Helping Low Level Players - increase chance of Magical Weapons

Could I suggest that one way of helping low level players cope with the current difficulty level would be to increase the percentage chance of getting magical weapons.

High levels either start with them (LW5) or make them (LA3), and survive long enough to enjoy them.

Low level players are stuck with what they pick up, and since they are dying more frequently than higher-level players, they pickup more frequently than anyone else.
They also quickly lose any good weapons someone gives them. You can't ask on every wave for someone to hand you the flak+4 again.

Just a thought.

Szlat wrote:

They also quickly lose any good weapons someone gives them. You can't ask on every wave for someone to hand you the flak+4 again.

You need to tell everyone who asks me for a particular flak that.

Honestly though, if I still have it, and I'm asked for it, I'll hand them out.

I personally loved levelling up when the requirements up to I believe level 40 were lowered after the server crashed. I'd prefer to have it easier to level up that way rather than allowing a crutch such as ghost or levels of vamp/regen. Being a low level is a pain regardless of difficulty, but if you can cut down on the time to level up to a decent level I think that is the most efficient means of helping low level players. Once you are in the level 40 range you can begin to become competitive and you don't have to spend most of your time staying alive rather than gaining XP. With my first character (Mach10) I didn't score 1000 until I was I believe level 65 or 66 and it wasn't until I was past level 100 that I could consistently survive maps all the way through. Staying alive wasn't simply me being able to buy more levels of vamp or ghost either, learning from the other players and learning the maps is the most crucial imo. I levelled up my other two characters at a faster pace than Mach10 for sure, but even knowing the maps and certain little tricks didn't keep me from dying (especially with my AM haha).

I think I'm going to agree with mach. In my opinion a better way to deal with the issue is to not give them a crutch, but just to lower the XP reqired. I think that could solve alot of the problems. Possibly even increasing the amount of points a new charactor starts with?

I don't think the leveling requirements have changed from when they were lowered after the April crash. What has changed is that the XP values has been changed back to "normal" and the difficulty has been raised.

I'd like to hear from the guys who are starting (even though the class isn't even in beta yet) Mechanic characters. How have you guys found things?

Fro, you're welcome to respond, and of course we will consider your feedback on this carefully. But remember, you are Fro.

I was going to start working on some of the "crutches" (and I was probably one of the first to say I didn't like giving them crutches) code this weekend. But since the discussion has warmed up a bit, I'm holding off (and I'm also looking for suggestions regarding either "different" ways of helping them out or better implementation suggestions).

I'd have to agree with the leveling up comments, giving everyone regen then taking it away seems a bit mean

Another thought would be to set starting health to 120 instead of 100 or something like that, I think an axtra 20 health would give an average lower levels just enough extra to stay alive long enough to not be bored from dying immediatly, plus you wouldnt have to take it away from them later.

I think we should just leave it how it is. You are saying how you don't want to give them a crutch..to me, lowering the XP required is giving them 2 crutches.

It's as simple as this: They don't like it and don't want to take the time to learn and practice then don't play.

It's just like eating something disgusting, you either suck it up and eat it anyway, or you toss it and go get something else.

Recently, I've started from zero with two charators; but since the xp was reset I've effectively started four (one medic, one LA, one LW, and my engineer). Seeing as that I'm decent enough at playing invasion (I understand how the XP works, how to level up, and some good pointers about staying alive: medics, running and hiding, getting good weapons), it has not been much of a challange to me.

My medic was certainly the easiest to level up simply because he could stay alive longer (healing himself) and because he got extra xp from experianced healing (while only small amounts at first, much more noticable latter).

Playing an LW charactor for me, was rather boring and uninvolved. Spawn each map, get a bunch of mostly crappy weapons, run, kill; nothing at all that interesting or different. I don't remember what level I went to with him, but it wasn't that far.

Playing an LA charactor, was extremly hard. The problem is, since this class is based on adrenaline, you need to get adrenaline. While you can sit around and let drip get you some (if your able to afford it early on) that's still not enough adrenaline to do anything in a very timely manner. What that means is that to be successful, you have to go out and kill things. I would arguably say, playing an LA charactor at low levels was almost harder then simply playing a non-class charactor (my engineer). Why? Possibly because I was preoccupid with buying LA abilities (drip, leech, loaded artifacts, adrenaline).

My engineer has been pretty straight forward. Kill, level up, buy stats. Nothing too unusual about him, and in a matter of a few days, I'm up level 24 or something. But this is the point where leveling begins to be very difficult. I think it might be worthwhile to change the XP curve from the start up to around level 35-40. I beleive the XP goes through exponetial increases, my suggestion is to possibly change that to linear increase. To me that makes much more sense for these low levels.

As a side note, I don't think mine or fro's (or anyone else who has started an engineer charactor) would be a very good measure of the difficulty for the early levels. We all understand the game rather well, and at least in mine and fro's case, not only can play well under one class, but can switch our play styles to fit a different one with relative ease (both already have multiple charactors of different classes). To get a good understanding of what new players think, we are going to need to get some real, new players feedback about specific things. For one point, is this low-level player thing, even an issue for most new low-level players? From my experiance, the super low levels (less then 20) are immensly easy due to the simple fact that you only need a few hundred XP to level. The problem comes in the mid 20's when the XP to level starts growing into the few thousands. Again that's biased based on the fact that possibly the early levels are already to easy. Should I be able to level up more than once per map in the early levels? With my engineer, I leveled up 9 levels in one map with the help of a vorpal lightning gun. Is that right or wrong?

A slightly long post there, but I think I did a decent job of dissecting what I could (medic, LA, engineer).

Well, I'm doing pretty good with my engineer so far. The 1st 20+ levels are quick to get. I'm just buying the core skills which isn't much different then any other characters I've had before. Although, not having resupply, an inf medic gun, vamp, or regen makes things a bit trickier. Although, the turrets and link the enginners get i believe will be inf ammo, so that won't be a problem as long as those basic skills don't cost very much.

As of now, I find myself hoarding all the health, shields, and ammo on the maps. This isn't a problem if there are only a few people on, but resources become scarce when theres lots of people picking up health/ammo. I run out of ammo pretty quickly on the later waves Unless there is a higher level medic on, it's hard to keep the health high enough so a nali doesn't sneak up behind me and takes me out in one shot

. Once again, this probably won't be much a problem when the engineer has his skills to buy.

The level requirements for leveling are already lower than they use to be. I'm not sure where the new lvl requirements stops and where the old one begins(i think it might be somewhere in the mid 30's). I think if we stretched out the lvl's to get up to needing 10,000xp to lvl. Let's say the first level to need 10,000xp was 86 instead of 66. That would make a softer incline all the way up. I remember with each of my characters, that the stretch about 60 to maybe the mid 80's was the hardest stretch. (I hope that made sense)

I think doing that would be the best way of helping the lower lvl. That way your not stipping any skills away from them later on or giving them a better chance of getting a cursed weapon(increasing the chance of a migical weapon will also increase the chance of a cursed weapon, which they can't toss). They can always get weapons from other players. Most of the regulars will go out of there way to get weapons to people. Oh, and I think it's a little easier to code than some other things like lets say giving certain lvls players certain skills.

Oh, and just for bragging rights, I broke a 1000 at lvl 22 with my new engineer.

Oh, just for bragging rights I broke 500 with my engineer, started at level 6 went up to level 14.

Not having a class though isn't probably the best way to judge new charactors either though, so that should also be taken into consideration here.

I am still agreeing that altering the experiance curve would be the best course of action as opposed to giving them skills that you will suddenly lose.

Hobo Joe said:

I think we should just leave it how it is. You are saying how you don't want to give them a crutch..to me, lowering the XP required is giving them 2 crutches.

It's as simple as this: They don't like it and don't want to take the time to learn and practice then don't play.

It's just like eating something disgusting, you either suck it up and eat it anyway, or you toss it and go get something else.

Now Joe, we both know that you are level 119 and a much better than average player even without that level taken into consideration.

Correct me if I am wrong, but a number of changes have been made to the difficulty of the game from the time you started your character, including taking away some of the higher + weapons and changing how much damage each plus of a given type is worth in damage. Not to mention the actual difficulty increase (well I just did so...)

Now as I understand it Damage = exp, so if you change the game so that less damage is given (magical pluses) and exp is harder to get due to monster difficulty, you have inflated the worth of experiance in existing characters.

Any thoughts?

I'm looking at it from the time I started my character (before all the changes) it was a hard xp grind then..and people starting characters now. It's a hard xp grind either way. Basically what I'm saying is if they don't want the challenge then they don't have to play.

I agree with Hobo. True, we used to have great weapons and therefore we leveled faster, but it's easier to level up (since the crash) those first 10 - 20 levels. More later... I have to make dinner.

Maybe the anw7ser is to smooth the curve of EXP nessessary to level (as FRO suggested). Up the requirement for the first few levels, but don't have it rise quite so steeply in the 20-30 range...

I wouldent give out a crutch if it was me running things (which I know it would not have lasted this long if I were) but it only takes a map or 2 to make level 17-20. Then it seems just a little later like 5 or 6 just to make a level.

I have been on RPG servers were things were set up so that you could make level 50 in like 5 or 6 hours of play, and after 5 or 6 hours of play they are actually getting boring. I don't want that here.