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Mclavin

Improvements to Locate Soul and Nolo

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This has been a hot topic for a while now with many people considering the current mechanics of locate soul and nolo causing stalemate and pvp to be stagnant, just like info minister did. 

The current issue is, small groups cannot roam because other groups/large groups will just spam locate names with kingdom priests + chopped veg until all names can be allocated to a deed

and larger groups never get engagements because smaller groups want to spam locate names to make sure there isn't a zerg waiting. 

The end result is nobody leaves deed until a hit is made on somebody off deed whilst others are on deed. 

The change to the old locate/nolo was needed and with this change, it was a right step in the right direction, nolo shouldn't keep you 10000% nolo'd for it's duration. 
I believe we can just go a little but further and add something cool to support all groups and get players off deed or even just add small patch to the current locate and make it harder/stronger.
This is why I felt a new thread was better instead of bumping the old once since the title was 'Revert Locate Changes' - I believe this is a step back.

This thread is created to put together ideas on how to better improve the mechanic we have, not go back to the old one.

One suggestion that was popular was only being able to get a hit on a person if you're within x amount of tiles of them. [Rather Long Distance perhaps]
Nolo would slightly reduce this distance and still provide a % chance to block the locate. Locate spam wouldn't be an issue because priests back at deed won't be within the x amount of tiles.
The perk to this idea is, small groups and large groups can go roaming without being spammed, this will increase the idea of people leaving deeds to find people, instead of sitting at deeds to locate them.

Other ideas were simply making locate soul harder to get a hit on nolo'd players with the power of a nolo being 90+ almost the same as a reinforcement disintegrate,
but have the power % go down with the timer so once it reaches 80% it becomes more and more easier to locate.
I suggest making Body Nolo's 60 favor so people out roaming have to sacrifice gems in order to remain 'under the radar'

Another idea was to make Nolo become easier to cast through as you get closer.

Many ideas were discussed in Discord, Retro said that the team are throwing ideas around and have heard our concerns about the current mechanic and what damage it does to pvp.
Making Pendulums / Tracking more useful would also be seen as a plus.

Many small groups have said it makes it frustratingly difficult to roam or even hunt on chaos, as soon as the ring is hit, it's time to go home.

Other changes Along side this can help smaller groups on chaos, delayed death tabs for example too, so groups can't rush in for a back door as soon as some action starts..

Small changes, big effects.

Share your ideas if you'd like change, or want complete removal, post below and share. 

Edit:

Other small ideas were
the more you locate a name, the more resistance that player builds
Or, locate soul works once like Locate Artifact

Edited by Mclavin
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ooo

 

lamps

 

see you all wanted locate soul changed and got your wish, now you want it changed again, I don't get it

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Everybody wanted a change to locate soul/no locate, the previous mechanic was disgusting, just making the current mechanic stronger could be fine, overall the change was good But not enough and no, we can't forsee side effects. We've played and we've discussed what can be improved with it.

We're using the time to discuss a more fleshed out mechanic to promote different styles of pvp/roaming, instead of tweaking numbers.
Why wouldn't we take the time to look at a mechanic and make a stronger change, especially since we aren't looking for plaster fixes anymore and the new team are actually Changing core issues.

This time last year MRC had full control over Chaos so roaming wasn't even considered a thing by smaller groups, these days with more lands and more players Trying to roam, this mechanic needs to be relooked at and improved.

'Never improve or flesh out more on an idea' - Jakerivers, the guy with the most suggestions. 

Edited by Mclavin

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I agree and local should be changed along with nolo.

 

Make it harder to locate someone that is further away and easier when they are closer.

 

Not all of us are priest though so.....

An idea for local list is make us use pendulums to get a local reading. There is no local list, but if you pendulum then it can start building a list of people in local.  Or maybe a pendulum is the only way to see who is in local.  Then we'll need to make teams for our own group since we can't see each other in local.  Or make local really small like 10-20 tiles.

 

Don't know an answer, but Chaos happens how McLovin said it.  Not many people roam around except for noobs since they don't realize the power of locate and it being the end of your life if you are all alone.

 

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Making pendulums and tracking more useful . would be a plus one.

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I would like to see a blending of your options. I feel locate should have a Max range based off of channeling and the cast strength. A better priest will be able to see out further than lower skilled ones but the cast strength gives an amount of RNG. Pendulum should work in a similar way. I admit I don't fully understand the failings of pendulum right now. Tracking needs to have a use. Currently I feel no urgency to raise this skill since its use is so limited.

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+1 to this idea. I for one dont go hunting on Chaos for fear of being located and rushed.  What Mclavin says is right. Smaller groups no longer leave deeds for fear of being located.

 

Say this mechanic wasnt present. I would go out hunting alone, and after a while, Mclavin would go out hunting as well. We just happened to meet each other on the field. A fight would ensue, while we both called for reinforcements. This could lead to either side dying to a group (lets be honest here, likely me) but now there is a crusader team trying to get back to deed before DD caught up to them. This is the type of encounters that right now are being missed.

 

Our pvp is limited by locate. This mechanic needs to change.

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Only thing about basing the cast range on a skill level like channeling is that most large kingdoms will have a high level priest giving them an advantage over lower level kingdoms which makes changing it no point.

 

As long as locate range is not based on a skill I'm cool with that.

 

Everyone triangulates locates everywhere and that's the biggest disadvantage to small groups right now.

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Difficulty based on distance is a must to make it balanced. Here are a few examples.

 

1. Some guy pops your local, then runs out of your local, he is <150 tiles from you. If he has a 90 cast on a ring + 90QL ring. You have 80 channeling and are stood next to an altar to get the bonus. It should take you 2-3 attempts to get a locate on this guy.

 

2. You are on your priest sat on deed, you throw a random locate on a well known enemy, if he is < 500 tiles from you (about the size of HOTA on chaos) the difficulty should be similar to what it is right now for the same casts as point 1. 6-8 attempts

 

3. You are on your priest sat on deed, you throw a random locate on a well known enemy, if he is > 1000 tiles from you (1/4 the width of the server) it should be near impossible to locate someone this far away.

 

Another thing that i would like to see changed is the the power of the cast on your ring should only go down on successful locates and by 1 point. Instead of the current which is .2 per cast even if it fails. This is to prevent someone endlessly spamming locate on someone until their ring is so low they can simply locate them anyway.

 

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If you cap the distance on locate cast all those kingdom priest will be moved off deed into caves within range of enemy kingdoms. The meta will change not the actual gameplay.

 

Reducing the size of local, in my opinion, is the best thing we can do to encourage ppl to leave deed. It will also make it so enemies have to get close in order to see who you have online at your deed. Instead of just doing a drive by 40 tiles out.

 

+1 to increased difficulty as distance is increased.

+1 to increase the favor cost on body nolocate but you also must increase its effectiveness.

+1 to losing a ring power only on successful locates

 

My idea? Remove the /who on Chaos. Why we should know exactly how many are on at any given time confuses me for a pvp server. Strong groups will hunt ppl down when pop is high and weak groups will travel/hunt when its low. This solution solves both problems.

 

 

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Locate Soul should be 60 favor, let's be honest, with the changes you will throw off locates if you feel somebody is within x range, you wouldn't be spamming.

I feel People you locate should start to get a resistance or you share the same cool down as locate artifacts to stop the spam of locate soul.

The 'Closer you are the easier it gets' MUST be limited to what it is now, not made easier, but body Nolo's at 90+ Should be so hard to break through but this power will tick down alongside a timer,

so those who are waiting around or hunting near enemy lands aren't instantly vunerable to being located/being forced to leave. It would also reduce the tiles an enemy as to be away from you, so if a enemy is normally 200 tiles away and able to get locates, a 90+ would be 100-150 tiles an enemy as to come within. 

It's important you consider and give options/player cost to AVOID the mechanic all together, otherwise sure you might get players off deed but you're gonna be located easier vs other roaming parties, this isn't what this is about.
If you cast a 90+ Nolo, you should be able to avoid being located at a stronger cost and it will cost to maintain that 90+ nolo. 

Alts in caves: Making it so 1 locate per 30 minutes helps this, also as spoken as an idea, make local range inside a cave, the same as trying to see somebody in a cave, max range 25 tiles away from a mine; Max range 25 tiles seeing out of a mine.
This will limit what an alt see's in local + stop the spam locates from it. Also, kingdom priests with half favor titles will likely never be taken off deed since titles would allow for easy spotting of when online and locate [if near your land anyway right]

I'm also open for improving pendlums and actually just removing the locate soul all together.

Edited by Mclavin

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Overall tho, the mechanic we go forward with should be something that can give a perk whilst roaming, if lucky and get a hit on somebody.
It shouldn't become the deciding factor for parties to leave deed, avoid pvp or even go into pvp. It should be nerfed enough that player instinct and scouting is taken more into account.

That would personally be my goal after all this.

Edited by Mclavin

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Sorry I have limited time so reading everything was not an option for me... I can tell you based on the jist of the OP description about roaming that it pretty much nails it right in the head. I would like to say I currently don't have any suggestions but I'm fairly sure some collective minds and ideas brought forward in this thread would be 1000 times better then anything we currently have right now..

 

I would also like to add that with a NOLO change I feel something should be added to chaos to yet further a reason for roaming and venturing out. Perhaps something as easy as chaos chests random spawns. Its already in game code wise and could be adapted to chaos. 

 

+1 to a nolo system change. 

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Limiting the range certainly sounds good, and perhaps even linked to channeling.

 

Can also make the precision more ambiguous even for triangulation.

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