Multiclassing (Adv) or Mass Killing? Which is killing HZ?

[Bori Grimbattle]

My opinion?

Too much multiclassing allowed. Multiclassing should have been restricted to one or two "similar" classes and not allowing each and every class on one toon.

Ny reasons? Multiclassing one toon with 5 classes is a lot easier then bringing 5 toons up to 100 once. So, once everyone gets multiclassed out the whazoo the game quickly gets stale and boring with nothing left to do but mass kill and farm. Not many seem capable of playing a pure mage or a pure fighter or anything pure.

To make the game soloable they allowed too many skills to be crossed over, which once multiclassed 10 plus times allowed the mass killing. To compensate dragons for being a single class and behind a multi biped they powered them up as Ancients.

So to finalize, the game balance is totally out of whack. As far as I am concerned at least 1/3 of the MoBs in the game SHOULD NOT be soloable by anyone,no matter how much power they have or how many classes they obtain.

And to those that say multiclassing is what makes the game unique I disagree. Rampant multiclassing is just a crutch for lack of game content, nothing more.

Edit: Restrict multiclassing to one or two similar classes eg fighter/healer/mage, add an extra 5 character slots so everyone can make up different toons and not just rubber stamped 10+ classes of the same toon.

[Goriax]

Unfortunately they're at where they're at and they can't roll back the clock. To suddenly restrict multiclassing, or to suddenly allow virtually no crossover between schools (which I think would be best) would get a lot of players upset. If you don't believe me look at some of the replices on this thread and others by players who've abused this to the max.

Going forward, the best thing I can think for them to do is what they've already started for crafting. Revisit each school, tweak it up, perhaps give it some goodies, but at the same time greatly reduce what skills cross over. (i.e. virtually eliminate crossover). Considertaking it even to the point of redoing hit points so if you're a level 100 of class A and a level 1 of class B, you have the hitpoints of the level 1 of class B. Or at least be very very careful about what crosses over to avoid things getting overpowered. If they eliminate crossover then change it so that if your current school is one of those tweaked schools (and if no other schools are allowed to cross over to it)then youradventure rating is just equal to your level.

I do think that it's good that most mobs are soloable. This isn't EQ2 and a lot of people like being able to solo. There should be a few unsoloable mobs which drop cool stuff found nowhere else but most should be soloable.

[Dragonboy]

Far to much multiclassing? Yes
Some mobs far to easy? Yes

Suddenly limit multiclassing? No

It would ruin the game and many multiclassers will leave...
*Remembers the minor change to SWG*

I enjoyed the system SWG used before the change...
Some might have tried it so I wont explain, but essencially it is like; If you wanna be melee and ranged you will probably be good at both, but not expert...

A simular "multiclassing" system could be better for Horizons...

[Justa Mirage]

"Raises his paw" I didn't multiclass (much) I took mage to 36 so I could have perfect spell and multicast. I took cleric to 10th so I could have Ressurection. I took Druid to 15th so I could qualify to be a ranger.

Not much multi-classing there :) and I enjoyed each level as I obtained them, though I am not a mass killing machine by any form of the term.

Multi-class probably is good if a few things were changed about what abilities from other schools actually are allowed between classes.

For example: when I switched to Mage, I got all these neat Fire and Ice spells but that's about it... they were neat looking but did no damage against a 50+ mob (which I had to kill in order to get any XP) however....

Mages can cast lightning bolts, and having an 800 nature skill allowed me to bring forth some very damaging level I and level II lightning bolts that outshined any mage spell I could have learned. So I basically levelled to 36th zapping things. Now, if they made it so that my lightning bolt (or other crossover spell) was limited to a nature = my mage level values, I would

A: level slower
B: be forced to choose mage spells instead of relying on my druid spells
C: Feel like a Mage, and not a Druid trying to raise my mage levels.

[Darksun]

My opinion?

Too much multiclassing allowed. Multiclassing should have been restricted to one or two "similar" classes and not allowing each and every class on one toon.

...

And to those that say multiclassing is what makes the game unique I disagree. Rampant multiclassing is just a crutch for lack of game content, nothing more.

Edit: Restrict multiclassing to one or two similar classes eg fighter/healer/mage, add an extra 5 character slots so everyone can make up different toons and not just rubber stamped 10+ classes of the same toon.

I have played a number of games now where I needed to develop more than 1 character if I wanted to play accross a range of schools, classes or skills and in every case I hated to have to do this, I simply wanted 1 character to play as I felt without having to worry about what this would do to my character.

The only reason I commenced playing Horizons was because I only needed to have 1 character. If this is taken from me or restricted, I will leave because the basic promise of this game would be gone. I have adapted to every change that's been made to this game, but I will not even consider paying for this game if I needed to build more than 1 character. There are too many more stable options out there to pay for this game under such a restrictive regime.

I think overall there are too many players that spend way too much time worrying over how everyone else plays the game or trying to force players to conform to their ideal of what the game should be. It's a game, if someone has some kind of mass killing machine or makes cash from PB runs or give items away for free or play solo orwhatever, what does it really matter to everyone else...aside from the fact that it may not accord with their view of how the game should be. (sorry Bori, not specifically directed at you).

Darksun

[evilkarl]

I don't think either mass killing or multiclassing are killing horizons but I do believe both have detrimental affects on the game.

Mass killing impacts the economy as it allows people to rake in techs, cash, items, tech comps at a much higher rate than one on one or even two on one.

Multiclassing keeps people here, but it also further facilitates mass killing and has allowed people to become far to powerful.

My solution?
Make mass killing more difficult it will slow down people multiclassing and reduce the rewards of the action. Something like give mobs an aura that increases all their stats when they swarm a player. The more mobs the greater the effects of the aura.

I've made too many posts in the past on multiclassing so I'll just make some bullet points on it now.[*]Makes less abilities masterable[*]Make more stats come from class specific non masterable abilities rather than base schools[*]Impose further limit on spell pools[*]Eliminate chaining of spells.[/list]I am lightly multiclassed all of the above would affect me in a negative way however for the good of the game (or a future game) they need to happen. The ability to add heaps of schools to a single character is great and it draws or keeps people here, however the increase of power granted by being able to do so is sevre. Yes there should be some increase in power but not as steep as it is presently.

[Helcat]

if the real reason some are complaining about mass-killing
is that farmers acquire high quantities of desirable items,
why not just fix the loot tables so rare items do not drop
from cannon-fodder MOBs? Much more elegant a solution.

[imported_tjl]

if the real reason some are complaining about mass-killing
is that farmers acquire high quantities of desirable items,
why not just fix the loot tables so rare items do not drop
from cannon-fodder MOBs? Much more elegant a solution.

because one character may find a mob to be cannon fodder, while another may find it very difficult. such is the case with muticlassing

[Joaqim]

When dragon lairs were released there were dragons who had mass-killing bipeds who fed their dragons with the coin gained by mass killing.

Yeah keep the legends... the highest bids I've seen were from dragons who made the pawnies standing knee deep in cutted gems.

[imported_Ssilmath]

Don't forget the ones that outbid bipeds on techs like Strength or Power V when they first came out...

[pogowolf]

I don't think it's the multiclassing or really any of the above.. it's the fact that HZ is still 1/2 a game.. 1/2 Old Artifact.. 1/2 Tulga. massive strides have been made by Tulga to bring the force into balance.. but until that's 100%.. that's your cause.

[Valornyx]

[img]/Web/Themes/default/images/icon-quote.gif[/img]Kumu Honua wrote:

When dragon lairs were released there were dragons who had mass-killing bipeds who fed their dragons with the coin gained by mass killing.




Yeah keep the legends... the highest bids I've seen were from dragons who made the pawnies standing knee deep in cutted gems.

Whilst I'm sure there were dragons who took this approach, on Chaos the most expensive areaon averageI believe at auction was Dralk where the 4 plots averaged about 30G per.

I bought one of those plots, but did not get my coin from massive gem farming. I did make some money off gems when I was levelling from 90-100 in craft, but for the most part I make moneyfrom selling T5 trophies to high level bipeds who have difficulty with their high ratings - but have loads of coin.

I also borrowed some money from a guildie and am still paying that back.

Another of the dragons who bought in the same area made 8g collecting and running resources for another biped.

Just the other day I saw a biped offering 75c / granite slab (not brick).. asan ancient dragon with an inv of 5000 and a marble tarbash and scalepack - I could have made money ten times faster on the granite than i could have on T5 gems back in the old PB days.

There are other good ways to make money ..gem farming is not very creative and not as rewarding as some other ways. Doubly so now with the PB changes.

SOME dragons tried to bury PBs in cut gems - others of us did not.. what is more those who are more creative have not hadtheir incomes affected at all with the PB changes.

[Dragonboy]

[img]/Web/Themes/default/images/icon-quote.gif[/img]Joaqim wrote: [img]/Web/Themes/default/images/icon-quote.gif[/img]Kumu Honua wrote:

When dragon lairs were released there were dragons who had mass-killing bipeds who fed their dragons with the coin gained by mass killing.




Yeah keep the legends... the highest bids I've seen were from dragons who made the pawnies standing knee deep in cutted gems.

Whilst I'm sure there were dragons who took this approach, on Chaos the most expensive areaon averageI believe at auction was Dralk where the 4 plots averaged about 30G per.

I bought one of those plots, but did not get my coin from massive gem farming. I did make some money off gems when I was levelling from 90-100 in craft, but for the most part I make moneyfrom selling T5 trophies to high level bipeds who have difficulty with their high ratings - but have loads of coin.

I also borrowed some money from a guildie and am still paying that back.

Another of the dragons who bought in the same area made 8g collecting and running resources for another biped.

Just the other day I saw a biped offering 75c / granite slab (not brick).. asan ancient dragon with an inv of 5000 and a marble tarbash and scalepack - I could have made money ten times faster on the granite than i could have on T5 gems back in the old PB days.

There are other good ways to make money ..gem farming is not very creative and not as rewarding as some other ways. Doubly so now with the PB changes.

SOME dragons tried to bury PBs in cut gems - others of us did not.. what is more those who are more creative have not hadtheir incomes affected at all with the PB changes.

You forget to mention that SOME players have been playing for 2 years now and during that time you can collect loads of cash...
If I hadnt brought most of my coin to Nadia during my year of playing I would have had 2-3g myself beforehaving to grind cash to goto 2g after the pawnbroker change...
During that grind I went from 4.4m to 4.0m hoard...
Hurray for hoardable drops...
Ow yeah ******** I didnt kill mass farmable mobs...
Better kill those in the future eventhough it is against my principles...

A perfect way to stop mass killing is to make ALL mobs cast massive stuns/debuffs and remove cleance from the game...

[imported_Ssilmath]

The same thing that Joaqims post did, why don't you give them some crap about it too?

[Justa Mirage]

Answer:

Mass-killing = Cash, comps, and hoardable items, highly desired forms, and crystals

It doesn't matter what race does the mass killing (as this thread is devolving back into the old and rehashed again and again "Dragons vs. Bipeds" threads)

What matters is a nice logrythmic curve that exists, the higher you go and the more unbeatable you become, the more monetary wealth and status you obtain. It's really a simple equation.

Those with things to sell (Sought after gems or cogs, forms, hoard items, etc.) are already massively uber and have lots of cash already, but they need more cash. Then there are those who are charitable and give out freely what they get (such as I do) to people. These players rich, or not, they are dragon or bi-ped, but it's the player behind the wheel and their greed factor that makes this "discussion" a fact.

There are those in Chaos that have made names for themselves, based on their gameplay methods. Loot or be looted, pillage or face losing out on free resources, selling things far more than their face value is one side's way of playing "king of the hill"

Then there are those that are community helpers, roll models, and people that play around you know what kind of person you are. I found a Zealot... I did :) fighting some eastern blighted creatures. What do I need with a rare artifact? I am not a fighter I am an archer, so I sell it on marketplace for a gold. Someone out there wants it. Same with a desired formula, I think it was strength V. I made the small meager amount I presently have looting little money bags off of corpses, or mobs that drop cash. I am not rich by any means, but my richness comes from the people I game with, you can't buy that with in-game coin.

So back to the topic at hand:

Multi-classing and Mass killing go hand in hand, just as Dragons and mass killing can be done, though a little more difficult, I have watched my guild leader take down many opponents at once with a dragon.

Luckily the old addage isn't true in Horizons: Those with the gold, don't necessarily make the rules.

[PJ]

While the issues of multiclassing and mass killing are interelated (each one encourages and enables the other), the issue of mass killing is the root issue. Loot and other forms of combat related rewards,are in general, quantity over quality.

The loot tables have set percent chances for each kill to drop various items. In general these chances are the same from mob to mob. Now through a variety of game mechanics, its possible for characters of all types, to kill numerous mobs at once. As it stands, the drop rates for items for killing 1 mob at a time are terrible, even if you're ridiculously multiclassed and smash single mobs with ease, the drop rates are bad. Much worse if you're a lowly single classer. But they can't just raise the drop rates, because that just scales up the reward massively for masskillers. The drop rates are either: terrible for single killers, ok for masskillers, or ok for single killers, and unbelievable rewarding for masskillers. They already did this with formulas. Immediately postmerge formulas, and techniques were rather rare loots. And it sucked out loud to be killing single mobs for formulas. The only way to expect to get any was via masskilling.Sometime over the past year, the drop rates were raised up. Killing single mobs at once you can actually get a fair number of formulas, and techs. But the large raise in drop rates coupled with mass killing made the majority of formulas/techs worthless aside from their coin value from a pawnbroker.

Now it was suggested that harder mobs should have better drop rates then easier mobs. And while i've campaigned hard for this, its an imperfect solution in and of itself. Why? Because of the scale. I've made a copy of myself onto Blight, and dropped all but 1 adventure school. Now while I still have slighly higher stats in some areas (focus/dex) from crafting, the copy is as close to a single class character as I can get it. Now, the single classed copy can kill t5 indigenous mobs and t5 WA mobs (theapproximate division between "easy" and "hard" mobs). And I'd kill 2-3 indigenous mobs in the time it takes to kill 1 WA mob. So the initial inclination is to say have for tech comps to have WA mobs drop their comps 3 times as often compared to WA mobs, instead of as often. Its an improvement in some sense, but still imperfect because while my single classed copy kills 1 WA for every 2-3 indigenous mobs. My actual character, inapproximately the same amount of time can kill about 2WA mobs. Or Ican do a field pull of regular mobs (the pulling and killing of all the mobs in 1 subspawn). Depending on the subspawn, this can contain upwards of 20 mobs easily. So instead of 1 WA for every 2-3 indigenous, its more like 1 WA for every 10+ indigenous for my multiclassed character.

Now the natural prediliction it seemsthat people have, since purely a pure loot table adjustment is insufficient, is to nerf the multiclassers. But that would be a mistake in several ways. Firstly in that most proposed nerfs are poorly thoughtout and would not solve the issue at hand. In that they remove parts from multiclassing that enhance masskilling, but leave those that enable it. Such nerfs wouldnt' fix anything and just piss people off and drive them away. Secondly, any proposals that could be put forward todisable masskilling via nerfing multiclassing would be such a large and fundamental nerf as to be dangerous to the financial stability of the game. But thirdly, this issue is independent of multiclassing as a dragon or most single class schools can destroy similar groups of mobs at once. If at a wave of Manga's hand, multiclassing vanished, mass killing would still be an issue. Whether it be dragons (particularly those that are intelligently outfitted for the purposes of masskiling), or similarly outfitted druids, or dwarf mages, or numerous other careful combinations of equipment and class, and occasionally race. So any nerf to multiclassers at all, even the outright removal of multiclassing wouldn't solve the issue.

I'm not disagreeing with there being some need to revist some facets of multiclassing, but i don't view that it should be done as a result of masskilling, or an attempt to fix masskilling, etc.

Lost in the multiclassing uproar was a small suggestion of fundamental combat mechanics wherein being the damage taken from multiple mobs would not scale arithmetically, but geometrically. This would solve the the problem of masskiling to some extent. Given that the fundamental issue with the combat mechanics is that the damage from individual mobs can be reduced so low as to close enough to 0, thatin combination with AoE attacks, 10, 20, 30 mobs are approximately as easy and quick to killas 1 mob. But this is well a complicated solution, (prone to being highly buggy) and could raiseissues, particularly with group combat, given the proclivity of mobs to gang up on particular group members. But even then it would be a solution, as oppossed to several nonsolutions listed above.

Now what is my solution, I'm not here just to poke holes in the solutions of others. To repeat the fundamental combat mechanic issue is that for your typical masskiller, the rate at which he kills mobs is not strongly correlated to the number of mobs he's killing. What it is correlated to is the number of mobs in the subspawn he's hunting in. So outside of fixing this combat mechanic, which I admit seems the obvious solution, we come at the problem from a different side.

Reduce the number of spawned mobs. That was one of the large differences with the merge. For the most part (yes there are a few exceptions), most indigenous spawns (once the mobs do spawn) there are an enourmous amount of them. So on average, cut the number of mobs in these spawns by a factor of 1/3, in compensation, double the drop rates. This reduces the benefit of masskilling, while boosting the benefits to single killers. It gives a much needed boost to new players, single classed players, lower level players, without insanely overrewarding masskilling. It also has the additional benefit of making the resource fields safer for pure crafters. Which wasn't much of a problem, but was substantially exaccerabated post merge by saturating the resource fields with high levels of mobs. As long as mobs respawn sufficiently, it won't hurtplayers hunting for specific mob types.

[Jayne]

Although I agree with what you have said PJ, I don't think any solution will make all happy. I see any changes will cause there to be consequences elsewhere. Unfortunetly I have no solution.

As I think of the problems, I come more to grip with the fact that our builds have there disadvantages and advantages. Me being Berserker am suited for the satyr's undead and one on one battles or 2-3 at most.I have come to terms with that, and that is my expertise.

On the other hand I am no way suited for mass killing like I have witness many times on fire island and the fyakki.

For me personally, I like the drop rate. I like the increased mobs in the areas I hunt, which has brought me more of a challenge. I know have to strategize when I go to Elnath and such. Plenty of mobs to watch out for. 3 months ago I was getting bored there because there wasn't enough mobs and the place looked bare. I think I would rather have that then go somewhere that looked barren and boring. But this is just my opinion.

And by the way although drop rates are the same, its not applied the same to all mobs. I personally know of a mob thats drop rate currently is ridiculous and totally different from any mob I have hunted.

Jayne

[Snowdonia Honeythorn]

I've gotta wonder. What exactly is wrong with my suggestion for solving mass killing? Helcat says it's not "elegant" whatever the heck that means (and it seems no-one elses suggestions are "elegant" either except his own /shrug).

See, I didn't really get this discussion started to address multiclassing but I suppose just having the mention of it instantly made everyone figure it was. I'll have to better word my subjects in the future. I only mentioned it because almost everyone and their dog points the finger at multiclassing like it's the devil and bane of HZs existance. So here I was saying no, I don't think it is as much as mass killing is. But for a LOT of people, that sentiment somehow got lost.

I can see problems with cutting the spawns down as well PJ. People will still be able to mass kill and with the loot tables increased to counter the decrease in spawn, they will still be netting the same or more drops as they did before but with less mobs to have to kill to do so. I agree, mob saturation is an issue in some areas (gem golems in Valley of Moon is a PRIME example) and could use a bit of spacing out but I don't see just cutting the spawn by a third disabling mass killing or it's benefits.

And to be honest, I don't want to disable mass killing. If a player wants to mass kill, then they should feel free to do so anytime they wish. What I do want, and feel is needed, is to disable the benefit from mass killing. If the loot tables could be restructured to recognize the ease at which someone could kill a particular mob and drop loot accordingly (IE tough kill for the player, loot drops are really nice, extremely easy kill, they get zilch) then that would help. If there was a /concider in this game, that could partially aid in a fix such as this. That could also help in keeping bored or poor high levels out of lower level content. But since we don't have a /concider this may be a much harder mechanic to impliment.

This is why I came up with the idea to just target it at mass killing in and of itself. Disable the incentive and mass killing will rarely if ever happen. I kinda used the recent PB changes as a guide. Agro/kill one mob, you get max benefit from it in XP and drops... Agro/kill two, possibly still get max benefit but may also be the teeniest bit lower. Agro/kill three, and benefit noticably drops (not much XP from any mob and all they are dropping is resources). Agro/kill 4 or more and BAM, no XP from any kill and no loot whatsoever. Of course, these numbers are only an example but get my point across. So mass killing won't be disabled, but the incentive will be. No incentive, not a whole lot of mass killing going on. I suppose I'm proposing that the current multiple mob bonus work in reverse and include loot drops as well only the cap is zero.

Now, aside from coding, which every suggestion thus far will require, what's wrong with it? Where are its flaws? Why will it not work?


I will say that I liked someone elses suggestion as well on the more mobs you agro, the stronger they become. It makes sense that larger groups of mobs would rally together to work as a team and bolster eachothers morale, thus bolstering their strength and aggression. Wild animals do this all the time. Humans do this all the time. And insects do this all the time. So I completely agree that this sort of change would not only be logical but should really be how things work.

[PJ]

The benefits you're talking about are that the difference between the reward per time for mass killing and single target killing is so large.

So using the numbers I'd suggested, # of mobs would be slashed by a factor, of 1/3, but the mobs would drop twice as much, so overall the total reward per time benefits of mass killing would be reduced under my suggestion by a factor of 2/3, or -33%.

Not that nearly as harsh a reduction as you propose but still a substantial reduction. But since its the difference between masskilling and single target killing that matters, at the same time that mass killing is getting its reward reduced by 33%, the rewards for single target killing is being upped by 100%, so thecurrent large gapbetween the rewards is reduced by a large amount.

Reducing the loot drops based on how many mobs your fighting can have consequences that are undesireable. Sometimes adds are ineveitable, even when they are undesireable, especially now that the social code for mobs is fixed. If the social AI of WA drags 2-3 extra class mobs onto me, and I somehow pull out that fight, via some combination of skill/luck/insane amount of levels. My loot noticeably suffers versus having killed those 3-4 mobs individually, even though doing it all at once was harder.

The issue with changing these sort of mechanics is they effect other areas simaltaneously, people who aren't intentionally mass killing, people forced into it because those mobs are group leaders (kwellens, wraiths, etc), group hunting.

As for the making more each additional mob you're killing at once, more dangerous. In addittion to the problematic situations I outlined earlier, (tinkering with game mechanics can upset other areas of the game), It wouldn't necessarily solve all problems. Dwarven Toughness, Ignore Pain, Daunting Mist Farming, are just some of the loopholes in such a solution.

[LaughingOtter]

Now, aside from coding, which every suggestion thus far will require, what's wrong with it? Where are its flaws? Why will it not work?


I will say that I liked someone elses suggestion as well on the more mobs you agro, the stronger they become. It makes sense that larger groups of mobs would rally together to work as a team and bolster eachothers morale, thus bolstering their strength and aggression.

I think you answer your own question, actually. [;)] The main reason I'd argue against your suggestion is that it nerfs by removing, whereas giving mobs strength in numbers is nerfs by adding. To take that idea further, what if the number of mobs killed in a given length of time directly influenced the chance for reinforcements to spawn? Even a flock of fyakki must have a shepherd somewhere.

Beyond escalating damage based on numbers, how about added abilities based on numbers? Get 10 golems together, and earthquake becomes Major Quake - double the area and quadruple the damage. Hurl Chunk scales up to Bombardment and becomes an area stun with a recycle debuff.

I don't think any change to mob behavior alone will fix things. Chain casting and masterable abilities that should be class-defining are glaring issues with multiclassing and also need to be looked at. On top of all that, the loot tables need to be revamped to address that side of the issue.