During the stream earlier this evening, Joppa talked to us about "ability points" which will be earned by players and used to upgrade individual abilities in the Living Codex. Here's what we know so far:
- You'll earn ability points as you level, but you'll also continue to earn points via some method after reaching the level maximum.
- At least for the moment, there does not seem to be a cap on ability points, meaning that you can eventually upgrade every ability you know.
- It was mentioned that there may be different quantities of ability points required to upgrade abilities
- It was also mentioned that there may be different ways to earn ability points, or different types of ability points to earn, especially for the highest upgrade levels or for epic abilities.
- The system was described as a "hybrid" of EQ's alternate advancement and WoW's talent trees - in the sense that they wanted you to earn these as you play and level, but they want them to be additive to your character, instead of being a specialization.
I strongly recommend that folks watch the recording of the stream if you haven't had a chance yet. If it's not already available it should be by tomorrow morning, I think.
I am curious what everyone thinks of this approach, so I wanted to start a discussion thread about it. Here are some questions just to get us started.
1) How should players be able to earn ability points?
2) Should there be different types of ability points to earn, and if so, what should they be used for and how should they differ from each other?
3) If ability points are directly tied into upgrading abilities, how can max-level content be balanced so that it isn't trivially easy for people with all their abilities upgraded, or crushingly difficult for someone who doesn't have many of their abilities upgraded? Should some high-level content be specifically designed for characters with lots of upgraded abilities?
4) In general, how long should it take after reaching max level before we have all our abilities upgraded? How much gameplay should be required to get to that point?
5) How can this system scale if the level cap is raised in expansions later on?
I like this as a system that extends content.
That being said, this is exactly ths type of thing that can be added later. A standard spell book would be fine for launch.
VR seems to be trying to get to in depth with to many systems.
There is value in keeping it simple. Especially at first. Give yourself room to grow.
I like it. I believe there is value in having such a system at launch as opposed to tacking it on later, as it completely changes up the leveling experience. Imagine having a legitimate choice as early as your 20s, to go seek out a specific ability upgrade instead of simply pumping out levels.
I would like the ability upgrades to be more involved than simple number increases, though. I haven't had an opportunity to watch the stream yet, so I apologize if this has already been covered. I think that ability upgrades should be quite impactful. Novel debuffs, conditional modifiers with large payoffs, etc.
Now, one could argue that a system like this is easily solvable. It's simply another layer to meta leveling strategies that will unfold. Players will stop at specific levels to get specific upgrades because of how important they are. Striking that balance will be integral to the success of the system.
In the absolute worst case scenario, though, the system will serve to mix up the staleness of simple level grinding, and that is a worthwhile endeavor in my eyes.\
Edit: Obligatory "how in the world is this going to work with progeny" comment.
I think it sounds awesome, especially while levelling. Choosing which abilities to enhance while you level, or choosing which lines of spells to keep enhancing as you gain new abilities which replace previous versions. Makes me feel like AAs + EQ2's Master level ability/spell quality options + WoW original talent trees all wrapped together.
Then at the endgame paying to reset your AP and re-distriute them as much as you can across your current main spells, then working to adventure, quest and raid to further gain enough AP to enhance all the abilities you use at level 50 + the special AP you need for Epic abilities.
3 modifiers per ability looks to be the baseline, in the stream 2 weeks ago Joppa mentioned some abilities may have 4 or 5 or more enhancement slots.
I am still curious how the Wizard's Spell-Weaving mechanic links into all of this though, it's a shame that question wasn't addressed yet. I imagine though that just the base ability gets modified and the Spell-Weaving parchment scraps stay as they are.
My biggest concern would be 1) how impactful are they, 2) how long does it take to get them all and 3) how many are there, if there is no cap? This can make it really daunting for any new/newer players and introduces a variant of "must be x in item level/stat/etc" to even group if you're trying to pug.
However, I love that it's in there at all, as most MMOs without some form of AAs quickly stale out.
This isn't comparable to item levels at all. Pantheon isn't an instanced game with tight gear checks. If it is, that would go against everything they've said thus far.
When was the last time somebody got denied a spot in a pug in EQ for lacking AA? The only time that ever mattered was applying to guilds that actually wanted to progress.
I like how they will alter the 'flow' of your leveling. While leveling up you can 'specialise' to a certain extent by picking and choosing which you enhance, but if you take your time leveling you can enhance everything (by using alternate point-gathering methods). It might be nice to feel you can benefit from taking your time.
But those that like to race to max level can do that and go back and pick up all the APs you blasted past in order to max out your ability enhancements, or you can choose to push through your epic ability enhancements first or whatever.
Some will spread out the APs to enhance as many abilities as possible in small ways. Others will spend a lot of points in their favourite abilities.
In a game where they don't really want 'specialisations' that feel like different classes or archetypes (which is fine) it adds some degree of personalisation.
BUT, yes, if the ability enhancement is 'significant' then how they balance encounters to be challenging to both fully enhanced and normally enhanced folks will be tricky.
Having said that, that is always an issue when it comes to balancing for those that have masses of twink gear or insist on doing encounters they out-level. I suppose at any particular level you can expect players to have a certain amount of APs and that won't vary *that* much.
This system is almost there. The only real failure I see is that a character is intended to be able to max out all abilities. It just makes the progression so dull. The only real choice is the order one chooses to max out their powers in. There will undoubtedly be a small handful of abilities for each class that are focused on first then everything else is just grinding.
How to make the system better:
1) Abilities have 4 tiers: 50% magnitude/duration, 70, 90 and 100
2) Unlocking the ability starts at 50% of maximum, the tier unlocks cost a multiple of 1,2,4 or 1,3,9
3) Max tier of all abilities would cost 500 points while leveling only rewards 50
4) The remainder of points can be earned more like achievements through quests and feats of strength. The feats of strength rewards could be in the form of drops or flags.
5) The first life cap for one character is 200. During the life there is an opportunity to raise the cap by 50. Each progeny start with a base of the previous lifes cap and the same 50 total possible cap boosts. 6 full lives would be required to unlock the cap but earning the full 500 point.
6) Leveling to 50 without stopping for feats of strength or quests should take 200 hours of full group grinding.
7) Waiting for opportunities to challenge feats of strength will be real world time dependent in such a way that there is a maximum available on the server per month that must be competed for though hard to monopolize.
8) Challenge quests with targets and level requirements are another way to earn points. A group is given a quest with a time limit. Accepting the quest will mentor all group members down to said level and give them a series of objectives to go and complete. These objectives will be out in the world but will have triggered spawns once criteria are met. There are conditions of failure. They are hard even for a balanced group. Accepting the quest locks you out for half that time window from accepting a new one even if you complete early or fail. The challenge quests are designed around filling a 2 hour window but allowing a 4 hour window to complete but might not take that long.
The outcome:
1) A very large amount of replay of the game through life cap raising and challenge quests mentoring you down to lower level zones that will once again be difficult. (If the game can use big data it can deliberately pick challenges that are in the least utilized zones by load)
2) Not being able to max all abilities will open up focusing on different abilities. How those abilities are influenced by core stats will in turn change the gear that particular player is focusing on creating diversity in both gear used and abilities used.
3) Combining diminishing returns for each tier with exponential growth of the cost will create a logarithmic power growth over time without relying on max level + gear upgrade merry-go-rounds.
4) Due to the log power growth a character with 200 points spent will likely only be 10% weaker on key abilities than someone with 500 points spent but their other areas may be 30% or even 50% weaker. This will allow them to compete and contribute at 200 points if they stick with their specialization while the 500 point player can do the full range.
5) Expect 500 point characters to take 2400 hous to unlock the cap to 500 (6 200 hour lives with an additional 200 hours of achievement hunting to raise the cap by 50 per life) and likely another 2400 hours to earn all 500 points on the final life due to requiring opportunities to gain points rather than just grinding.
Tacking this system on top of the standard class level system would give you a truly tremendous amount of replay time while still allowing a single life play through to also fully enjoy the game.
When it comes to build uniqueness, i'm neutral on it as I care more about how enjoyable the class is to play rather then being a unique duckling.
In regards to the codex/spellbook that was showcased, this is all the feedback i have on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=226SbpAIIvo
Nephele said:- You'll earn ability points as you level, but you'll also continue to earn points via some method after reaching the level maximum.
I don't believe you have to be max level to start finding/looting/questing for ability points. He said you'll earn them automatically as you level but there will also be other ways to gain them. I don't think he said "after max level." Just to clarify :) (course if I'm wrong please feel free to re-correct me haha)
Ezrael said:Then at the endgame paying to reset your AP and re-distriute them as much as you can across your current main spells...
I also don't believe there are any plans to let players "respec" ... I was under the impression that "choice matters" and once you choose that's it. Did I miss this in a stream? I'm pretty sure there will be no respec option ... again, correct me if I'm wrong please!
Now for my own question - am I the only one who will be tempted to save my points so that I make sure I end up spending them on the abilities I end up using most? (again, this goes with the assumption that I won't be able to respec)
Liav said:There is no build uniqueness, because builds don't exist in Pantheon.
Ageeed - my argument has always been that the player behind the screen is what makes each player unique. Your personality, committment, reaction time, choices you make while grouped, etc. That is what will make us all unique. Not the class we choose.
bdo has a similar system, however, it is mathematically inefficient to unlock every ability.
for example:
said player has 100 skill points
rank 1 holy spank would cost 5 skill points, rank 2 cost 10 skill points, rank 3 cost 20 skill points, rank 4 cost 40 skill points
rank 1 sparkle sunshine cost 10, rank 2 cost 30, rank 3 cost 60
rank 1 google eyes cost 50, rank 2 google eyes costs 100
in a way they can soft cap maximum skill points
to clarify, the more skill points one has, the greater the diminishing return is to obtain skill points.
Ranarius said:Liav said:There is no build uniqueness, because builds don't exist in Pantheon.
Ageeed - my argument has always been that the player behind the screen is what makes each player unique. Your personality, committment, reaction time, choices you make while grouped, etc. That is what will make us all unique. Not the class we choose.
i semi agree. i think they need to tweak some of the combat, like add a robust gcd. right now, there isn't much player expression outside of tweaking the las12 and resource management.
disclaimer: I have watched a third, I will watch more later
- Awesome workstation jason! neat plant under tensile-geary lamp, nice groovy colorwavey light thing by cactus- science apparatus on the shelves?- awesome.
Ability Poinits and progeny- notice the green Text that says X% percent of healing and second line X% duration of time, or whatever. If progeny enabled it would either: wipe the abilities clean, come with a set number of abilities that you need to assign(because you may be a different class), or that %age is low if the abilities are carried over and will increase as levels increase.
Ability points and %ages: Will those %ages increase with levels? so if a caster wanted to be a DPS machine, they could spend their abilities in damage and then watch those percentages go up passively as they level? while they back fill the other abilities?
Ability points quested: Wouldn't that be neat. Only certain ability points can be granted from an NPC or from a quest for certain things.
Fishing has no ability points- but what if it could? maybe through a quest or one of those crazy long but fun timesink "catch and mount and display every fish" or "Catch and mount the largest of every fish" in Terminus (9lbs wont do, must be 10lbs) that takes forever and allows one ability point in the skill to grant.....deep sea fishing off a boat (more fun timesinks to do when doing nothing) that could further unlock.... sky fishing off a dirigible? (gnome lore related timesink :D)
-side note- the Murk looked full of climbing opportunities-
Ability points and level control: Can we throttle leveling to put more exp to ability points? in either spells or skills? to delay the leveling process ourselves and to help ourselves boost ourselves where we think we are weak?.
Manouk said:Ability points quested: Wouldn't that be neat. Only certain ability points can be granted from an NPC or from a quest for certain things.
Fishing has no ability points- but what if it could? maybe through a quest or one of those crazy long but fun timesink "catch and mount and display every fish" or "Catch and mount the largest of every fish" in Terminus (9lbs wont do, must be 10lbs) that takes forever and allows one ability point in the skill to grant.....deep sea fishing off a boat (more fun timesinks to do when doing nothing) that could further unlock.... sky fishing off a dirigible? (gnome lore related timesink :D)
ability points for lifeskill/profession works(bdo does this to some extent with the shai class). i think as long as they have a soft cap system with many ways to get ability points, would be ideal.
questing, killing and crafting could net different yield of ability points.
so something like after 500 ability points, the value is halved for ability point gains, then at 1000, it's halved even more.
Ranarius said:Nephele said:- You'll earn ability points as you level, but you'll also continue to earn points via some method after reaching the level maximum.
I don't believe you have to be max level to start finding/looting/questing for ability points. He said you'll earn them automatically as you level but there will also be other ways to gain them. I don't think he said "after max level." Just to clarify :) (course if I'm wrong please feel free to re-correct me haha)
I think you misread my statement. You are correct though. Presumably, you'll be able to get "extra" ability points even while still leveling up via the same methods that you'll use to acquire them after reaching the level maximum.
Ranarius said:Ezrael said:Then at the endgame paying to reset your AP and re-distriute them as much as you can across your current main spells...
I also don't believe there are any plans to let players "respec" ... I was under the impression that "choice matters" and once you choose that's it. Did I miss this in a stream? I'm pretty sure there will be no respec option ... again, correct me if I'm wrong please!
Now for my own question - am I the only one who will be tempted to save my points so that I make sure I end up spending them on the abilities I end up using most? (again, this goes with the assumption that I won't be able to respec)
Joppa mentioned in chat either during this stream or in the PantheonPlus stream afterwards that the current plan was to allow players to pay for a respec. Basically just a do-over if you decide that you really don't like where your points are and want to shift them around. Personally, I don't think this is needed since I can always just go get more points, but I can see why it might be something that people want.
I definitely don't think you're the only one who will save up your points. Personally, I'll probably be someone who uses them as I get them - but that's just me.
1) How should players be able to earn ability points?
Leveling, world bosses, exploration, quest rewards. Maybe through some achievment system, like you've killed 1000 of this type of mob, have an ability point sort of thing. I'd really like to see some ability points gained through exploration e.g. some trigger at the highest peak in a zone that you managed to find a way up to give you a point among other points of interest.
2) Should there be different types of ability points to earn, and if so, what should they be used for and how should they differ from each other?
An idea I like, instead of just a series of upgrades in numbers, would be changing the actual buff/debuff component or function in either subtle or huge ways, like changing a slow spell to a root spell or something. Or something that changes an ability to hit 100% of the time, no misses, no resists but you can never crit with it sort of thing.
Maybe instead of numbers upgrades we get specific ability modifiers that can be slotted in those 3+ slots. Maybe all the upgrades you get specifically from leveling are just increases in % and stuff but upgrades you get as drops or other methods would be ability specific modifiers and there would be a nice variety per ability, more than you could slot, but you would be limited in how many you can slot.
I like the idea of epic ability points being raid drops and maybe even being ability specific with some abilities only being on the loot tables of some raid bosses. Maybe raid trash mobs have a chance to drop normal ability points.
Nephele said:Joppa mentioned in chat either during this stream or in the PantheonPlus stream afterwards that the current plan was to allow players to pay for a respec. Basically just a do-over if you decide that you really don't like where your points are and want to shift them around. Personally, I don't think this is needed since I can always just go get more points, but I can see why it might be something that people want.
I definitely don't think you're the only one who will save up your points. Personally, I'll probably be someone who uses them as I get them - but that's just me.
it's needed if there is cap, soft cap or exponential dr on obtaining skill points :O
They stated that this system was not intended to be used to create subclasses but I just don't see how you can pull it off when so much of this game is intended to be played below max level/skill points. Unless these points do not make meaningful changes to your skills then the order you chose to upgrade will make a diffrence in what your character can do. I can see problems where for example, a Paladin focuses on skills that help on magic damage rather than skills that help on physical damage. You then have 2 diffrent Paladin builds while leveling and a group might prefer one or the other depending on what they want to do that day.
One idea i had to make this system easier to balance is to limit the skills that can be upgraded to only a classes secondary role skills. for example: Paladins can only upgrade healing or dps skills. Clerics can only upgrade dps or cc skills. This way a Paladin or Cleric can change what the do when they are the 2nd tank or healer in the group but the Pally's heals would never replace a healer or a Cleric's CC wouldn't be as good as a full support class. More importantly all the Paladins and Clerics would have the same tank and healing skills as others and wouldn't get out of balance based on what skills they chose to upgrade.
Overall i feel the deves are taking on more than they can hanndle when it comes time to balance this system.
It's...okay. I am glad someone will be able to eventually upgrade every ability so it isn't as much of a "spec" or "build" kind of thing. I feel talent/AA trees are bad and only ever offer the illsion of choice to appease a certain type of gamer. I find it to be a far greater boon to a game when "every" is the same in terms of abilities/capability at max level, for grouping/balancing/challenge/enconter design.
I still think this system is going to suffer from "optimal paths" but perhaps less so than talent/AA trees generally are since you can't fully "waste" points.