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New Score System - Intentions and Details

Phoenix_Mythic

UO Legend
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Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
We're working to fix the issues that caused the score system to break down and report scores of -2.1 billion. Once that is fixed, we will be re-opening the Factions test shard. Right now we don't have an ETA but we're working to get it going again early this week.

In the meantime, I'm gonna start this thread to discuss the intentions and some of the details of the new scoring system, so that everyone will have a better understanding of what to expect when the test server is available again.

Basically, what we're after here is a score system that is more meaningful than the old, is more difficult to exploit, provides some kind of measure of participant performance relative to other participants, and encourages participation in larger and more balanced fights.

To accomplish those goals, the new score system works in a fashion that is radically different than before. Kill points are gone. The system still tracks kills and deaths, but those are there just for bragging rights and leaderboard positions.

Rather than tracking kill points, the system instead tracks various battle statistics over time. These stats are tracked per individual and in aggregate all faction players. It works by keeping track of when Faction fighting is in progress. Only when Faction fighting is happening nearby will your stats be tracked and your scores be recomputed.

Instead of presenting a score computed from raw numbers, the system instead compares your average stats over time to the global average. The result is a comparison showing how your average performance compares to the entire server.

For example, if you've done an average of 10 DPS for all the time you've spent in Factions fights and the serer average is 5 DPS, then your average is twice the server average. If we call this ratio a "Rating" then your Damage Rating would be 2.0.

The Ratings are multiplied by 2000 to produce a score. This way, the average score for each of the five ratings is 2000. In the above example, your Damage score would be 2000 * 2.0 = 4000.

Your total score is the sum of your five sub-scores, so the average total score is 10000.

Now, the system modifies the raw numbers tracked as part of a "renown" system. The idea behind it is that the more witnesses there are to deeds done in battle, the more score those deeds are worth. And, the more one-sided a battle is, the more score the deeds are worth to the underdogs and the less they are worth to the larger side.

The idea is that small battles are not particularly notable and a zerg is not heroic.

An overwhelming force is expected to win, so their battle stats tracked for that fight are reduced. On the other hand, the smaller force, being overwhelmed by a larger one, will gain more benefit to their score for that fight because they are fighting long odds.

And, for larger fights, everyone involved will get a buff to their stats tracked for that fight. It's much better all around to fight 10v10, or at least 10v5, than it is to fight 3v3.


So, here are things to keep in mind about the new score system:

Scores are averages over time, meaning your score can go up and down as conditions change.

Since scores are over-time averages, they allow people with small amounts of play time to be compared to people with large amounts of play time, on the same scale.

Scores will tend to fluctuate wildly when the system first goes online, because the global averages will vary a lot, until there is a lot of data in the system. Over time, the scores will stabilize and change more slowly. Note that there is a decay mechanism that will prevent the averages from becoming locked in with so much weight that they eventually won't move much at all.

In order to exploit the system to artificially inflate scores, you need a lot of people making coordinated effort; we hope that it will just be easier to go and fight for real than to go to all the trouble to cheat it. We realize we'll never be able to build a completely un-exploitable system, but the idea here is that the more you work to game the system, the more the result looks like actual PvP.
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
The Ratings are multiplied by 2000 to produce a score. This way, the average score for each of the five ratings is 2000. In the above example, your Damage score would be 2000 * 2.0 = 4000.

Your total score is the sum of your five sub-scores, so the average total score is 10000.
If your subscores are the same number of say 4000, the sum total score is going to be 20000. The shard average total is 10000 correct?
 

AzSel

Lore Keeper
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Would it be possible for people with more then 1 active accounts to have 2 characters in different factions and have one character damaging the other character while one of the characters heals himself continuously and they both farm points or ranks like that? Hope not.
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
An overwhelming force is expected to win, so their battle stats tracked for that fight are reduced.
How is the reduction determined?

I'm having a hard time with the intel and stealth. For those that don't hide or stealth. Since all subscores go into your total score, those that do have this will accrue more total points than those who dont.

Is it the thought that they won't be able to do as much damage or healing if they have this? That seems like a gamble if so.

Also if you're comparing your score on "Ratings" per category on an average, why not deflate the number and simply multiply each "rating" by 10 or 100 and then add the total score?
 
I

I Am Hypnotic

Guest
Will there be like a grace period for the first few days to wear faction pieces?

Cuz now all the suits will be useless when it goes live and I won't even be able to get points... That's the only issue i'm having right now.
 

Podolak

Crazed Zealot
Professional
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Will there be like a grace period for the first few days to wear faction pieces?

Cuz now all the suits will be useless when it goes live and I won't even be able to get points... That's the only issue i'm having right now.
From what I have read in the other threads (where Mark said that people can just used imbued items for a while) you will need to earn the rank again before wearing them. Also please keep in mind it is possible the faction arties will be changed making our current ones useless. They haven't assessed the "power" of arties yet, just the points needed to wear them.
 
S

Stupid Miner

Guest
... going to poke at the system a bit see if anything falls out.

-------
Note 1:
What's to prevent someone with... 5+ accounts multi-clienting and farming score by having 1 char kill the chars on the other accounts?

And if you reduce the effect of the score gain for killing the same player repeatedly, they could just switch to another of the 6-7 chars on the accounts and just cycle through them.
To prevent this you'd have to reduce the score gained for the entire account, not just that character.

-------
Note 2:
If I'm reading this right, wouldn't someone like a thief or fielder--someone who participates in battle but doesn't do damage--have their score actively reduced by staying within the 'zone of battle'? Same with those in stat-loss, wouldn't this further harm them? And wouldn't this encourage thieves to not help out at all in the faction fights?
Also, wouldn't this encourage people to... pop up in a fight, do a ton of damage, and leave as quickly as possible? It'd exploit the "over time" effect.
This'd also harm the people who actually stick around and persevere, since it's much harder to maintain results over a long amount of time, the several hours of a defense, as opposed to ducking out early to save score. The people who stay for the duration should be benefited, not harmed for their perseverance.
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Note 1:
What's to prevent someone with... 5+ accounts multi-clienting and farming score by having 1 char kill the chars on the other accounts?
They're basing it on wishes and happy thoughts. All they would have to do to prevent that is put a kill/damage/heal whatever cycle on the system like we have now.
 

Viquire

Crazed Zealot
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
So, here are things to keep in mind about the new score system:

Scores are averages over time, meaning your score can go up and down as conditions change.

Since scores are over-time averages, they allow people with small amounts of play time to be compared to people with large amounts of play time, on the same scale.

We realize we'll never be able to build a completely un-exploitable system, but the idea here is that the more you work to game the system, the more the result looks like actual PvP.
I like the sound of this comparative ranking very much. Looking forward to trying to break it. ;)
 

Phoenix_Mythic

UO Legend
VIP
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
What's to prevent someone with... 5+ accounts multi-clienting and farming score by having 1 char kill the chars on the other accounts?
I think it might be interesting to add some sort of "crystal ball" to faction strongholds that gives out sextant coordinates of locations where faction fighting is taking place along with an indication of the size of the fight. Since the new score system does track where fighting is taking place at any given time, this would be very doable.

Something like that would at the very least make it so if you were busy cheating then it'd be likely that some unwelcome guests would crash your party, or you'd have to keep gating around.

Again, if it's easier to just fight than to game the system, I'd hope people would just have fun fighting.
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Something like that would at the very least make it so if you were busy cheating then it'd be likely that some unwelcome guests would crash your party, or you'd have to keep gating around.
Not if it were inside your house.....
 

Cetric

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
UNLEASHED
Not if it were inside your house.....
I like the coordinate idea.

And i definitly think making it so you cant get points while in a house would be a really really good thing, help versus exploits, and cut down on house fighting o.0
 

Phoenix_Mythic

UO Legend
VIP
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
And i definitly think making it so you cant get points while in a house would be a really really good thing, help versus exploits, and cut down on house fighting o.0
This is something we intend to do, and if possible it will be added before the next public playtest of the score system.
 

Lore Denin (GL)

Sage
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I like the concepts and theory behind the new ranking system. Please give us ample time to workout bugs and potential exploits on Test. Here are some of my initial views of benefits and pitfalls incorporating some of what you said from previous posts:

Designate the Strongholds as "Heroic Areas". Provide players with incentive to actively Fight/Defend the Stronghold by rewarding them with a higher rank value for their efforts. Having the Sigils in the Faction stronghold would increase the overall "heroism" of the battle.

This would help focus faction fighting by increasing the overall rank of people who actively particpate in the faction goals of raiding, defending and controlling the towns.

Important: Limit the "Heroic Areas" to the Strongholds. Adding additional Heroic areas would diffuse the action and increase the likelihood of explotation. By limiting the location to three possible locations, you would increase the possibility of being caught trying to exploit the system [which undoubtably some people will try to do].

Fighting while holding a Sigil or in the area of a sigil should NOT increase heroism UNLESS it is placed on a Stronghold sigil post. I can see people with multiple accounts stealing the sigil with one character and then organizing fights with friends and such while the character is hidden holding the sigil. The ability to use this as an exploit would be endless and would ruin the ranking system.

I think it might be interesting to add some sort of "crystal ball" to faction strongholds that gives out sextant coordinates of locations where faction fighting is taking place along with an indication of the size of the fight. Since the new score system does track where fighting is taking place at any given time, this would be very doable.
I worry about giving players the ability to track faction fights all over Felucca. When I am not at my base defending (which is rare when I play), I enjoy the occasional run in with a skilled enemy whom I can test my skills. I do not want to be suddenly zerged by all the opposing factions or even aided by my own Faction at that point. I enjoy the large scale battles in the context of Raiding/Defending bases, however I do not want to be ganked everywhere I fight in game.

Instead of tracking faction fights all over Felucca, Limit it to tracking fights in areas of Faction domain like a controlled Faction Town (as you are now responsible for its protection) and an Allied Creatures Spawn Area (Players should be able to help allies and prevent other factions from farming silver).

Knowing when enemies are attacking your territory and your allies is great incentive to control towns.

-Lore
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Can you please clarify what goes into the points for Intel? Is this using the tracking and detecting skills? Where does removing traps fit in? And what about making trap deeds and trap removal kits or making other items that use faction silver?

I'd just as soon you forgot the whole mess and just kept track of kill points and dumped the artifacts, but since it's clear you're not going to do that, can you please give us better details on all those odds and ends skills that the "support" or "crappy" players tend to use??
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I hope that at least for intelligence gathering purposes, you will be including some of the area outside of the strongholds too. It's kind of pointless to have a scout who is supposed to be warning you about incoming enemies getting an incentive to do their scouting while inside the stronghold. What can they possibly see? They often need to be at least a little distance outside of the stronghold to be able to give you a decent warning.
 
C

Cloak&Dagger

Guest
Lore while your post is sensible and credible, it does not help them to prevent gaming the system.

A few possible things to note, I do not think you should get points for healing YOURSELF healing others is a tactical move, healing yourself...if you do not heal yourself then you mind as well just go afk, plus this allows for to much room for gaining points. Also a diminishing returns type system would work, like you can't gain points from simply repeatedly hitting the same person over and over, also can't gain simply from healing the same person over and over.

I know I do not have perfect ideas, but it is not like it is easy to fix the problem at hand. xD

Thoughts? Opinions?
 
C

Cloak&Dagger

Guest
I hope that at least for intelligence gathering purposes, you will be including some of the area outside of the strongholds too. It's kind of pointless to have a scout who is supposed to be warning you about incoming enemies getting an incentive to do their scouting while inside the stronghold. What can they possibly see? They often need to be at least a little distance outside of the stronghold to be able to give you a decent warning.
I was under the impression that they would gain points so long as there was enemy faction members in the area. So....it is not limited to just the stronghold? Or did I misread something, or not see something posted?
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Cloak‡1691498 said:
I was under the impression that they would gain points so long as there was enemy faction members in the area. So....it is not limited to just the stronghold? Or did I misread something, or not see something posted?
That's my point....if the crediting is limited to fighting that occurs in the stronghold, then someone using tracking outside of the stronghold entrance would get no credit for it.

Phoenix hasn't clarified this issue in this thread. He just talked about "faction fighting nearby." No definition of what constitutes "faction fighting." No definition of "nearby."
 
S

Stupid Miner

Guest
I think it might be interesting to add some sort of "crystal ball" to faction strongholds that gives out sextant coordinates of locations where faction fighting is taking place along with an indication of the size of the fight. Since the new score system does track where fighting is taking place at any given time, this would be very doable.

Something like that would at the very least make it so if you were busy cheating then it'd be likely that some unwelcome guests would crash your party, or you'd have to keep gating around.

Again, if it's easier to just fight than to game the system, I'd hope people would just have fun fighting.
Clever, it's definitely a step in the right direction.
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
This is something we intend to do, and if possible it will be added before the next public playtest of the score system.
You need to clarify soon what's going to happen to the houses that already exist right on top of the sign-up stones and what will happen to those areas in the future. It's ridiculous to have houses one tile away from the sign up stone and blocking the entire path to a stronghold.
 

Lore Denin (GL)

Sage
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Cloak‡1691496 said:
A few possible things to note, I do not think you should get points for healing YOURSELF healing others is a tactical move, healing yourself...if you do not heal yourself then you mind as well just go afk, plus this allows for to much room for gaining points. Also a diminishing returns type system would work, like you can't gain points from simply repeatedly hitting the same person over and over, also can't gain simply from healing the same person over and over.

I know I do not have perfect ideas, but it is not like it is easy to fix the problem at hand. xD

Thoughts? Opinions?
I completely agree. I do not understand the inner mechanics of the system well enough to make useful comments. Intuitively, skills like healing, stealthing seem like they would be very hard to control and protect against exploitation but they also seem positive they can do it.

So in the end I will just have to wait and test to see if the ranks seem to be working and we'll have to make notes of where they might have to alter their formula or eliminate a factor.

Tina you also bring up many great points and concerns. We might have to just test and see.

Also your right on about the houses.... Not sure if a Gm can do this but homes should be moved a screen or two away before the system goes live and a no placement zone should be in effect for at least a screen in every direction from the signup stone (which might also give you an extension of the faction zone for intel points and rank consideration [whatever that exactly means :) ]

-Lore
 
C

Cloak&Dagger

Guest
I completely agree. I do not understand the inner mechanics of the system well enough to make useful comments. Intuitively, skills like healing, stealthing seem like they would be very hard to control and protect against exploitation but they also seem positive they can do it.

So in the end I will just have to wait and test to see if the ranks seem to be working and we'll have to make notes of where they might have to alter their formula or eliminate a factor.

Tina you also bring up many great points and concerns. We might have to just test and see.

Also your right on about the houses.... Not sure if a Gm can do this but homes should be moved a screen or two away before the system goes live and a no placement zone should be in effect for at least a screen in every direction from the signup stone (which might also give you an extension of the faction zone for intel points and rank consideration [whatever that exactly means :) ]

-Lore
GMs should be able to do this in theory, but I do not know if they can move the house in its entirety, I'm sure they could move the house, and each item in it one by one.... But the houses being right in the way is an issue.
 

Viquire

Crazed Zealot
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I think it might be interesting to add some sort of "crystal ball" to faction strongholds that gives out sextant coordinates of locations where faction fighting is taking place along with an indication of the size of the fight. Since the new score system does track where fighting is taking place at any given time, this would be very doable.

Something like that would at the very least make it so if you were busy cheating then it'd be likely that some unwelcome guests would crash your party, or you'd have to keep gating around.

Again, if it's easier to just fight than to game the system, I'd hope people would just have fun fighting.
I like the sound of all of this very much indeed. I do still have questions about the open section of castles, but I will be making plans to place one straight away so the possible impact can be determined.

Thank you for hearing the concerns of the players and responding promptly and creatively.
 
L

Lord GOD(GOD)

Guest
I get the feeling I'm reading this wrong. In the example the player has 2x the damage points of the shard average, is that likely? I know thats just an example for numbers sake but what I mean is isn't it more likely that the shard average is primarily going to be generated by the shards largest guilds fighting over bases/spawns/harrowers etc, and therefore always be a number vastly higher than an indviduals damage score? With that in mind, you said also that someone fighting against the odds has their points weighted, are they going to be weighted so heavily that a player on their own can achieve any kind of rank with which to get faction gear?

At the moment it doesn't sound like it. It sounds like what we have now, some players with billions of points raising the bar for people who have just joined. (I am pretty much convinced I've understood this wrong or it seems you're just recreating the current problem in a more elaborate way.)
 
C

Cloak&Dagger

Guest
I get the feeling I'm reading this wrong. In the example the player has 2x the damage points of the shard average, is that likely? I know thats just an example for numbers sake but what I mean is isn't it more likely that the shard average is primarily going to be generated by the shards largest guilds fighting over bases/spawns/harrowers etc, and therefore always be a number vastly higher than an indviduals damage score? With that in mind, you said also that someone fighting against the odds has their points weighted, are they going to be weighted so heavily that a player on their own can achieve any kind of rank with which to get faction gear?

At the moment it doesn't sound like it. It sounds like what we have now, some players with billions of points raising the bar for people who have just joined. (I am pretty much convinced I've understood this wrong or it seems you're just recreating the current problem in a more elaborate way.)
The way I read it, the larger groups would be gaining less points than smaller groups, so that in turn starts to even the field. Then the "average" could still be maintained at a relative pace as to be easy for everyone to gain.

The example above is based on a 2 person scoring system, basically if i have 2000 points and you have 1000 points the average is 1500 points and I have 2000 so I would have 1.25x the points of the average.

if we put it on a grander scale, let us say there are 20 players in factions

I have 2000 points and each of the rest of the players have 3000 points, that means there are 59000 points in the system, averaging to 2950 points per player, so I would have .67 points relative to the total number of players. Obviously the closer you are to the top, the better you will be, but the idea here is to give the rank a bit of meaning so that not everyone is running around rank 10 unless they actually are as good as the other rank 10 people (meaning they accumulate the same number of points)
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
The example above is based on a 2 person scoring system, basically if i have 2000 points and you have 1000 points the average is 1500 points and I have 2000 so I would have 1.25x the points of the average.
I was thinking the 2000 was a fixed number to multiply the average ratio to compute a score. The ratio is based on an average, not just 2 people.
 
L

Lord Strahd

Guest
Basically, what we're after here is a score system that is more meaningful than the old, is more difficult to exploit, provides some kind of measure of participant performance relative to other participants, and encourages participation in larger and more balanced fights.
A very interesting piece of work you have there Mike Moore. It sounds like it has a lot of potential, and works toward the goals you presented.

However, what is your definition of meaningful? Did you mean more meaningful by being more accurate? Did you mean more meaningful by being fun? Did you mean more meaningful by being something to get people out there and participating in factions? Did you mean meaningful as in people will care about those stats?

I'm saying are you assuming people will come out to factions and change the way they are playing in those factions, based on those statistics alone?

I think it might be interesting to add some sort of "crystal ball" to faction strongholds that gives out sextant coordinates of locations where faction fighting is taking place along with an indication of the size of the fight. Since the new score system does track where fighting is taking place at any given time, this would be very doable.
I know of other games that Mythic is involved in and they have something very similar to what you are describing there. However it also has other affects that you didn’t describe. Like for instance, there wouldn't be any surprise attacks, considering that everyone who is looking in the globe would know when and where the fight is taking place, that’s of coarse assuming that surprise attacks would make a difference or have a place in the future.
 

slayer888

Lore Keeper
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
We're working to fix the issues that caused the score system to break down and report scores of -2.1 billion. Once that is fixed, we will be re-opening the Factions test shard. Right now we don't have an ETA but we're working to get it going again early this week.

In the meantime, I'm gonna start this thread to discuss the intentions and some of the details of the new scoring system, so that everyone will have a better understanding of what to expect when the test server is available again.

Basically, what we're after here is a score system that is more meaningful than the old, is more difficult to exploit, provides some kind of measure of participant performance relative to other participants, and encourages participation in larger and more balanced fights.

To accomplish those goals, the new score system works in a fashion that is radically different than before. Kill points are gone. The system still tracks kills and deaths, but those are there just for bragging rights and leaderboard positions.

Rather than tracking kill points, the system instead tracks various battle statistics over time. These stats are tracked per individual and in aggregate all faction players. It works by keeping track of when Faction fighting is in progress. Only when Faction fighting is happening nearby will your stats be tracked and your scores be recomputed.

Instead of presenting a score computed from raw numbers, the system instead compares your average stats over time to the global average. The result is a comparison showing how your average performance compares to the entire server.

For example, if you've done an average of 10 DPS for all the time you've spent in Factions fights and the serer average is 5 DPS, then your average is twice the server average. If we call this ratio a "Rating" then your Damage Rating would be 2.0.

The Ratings are multiplied by 2000 to produce a score. This way, the average score for each of the five ratings is 2000. In the above example, your Damage score would be 2000 * 2.0 = 4000.

Your total score is the sum of your five sub-scores, so the average total score is 10000.

Now, the system modifies the raw numbers tracked as part of a "renown" system. The idea behind it is that the more witnesses there are to deeds done in battle, the more score those deeds are worth. And, the more one-sided a battle is, the more score the deeds are worth to the underdogs and the less they are worth to the larger side.

The idea is that small battles are not particularly notable and a zerg is not heroic.

An overwhelming force is expected to win, so their battle stats tracked for that fight are reduced. On the other hand, the smaller force, being overwhelmed by a larger one, will gain more benefit to their score for that fight because they are fighting long odds.

And, for larger fights, everyone involved will get a buff to their stats tracked for that fight. It's much better all around to fight 10v10, or at least 10v5, than it is to fight 3v3.


So, here are things to keep in mind about the new score system:

Scores are averages over time, meaning your score can go up and down as conditions change.

Since scores are over-time averages, they allow people with small amounts of play time to be compared to people with large amounts of play time, on the same scale.

Scores will tend to fluctuate wildly when the system first goes online, because the global averages will vary a lot, until there is a lot of data in the system. Over time, the scores will stabilize and change more slowly. Note that there is a decay mechanism that will prevent the averages from becoming locked in with so much weight that they eventually won't move much at all.

In order to exploit the system to artificially inflate scores, you need a lot of people making coordinated effort; we hope that it will just be easier to go and fight for real than to go to all the trouble to cheat it. We realize we'll never be able to build a completely un-exploitable system, but the idea here is that the more you work to game the system, the more the result looks like actual PvP.
After listening to the idea from you, it seems its maybe not bad for the participation. However, I would like to say that, this is almost mission impossible.

1.)
Its easy to list out how these points work but to do it without flaws???? I doubt it honestly. It will end up with more bugs, issues and whines in the end in my opinion. Moreover, its very complicated for us to understand as well.

2.)
I think that faction should be focused on improving the participations of faction town raids, sigils guard, fights. It should not only focus on the small pvp populations instead focus on the community (include trammies) as a whole.

The faction arties did help with the participation of "JOINING" but not really helped much for the participation of the above (raids, guard, fights). You could see that nowadays many guilds are joining factions to get the arties but never participate into fights.

3.)
In my opinion, faction arties should stay as powerful as now because you risk 20 minutes stat loss everytime you die. However, faction arties should be a system to help the participation of fights, instead of only helping the participation of joining and going back to Trammel to wrack on monsters.

4.) In order to prevent this happening, I thought of several ways:-

a.) Enable all faction people to kill each others outside of town guards area (even in Trammel as well). However, I believe this is just gonna reduce both the participation of "Joining" and participation of "Fighting" in the long run. Because if your connection is not good, you are more dumb than the other guy, you will just end up eating dirt no matter how hard you struggle which will drive you out of the competitions sooner or later. Again this method, I wouldn't recommend at all.

b.) Add in different faction monsters in key (resources farming, monsters bashing) area in Trammel, to make things tougher for those trammies who joined faction but not participating into Felucca fights or sigils guarding. Faction monsters at this stage will not provide silver coins at all. This I think is very simple. However, what type of monsters to implement is yet to know. Maybe we could even make a story saying an all-out war between factions warriors/mages all over the world (work similar to that of terathan vs ophidians).

For example, you go to UOSA hunting essence of achievement. There are some factions npcs (warriors/mages) fighting each others or lurking around to kick different factions butt. So this is an add-on trouble to those who bring factions chars to trammel side for hunting. If faction npcs kicked your butt in trammel, you will still get the stat loss as you normally would by players in fel.

By standing at the Trammies side point of view, I believe that in their mind, their main enemy are monsters they are bashing daily (instead of players which kick their butt everytime they step in Felucca).

c.) Based on the EM events system, I must conclude that these ALWAYS are able to involve 90+% (online players) to participate in the event. We should input this sort of automatic event system in the faction instead. What I mean is, by controlling towns/corrupting sigils, you are allowed to participate into some daily events inside factions (which some of them are only able to participate by controlling the towns, whilst some of them are encouraging all factions and faction members to participate as a whole).

I am not gonna list out the daily event type or anything on this part as I've been mentioned in many many many many posts..... but out of the 3 solutions, I definately would use c.) as it will brings in more interest to control towns, more things to play and helps with the participations as a whole.

It will at least NOT be sending messages such as below:-

If you're weak, you dont deserve faction arties
If you're weak, you dont belong in faction fights
If you're weak, you dont need to participate in anything because it wont make a difference to you anyways

Lets think of the community as a whole and not for only the pvpers or those who play UO 12 hours per day.
 
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Cloak&Dagger

Guest
A very interesting piece of work you have there Mike Moore. It sounds like it has a lot of potential, and works toward the goals you presented.

However, what is your definition of meaningful? Did you mean more meaningful by being more accurate? Did you mean more meaningful by being fun? Did you mean more meaningful by being something to get people out there and participating in factions? Did you mean meaningful as in people will care about those stats?

I'm saying are you assuming people will come out to factions and change the way they are playing in those factions, based on those statistics alone?



I know of other games that Mythic is involved in and they have something very similar to what you are describing there. However it also has other affects that you didn’t describe. Like for instance, there wouldn't be any surprise attacks, considering that everyone who is looking in the globe would know when and where the fight is taking place, that’s of coarse assuming that surprise attacks would make a difference or have a place in the future.
Actually.....it would improve on surprise attacks? It is not keeping track of where other players are, but where fights are. That means if a group "surprises" another group, and another group, or perhaps a larger force of group b, were to see that this fight was going on they could in return "surprise" group a (or both groups a and b if they are a separate group) while the battle was taking place, or perhaps shortly after.


As to the first part, they are not assuming people are going to be super drawn to this method of scoring and come flocking to factions, they are making waves of changes to factions based on the this initial set of changes. Those stats are more meaningful, if you like them to be or not. If you are a "sit and wait till redlined" type of player, you more than likely wont like these changes as much. Also I know most players are not that concerned about kill stealing these days, but at least now each participant is being rewarded, and that is more meaningful than just getting a kill.

Currently if you do hundreds of damage to a player but never kill them, and I wrestle them hitting them for 2 damage and they die, you get nothing and I get all the glory for the "kill", no glory to be had in my mind since it was 2v1....but you get the idea.
 
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Cloak&Dagger

Guest
They have said several times you gain no points inside a house.
Where?
Right here in this thread. I will find the post by mark in the other thread, and the post by Log....(I can't remember his real name or his call tag hah) from the third post, but in the mean time here is one spot.

And i definitly think making it so you cant get points while in a house would be a really really good thing, help versus exploits, and cut down on house fighting o.0
This is something we intend to do, and if possible it will be added before the next public playtest of the score system.
Edit: and the post from mark:

Well, the core of it is consentual pvp. But we want to add other elements to make it relevant to people who don't pvp. For example, I don't play football, never have other than some school yard/sand lot stuff. That doesn't mean I can't be involved in pro-football. I can support the team by buying tickets. I can gamble on it. I can watch the games. I can discuss it with my friends. I can start a magazine about it. I can give commentary. These are all valid ways to be a part of pro football without being good at football.

In the military, I know there are people who spend their entire career and never shoot anyone. My dad was one of them, he was a dentist in the Air Force. He was valuable to them, he was "involved". But as far as I know he isn't much of a warrior.

So, Factions isn't a sport, but the analogy stands that there should be ways to be involved in factions that don't require you to be good at pvp.

If you have spies that just watch the enemy base from invisibility, isn't that valuable? Aren't they putting themselves in danger to serve their faction? Shouldn't that service be counted? Will they every pass Rambo? No, but they are helping and Rambo doesn't hate them for helping. Rambo is glad he has some intel.

As I said above, hiding is only rewarded when enemies are nearby and it is rewarded in direct proportion to how many enemies are nearby. Also, nothing is rewarded if you are inside a private house. You might be able to snipe from a roof, but you will not get credit for it.
Not able to find the other post, Pretty sure it is there though.

Edit 2: Holy crap I did not even think about this before, what if the house was public and all the doors locked? Would no points still be awarded? Being inside a house at all should remove gaining points, not just inside private ones.
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
You do realize Cloak, the first quote was after I commented on the house and the second isn't even in this thread? Lol
 
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Cloak&Dagger

Guest
You do realize Cloak, the first quote was after I commented on the house and the second isn't even in this thread? Lol
Well two were made before you mentioned it, :p

Which is what I said. I do realize the other one was after you said it, but meh, it is still there. I never said in this thread, and you have been in the other two (or three) threads about this, so I thought it was relevant.
 
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Lord Strahd

Guest
Actually.....it would improve on surprise attacks? It is not keeping track of where other players are, but where fights are.
CONTRADICTION

Where there is smoke there is fire, and where there is a fight, there would be players in those fights. If you attacked a (insert anything you like here), wouldn’t it let everyone looking at the globe your location and about how big this fight would be? How would it improve my surprise attack? You now know about the attack because the globe told you about it.

As to the first part, they are not assuming people are going to be super drawn to this method of scoring and come flocking to factions, they are making waves of changes to factions based on the this initial set of changes.
Hmmm, has the developers told you something that the rest of us didn't get to hear.

Wait a second.....*pulls out photo*
Isn’t this a picture of you standing with the developers?

:grouphug:

Those stats are more meaningful, if you like them to be or not. If you are a "sit and wait till redlined" type of player, you more than likely wont like these changes as much. Also I know most players are not that concerned about kill stealing these days, but at least now each participant is being rewarded, and that is more meaningful than just getting a kill.

Currently if you do hundreds of damage to a player but never kill them, and I wrestle them hitting them for 2 damage and they die, you get nothing and I get all the glory for the "kill", no glory to be had in my mind since it was 2v1....but you get the idea.
It seems like you think it would be more meaningful because they are more accurate than the old way. If that’s what you mean then, I think I would agree with you. However I’m not so sure its meaningful in the other ways, unless there’s a lot more coming to factions.
 
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Cloak&Dagger

Guest
CONTRADICTION

Where there is smoke there is fire, and where there is a fight, there would be players in those fights. If you attacked a (insert anything you like here), wouldn’t it let everyone looking at the globe your location and about how big this fight would be? How would it improve my surprise attack? You now know about the attack because the globe told you about it.



Hmmm, has the developers told you something that the rest of us didn't get to hear.

Wait a second.....*pulls out photo*
Isn’t this a picture of you standing with the developers?

:grouphug:



It seems like you think it would be more meaningful because they are more accurate than the old way. If that’s what you mean then, I think I would agree with you. However I’m not so sure its meaningful in the other ways, unless there’s a lot more coming to factions.
Uhm, I am not about to start arguing pointlessly again, your big bold letters mean nothing to me, since it is not accurate. Are you saying you can only surprise someone if you don't know about the fight? then...you are the one who is surprised, it is not a "surprise attack" those are planned, and since the globe is telling you where the fighting is, you can plan the attack. That will be all I have for that topic, unless you make a meaningful post about my comment.

Secondly, if you are unwilling to actually fully read what the developers are saying, and process the information then why should I bother to repeat it, several times over? I will edit this post in a moment with where it is said they plan to make more changes, but don't expect me to hold your hand all the time.

And last, yes we agree.

Edit: Let me know if you need more, pretty sure there is one more post about it.
Since there will be a couple of months between now and when this hits a live server, players will have time to make an alternate suit. All faction artifacts are just replicas of PVE artifacts, so if you really gotta have it, then you can farm it from PVE.

IMO a good imbued suit is plenty good to start. It's not going to be the tip top, but as you point out, nobody is going to have the new faction artifacts so it will be a level playing field.

Anyway, we hope you will come on over to the Factions TC and check it out.

As Mike mentioned, this is just the beginnings... provided there is support from the players to move forward. Cal's not going to let us keep working on it if noone seems to be interested. We are really excited about these changes so I hope you all well at least create a character on the Faction TC and check it out for yourself.
Right now the sigil timers and the process for taking towns are unchanged. Updates to town conquest are on the radar for the future, not this initial Factions update.

Silver is the same, as are the stat loss timers. We are planning on making tweaks to these things as the playtest progresses, with an eye towards including those changes with the first Live publish of this system change.

Our current line of thinking is to reduce the statloss timer but not completely eliminate it.
 
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Cloak&Dagger

Guest
Yeah you did. lol
That was after you asked where, :p

I meant before that I didn't say it was in this thread. :)

Like originally, I just said they had stated it, never meant it was in this thread...I think in that same post I said I had to find the other posts in the other threads :p
 
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Lord Strahd

Guest
Uhm, I am not about to start arguing pointlessly again, your big bold letters mean nothing to me, since it is not accurate. Are you saying you can only surprise someone if you don't know about the fight? then...you are the one who is surprised, it is not a "surprise attack" those are planned, and since the globe is telling you where the fighting is, you can plan the attack. That will be all I have for that topic, unless you make a meaningful post about my comment.
However, what is your definition of meaningful?

Pfft...forget it! :bdh:

Secondly, if you are unwilling to actually fully read what the developers are saying, and process the information then why should I bother to repeat it, several times over? I will edit this post in a moment with where it is said they plan to make more changes, but don't expect me to hold your hand all the time.
As to the first part, they are not assuming people are going to be super drawn to this method of scoring and come flocking to factions, they are making waves of changes to factions based on the this initial set of changes.
I guess Ill have to spell this out to you. My point is that you’re speaking for the developers when you don’t know more than anyone else does. I have no doubt in my mind that there is more, however with statements like the one from developers....

The fact that more people don't play factions makes it hard for our bosses to let us spend time on it.
It doesn't set well with me, and makes me skeptical from the beginning. You’re not the only one that can draw conclusions from developer’s posts, however you dont see me walking around acting like I got the 411.
 

Cetric

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
UNLEASHED
Great idea with the sextant and coordinates! Like it a lot
For sure. The world is toooooooo big to have to scout for a fight 24/7. checking these coordinates will lead you to blood o.0
 

KalVasTENKI

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Would it be possible for people with more then 1 active accounts to have 2 characters in different factions and have one character damaging the other character while one of the characters heals himself continuously and they both farm points or ranks like that? Hope not.
Yeah, that's an obvious exploit already..

Then again it's hard to make any type of system loop-hole proof.

There will always be a loophope...

It will always shed upon the masses.
 
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Lord GOD(GOD)

Guest
Could named regions or directions be worked out instead of coords?

[Direction], [In], [Near], [On]
[Town], [Moongate], [Dungeon], [Island], [Spawn (for T2A)]

I just think by the time you'd looked up the coords it would have moved. Especially the way some people run to the server line etc.
 
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Lord Strahd

Guest
I myself lean more to a very small amount of information.

For instance, a stronghold would light up when attacked.

I dont like the idea of open field fighting lighting up, it would take away any cat and mouse fighting, in my opinion.

I dont think numbers of participants should be listed.
 

MiNi MaGi

Sage
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Note 1:
What's to prevent someone with... 5+ accounts multi-clienting and farming score by having 1 char kill the chars on the other accounts?
They're basing it on wishes and happy thoughts. All they would have to do to prevent that is put a kill/damage/heal whatever cycle on the system like we have now.
maybe yall should re-read his post. he clearly said that kill shots/points are removed. so someone who just kills off his characters wont recieve any benefit form this.
 

Berethrain

Slightly Crazed
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
maybe yall should re-read his post. he clearly said that kill shots/points are removed. so someone who just kills off his characters wont recieve any benefit form this.
It was an example, the question applies to the rest of the scoring system.

Hence the kill/damage/heal etc...but apparently you dont get points from it in a house anyways so its a moot point.
 
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