Nimble fingers? Balance items!

[Hugh Longshanks]

that's BRILLIANT Con. Regardless of anything else, the first issue is to come up with a list of different attributes....

So:
Melee/Ranged Damage
OP Damage
Melee/Ranged Block
OP Block
Melee/Ranged Attack %
OP Attack %
Melee/Ranged Defense %
OP Defense %
Fire Damage
Health Gain
Taint
Poison%
Critical
Stun
Agility
Crushing Force
Experience Gain

I'm putting melee and ranged attributes together since I assume they would cost the same.

[Tim]

This looks like a good idea for determining the levels of items and talismen, but doesn't really balance them. A few potential flaws I see:

• With the system you described, a sword that does 20 melee damage would be the same level as a spear that does 10 melee and 10 ranged. As would a bow that did 4 ranged damage with 4% gold steal. I think we would agree that these weapons would not be equal in usefulness.
  
• I don't like the limitation that only x% can go to pure damage. That takes out all basic items. Not everything has to have special abilities.
  
• The trickiest thing I can think of when dealing with item balancing/worth is +-X% attack/defense. It's usefulness is strongly tied to what it is attached to and what else the player has equipped. If you're weapons only do 10 damage, +20% only really adds 2 damage, where if they do 100, it adds 20. It can be accounted for when you put it on a weapon, but what of talismen? They're the tricky part.
  
• How would negative stats play into it? Would they add points to be allocated? If so, you could have a knife with 50 melee damage and -30% ranged damage. If your main weapon was a bow, then the negative really won't effect you.
  

[Tim]

Ok. I'll reclarify a few things.

Let's say you have a talisman that adds 20% melee damage. How do you define what level that should be? Putting that talisman on a weapon that only does 2 damage isn't that great an effect, but if you put it on a weapon that does 100 damage, it adds a great deal. Taking it a step further, a knife that only does 2 melee but adds 20% melee is pretty weak, but if your main weapon does 100 damage, that 20% helps out a whole lot. That's the tricky part of item balancing.

As for negative effects, yes, I can generate careful combinations for strengths and weaknesses, but depending on what combinations of talismen and items you use, it could have drastic effects.

Example: You have a talisman that adds 5% critical but -10% melee damage, if you put that on a throwing knife (and used a bow) you get a knife that who's level is probably lower than it should be.

I'm not saying I disagree with your idea. I actually did pretty much this exact same thing to determine the worth of each item (and how as of now I plan on determining item level). I'm just pointing out the weak points in the system, hoping that someone else will think of a way to make it better.

[Hugh Longshanks]

What if we completely divorced damage and defense from the more additive skills, like Health Gain or fire damage?
Say have two sets of variables for a talisman. One would consist of damage, block, attack, and defense, and have a certain number of points one can allocate depending on level. The other set of attributes would have its own separate counter for attributes....

Or, we could do it in such a way that attributes affecting the outcome of a battle would have certain number of points independent of the attributes that don't (basically just gold steal and exp gain). How these points are figured or allocated are beyond me, but it ought to clear up the problem of having a talisman that is going to cause you to lose, but has 20% experience gain and is therefore useless.

[kaldar]

yes the balancing part is very hard ..... i think craig gave up after a while and that is why everyone was initially all using PW HMB Of the Dragon or PW HMB of Shadows lol

it is hard , but I think the first part is figuring out what you want the battles to look like at different levels and play test the different equipment.

I think with the initial item lvls that Craig made for this version nobody could ever use the talismans , or really kill each other except by using taint. Now we find 1 hit kills quite common when a critical goes off , and battles lasting longer than 5 rounds is quite uncommon.

I would prefer some sort of happy medium. This part does take time though.

I'm also just a bit disgruntled because i'm being beat up by people 4 levels lower than me when I have just about the optimal offensive gear on

[Hugh Longshanks]

That idea I like. And I'd be willing to help, too. I could carry over the stuff I've done for my own game...

[Tim]

Well, some of the things will be scrapped. As complex as the duel script is, I'm may just be better off starting from scratch on it. And if I do that, the weapon system can change to pretty much anything.

[kaldar]

I think in the long term we would be best served planning out what we would like the game to be and then try to implement it in iterations.

If we could get some additions such as quests , more interaction in game , more lvl up diversity , and such ...... i think we could atleast retain some players.

After all , the most important part of this whole thing is getting new people to play , old people to return , and the game to thrive again.

We need more than a dozen players in other words

It is hard to get people to play when they say well what happens to the guy when i attack him ...... ummm he loses gold ....... he doesn't get hurt ...... ummmm no ......... what do i get to do in all these towns ....... ummmm some shops have more items than others ........ so if the town i'm in has everything i want i don't need to leave ? ....... ummmmm no ..........

[Hugh Longshanks]

Yup. Perhaps we should start a new thread to discuss brand-new systems for warfare....

[Tim]

Eh. More like poor you, because that means work for v2 will take longer. ;D

[Mat Cauthon]

Yes yes please I like that ! My own Tali