Training Camp

[AidanRyuko]

I had two ideas and this downtime is the perfect time to write them on the forum I have a suggestion in the lines of a training camp, its an idea that gets me so excited I kinda want to draw concepts of this. The quest "Prove your worth" in Three Barrel Cove represents this idea best, as it's a quest where you get tested in strength, agility and thinking power.

The training camp would be a facility hosted within stormreach (maybe the tall building in house Deneith as a soldier training facility?) that tests several aspects of a player with the goal of improving them. This would be a great tool for new players or players that want to improve themselves to increase their survivability in quests. The facility keeps track of top scores reached by yourself and possibly those of friends so you can focus on beating those scores! By doing that your overall performance should also increase. On top of that there are trainers who can give tips on what affects jumping, how to tumble, when to defend etc (I find a lot of people don't know that holding shift when they are on the ground reduces damage for example).

There are two types of gear you can use in this facility,
your own gear: This is what you use in regular runs, this is where you set scores with and deciding what you wear will offcourse affect what score you can reach, IE. blurry gear with +6 to reflex saves will make the dodge room easier then regular armor.
Training camp gear: unlocked by reaching certain scores like getting hit zero times in the dodge room, only usable in the camp itself and it will not affect your current scores in rooms because this gear has incredible statistics. The use of this gear is meant to give expert players a platform to experiment with several builds/gear types to see what potential they can make out of their character. There is one room where this gear will set a time and that is the overall room where they follow a parcours testing the speed and survivability. This way participants in the camp can compare times with several different types of gear.

There would be several aspects of your character being tested:
Dodge room:
To learn how to dodge and pay attention to the environment this room is installed with several arrow traps and non-killable npc's that will try to hit you during a period of 90 seconds, you get scored depending on how often you received a hit.

Ninja room:
To learn how to sneak up on monsters this room has a mini fortress with several alarm bells, the objective is killing as many monsters as possible within 180 seconds without ringing an alarm bell. Killing a monster earns you 10 points, an alarmbell costs 15 points, directly adding to your final score. Sneak and/or high damage potential suggested.

Agility room:
To learn how to estimate jumps and effectively climb ridges and ladders this agility room is installed, it's a room with several objects that can be climbed and jumped to, people with high jump levels and/or speed will be able to shortcut some parts. This room is set to 120 Seconds and is set up vertically. Every 10M/30 Feet upward has a check point worth 10 points.

Combat room:
To learn how to handle real combat we have installed this combat room, our aura will protect you from death but will not stop you from getting incapacitated so be aware! The system has 100 monsters in stock, there is a time limit of 600 seconds.

You decide how many monsters will spawn per wave, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 14, 20, 25, 33, 50, 100. The more monsters at once the higher the score modifier, it is suggested to start with 2-5 monsters per wave as 100 is nearly impossible to beat solo.


Targetting room:
To learn how to aim properly we have installed this targetting room, you will be standing on a tower with kobolds running around holding a target above their heads, check your minimap to see targets appearing in a 360 degree radius of your tower (designated as red dots). Score gets determined by the amount of targets you shoot. This room is set to 120 seconds of time. A target is worth 10 points, but shooting a kobold gives -1 point and destroys the target he was carrying so do your best to aim well!

Healing room:
To learn how to heal and anticipate incoming damage we have installed this room filled with kobolds trying to survive uncurable acid. They will run all over the place and receive periodical damage. The room is filled with several obstacles, in order to keep everything alive you may have to time your heals and pay attention to each kobolds location. This room is set to 120 seconds. Each kobold is worth 1 point per second alive, making the maximum score in 120 seconds with 10 kobolds 1200.

[InsanityIsYourFriend]

i like this idea, the dodge room should not have archers though, as archers will hit you unless they miss vs your AC
instead how about traps

and the combat room do you really want to see a wizard go in there set it to 100 and then wail and win?

[AidanRyuko]

a wizard might wail half a dozen at once but would quickly be overrun by such an amount of enemies.

it does raise some questions about the setting this should be played in though? should it be clear, should it have obstacles, tunnels, different height levels?

[InsanityIsYourFriend]

definately! circle with nothing in it would be mostly for 1v1! cant have easy access XD

[Ungood]

the combat room do you really want to see a wizard go in there set it to 100 and then wail and win?

This could be fixed by either: Death Ward the Mobs, Make them Construct (and thus immune to insta-death spells) or Make them Undead. That way it is about Combat, as opposed to insta-kill spells.

[AidanRyuko]

that's a great idea ungood!

[InsanityIsYourFriend]

SR and saves works too, but i dont think everyone should have death ward due to negative dmg being an aspect of combat as well

[AidanRyuko]

been meaning to post some pictures for a while but have been distracted by work and the game itself, also did some research on the matter and found out ddo actually had something called "Academy training" for new players, this was an instance that taught the basics. Very basic and very short. I believe that with the proper expansions to the academy it can be an amazing facility to spend time at.

without further ado some pictures to give an idea of possible instances, I don't have the graphical skills to actually make room designs so I just used pictures of existing dungeons, but itll give a general idea I think.

[Captain_Wizbang]

Interesting.

Reminds me of the original training quests on the start up island from years back.

Those were the days, back when we had to buy a weapon from a guy missing a few fingers.

Good idea, but having different schools for lvl 1, 4, 7 would make it even better.

+1 OP

[danotmano1998]

<idea post>

These are quite good ideas. Mini-challenges, designed to help people get the most out of playing their characters! +1

[AidanRyuko]

thanks very much for the compliments, different level ranges is indeed an interesting idea to add to the facility, also because different level ranges offer different equipment/enhancements/feats that open up new possibilities.

the main goal of the facility is improving your character, may it be basics or advanced subjects. If the facility has a log of your scores you could actually keep track of how much better you become through practice or equipment improvements.

I have low AC, but I rotate around enemies, jump over traps, hold shift when down.. when I see teammates or new players I sometimes notice a lot of room for improvement, also feeding this idea.

[Xynot2]

Have a series of tests you can select a difficulty for (lv 1-20). No XP. No loot. Strictly solo. All gear would react as plain gear. No masterwork, no +. A real gauge of the character. A score card at the end that tells you what you lacked for each tests. (saves, natural resistance, AC, Stat reactions) and then maybe a suggestion of what could be done to better that 'soft' area(s).

[AidanRyuko]

I don't think plain gear would be a good idea, gear affects performance a lot. but you do bring up an interesting part. for example, a log that shows how much AC you had and how much the monsters were rolling on average (mirroring real monster rolls of that level), required reflex save to have a chance at evading traps and your current reflex save. more detailed logs of performance would be nice.

But Turbine could also add some of this as tips in the loading screen, IE lines for agility facility loading screen:
- You can use Jump potions to increase the jump skill.
- The jump skill is at it's highest when you reach 40.
- equip a striding item to increase your run speed.

[Galeria]

I love the idea, have suggested something similar myself.

I'd love to see an Abbot training course, with wands and ice, goggle and roids training. (I might just stay in 'roids all day seeing how many I could do before it got me.)

Puzzle training, combat training, etc. I think the devs might be surprised how many people would play with it just to beat their own best times.