Please modify Repair Weapon (and armour) mechanics to reduce barrier

[Tlok]

Please modify the weapon and armour repair/wear mechanics to bring these skills in line with other skills and remove one of the major boring unnecessary grinds new melee characters have to endure.

The current repair weapon (and armour, and probably tool) mechanic forces a huge redundant grind on new characters and is a significant barrier to new players. Currently, to become reasonably self sufficient, which is required if you play on off hours or if you want to RP a self-sufficient character, you must go through a hugely boring cycle of rats and chickens.

You start with clubs, because that is all you can repair. You have to work up your club skill until you can kill them in less than a game hour per rat, meanwhile selling their meagre treasure to buy hugely expensive repair kits and pay exorbitant training costs. The price to train club is reasonable, but the price to train repair is horrendous. And every repair is s l o w.

So after hours of grinding, I can finally kill a rat with a club in a reasonable amount of time, and can repair my club. What's next? Repeat the whole miserable cycle with a dagger, but this time with increased costs because I need to get repair from 2 to 4, which costs more than 0 to 2. Rats don't drop better treasure, by the way.

So finally after many more hours of grinding, I can kill rats with daggers and repair them. What's next? Repeat the cycle with sabres, starting from skill 0 again, and still on rats and chickens because that's what I can kill with skill 0 sword.

So finally after more hours of grinding, what's next? Repeat the cycle yet again, still with rats and chickens, because that's all I can kill with level 0 axe. Only now leveling repair takes forever, because the number of points to get to rank 10 (out of 200?!) is ungodly. And those rats still don't drop any better loot. Oh, and by now my armour is shredded so I have to start leveling repair on that too, and undoubtedly the cycle will repeat training heavier armour, but at least I'll be able to move to tougher opponents if I haven't died of boredom.

I have some specific suggestions to improve this, and realistically all or most are needed, though a few to start would help considerably.

1) Make weapon repair work on all weapons starting from rank 1. Let it repair only a little damage per use if you must, but let it repair whatever weapon fits your character concept. If I start my character as a woodsman, I should use an axe and be able to sharpen an axe right from the get go. Like Novocadian's smith alt, leveling repair would be part of normal character "life" not an out of character grind to satisfy quirky mechanics.

2) Make weapon repair kit usage be proportional to amount of damage repaired - If I only restored 10 points I only use 20% of a kit. If I repair 100 points, I use 2 kits. This makes the cost proportional to a character's ability to pay - higher level characters with Q300 swords use more kits than lower level characters with Q50 daggers. Right now it's worse than equal, it's actually backwards!

3) Make weapon wear proportional to damage dealt - or better still, (damage-hardness)*wear factor because let's face it, if you gave Andre The Giant an axe and told him to hew a bison to death, he'd put more nicks in the blade than if you gave Pewee Herman a Sabre and told him to kill some chickens. Even 100 chickens. Probably 1000 chickens. Poor chickens. Poor Peewee.

4) Make weapon repair time short and constant (5-10 seconds real time per repair?). If an experienced and invested player wouldn't put up with 4 minutes to make one repair pass on a weapon what makes you think a new character would? And if it is going to take 20 passes to repair a club, they must each be short enough to manage - you're still getting 4 minutes to repair the club (which is still too long IMHO) but you are making progress along the way and you can do a bit now and a bit later, rather than being stuck staring at an unmoving screen for 4 straight minutes.

5) Lower the training and practice requirement for repair to bring it in line with other skills, at least for the lower levels. I don't care if you think it's realistic to take more training to sand a splinter out of a club than it takes to learn to make puff pastry (I've done both, by the way, and it's not), it's a game and something as simple as being able to maintain your gear has to be accessible. If you make the game too much like the real world people will prefer the real world, because at least there you don't have to worry about network latency and if you meet a nice girl she probably actually *is* as girl and ...oh, well, anyway. (BTW - that's just a joke, I'm trying to make the Wall-O-Text at least amusing)

If all, or at least most, of these suggestions were implemented it would greatly improve new player retention and enjoyment for a large segment of new players, and probably existing players as well. And would do no harm to the players it did not help. Some of the changes would require non-trivial work, and temporarily adjusting wear rates and/or repair costs would be a good stop-gap measure.

Thank you for taking the time to read and consider my proposal
Tlok

[Bonifarzia]

I fully agree with some points Tlok makes, and disagree with some others.
Yes, practicing weapon repair is cumbersome (like most other sorts of crafting), the rules for applying the repair process have been a difficult issue even though they changed a few times since i have been playing, the prefactor for the training costs is just hilarious (can it be repair weapons is still one of the most expensive of all trainable skills?) and the limited amount of low price items makes it tough to get started.
However, as a new player or when starting a new character, you should not worry much about doing all on your own. You can do well without any ranks in the repair skills, as you are likely to find somebody to help you with your worn gear. Many characters that offer repair services don't even ask for payment, and if they do, it's certainly orders if magnitude less than the training costs. And speaking of unrealistic training procedures, you should note that most characters use ruined (quality one) equipment when practicing combat skills. I think my training plate set went all the way from zero to rank 200.

[Tlok]

However, as a new player or when starting a new character, you should not worry much about doing all on your own. You can do well without any ranks in the repair skills, as you are likely to find somebody to help you with your worn gear.

I'm grateful for your advice, with this post I could easily have been a new player stuck with broken gear and frustrated by my inability to kill rats and unsure what to do, I appreciate that you reached out to help. Fortunately, I already have had numerous friends offer to repair for me, and I'm grateful for those generous offers.

But they come at a cost to role play - I had a character concept of someone from an small outlying farm, full of independence and dreams of fame and fortune, eager to prove to himself and his parents that he can make it on his own. The gift of an axe and a small horde of Tria was the seed to start his career, and I dove in... only to have my role play shattered by the mechanics.

I could have one of my friends repair for me. I can also support myself on mining, and buy repair or simply buy or forge new gear as mine wears. It's just ironic that a game that purports to place such an emphasis on role play implements mechanics that so thoroughly destroy it for me. I can make it just fine with the current mechanics, it's just that my character dies a little bit every time I have to back off and think how I'm working around the mechanics rather than playing my character.

Right now I'm just playing a MOFRPG (at 30 players on any given night it doesn't really qualify as an MMOFRPG) and that makes me sad because I think the game could offer a lot more.

I'm not a fanatical role player - I like it and I think it makes FRPGs better, but I would and do play games with very little RP. My wife and I started playing DDO when it went free to play and we play together, often in character, a couple of nights a week - but not more than 10% of the people we group with want to RP. I'd gladly play PlaneShift if the RP were removed entirely, provided it was otherwise fun.  But RP remains a stated goal of the PS project and I'm trying to fit in and contribute, so I'm pointing out what breaks it for me and trying to propose some solutions.

[novacadian]

@Tlok: There is a feeling that is coming through your posts that you would like to be able to play PS independently yet are using RP to justify reasons for changing mechanics that are impeding you to do that. That is just my opinion from following your posts.

All of our characters arrive a young newbies. They do not arrived as skilled crafters. One can have a goal of what they want their character to become; yet like real life the game world can shape that.

You could play a character that seeks independence; yet that character (as in real life) would have to seek mentors to show them the skills they need to achieve that and except help when offered.

To me you seem to be missing an important aspect of character development. You, the player, seems to have a fixed idea of what the character should be like. If that were true in real life then we would all have become the thing that we wanted when asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" Most of us have found different paths since then.

So it is with the characters we play.

Your points about balancing are valid. That is something that one should always expect with game software under development; yet balancing and making it easy for each player to play PS with no needed interaction with other characters are two different issues.

- Nova

[Talad]

I'm analyzing the weapon decay and I'm a bit embarassed.  It looks really very bad. Seems that killing 1 rat removes 1 point of quality. So with 50 rats the dagger will be unusable. Which makes very little sense.

At the moment the decay is basically 1 point every 10 hits. Then there are a number of calculations for blocks, resistance, etc... but still it's really too high. So the first thing to do is to change it to decay 1 point every 100 hits. That will already make it a bit better. This is done now, and will be available at next reboot.

I also added the description on usage on the repair kits.

Next I will investigate why you can repair only clubs. Stay tuned.

[Tlok]

@Tlok: There is a feeling that is coming through your posts that you would like to be able to play PS independently yet are using RP to justify reasons for changing mechanics that are impeding you to do that. That is just my opinion from following your posts.

LOL, I can understand how you might be confused, I *do* discuss the problem from many different viewpoints and I might not always clarify which is mine and which is the style of a friend or hypothetical player. Maybe I'm hopelessly egalitarian, but I think the style and needs of other players should be considered as well as my own. To be perfectly clear I prefer playing with others, I joined a guild within my first dozen or so hours of play, and I am delighted to play with them. A truly great group of people I am proud to call my friends. I also have no desire to max all my skills. I came *because* it was advertised as a MMO with an RP emphasis, I want to interact with others and I want to role play.

But I do think the game should be *able* to be played with minimal interaction with others, and should be *able* to max all skills, and should be viable with nothing even close to max. In short, I think the game should *allow* as many different styles as possible. All of my suggestions have focused on things that expand accessibility significantly more than they restrict it. I would consider it beneath my dignity to make proposals that advanced my interests at the significant expense of other players' enjoyment of the game (unless their enjoyment stemmed from limiting or putting down others, I have no problem denying bullies their fun).

I would never support something disruptive like OOC in main chat, but I absolutely support things like being able to play without interacting with other humans or being able to max all skills, even if they have no interest to me. I do so in the hope that if I stand up for the rights of others they'll stand up for mine.

All of our characters arrive a young newbies. They do not arrived as skilled crafters.

At no point have I suggested it should be otherwise. I have not complained about starting tria, PPs, or skills. Perhaps you attribute another poster's request to me?

To me you seem to be missing an important aspect of character development. You, the player, seems to have a fixed idea of what the character should be like. If that were true in real life then we would all have become the thing that we wanted when asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" Most of us have found different paths since then.

Do I want to be master of my own destiny in a video game? Um, ... yes? You don't?

Nothing I have suggested would force you to choose at the onset. If you want to take a thistledown approach to advancement, going where whim or chance take you, fine, enjoy, I wouldn't dream of stopping you. I like a little more planning, well please, let me have it. Live and let live. it's not so much to ask, really.

yet balancing and making it easy for each player to play PS with no needed interaction with other characters are two different issues.

Please do not put words in my mouth. Nowhere have I said I do not wish to interact with other characters and I resent any such implication. I have no desire to catch my own fish or bake my own pies. I didn't even want to mine my own ore. I wanted to wield a sword. I wanted to repair my own weapons. Is that so much to ask? A few simple skills that fit my character?

[verden]

No, it's not too much to ask. Imbalance in this process has been recognized. I agree that interaction should be minimal, at least at initial levels. More emphasis on balancing and playability in the early levels will retain more players. Emphasis on interaction and roleplay should come into play later in character development to maximize retention of players.

[Dau]

@Tlok: There is a feeling that is coming through your posts that you would like to be able to play PS independently yet are using RP to justify reasons for changing mechanics that are impeding you to do that.

Brief digression to ask, quite seriously: why would it be bad to want to play independently, especially when new?   Some people are shy, especially when they're new players first getting used to a game.   Some people are hesitant to accept charity (I know I personally am often uneasy asking for help, in part because I had an very unpleasant experience as a newbie re: one of those oldbie benefactors).   Some people may just want to play loners or very independent people.   I'm not sure it's a great idea to cater PS exclusively to shameless extroverts.   

Back on the main topic: yeah, I've gotten to the point where I'll either use cheap and disposable weapons or (occasionally) pay some other sucker to do the work for me.   I think I ran the numbers once re: how much cheaper that was!   Repair weapon/armor being so difficult doesn't even make sense in context, as there are other, cheaper skills that objectively would be no easier or harder to learn to do.

[Bonifarzia]

Next I will investigate why you can repair only clubs. Stay tuned.

I think that was because the check for rank requirements was based directly on the value of the target item when sold to an NPC. This means that the bigger blades like claymores or reinforced battle axes are quite tough here, especially when the exponential quality dependence of the price sets in for high end crafted gear. I wonder if we really need such requirements, as the process of "repair" does not require any stationary tools and seems much like whetting and polishing up, so that should not differ much technically from one blade to another. The most important parameter to have skill ranks enter is probably the loss of end quality, which should be chosen with great care.

[Talad]

Ok, the folllowing changes have been applied.

1) We modified a number of weapon costs to align those to the actual damage per second value, so their overall effectiveness.
2) We brought some basic weapons, like mace, club, shortsword, dagger, knife below 1000 tria value.
3) We modified the script to repair, so it's possible to repair all weapons below 1000 trias with no skill in repair. More skills is required for more costly weapons
4) We changed the decay rate for all weapons from 0.1 to 0.01. So basically now those decay 10 times slower.
5) Modified the description of the repair kits, so they tell the player how can be used.

All the above is effective in game now.

If you still experience issues with this topic please open another thread. Continue to keep the feedback coming! It's very helpful.