[crossfire] What about a gameplay revolution?

[Mark Wedel]

Juha Jäykkä wrote:

<much snipped in this reply - I don't see much point in including lots of stuff 
where the only think I add is 'I agree'>

>> - Recipes/instructions should really be a character attributed, not a
>> player attribute.  I realize there are some special recipes right now where
>> only a character that has learned it can make it, but for a large number,
>> it is really the player knowing the recipe (either through looking at the
>> file, or just acquiring tidbits among multiple characters)
> 
> Nice point. Perhaps the recipies should be force-objects on the character?

  Yes - that would work.  It would also allow something along the line of 'what 
recipes do I know'.  Instead of having to jot down recipes you find in the game 
someplace else (or keep all those scrolls), one could get a listing of all 
recipes you found, etc.

>>   But related to your comment above, maybe mix different parts together. 
>> Maybe that item still can hold 10 different bonuses.  Maybe 1 beholder eye
>> can be used to give a 1% magic resistance bonus, and if the player wants,
>> could put 10 beholder eyes on that item for a 10% resistance.  But maybe
>> also he can take those beholder eyes, do some alchemy type stuff and get a
>> single item that gives him 3% magic resistance but only use one slot, etc.
> 
> Sounds good. The current alchemy involves mixing magic (or alchemy produced) 
> stuff in "better" recipies, so why not keep doing that? To get +10% magic 
> resistance using only one slot, one might need either a more powerful monster 
> part or something created from beholder eyes, like 10 rings of +1% magic 
> resistance. That way we'd have a kind of chain of items, starting with 
> beholder eyes used to create potions of magic resistance, next being these 
> potions used to create rings, rings used to create amulets and finally 
> amulets can be used to create rings where +10% resistance only consumes one 
> slot. Up to some limit, of course - otherwise we hit the ulta-powerful stuff 
> again.
> 
> All of this naturally needs much tweaking to get the balance right. I think 
> linear growth on the number of beholder eyes is too easy.

  Yes - I think there are a few ways to limit this:
1) Number of slots an item has for enchantments.  Some may hold more than 
others, and thus be more valuable.  But in any case, the max slots should be 
something fairly limiting.
2) Growth of bonus should not be linear.  A square bonus would work pretty good 
(so to get an item with +10% resistance, you'd need to have a total of +100% 
resistance items).  That in itself may not be hard.  OTOH, such items may become 
rarer - you wouldn't sell those items to the shop anymore if they are now useful 
for making your items.
3) Different items have different affinities - I'll detail this more below about 
race/class balance.


> Like everywhere where it comes to balancing different race/profession combos. 
> I do not think a troll sorcerer should be as powerful as a fireborn sorcerer, 
> but I certainly do think that the current situation where anyone or anything 
> using weapons and armour quickly becomes way more powerful than those who do 
> not use them - simply because there are so exceedingly powerful 
> weapons/armour, and only those, around. Of course, adding a superior ring, 
> for example, will not change things: the fighter will simply use it as well. 
> What would be needed is some way prevent that. And it needs to be "natural". 
> The only thing I can think of is somehow related to the skill levels. Perhaps 
> item powers should look at skill levels instead of the total? Something along 
> the lines of rings need evocation, amulets sorcery, daggers 
> one-handed-weapons etc. And after that we need to prevent fighters from 
> reaching high evocation levels... Anyone any ideas? Or is the whole thing 
> totally unnecessary?

  I think you do have a valid point.  One problem (IMO - others don't see it 
this way) is that any class can pick up any skill.  So while racial bonuses do 
matter, what class you start with doesn't have much impact.

  I don't really want to focus on redoing the skills in some fashion, so will 
instead continue with the item discussion.  But note that effectiveness as a 
spell caster does depend on your skill level.

  My point about affinities above may be different items may take some 
enchantments better than others.

  Something like plate armor could perhaps only be improved with bonuses that 
directly relate to combat/protection (resistances, AC, etc).  But a set of mage 
robes may allow some different affinities, like improved sp regen, improvement 
of certain stats, etc.

  Same could be true of a sword vs a dagger.  The sword could perhaps largely be 
limited to bonuses related to doing damage.  But that dagger (maybe we should 
really just add something like a wand or other non combat item a character 
holds) could have bonuses related to spell casting.

  Now this still doesn't solve the problem of the fighter deciding he wants to 
wear some mage robes and wield a dagger.  OTOH, now he really is like a mage, so 
maybe no problem there.  IF (and a big IF there) we want to keep the current 
system where any starting class can pick up new skills, there isn't much way you 
can limit what skills they can use.  But if that fighter now has to use mage 
equipment to be useful, well, he starts to look a lot like a mage now, not a 
fighter.

  Another possibility is limiting certain items by class and/or race.  Maybe 
only spellcasters can use a wand in their hand instead of some other weapon.  If 
like above, that wand has affinities for spellcasting type skills, it 
effectively gives them a leg up.  Likewise, certain weapons should probably only 
be usable by fighter.  If we want to prevent fighters from be mages, mages also 
shouldn't be able to be fighters.

> 
>>   I was thinking about this.  Items below some condition could be worth 0
> [...]
>>   A quick thought could be that most of that stuff has 'condition 0' 
>> denoting it is broken crap (useful for materials and repair), and another
>> else has 'condition 100'.  At least that one, on that initial pass, we'd
> 
> Perhaps everything dropped by an orc should either be 50% or 0% condition? It 
> would be natural for the weapons to NOT be at 100% and something should also 
> be totally crap. I think 0% should be irreparable: perhaps those items should 
> just vanish like some arrows?

  Maybe.  A broken item could still be scavenged for materials perhaps, but 
maybe that isn't something we worry about.

  A case could be made that magical items should perhaps generally be found in 
better shape.

> 
>>   For the forks, most likely we could take much of changes they've made to
>> the server code and use it ourselves, because that work would also likely
>> be under GPL (GPL license says derivations must also be under GPL)
> 
> Why don't we do that, then?

  We'd have to know what to grab - unless we just wanted to take everything 
(which I don't think is the case), you'd have to look and find the features we 
want, port them over, etc.

  For some things, like bug fixes, finding out how the bug was fixed may not be 
any easier than just fixing it in the first place.