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Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Arena and a Scaling Soft Cap on Gear Power Level System
Altodor
Member, Leader of Men, Kickstarter, Alpha One, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
My power level is over 9000. There its been said now you cant say it.
Hello I want gear equalization in arena but I realized that the open world should be the focus and gear equalization, even though imo its not too big of a deal, will rip some people away from the open world (the important part of the game).
So my goals for this system are
1. Not have gear be the most important variable in a rated arena fight
2. Keep gear relevant in arena fights
3. Protect the noobz from getting overwhelmed by the gear variable. Thats right only the gear variable. Not anything else.
I am by no means saying the core game should be balanced around arena encounters btw. It really shouldnt. If arenas awesome great. Should it be the focus? I think we all know it sure as hell shouldnt be.
Quick note that Steven said gear should make up 40-50% of overall power level. Which just makes me think 2 naked guys can destroy a 1 geared guy. So honestly im inclined to think gear kinda doesnt matter anyways and what matters is what type of gear you put on. Better stat allocation will always net better results. But hey ill throw this idea out here anyways.
So this is how I think arena should work
Once you reach level 50 (projected to be 225 hours of leveling as of this moment) you will be eligible to enter arena.
You will more than likely get into arena with pretty basic or atleast pretty decent level 50 gear. Giving you a power level sort of on the low tier end in terms of gear. Now in these low ratings there is a soft cap on anything above power level 100 (random number for power measuring). Giving you lets say 50% power level reduction on anything past this point. This prevents the gear variable from being super relevant in the low ratings of arena.
Now as you progress up the ladder the power level increases. Lets say after getting higher rating power level 200 is now the soft cap and anything past is reduced by 50%. Making you a bit undergeared for your rating. You go out into the world and gear more. Maybe until you hit the soft cap so that you can continue to compete at a semi optimal level.
I hope we all get the process im gonna skip some points and get the end of the soft cap.
So you reach a pretty high rating and the soft cap now becomes static. As in lets say 500 power level and no matter how much higher you go in the rating it will always be 500 power level soft cap. Anything past this power level will result in a 50% reduction in your power level over 500 power level. So if I was power level 600 then at that higher rating I would actually have 550 power level in the arena.
I dont want to go over balancing these are just examples to help paint a picture.
Since its confusing there could be a quest to help understand it or a helpful ui to show soft caps in the arena tabs I guess.
Also this is the game for me I just want the arena to be more balanced if gear was variable that really turned the tides in battle. So its still relevant in the equation
To sum this up on the positives side of things - It protects noobs and maybe mid tier players - Gear matters but there is a diminishing return on it
Edit: Someone made me think it was a good idea to put here that this would only be for ranked arena - I wrote this at 7:44PM EST November 5th 2020
Hello I want gear equalization in arena but I realized that the open world should be the focus and gear equalization, even though imo its not too big of a deal, will rip some people away from the open world (the important part of the game).
So my goals for this system are
1. Not have gear be the most important variable in a rated arena fight
2. Keep gear relevant in arena fights
3. Protect the noobz from getting overwhelmed by the gear variable. Thats right only the gear variable. Not anything else.
I am by no means saying the core game should be balanced around arena encounters btw. It really shouldnt. If arenas awesome great. Should it be the focus? I think we all know it sure as hell shouldnt be.
Quick note that Steven said gear should make up 40-50% of overall power level. Which just makes me think 2 naked guys can destroy a 1 geared guy. So honestly im inclined to think gear kinda doesnt matter anyways and what matters is what type of gear you put on. Better stat allocation will always net better results. But hey ill throw this idea out here anyways.
So this is how I think arena should work
Once you reach level 50 (projected to be 225 hours of leveling as of this moment) you will be eligible to enter arena.
You will more than likely get into arena with pretty basic or atleast pretty decent level 50 gear. Giving you a power level sort of on the low tier end in terms of gear. Now in these low ratings there is a soft cap on anything above power level 100 (random number for power measuring). Giving you lets say 50% power level reduction on anything past this point. This prevents the gear variable from being super relevant in the low ratings of arena.
Now as you progress up the ladder the power level increases. Lets say after getting higher rating power level 200 is now the soft cap and anything past is reduced by 50%. Making you a bit undergeared for your rating. You go out into the world and gear more. Maybe until you hit the soft cap so that you can continue to compete at a semi optimal level.
I hope we all get the process im gonna skip some points and get the end of the soft cap.
So you reach a pretty high rating and the soft cap now becomes static. As in lets say 500 power level and no matter how much higher you go in the rating it will always be 500 power level soft cap. Anything past this power level will result in a 50% reduction in your power level over 500 power level. So if I was power level 600 then at that higher rating I would actually have 550 power level in the arena.
I dont want to go over balancing these are just examples to help paint a picture.
Since its confusing there could be a quest to help understand it or a helpful ui to show soft caps in the arena tabs I guess.
Also this is the game for me I just want the arena to be more balanced if gear was variable that really turned the tides in battle. So its still relevant in the equation
To sum this up on the positives side of things - It protects noobs and maybe mid tier players - Gear matters but there is a diminishing return on it
Edit: Someone made me think it was a good idea to put here that this would only be for ranked arena - I wrote this at 7:44PM EST November 5th 2020
2
Comments
side of ashes atm trying to get educated, coming from the BS that is WOW PVP
i think your looking at gear Bracketing in Parallel to ranking?
So at "X" rank you get a reduction to the Diminishing return on stats gear gives?
it could be good on paper for sure but time to acquire Gear could affect the rankings if certain pieces of gear outweigh the diminishing returns of stat stacking.( WoW fire mage mastery stacking + tank Verse Stacking)
I agree that making gear be important is essential, and making the game keep away from "Arena balancing"
Skill is king in PVP if Big plays can be essentially Negated by a gear disparity in a match then its just super dissapointing.
an example i could use is the Drest trinket in WoW PVP being so Needed, or the PVE trinkets being imbalanced in PVP cos they wherent designed with that in mind.
The power level system could be read through the total amount of stats you have.
Im having a hard time thinking about how this could effect on use trinkets. Especially if it gave you lighting flat damage on your attacks as an example. Kinda hard to think about that especially when I dont understand how jewelry will work in AoC.
TBH Id discuss that later I still think it has a solution and that the soft cap system should work well
Edit - Im a failure at life
Edit -
Now as for the ideas from @Altodor, these are very similar to the hell gate system and arena system of Albion online. Which is actually a good thing.
My only concern is how you will be able to do the ranking/scaling system when normally players of different ranks end up fighting each other. Or do you think that players should only fight those within their tier of soft cap/rating?
About your goals:
1. As mentioned in your other thread about equalizing gear, gear will and should always matter in a mmoRPG, a role playing game. If that doesn't appeal to you then this might not be your genre.
2. This will still be the case without a pvp scaling system.
3. "Noobz" will get crushed either way, if gear mattered or not. If they like the game they will continue to play and learn the game, and one day they will no longer be "noobz". A new player getting crushed or seeing someone else getting totally destroyed will encourage them to get better, having someone to look up to.
Again, why do you want a system like this? Give me the reason and not the idea behind the solution.
I want to retain the full value of my gear across all content.
Realize that we are all equalized in our equal ability to obtain gear.
If the world is not equalized, why would the arena?
Remember this is a open world PvP game. What makes the arena more equalized is that you have a set team size and you all start at full health/mana. That already is way more competitive than the world.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
Usually open world pvp comes down to numbers or taking someone by surprise. In arena you are up against full health/Mana (as mentioned by Vhaeyne) player that knows you are coming.
If you lose then that means your opponents knows more about the overall game. What gear to use, what abilities to press, and where to spend your talent points. And that also means you have alot more room to grow both in skills and knowledge.
mmorpgs, role playing games, is about pure skills but also about the overall knowledge about the game, and mmorpg tend to be pretty big games. That also means that you can not "master" a mmorpg by playing it 1-3 hours a week, you need to spend time ingame with your friends and the community alot, but also IRL by doing some research and what not to really become the best.
But the question is, why do we need a soft cap? What is the reason you want to remove a power cap?
When it comes to ranked arena, the best players with the most skill and best gear will be the toped rank players. Meaning that high powered players will queue up against each other.
So why? @Sathrago
It allows more players the ability to participate. That's pretty much the only reason. Some people can't farm for hours for bis gear, so maybe they can hop on and do a bit of arena without feeling like it's completely hopeless due to gear?
I do want to clarify my own position on this though, I don't care if there is an item power soft cap, and given a choice I would do without it. However if they decided to do something like that I could completely understand why.
The suggestion literally doesn't matter for anybody but the top echleon of players as lower players below that will simply get matched against either
In the end, they'd always just meet players, that should give them a somewhat interesting challenge. People that "overwhelm noobs" with their gear will climb soon enough and meet similarily geared people.
Those who want to be at the very top however should be expected to go for the gear grind to be at the very top. This is despite pointing out the obvious flaws of this system.
A: downscaling of gear/strength hasn't worked in a single game in existance. You are either significantly stronger or significantly weaker than real low leveled / real low geared players.
B: The static tier system sucks for everybody transitioning tiers without being overgeared in the first place.
Let's assume you have the following tiers:
Now, what will happen is, that the so called "noobs" will face a significant hurdle the moment they go from 1200 to 1201. The moment they go beyond that point, while having insufficient gear to back it up, they will be at a natural disadvantage. Which leads to those players not wanting to progress past the point of 1200. Players, that would be far better in terms of skill dump their ELO to stay at a point where they are not at an disadvantage, which will results in another bad experience for the players that belong in this tier.
The problems are smurfs, that dump their ELO on purpose to "stomp some noobs". Soft or hardcapping gear doesn't stop that at all. Disincentivize smurfing is what they should be aiming to do, not limit the influence of gear, which will result in the exact opposite.
Also, this is a false equivalency. Gear and your Build are multiplicative, not additive. They feed off each other.
That's what the ranking system is for. To be matched against players of equivalent strength. They can jump in whenever they want and face people on a similar power level than them. Whether this is through gear or skill doesn't matter.
Right I get that. It's honestly more about preference. One side wants a more organic arena and the other wants a more structured one. Im for organic personally.
Organic meaning an mmo with arena in it that doesnt limit gear. Essentially the current arena system. I wanna go no life the game for hours on end and then slap the crap out of some dudes in arena with my Xxdragonslayer weapon and shiny unique augments from like religion or whatever.
Oh sorry, I thought you was against what you called organic and was for the soft cap and equalizing gear.
Sorry I misunderstood xD
I feel the same, organic arena is the best option for a mmorpg where the focus is on the whole character.
I was attempting to give a reason for the soft cap as I felt it made sense if the goal was to allow more players to join in. All good brah.
A system like that would also allow new players practise for ow pvp.
You're bleeding for salvation, but you can't see that you are the damnation itself." -Norther
I agree with @Sathrago in the sense that an even playing field in Arena where an enemy is in the same boat as you but is only seperated by skill level would far outlast a system where any Random Joe with Good RNG on any given week could waffle stomp anyone in their path because of a stat disparity
Reducing the Power gap to a reasonable level Not removing it entirely i think is the essence of the conversation here
@Blackhearted - i wouldnt say necessarily "practice for OW" i think Duels or even Unranked PVP for that.
when it comes to ranked, Id want to be sweaty and go for the big W everytime and earn the potential reward for the effort put in to Learn classes, counterplay, mechanics, movement
Pro's cons for certain class/builds
there is time put in to learning what the potential Meta would be and how to break it THATS where the skill in Ranked Arena is in my LIMITED Opinion
to tie back to @Altodor's original post
WPVP should be the driving force its more engaging on a wider scale (and makes for great content
Southshore V Tarren Mill BOYS!) Pvp shouldnt be balanced around Arena. But there should be a defined ranking to stop people who on any given week can change their pvp fate by 1-2 pieces of gear
Im all for stomping noobs, but only when it comes down to the gameplay decisions i made on the fly
Not because i Pulled out the Sword of a thousand Truths and essentially 1 Shot a team
I'm all for ranked arena where high ranked player fight against each other, I do not see why a soft cap to gear is a necessary though.
A skilled player will play the game and earn gear "passively" and will be able to rank in areana.
A new player will play ranked arena and get smashed either way, with a soft cap or not.
Is there reason behind the soft cap that you only want to do arena and nothing else or what is it? I have only heard ideas or suggestions to solve those ideas, but I haven't heard the reason behind the idea that you don't want a power gap.
If you say "RNG" then fine, but at this point we don't know anything about how the gearing system will work so at that point it's only ideas based on speculation based on precious experience in a different game.
From my point of view I hear people wanting pvp scaling because they are tried if getting smashed by better player which they blame on "random" gear drops and not skill at all.
Some good points here that id like to talk on more.
but my main reason for agreeing on a soft cap is ive played reasonably High pvp in another MMO and PVP STAT Scaling is terrible if you've seen any of rextroy's vid from wow you can see why but thats when ALL PVP is scaled regardless of level/gear* ---- More on this after
World PVP is more of a zerg fest than calculated choices/reactive choice arena pvp is more.. Purely Skill based.
to rebute your point there is no concievable way the New player would do more damage than a geared + Experienced player in your example.
gear would be at the Peak of the Cap whilst new player would be at the minimal possible stat so experienced players benefit from the softcap but not by much
Plus the Skill and game knowledge gained in those months would outweigh the possiblilty of a NEW PLAYER being able to topple a seasoned player in a bracket. they simple know their class better
the bracketing would keep people on an Evenish Playing field where gear matters but at a diminished return so nobody in the lowest bracket can outright Massacre the new player with stats alone
the reasoning for the soft cap is to handle the situation when a player is in the example you mentioned:
A player who has been playing for months, recently joined an Arena for the first time. vs someone who has only been playing arena or recently played the game has gotten a few wins and a small few drops
The Arena only/Brand new guy can still put up a fight comparable to the guy who has gear/no Arena skill In the Lowest bracket then skill comes into play. PVP Is a totally different ball game than just PVEing something to death,
and the New to arena but geared guy can benefit (a little) from his gear but because the guy has never done Arena PVP or just PVE,WPVP he would know less about the in's and out's of small team fights
Again im assuming most WPVP will be somewhat large scale
the more skilled a person is in ARENA they should come out on top a larger % more than if you hadnt done a day of Small team PVP 2V2, 3V3, 5V5 whatever it may be
i have writtin this after a celebration so im SLIGTLY Toasted but i believe my point was made without too much error
The reason I don't want any scaling or soft cap is that I don't like the feeling of my gear getting weaker just because I'm doing ranked pvp arena in the same game that I got that gear from. If I hit a guy for 2k damage in wpvp I should hit him for 2k in arena.
Getting gear isn't easy in any game, yes it might not be difficult to get but atleast you are playing the game and learning from the experience, and from that experience you gain skill. I don't believe that people should get punished in ranked arena for farming gear out side ranked arena.
I also want to say that, bad players will always lose, it doesn't matter how good gear they have they will lose. I have seen many ranked 14 geared players (bought account) in wow classic begin terrible players and not knowing there class, and because of that they can't get any kills.
The fact is that gear should matter because of the experience of getting that gear matter, and if you lose that in any aspect In a mmorpg it's no longer a role playing game.
I can however see some good points with the soft cap, and I wouldn't be angry with the developers if they did something like it. But I still don't think it's a good game design for a mmoRPG, making experience wpvper, large scale pvper or pvers weaker in arena just because new players shouldn't get smashed (which they will either way) isn't a fun experience.
I also want to say that, I recently got in to flag carrying in wsg in wow classic again on my druid. But at first I was the worst. Had the wrong specc, not good gear set up, and because of that the enemy teams flag carry (fc) crushed me. But after seeing how good a fc can be I got inspired. I stared looking into talents i needed, new gear setup and some pots I can use. And after practicing and many wsgs I got better and better.
With this I want to say that, it's not a bad thing for new players to get totally smashed, because from that they can see that they have much to learn and some day they can do that too.
Albion hellgates is kinda the inspiration for the idea. I was under the impression that people for the most part play against people from the same rating. That is how it should work at least. Wouldnt be too bad of an idea if the system wasnt so rigid with soft cap levels. It would go up every 25 power levels or something.
Just to say it again yeah I do think they would match up with similar ratings
The goal is so that gear power never becomes a much more important variable than skill, talents, team composition, weapon choice, and gear set bonuses. There might be more variables but what im saying is to highlight what I mean
So gear still matters in this system its just less powerful. I did mention that I dont think gear will matter too much if it makes up 40-50% of overall power. Maybe a system like this wont matter.
The term might not be power creep but the term does feel right. People get omega powerful and nothing else matters in a competitive setting. Thats what im trying to avoid.
Also I mentioned that this is the game for me
Nah it isnt. Atleast I cant find a thread like it anyways
So the point isnt to equalize gear its to give a diminishing return on it depending on rating. To help it not become a huge variable over things that actually matter in a competitive setting. Other variables like skill and team comp. Stuff like that.
That makes sense from a role play perspective. Its just that the roleplay perspective doesnt change my mind when it comes to this sectioned off competitive very small part of the game. I rather think more about what is more enjoyable gameplay wise than keeping the integrity of the game here. I still do feel you though for sure. It really wouldnt make sense to not keep your power everywhere.
Maybe cast a arcane magic limiter on you so you cant unleash your full power and destroy the world ja know
I dont really see what we disagree about here. Thats the perfect scenario right there for me. I would like people to think I need to learn more and try different gear setups and team comps vs I need to grind to raise my power level.
Since ja know, I got fucked and im bad so I chalk it up to them having better gear and never play arena again. Oh! Cant say that if there is some sort of gear diminishing returns.
Thats worst case scenario dont quote me on this plox ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Thanks you put a stupid grin on my face. Albion really does show it well. But maybe it serves that game better since its full loot drop.
Just tossing ideas here boiz. Thats all it is
instead of adapting a special mechanic in the arena, I'd prefer if they focussed on adapting the gear system properly. If they can keep the power difference through gear balanced, then there isn't need for a soft cap in the first place.
Ok great I got some points to kinda disagree on!
So at some point gear soft cap would stop I hope I did write that but im pretty sure I did. plz dont make scroll papa.
So the point for that is to not make power creep a thing. Good/bad example (Ill explain) is Archeage. The whole entire pvp part of the game is either getting 1 shot or 1 shotting someone. Everyone dumps resources into weapons and does that. Bye bye any chance I have at thinking about counters to scenarios when time to kill is 2 seconds. Anyways I say its a bad example because even with shitty gear you still one shot everyone LOL. Game sucks. But at the same time it doesnt.
The other point which I will shamelessly say was the first intended goal. Kinda dont agree with it ja know. But its to put a finish line in front of people for high rated arena. Even though its not the finish line. You could still go over this and benefit from it. I wanted to put it before legendary weapons came into the equation but not too soon that youll reach it in a months time playing the game. TBH getting to level 50 will take you a month. This is so power level is never the reason for winning at the top ratings. Im so powerful I kill you 1 rotation type thing.
Id like to talk more about that point but I think thats all I got really.
You know all those points about getting matched up together make sense. Like a lot of sense. It would all be somewhat the same encounters and interesting probably.
Id say id like it to always be similarly geared and similarly skilled players all the time. Unless you distinguished yourself climbed rating now its worse gear and similar skill. Or you decided im gonna overgear to do good my early ratings. Whatever.
I could see how if gear was really important it would naturally balance the ratings the way im saying with soft cap. But I just feel like there is some scenarios where the gear and the rating dont match up and people get fucked. I still think this would help those scenarios and it not just about the top players at this point. I guess thats your point about smurfing. This soft cap idea could prevent that.
So for point A about downscaling - Albion has a system like this. But it plays on risk vs reward with the full loot drop in hellgates. So if I want I could bring my tier 8 gear but id have 50% power reduction past 1000 power level AND that gear costs a lot and would suck to lose. I guess here people would risk shit so theyd still gear up if they wanted to do better. So yeah, it has worked but not exactly LOL
Ill add that people in mid tier gear who are more skilled beat people who are more geared but are worse than them possibly because of this soft cap system (in Albion Online Hellgates). The power creep in there is pretty significant.
So for point B my first thoughts were I mentioned that the balancing part of it doesnt matter to me. Why not change it so its not static. Make brackets are closer. Make the elo increase soft cap per 10 points idk. I just dont wanna break my head over that now before I see if the soft cap system holds its ground to arguments.
Just to say it again there wouldnt be a unlimited gear scaling if thats what you meant. Static soft cap after a certain point. Might suffer from rating values changing idk. plz no balancing papa 4 brain cellz hurt already.
If people dump rating to stay at a point let em do it. I guess there more interested in playing arena than competing. Maybe those dudes could do another arena mode that doesnt have soft cap system and ladder. You know to have fun or something like that. Skirmishes I think they are called in WoW. This point doesnt hold up too well im just not concerned with people tanking rating so they dont have gear anymore since the soft cap increased. Those same guys dont want to do arena for rating imo.
High geared people tanking rating to fight noobz is just so stupid with the soft cap system. Imagine being geared and high rating. Tanking rating and having your gear stats lowered and not getting the satisfaction of roflstomping some pug in the lower ratings. Then having to go back up the ladder fighting people who are similarly geared to you and probably similarly skilled too. I dont see it happening atleast with the soft cap stuff.
I have dedicated a large part of my morning to this and it made me happy. Always giving good points Warth ty. Also I will try to learn what the gear stuff means some day. Some day.