Cherek wrote:Why do you want all NPCs to provide the same XP? And why do we want to spread out the population over all domains? Is there any reason we want people to travel to all domains?
I think this would happen:
People will find a remote place where nobody else goes that is perfect for scripting. Turn on the script and grow. No need to team, no need to interact. Just find your own little corner of the world to grow. And even if you dont have a script, its still a perfect way for endless grinding without having to bother about anyone else. I do not really believe in adding a place that is "made for scripting" and then try to add things to prevent it. I would rather see people didnt want to script in the first place because what you are doing is actually fun.
Personally I think scaling NPCs is exactly the opposite of what we need. I think we need to reward interaction and socializing, and I think we need to try to centralize our population so they actually meet up. Not spread them out. I am perfectly fine with that people dont travel to all places, especially with the number of people we have. With more players, people will spread out naturally since it will be too crowded in certain places.
If we want to make grinding more fun I dont think scaling NPCs is the way to go.
I think we need ways to grind that actually require attention, that are challenging and rewarding, and most importantly that are FUN.
For me that would be for instance:
Assault X. (team)
Join up with a friend on two and assist some army in assualting a fortress or something. An assult takes about 30 min - 1 hour to complete. If you succeed in storming the fort you get an addiation XP boost, making it a little more rewarding than normal grinding. And also more fun.
Defend X. (team)
Same as assault, but you try to defend a place from attackers instead.
Boss dungeons. (solo or team)
Enter a dungeon, fight your way through hordes of minions to reach the boss. Once killed the boss provides a boost of experience to the entire party. And perhaps some nifty item(s) too.
These types of things that require you to be alert, to team up, and that provide a certain amount of excitement is what I think could revolutionize the way gaining XP works here.
History also shows that people enjoy these types of things. Kroug raids, Vingaard Keep raids, Sparkle raids etc have always been popular, even though they dont pose much of a threat anymore, and even though they are not rewarding. I think these types of things would greatly improve grinding and make it much more fun, and with much more interaction.
Scaling NPCs would I fear just make people script more, and interact less.
What you want to promote is teaming in Genesis. You want to make it rewarding enough that people are encouraged to take other players out with them, say Beginner to Expert level.
Say you are a grinder, you probably have no problem with this because for you and your teammate this is your daily activity and adding a little one with you will benefit him, but not really "slow you down". Or does it.
Well I can't take him to Terel Trolls one of my normal spots because they'll auto-attack the smallest in the team, and he/she is a dead man. I can't really take him to Qualinosti because the elves would slaughter him/her. Mithas can get dangerous if he assists to quickly and they troll one shots him. Icewall is definitely out of the question.
Now that being said, these situations are "what ifs" but still valid. Something that will make you think twice about the headache you'll get from worrying if the little guy is going to be dying, attacked all the time, whatever (Oh ya and you only can play 2 hours a night max because your a busy person).
So you can't hit any of the prime XP spots that will benefit you and your regular team-mate, but you also want to do your part for Genesis and try and help new players see content, and enjoy themselves. Where can you take him that will still benefit you cause "its your time, so should be your enjoyment" and let you do your part for helping the cause? If less hostile NPCS scaled you'd be able to contribute?
I'm not saying oh I want the world to be easy, I'm saying or attempting to resolve; How do we make people travel to all the domains and utilize more then 50% of Genesis's content, and how do I promote player interaction, while making it worthwhile for people to team.
And for people who think that grinding doesn't require one to pay attention (least at my size) I'm saying you don't grind often enough. Qualinosti, Terel Trolls and Mithas can all turn south fast if your not paying attention. I don't know how gaining combat xp can be "more fun" because if you put raids on Cities offering more XP, but there is more of a chance of dying, people are going to tend and go for the "easy XP".
If there's a team bonus and its significant (Thanks for checking Petros) then I think more people would actually take people out killing because maybe dropping down to Draconians and Centaurs for the little one, will still give you your CXP fix. If it doesn't, then the game isn't designed to promote team-playing. You can't really Quest as a Group. You can't Herb as a Group. That gives you walking around exploring and for those of us who have been around for 20+ years that's kind of redundant. That leaves you Combat Killing for XP.
Just my opinion.