Skill practice and challenge

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Rias
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Skill practice and challenge

Post by Rias »

Some recent updates and various comments and threads about more practice-based progression made me want to make a post to talk about how we're shifting more to challenge-based progression in general.

This morning I fixed an oversight bug with Climbing practice so that the practice amount is now based on the climber's base skill without any modifications from skill buffs/penalties, encumbrance, etc. This is how the combat experience is calculated as well: Considering base skill rather than any buff/debuff/situational modifiers. We prefer this for a few reasons: First, we don't want to penalize people who seek out buffs and cirumstance bonuses by giving them less skill practice for their trouble. Second, we don't want people deliberately seeking debuffs and other penalties to try and get more practice out of content that they have out-skilled. We want people moving on to new content when they've out-skilled something. If adequate challenges aren't available or there's a large gap between challenges, we'd prefer to fix that by adding new content rather than providing meta workarounds.

Thinking about this kind of stuff gives me some flashbacks to people in CLOK asking on ESP for someone to come injure their arms and legs so they could continue getting practice from mobs they had otherwise outskilled, rather than just moving on to a more challenging combat zone. It was pretty silly both IC and OOC. The intent of the challenge-based gains system is to encourage people to keep moving to new content in order to continue progressing a skill. We as staff have a lot of fun adding new content to the game, and we want people to experience new things as they progress. It's discouraging to see content be ignored by people who prefer to just ease their way to their caps on the most basic-level starter stuff. From the player experience side, it can be highly unsatisfying to eke out progression really far by doing the same easy thing over and over, then see new content added that one won't really be able to experience because one meta-ed their skill so high on easy/early content that they no longer need to work on progression anymore. Sure, one could go back and try that new content out anyway despite it not providing a challenge, but at least for me, situations like this always feel sad, like I missed out on the real experience, and I don't really have any particular reason to go back after just seeing what the content is once.

Setting up challenge-based progression is easier for some skills than others, but the goal is to implement this kind of progression at least to some degree for every skill. On the PCs I play, there are some skills I've gotten up to my goals that just didn't feel satisfying because it could be done without ever seeing any new content from near 0 to the available cap for that character. And even for me, the temptation is real to just focus on the easy familiar stuff and shy away from the more difficult or inconvenient or unfamiliar stuff. Why learn a new area or a new recipe or a new mob when I can continue progressing on this same content I started on and am already familiar with? As I like to say: "If players can, they will." And I and the rest of staff are in there along with everyone else.

There are a lot of considerations and potential adjustments to be made. The meta for training up dodge and block is particularly bad, as it doesn't consider challenge at all. I'm also looking at capping the practice potential for no-challenge activities like challenge-less tasks, sleight of hand tricks, performing RP tumbles/flips, and things like those, once we have more challenge-based means of practicing those activities. We're looking over the various crafting recipes and planning to have a better spread of skill requirements for them to provide increasing challenges for crafting as well, rather than, say, carving wooden pegs from 0 to cap. (Yes, this does mean I'm going to start actually working on cooking so I can add increasingly challenging recipes for it as well.)

Suggestion posts like the recent ones listing ideas for giving challenge-based progression opportunities to Perception are very helpful, so please do continue posting ideas for skills that don't currently have challenge-based progress opportunities (or just don't have much yet)! We want the progression journey to be more interesting and memorable, and to encourage people to move around a bit more and vary up what they're doing with their skills more often.
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Alicron
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Alicron »

In my experience there was a point where you could train combat skills with only minor risk but once you met a certain skill threshold anywhere else you went was absolutely SHEER DEATH! This was the reason why I stopped playing. I could no longer gain skill without an entire hunting party or a solo character completely meta'd from the ground up to meet the challenge.

In old CLOK there were often areas designed for training with high skill, lower risk enemies and other areas meant for group exploration with high rewards and powerful enemies. That way there were both options available. This does not seem to be the case in COGG.

I have no doubt that there are those who prefer it this way. These are often the "Dark Souls" kind of players who prefer EXTREME challenges and will complain endlessly if it is anything else but that. But can't there be a happy medium somewhere? One that will allow the masochistic player and the after work solo player to both have something to enjoy?

In short, I humbly ask that both extremes of play-style please be considered when designing skill challenge and new areas in general.
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Rias »

I was speaking more to numbers than the dangerousness of activities or mobs. We do love our scary areas and dangerous creatures, but we don't need everything to be a deathtrap just to provide practice. That said, creatures do tend to get more dangerous at higher skill ranges to help them stand a chance against the player characters who are themselves picking up new abilities that make them more dangerous as well. As we add more content, we'll have more of a selection so characters can choose which activities/zones are more suited to them based on their strengths and weaknesses.
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Lexx416
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Lexx416 »

Rias wrote: Thu Mar 23, 2023 3:15 pm I was speaking more to numbers than the dangerousness of activities or mobs. We do love our scary areas and dangerous creatures, but we don't need everything to be a deathtrap just to provide practice. That said, creatures do tend to get more dangerous at higher skill ranges to help them stand a chance against the player characters who are themselves picking up new abilities that make them more dangerous as well. As we add more content, we'll have more of a selection so characters can choose which activities/zones are more suited to them based on their strengths and weaknesses.
I imagine the (potential but seems PRETTY likely) change to fewer guild restrictions to abilities and skill caps will help with that as well - so that the people who WANT to do combat against those dangerous critters will have more options to choose from.



Overall, I like the idea of shifting over to more "challenge based practice". Things like Stealth and Shield/Use dodge are pretty egregiously easy to raise.

I'm curious if that will end up extending to skills that are a bit more tricky to come up with challenges for - the Medical skill came up on Discord, as did Druidry and Sorcery, and I was wondering if skills like that are likely to have some kind of skill-challenge threshold/limitation in terms of practicing them, and if so if you have any idea what that might look like yet?
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by artus »

I just realized I missed most of the suggestion topics, whoops. I think the temptation doesn't just come from something being easy though. It also comes from the likelyhood of injuries one may get, given there's no guarantee we'll get physickers with us on every trip or pray we don't snap any tendons going out, or don't have to run back to somewhere that can potentially be quite far because we get a bleeding wound 30 seconds in. Acquiring fractures is very, very easy. Anything with crush/bludgeon/puncture for 40+ damage can do that and technically anything in the game can do it. Flashback to yesterday when I was out training with someone new to both the game and the character. We did have to run back to town more than twice to fix our bones, with me having slight fracture, thankfully eased away by vitality heal, and her having no help and no one on esp available to do so. Injury happens far too often and resources and manpower aren't as reliable as people wish. That was only the graveyard near Shadgard, a place supposedly friendly enough to newbies, with skeletons that can deal 70 damage to the unarmored chest. I was at fault anyway for not wearing armors, but the other player was new. She got injured after I gave her a spare piece of armor, having no money to buy her own just yet. I love potential challenges, but admittedly, some things pack too much punch and make practicing more of a scare. At least this is what I think why people feel like playing safe. Not sure about anyone else's experience though.
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Rias »

Lexx416 wrote: Thu Mar 23, 2023 3:30 pm Things like Stealth and Shield/Use dodge are pretty egregiously easy to raise.
The Shield and Dodge skills are now requiring a suitable challenge! Currently the max attack roll can't be less than 75% of one's max defense roll in order to get gains from it, to keep people moving on up through the combat zones. The Ravenwood ravens will no doubt appreciate finally getting a break.
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Serity »

Rias wrote: Thu Oct 19, 2023 12:01 pmCurrently the max attack roll can't be less than 75% of one's max defense roll in order to get gains from it, to keep people moving on up through the combat zones.
I appreciate this clarification quite a bit, it instantly answers the concern I had - that is, if a non-combatant is trying to raise from 500 to 600, they're rolling d600, so they can fight enemies at-and-beyond d450 offense.

A change in an overall positive direction - I think we can all agree that the ravens were a bit ... cheese. I have a handful of questions on this topic, as I usually do.

For dodge replacers, will someone with 700 acrobatics and Graceful Dodge be treated as having d546 dodge if they want to start improving their dodge skill from 0? If so, it might lead to situations where people intentionally swing so they get attacked in roundtime in order to level their dodge... but that's likely a better scenario than some of the alternatives.

Is there any chance of shield bash, grapple, tackle, etc. receiving a defense from the defensive skills? If non-combatants are going to need to start fighting those higher level foes to raise their skill (and given you have to be swung at, a guard won't suffice), having zero melee/ranged skill against those (and thus zero defense) is going to be extremely risky.

Does CvC "sparring" work to improve it? With the caveat that a bad blow can kill someone, obviously, but some of the higher level players might not mind resorting to fisticuffs, I'd imagine...


edit: One more question I forgot: can you weigh yourself down with huge amounts of encumbrance so you can go back to fighting ravens?
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Navi »

It's a welcome change. I definitely did use the ravens to train up my dodge skill, mainly because I don't know anyone who likes to grind for hours and hours. I already did who knows how many hours, days, and weeks of it back on CLOK. Still, those skill points did feel empty, like I didn't earn them. At the same time though, this change isn't retro active. Majority of players who focus in skills have already raised them to where they want them to be.
It creates this weird dynamic where newer players are looking for advice on how best to train without getting beaten to a pulp from these other high skill level player characters, who are unable to provide advice in these areas because they haven't had to experience them. If I were a new player and I experienced this, I'd be more than a little frustrated.
One example that comes to mind is the 200/300 skill range of combat. Most commonly this range would mean you train in Tarueka Town or Dusklamp. With these new changes, you're no longer rewarded for a quick kill. Instead, you're going to have to balance quickly killing a guard and allowing them to attack you in order for you to build up your defenses. However, this means that you're now willingly opening yourself up to tackles, staggering blows, and dirt kicks. Before this change, most players simply saw these as nuisances that they failed to avoid because they didn't kill them quickly enough. You might have a couple bad rolls and now your being juggled between two guards because one walked in at the wrong time. Now though, you're actually going to have to stand there and take your chances because that's your best chance of avoiding the attacks. There's not much advice older players can offer newer players because they have had two completely different experiences.
It also kind of makes it more difficult for you as a development team because you're getting smaller amounts of feedback from players on the system who are experiencing it all together, with majority of the feedback coming from players who have an extremely skewed position. My suggestion would be to lower the skills that you have adjusted progression for, either back down to 0 for skills like perception that you could raise just by paying, or perhaps by 80 percent for skills like dodge that have some requirement for practice. Players who have ranged and melee will still have a leg up because they have defenses to rely upon, but now they can actually experience the change completely, provide better feedback, and develop better strategies to help newer players.
I know it's easier just to ignore this area completely because it's a hard change, especially because there will probably be more than a few players who complain. However, it will improve the quality of feedback and overall be more healthy for the community.
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Lexx416 »

Navi wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2023 5:06 am My suggestion would be to lower the skills that you have adjusted progression for, either back down to 0 for skills like perception that you could raise just by paying, or perhaps by 80 percent for skills like dodge that have some requirement for practice. Players who have ranged and melee will still have a leg up because they have defenses to rely upon, but now they can actually experience the change completely, provide better feedback, and develop better strategies to help newer players.
I know it's easier just to ignore this area completely because it's a hard change, especially because there will probably be more than a few players who complain. However, it will improve the quality of feedback and overall be more healthy for the community.
As someone who never purely grinds defense skills on ravens, and generally raises their offense skills at the same rate as my chosen defense, there's very little that would feel as disrespectful as lowering my dodge or shield use skills back to 0 for "better feedback".
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Re: Skill practice and challenge

Post by Serity »

Navi wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2023 5:06 am One example that comes to mind is the 200/300 skill range of combat. Most commonly this range would mean you train in Tarueka Town or Dusklamp. With these new changes, you're no longer rewarded for a quick kill. Instead, you're going to have to balance quickly killing a guard and allowing them to attack you in order for you to build up your defenses. However, this means that you're now willingly opening yourself up to tackles, staggering blows, and dirt kicks. Before this change, most players simply saw these as nuisances that they failed to avoid because they didn't kill them quickly enough. You might have a couple bad rolls and now your being juggled between two guards because one walked in at the wrong time. Now though, you're actually going to have to stand there and take your chances because that's your best chance of avoiding the attacks. There's not much advice older players can offer newer players because they have had two completely different experiences.
Let me put aside how badly most people will react to being told "and now you have to grind for weeks and months in areas you already cleared", just to focus on the pain points. Like you, I also have concerns about the mid-higher levels, especially for non-combatants, since maneuver defense is quite often not a defensive skill.

But let's be honest here - there's a difference between a quick kill and an instant kill. The vast majority of players can't go straight for the assassination - and indeed, the aim system somewhat neuters most attempts at such a thing. A quick kill still leaves you open to being swung at, at least one or twice, especially when you enter the room, and at that point it's a matter of volume. That being said, it's true; the above applies to solo players, but it'll seriously skew advancement rates for players who like to group in parties of two, three, or more, since foes are often given no opportunity to fight (as they shouldn't be!).

There's also negative rerolls to consider: you start smashing their limbs, destroying their limbs, their offensive attacks are going to stay high-sided dice, but their accuracy will be in the gutter on account of their negative rerolls. A slight fracture (-1) on the right hand, and a minor fracture (-2) on the right arm, stack to give -3 rerolls to attacks made with your right hand. I can see that it might start being the case that higher level characters go to lower level areas just to smash all the arms and legs of all the mobs just so people can dodge train more effectively, given they can reliably target those areas. ...not hot, but also not necessarily undesirable (though roleplay-wise it's super janky).

As it is, right now, I think (until Rias confirms otherwise) you could probably just go the DBZ route of training and load yourself up with weights to tank your max defenses and keep going at ravens. Not a hot thought there.

Squishier, non-armored combatants also now can't train their defenses very effectively - they usually required guards to level their offense since they court death constantly otherwise, but now seem to have little recourse other than to indeed court death; avoidance/fending and shadow familiars, I believe, don't tick any sort of defense. To level dodge without risk of death, they'll have to (somewhat counterintuitively) load up on armor so they don't risk getting smeared across the floor (...which, as with the DBZ concern, would also lower their max dodge...), so now people are getting "punished"(? in a manner of speaking) for chaining CCs together and fighting smartly, as noted above.

I am really not sure of a solution to these pain points, but that's sometimes how iterative development goes - get something out the door then brainstorm and improve. It's pretty clear something needed to be done, and scaling defenses to opponent difficulty seems the clear and obvious path forward.

Maybe tagging a foe can also qualify you for some defensive practice on mob death (perhaps at half that rate), for whichever defense you would have used, had you been swung at when you tagged them? That'd be a flat check of opponent offensive die against your defenses at the time of tagging, withheld until the opponent actually dies. Not as quick as sitting there and getting swung at a lot, but also not "if you don't sit here dragging out the fight you get nothing".

For a lot of players - like Lexx, I think - nothing has changed, they ground out dodge naturally and everything worked out okay, but there's still sets of players out there, I think, for whom the process could use some refinement.
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