Multi-Patch/Update Preview: XP Changes

[GramercyRiff]

This is all really poorly worded. It seems like a shell game to nerf xp. You should be making the grind shorter not longer lol. This is all really bad from how I understand it, which isn't easy to understand because of how poorly it's written.

[Ultramaetche1]

5. Optional objectives will ransack, and that ransack will not reset over time; they are essentially being changed to a play-through bonus with ransack that only resets with a Racial, True and Iconic Reincarnations. To compensate, optional objectives will ransack more slowly. With this change we can add more, or make more of them have greater rewards. Note: the reduced rate at which optional objectives ransack has not yet been changed on the test server.

This seems harsh, especially for quests with both heroic and epic versions such as Spies and VoN 3. If you play those quests in heroic, you already accumulated 1 run of ransack before even hitting epic. Will there be some method implemented to differentiate between heroic and epic completions with quests that contain both versions?

[erethizon]

Interesting.

If that is so, Devs please clarify.

The concept is fine with me and would encourage broader grouping.

I really hope it is a purposeful change because it would broaden grouping in a way we have never seen. Sure, we all know that letting people get max reaper experience if they are 3 levels above a quest will greatly widen group levels (using your example a level 16 vale quest could include level 19 characters and still get max experience even for reaper), but there is another side of this.

Currently I am the leader of 95% of the groups I play in (and I always group). The reason for this is that I only run quests at my current level. If I am level 12 and I see an LFM for a quest above my level it isn't that I wouldn't like to join a group already in progress. It is that I know if I join that LFM then some of my level 12 quests will go to waste because I will outlevel them and either have to skip them entirely (which I probably can't afford to do since I save all the epic quests for epic first time bonus) or do it later at an experience penalty (which is a sacrifice I don't want to make). Thus I almost always make my own groups even if there are people posting groups for content I haven't run.

If I know I can run those level 12 quests for full experience (including reaper experience) at level 15 and even if I don't get around to it until level 16 I will still get full Bravery Bonus and only take a 10% penalty to base experience and reaper experience it would open up playing with other people in a whole new way. I am probably more excited about this than anything else I have read for this update.

If all this is true then all we need to consider now is the power levelling penalty for heroic quests. I forget what it currently is, but if we let level 19 people into our vale quests, what is the lowest level person we can also have in the group without that person suffering a power leveling penalty? Ideally they will do what they did with epic and remove power leveling penalties, but if not then ideally the range will at least be widened.

Also, since you currently can group level 20 people and level 30 people in the same epic quest with no power levelling penalty (and with no loss of base experience for being too high for the quest), hopefully this means that you will get full BB on all epic quests the first time you do them no matter what level you are. Currently epic levels are a nightmare of trying to squeeze in all the low level quests before I get too high in level and making a bunch of parties with very specific level requirements so that BB is not ruined. I can't tell you how happy I would be if I could simply make all my future epic LFM's level 20 to 30 (with the possible exception of very hard content that a level 20 couldn't handle) rather than having to always exclude the higher level players because they will ruin Bravery Bonus.

I don't mind not being in high level parties when I am low in the epic reaper levels (the higher level content is too tough anyway), but I don't like having to exclude high level players from my lower level epic quest LFM's just because they will stop BB. This is especially true given how many of the people in epic content are level 30. Every life I look forward to finishing all the level 25 and lower epic quests so that I can finally start including level 30 people and still get BB. Forming parties is so much easier when you don't have to exclude the huge number of players that are just sitting at level 30 waiting for something to do. Allowing these people to be included in lower level epic quests without stopping BB would be such an improvement.

[Silverleafeon]

If all this is true then all we need to consider now is the power levelling penalty for heroic quests. I forget what it currently is, but if we let level 19 people into our vale quests, what is the lowest level person we can also have in the group without that person suffering a power leveling penalty? Ideally they will do what they did with epic and remove power leveling penalties, but if not then ideally the range will at least be widened.

+1 something for the Devs to discuss.


From ddowiki:

Power-leveling penalty: (Individual) If you are questing with higher level characters (i.e. 4 levels or more higher than your character), you (only) will suffer an individual penalty. If you are...
...4 levels below the highest-level character in the party, you receive a -50% penalty.
...5 levels below, you receive a -75% penalty.
...6 levels below, you receive a -99% penalty.
...7 or more levels below, you receive no XP regardless of bonuses.
Note: Characters that are level 20 or higher do not receive a power-level penalty, even when grouped with level 28 characters. (Verified: level 20 had no penalty with a 28 in quest.)


I remember when this was actually relevant before bravery bonuses.
Interesting that it will become relevant again.
Believe it or not, that -99 penalty can actually let in a fair amount of xp when you add bonuses to it.

[erethizon]

Talking about TOEE - all I do is farm this puppy when I am way over level. Part 2 end fight everyone gets one-shot and dies if you try to do this anywhere near at-level. Not sure if your data shows how many people start part 2 but don't complete it. Most just farm the pyramid chest and then recall/reset. I don't think more xp will fix any of these issues. Split part 1 into 2 quests. Adjust the end fight on what is currently part 2 or make it a raid so 12 people can be in on the end fight.

The Temple of Elemental Evil is actually the first (and only) quest pack that made it onto my never-run-again list. I actually have never run it on epic (because of the bad experiences I had when running it on heroic). I'd like to try it on epic but it seems to be too big of a gamble now that I have enough content to not need it even when getting 5000 favor every life (which I have done the last dozen or so lives).

When I first got the pack I would run it on elite at level 9 and the process was always the same. I would get 1 other person to join (I could never find more than one person at least for part 2), we would get to the end boss and wipe around 5 times. The other player would stay in the quest while I recalled and then he would recall when I made it back in the quest. We would run to end boss and wipe again until we finally defeated the boss.

I did this for a few lives until ToEE made it only to my newly minted list as the one (and only) quest pack that I would never run at level. I started running it on heroic elite as a level 30 with other level 30 people in the party (I didn't want to risk it would wipe me by myself even as a level 30). I'm not sure it would actually wipe me if I were alone but it's a risk I still don't want to take given that death seemed to be random and from out of nowhere.


So what is the point of what I am saying. It's simple. Put a shrine somewhere near the boss fight so that a wiped party can get back up and continue trying to fight the boss. No boss reset (which is the way it currently works at least in heroic, thankfully) and no need to recall and run back to the quest (which makes running it on reaper literally impossible since there is no reentry on reaper). I know having a res shrine would make the boss fight significantly easier, but the alternative is what you have now, which is having that quest chain be the most avoided non-raid content I have ever seen in the entire game. I know you hear a lot of bad-mouthing about Threnal and Restless Isles but I see that content run way, way more often than ToEE. I still run the former two quest packs every life. I haven't run ToEE in a long time and it isn't even because it is too long or I don't like it. It is because the end fight for part 2 is too much of a gamble to ask people to join only to have everything turn sideways at the end leaving everyone in a bad mood and the party falls apart.

[memloch]

Why not have the ransack bonus reset on an Epic Reincarnation as well for people that like to stay in epic levels.

[erethizon]

So, it's fine if people are forced to play a lot of stuff they hate and leave, but not fine if people have options and choose the worst ones for them and leave. Scratching my head over that one, man.

Edit: BTW, what I see on Khyber is a pretty good mix of choices. A lot of people run dailies. A lot of people run sagas on elite. Some people run reapers straight through. And some people LFM hop with whatever happens to be posted. Forcing what people choose to do into a crazy "we know what's good for you" funnel with crazy xp restrictions is bad all around.

I'm referring to the very common phenomenon in MMO's where you see people grinding experience as efficiently as possible while claiming how much they hate it and how boring it is. They say they want to play other content but they "can't" (their word) because it doesn't grant experience as efficiently. They will literally bore themselves into quitting the game. What they actually want is both max experience per minute and variety but that is very difficult to achieve because some action is always going to be most efficient and trying to balance 10 different activities to all give the exact same experience per minute to all character types is a lesson in futility.

The easiest way to solve this is what they are doing. Give massive rewards for running things the first time and greatly lower the rewards for repetition. The end result is that you literally can't bore yourself into quitting by running the same quest over and over for the most efficient experience because it is no longer the most efficient experience. If anything they are not doing enough. First time bonus for many of the quests on their Major and Minor lists (and some that are not even on the lists) need to be increased dramatically. For example, given how difficult ToEE is, the first time bonus should be huge. Make it so that the most efficient way to gain experience is to run each quest exactly once. That means that really difficult quests that take an hour and half give massive experience and are still more efficient than rerunning Wiz King.

If people truly preferring running EH dailies that is fine, go ahead and let them, but don't make the mistake of leaving such activity as the most efficient way to level. Many of the people that claim to love them and want them to remain as they are also post about how much they hate the ETR grind because of how much they hate having to run dailies everyday.

I could even get behind having first time bonuses refresh every so often (perhaps on the first of the month every month) so that people that only ETR can repeat quests for full experience every so often, but they still will find themselves running a variety of content far more often rather than complaining about the repetitive nature of ETR (which is only repetitive because they are running the same quests every day because those give the best exp per minute).

[CSQ]

This is all really poorly worded. It seems like a shell game to nerf xp. You should be making the grind shorter not longer lol. This is all really bad from how I understand it, which isn't easy to understand because of how poorly it's written.

Actually, most situations will see either equal or increased experience because of buffs to many quests. I'll try to break down the changes, and hopefully I'll get it close to right.

Situations with increased experience:
Experience rewards (not counting optional objectives) for completing subsequent completions of a quest after the daily bonus resets (since the daily bonus is increasing)
First runs of normal/hard/elite difficulty content in epic (since the daily bonus has increased by 10% for elite)
Reaper experience while at the current maximum level for brave bonus (eg level 6 for a quest that is level 4 on normal difficulty)
Running content for the first time while over the current maximum level for the brave bonus (since it's now a bonus based on quest completion, not level while running the quest, iirc- it's a bit vague as to whether this is WAI)
Running buffed quests (applies to almost every situation, except perhaps first time Reaper and farming optional objectives past ransack)

Situations with unchanged experience:

Running normal/hard/elite for the first time on heroic content that has been neither nerfed or buffed.

Situations with decreased experience:

Running reaper content for the first time on normal.
Reaper experience for running quests the first time at current maximum level for reaper experience- because the experience bonus for reaper has been decreased, first runs will pay less. Subsequent daily runs will actually pay more because of the buff to daily bonuses, however. If you run at current maximum level for brave bonus in reaper, however, you will receive an increase in reaper experience thanks to not having the over-level penalty, so it's a bit more complicated (and would, say, buff my heroic leveling RXP gain because I run content until I cap experience, so I'm always over level in early heroics and taking a penalty on live but I'll get a lot more with this change because of the change.
Running E/H/N or R/E/H/N for first complete bonuses, since those bonuses have been shifted towards daily/brave bonuses.
Running content that derives its experience from optional objectives multiple times, since optional ransack will not reset. This is the big sticker and the one thing that I personally would get rid of ASAP. Optional experience ransack makes certain quests worthless after multiple completes, depending on how quickly/significantly they ransack, and since we have no specific numbers on this I'm going to assume it's pretty catastrophic because I can.
Running quests that had their experience payout nerfed, obviously.

Situations that are different from current and I'm too lazy to math:
Running elite after normal/hard difficulty (provided you wait until the daily bonus resets) should be increased because of the way brave bonus works now (increasing experience for the first time completed on hard/elite), but with the changes to first completions I could be wrong.

Things I dread:
Updating the Reaper experience calculator for the changes to experience penalty range. RIP my laziness.

TL: DR- Most things are improving or staying the same, expect for leveling regular experience (heroic or epic) in Reaper, repeating content without waiting for the daily reset, and repeating content that gets significant portions of its experience from optional objectives, depending on penalty and ransack rate. This last one is the only part I personally find objectionable, since the ransack is permanent unless there is a reincarnation (excluding epic and lesser reincarnations). The reaper heroic/epic experience hit does sting a little, but the bonus to reaper experience when running content at higher levels (i.e. level 6 for base level 4 quests) is enough to incentivize reaper, so that's okay.

[CSQ]

I could even get behind having first time bonuses refresh every so often (perhaps on the first of the month every month) so that people that only ETR can repeat quests for full experience every so often, but they still will find themselves running a variety of content far more often rather than complaining about the repetitive nature of ETR (which is only repetitive because they are running the same quests every day because those give the best exp per minute).

I like this. A similar reset for optional objective ransack would also make that particular change a lot less painful.

[Grace_ana]

I'm referring to the very common phenomenon in MMO's where you see people grinding experience as efficiently as possible while claiming how much they hate it and how boring it is. They say they want to play other content but they "can't" (their word) because it doesn't grant experience as efficiently. They will literally bore themselves into quitting the game. What they actually want is both max experience per minute and variety but that is very difficult to achieve because some action is always going to be most efficient and trying to balance 10 different activities to all give the exact same experience per minute to all character types is a lesson in futility.

The easiest way to solve this is what they are doing. Give massive rewards for running things the first time and greatly lower the rewards for repetition. The end result is that you literally can't bore yourself into quitting by running the same quest over and over for the most efficient experience because it is no longer the most efficient experience. If anything they are not doing enough. First time bonus for many of the quests on their Major and Minor lists (and some that are not even on the lists) need to be increased dramatically. For example, given how difficult ToEE is, the first time bonus should be huge. Make it so that the most efficient way to gain experience is to run each quest exactly once. That means that really difficult quests that take an hour and half give massive experience and are still more efficient than rerunning Wiz King.

If people truly preferring running EH dailies that is fine, go ahead and let them, but don't make the mistake of leaving such activity as the most efficient way to level. Many of the people that claim to love them and want them to remain as they are also post about how much they hate the ETR grind because of how much they hate having to run dailies everyday.

I could even get behind having first time bonuses refresh every so often (perhaps on the first of the month every month) so that people that only ETR can repeat quests for full experience every so often, but they still will find themselves running a variety of content far more often rather than complaining about the repetitive nature of ETR (which is only repetitive because they are running the same quests every day because those give the best exp per minute).

The question really is, who cares? If someone wants to run an epic life running spies and only spies until their eyes bleed, what does it matter? It doesn't. People DON'T only run dailies to level. Some do, some do other things, most do a mix. The point is that letting people play the way they THEY feel is the best/most fun for them is the best way to handle this. Players don't need regulations handed down from the Minister of Fun specifying exactly how many times to do things to maximize the fun players have been ordered to experience. They need to be allowed to play they way they want for the toons they have, the people they run with, the time they have, and their own personal comfort levels. While Fun Nazis apparently appeal to a segment of the player population, the devs shouldn't be engaging in such tactics.

[Vyder]

This is all really poorly worded. It seems like a shell game to nerf xp. You should be making the grind shorter not longer lol. This is all really bad from how I understand it, which isn't easy to understand because of how poorly it's written.

Its over complicated for no reason.

[CaptainSpacePony]

Thanks for the summary CSQ, but

...
Situations with decreased experience:

Running reaper content for the first time on normal...

What does this mean?

[axel15810]

Instead of ransacking optionals permanently, why not just make all optional XP not be granted until quest completion? That seems like a better/simpler solution to me if the goal is to stop optional grinding in quests like Wiz King. The proposed idea seems unnecessarily complex and confusing for players.

All else looks fine to me though.

[droid327]

Why not have the ransack bonus reset on an Epic Reincarnation as well for people that like to stay in epic levels.

Because if ETRs reset like HTRs, that would also reset Saga completions. And first time bonuses, but if you're ETRing then being able to bank sagas at 30 and then claim them at 20 is a much bigger deal.

[SerPounce]

Because if ETRs reset like HTRs, that would also reset Saga completions. And first time bonuses, but if you're ETRing then being able to bank sagas at 30 and then claim them at 20 is a much bigger deal.

Personally I’d rather have the first time bonuses, but I can understand why others might feel differently.

[pgm152]

These XP changes are trying to encourage running multiple quests, but I'd like to point out your itemization system discourages the same thing. You itemize using a "only quest X drops item Y" strategy, and sometimes only a specific chest in quest X. If item Y is a must for my build I have no choice but to run quest X over and over, which was never the best route for XP to begin with and now will get worse. Now, if I was free to run any quest in that pack for a chance for item Y that would be different, I could play a complete variety and wait for item Y to show itself, but today it doesn't work that way.

This will penalize players that make play decisions based on items rather than XP gain.

[Fedora1]

Just want to add - I don't think there is anything that will entice me to run Restless isles.

[redoubt]

I like the idea of encouraging people to play a wider variety of quests. Even some small rearranging of quest specific xp should be okay.

However:

The blanket nerf to reaper xp should be corrected to at least match live.

And...

The proposed change to optional xp is bad. I like your intent and I understand and support the idea of preventing optional farming. However, this, in my opinion is the wrong way. As many, many others have said here, optional xp ransack is okay, but allow it to reset. If it drops 20% per run, allow it to reset 20% each day. (Or similar.)

Thanks!

[Saekee]

Its over complicated for no reason.

I actually can’t figure it out other than reaper grouping diff fixed & skip BB now

[Dark_Helmet]

I would ask why all of this "dev time" is wasted on this but it will just be ignored.

Playstyles are not being represented: You are just catering/punishing based on zergers (those who try to get xp / min will always run certain quests the most and skew results away from the majority of casual people).

There is no representation of the enjoyment of running some quests. You are trying to use metrics to force people to play quests that are not conducive to all playstyles.

Just like you have started melding specialists into allowing specialists abilities to be used by any class, you should just rename this to something else.