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Post by tils on Feb 15, 2024 18:49:14 GMT
Below was the beginning list of some potential change discussions. I will throw this here as a placeholder to begin discussions and see where it goes from there. Sorry for the long post in advance Here are some things that come to my mind, but I am not dead set on changing anything or everything either. So it would be a Team/Player discussion if up to me. 1. Drones/Clones. 2. GS Cloak. 3. Too easy to level. 4. Randoms. 5. Puissant Bonus on Shifters. 6. Barbs. 7. Summons. 8. Seasonal Bonuses. 9. Immunity Items. 10. New Forge Stones. 11. Greater Restore/Heal pots make clerics useful again My thoughts on the above. Keep in mind I primarily play solo and group to help others when there is a LFG request. I enjoy the DM server events for groups, but past that I am a farmer looking for that sweet sweet loot Never been focused on PvP on this server even back in the old days 1) Drones-leave as is now with only one available at a time- Not a deal breaker to me really in any way though there are a number of builds very dependent on drones. 2)Gsanc cloak -ditch it or change to where you are vulnerable after an offensive action (including curse song) Not a deal breaker to me in anyway though really...let people enjoy what they enjoy. 3) levelling-love the way it is especially with server wide boosts. Not a deal breaker but I am a destination not about the journey kind of guy. I have levelled a number of toons on the test server to mid teens...the grind is real and thats with all the quests pre epic 4) Randoms-candidly saved the game for me and would keep me forever. The endless opportunity for the unique item for any build, all RNG...love it!!! This one would be a deal breaker for me...its what keep me coming back hoping to win the random lottery 5) Puissant on shifters-personally think it is necessary with the limitations of not being able to use or do anything other than potions (may want to look at uber pots though in conjunction) Not a deal breaker but again doesn't break the game. Pros and cons to these classes 6)Barbs-I dunno at the time when they rec'd buffs before most other classes maybe, but seem fine to me...I have 3-4 lvl 40's and rarely play them. Not a deal breaker but class balancing will always have classes people feel are unfair compared to others. Candidly rarely seen a game, or even pen and paper, where that's not the case...especially once you throw in gear as well. Unless its an exploit (gsanc cloak hehe) leave it. 7) Summons-no comment not sure what is being looked for here 8) seasonal bonuess close second to randoms for me as it adds flavor to the server. Server is way busier when bonuses are high. I can log in when server bonuses are low or not there vs a day with 12/30 and bonus cr of 5+ and there will always be 6+ people on. Potential deal breaker and I say that just seeing player volumes based on server bonuses and events 9) Love immunity items...they are rare and can be a key item to designing a completely new toon- not a deal breaker but such quality of life items and opportunity for very different builds 10) New stones, personally I liked it always ensured you could have a useful weap as you levelled- not a deal breaker but nice quality of life 11) heal potions-absolutely keep, I don't want to be forced to group with a cleric/healer. I am sure many of us have played other MMO's etc and trying to find the class specific Tank, healer, DPS roles was annoying unless you had a set group of people that played at the same times. Personally seems like a deal breaker to me, no way am I only playing if I can find another player to heal me, or use heal kits after fights The newest version of the server is excellent. Thank you to Chree and others for all the hard work on the continued changes. I know there is little to no chance to get everyone to agree on every change. Each of is is likely playing the game for different reasons . But from a long time loot hoarder (whore), I like where the server is at for the most part. Also keep in mind much of the server has been tweaked for the constant power creep that inevitably happens over time. We will want to keep that in mind as well Ok now here's hoping the vault can be recovered and we run a status quo and a second server with fresh vaults and whatever changes are agreed to. Either way fun to have some options, and great job Findell for getting EE running!
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mogliuth
Wheaton Pixie
Playing on EE
Posts: 30
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Post by mogliuth on Feb 16, 2024 18:05:22 GMT
I like the reasons u mentioned and i am the same opinion. U find good words for that. I played extremely 10-12 years ago an then i paused for a long time and 3T in the past was hard and challenging. And it was awful to relevel a toon or test something direct on the server. Drop rate or something that feel like thing never comes up ... The last set of the server is totally different because it is thru the seasonal thing still challenging and difficult. But it got regions u can't go with a build or u build it only for a region. U got more options to play the way u want. And not to forget to mention a great felling for a good drop rate and u can test new builds in game and do not need to hope it fits on 3T. PS: Special thanks to all DM's and developer and people who keep 3T up and running many thumbs up for u and your great art of genius work. U saved my day's PPS: tils u cant post that in a shorter way then u did Edit: Oh yeah ruhle rod of sequencer ... i need many of them
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Post by apecraze on Feb 16, 2024 18:23:59 GMT
I raised my voice loudly on the cloak, as some people will know :-) It needs to go in the current form.
Next thing to go and not on the list : duplicator rod :-p
Other than that I would like to commend the dev team and supporters for the great work over so many years, that sort of dedication is not be found often
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Post by kid on Feb 16, 2024 18:39:47 GMT
I raised my voice loudly on the cloak, as some people will know :-) It needs to go in the current form. Next thing to go and not on the list : duplicator rod :-p Other than that I would like to commend the dev team and supporters for the great work over so many years, that sort of dedication is not be found often Isn't that basically under drones?
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Post by apecraze on Feb 17, 2024 18:16:40 GMT
No, Drones are fine imho, but tradeable items to increase their usage are not
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Post by Rijnius on Feb 17, 2024 21:20:25 GMT
This. Do we have the option to base the new EE version on Chreelisters latest build? That would be fantastic. And this is just my personal taste, but while we're at it ( ) then I would like to see... - The character vault wiped. If there is balancing to be done, we should start fresh for everybody. - Drones gone. If we insist on a gimmick summon for classes that don't have access to summons and need a little distraction or help, make it EITHER kill things with a health pool similar to the character and no immunities whatsoever OR make it immortal for a while but with a "noodle" as a weapon so it only functions as a distraction. - Random loot is fantastic and gives purpose for grinding. - Seasonal bonusses and buffs that can be triggered by the player are very engaging. However, they used to invalidate the whole townside experience recently with bonusses going that high. I basically used them as a compensation for the lack of a respec feature for the character. Maybe if we can have that and get the ability to experiment with some builds with same starting stats, we would not need to redo endless toons with just a little tweak here and there for which a grind to epics would feel quite unneccessary. For balancing purposes one could consider capping the XP/gold bonus to x2, which makes it still noteworthy but not as overpowered. - Permanent immunity items (fear, death, mind-immunity, ...) should go away for good!
- I really dislike greater restore and healing potions as a source for healing since you need ZERO investment to use them effectively. At least heal kits need some skill points put into them. Maybe consider heal skill points for potions and scale them accordingly with 127 skill points max. to make them as effective as they are now and heal maybe 50-60 HP per use with no skills invested with linear interpolation inbetween? - Items like rod of wonder or the cloak ape mentionened should go away. - Puissant widget, warrior widget and barbarian rage should not give AB bonusses, but damage and/or AC only. Or with very high fighter or barbarian level investment (e.g. 15 fighter levels for AB boost or 28+ levels barbarian for AB boost, so you need some dedication). Puissant also is be exploited by shifters which get insane AB that way with endless duration. On that note, the +1 AB / 3 shifter levels could be toned down a bit. Currently you could cap the AB with +8 weapon with 22 shifter levels and +2 puissant and warrior widget/belt. That is insane for any toon to get that close to the cap without external bard or cleric buffs or true strike. - Make Pale Masters have two undead pets max. using the dominate feature only. The pet's pet used to bug quest updates for the party on kill and the party list. - Make elemental summons a lot weaker, unless heavy investment is put into them with spell / greater focus (conjuration) AND very high wiz/druid/cleric/bard levels. With the recent changes you were able to summon level 32 elementals way before character level 20 if I recall it correctly. - Reduce the costs for tokens in the shifter cave.
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Post by taroc on Feb 18, 2024 0:16:19 GMT
- The character vault wiped. If there is balancing to be done, we should start fresh for everybody. - Seasonal bonusses and buffs that can be triggered by the player are very engaging. However, they used to invalidate the whole townside experience recently with bonusses going that high. - Puissant widget, warrior widget and barbarian rage should not give AB bonusses, but damage and/or AC only. Or with very high fighter or barbarian level investment (e.g. 15 fighter levels for AB boost or 28+ levels barbarian for AB boost, so you need some dedication). Puissant also is be exploited by shifters which get insane AB that way with endless duration. On that note, the +1 AB / 3 shifter levels could be toned down a bit. Currently you could cap the AB with +8 weapon with 22 shifter levels and +2 puissant and warrior widget/belt. That is insane for any toon to get that close to the cap without external bard or cleric buffs or true strike. - Reduce the costs for tokens in the shifter cave. I imagine on the EE server the vault will be what it is now, with the new characters players already have there in the couple of weeks it's been up. Unless there's a vault wipe before it goes live. I think an EE version should start with a clean vault and if we can access the old vault, maybe have a separate unchanged (aside from Chree's 'The End' update added) server running 1.69 with the old vault. I don't think the old 1.69 vault should be imported into EE. Seasonal bonuses. I disagree that they invalidate the townside experience. I got several toons to 40 just killing orcs, never once set foot in Epics Puissant widget is fine as it is. Either get rid of all widgets or leave it alone. The shifter cave token cost is there as a gold sink, if the server stays as it was in it's latest form, gold will be easy to come by; I'd suggest increasing the token cost to something like 10 million. The rest of your post I either agree with or don't care enough either way.
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mogliuth
Wheaton Pixie
Playing on EE
Posts: 30
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Post by mogliuth on Feb 18, 2024 2:18:59 GMT
I think what Rijnius said would turn 3T more in to a more difficult version that 3T was. (on principle ok for me, but not for now) The version 1.69 was IMHO need to be more easy because there don't where 2 servers full with 60 people playing 3T. You can't find a group with a cleric or a group that was big enough to crawl thru the maps without a cleric ... 12 years ago with a more difficult version of 3T it was possible, but may be 3T will be that popular again. But in the meantime i agree to Taroc. And if it is need to get new balanced in the future (because of a full server ) i trust in the dev and DM Team, that they take care about that.
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Post by kid on Feb 18, 2024 2:31:17 GMT
1. Drones/Clones.
I'd say get rid of drone items and get rid of post lvl 40 progression for them. They'll still be useful but not a crutch like they currently are.
2. GS Cloak.
Remove it.
3. Too easy to level.
I'm honestly on the fence about this, I get where you are coming from but having spent literally years levelling and relevelling builds, it's kind of nice to be able to progress a bit faster. Maybe you could shift bonuses over to favour quests rather then enemies killed so at least people are doing those rather then just killing orcs for 30 lvls.
4. Randoms.
Honestly one of the best things added to the server. I've briefly mentioned this before but if I had my way I'd throw out the overwhelming majority of the tier based loot system and replace it with random drops. I'd go even farther and say you should add in random armour NPCs, locked behind quests, at various points of the levelling progression. If anything should be done, it should be the addition of negative traits to random item rolls so you have to look at trade offs. Bonus points if you can rename stuff after it drops.
5. Puissant Bonus on Shifters.
Needs fixing. I'd suggest making it so shifters always get focused puis regardless of what weapons feats are taken (but still requiring weapon feats to be taken of course).
6. Barbs.
Might be my bias coming in here, I've played barbs a lot (I was doing it waaaay before it was cool too) and to be frank, there is almost always a build that is more suitable for whatever you are doing.
7. Summons.
I'd agree that basic summons could do with a nerf, I've argued in the past that it's weird that casters get better summons then dedicated summoner class through out most of the lvling process. To add to this, I think BG doom knight should be replaced with their main summon -1 lvl and the problem with their main summon being dispelled should be fixed. Also, having played PM summoners extensively, I think they are fine as is but it would be nice if the weird bugs with them could be fixed if only for the sake of not annoying people you're partying with. People might think 4 summons is OP but UD2D is everywhere and you can lose the lot all at once quite easily. Extra mention for druid familiars needing some love.
8. Seasonal Bonuses.
I actually like these and it certainly boosted the amount of players. Maybe some balancing would be in order for them.
9. Immunity Items.
I think immunity items are a good thing. If you were going to do anything with them, I'd suggest making it so the only practical effect on them WAS the immunity attribute so you are sacrificing a gear slot entirely for them. Closely related, so I'll mention this here: I'll go out on a limb and say that 1 rolls are difficulty crutch, one that gets lent on far to much endgame. Another suggestion I've made in the past is changing 1 rolls from being an auto fail to being a reroll with a negative to the save/a bonus to DC, if this were the case, I suspect the value of immunity items would drop quite a bit.
10. New Forge Stones.
Great addition. Now remove t11 (and other tier) weapons and add more random weapons to really open the whole thing up.
11. Greater Restore/Heal pots make clerics useful again
I would just leave them as is. Removing them would require an entire re-examining of endgame dmg values and the like. Not to mention I don't like the idea of raising a classes value by forcing other classes to rely on them.
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Post by mcbutcher on Feb 18, 2024 9:54:59 GMT
Jeez all these suggestions make 3t sound crap to me 😂
I mean, 1-2 of the changes maybe... But if they were all implemented I'd probably not bother coming back.
I'll make a post with what I think on all of them when I have more time.
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Post by tils on Feb 18, 2024 14:11:47 GMT
Jeez all these suggestions make 3t sound crap to me 😂 I mean, 1-2 of the changes maybe... But if they were all implemented I'd probably not bother coming back. I'll make a post with what I think on all of them when I have more time. Totally agree!!!!!
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Post by chreelister on Feb 18, 2024 15:26:56 GMT
These changes for me depends on mostly if we can get the Vault back or not and/or have 2 servers. If we have to go with 1 server, then I wouldn't want it to be so hardcore, but if we have 2, no reason why one of them couldn't be a little or lot harder than the other one. So that way you could pick. If we keep the old vault then no reason to change anything, in my opinion.
You could also pick a middle of the road option on all of these, like keep drones but nerf their AB and Damage. Randoms would be a lot closer to being in line with other items without their server bonuses, IMO, but could be redone totally. Seasonal drops could be more rare, like say 4 times to 8 more rare, that way the server hardly ever gets maxxed. In my EE world I was working on, I got rid of the unfocused puissant bonus, which fixed the Shifter issue. I also don't mind having overpowered items in the server as long as they are really rare, can't be DMed in and can't be duped or at least we will have a way of knowing it was. In Randoms, if you got something good, as a Dev I was pretty certain you got it the right way and if you seen something really good more than once, like an exact copy of something, you know it had to been duped, (So this goes with Immunity and Drone items for me, unless the team/majority are against it). New Forge stones could be more rare to drop. Barbs in my EE server I was working on, got nerfed like 25%, their bonus damage and their rage DC, attacks were capped at +2.
So now things have changed, so the new server whatever we come up with, may be totally different or all the same. I was making the EE server with the mindset that the old v1.69 server would always be going and you always have the option to pick. That might not be the case.
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Post by mcbutcher on Feb 18, 2024 16:04:58 GMT
I can almost guarantee you that if you had 2 servers, 1 with everything the exact same, and 1 with most or all of the suggestions being made above that eventually the server that's exactly the same as it was before the crash would have the most people on it.
Even the poeple who want it more hardcore would come back to that one eventually 😂
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Post by tils on Feb 18, 2024 16:48:32 GMT
The server didn't change (and in my opinion improve) over time because everyone loved the way it was. There was a desire to see changes. It seemed it was always about buffing a class that was too weak. Then it became too strong so another class was buffed, or new areas added, or new mechanics to the mobs etc. Just resetting it will only eventually lead to boredom without power creep etc. I know I suffer through the glasses of the past was better, candidly it rarely actually is, it's just the way we remember how something new at the time felt Either way, a lot of what Chree says above about key factors being if the vault is able to be recovered and 1 or 2 servers will make a huge difference in where things go. On that note...is there any update on a few things: 1) Is there any news on if the vault data is recoverable? 2) regardless of it being recoverable is there any plan to update the current EE server to a newer version and turn on the drops? I think everyone is aware it is test and any toons may be lost/wiped, but playing with newer versions is more fun and really missing drops Totally understand if there is no real clarity on the questions above...only asked out of love for the server and a desire to farm hehe. Thank you again to all of you who are working on getting 3T back, it is much appreciated!
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bolto
Arakan Scribe
Posts: 72
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Post by bolto on Feb 18, 2024 17:17:27 GMT
I finished leveling a new character to 40 on the test server, so with that perspective in mind, my thoughts on the following. (And this is from the mindset of assuming that there is only 1 server)
1. I used to think drones needed full removal from the game, but I am not anywhere near as sure about this now, given what I will go into later on why, but they are definitely right now too strong for what they can do, I can get behind removing all item uses that is not from the widget from the game, the question is, do you have 2 uses only total at current power, or do you cap it at lvl 40, but keep it as a distraction/lure? I am somewhere around there currently, just have the 2 from widget, but not have the drone be able to carry so hard offensive wise, but it still having a very good use (The sole reason that keeps me from voting for it's removal completely is shifters, it gives non shifter more tools to use) I think this would need to be tinkered a bit to be reasonable, exactly on how much power to cut from it.
2. This is something that I think most of the server including myself are in unanimous agreement of, it's just way too busted, I would vote for it's complete removal here.
3. The one thing that keeps me from leveling more characters, is the whole process of doing leveling, it takes a lot of time and even in current 3T I rarely level new characters, I probably at the start would level some new guys, but the time investment is major (Which isn't that good on testing new build ideas) If somehow the whole seasonal stuff got removed, I would like to see more generous ways of lowering the time taken to level, this one is more a personal opinion for myself and won't apply to everyone, some people love leveling and good on them if they do, but it wouldn't hurt if this part got made easier if seasonal items were to get nerfed/removed.
4. The random item system is by far the best innovation of modern 3T and I kid you not when I say that this system alone has extended the servers life by years, people love to find shiny stuff and it is one of the big pulls of the game/genre, while I can agree that the power it drops is a bit imbalanced, I really do not want to see this nerfed so much, it really depends on how the server diffculty gets adjusted if a lot of changes happen etc, but I would think it would be a grave mistake to completely remove random item drops from the game, they need to stay.
5. I think the unfocused bonus shouldn't apply to shifters (This has likely been an oversight for quite a long time) But just leave it at that for now
6. The only barb character I played is the last character I made on modern 3t (And it was a shifter barb lol) while I don't understand the class very well compared to a lot of other players, my gut reaction says that barb is probably fine as it is (Even on shifter variants) right now on the 2011 version of 3T if barb changes are as they are or close to what they are currently, they are probably one of the best classes in the game for farming end game currently, but in 2024 3T this is not the case, they are still useful yes, but they are not exactly busted compared to say bard/sorc/shifter
7. Again not really that much to say here, but in early game, they are too strong, probably need an adjustment there, not as much in endgame though
8. The seasonal system has always been kinda a trap, players have logged in and logged out on the basis of how high the bonus is and also in terms of events there are clearly way better events then others (Aka, the easter egg event is the biggest that comes to mind in terms of being massive) that said I do enjoy having such events, this one feels like an all or nothing one in either keeping them or removing it from the game, but I can say that I definitely have on a number of occasions decided to not play due to the bonuses being too low (And this is a problem spot)
9. Same point as 1, before I would of had said full removal from the game but .. the problem is, a bunch of builds get rendered dead on the spot on this change and all this would do is make shifter more dominant due to a lot of those builds getting those said immunities, 1 rolls really suck hard, maybe something like say mind immunity could still be possible on random items, but it would be the only property that could be on the item and might even have a downside, this one I would need to think more on, but due to the issue of potentially centralising the meta on shifters if literally every big nerf occurs on this list.
10. Forge stones are completely fine and should stay in the game as is, apart from potentially just making them rarer, but I don't think this needs any adjustment at all
11. Can't get on board with removing heal/GR pots from the game, the only thing I could agrue is making them more expensive, but with even some of the busted gear on modern 3T, can you even imagine how hard stuff would be with heal potions completely obliterated? Not to mention on top all of the nerfs that could happen?
That is currently my thoughts on those points, but the greater point I want to make is and I been hinting at it from what I typed, but you can't just nerf everything and then keep the mod currently as it is with no changes, a lot of the later areas were designed with such power creep in mind, and if you take away all of the power, a lot of the endgame areas suddenly become impossible or close to impossible (Or even worse, not worth the investment in time due to difficulty) My worry is, if every nerf is at it's maximum impact here, shifter will dominate the meta and kill off most of the build diversity, this is not an easy thing to balance around, I would think maybe we need to balance it way more slowly then just all at once. The end of the day, you still want the server to be fun and be excited to find a good shiny or two, while balancing is important, I really don't want to see a nuke dropped and have the game feel terrible to play and being locked into less build choice.
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