Feedback regarding trainers, from the new guy.

[erwin]

Well, it might just be me, but I think there are some players who would prefer to play/level till GM in just a few zones, and then spend the time after GMing questing and or exploring. While I was like that too (I spent my last two class remorts levelling up on dock workers and lunatics), I'm not sure how other players would think.

There will be players who give up half way due to the 'grinding' of the same mobs for xp, or those that manage to GM, but then lose interest because they don't know how to quest effectively. Or just reach GM, haven't seen the many zones that 4D has to offer and then leave.

I would think that this is the reason why the new system was implemented.

I do see your point Iwku, in that giving hints may lead to quite a lot of frustration to players whilst they figure it out in the map room. I'm also currently trying to find some trainers for my esper, and having a difficult time with some T3 spells, even though I'm a GM.

But, I'm thinking that as games go, there should be some 'element' of difficulty, and that difficulty shouldn't be restricted to 'level of player + eq versus level of mob'.  Whether that difficulty should also include skill/spell hunting is the issue here, and at the current moment, I'd go for the hints at tier 4. For Tier 4 skills are somewhat "uber", so I'd say have hints, for these hints would narrow it down to maybe 1-2 zones.

Maybe other people that are levelling currently could give their opinions here, so that it'd be better for the imms to decide on how the directions to trainers should be presented.


*On second thought and might not even be related, how about something like a journal that updates itself each time you find a trainer or do something else? I'm thinking of something along the lines of the might and magic journals (at least, for MM6, MM7, MM8). It could update itself each time you type 'practice skills/practice spells' at a journal. So if you found Professor Botta, it would read Professor Botta teaches locate object or something. Useful if you find a mob that teaches a skill/spell you can't learn yet, since I noticed many T4 skills/spells trainers are with zones that have lower tier trainers too.

Journals could also extend to entering zones, or solving quests etc...

[Kvetch]

Funny you should mention a journal...

I actually have a journal coded into the test port - many thanks to Mord who I believe made the original script somewhere and I did a copy/paste on it.  It is a journal that you have to update yourself though, it doesn't update itself.  My problem with the journal is that unless you know how to use it, it's very easy to get stuck in it.  For example, I was testing it out and couldn't figure out why I couldn't save - ended up being the symbol used in the journal is ;s - much like when you do notes it's /s, but ; was also my parser so it was interferring.  The reason I had the journal was for a prize for a quest, but with having so many problems with it (if anyone has read the newbie board in mudschool you know how irritating people can get trying to post messages on there and save them) I've hesitated to do so.  If I knew enough about the journal code (like I said, I copied/pasted - thanks Mord), I'd switch out the symbol so it'd use / like notes do instead of ;.

As for this topic (as I know the journal thing was a bit offtopic) I think I'd rather do:
T1 - Zone - Mobname - Location
T2 - Zone - Mobname - Location
T3 - Zone - Mobname
T4 - Zone - (Hints - instead of zonename on the very uber skills)
or another thought for T4 would be:
T4 - Dimension (Hints instead of dimension name on the very uber skills)

Personally, if it were just hints on the T4 skills, I'd probably just try to get through T4 with the T3 and lower skills that I found and would be happy with any T4 skills that I happened to run across.  Kinda like I think I may've been the only gypsy that never learned woodsing.

The only reason I have T1 and T2 skills the same is because you're really not a non-newbie until t3, IMO.  At T2, you're still trying to figure zones out.  But maybe it's just me and maybe it's because I insisted on really delving into the zones I happened upon.  Of course, I'm trying to approach this from the point of view of someone that's not played the mud before.  I mean, if you're a 20 remort T2, then you shouldn't need all the information that a 0 remort T2 does.  I'd rather err on the side of giving a little too much information and keeping the game fun for newbies, but not selling the farm to keep the cow... er... something like that.

Another suggestion would be to maybe list in the helpfile of the skills/spells the ones that are only really good for PK.  For example, clone (since that's one Virisin said) could say "only effective in a pk situation" or some such junk.

[erwin]

T4 - Zone - (Hints - instead of zonename on the very uber skills)
or another thought for T4 would be:
T4 - Dimension (Hints instead of dimension name on the very uber skills)

Hmm. T4 - Dimension (Hints instead of dimension name on the very uber skills). This for T4 would be like the current hints now, though hints instead of dimension name somehow give more information than just the dimension.

But how about Dimension + Hints for T4 skills/spells?

[Kvetch]

Oh, your hints must give more information than mine would. 

[erwin]

Well, hints would help more than dimension.

I mean, if I was a mage looking for the fireball spell, and only the dimension, say, prehistoric was listed, i'd be looking for ALL the caster type mobs, in the offchance that *one* of them may just teach it.

But a hint would be more focused, hopefully..

[Xeriuth]

Tier 4 skills/spells are uber? I don't remotely see them being uber, uber things or good things are added as subskills and have a quest of some sort attached to them making them the hardest to find.  Tier 4 is just a part of the class, making them exponentially more difficult by offering less information is simply absurd.  I say keep Zone and Mobname, hence when they get to the zone they can type where mobname and see the roomname.  This way all skills/spells are on the same page besides the fact some are in more difficult areas to get to and explore.  Also there are tier 1 and 2 spells better than tier 3 and 4 spells, nothing about them being tier 4 makes them better, take mana and electric blast for example, they suck. Absurdly long timers ruin those spells and i'd much prefer cast magic missile or fireball or call lightning, if not that then shocking grasp. 

All in all spells need a big overhaul and more skills could be added so a fighter or rogue dosn't just have to sit in combat and wait for the mob to die quaffing heals the whole battle or at most be able to start with backstab and use kick during it.  Encircle behead and cleave are essential to the classes, it is what makes the class the class and making it that much harder to get boggles my mind and cheats them out of getting that new skill quicker and using it and having fun. Just like casters have a wide array of spells maybe melees should have several type s of things to use in combat, spice it up a bit? Also with this there could be the potential of initiating a type of chain system... perform these things in this order and get a special move. Just a thought, I've seen it once before and it was pretty impressive.

[Virisin]

The fact that spells are badly organised currently is no reason to not make a good change like this to prepare for the future. Spells ARE going to be reorganised, so are skills. Skills/spells are going through quite a big change atm, not just trainers.

Also, the fact that to be good at warrior/hunter/thief you need the 1 uber skill that class has to offer is ridiculous. Hence why we're going to make the classes more unique, and not have them rely on one skill/spell.

[Iwku]

Quote:

"There will be players who give up half way due to the 'grinding' of the same mobs for xp, or those that manage to GM, but then lose interest because they don't know how to quest effectively. Or just reach GM, haven't seen the many zones that 4D has to offer and then leave.

I would think that this is the reason why the new system was implemented."


So you think that the player who has the style of play of grinding the same mobs is going to leap at the chance to aimless run around the whole future dimension looking for one trainer, then the whole prehistoric for another and then around the whole of medieval for another? If that player was told to go to a certain zone and mob to get a skill, then there would be more chance that this player could find different mobs to grind. 

And I don't see how aimlessly searching an entire dimension helps you learn to quest more effectively. I guess it could be argued that once you found the trainer mob that you might stay and do the quests.  But the player who currently reaches GM and doesn't know how to quest effectively is not going to   suddenly start doing quests because s/he is sent on a wild goose chance to find some random mob that is somewhere in an entire dimension.

As I've said before this new system is a nice idea, but it is more likely players will go out and see new places if they are given the zone and mob name.  It doesn't have to be so difficult.  Actually, it's not even difficult or challenging, it's just mostly time consuming and luck.

[erwin]

Looking at how the trainers are spaced out, it seems that they are there for players to explore the zones, etc, find trainers. While the discussion continues, I have a suggestion.

How about when you find a trainer, say, maybe for fireball, practice it at least once, Mike (at recall), can further your instruction in fireball?

Some reasons, that players may not have enough gold to train till what level they desire, and that the mob may be be in a tedious to get through area (behind aggro mobs, that sort), load keys only on zone reset.

ICwise, it could be something like learning the techniques of fireball say, from Gojira, you trundle back to recall, show Mike the basics, Mike recovers a bit of his amensia, and is then able to teach you fireball all the way up to 80. Of course, for this 'convenience', maybe a bit more gold could be charged.

What do you all think?

[Fizban]

I like the idea, and here's something to support the idea as well as ease my boredom.

Code: [Select]

Intended For: Mob
Type: Command
Arg List: Practice
if %actor.skill(%arg%)%
  if %actor.prac% < 1
    say You have no practices.
    halt
  end
  if %actor.gold% < 500000
    say You can not afford the fee.
    halt
  end
  nop %actor.prac(-1)%
  nop %actor.gold(-500000)%
  eval skill %actor.skill(%arg%)% + %random.3%
  nop %actor.skillset("%arg%" %skill)%
  %send% %actor% You feel more comfortable with your ability in %arg%.
else
  say I can not help you increase your skill in a skill or spell that you do not already know.
end

[Estidn]

I like that idea a lot Erwin would make sense.

[Fizban]

Funny you should mention a journal...

I actually have a journal coded into the test port - many thanks to Mord who I believe made the original script somewhere and I did a copy/paste on it.

It was a script written by Aich on TBA. Mordecai then did a rewrite of it there to make it shorter and neater.

[Kvetch]

Right then.. so *YAY* to Aich! (and Mord for the subsequent rewrite - what's with making these things shorter and neater?)