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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Crepitus wrote:

stuff

If you think I don't care about the solo player, your totally wrong. ALL my posts are from and about the soloist view point.

The reason I say you stopped at WOW is because the rest of the post is about how to make research for the soloist viable, without reverting the kernel drop rate.

With 100% kernel drop rate, the amount of NIC gained by farming NPC's is way too much. If it was reverted they would have to nerf the 'goo' to the point where its more of a nuisance than a NIC source.

And, it looks like I'm going to have to elaborate on the balance discussion, because your still only seeing 'WOW' and not the way I am using it as a comparison.

Paragon, for the WOW illiterate, is one of the top 5 ranked guilds in the world. Out of millions of players and thousands of guilds world wide, these 40 or so players are at the top of the game. The currently released raid content for Cataclysm, this guild finished the content in about 5 weeks (if you don't count the cow kill); short hand for this is 13/13 or they killed all 13 bosses on hard mode. 5 months later, ONLY .28% (no, I didn't misplace the '.' that's .00028) of the thousands of guilds have reached and killed the 'last' boss. But about 20% of the guilds have killed the 'first' boss. (note the %'s only include registered raiding guilds, not the casual 4 newbs that think killing hogger is epic)

Blizzard admits they tuned this tier of raiding a little to high, and they have been nerfing the encounters periodically.

In Perpetuum M2S displays the same qualities of a Paragon. They have a roster full of beta players with months of beta experience that know how to play, excellent leadership, and the ability to work as a team to complete goals. These traits aren't exclusive to M2S, but the fact they finished the research tree first is just one of the things that puts them in the top ranks.

Blizzard balances around only about 20% (guesstimate as they don't actually release this information to the public) of the guilds being 11/13 by the time the next content patch is released, which they are going to miss because they tuned it to hard. But they did not tune the encounters so that it would take a Paragon like guild until the next patch to complete. Also, after the next patch is released, new tiers of gear will allow current raiders to get to 13/13.

There will always be those guilds that lead, and complete content long before the remainder of the guilds even get close. But the game difficulty is balanced around a % of the guilds reaching the goal by a given time.

A corp like M2S will always complete content in Perpetuum long before the majority of other corporations, if they continue to operate in cooperative play, and that is their reward for being good at the game; but its not something that just ANY corp can do as it requires a lot of good players and leadership. M2S is just ONE example, but the number of really GREAT corps in the game is small (and would still be even if there were more players as great players tend to join with the top corps).

So, my analogy is: Perpetuum can't balance the game around the top corps in the game, or the remaining 99% of the corps will be unable to compete.

Reducing the kernel drop rate isn't a straight attempt to nerf research, as its mostly about keeping the NIC gained from NPC farming down, but it IS going to affect kernel research.

Further, my argument with the state of research went a step further, to imply that it is something that needs to get EASIER to do as time passes; or more accurately - There should be a time limit on the lead corporations get from being excellent at the game, or they will never be challenged in the game.

That assumes of course that more content is coming. If T4 is the end of the line than eventually all corps will get there. But assuming there will be T5,6,7 and the current status remains, than a corp like M2S will have T7 while the rest of the corps are still back at T2.

So sure, T1 to T4 at this time is not a terrible gap, but T2 to T7 will be.

Not all corps are created equal and it disingenuous to just say "get better".

Over time as players get experience the general level of play will get better, but so will that of the leading corporations. Even though this is a sandbox game, it is still a game. The framework of the game in combat is set up to eventually allow players to even out extension differences, there also needs to be a game mechanism to allow researches to get significantly better over time. There are also extensions to help miners get better, and builders, but only 1 small extension for research.

More research extensions will help corporations compete and make the game better.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Styx wrote:
Crepitus wrote:

Some people have posted defending this saying "not everyone is supposed to be in t3/t4" -- of course .. so you can have fish in a barrel or keep them in alpha amirite?

Styx wrote:

Not every corporation is supposed to have T3 / T4 research

There's a difference between using T4 equipment and having the research. Sure everyone can use it, they just have to buy it from the players and corporations who put the significant amount of effort in to get the research.

I don't keep a close eye on the market but I check it every so often. A couple of months ago T4 equipment was not widely available on the market. Now, however, there seems to be a lot more of it.

So what we are going to see is a trend where small/new/alpha corps or solo players are always going to be behind the curve when new tech is patched in, and it's always going to take a couple of months for them to be able to catch up even if they just want to buy their top tier gear.

I also think corporations who operate during the morning server time will have an advantage, because they can sneak onto islands usually dominated by EU/US folks and mine, use the outposts, do missions or farm NPCs with little risk. So unless the current beta corps come to dominate all timezones, there is always going to be an opportunity for non-beta corps to trickle beta resources onto the alpha market.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Arga wrote:

Reducing the kernel drop rate isn't a straight attempt to nerf research, as its mostly about keeping the NIC gained from NPC farming down, but it IS going to affect kernel research.

I think if the only intent was to reduce NIC from farming NPCs they would have reduced the amount of kernels required to research something to match the nerf (which to the best of my knowledge, they did not). 

That would have kept the research curve as it was intact.  It seems pretty clear that they intended to slow research down by a huge amount and in doing so hurt everyone not at the top of the trees disproportionately.

Arga wrote:

Further, my argument with the state of research went a step further, to imply that it is something that needs to get EASIER to do as time passes; or more accurately - There should be a time limit on the lead corporations get from being excellent at the game, or they will never be challenged in the game.

This is a good point, but I don't know how that could be implemented in a way that would seem fair to all parties.  As is obvious from Styx's commentary, they feel like they've earned the right to sit on the tech superiority throne and want to extend that lead for as long as possible (to the detriment of .. basically everyone else wink).

Also .. I should point out that the argument you're making for research is pretty much identical to some of the ones made about EP in other threads wink which means probably we won't get anything in either case since I believe the current stance is Working As Intended.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

All we can do is post and hope )

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Arga wrote:

So sure, T1 to T4 at this time is not a terrible gap, but T2 to T7 will be.

This is an interesting point...how much of a gap should higher tiered gear create? Should it be like extensions, where optimum efficiency is at level 5? So in a year do we want to see the majority of people running around in T5 gear for pvp on beta, whereas T10 is so expensive it's not worth risking so you only see rich industralists swanking around it on alpha?

This is something we should be giving the devs feedback on now.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Crepitus wrote:

As is obvious from Styx's commentary, they feel like they've earned the right to sit on the tech superiority throne and want to extend that lead for as long as possible (to the detriment of .. basically everyone else wink).

I don't think this at all. I simply want everyone else to go through as much effort as we did. If the kernel drop rate wasn't reduced then it would become easier to get technology research by a not insignificant amount.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Styx wrote:

I don't think this at all. I simply want everyone else to go through as much effort as we did. If the kernel drop rate wasn't reduced then it would become easier to get technology research by a not insignificant amount.


How does it get easier by staying the same as it was for you?

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

One thing that sticks out for me is the point Arga makes above in relation to addition of new content. We had the observers dropped in and their kernels make a nice big dent in research, who's to say that in the coming months other 'stepping stones' aren't added that significantly benefit those earlier in the tree?

Possibly kernels from missions or alpha artefact scanning which have a bonus to research in the T1 - T3 realm if they say add T5 and T6 levels in. This way the corps with full tech trees get their new levels to hit and the gap isn't widened too much as others can concentrate on the bonus kernels to accelerate their research up a bit also. This also means newer corps aren't always crippled with the same rates which were needed to get to the top first.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Crepitus wrote:
Styx wrote:

I don't think this at all. I simply want everyone else to go through as much effort as we did. If the kernel drop rate wasn't reduced then it would become easier to get technology research by a not insignificant amount.


How does it get easier by staying the same as it was for you?

Did you just choose to participate in a discussion about the recent kernel change and plasma addition without reading the patch notes regarding said changes.

Edit: This is a great discussion, please keep it extraordinarily civil. Thanks. - DEV Calvin

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

I don't think any of the kernel/plasma changes were necessary at all.  Easy to see why you're the leader of the biggest Troll factory in game.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Crepitus wrote:

I don't think any of the kernel/plasma changes were necessary at all.  Easy to see why you're the leader of the biggest Troll factory in game.

It's besides the point whether you think they were necessary or not. What's relevant is the impact that they had which you completely neglected to factor into anything you've posted.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

styx wrote:

It's besides the point whether you think they were necessary or not. What's relevant is the impact that they had which you completely neglected to factor into anything you've posted.

Translation: I disagree with you.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

I don't get what your saying here syndic. There's not enough to do in game so you want people able to finish research easier? Observer kernels are already making it easier. This was a well needed balance.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Campana wrote:

This is an interesting point...how much of a gap should higher tiered gear create? Should it be like extensions, where optimum efficiency is at level 5? So in a year do we want to see the majority of people running around in T5 gear for pvp on beta, whereas T10 is so expensive it's not worth risking so you only see rich industralists swanking around it on alpha?

This is something we should be giving the devs feedback on now.

Keep in mind that Tiered gear is not just about combat, T4 industrial mining etc also has a impact on players ability to earn NIC and in resource gathering. The T4 PVP items just get the most media attention.

Looking from this perspective, a Riveler decked out in T4 mining gear (with T4 Nexus) has a clear advantage over a T1/2 miner. The difference between T1 and T4 combat is much more subjective, as player skill, fit, and opponent fit can effect the outcome. If you could somehow nullify skill and EP differences, than I think it would be clear that T4 has a clear numerical advantage, but that's not how the game works, so Tiered items in combat are not so clear cut.

On average however, T4 even over T3 gives the advantage to the higher tiered combatant, if they are able to capitalize on it. T5 should give a CLEAR advantage over T4, as its the next 'set' of hardware, but T6 should only be incrementally better than T5.

What this does, is makes getting to the next "set' of hardware tier a must for hardcore, but the expensive and research to get there should be in proportion to the advantage.

Where the issue arises, is if its TOO difficult to get to T5 that only the best corp in the game can do it, than that Clear advantage becomes the "I WIN" button.

Either T5 would need to wait until the majority of hard core corps (beta) where finished with the tree, so they all start at '0' again in the race for the next tier, or T5 research would have to rapidly advance up to T4. Some corp will get there first, and they will have a time when they are very strong, but that lead will only last until the next best corp gets to T5, etc.

Create a distinct 'gap' between tech releases, so there is strong motivation to upgrade, but make it easier to get through the previous set so that the gap continues to feel like T1 vs. T4, but its T4 vs. T5.

Perpetuum has already set the expectation with 4 levels of tech in the first release. They could slow this down by only having 1 more level each time, and that it is a significant upgrade, or they can continue to have smaller incremental changes in tech, like T5-10 for the next set.

More levels adds complexity to balancing, but seems like it would be more fun for players, not to mention lots of weird new names. smile

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

The reason I was mainly looking at extensions and not additional world drops for changing the research rate is simply that there's no complexity in the Prototyping 'profession'.

Currently Research is Complexity 1 and it can take as little as 12.5k EP to cap it at 10%. After this points are than put into making more prototypes faster with less material costs.

There's no decisions to be made, you cap research then start eating kernels. As you progress, your putting points into protype production and that's it.

It would be much more interesting if there were additional research paths, such as 1 for each faction and industry for another 10%. Once at 10x2 for say Nimqual and eating kernels, now you have to decide if your going to start skilling prototyping or if your going to go to 10 in another faction.

The advantage from the game point is it requires corps to have more than 1 prototyper, since the production of prototyped equipment is going to be slower because they have to spend EP on research instead of production.

The addition of a 3rd type of research skill, that only allows you to research a certain level of kernel, like light, assualt, mech, ect but also adding 1% more research per skill, would further add complexity to a currently flat profession. Or, this 3rd extension could be complexity 9 and relates to the max tier you can learn; skill 4 to learn T4.

The %'s are just out there, I don't have the same info Styx has, so maybe its .5% or 2%.

Corps that want to get tiered gear quickly will need to spread around the kernels to the specialized players. But they will also have to balance research time with production logistics; so maybe its better to just go 6x2 and use more kernels, but reduce the production material costs and time with those EP.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

thats partially how the "research" worked before they introduced the kernels.

you had a whole set of extensions for production, seperated like the enabler-extensions:
- basic/advanced robot production
- nuimqol/thelodica/pelistal tech
- ....

training up the extensions was the "research".

but that would lock out the higher tier equip even more from newer player (just as the control of heavy mechs)

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Annihilator wrote:

but that would lock out the higher tier equip even more from newer player (just as the control of heavy mechs)

I understand this point, the gateway extension idea is something that would put a time limit on research, and would defeat the purpose of catching players up. I felt OK as I wrote it, but I didnt really think it out to like T10, where it would take 145 days.

I agree that time gating is exactly what I said I didn't want, so this is a bad suggestion.

The faction specific extensions still fit the goal, because they are bonuses you get for every level, which is what I intended; the longer you specialize in Research the more you get from each kernel.

Getting to something like "T10" is still going to take a wildly large number of kernel's, so its not likely that a new player would reach T10 in 145 days anyway, but if they are part of a large corporation feeding them kernels, there shouldn't be a gate stopping them from getting to the 'highest' tiered available; just the volume of kernels they are able to gather and the % bonuses.

Thanks for pointing that out.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

As someone who is considering joining this game with my DDO guild, I think it's more reasonable that it take 2-3 months(4 at the most) to get to top CURRENT tech in some areas with 60-80 people in a guild. 6 months is IMHO too long.

Another factor you need to consider is that this is only the current tech in the game. As they add items for us to use both higher tier and a wider selection(like the arties they promise) the grind will only get longer. For a 6 month old game with a relatively short current tech tree, 6 months is too long.

The more I read the less I think I'll be joining this game with my guild, although I am still considering it. It's not that it's a bad game, or the time required, it's that the devs keep making the wrong decisions if their aim is to increase the fun factor and accessibility to new players.

It is just a game after all.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

This is a long thread, and a complext topic, but most of the issues are with smaller guilds.

A corporation with 60 active members working together would complete most of the tech tree in 4 months, even with the reduced kernel drop rate. This assumes that you spend most of the first month building skills and establishing yourself on one of the new beta islands.

Truely, at this point in the game, with new Islands coming soon, a relitively large 60 person corp could have a really big influence in the game. If you wait a year to join, even a 60 person corp would have trouble 'keeping' an outpost against even a smaller more established corp.

70 Reply by Xyra Arien (edited by Xyra Arien 2011-04-11 08:21:36)

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Arga, I'm not looking for a game to play for a week or a month, I'm looking to do something when I've done a 10 hour play-session in DDO And I'm burned out for the next several years.

My issue is not with what my corp would be capable of, but rather the overall health of the game and a constant influx of new players to increase the player-base.(Doesn't have to happen overnight!)

I'm not interested in what would happen to me/my corp. I'm interested in good governance of the game by the devs so that the game thrives and it's not shut down in 6 months or 2 years.

Near as I can tell they got some devs together and made themselves an EVE clone without truly understanding why EVE worked so well, and how the differences in their game impact the deign decisions they make/how to fix things that are broken.

I can't really even give advice or see how well they are doing at their goals without knowing their design goals. Big game with lots of players? Small game with steady growth? Do they prefer open world PVP or territorial lock-downs? How much should a larger guild outnumber a smaller guild before they have a chance and how long should they have to grind to get that chance?

Lots of questions, few answers. By appearances they are just knee-jerking things toward a more EVE-like game without comprehension of the differences and/or the advantages of doing things diffrently.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Crepitus wrote:
Styx wrote:

I don't think this at all. I simply want everyone else to go through as much effort as we did. If the kernel drop rate wasn't reduced then it would become easier to get technology research by a not insignificant amount.


How does it get easier by staying the same as it was for you?


You obviously did not read the last few pages of comments nor the latest patch notes. Or maybe you just did not think about the changes...

More NIC from new loot compensates loss of NIC from Kernels. If Kernel prices stay around the same as they were so far, you can buy as many kernels from market in exchange of your loot NIC that in total you again have a kernel for each NPC kill.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Andrew Redburn wrote:

More NIC from new loot compensates loss of NIC from Kernels. If Kernel prices stay around the same as they were so far, you can buy as many kernels from market in exchange of your loot NIC that in total you again have a kernel for each NPC kill.

Now usual price of 2-3 tier kernels is about 30k. Before nerf it was less than 10k (usually it was possible to buy it for 5-6k).

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

ty 4 bump, t4 also increased in nic cost

74 Reply by Styx (edited by Styx 2011-05-04 14:35:42)

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

As an update to this I'd prefer it if the kernel drop rate was put back to 100% however the kernel research values decreased accordingly. The overall effect would be the same however it wouldn't be a dice roll as to whether you got a kernel or not.

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Re: Revert the kernel nerf.

Styx wrote:

As an update to this I'd prefer it if the kernel drop rate was put back to 100% however the kernel research values decreased accordingly. The overall effect would be the same however it wouldn't be a dice roll as to whether you got a kernel or not.


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