Deathangel

Well. For some skills, 1:1 isn't as horrible as it sounds at first. Sure, epic has faster skill gained, but the vast majority of time spent skilling on Epic requires you to skill at higher Effective skill level, and at a slower rate due to this curve than if you skilled at your actual skill level. For example, a skill like shieldsmithing or leatherworking, which I have reached 90+ on Freedom already, on SBCoC, usually goes a bit like this. On Freedom, SB and CoC: 3 points per hour at 50 skill range, gradually decreased to 1 point per hour at 70 skill. Finally, about .60 skill per hour through the 80's and .20 per hour at 90. This is rough math, but I've grinded many skills on my account Deathangel to 90 and most of them take this similar rate of progression on Freedom. That's my freedom grind progression. Now consider grinding those same skills on Epic, SB and CoC: my actual 50 skill 3pts/hr on freedom initially becomes something like 75 effective skill due to the epic curve. That means i'm gaining about 1pt/hr at 50 skill due to effective curve... however, I'm also benefiting from the Epic skillgain (x3), so that Epic 1pt/hr at 50 skill becomes 3pt/hr at 50 skill, on epic with SB and CoC. That means i'm skilling, using the same methods, 1:1 with what I would be gaining on freedom for 50 skill. The curve cancels out with the skillgain boost for 50 skill range on skills like mining and imping skills (carpentry, smithing,tailoring). Conclusion: throughout the 50 actual skill range, 1:1 is a fair conversion ratio. Now let's consider the same scenario but at 70 skill range: At 70 actual skill, on Freedom, I typically get 1pt/hr with SB and CoC. Most skills in wurm progress this way, with a few exceptions like prayer, meditation, channeling?, etc. So let's compare my 1pt/hr Freedom skilling to what I'd be getting on Epic (again, SB+CoC). Converting 70 range Freedom skilling to Epic, Firstly, the epic curve makes me gain slower because 70 actual skill ---> about 90 effective skill on Epic. So instead of gaining 1pt/hr on epic like I do on freedom, I would gain at the 90 skill rate of (roughly) 0.2/hr (again this is with SB and CoC). Initially, before the x3 Epic skillgain buff, I am going to be gaining at .2/hr at 70skill on Epic which is much slower than 1 pt/hr on Freedom. Now we apply the Epic x3 gains effect: .2/hr on Epic at 70 skill goes up to .6/hr at 70 skill on Epic. That means, I'm getting 0.6/hr for most crafting skills on epic at level 70. On Freedom, I would be gaining actual skill at a faster rate of 1/hr at level 70. This means that for the 70 actual skill range, 1:1 is NOT a fair transfer ratio because skilling is faster on Freedom beyond 50's. For imping skills then, it is slower to skill on Epic than on Freedom beyond level 50 (approximately, I could put effort into exact cutoffs if devs wanted help implementing a fair conversion ratio). Note: This comparison is for most skills in the game that progress like imping skills (carpentry, smithing, tailoring). An easy comparison can be made for other skillgain types, it will just look a little different. Now lets consider the early skilling (sub 50). In this situation, it is faster to skill on Epic than Freedom below 50. Take 30 skill for example. 30 actual skill on freedom is going to be faster than my 3pts/hr at 50. I can't remember exactly what 30 skill with SB and CoC is like, I'm gonna use 5 pts/hr as a reasonable guess. So 5pts/hr on freedom for 30 skill level. Now we consider leveling at 30 actual skill on Epic. The curve makes 30 skill act and look like 50 skill. So instead of gaining 5pts/hr on epic, before applying the x3 gains, you're looking at 3pts/hr. Now we apply the x3 Epic gains and that becomes 9pts/hr on Epic at 30 actual skill. It's almost twice as fast to gain skill around level 30 on Epic, than on Freedom. So a 1:1 transfer on Epic-> Freedom at level 30 is NOT fair, but in the opposite way that 1:1 is not fair beyond 50. Is there a way to convert Fairly, going both ways? Yes, there is. How? We can linearly approximate this shift using a few simple formulas for each 10 point skill range so that each skill is adjusted equivalently on transfer between the clusters. For example, 5 points gained on Epic at level 30 would translate to 2.5 gained on freedom at level 30, since last portal transfer. If I get blacksmithing from 30 to 35 on epic, then when I return to freedom I should have about 32.5 blacksmithing. If I go from 50 to 55 on Epic, I should have 55 when I return to Freedom. If I go from 70 to 75 on epic, I should have (1/.6)*5 = 78.33 skill when i return to freedom. That would be FAIR transfer ratios, or close to it based on TIME SPENT. That's using a linear piecewise function that has different ratios for different skill levels and it could be defined for as many intervals as we want to make it as fair as possible, but the result of a bunch of small skill range ratios would just be a good true function that represents it perfectly, some kind of exponential function that I could solve for if we wanted it. This was written with respect to imping skills. Some skills work differently and deserve their own discussion. I'm just illustrating a fair conversion ratio for different skill levels that represents MOST important skills in the game to make it very plain and obvious that it can be done and that this post took me only 15 minutes to think out and write and that a happy, mostly fair solution can be drawn out in less than 1 full day of effort for all skills in the game if the right ppl are working on it, and implemented the next day. Very respectfully.

A smaller proximity block (no loot if enemies within 10 tiles) would be more reasonable than a local proximity block. Basically reduce the epic enemy presence block range.

I recommend this for incentive to play on either cluster. Another nice thing would be my suggestion for 2 way skill transfer, at a fair conversion ratio (which might be 1:1 initially). See other topic for discussion on that related subject.

I agree. A good solution might take a full days work, and might take another days work retweaking after testing and feedback. I don't think the SB gain while on diff cluster will be a major source of problems. Ppl need sleep at some point and it does reward turbonerding in a small way, without needing to spend money on SB powders. Players getting an extra 30min SB daily is what we are talking about here.

"If they make that change, I will reprem and come over to epic gladly." - inactive player RE: OP

As it is, faith does not transfer freedom --> epic. so making faith work differently on epic would not affect freedom, thankfully. Edit: Another half-decent solution is to place no daily tick caps or cooldowns on follower faith gains. Also, reduce the 1 week faith conversion cooldown.

It takes me at least 10 faith divided by 3 prayer/hr * 1 faith/prayer = 3+ hours of waiting to reach 10 faith skill as a follower. Give me 3 hrs in any other skill on EPIC and i would be able to make a useful set of items by the end of it. But with faith, after 3 hrs, even a 90 channeling toon is useless. I think removing the prayer cap and shortening the cooldown would be a good short term approach, if there is enough merit to the suggestion and ppl actually think it would benefit the server / pvp. edit: however, the above example must be done over 3 days to reach 10 faith as a follower, due to 5/day cap. this is kinda silly imo.

Soooo, I'll be the one to bring this up. PPL are interesting in shorter term servers on epic, kinda. Like, maybe 4 months at a time, or something regularly reset map/item wise. What about faith? Faith is probably the lagging mechanic for this fast-paced and short-term play-style we are pioneering. Like, how can we make the average new player reach a useful faith level before the next reset so that he can enjoy pvp ? Personally, I can make an alt army to get it done in a week or two, perhaps 70 faith from sermons and stuff, but GL with player retention if that is the only viable way to become a useful priest on the epic cluster, the way it is being run / tweaked now. Ways to make Faith faster for EPIC... Remove the daily faith tick cap? Double skill gains? Reduce the faith cooldown for ticks? Personally I think meditation and faith need some looking into regarding their "pace of progression" for the EPIC servers/ Elevation. I already may have channeling skill, but its gonna take me several days to even be able to priest here and a lot can happen between now and then on this server. Additionally, a week to priest + several weeks to reach 80 or so faith is a significant chunk of the server life. Even at 80 meditation, it will take me a long time to get to the more interesting path abilities (lvl 9). Basically, I'm just trying to say that the faith and mediation progression on Epic does not mesh well with the pace of everything else. I can make a full set of gear in 2 hrs, but I have to wait a month to be a useful priest unless I go very hardcore on it, which means its probably beyond the reach of starting players and more casual players - out of their reach on a server meant to cater more to a casual, easier but fun playstyle.

Ya why punish players for playing the game by devaluing their work inconsistently. Maybe someone just hasn't sat down for a few hours and coded a solution for it.

and consult a couple mechanically experienced players that have grinded a lot ( I can make some recommendations in private )

Make it so a "fair" amount of skill gained on epic is transferred and kept when you go to freedom.

It struck me as an odd idea at first, but the more I think about it, the better I think it will be for the game, PvP community, and epic.

Didn't this happen once and it went very badly? Something about forcing pvp on players that only play pve and a bunch of subscriptions were lost? If you remember this please speak up, i might just be remembering wrong. I like the idea, for the reasons mentioned so far, but I'm not sure how to prevent abuses of it. It would certainly be a game changer.... what about the people that have played for ages and dont want their deeds raided? People leave some pretty valuable stuff out on freedom. This would really wreck that... unless a hybrid system was figured out, like unable to pickup items. Then you could lockpick in and kill someone but not take stuff. Its a tricky idea.

I mean, yeah its basically all of TC pushing to fix stuff that's not really broken or overused. Based on footage from recent fights when everyone is dying from axes, not spells (am i missing something?), most WU are trying to say there is not imbalance... Agree tho shieldbashing could be a potential tweak to interrupt casting. I dont think chances to block a spell that already has a chance to fail/power roll is the right answer. I think Mondain/platinumbeef described the situation pretty accurately in his above post. And yes, if it gets changed much more I want /transfers again because of the points mentioned about us choosing based on originally proposed mechanics.

I like the idea of priests having a tougher time blocking hits while casting. I don't however think the current system is broken, though. I don't see fights (and I'm in most fights, I think) where people are winning because of priests. So while I like your suggestion, I don't think it is going to change your ability to win fights since it will just add another meta for you to adjust to. Melee still trumps long range spell casting, because you can't move while casting spells. You might see 1 guy casting a spell while a group of fighters rush a target. Most people don't stand still when bodies are dropping, in my videos. They're swinging a big stick instead. Spell spam is not the "problem" at the moment. So I disagree that this change will solve the proposed imbalance, because I just do not see this imbalance anywhere in real fights atm to begin with. Where are people dying to spells? I actually am clueless on where that is coming from. If anything, I've seen pillar spells used like normal, less healing spells being used than normal, and some skirmishes initiated by a shard of ice to inflict hurting status on a called target. I'm not seeing 20 priests nuke people. I'm seeing a ton of coordinated axes dice people up, even people trying to cast LoF, etc. Actually, I'm seeing a few of your guys get butchered while casting LoF or Scorn of Libila, even without worse chances of blocking while spell casting. So if anything, I'd expect this change to make stuff harder for TC based on recent fights. It would also be harder for WU casters, but that is realistically only a few people per fight and once the rush begins no spells are being casted except by maybe 1 guy in the back, hard to reach. I like the suggestion about harder to block while casting. I've actually lost 1v1s to priests because they tank well and cast heal on themselves mid fight. This might help with that. I don't see it addressing any imbalances associated with priests in huge group fights though, because most of huge fight damage dealt is melee, not priest damage spells.

double post oops. We can all be frenemies... but I don't think it's very bad like you're making it out to be.

I didn't see many spells casted on that bridge. Some AoE's, maybe 1-2 direct damage spells...

I also think it is very very nice that the counters to spell damage are mostly an equal playing field. Move out of spell range. Break line of site. These are things that new players can master without waiting 5 years or paying to play. Tangleweave is a less entry-level counter, but very effective for the higher damage spells.

I agree with Oblivionnreaver on this. Huge axes and arrows are still very relevant and this is shown in recent pvp with arrow deaths and melee madness. I am not a priest and I seem to make a difference in every fight with my huge axe out. My non-priest fighters wreck people with huge axes. The most recent wipe on TC was also almost fully melee, with very little spell casting. I don't think your perception of priests being OP is fully accurate. I mean, I wish I was a priest, because I wouldn't have to use arrows for long range attacks. But we just killed someone (Wilca) very fast with arrows the same day as the TC-WL wipe, but no spells were casted. I haven't really tested the damages since they recently got reduced, but I imagine it is not any more OP than before it got reduced, and considering that all of the recent wipes were mostly melee damage or arrows, I see no real imbalance yet. Perhaps the greatest benefit to spells is that you cannot block them like arrows. Honestly, I like this, and I think the resistances do a good job of delivering diminishing results for spell spam, as it is. I guess the important question is, should a player be able to die by spell casting? I think we all agree arrows and axes make sense. But spell casting? I think some of us agree and some disagree with the idea spell casting should be similar in effectiveness to arrows and melee damage. I think most of us agree though that casting fire heart or shard of ice was a joke before the work Sindusk did on it. Also, when you are gatehopping your enemies have more time and motivation to use spells on you than in a dynamic open-field fight where travel time is worthwhile in running up to your enemy physically and swinging at them. I will probably shoot you with arrows and spells if you are sitting at a minehop so I don't have to run up to you (more effort) only for you to jump back in to safety. An arrow or spell is more stealthy, I think, and more likely to catch you out of your hop than a huge axe (or simultaneous huge axes) since you have more warning with me running toward you. Not necessarily because spells are so much more OP than melee. @NikiIf you are calling leather armor the meta, and suggesting inside info to WU that leather armor will be the new meta... That's not quite true. WU was wearing drake/plate when the August armor change went in, long before the priest overhaul, and we were wiping a lot to TC at that time. We gradually switched to chain, then leather most recently. Over 7 months, WU experimented with all the different armors (including cloth, if you go check out my Solo Roaming videos in the Chaos section). Leather seems to be a sweet spot in crafting effort vs damage reduction. Its not just priests in leather either, for some 30% bonus to casting. Deathangel has been in leather a lot lately and he is not a priest. 7 months of experimenting with armor types does not amount to inside info on the new meta. Also, leather might not be the best, maybe cloth is lol. We haven't tried everyone in cloth yet, but it worked pretty well in my 1v1s.

Hey I'm doing the same thing this summer! I'll be starting my trip in Ramstein, Germany, though.

Bump to the top, top toons dont champ usually. This would be pretty fair way to make it a better trade off for more top tier toons, if those types of accounts are actually meant to be able to reasonably champ, anyway.

I like both of these suggestions. I supposed you don't have to participate if you don't want to travel across the map. However, you are likely to encounter enemies if you choose to participate, which makes the travel risky and worthwhile, since you can catch enemies away from deeds. Some way to make people travel home with their loots would be nice, but nothing too overbearing (I liked the idea that all the loot would be moved to the most recently captured battle camp, so that you dont have to coordinate 4 routes of loot transport, just 1, but it still gives enemies opportunity for interception and a motivation to go roam for you). I don't like the hota statue + lumps spawning safely at home. I think its good to have it carried back (especially the statue, which is worth some money but will slow you down on your way home. More thought will have to go into how you safely transport it home, and the random locations will prevent a safety net of deeds being built around the zone so that travel home poses a small risk as well)

+1 i kinda like the idea. it certainly encourages pvp more than HOTA in its current form. I think it would be better to not allow any building/terraforming within the 40x40 zone, period. Keep it a natural landscape. See how that goes. If for some reason players start fencing the entire 40x40 zones, there could be a 45x45 increased off-deed decay zone that remains for x days based on how long it takes 80ql offdeed structures to decay, for example. Idea sounds great on paper though. Perhaps we could set a couple timers in here for a more group-oriented testing session (for example, Wednesday 7pm US Central time those interested could login to compete on the test server, and again at say 12pm US central time next Saturday). DA

Thursday.... thats about 4 days from now.. let me see what my SB is at... https://imgur.com/a/gqAwPFh I think 10 or 11 days may be better for me. Maybe 14. Idk. edit: yay i got unbanned, should be able to also enjoy the SB ty

I love you Sindusk ❤️ best pvp changes i can recall in 8 years DA