Sign in to follow this  
Zuelatak

Rift Point Rework

Recommended Posts

10 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

How would you feel then if we just removed the ranking system and gave everyone the same rewards for just being in local like Uniques? Then nobody is being benefited for anything.   

 

I support this so I can AFK sooner

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
14 hours ago, Sheffie said:

Rifts should be first and foremost a community event, not an opportunity for those with the highest skills and best equipment to cash in.

Absolutely. But while I appreciate the idea behind your proposal, it might still raise new complaints. One is about the rift beasts which are able to gang up, surround players, and take turns taunting, stealing your focus, often even interrupting your swing. Even for a powerful melee fighter, that can be a deadly threat (I love it ;) ). But it also means that 5 or 6 creatures are attacking you, and only dying slowly one by one, possibly even killed by someone else.

 

A "damage dealt" count would help here, but be deeply injust in other cases. E.g. when I am standing at the WM with my elemental immunity whacking with my axe and not having to care for his AoE, while others have to run and heal up, I could be (and have been) amassing half of the damage dealt to that creature sometimes, and he has lot of hp, and heals up soon.  And soon there may be new "point optimizers" adapting to the new mechanics and tactics. And even more complaining about, even if it does not, or rarely, happen like the "tagging".

 

That is why I am skeptical towards fixing the unbroken. "Tagging" may be exploited by a few, here and then, especially when there are many participants, and they are fighting in closed groups. Btw., to my knowledge, all actual point attribution, tagged or not, gets lost once a fighter leaves the rift area, for example going behind a fence outside it to heal up (not to mention that only a dying mob at most 4 tiles away will count). But here again,  some are getting frantic about possible "injust points".

 

I fully support that rifts should be fun, not a point competition in the first place. When I am for keeping the point system, then because it allows players to see themselves grow, from "minimal" up to "phenomenal".

 

Edited by Ekcin
typo
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

+1, current system just seems like lazy coding. With how strong the rift mobs are, did they really intend for an unarmed noob with starter leather who gets a swing off to get the same points as someone who dealt 100% of the damage to a mob? Those doing the work should be rewarded more, if I were starting today, it would worry me more if the current system was their actual intended philosophy. Working towards something is a big part of this game IMO. 

Granted, actual abuse of this system is probably minimal, personally I'm not bothered by those who do it. 

 

If they want to keep the rewards system as is, so as to not disenfranchise "new players", fine, but at the least, make a more meaningful leaderboard with damage dealt, healed, taken, etc, maybe separated by waves. Other games have this. Could you imagine a popular game like DoTA or WoW where at the end of a pvp match, the statistics board only showed who hit the most people one time? 😆 

 

Bottomline, when you go to a rift, you should be spending time to help complete the rift. In whatever way you can/want healing, fighting, supporting, etc, because that's what's fun. Going to a rift and having to worry about running around and how many mobs you can tag is silly. 

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I have never done this tagging nonsense, fought fair and square and usually ended up at the very top behind the priests (and Volladol :-p). I don't quite see the issue.

  • Like 2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
17 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

How would you feel then if we just removed the ranking system and gave everyone the same rewards for just being in local like Uniques? Then nobody is being benefited for anything.   

 

I would not like that very much, as you might be able to guess, given that I just proposed something different.

The difference between rewards being more evenly distributed and rewards being entirely evenly distributed is a subtle one, but... eh, it's not that subtle.

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
26 minutes ago, Josso said:

I have never done this tagging nonsense, fought fair and square and usually ended up at the very top behind the priests (and Volladol :-p). I don't quite see the issue.


The difference between concentrating on tagging or just fighting and not caring about tagging can be quite large. I've only really concentrated on tagging once because I wanted points for pads early on, was able to get 600ish pts and top two spots with my priest alt. Rifting without much regard for tagging, I usually sit around 10-20 rank with a few hundred points less. Sometimes it's enough for top 5 still, but for sure, it does make a difference if you concentrate on tagging to the tune of ~200 pts.

 

Also tagging only matters if there are at least two groups fighting and effectively killing mobs. If its just one mob being killed at a time, there's not much benefit to be had tagging.

Edited by Aldurair
Append

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
11 hours ago, Madnath said:

I support this so I can AFK sooner

For the sake of the game. Could you please make it clear Madnath if you're memeing or if you'd really like that kind of change. >.<

 

11 hours ago, Ekcin said:

Btw., to my knowledge, all actual point attribution, tagged or not, gets lost once a fighter leaves the rift area, for example going behind a fence outside it to heal up (not to mention that only a dying mob at most 4 tiles away will count)

AFAIK it is not lost when leaving the rift area. You can tag all of the mobs and then chill in the healing pen whilst others kill them. I'm fairly sure seen several players doing this. I do know for a FACT as well that if you bring a rift creature outside the rift zone and kill it you'll still get a point, so I do believe tags are not lost just because you left the zone. 

 

 

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
4 hours ago, Josso said:

I have never done this tagging nonsense, fought fair and square and usually ended up at the very top behind the priests (and Volladol :-p). I don't quite see the issue.

That's awesome that you're able to do that! However, just because you have not seen the issue doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Plenty of people like myself have expressed seeing the issue and would like it to be addressed. Do you not see how a fresh player can easily get the same or more points than you for doing no actual participation.

 

4 hours ago, Aldurair said:

Also tagging only matters if there are at least two groups fighting and effectively killing mobs. If its just one mob being killed at a time, there's not much benefit to be had tagging.

This is true, but only really happens at rifts of 20 people or under. If we're talking about the avg. NFI rift there will always be several mobs being attacked at once.

 

 

4 hours ago, Sheffie said:

I would not like that very much, as you might be able to guess, given that I just proposed something different.

Yes, but what you proposed contradicts your stance of what you define as a "community event."

"Rifts should be first and foremost a community event, not an opportunity for those with the highest skills and best equipment to cash in."

I'm positive that most systems that rewards players for specific activities will be backed by their skill and equipment. The only way in my mind to remove the need for skill and equipment is to give everyone the same reward regardless of their participation.  

22 hours ago, Sheffie said:

When a rift creature dies,

  • award points to everyone who is engaged with that creature, and 
  • award points to the person that creature is attacking.

Players with more skill and equipment will be able to:

  • Retreat and heal less, thereby being able to engage in more creatures which means more points
  • Tank more creatures which means more points
  • And whilst you didn't give a new way for healing to work, the current system does reward healers with more skill and equipment

What do you find is the problem with rewarding those who do MORE at rifts than others? It is called "Participation points", so should it not be based off of how much players are participating?

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

While you are busy reworking the whole system...

 

Can you make a system where I can teleport into the rift and teleport back to deed. The travel distance is tedious for any non hardcore player as it already is. To my opinion the moment that you travel and do stuff at the rift. No matter how big or small. Is already insane to me. 

 

Anyone that thinks it's worth to travel 3 hours in total is hardcore in my mind. Not to mention that the rift itself can take hours upon end. Hell if that is the main content Wurm provides, no wonder this game is only played by niche amount of players and dropping...

 

You all are actually insane and pros in my mind.

I paused playing mainly for the insanity you have to go through with this game.

Edited by Deltora
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, Deltora said:

an you make a system where I can teleport into the rift and teleport back to deed. The travel distance is tedious for any non hardcore player as it already is.

 

It's why I burned out around 71% rift completion goal and needed another break. When I realised I kinda wasted 100 hours of my life just sailing/riding to and from rifts. Great fun. Awesome game design.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
6 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

That's awesome that you're able to do that! However, just because you have not seen the issue doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Plenty of people like myself have expressed seeing the issue and would like it to be addressed. Do you not see how a fresh player can easily get the same or more points than you for doing no actual participation.


Even though I find rifts revolting, I am willing to help you prove your theory. I will come to today's rift and fight normally. You bring a 0 skill alt and just tag mobs. When you outperform me on the leaderboard, you have something substantial to bring to this thread. How about that?

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

18 hours ago, Ekcin said:

Btw., to my knowledge, all actual point attribution, tagged or not, gets lost once a fighter leaves the rift area, for example going behind a fence outside it to heal up (not to mention that only a dying mob at most 4 tiles away will count)

AFAIK it is not lost when leaving the rift area. You can tag all of the mobs and then chill in the healing pen whilst others kill them. I'm fairly sure seen several players doing this. I do know for a FACT as well that if you bring a rift creature outside the rift zone and kill it you'll still get a point, so I do believe tags are not lost just because you left the zone.

 

I am speaking from my experiences with rift mechanics, which, btw. have been changing a lot over the years. But I am fairly sure that there is no rift point gain from activities outside the rift area. In former rifts, mobs tended to stray out of the area, pursueing players quite far  away, and/or posing a threat to horses hitched outside of fenced areas (both that has been changed). Killing such mobs did not give any score. Similarly, when a priest/ess is healing from outside the rift area, it is easy to see that her/his score does not rise (Priests, in a way, "tag" everybody they hit either with healing, or damage spells, which is the reason why they are leading the scoreboard).

 

Personally, I repeatedly had situations where I killed casters and summoners teleported off the actual combat, was surrounded by packs of dogs (often ogres too as they tend to defend summoners and casters under attack), and had to abort fight to save my butt and heal up. In such situations, I had "tagged", more involuntarily, quite a few mobs pursueing to the safe zone. In none of such situations I could observe any score increase from these mobs being finished when outside the combat area. So I assume your statement is factually wrong. Or mechanics differ on NFI which I doubt.

Edited by Ekcin
typo

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
6 hours ago, Deltora said:

Can you make a system where I can teleport into the rift and teleport back to deed. The travel distance is tedious for any non hardcore player as it already is. To my opinion the moment that you travel and do stuff at the rift. No matter how big or small. Is already insane to me. 

 

In fact, you may be teleported to the rift if priest is willing to summon you. Teleport back either requires a priest summoning you back, 1000 karma for a home portal karma spell, or meditation skill 80 which grants you a recall home every 18 hours (shorter cooldown with 13th to 16th grade iirc).

 

Being insane is no prerequisite to play Wurm. But it certainly helps.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Ekcin said:

In fact, you may be teleported to the rift if priest is willing to summon you.

 

This is only useful if the rift is on the server you play on and you might know people there. But if you sail to another server and bring a horse with you, not helpful.

 

Considering at what hours rift happen, I only was able to make 1 rift every 2 months on Deliverance due to how they are scheduled.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Josso said:


Even though I find rifts revolting, I am willing to help you prove your theory. I will come to today's rift and fight normally. You bring a 0 skill alt and just tag mobs. When you outperform me on the leaderboard, you have something substantial to bring to this thread. How about that?

 

I will be at todays rift as well, I will NOT be tagging at this rift. Simply focus down a mob and move onto the next. See you all there :)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
51 minutes ago, elentari said:

[summoning]

This is only useful if the rift is on the server you play on and you might know people there. But if you sail to another server and bring a horse with you, not helpful.

Granted it is less effective on other servers, but still not useless. You could hit a coast not too far from the rift, let yourself summon, and have only to get back, or even summoned back if someone lives close to your mooring point. Granted, it requires some contact with the locals.

 

51 minutes ago, elentari said:

Considering at what hours rift happen, I only was able to make 1 rift every 2 months on Deliverance due to how they are scheduled.

Honestly, I have troubles to understand that. Deli is a small server, and regular players do know one another. To my knowledge, you are in a European time zone, CET or EET. Maybe you are professionally so committed that you cannot play over day, and cannot even do that for 10 minutes. Otherwise it would hardly be a problem for you to either travel or let yourself be summoned to the rift area, whack the few mobs you need for the rift being recognized, and recall home. Would be a 5 minute thing during the 1:20 to 2hrs a rift on Deli lasts, logging out on closure. You could even ask a trusted friend to do that for you. There is a difference between not being able and not being willing.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Unfortunately for 2020-2021, I didn't work from home 90% of the time. I had to go into the office to verify papework 4/5 days a week. So that pretty much meant that anything between 7 AM - 7 PM (includes traffic) means a no go zone for me. If a rift happens beyond 11 PM I have zero chance of going to it since I know I'll fall asleep during that time. So my only chances are the weekend assuming a rift manages to open on Deli in those 2 days. Hence my reasoning = managed to do 1 rift every 2 months on my own homeserver. 

 

I'm too lazy to pull up the niarja stats but you can look up EURO rift times for the past 8 months and see what I'm talking about.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Agreed your professional situation does not reasonably allow for more than a few hours of wurming during workdays. 

But sorry Elentari, you are playing Wurm  a decade longer than me, have skills far above mine, and want to tell me that you are unable to bring your character to a rift location the evening before a rift starts, have no trusted friend to whack the few mobs for you, then karma teleport or recall home, and log out after rift closure? 

 

I boils down to that you do not like that, that even during weekends you do not want or like to travel to a rift on another server whose rift location may be 20 minutes away if you are coastal (mind you, that is not Xanadu, and I know the sailing time from my deed to the server border which is roughly once through all of Deli). This decision is upto you, and is of course perfectly in your right, but not the guilt of the game.  As said: There is a difference between not being able and not being willing.

Edited by Ekcin

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah well, blame it on changing careers heh. Back in 2013 I was working as a part time translator from home so I could reasonably game, queue up some imping actions while I browsed dictionaries or used CAT tools.

 

Also getting decent skills is a long term burn out that leads to one outcome eventually : the need for new content to play. One grind is pretty much like the other. I need some new content past personal goals, something fun to get me back in the game.  Without new content we eventually succumb to that inner voice of despair that hisses deep in your soul " Why are you wasting watching timers in a game when you can do something else? " . Dramatic, I know. But you get the idea.

 

Back to rifts, I can't see any solution at this point to satisfy players. Wurm doesn't have convoluted code that tracks metrics such as " % damage done to mobs by individual players" like WoW or other games have in raids so you can see how much each player really contributed to a fight.

 

I doubt the devs would code that just for the sake of rifts. I do think the game should code stuff like "first aid on other players" as a measure of potential contribution to the team effort.

 

Rifts should indeed be more team oriented but for that the AI needs to be smarter and rifts would need to be more challenging.

 

If anything I'd propose that leaving the rift area will reset your points to 0 if you leave it for more than 60 seconds (timer assuming your game might crash or something and needs to be reloaded).

 

I'd like rifts to be sort of inescapable until you kill everything in a wave. Lock players and have them survive. Just a thought.


Tagging is meh...I've done it myself tbh in the past and not proud of it. But I saw it sometimes was the only way to get to a 80+ participation when rift mobs fell around me left and right by other players and I was still tanking an ogre for 2 minutes straight.

 

If you'd really want "rift points" to be an accurate metric, it would need some serious coding to gauge % dmg to each rift mob done by players. To that end I'd assign a value of 1-10 of point difficulty for each rift mob with the following table:

 

Rift beasts = 1 point if soloed.

Rift jackals = 2 points

Rift summoners = 3 points

Rift caster = 4 points

Rift ogre  = 5 points

Rift ogre magi = 6 points.

Rift Warmaster = 10 points

Champ/ Hardened/ etc status will give a few extra points to each individual mob.

 

Argument example, rift done by 4 players, this would look like a log for my own toon:

 

 Elentari 23% dmg done on rift 50 rift beasts=  11-12 rift points (assuming a rift beast would be worth 1 point).

                   30% dmg done on rift jackals on 61 jackals  = roughly 37 points.

                   20 % dmg done on ogres out of 40 ogres = 40 points

                   32% dmg on warmaster = 3 points

                   0% dmg done on other mobs = 0 points.

Total 80 or 81 points reward. ( don't judge my math, I was in a hurry :D )

 

It could be coded. Other mmos have similar metrics to track players contribution in world events, raids, dungeons, quests and so on. It would require testing but unless rifts were made more challenging and more interesting, the system would only serve to discourage tagging and encourage staying on one target. Keep in mind switching targets can lead to a small window in which your char is not attacking at all. Not to mention stuff like losing focus, changing CR due to target distance or position, etc.

 

Edited by elentari
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
5 hours ago, Ekcin said:

So I assume your statement is factually wrong. Or mechanics differ on NFI which I doubt.

I'll do some testing at today's rift, but I am also assuming you are factually wrong.

 

1 hour ago, elentari said:

Keep in mind switching targets can lead to a small window in which your char is not attacking at all. Not to mention stuff like losing focus, changing CR due to target distance or position, etc.

Tagging also encourages switching targets. If not, more frequently to the point where you aren't ever focusing or event attacking. I do agree with you that something like this could be difficult to code, but if that's the case then I want to here a dev reply to this post stating why certain features are asking for too much, so that we can then tone down our solutions. However, without a dev doing that I see no reason why we should just assume they can't do anything and tone down our ideas preemptively. 

 

6 hours ago, Josso said:

Even though I find rifts revolting, I am willing to help you prove your theory. I will come to today's rift and fight normally. You bring a 0 skill alt and just tag mobs. When you outperform me on the leaderboard, you have something substantial to bring to this thread. How about that?

I will attempt to do this with one of my Camera accounts, but I don't know if it'll be able to generate points since it's not premium. If it doesn't then I'll consider dropping 5 silver to test it at another rift.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
33 minutes ago, Zuelatak said:
6 hours ago, Ekcin said:

So I assume your statement is factually wrong. Or mechanics differ on NFI which I doubt.

I'll do some testing at today's rift, but I am also assuming you are factually wrong.

Following up on this we were both wrong.

-Tagging mobs and leaving the rift area does not reward points when the target is killed, but does reward fighting skill.

-Killing a rift mob out of the rift area does reward points and fighting skill.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I've completed 100 rifts on one avatar and 95 on two others, and always in top 3, whenever I check anyways.

 

It's simple, kill mobs for more points.  Do it like this:

1. Invest in AoSP armour, a frost prot ring, fire prot ring, glacial necklace and Frostbrand weapon and LT weapon.  Use Frostbrand whenever above 75%.  Use LT when below 75%. 

2. Fight in aggressive mode for maximum damage output and stay focused especially on the mages and ogres.

3. Do not rush into a group thinking it's like WoW and you'll receive the points because the mobs aggro'd you first.  It doesn't work like that if kiting a train of mobs and have to leave the rift area to lose them.  Instead, hang back and let them spread out a bit.  Don't take on more than you can handle.  If you have to run out for emergency healing, you'll lose potential points.  

4. Join a group of players and burn down the same creature as quickly as possible.  If there is a big group with many creatures and it's obvious that people are targeting different ones, then yes, target those around you for a second or two in melee range, but focus down the one with the lowest health and always switch to the next one with the lowest health.

5. Order of priority (weakest to strongest mob) is beasts, (summoners and casters), jackals, mages, then ogres.  If the group has targeted and seriously wounded a stronger target with other weaker targets present, switch to the stronger target and help finish it off, then seek out the next lowest health mob, or if none then the weakest mob.

6. The majority of the time, the group will become overwhelmed at times, especially if fighting close to the beam while spawning.  If being targeted, health is dropping, and the situation seems dire, don't hesitate to retreat to the outer edge.  Find another person or small group that has also retreated and start working on outer mobs in priority order.  Work you way back towards other groups.  The goal is to kill mobs without being targeted so you can spend time killing rather than retreating and bandaging.  The best place to do this is in the outer edges inside the rift area where there are fewer mobs.  I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but when you are not actively killing, you are effectively losing potential points.

7. Occasionally, a low health summoner or caster will have teleported away and may be standing by itself.  If deemed safe from pulling stronger mobs, rush in and finish it off, then ride away.  These are usually fast easy kills, but can be tricky to pull off sometimes if other mobs are around.  Look for those opportunities.

8. Burn hearts.  You gain 1 point each and they are the easiest way to gain points.  I butcher corpses and collect hearts for the next upcoming rift.  That way I don't have to waste time butchering during the rift and can immediately start burning.

Edited by Galatyn
added aggressive mode
  • Like 2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
4 minutes ago, Galatyn said:

I've completed 100 rifts on one avatar and 95 on two others, and always in top 3, whenever I check anyways.

 

It's simple, kill mobs for more points.  Do it like this:

1. Invest in AoSP armour, a frost prot ring, fire prot ring, glacial necklace and Frostbrand weapon and LT weapon.  Use Frostbrand whenever above 75%.  Use LT when below 75%.

2. Do not rush into a group thinking it's like WoW and you'll receive the points because the mobs aggro'd you first.  It doesn't work like that if kiting a train of mobs and have to leave the rift area to lose them.  Instead, hang back and let them spread out a bit.  Don't take on more than you can handle.  If you have to run out for emergency healing, you'll lose potential points.  

3. Join a group of players and burn down the same creature as quickly as possible.  If there is a big group with many creatures and it's obvious that people are targeting different ones, then yes, target those around you for a second or two in melee range, but focus down the one with the lowest health and always switch to the next one with the lowest health.

4. Order of priority is beasts, (summoners and casters), jackals, mages, then ogres.  If the group has targeted and seriously wounded a higher priority target with other lower priority targets present, switch to the higher priority target and help finish it off, then seek out the next lowest health mob, or if none then lowest priority target.

5. The majority of the time, the group will become overwhelmed at times, especially if fighting close to the beam while spawning.  If being targeted, health is dropping, and the situation seems dire, don't hesitate to retreat to the outer edge.  Find another person or small group that has also retreated and start working on outer mobs in priority order.  Work you way back towards the rift or other groups.  The goal is to kill mobs without being targeted so you can spend time killing rather than retreating and bandaging.  The best place to do this is in the outer edges inside the rift area where there are fewer mobs.  I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but when you are not actively killing, you are effectively losing potential points.

6. Occasionally, a low health summoner or caster will have teleported away and may be standing by itself.  If deemed safe from pulling stronger mobs, rush in and finish it off, then ride away.  These are usually fast easy kills, but can be tricky to pull off sometimes if other mobs are around.  Look for those opportunities.

7. Burn hearts.  You gain 1 point each and they are the easiest way to gain points.  I butcher corpses and collect hearts for the next upcoming rift.  That way I don't have to waste time butchering and can immediately start burning.

This is how I would like to see rifts go, but I'm still confident with a fresh character I can get pretty similar points to you. Also, I feel the need to say this again but the difference between tagging and not tagging scales with the amount of players present at a rift. I'm looking into making a new character to prove my point as it seems that it's needed.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
13 hours ago, Deltora said:

While you are busy reworking the whole system...

 

Can you make a system where I can teleport into the rift and teleport back to deed. The travel distance is tedious for any non hardcore player as it already is. To my opinion the moment that you travel and do stuff at the rift. No matter how big or small. Is already insane to me. 

 

Anyone that thinks it's worth to travel 3 hours in total is hardcore in my mind. Not to mention that the rift itself can take hours upon end. Hell if that is the main content Wurm provides, no wonder this game is only played by niche amount of players and dropping...

 

You all are actually insane and pros in my mind.

I paused playing mainly for the insanity you have to go through with this game.

-1. Teleportation already exists thru karma. No need to make the game easier than its already become. I always travel a day or two prior. :)

  • Like 2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Thanks, Galatyn for that summary which matches my observations. Just to note, I nearly never care a lot for high scores. Usually I score around or below rank 4-8 depending on the number of participants, and get between 220 and below 300 rift shop points, and MM ql 83 to max 93. I am content with. My main objective is to contribute to fast rift closing, and preventing player deaths where possible. Further on, I take the opportunity to improve my shield bashing, and taunting, and of course FS and agressive fighting. That way, I am enjoying rifts instead of staring at scores.

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this