[CF List] Too stupid...

[Mark Wedel]

Raphael Quinet wrote:
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      Yes, this is very important: I would hate to find a map in which I
     
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      spend a lot of time fighting tough monsters using several expensive
     
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      potions and wands, and then reach a treasure room that contains only
     
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      some artifacts that I cannot use because my current level is lower
     
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      than what the map maker recommended.
     
     
 Liberal minimum level estimates could be put in place (2/3'rd or ½ min level on
the artifact).  And even if your just a little bit lower, it just means you need
to gain a little exp and then you can use the item.


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      Since the problem occurs mostly with low-level characters, the
     
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      artifacts could be made unusable by players that are lower than level
     
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      8 or 9.  With the current set of maps, I think that a player who has a
     
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      level between 1 and 5 should stay inside Scorn, a level between 5 and
     
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      10 is suitable for some (non-artifact) quests, and a level above 10 or
     
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      20 is usually required for the artifact quests.  Since some level 20
     
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      quests could be solved by a good team of level 10 players, setting the
     
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      threshold for the artifacts around level 8 or 9 should prevent most
     
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      abuses without ruining the fun for a team of players who managed to
     
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      get through a high-level quest.  This threshold would be fixed for all
     
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      artifacts so that the map makers would not have to take care of it.
     
     
 Level 8-9 can be achieved in probably just a few hours of play.   And I believe
some of the bigger problems are not the things like dragon shields or dragon
armor, but rather truly unique artifact (map customizations) on very high level
maps - maps require level 50+ characters.  It is presumably those artifacts that
are really going to have the minimum levels, so they can be made pretty good
without the worry of them being given to 5'th level characters.




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      - If the player's level is lower, but more than half of the artifact
     
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         level, then every once in a while there is a 10% chance that the
     
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         artifact is unapplied automatically.  The frequency of these random
     
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         events could depend on the difference in levels.  For example, the
     
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         delay could be 1 minute divided by the level difference.
     
     
 I have a feeling there will be lots of complaints about this - when a character
dies because that artifact became unequipped, people are not going to be happy. 
And what someone can easily do is write/modify a client that looks for these
things, and then automatically re-equipes it for them (giving basically the lag
time of it actually not being equipped).

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      - If the player's level is lower than half of the artifact level, then
     
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         instead of being unapplied at random, the artifact would be dropped
     
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         to the ground.
     
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      This should be enough to discourage low-level players from accepting
     
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      powerful items given by high-level players.  Imagine that you are a
     
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      level 5 fighter running through a room full of demons and wyverns with
     
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      a shield that makes you immune to most attacks and a very powerful
     
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      weapon that kills these beasts before you even see them... then
     
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      suddently you see the message "Your Shield of Immunity glows with
     
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      power - you cannot hold it anymore." or even "Your Hackslayer+30
     
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      vibrates violently and falls to the ground".  You would probably be
     
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      in deep trouble...
     
     
 I don't think the problem is too much that low level characters now going on
quests that are way beyond their skill if they didn't have that item (although
the players would have to answer if that is really happening or not) - my guess
is they get the artifacts and now may go on slightly more difficult quests.  One
of the complaints wasn't as much that the low level characters would now go on
all the tought quests, but more that if all the low level characters have the
best artifacts (due to generous high level characters), that sort of diminishes
their specialness.

 The other problem I see with the above is it could really screw new players. 
For example, someone new connects, plays for a little while, asks for some help,
and the experienced old hand drops off some extra artifacts.  That new player
may not know the dangers, and would probably be pretty upset if they take them
for face value (good items), and then get killed when they suddenly unequip/drop
to the ground.  This could be help by good messages about the items themselves.

 If you just have a minimum level and lower than that level you can not use
them, that provides a simple method - no one will get killed because of it, and
its also much simpler to do.  That would presumably help out the problem of low
level characters having too many artifacts.

 Another suggestion tossed out a long time ago would be giving artifacts and
effective ego, and if the ego of all your artifacts is above your level by some
ratio, bad things start happening.  This would apply to both low and high level
characters - a high level character may be able to get all the best artifacts,
but wearing them all at the same time may go above his ego total.  And for low
level characters, one artifact may be above the ego total.

 Now what happens in that circumstance could by anyones guess.  Different
artifacts could even do different things (some may confuse the player, others
may only let the player attack, others could drain sp/hp/mana/food, etc).  But
this then falls into the above area again - could be too obnoxious.  It may be
cute the first few times you see it, but if your using just above your ego and
die because something strange happens, you probably are not going to be very
happen by the extreme randomness.