Suggestion [Heroes] Leveling and Player Retention

[Multitallented]

As a former server owner I have dealt with and solved this problem a long time ago. I can see that it is a big problem.

Inherent in the leveling system is a mechanic that abuses new players and makes good fights between experienced players rare. The level difference has to be 5 or less most often. It also allows for a scenario where senior players can prevent less senior players from playing at all. This is because lower levels are at a severe disadvantage, which results in repeated death at the hands of camping players.

I've heard about this problem a lot on the outside of herocraft. A lot of my players refused to join me on herocraft for this reason. Now my entire town has been shut down temporarily because of this. I argue that it is unreasonable to force everyone on pvp to be nomadic until they grind to level 65. I would also argue that no person/group should be forced to log off to prevent being hunted repeatedly. These things are vital in a hardcore environment.

I would be happy to help code/config/balance any solution that will fix this problem.

Let's weigh the pros and cons.

Current Situation
Pros:
- Simple linear progression
- Strong sense of reward for gaining levels

Cons:
- Divides the server into PvE and PvP
- Punishes you for changing classes by sending you back to PvE until you are near max level
- Forces PvP players to play PvE or be harassed on the PvP server until they are near max level

Dynamic PvP Flagging and zoning (World of Warcraft solution)
Pros:
- Less divided server
- Reduced harassment
- Simple linear progression
- Strong sense of achievement when gaining levels

Cons:
- Reduced PvP
- Added complexity (where should I go to get a good fight?)
- Code development costs are higher
- Possible abuse of non-pvp flagged players stealing or spying

Flat leveling (TF2 solution)
Pros:
- Increased PvP (every fight is a good fight)
- Simple Progression
- Increased Variety (more classes with more fighting styles)

Cons:
- Weak sense of achievement when gaining levels (you don't unlock much or gain hp/damage/etc)

Dynamic Classes with Flat leveling (Star Citizen solution)
Pros:
- Non-linear progression (quests unlock skills to replace your current ones)
- Increased Variety
- Increased PvP
- Becomes a challenge to collect skills.

Cons:
- Added complexity
- Code development costs are higher

Dynamic Classes with PvP flagging (Skyrim solution)
Pros:
- Non-linear progression (quests unlock skills to replace your current ones)
- Increased Variety
- Less divided server
- Reduced harassment
- Becomes a challenge to collect skills.

Cons:
- Very high complexity
- Reduced PvP
- Code development costs are very high
- Possible abuse of non-pvp flagged players stealing or spying

 

[Multitallented]

Apparently the current solution to this problem is to direct new players to the PvE server until they are in the top levels.

 

[TsiJiang]

I wonder if it'd be code-able to make townships safe-zones where members can't hurt or be hurt by other players? Only downside to doing so is players using this to their advantage to hide in their town to heal up and attacks again or people camping outside of towns to attacks players who leave. To alleviate this i suggest making it into a zone buff. If in combat, you are prevented from getting within a certain radius of the town, or per se the edge of the safe-zone. and upon entering the safe-zone the buff is applied for an unlimited amount of time so long as you are still within the safe-zone. Upon exiting the safe-zone the time for the buff is set to a specific number (say 30 seconds) and it counts down. The buff itself essentially makes you invulnerable and you can do no damage via any means spells, arrows, or striking. for the duration of the buff similar to the invuln cleric spell but with a damage to 0 debuff on the player. I go the idea from an old game i still play called Graal Online (Zodiac Server). For that matter the same thing could also be applied to all revival points.

 

[Multitallented]

I wonder if it'd be code-able to make townships safe-zones where members can't hurt or be hurt by other players? Only downside to doing so is players using this to their advantage to hide in their town to heal up and attacks again or people camping outside of towns to attacks players who leave. To alleviate this i suggest making it into a zone buff. If in combat, you are prevented from getting within a certain radius of the town, or per se the edge of the safe-zone. and upon entering the safe-zone the buff is applied for an unlimited amount of time so long as you are still within the safe-zone. Upon exiting the safe-zone the time for the buff is set to a specific number (say 30 seconds) and it counts down. The buff itself essentially makes you invulnerable and you can do no damage via any means spells, arrows, or striking. for the duration of the buff similar to the invuln cleric spell but with a damage to 0 debuff on the player. I go the idea from an old game i still play called Graal Online (Zodiac Server). For that matter the same thing could also be applied to all revival points.

The problem is not township related. The new townships code already has mechanisms built in to handle this. These mechanisms work from what I can see on the siege server beta.

 

[Multitallented]

Let's weigh the pros and cons.

Current Situation
Pros:
- Simple linear progression
- Strong sense of reward for gaining levels

Cons:
- Divides the server into PvE and PvP
- Punishes you for changing classes by sending you back to PvE until you are near max level
- Forces PvP players to play PvE or be harassed on the PvP server until they are near max level

Dynamic PvP Flagging and zoning (World of Warcraft solution)
Pros:
- Less divided server
- Reduced harassment
- Simple linear progression
- Strong sense of achievement when gaining levels

Cons:
- Reduced PvP
- Added complexity (where should I go to get a good fight?)
- Code development costs are higher
- Possible abuse of non-pvp flagged players stealing or spying

Flat leveling (TF2 solution)
Pros:
- Increased PvP (every fight is a good fight)
- Simple Progression
- Increased Variety (more classes with more fighting styles)

Cons:
- Weak sense of achievement when gaining levels (you don't unlock much or gain hp/damage/etc)

Dynamic Classes with Flat leveling (Star Citizen solution)
Pros:
- Non-linear progression (quests unlock skills to replace your current ones)
- Increased Variety
- Increased PvP
- Becomes a challenge to collect skills.

Cons:
- Added complexity
- Code development costs are higher

Dynamic Classes with PvP flagging (Skyrim solution)
Pros:
- Non-linear progression (quests unlock skills to replace your current ones)
- Increased Variety
- Less divided server
- Reduced harassment
- Becomes a challenge to collect skills.

Cons:
- Very high complexity
- Reduced PvP
- Code development costs are very high
- Possible abuse of non-pvp flagged players stealing or spying

 

[TsiJiang]

/rantmode on
Listening to your pros and cons starts to make me wonder if your overall plan is to make the server to be a PVP only server or a majority PVP oriented. While a solution to this would be nice, I just hope that it doesn't cause them to shut down the PVE server. I, for one, have never been to the PVP server nor do i intend to. I avoid PVP like the plague on every MMO I've played all for the simple reason, never ever got any good at it no matter how much i played, learned strategy, I couldn't get better. I might be the only player on the server who feels this way about PVP, or might not, just consider the chance that a loss of the PVE server would be a loss of one or more players. At the very least separate the separate the PVE server into a "legacy PVE" server before making any changes suggested.
/rantmode off
/flameshield up

 

[Multitallented]

/rantmode on
Listening to your pros and cons starts to make me wonder if your overall plan is to make the server to be a PVP only server or a majority PVP oriented. While a solution to this would be nice, I just hope that it doesn't cause them to shut down the PVE server. I, for one, have never been to the PVP server nor do i intend to. I avoid PVP like the plague on every MMO I've played all for the simple reason, never ever got any good at it no matter how much i played, learned strategy, I couldn't get better. I might be the only player on the server who feels this way about PVP, or might not, just consider the chance that a loss of the PVE server would be a loss of one or more players. At the very least separate the separate the PVE server into a "legacy PVE" server before making any changes suggested.
/rantmode off
/flameshield up

I agree. There are absolutely those players who will want PvE only. I think it is unreasonable force someone to PvE or PvP if they don't want to. I believe that is exactly what the current setup is doing though.

Edit: I do think that there is best solution that would bring PvE and PvP together somehow, but that's not what this thread is about. I'm not even sure what that solution is yet, but I think it would involve PvP flagging

 

[TsiJiang]

Ok Reading over and trying to understand the "Star Citizen" system, I'm noticing one thing. Making skills quest based or even level based, regardless to whether or not you have ramping damage and HP still makes PVP unfair to the newer players and makes them still prone to players to say have all the skills and know exactly what to do with them compared to someone who just connected to the server to be with their friends. Granted this might just be a misinterpretation since I can't seem to get a clear definition of what you mean't by "PvP Flagging" with the other two suggestions.

Also what about just Dynamic PvP flagging without zoning. (just realized what you meant by it). with a cooldown timer of say an hour for turning PvP flag back off. and to add to it (also copying from Zodiac server again) forced PvP flagging for capped players and vice versa for players under a certain level.

 

[CoolBeans279]

Apparently the current solution to this problem is to direct new players to the PvE server until they are in the top levels.

Not gonna read all of this but basically what i see from this is lower lvls getting camped.

Well theres ways to prevent camping easily, people rather just get killed over and over and complain.


Point is with hc you cant be lvl 45 and kill a lvl 65 (we're not talking pro player vs some noob who maxed, im talking about the average player)

even lvl 60 vs 65 can be hard sometimes, i think its mainly because attributes.


Anyways best solution is go to pve if you're new.

 

[Multitallented]

Ok Reading over and trying to understand the "Star Citizen" system, I'm noticing one thing. Making skills quest based or even level based, regardless to whether or not you have ramping damage and HP still makes PVP unfair to the newer players and makes them still prone to players to say have all the skills and know exactly what to do with them compared to someone who just connected to the server to be with their friends. Granted this might just be a misinterpretation since I can't seem to get a clear definition of what you mean't by "PvP Flagging" with the other two suggestions.

Also what about just Dynamic PvP flagging without zoning. (just realized what you meant by it). with a cooldown timer of say an hour for turning PvP flag back off. and to add to it (also copying from Zodiac server again) forced PvP flagging for capped players and vice versa for players under a certain level.

The Star Citizen solution does not work like that. You have more skills to choose from, but can only memorize 4-6 at a time. Also, new players could start out with skills that well, don't require a much knowledge about heroes. Let me give you an example:

Lostsoul:
- Basher (passive buff that gives you a chance to stun a player when you hit them)
- Flight (passive buff that makes you faster when you are below 50% hp)
- Lifesteal (passive buff that heals you when you hit players or mobs)
- Reborn (you come back to life at 50% hp when you die)

Hopefully, then you would still have a fair fight. You could even have new players get a random starting class so there is variety. The analogy for this is that players won't have to play checkers before they can play chess.

I agree. That's what I was suggesting for pvp flagging, except you would only let them change flags at spawn instead of having a cooldown.

 

[Carbash]

My biggest concern is that the PVE server is taking away from the PVP server.

Residences are cheap and easy to maintain, and on the PVE server impossible to get in to. There is no reason to make townships on the PVE server and no reason for residences on the PVP server. Items travel across servers, making PVE the optimal server to store items. PVE is where everyone is sent to lvl up, making it less likely they would move to PVP to populate it (due to the convenience of items and a residence already in place on the PVE server). To further the issue, with every map that gets introduced the population gets split even more (bad). To be honest it's a big mess. The ultimate solution, in my opinion, would be to focus on one style of game play. Be it PVP or PVE. Unfortunately I dont think that is what is going to happen.

A possible solution, one large map, where you can flag PVP on or off at a cost and unchangeable for 24 hours. When PVP is toggled off certain items are unusable such as lava buckets, water buckets, and flint and steel. Also create rules against PVP-off flagged players interfering with PVP fights at all (including township raiding) that result in bans.

I also feel that residences should outright be removed.

I hope i have not gone off topic too much, but i feel this is directed at player retention.

 

[Multitallented]

Not gonna read all of this but basically what i see from this is lower lvls getting camped.

Well theres ways to prevent camping easily, people rather just get killed over and over and complain.


Point is with hc you cant be lvl 45 and kill a lvl 65 (we're not talking pro player vs some noob who maxed, im talking about the average player)

even lvl 60 vs 65 can be hard sometimes, i think its mainly because attributes.


Anyways best solution is go to pve if you're new.

It's not just low levels getting camped, it's hard to find good fights for level 65s.

 

[Multitallented]

My biggest concern is that the PVE server is taking away from the PVP server.

Residences are cheap and easy to maintain, and on the PVE server impossible to get in to. There is no reason to make townships on the PVE server and no reason for residences on the PVP server. Items travel across servers, making PVE the optimal server to store items. PVE is where everyone is sent to lvl up, making it less likely they would move to PVP to populate it (due to the convenience of items and a residence already in place on the PVE server). To further the issue, with every map that gets introduced the population gets split even more (bad). To be honest it's a big mess. The ultimate solution, in my opinion, would be to focus on one style of game play. Be it PVP or PVE. Unfortunately I dont think that is what is going to happen.

A possible solution, one large map, where you can flag PVP on or off at a cost and unchangeable for 24 hours. When PVP is toggled off certain items are unusable such as lava buckets, water buckets, and flint and steel. Also create rules against PVP-off flagged players interfering with PVP fights at all (including township raiding) that result in bans.

I also feel that residences should outright be removed.

I hope i have not gone off topic too much, but i feel this is directed at player retention.

It is about player retention so you are not off topic. PvP flagging so far is the popular solution to uniting the player base so I'll start a poll on it in a separate thread.

 

[JupiterRome]

Go to PvE otherwise deal with it

 

[Multitallented]

Go to PvE otherwise deal with it

I've edited my original post to avoid future unhelpful comments like this.

 

[CoolBeans279]

Go to PvE otherwise deal with it

basically, we already made pve to help with this..


Wish all these noobs could see how it was back in dg, 1 map, tons of fun

 

[JupiterRome]

basically, we already made pve to help with this..


Wish all these noobs could see how it was back in dg, 1 map, tons of fun

Yeah I loved Bastion.

I've edited my original post to avoid future unhelpful comments like this.

Dude this actually was VERY HELPFUL IMO Noobs complained about being camped people said its part of the server deal with it, so Kainzo added pve people flamed at him, What more do you fucking want? He already tried to include everyone..
And how does this current system punish you by forcing you to go back to pve till you are near max? I masterd Bloodmage ,Beguiler ,Cleric, Druid, Disciple, Ninja all Last map without going to PvE? I've killed max rangers as a lvl 12 dk when they came to hunt me.... I honestly don't have any idea where you are pulling some of this stuff from?

 

[Multitallented]

Yeah I loved Bastion.

Dude this actually was VERY HELPFUL IMO Noobs complained about being camped people said its part of the server deal with it, so Kainzo added pve people flamed at him, What more do you fucking want? He already tried to include everyone..
And how does this current system punish you by forcing you to go back to pve till you are near max? I masterd Bloodmage ,Beguiler ,Cleric, Druid, Disciple, Ninja all Last map without going to PvE? I've killed max rangers as a lvl 12 dk when they came to hunt me.... I honestly don't have any idea where you are pulling some of this stuff from?

Not all of us want the opportunity to fight a max level ranger as a level 12 anything. I'd rather not waste my time. I think it's great that you can level up, get leaderboard kills, and brag about how many classes you have mastered. Why not do all of those things while avoiding the whole bored veteran/harassed noob thing? How often do you fight another player your level? What if every player could be your level? I would think that would be more fun than trolling the landscape for a fight (especially if you are level 65 and they are 12).

Besides that, it gives the server a bad rep, which is very damaging.

 

[Carbash]

Yeah I loved Bastion.

Dude this actually was VERY HELPFUL IMO Noobs complained about being camped people said its part of the server deal with it, so Kainzo added pve people flamed at him, What more do you fucking want? He already tried to include everyone..
And how does this current system punish you by forcing you to go back to pve till you are near max? I masterd Bloodmage ,Beguiler ,Cleric, Druid, Disciple, Ninja all Last map without going to PvE? I've killed max rangers as a lvl 12 dk when they came to hunt me.... I honestly don't have any idea where you are pulling some of this stuff from?

Its not about "punishing you" by making you go back to PVE to level. Its about keeping the server split and how that is bad for the server overall. While you are not directly forced to level in PVE, it is much easier to do so (due to not being camped). This ease makes leveling on the PVE server generally faster. Ease and speed of leveling is what you are looking for with the "grindy" leveling system in place. He is suggesting multiple ways of fixing the issue at hand (player retention and leveling).

I like the idea of a flag system with a simple linear leveling experience. The reason i don't like the dynamic leveling system is that it would be difficult to balance, or just become cookie cutter specs (which defeats the purpose).

 

[JupiterRome]

Not all of us want the opportunity to fight a max level ranger as a level 12 anything. I'd rather not waste my time. I think it's great that you can level up, get leaderboard kills, and brag about how many classes you have mastered. Why not do all of those things while avoiding the whole bored veteran/harassed noob thing? How often do you fight another player your level? What if every player could be your level? I would think that would be more fun than trolling the landscape for a fight (especially if you are level 65 and they are 12).

Besides that, it gives the server a bad rep, which is very damaging.

Pvp is bad rep?

Its not about "punishing you" by making you go back to PVE to level. Its about keeping the server split and how that is bad for the server overall. While you are not directly forced to level in PVE, it is much easier to do so (due to not being camped). This ease makes leveling on the PVE server generally faster. Ease and speed of leveling is what you are looking for with the "grindy" leveling system in place. He is suggesting multiple ways of fixing the issue at hand (player retention and leveling).

I like the idea of a flag system with a simple linear leveling experience. The reason i don't like the dynamic leveling system is that it would be difficult to balance, or just become cookie cutter specs (which defeats the purpose).

PvE will not be removed Kainzo said this would honestly not have much point, The server will be split