Why doesn't EXP lapse?

In case anyone's been missing it. it's been stated that this behavior is not intended and is merely a bug.

Not that further discussion isn't warranted, as it could bring up some good points. But I think most people would rather it just go back to intended behavior of receiving all XP.

After all, consider that even if you don't send the crownstar to the museum you can still use it and reap the massive benefits therein that you may not even receive from skills (useful things like regen, trap affinity and resistances you may not get from skills you'd otherwise grab from the XP). Either way, RNG has blessed you immensely, and if we want to prevent this we should prevent the item from spawning in fountains at all.

I don't want that, though. Because as someone prudently pointed out, even maxing yourself out won't win you the game. One mistake and one of those DREADED THERMOBLOBBIES will SET YOU ON FIRE.

Levels won't save you from fire. There is no skill for "Stop, drop and roll."

well, i mean, there's Promethean magic and stuff but that's definitely beside the point. because goddamn, thermoblobbies.

 

Personally I wouldn't rather go back to the 'intended' behavior of receiving all of the exp. Capping out at 2 levels gained would be my personal best scenario.

I think it's important that if you defeat a really powerful monsters that you be rewarded for your effort. (I once defeated a chest of evil monster that gave me enough exp to get three levels, but of course under the current system I only gained one). At the same time, I think it is important to protect the play experience and not cheapen the leveling process.

There has to be a middle ground somewhere.

 

The problem is that what you've gotten used to isn't "protecting" the experience it's actually cheapening it. The reason there seems to be a grind in levels EARLY in this game is due to the lack of a reasonable lapse. For instance you beat a monster that should level you up worth say 1300 EXP but you only need 5 of that to level, you lose 1295 just like that. The next level is worth 12000 someodd. Wow, man that sucks.

This scenario is far more common than lapsing will ever be. In actuality the "Lapsing Problem" only exists for say the first 5 levels. It's unrealistic to think you'll lapse into end game on a reliable or even reasonably considerable scale. People speak of a Crownstar but in actuality no other artifacts are really going to propel you anywhere near that level and ironically if you intended to do it yourself you have to level up to get the skills to even create the items you would use making the "leap" somewhat self-correcting to begin with.

Essentially, sir, what you've gotten used to, in my opinion, is the joy of deprivation. I simply cannot say that this Videogame Sadism is healthy!

 

By the way, fixing this bug will allow us to see just how well Rogues do at gaining XP compared to other classes. Even with roguely skills like lucky pick I don't seem to get ahead. I'd like to see that, personally. Being level 6 at the end of DL1 instead of 5 would make me feel nice about my class choice.

And, of course, it just feels right.

Honestly, if this becomes a problem, we can simply nerf XP values here and there. (I personally feel minibosses give a ridiculous amount of XP for how not dangerous they are. I mean, they're weaker than named monsters, so...)

 

I disagree. There's a lot of people who'll say that the first few levels are the hardest part, and from there to the end is easy because you have the tools to deal with any situation.

 

I've never understood how people can take this stance. What I am advocating is not 'depriving myself' of the experience of playing the game, but of too much 'experience' ruining my experience of the game.

Games are about challenge and overcoming it. If you take away all of that challenge for the first five levels just because you happened across a somewhat tough mob that you defeated (or you nixed a particularly valuable artifact) that isn't rewarding you for playing the game. However, conversely, gaining almost nothing from completing the same action is equally unrewarding. The balance is to control the situation so that it does not become unreasonable, while still allowing for the player to be rewarded.

To take this to an extreme in the position you are advocating (which, you are in your suggestion, even if you do not realize it): Why not simply give yourself 500 life, 50 base damage, a short cooldown teleport and infinite mana when you begin the game? Surely you can realize why THAT is a bad idea. But, consider that eventually you will attain all of those things, and it won't even be the end of the game! Why then should it be a poor idea?

Without enforced limits, there IS NO GAME.

 

I'm afraid I must disagree with you here. Defeating an opponent who is much stronger than you are (say, a Muscle Diggle in a mysterious portal room) requires great skill, and acquiring a valuable artifact early on requires great luck (and occasionally great skill as well). In all cases, you're being rewarded for your playing; either for knowing how to play the game well enough to win against enemies who are much more powerful than you are, or for being dedicated enough that the Random Number Gods have blessed you with an exceedingly unusual happenstance, or both. (To reiterate, you've got a 1 in 100 or so chance of getting any trinket from a fountain, a list which includes all of the craftable rings which cannot in any way be argued to be useful at all; and stealing from Brax successfully isn't exactly a cakewalk.)

(I will agree that most minibosses do need their experience nerfed relative to their challenge rating. The Great Pumpkinn is an example of one that does not.)

 

The flaw in you argument, Karock, is that we're not advocating XP gain without limits. There are limits in place already, they're set by the developers when they create the formulas for XP gain. Creature X is worth so much XP, the player should enjoy so much reward for defeating it. If you have the Archaeology skill and you find an artifact, you should get so much XP for sending it to the museum instead of wearing it. If you brave a mysterious portal, you should get the XP for fighting any overpowered guys you find.

Again, these are not our values, they're the values set by the game developers (although we offer feedback on them). They're good limits, for the most part, and David, at least, has said that the intended functionality is that players should get them all the time, even when leveling up.

The argument that we should change things simply because of one extreme statistical probability, that a player with Archaeology will find a Crownstar Addendum or Time Lord Scarf in a fountain in the first three or four levels, is absurd. Should that happen, let the one player enjoy his good luck. Until Archaeology gets nerfed again, anyways...

 

Uh.

At low levels, the XP gain doesn't change. At high levels, where a single crownstar can mean something to the tune of 12000+ XP, it makes a big difference.

 

Actually, given that the devs (or at least David) have already said that:

1) XP from Archaeology is getting nerfed

and

2) rollover XP is on the to-do list

Perhaps we should just wait and see how the game plays once those changes are made, rather than arguing about it?

 

Well, we started arguing about my suggested formula fix for IBIAM.

 

Jeez man I wish people would read my posts. I'm not arguing for no exp rollover, but for limiting it in a fashion that both rewards the player and prevents it from ruining the play experience of that character. (To be clear, I am saying there are situations in which the experience gains from actions are vastly unbalanced relative to the level at which you complete them, thus I believe an alternative cap is needed). This is also not limited strictly to finding a crownstar addendum in a fountain, but is relevant to any situation in which rollover exp would occur. Ideally, in the vast majority of situations, it wouldn't affect rollover exp at all.

I'm fully aware of what David said, and since said change is on the 'to do' list, I wish to voice my opinion on the matter and perhaps have some influence on the dev's thinking when enacting the change. There is absolutely no reason for me to 'keep quiet' and let a change go in that I feel could be done in a better way. However, the actual change that goes into the game will be determined by the devs who made this game as the best choice in their estimation.

 

It might help your argument if you clarified the kind of change you'd like to see. From what I can gather, you want something like what I suggested (though I don't actually want it): when you level up, your xp rolls over as normal. If you level up again, the XP that's "flowing in" still, so to speak, is halved. If you level up again, it's halved again. The soft capping could start after 2 level ups, too.

It's a sort of soft cap. And yes, you'd be correct in that you generally would never notice this change. I personally believe we should have a look see as to how the game plays and how people level up after the fix, before we start worrying about whether or not it was a problem.

Was it a problem before this bug? I'm fairly certain it wasn't around, though I might not have even owned the game before then. Assuming the bug hasn't always been around.

 

Hey, has Archaeology been nerfed already? Because I seem to be getting a lot less experience per sending to the museum.

While I really can't complain about this, I would caution how it's done.
You already "fixed" This translation is all wrong.
I think XP gain needs to be reduced some, yes, but let's be careful here. Just 30% less would be a good start.

I'd prefer Archaelogy to stop being beaten by the nerf stick, but that's just me.
Don't kill me everyone. I really think 30% should be fine.

 

Well, it seems to be a skill everyone uses. That tells me it's too powerful. It and Burglary are these skills everyone takes, because they fit into every build.

It would help if they were slightly later on in the tree, and prior skills gave things only rogues benefitted from. Everyone benefits from lockpicks, but a Warrior hardly needs escapes (generally.)

Which is a problem, because making the second point Invisibility or even Lockup would be really powerful, as those are great skills (and would be for Wizards, certainly).

Archeology, well, all of it's useful for everyone. Except for Charlemagne, maybe. I'm still not quite sure what the point of that skill is besides a confusion/pacify AoE.

Unless that was the intent; making those trees useful for all archetypes. I dunno about that, though.

 

Don't think so?

 

Well, then, something seems off, because I swear I'm getting less.

 

To be clear, what I am saying is:

The game awards a fixed amount of XP for a certain action. You should always get that much XP from performing that action, no matter what level you are at or how close you are to leveling up. This creates optimum enjoyment 99.99999% of the time. I don't feel jumping through absurd mathematical hoops to "solve" the other 0.00001% of play situations is warranted.

Two or three extra levels above the curve do not significantly alter the gameplay experience as much as finding out of depth equipment does, yet I've never heard anyone suggesting Brax shouldn't have out of depth items in his store, or that items shouldn't be able to spawn as much as five floors "earlier" than their item rating suggests. That's just part of the RNG. I feel overflow XP should be treated exactly the same. It makes each run a little different, and it removes the bad taste of loosing XP entirely.

I understand that you feel your opinion will create good gameplay. I feel that there are holes in your argument, and I presented them. That's not an attack on you, just a statement of my opinion. I never once told you to keep quiet. I said that both points that people are showing concern over are slated for changes and rehashing positions over and over again is not productive. Our opinions are out there, lets see what comes of them.

But since you feel people's statements were unclear, I hope this clarifies my position as well.

 

Let me split this up.

First games are not universal. Challenging this game is not about the instant-win button scenario where like in some RPG you can get the "strongest" weapon in the game on the first level and instantly beat the entirety of the game because you have the strongest weapon. This game is actually less, almost not at all, about your equipment or your skills and more about your brains and tactics. The entire reason that the game is playable as it is isn't because of the fact that you are level 3 million but instead it's because of the fact that you have the wit to come up with a few effective strategies over resorting to extensive pools of resources. For instance on the first level of the game if you learn as your first skill Summon Mustache Golem you are COVERED for the first 3 or so levels almost automatically. Is this cheating? Do you call this "overpowered"? Same with leveling twice and getting yourself a floating dragon. You want instant win on the first floor? You start off with Leylines and Viking Wizardry on any difficulty and literally kick, slash, club, or magickeywizbiz anything you come across for instantly deadly damage.

That is Dungeons of Dredmor.

In actuality these are not only feasible they are truly realizable. Okay, so perhaps not 500 health, but how about a free 30 with +4 regen? Take the skills Piracy, Alchemy, and Smithing, get Smithing to 2, get Alchemy to 3, Transmute yourself some Emeralds and get two Gold. Look at that, 30 HP with +4 regen. "That's multiple levels!", no, actually it's doable in one level, and if you want to be cheat with only one gold, or one gold and emerald, etc.

Getting a quick increase to base damage? Really? That's the easiest thing to do in the beginning of the game since two skills give that, both upkeeps, and with the inclusion of the Egyptian skill, Leylines got even SWEETER. But let's not go on for too long with combos and conundrums; my point is that you do not seem to be able to understand how the value of the game exists or at least not in it's entirety. You see lapsing as "giving yourself an undo edge" however you are failing to see that there's no edge, and the reason this is happens to be because the game works by keeping you on your toes even to the end, you get cocky? You die. End. Failing to prepare for level 1 is not gameplay it's stupidity and dying on level 3 because you got zapped by an Octo is bad luck but to say that being level X even if it were 50 and you learned ALL of your skills instantly wins you the game is just utter madness.

You can ( and I have ) be really powerful and die on floors you've previously cleared after it respawns just because you think you're the man. Keep in mind 80%* of all deaths in the Dungeons are due to player error, not monster power.

* It's real.

 

Gonna agree with DoDgirl about how this game works, i bought the game and all DLC at the same time and started rollin around with permadeath on going rouge, first couple hours go by and im starting to get my act together and then 5 finger discount awards me with a dagger that does 50 damage... i practically piss myself because i am now one shot killing everything and i swear i have the best item in the game now, i know now that while its a great item, its most certainly not the best, but the point is 2 hours later i enter a dimensional code... and get sent straight to diggle hell... ill let you figure out what happend next

Ever since ive made one staple trademark in my games, i always hit random and roll with whatever i get, unless its like 4-5 weapon skills at once, i still havent beaten this game because of it and am so not caring that i havent.

RNG makes this game absolutly a blast to play.