change the repetition XP penalty?

[Dariun]

I think the XP penalty for repeating a quest multiple times should be changed.

My preference would be to put it on a timer just like the chest ransack timer except with a longer duration. The ransack timer lasts a week. I would say a month would be a good time for the repetition timer.

This would be most helpful for people who get stuck in mid levels (8-12) and are finding it harder and harder to find XP.

Why a month? Because that is long enough to encourage people to go do other quests rather than just wait a week and run Stormcleave 4 more times but it is short enough to minimize the frustration felt by people who get stuck at a level.

This should not reset the bonuses for 1st time completion on Normal/Hard/Elite; just reset the penalty counter so that after a month the first time through you get no XP penalty, than 10% the next time, 20% the next, etc.

If this change doesn't seem like a good idea, I think a different approach would be to either (1) lower the penalty from 10% per repetition to 5% per repetition or (2) cap the penalty at 50%.

All in all I think this would help out players who are getting frustrated leveling up (esp. soloers and static groups that play once or twice a week) without going outside the spirit of the game.

If you haven't done the quest in a month, you can't remember it all that clearly, so there shouldn't be as much of a penalty (I could even see dropping the penalty back to 10% after a month instead of 0). Also, if it makes sense that the loot rewards get reset, I don't see why the XP rewards shouldn't as well.

I'd be curious to hear what people think.

P.S. I'd also like to see the Slayer quests reset in explorer areas, but that's probably another topic...

[Lithic]

At best, I think repetition counter should drop by 1 per week. That way if you ransack the exp in a quest, it will take 2.5months to get back to the normal quest exp.

In any case, there is so very much exp in the game, that theres no need to reset the quest counter. Try doing some of the non-min-max quests for a change. They can be quite fun.

[Yaga_Nub]

I love this idea.

I have a lot of characters that get zero xp from DQ quests, zero xp from VONs, zero xp from SR, and even zero xp from Orchard quests.

Throw us a bone!

[ChildrenofBodom]

Try doing some of the non-min-max quests for a change. They can be quite fun.

Lies.

[Yaga_Nub]

Lies.

**** lies!

[Dariun]

At best, I think repetition counter should drop by 1 per week. That way if you ransack the exp in a quest, it will take 2.5months to get back to the normal quest exp.

Not a bad thought. I think that would work well too, but, frankly, it would be less of a penalty to me than a 1 month timer since I'm unlikely to do a quest more than twice a week ever...

In any case, there is so very much exp in the game, that theres no need to reset the quest counter. Try doing some of the non-min-max quests for a change. They can be quite fun.

The non-min-max quests are often quite fun, but they are non-min-max for a reason. Their XP sucks and is often completely inappropriate for their difficulty, but that is another discussion.

[Dariuss]

i would take it the other way actually.... you get the full xp on your first run of a difficulty level, then it drops to 75%, 50%, and don to a bottom 'cap' of 25%

i owuld rather have people discouraged from running the same set of...8 or so quests... to level themselves, and encourage running different quests. I think this would help with seeing a more varied LFM panel, and eliminate some of the mid-level grind.

To be fair, though, this system would work better with an xp re-evaluation of all quests, so there aren't certain quests that give significantly more xp than others.

[Dariun]

i would take it the other way actually.... you get the full xp on your first run of a difficulty level, then it drops to 75%, 50%, and don to a bottom 'cap' of 25%

i owuld rather have people discouraged from running the same set of...8 or so quests... to level themselves, and encourage running different quests. I think this would help with seeing a more varied LFM panel, and eliminate some of the mid-level grind.

To be fair, though, this system would work better with an xp re-evaluation of all quests, so there aren't certain quests that give significantly more xp than others.

This would massively favor the educated, well equipped, organized players over the other 75% of the player base unless you drastically increased XP on about 40% of missions (e.g., change Chuch and Cult from ~1500 XP base to ~8000 XP base). And if you did that, the educated, well equipped, organized players would be able to hit level cap in about 3 hours instead of 3 days.

This approach would also require elimination of:

1. XP penalty for reentry.
2. XP penalty for having a character in the party above quest level.
3. XP penalty for having a character too many levels above your level.

I don't really think we should eliminate any of those, but if your idea is implemented you have to or else it would be mathematically possible for a character to get stuck at a level and have it be impossible to level (e.g., first 2 times you do SC there is (1) a lvl 11 in the party and (2) you reenter twice -- you would get 30% XP first mission and 5% XP for second mission with a max potential of 50% XP for the third try).

You would end up with people dropping groups rather than recall and reenter or they would drop groups because the leader invited someone whose level was "too high".

It would also allow people to grief noobs by destroying the XP potential for high XP quests (e.g., not telling them there is a high level character in the group, encouraging them to recall for spell points, etc.).

I think this idea fails my #1 test for all proposed game changes:

Does it make the game more fun for most players and increase the long term health of the game?
If no, is there a really really really good reason for making the change anyway?

[Strykersz]

This would be most helpful for people who get stuck in mid levels (8-12) and are finding it harder and harder to find XP.

People find it hard to find xp for 10-12?

[Drider]

I raised 2 characters to level 13 in 2 weeks time.. One without the XP bonus and another one with the +25%.

I maybe.. maybe did more then 25-30 different quests total. You don't need to get rid of the repetition XP penalty. There is more then enough XP out there for you to level your characters.

[BlueLightBandit]

**** lies!

And statistics?

Okay guys... here's the deal:
1. There are literally hundreds of quests to run in DDO. Yes, HUNDREDS.
2. Characters in DDO will never EVER run out of XP.
3. Even if your xp is "ransacked" on one quest, there are HUNDREDS of others to gain xp for.

Making a change like those have mentioned above would be silly. The devs want you to run OTHER quests... not just the same ones over and over and over again. Personally, I'd have no problem if you earned 0 xp for every time you repeat a quest on the same difficulty. (You get one run on normal, one run on hard, one run on elite, and if you want to gain xp from it again you have to run it on solo... otherwise, pick a new quest to run)

Of course... the Shroud is the exception... but that doesn't mean that you HAVE to run it 100% of the time

[Beherit_Baphomar]

I love this idea.

I have a lot of characters that get zero xp from DQ quests, zero xp from VONs, zero xp from SR, and even zero xp from Orchard quests.

Throw us a bone!

You actually have to complete the quests to get the XP Yaga....

[Dariun]

2. Characters in DDO will never EVER run out of XP.

You know, there are two types of players in this game:

Those who understand how the XP mechanics work or at least understand that they don't fully understand it, and those who say things like that.

[Dariun]

I raised 2 characters to level 13 in 2 weeks time.. One without the XP bonus and another one with the +25%.

I maybe.. maybe did more then 25-30 different quests total. You don't need to get rid of the repetition XP penalty. There is more then enough XP out there for you to level your characters.

This suggestion isn't about whether or not there is enough XP available to level cap a character.

It's about whether or not the currently implemented repetition penalty for XP can be improved to make DDO more fun for more people.

If you are level capped and have therefore determined that there must not be any problem worth considering, then you are part of a very large group...

[Drider]

This suggestion isn't about whether or not there is enough XP available to level cap a character.

It's about whether or not the currently implemented repetition penalty for XP can be improved to make DDO more fun for more people.

If you are level capped and have therefore determined that there must not be any problem worth considering, then you are part of a very large group...

So what you are saying is.. yes there's tons of XP out there, in a bunch of different quests... however I'd really like to run Stormcleave 20 times instead of having to do something else.

[Dariun]

So what you are saying is.. yes there's tons of XP out there, in a bunch of different quests... however I'd really like to run Stormcleave 20 times instead of having to do something else.

What I'm saying is the repetition penalty is not serving any purpose if someone is stuck at a level for over a month unless you are a fan of kicking people when they are down.

You can say "go do other quests" but if they were going to do that they would have already.

You can say "screw them then," and that's fine if that's what you want to say. Says more about you than them anyway.

I'm not thinking about how people *should* play I'm thinking about how people *do* play.

Also, I think it is dumb that I can still get nearly infinite top notch loot every week, but the XP is diminished forever.

[Beherit_Baphomar]

You know, there are two types of players in this game:

Those who understand how the XP mechanics work or at least understand that they don't fully understand it, and those who say things like that.

Y'know, I gotta agree with BLT on this one.
There is a TON of XP out there, because people dont want to touch those quests doesnt mean they should change the XP penalties.

Are there not enough capped characters running around?
Do we need more people playing endgame content?

[Drider]

What I'm saying is the repetition penalty is not serving any purpose if someone is stuck at a level for over a month unless you are a fan of kicking people when they are down.

You can say "go do other quests" but if they were going to do that they would have already.

You can say "screw them then," and that's fine if that's what you want to say. Says more about you than them anyway.

I'm not thinking about how people *should* play I'm thinking about how people *do* play.

Also, I think it is dumb that I can still get nearly infinite top notch loot every week, but the XP is diminished forever.

Huh? I don't know anyone that doesn't play a toon because they are sacked out on xp on one quest. If they are doing that, that's just being a bad player.

And if you are getting top notch loot every week, then you are most likely capped or near capped. In which case the XP amounts mean nothing. Also there are more then a few quests in which you can get good loot.

[BlueLightBandit]

This suggestion isn't about whether or not there is enough XP available to level cap a character.

It's about whether or not the currently implemented repetition penalty for XP can be improved to make DDO more fun for more people.

If you are level capped and have therefore determined that there must not be any problem worth considering, then you are part of a very large group...

'

The "currently implemented repetition penalty for XP" is there to encourage people to run multiple quests. That's what the devs want... for people to run OTHER quests from time to time.

Fun is a speculative term, but the theory is that if a player only runs one quest the whole time, that one quest will become less fun, so they put things like the repetition penalty in place to do just that... make the game more fun.

And I agree, I have capped twelve characters... I'm part of a large group that understands a large portion of the game. I would venture out to say that it would be silly of someone who hasn't experienced every aspect of the game to demand changes of it. It would be like someone who has never played a rogue complaining about the DC to disable traps... whether they are right or wrong, the value of their opinion is lessened because they do not understand the whole picture.

So here's my solution to the op... cap your character, play him/her/it for 90 days while capped. Get your 1750 favor... and THEN come and discuss XP penalties... until then, you're not seeing the forest from the trees.

[Dariun]

lol. Thanks for your comments. I now understand what you understand.


I think my suggestion (1) improves the game, (2) without significant development work, (3) without harming the game, and (4) in keeping with the spirit of recent improvements to the game.


1. It improves the game by supporting more playstyles and thus more players. DDO is fairly tough for small non-twinked groups, soloers, players with limited playing times who simply cannot do CO6, Threnal, and VONs because they cannot put in the time to finish them in 1 play session and because they are not part of a guild that supermegafastohmygod zergs them in 27 minutes. This is not to say these players do not put the time IN THE GAME, because they do. Its just that instead of having 30 hours spread out over 6 or 7 sessions they have 30 hours spread out over 20-25 sessions.

I also would restate my previous point: If players are stuck at a level for a month they are not having fun. You can blame them, if you like. Probably not a good way for a game developer to think about it though...

2. I assume there would be little development time to do this. If I'm wrong then the idea is less good.

3. The one month timer would be sufficient to encourage most of the player base to completely ignore this change and probably not even be aware of its existence. The only people it would really affect are those whose playstyle has them stuck at a level.

4. Recent changes to the game have been aimed at making these types of players (like me, I admit) happier. The Devs have already removed the death XP penalty. Why? Because the same types of players who are hurt by the repetition penalty were hurt by the death penalty and player feedback convinced the Devs it was a real game problem. The death penalty hurt worse, to be sure, but the repetition penalty also hurts. They also added the explorer areas, which are great and help the same group. This would be another change in keeping with this philosophy.

Anyway, I offer the suggestion to the Devs. They can ignore, mock, reject, or use as they see fit.

Cheers,
Dariun