Suggestion : account-shared alliance ranks

newtinmpls · February 2015

Good point Sypher.

I think achievements should be disconnected from dyes. Dyes like choice of clothing should either be available to all, or connected to crafting.

For that matter I would have champion points and horses (? must be a thing from the PTS) individual and not account wide.

Costumes - they are individual, although you can share them with other characters via your bank account. Used to be you could trade them until they switched to "bind on pick-up" which I do not like.

Sypher · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

Good point Sypher.

I think achievements should be disconnected from dyes. Dyes like choice of clothing should either be available to all, or connected to crafting.

For that matter I would have champion points and horses (? must be a thing from the PTS) individual and not account wide.

Costumes - they are individual, although you can share them with other characters via your bank account. Used to be you could trade them until they switched to "bind on pick-up" which I do not like.

I guess the best example would be the champion point system. Say you have 1 main who has 1,000+ Champion points. You will be able to make a fresh new account and have the 1,000+ champion points to use on that account. This causes a much greater "imbalance" compared to having the alliance rank and/or Support and Assault skill lines on a brand new character.

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+ Especially now that certain abilities like 'Vigor' are required for most stamina builds and most players will be left without this skill for months because of how long the alliance grind is.

olsborg · February 2015

I agree, one of the main reasons I wont bother with a new char right now is that I know, with my time schedule, I wont get to rank 10 with an alt until sometimes next christmas. And id like to have vigor on him.

newtinmpls · February 2015

Sypher wrote: »

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Sypher · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Besides encouraging replayability and alt creation. The assault/support grind is inconsistent with other grinds in the game.

Leveling 1-50 takes a few solid days of grinding.

V1-V14 takes 1-2 weeks of solid grinding.

Maxing a craft takes ~4 months?

While the PvP grind takes some people 1 year+ I know some people who have been playing since release and still haven't hit AR24 to unlock A/S 10.

This discourages alt creation and repeatability. Which is a fundamental aspect of prolonging a games life span.

Juraigr · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

You can get all your dyes, fancy pve gear through one char how outraged would those pve noobs be if your aether was locked to one char?

newtinmpls · February 2015

I had asked why the second character should have an easier time than the first.

Sypher wrote: »

Besides encouraging replayability and alt creation. The assault/support grind is inconsistent with other grinds in the game.

Leveling 1-50 takes a few solid days of grinding.

V1-V14 takes 1-2 weeks of solid grinding.

Maxing a craft takes ~4 months?

While the PvP grind takes some people 1 year+ I know some people who have been playing since release and still haven't hit AR24 to unlock A/S 10.

This discourages alt creation and repeatability. Which is a fundamental aspect of prolonging a games life span.

So what I am hearing is that in order to make the game fun, nothing should take longer than say ... 4 months to accomplish?

newtinmpls · February 2015

Juraigr wrote: »

You can get all your dyes, fancy pve gear through one char how outraged would those pve noobs be if your aether was locked to one char?

I'm not sure what you mean by aether being locked to one character.

I don't like dye colors being locked, period. Mostly because compared to other ES games, there is a serious dearth of ability to personalize character appearance. So for me it's sort of a lore issue. And also fun.

PvE gear I can't speak to. I prefer the crafted sets, but I've gotten "there" (able to make them) by so much deconstructing that I couldn't afford to buy what most of the found set pieces sell for anyway. Same as I know the motifs by having found them (and as of tonight by a really sweet other PC selling me one for literally 11 pennies - thanks!).

My understanding is that the 'gear' at any level can mostly be traded (bound on equip seems to be the standard rather than bind on pick up).

Sypher · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

I had asked why the second character should have an easier time than the first.

Sypher wrote: »

Besides encouraging replayability and alt creation. The assault/support grind is inconsistent with other grinds in the game.

Leveling 1-50 takes a few solid days of grinding.

V1-V14 takes 1-2 weeks of solid grinding.

Maxing a craft takes ~4 months?

While the PvP grind takes some people 1 year+ I know some people who have been playing since release and still haven't hit AR24 to unlock A/S 10.

This discourages alt creation and repeatability. Which is a fundamental aspect of prolonging a games life span.

So what I am hearing is that in order to make the game fun, nothing should take longer than say ... 4 months to accomplish?

Not exactly. Anything that has become a necessity to play competitive pvp shouldn't take close to a year. Well it could, but ideally it shouldn't,

Angavar · February 2015

I agree with ranks being shared by characters in the same faction. Not so much cross faction.

Personally, I have been playing since beta, and my main is still only captain grade 2. I also have a v5 and v6, both around rank 10.

When I'm playing my alts, it feels like a waste of AP, because I'm not contributing to my main character. I would be much more inclined to play alts more often if the rank was shared.

As someone said earlier, if champion points carry over to alts, it makes sense that rank should too, especially considering how much AP it takes to rank up once you get past ~15.

Also agree that the shared ranks should only be available past vr1, or the nonvet campaigns would be very imbalanced.

joshisanonymous · February 2015

I don't much like the idea of anything being account wide save maybe your bank, and then only because people will still pass gold/gear to alts whether it's easy to do or not. This is still an RPG; developing your character is supposed to be fun. It becomes much more like a FPS if you only have to develop one character then everything you make from that point on is automatically maxed out in everything. (And I say everything because if you're gonna say, "Oh, I shouldn't have to grind before I can enjoy playing," as absurd as that sounds to begin with when talking about an RPG, you might as well suggest that literally everything is account wide.)

I don't see what the purpose of this would really be. Replayability? What do you mean? You're not actually replaying anything, you're just getting everything automatically because you already did it on another character.

I also don't buy that you can't be competitive until you get to such and such a rank. DAoC had a much more extravagant reward system for PvPing, and yet low ranked characters could still be competitive. And people made alts. It wasn't some unheard of thing, even though it could certainly take a year to get to a decent rank (at least back in the day).

Asgari · February 2015

All DC chars should share an Alliance Rank pool, same goes for AD and EP. No need to mix alliance ranks earned cross faction.

It was hard enough getting one character to 26 and another to 24 and my third to 16. Now you want me to make my final class and have to catch those too? Merge the AP gained and level the AvA accordingly. Obviously the AP it self should be character bound as it is now but the ranks themselves should be account wide.

Enodoc · February 2015

joshisanonymous wrote: »

I don't much like the idea of anything being account wide save maybe your bank, and then only because people will still pass gold/gear to alts whether it's easy to do or not. This is still an RPG; developing your character is supposed to be fun. It becomes much more like a FPS if you only have to develop one character then everything you make from that point on is automatically maxed out in everything. (And I say everything because if you're gonna say, "Oh, I shouldn't have to grind before I can enjoy playing," as absurd as that sounds to begin with when talking about an RPG, you might as well suggest that literally everything is account wide.)

I don't see what the purpose of this would really be. Replayability? What do you mean? You're not actually replaying anything, you're just getting everything automatically because you already did it on another character.

I also don't buy that you can't be competitive until you get to such and such a rank. DAoC had a much more extravagant reward system for PvPing, and yet low ranked characters could still be competitive. And people made alts. It wasn't some unheard of thing, even though it could certainly take a year to get to a decent rank (at least back in the day).

You explained this a lot better than I could

The best I came up with was:
New characters are called new for a reason. If [x thing] was shared, these characters would have shortcut the effort required to get to a certain position that other new characters would have to put in to get to the same position, and getting somewhere without putting in the effort is cheating. You may have put the effort in once, but if you want to play a new character, you should have to put in new effort.

DisgracefulMind · February 2015

Princess_Asgari wrote: »

All DC chars should share an Alliance Rank pool, same goes for AD and EP. No need to mix alliance ranks earned cross faction.

It was hard enough getting one character to 26 and another to 24 and my third to 16. Now you want me to make my final class and have to catch those too? Merge the AP gained and level the AvA accordingly. Obviously the AP it self should be character bound as it is now but the ranks themselves should be account wide.

I agree completely with this. Alliance rank should be alliance bound for those characters on said alliance.

Asgari · February 2015

Enodoc wrote: »

joshisanonymous wrote: »

I don't much like the idea of anything being account wide save maybe your bank, and then only because people will still pass gold/gear to alts whether it's easy to do or not. This is still an RPG; developing your character is supposed to be fun. It becomes much more like a FPS if you only have to develop one character then everything you make from that point on is automatically maxed out in everything. (And I say everything because if you're gonna say, "Oh, I shouldn't have to grind before I can enjoy playing," as absurd as that sounds to begin with when talking about an RPG, you might as well suggest that literally everything is account wide.)

I don't see what the purpose of this would really be. Replayability? What do you mean? You're not actually replaying anything, you're just getting everything automatically because you already did it on another character.

I also don't buy that you can't be competitive until you get to such and such a rank. DAoC had a much more extravagant reward system for PvPing, and yet low ranked characters could still be competitive. And people made alts. It wasn't some unheard of thing, even though it could certainly take a year to get to a decent rank (at least back in the day).

You explained this a lot better than I could The best I came up with was:
New characters are called new for a reason. If [x thing] was shared, these characters would have shortcut the effort required to get to a certain position that other new characters would have to put in to get to the same position, and getting somewhere without putting in the effort is cheating. You may have put the effort in once, but if you want to play a new character, you should have to put in new effort.

Don't forget new characters post 1.6 will have access to the CP system. Obviously someone who has pvp or PvE a lot will indeed have a lot of points already and have certain advantages.

So it only makes sense to have characters in your alliance to share their progression as well.

Talcyndl · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Because if people remain stuck on their main characters (out of an understandable dread of redoing the AP grind), the population imbalances are going to continue and get worse.

Sanct16 · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

Juraigr wrote: »

You can get all your dyes, fancy pve gear through one char how outraged would those pve noobs be if your aether was locked to one char?

I'm not sure what you mean by aether being locked to one character.

I don't like dye colors being locked, period. Mostly because compared to other ES games, there is a serious dearth of ability to personalize character appearance. So for me it's sort of a lore issue. And also fun.

PvE gear I can't speak to. I prefer the crafted sets, but I've gotten "there" (able to make them) by so much deconstructing that I couldn't afford to buy what most of the found set pieces sell for anyway. Same as I know the motifs by having found them (and as of tonight by a really sweet other PC selling me one for literally 11 pennies - thanks!).

My understanding is that the 'gear' at any level can mostly be traded (bound on equip seems to be the standard rather than bind on pick up).

Imagine that crafted sets were bound to the character that crafted it.

Having PvP ranks bound to the character you got the AP on is pretty much the same.

newtinmpls · February 2015

Sanct16 wrote: »

Imagine that crafted sets were bound to the character that crafted it.

Having PvP ranks bound to the character you got the AP on is pretty much the same.

I'm imagining that ... and I would by okay with it. Most of my characters are 10+ level in any given crafting, and in my exploration-and-role-play heavy gaming style I have no one above level 33 despite playing for about 9 months.

I agree that some things have to be done (game mechanics wise) because of programming/account constraints and practicalities. Banking is one of them. Although I have two accounts, so there are some banking/trading issues.

However, I don't see that "rank" and "items" make sense in terms of being equivalently "account wide". I am against account wide trait knowledge, I'm not particularly happy with account wide dyes (although that's mitigated by my hatred of most of the available colors ... the word 'lurid' comes quickly to mind). I'm not happy with what I hear about horse skills being account wide (however I expect to be able to compensate - in my own head - with my awesome RPG skills).

I can easily see that "making something and selling it" can equate to a real world-ish function, so that makes sense.

I don't see that "sharing a rank" equates to anything other than nepotism and/or bribery. On the other hand.

This could be a really interesting jumping off point for additions to the justice system. What if there really was nepotism and bribery? Could be cool.

Asgari · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

Imagine that crafted sets were bound to the character that crafted it.

Having PvP ranks bound to the character you got the AP on is pretty much the same.

I'm imagining that ... and I would by okay with it. Most of my characters are 10+ level in any given crafting, and in my exploration-and-role-play heavy gaming style I have no one above level 33 despite playing for about 9 months.

I agree that some things have to be done (game mechanics wise) because of programming/account constraints and practicalities. Banking is one of them. Although I have two accounts, so there are some banking/trading issues.

However, I don't see that "rank" and "items" make sense in terms of being equivalently "account wide". I am against account wide trait knowledge, I'm not particularly happy with account wide dyes (although that's mitigated by my hatred of most of the available colors ... the word 'lurid' comes quickly to mind). I'm not happy with what I hear about horse skills being account wide (however I expect to be able to compensate - in my own head - with my awesome RPG skills).

I can easily see that "making something and selling it" can equate to a real world-ish function, so that makes sense.

I don't see that "sharing a rank" equates to anything other than nepotism and/or bribery. On the other hand.

This could be a really interesting jumping off point for additions to the justice system. What if there really was nepotism and bribery? Could be cool.

As a player who has spent 9 months rping and collecting dyes what gives you any say into pvp related changes? You haven't spent countless hours battling through botched patch after patch with zero content updates.

I bet if I brought up the topic of removing buffs you'd probably have a stroke too.

Iyas · February 2015

I think its a good idea but you know...good ideas and zos

so no accound bound alliance war rank for us

newtinmpls · February 2015

Princess_Asgari wrote: »

As a player who has spent 9 months rping and collecting dyes what gives you any say into pvp related changes? You haven't spent countless hours battling through botched patch after patch with zero content updates.

I bet if I brought up the topic of removing buffs you'd probably have a stroke too.

I do think that the concerns of PvE and PvP tend to differ in detail. I was attempting to address the underlying mechanism of "should X" (any given X) be player specific or account wide. One of the players here with a strong preference for expanding things to account-wide urged me to consider how that principle would play out when applied to some of the PvP mechanics.

Asgari · February 2015

newtinmpls wrote: »

Princess_Asgari wrote: »

As a player who has spent 9 months rping and collecting dyes what gives you any say into pvp related changes? You haven't spent countless hours battling through botched patch after patch with zero content updates.

I bet if I brought up the topic of removing buffs you'd probably have a stroke too.

I do think that the concerns of PvE and PvP tend to differ in detail. I was attempting to address the underlying mechanism of "should X" (any given X) be player specific or account wide. One of the players here with a strong preference for expanding things to account-wide urged me to consider how that principle would play out when applied to some of the PvP mechanics.

Doesnt matter if you have AvA unlocked at low levels once CP are introduced.

Dalglish · February 2015

If this were to work I think it would have to be on a faction level not account wide.

So an AD char would not gain from any progress made while on an EP char and vice versa.

joshisanonymous · February 2015

Talcyndl wrote: »

newtinmpls wrote: »

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Because if people remain stuck on their main characters (out of an understandable dread of redoing the AP grind), the population imbalances are going to continue and get worse.

Assuming that the only way populations can be balanced is by people switching factions. That seems like a crappy way to balance such a thing to me, though, not to mention people do make alts already. People have switched factions and you can see a good number of signatures with more than one VR14 listed.

Sanct16 wrote: »

Imagine that crafted sets were bound to the character that crafted it.

Having PvP ranks bound to the character you got the AP on is pretty much the same.

That comparison makes no sense at all since crafted items are meant to be sold/traded.

I still see absolutely no reason why this is necessary, other than to save people effort (that effort being the horror of having to play the game as if it's an RPG). If that's the only reason this stuff should be account wide, then you might as well make literally everything account wide. Once you cap out a character at VR14, infinite CP, and rank whatever, all newly created character are exactly at the same place. You'd essentially end up with a FPS style game and completely empty PvE zones. I really don't even understand why CP are account wide for the same reason.

ToRelax · February 2015

joshisanonymous wrote: »

Talcyndl wrote: »

newtinmpls wrote: »

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Because if people remain stuck on their main characters (out of an understandable dread of redoing the AP grind), the population imbalances are going to continue and get worse.

Assuming that the only way populations can be balanced is by people switching factions. That seems like a crappy way to balance such a thing to me, though, not to mention people do make alts already. People have switched factions and you can see a good number of signatures with more than one VR14 listed.

Sanct16 wrote: »

Imagine that crafted sets were bound to the character that crafted it.

Having PvP ranks bound to the character you got the AP on is pretty much the same.

That comparison makes no sense at all since crafted items are meant to be sold/traded.

I still see absolutely no reason why this is necessary, other than to save people effort (that effort being the horror of having to play the game as if it's an RPG). If that's the only reason this stuff should be account wide, then you might as well make literally everything account wide. Once you cap out a character at VR14, infinite CP, and rank whatever, all newly created character are exactly at the same place. You'd essentially end up with a FPS style game and completely empty PvE zones. I really don't even understand why CP are account wide for the same reason.

CP are account wide for the same reason many want alliance ranks to be account wide (at least per faction).
It is not meant to be capped, so you always make progress playing.
If CP were not accoutn wide, it would be less encouraging to play other characters because your main character is just so much stronger, even if you would rather play another class now. But if you still play another character, you don't make progress on your main character, so you have no really strong character after some time, compared to other players.
The alliance war skill lines can be capped easier, but it still takes a lot of time on that character and a lot of players playing alts a lot don't have a single character on rank 24, which puts them on a serious disadvantage in 1.6.

Winnamine · February 2015

Sypher wrote: »

newtinmpls wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Besides encouraging replayability and alt creation. The assault/support grind is inconsistent with other grinds in the game.

Leveling 1-50 takes a few solid days of grinding.

V1-V14 takes 1-2 weeks of solid grinding.

Maxing a craft takes ~4 months?

While the PvP grind takes some people 1 year+ I know some people who have been playing since release and still haven't hit AR24 to unlock A/S 10.

This discourages alt creation and repeatability. Which is a fundamental aspect of prolonging a games life span.

Sypher

You level at the speed of.... what's slower than tortoise?

Tripwyr · February 2015

Winnamine wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

newtinmpls wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Besides encouraging replayability and alt creation. The assault/support grind is inconsistent with other grinds in the game.

Leveling 1-50 takes a few solid days of grinding.

V1-V14 takes 1-2 weeks of solid grinding.

Maxing a craft takes ~4 months?

While the PvP grind takes some people 1 year+ I know some people who have been playing since release and still haven't hit AR24 to unlock A/S 10.

This discourages alt creation and repeatability. Which is a fundamental aspect of prolonging a games life span.

Sypher
You level at the speed of.... what's slower than tortoise?

Sypher

newtinmpls · February 2015

Well as a mostly PvE player I can't speak to a lot of this because I have no idea what you are talking about. I'm guessing that AR is alliance rank and AP are alliance points.

What is an FPS style game?

What does AvA stand for?

Thanks.

Sypher · February 2015

Winnamine wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

newtinmpls wrote: »

Sypher wrote: »

The idea is, the process of making a new account and getting back into the fight shouldn't take 3-4 months+

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Besides encouraging replayability and alt creation. The assault/support grind is inconsistent with other grinds in the game.

Leveling 1-50 takes a few solid days of grinding.

V1-V14 takes 1-2 weeks of solid grinding.

Maxing a craft takes ~4 months?

While the PvP grind takes some people 1 year+ I know some people who have been playing since release and still haven't hit AR24 to unlock A/S 10.

This discourages alt creation and repeatability. Which is a fundamental aspect of prolonging a games life span.

Sypher
You level at the speed of.... what's slower than tortoise?

That's not the only thing I'm slow at finishing

joshisanonymous · February 2015

ToRelax wrote: »

joshisanonymous wrote: »

Talcyndl wrote: »

newtinmpls wrote: »

And my totally rhetorical response is "why not?"

If such and so effort took that long the first time, why should it be cheaper/easier the second time?

Because if people remain stuck on their main characters (out of an understandable dread of redoing the AP grind), the population imbalances are going to continue and get worse.

Assuming that the only way populations can be balanced is by people switching factions. That seems like a crappy way to balance such a thing to me, though, not to mention people do make alts already. People have switched factions and you can see a good number of signatures with more than one VR14 listed.

Sanct16 wrote: »

Imagine that crafted sets were bound to the character that crafted it.

Having PvP ranks bound to the character you got the AP on is pretty much the same.

That comparison makes no sense at all since crafted items are meant to be sold/traded.

I still see absolutely no reason why this is necessary, other than to save people effort (that effort being the horror of having to play the game as if it's an RPG). If that's the only reason this stuff should be account wide, then you might as well make literally everything account wide. Once you cap out a character at VR14, infinite CP, and rank whatever, all newly created character are exactly at the same place. You'd essentially end up with a FPS style game and completely empty PvE zones. I really don't even understand why CP are account wide for the same reason.

CP are account wide for the same reason many want alliance ranks to be account wide (at least per faction).
It is not meant to be capped, so you always make progress playing.
If CP were not accoutn wide, it would be less encouraging to play other characters because your main character is just so much stronger, even if you would rather play another class now. But if you still play another character, you don't make progress on your main character, so you have no really strong character after some time, compared to other players.
The alliance war skill lines can be capped easier, but it still takes a lot of time on that character and a lot of players playing alts a lot don't have a single character on rank 24, which puts them on a serious disadvantage in 1.6.

This is exactly how it has worked in practically every MMO since MMOs have existed. If you're all about making alts, you're not gonna get the same kind of pay off for the time you've put in as someone who wants to commit to one solely one character. What's wrong with that? Why do we need people to be making alts? I understand that account wide CPs means people will be more likely to play alts, but what good does that do anyone? And are we saying that no one plays alts now? Or that that's the only way to balance out PvP populations or to keep PvE areas full? I'm sure it's meant to address these questions, but I'm not at all convinced that the best way to do that is to destroy the sense of character development with CPs and, as people are suggesting, APs.

EDIT: As far as having no real strong character, this also has a lot to do with how much people play. One person might play only one character but for 5 hours a week, while another might play four characters for 10 hours a week each. The latter will still have stronger characters than the former, but not as strong as someone who plays 40 hours a week on one character. There are many more variables involved than simply some exact timescale that's equal for all players.