, exactly, are disappointing or even untrue?
People do this to make their characters into that which they want to play. There is no getting ahead. I have seen people say that this will give people advantages over others. How is that any differant in the least little way from someone who sits just as motionless killing the same creatures? They both have the advantage over people who do not do the same. Leveling is leveling, no matter how you do it. What is the difference if you sit there staring at your character killing the same creature over and over and trying to make some sort of half baked RP as to why she is doing it, or parking your character next to that same mob and going off to do something else, while RPing that your character is in dedicated training, or whatever half baked RP you would be doing with your hand on the mouse?
Would it be ooc for me to park next to an agressive mob, then do an /away message that says "I am in dedicated training, and my master has ordered me to talk to no one. Be on your way." Or have a shortcut set up for the same thing. I have tried to talk to Slash-n-dashers before, and get very little response. Most of the time none. No one roleplays around mobs. It is all about training, and getting stronger. That is the lowest form of 'RP'.
My post may be disappointing to you, but it is disappointed to me. The entire combat and training system is based, and would fit nicely in a single player game, as that is what it is. The rules support that. The game supports that. The tasks (quests) support that. The code supports that.
Whan it comes to roleplay, I do nothing but support and promote it. When it comes to newcomers, I guide the ones that wish to be guided, and try to include as many as I can in my RPs. When it comes to older players, I do not take their side just because they have been here longer. I listen to every side before I come to a conclusion. When it comes to the Settings, I push the boundries, but never cross them, and remain true to what -could- happen, if not what would or did.
If you judge me to be a bad role model by making my opinion known in a subject as lame as out of character, AFK camping of redundantly spawing creatures that are not behaving according to the settings in the first place, then so be it. If everyone in the game roleplayed their hardest while online, then camped AFK and ooc, by god, that would be a fine day.
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I like Karyuu's idea of an AFK function that can be visible to others. It could be as simple as changing the font text color.
How about a big "Zzzzzz" next to their name tags and drool coming out their mouth? :woot:
either that a little inflating/deflating bubble like in some anime.
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I agree with Under the moon in one way and I disagree with him in another.
I think that levelling up should be easy. I think that a restriction should be made on it that slows down the process, but I don't enjoy grinding more than anyone else. If we could have a system that allowed people to level up over time, but grinding didn't help you any, and you didn't have to put a lot of real life time into training in order to level up, then I think that would ideal.
I'll disagree with him on this though: He said that people grind in order to RP the characters they want to play as. This is outside of the settings and therefore IMO bad roleplaying. We don't enter the game as powerful mages or warriors. It is dictated by the settings that we enter the game as mere peasants and slowly over time we grow in skill and fame.
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You guys didn't read my comment on an AFK-mode too carefully. I mentioned an AFK mode that would display some sort of icon by your character's name, and would not allow you to do anything but have access to the chat. No fighting, no repair, mining, etc. Plus it would not be automatic, but manual. As I said, I have practice with an automatic boot from the server every time I log in, and it's beyond aggravating. Therefore if you know that you are going to be gone for a few minutes, it shouldn't be a huge effort to either type /away, or click on a shortcut for it, even if your pull away is urgent.
O.o Ohhhhh, I like this idea very much!
For the life of me I can't undersand why people want the right to stand at an NPC while AFK and bot. I mean really in the long run what does it accomplish? Your character is tough? Big whop! You didn't earn it.
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O.o Ohhhhh, I like this idea very much!
For the life of me I can't undersand why people want the right to stand at an NPC while AFK and bot. I mean really in the long run what does it accomplish? Your character is tough? Big whop! You didn't earn it.
When I was working on the levels of light armour above 45, I found that it took over 10 minutes to level up just from camping infront of a rat in full defensive. Level 50 took over 15 minutes I think. For some of those last levels, I got up from the computer and came back later. I don't feel particularly ashamed. Watching a screen for 15 minutes without doing much of anything else isn't particularly fun. But that's why people do it.
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Must every character in the world start out as a lowly peasant? What about sons/daughters of nobles/magicians/etc?
Do you want to RP everything up to the point of the grizzled old man so you can play the grizzled old man?
To me, that sounds foolish.
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Must every character in the world start out as a lowly peasant? What about sons/daughters of nobles/magicians/etc?
Do you want to RP everything up to the point of the grizzled old man so you can play the grizzled old man?
To me, that sounds foolish.
I think that such characters add colour to the game. But I also think that the settings were writen in such a way that they prescribe a certain character that people are intended to start off as. Talad himself has said that he enjoys the creative ways people make characters, and I think it would be a loss if we didn't have the grizzled old men and the dark strangers with mysterious pasts. But such characters are acting outside of the settings.
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Monketh: As the game is now, playing by the rules in place, yes. As it should be, no. I agree, it is foolish. The settings do say you start out as a peasant. I say the settings are wrong in this aspect, and need to be changed. It robs from the diversity of the game. You CAN NOT play an old, grumpy dwarf who spits a lot under the current settings.
Er...but now we are going afar from the subject.
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When I was working on the levels of light armour above 45, I found that it took over 10 minutes to level up just from camping infront of a rat in full defensive. Level 50 took over 15 minutes I think. For some of those last levels, I got up from the computer and came back later. I don't feel particularly ashamed. Watching a screen for 15 minutes without doing much of anything else isn't particularly fun. But that's why people do it.
I'm just wondering why a you should be able to get any training in the higher levels of light armor from a low level monster such as a rat. I don't doubt it happens, I just wonder why it is possible. Personally I trained my light armor in the process of training my other combat skills, by fighting mobs. I trained your way a few times in the mid levels, mostly with a dropless merc in the arena, but found it was too boring and not particularly rewarding either. It takes longer to to train but it is more in character.
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I think the idea is a good one to not have everyone the same when they first start out. It seems to be forgotten though that we aren't the same. We have choices on what we pick as our trades and skills. Depending on what you choose is what your out come for skills being higher or lower will be after character creation.
I think for the most part people are trying to push for things this game just isn't ready for yet. Or thinking that the way it is now is how it will stay. They are still working on the basic's and still don't even have all of the characters meshes done yet. I think keeping in mind that the game will have drastic changes in the future and also drastic changes in the way systems work should be a given. What we know now my not even exist in the future.
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Personally, I think (and I think that everyone agrees to a degree) that the leveling system is pretty broken. The basic problem to me seems to be the concept of XP in the game.
Practice points are gained by practicing the skill in questions, they allow people to get stonger in that particular skill.
XP is gained by killing monsters, it is used to 'buy' theoretical knowlege from NPC trainers.
XP in essence is simply the limiting factor that is designed to limit the speed at which people get stronger. Call it the growth potential. This is like saying that you cannot become a master swordsman in 3 days, even if you practice constantly for 72 hours straight. Eventually something runs out and you cannot gain skill from that practice anymore. (in RL it would be that your collapse from exaustion, or your mental willpower runs out, you lose interest, or your brain 'fries' from the constant learning)
The problem is that in PS you get a virtually unlimited amount of XP from killing monsters or doing some other repetable activity.
To put this in an RL example... suppose you wanted to be a master swordsman. You need to practice to do this but it takes a lot of practice and you can't do it all in one go because you will 'burn out' and have to stop to rest eventually. But if you got a 'magic treadmill' that costs you absolutly nothing to maintain or operate, but while you run on it it can drain away all the fatigue, satisfy all hunger, and get you all set to get practicing again.
The result, a person with a 'magic treadmill that eliminates all fatigue' could practice swordplay for hours, run on his treadmill to remove his fatigue, and then quickly go back to practicing again. If he works had enough, he could probably cram in more practice into 3 days than many people can work into 3 weeks. You can get almost anything done if you can get rid of the need to eat, drink, play, and socialise.
Essentially, getting XP from killing monsters (while practice points are gained from performing actions) is like a treadmill that you use to eliminate all need to do anything other than practice. Its very boring and pretty unrealistic.
Anyway, possible sollutions to fix the leveling system.
1. limit the amount of XP you can 'store up' at a time so that once you save up an amount (like 100 XP or so) you simply don't gain any more until you spend that on something. This would discourage spawn camping for long periods of time... but would still be a pain if the XP cost to level skills remained so insanely high.
2. create an item that gives a set amount of XP for its consumption (such as a potion, a fruit, or a book that vanishes once read). If it can be bought for tria than it could very well be gained by people with money-making skills instead of monster-killing skills. If it can be mixed through a potion-making skill then it will encourage the learning of that skill and the aquisitian of the items used to make it. If it can be a reward given out for Good Roleplay then it could help those who would rather Roleplay than sit around killing monsters. It would turn XP from a 'free' item you gain by camping into a comodity with value.
3. Have 'XP' be automatically given out for a period of time that PlaneShift is played by non-afk people. For example, when you are in the game you may get a set amount of XP every 5 minutes or so. If you don't make any user-input from the keyboard or mouse then your character 'falls asleep' and does not get any XP for being awake. This would pretty much just reward people for logging on and doing things, if no other way was given for gaining XP then the most powerful people would be those who spend lots of time in PS... assuming they use the XP to train and practice skills with.
Personally, I would like to see the introduiction of potions that give XP for drinking them. make the potion ingredients be various items from around Planeshift that have to be gathered together. It could create a pretty decent economy with different people gathering different things, alchemists mixing them into potions and then selling them to people. It would turn the 'powerleving by killing monsters over and over' into 'powerleveling by gathering items, trading, and working with other players'
And before potion making comes out have an NPC merchant sell them, could provide a decent investment for people with massive amounts of tria they don't use.
As for the actual topic about people exploiting bugs to gain XP while AFK: I would suggest the idea that was proposed in this thread about having people who where AFK for while (say 5 or 10 minutes) have their character fall asleep or something. Then while asleep they cannot auto-defend and if they are next to an agressive monster they get killed. If AFK for an hour then the game automatically logs off and shuts down... possibly leaving a message saying "You have been Disconneted from PlaneShift because to seem to have been away from the keyboard for more that 60 minutes".
Or something like that.
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3. Have 'XP' be automatically given out for a period of time that PlaneShift is played by non-afk people. For example, when you are in the game you may get a set amount of XP every 5 minutes or so. If you don't make any user-input from the keyboard or mouse then your character 'falls asleep' and does not get any XP for being awake. This would pretty much just reward people for logging on and doing things, if no other way was given for gaining XP then the most powerful people would be those who spend lots of time in PS... assuming they use the XP to train and practice skills with.
This has been suggested by myself and possibly others and I think it could work along with just assigning the skills and eliminating any kind of training. I would like tosuggest a refinement and have the experience start the minute the character is created and increment even when off-line at some low rate. The rate could increase for time spent on-line with that character and a gm could give a bonus multiplier for participation in events. In the likely case that the devs would not want to throw away their hard work on the training system it could be tweaked so that after allocating the skills it would take some time for the skill to update and the current system could be used to reduce that time. This way those who don't want to train anything and just spend their time playing make-believe (well it is all make-believe, don't get your knickers in a knot here) can do what they want and still get the statistics to back their play and those who enjoy playing with the toys the devs provide can do that too. The role players will get their training bonuses by participating in events and the game mechanic afficionados will get theirs from interacting with the game system and everyone will be happy.
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Uhm, the thread seems to have gone in another direction that the original title...