"risk VS reward" doesn't work - Distribution of experience solo and group

At the moment, experience is distributed extremely unfairly in groups.
A group of 2 players will receive a total of (approximately) 1.5 times more experience for killing one monster than if one player killed this monster alone.
A group of 8 players will receive 2-3 times more experience (in total) for killing the same monster than a group of 2-3 players.
What is the point of such distribution?
Motivation to play in a group?
But then a group of 2 players should receive (in total) the same amount of experience as a group of 8 players for the same mob!
It is quite obvious that a group of 8 players will kill a mob (conditionally) 4 times faster than a group of 2 players (let's imagine that everyone is dressed the same)
At the moment, leveling up in a group of less than 5-8 is not effective.
This is a very big hole in the game design - who advised you to do it?

I understand that the game is aimed at group content of players and their interaction. But in essence, you are turning the game into a zerg rush (in the sense that playing in a party of less than 8 people is not effective). I understand that most players prefer to level up in a party of 5-8 players and will probably take a negative attitude to this topic. But if you leave everything as is - the current "rules of the game" will kill (or greatly spoil) the game for solo players and players in small groups (2-3 people in a group)

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Laetitian

This is completely standard, especially in games that have diminishing returns for killing mobs significantly above your skill level.

Personally, I like games that encourage killing substantially higher-level mobs in groups (think 2-3 TIMES your level, or 20-100 levels higher, just as a vague reference) in order to reward specialisation. Those games don't need to add party XP, because you already get rewarded enough for grouping by improving your potential to kill very difficult mobs by maximising your class efficiency (Tanks can specialise on their role, damage dealers don't need to watch their survivability or gate their mana consumption as much, supporters can mostly just support.)

But in games that don't allow those types of highly rewarding dynamics, because they gate how rewarding the XP gain gets if you maximise the level of the encounter you can handle by dumping a bunch of resources into it and using up all your class tools and HP/Mana to exhaustion, then you kinda need party XP.
Because if you have a tank and a healer in your party, they don't add enough to the clear speed to justify grouping up, unless you're an extremely well-oiled machine that gets the full benefit out of some buffs and resting less often. For a game that wants to encourage grouping, that's not good enough.

So if you want to campaign against group XP, you have to campaign for higher uncapped rewards for challenging significantly higher level enemies/content.

JohnnyHazz

Laetitian wrote: »

This is completely standard, especially in games that have diminishing returns for killing mobs significantly above your skill level....

Good comment, but...
Firstly, when farming higher-level mobs in a large group of players, players receive more rewards in the form of glints and more valuable (or high-level) items - which is an additional imbalance compared to "small" groups.
This "imbalance" can be left as is (if you change the balance from the first post) - then players will have to choose what is more important to them - more valuable drops (playing in a large group) or more experience when playing in small groups.
Secondly:
There are elite mobs in the game that are difficult (or almost impossible) to farm in a small group.
In theory, the existing experience distribution scheme (more experience for large groups and less experience for small groups) should work for such mobs. Then large groups of players (low level) - will be able to get an advantage in the form of experience and drops when farming elite mobs. And players playing in smaller groups (but having a higher level) farming the same mobs will be able to get more drops, but less experience.

At the moment, the game's main mantra "risk versus reward" doesn't work - because larger groups of players usually risk much less on farming - than smaller groups - but at the same time receive more of all types of rewards.
We get that "less risk - more reward" - I don't want that kind of game:

AirborneBerserker

JohnnyHazz wrote: »

At the moment, experience is distributed extremely unfairly in groups.
A group of 2 players will receive a total of (approximately) 1.5 times more experience for killing one monster than if one player killed this monster alone.
A group of 8 players will receive 2-3 times more experience (in total) for killing the same monster than a group of 2-3 players.
What is the point of such distribution?
Motivation to play in a group?
But then a group of 2 players should receive (in total) the same amount of experience as a group of 8 players for the same mob!
It is quite obvious that a group of 8 players will kill a mob (conditionally) 4 times faster than a group of 2 players (let's imagine that everyone is dressed the same)
At the moment, leveling up in a group of less than 5-8 is not effective.
This is a very big hole in the game design - who advised you to do it?

I understand that the game is aimed at group content of players and their interaction. But in essence, you are turning the game into a zerg rush (in the sense that playing in a party of less than 8 people is not effective). I understand that most players prefer to level up in a party of 5-8 players and will probably take a negative attitude to this topic. But if you leave everything as is - the current "rules of the game" will kill (or greatly spoil) the game for solo players and players in small groups (2-3 people in a group)

I'll tell you what I was told when I pointed this out 5 months ago.

"Your stupid and don't know what your talking about."

"This game is NOT for solo players"

The players are too short sighted and the devs don't care. It sucks, but its as simple as that.

JohnnyHazz

AirborneBerserker wrote: »

I'll tell you what I was told when I pointed this out 5 months ago.

"Your stupid and don't know what your talking about."

"This game is NOT for solo players"

The players are too short sighted and the devs don't care. It sucks, but its as simple as that.

I understand that the game is aimed at playing in a group. But the game is also aimed at the principle of "risk versus reward" - which currently does not work when playing in a large group (if it farms non-elite mobs of +- level equal to the level of the characters)

As one of the "balance" options - it would be possible to suggest that groups of more than 4 (5?) players should receive significantly less experience when farming non-elite mobs (without stars (or even when farming 1-2 star mobs).
Because at the moment I see everywhere how large groups farm regular mobs - while not receiving any risk and receiving increased (compared to groups of smaller composition) privileges.

This is a problem, it needs to be discussed.

Laetitian

JohnnyHazz wrote: »

in a large group of players, players receive more rewards in the form of glints and more valuable (or high-level) items [...]
This "imbalance" can be left as is (if you change the balance from the first post) - then players will have to choose what is more important to them - more valuable drops (playing in a large group) or more experience when playing in small groups.

But that's not in line with the game's intention to encourage and reward grouping. The game you're proposing doesn't encourage grouping, it just requires occasional purpose-specific grouping until you're geared up. Until level cap you'd still mostly be encouraged to go the path of least resistance and solo with a self-sufficient build. That goes against Ashes's design philosophy, and, as I keep saying on these forums, if you want a solo-friendly themepark MMO, there are 10 popular ones that you can go play right now.

(If none of those games hold your interest enough to accept that Ashes might not be meant for you, perhaps you should consider that you might benefit from being open to something that's intentionally different from those games.)

JohnnyHazz wrote: »

At the moment, the game's main mantra "risk versus reward" doesn't work - because larger groups of players usually risk much less on farming - than smaller groups - but at the same time receive more of all types of rewards.

They risk their time coordinating their efforts. If they group with unreliable or unskilled/unspecialised people or choose inefficient grouping methods or locations, they'll lose a ton of time and efficiency that would be much easier to avoid if they were alone. If their party disbands, their specialised skillsets will be less effective than if they were running around with a self-sufficient build.
I know that's not a framing you'll like, but that's what grouping is all about.

JohnnyHazz wrote: »

Because at the moment I see everywhere how large groups farm regular mobs - while not receiving any risk and receiving increased (compared to groups of smaller composition) privileges.

Their risk is being inefficient. They don't get infinite party experience boost; the rewards are diminishing. There is a balancing act to this in the game design for sure, but as long as there is some amount of diminishing returns per additional player, and the base party xp boost is 50% or less, you'll always get vastly diminishing returns the larger the party is. You'll have to run farther or wait longer to find more respawned mobs. As long as the numbers are decently reasonable, it's a self-balancing mechanic, and I think it's a good thing for Intrepid to err towards making the party boost slightly too high, in order to encourage groups. Players can figure out the specifics and politics of how many party members they can efficiently sustain. (Keep in mind many of the groups you're seeing are probably less efficient than you could be with a smaller group; it's up to you to exploit that.)

JohnnyHazz wrote: »

I understand that the game is aimed at playing in a group. But the game is also aimed at the principle of "risk versus reward" - which currently does not work when playing in a large group (if it farms non-elite mobs of +- level equal to the level of the characters)

"Risk versus reward" doesn't mean you should get rewarded for making unstrategic choices because you increased your own risk. If you choose to go into a warzone alone and you keep getting wiped back to your respawn point, you shouldn't get higher rewards for being careless/stupid on the rare occasion when you do succeed to get something.

JohnnyHazz

Thanks for the detailed answer)
Nevertheless - if I am slightly mistaken in something or make not the best suggestions (in fact, the first thing that came to my mind) - this does not eliminate the problem that the imbalance in experience depending on the size of the group (in its current form) is acceptable.

You make an educated guess (from my point of view, an incorrect guess) - that the "risk" for large groups is that they are not effective.
Unfortunately, what I see in the game and my experience of playing in full groups and small groups - indicates a completely opposite situation.

In the game, most spots for farming consist of a large or very large number of mobs. Farming large spots is always more profitable as part of a large group than as part of a small group.

I am not against playing in a group. I just want the game to make sense for games in small groups of 2-4 people.

At the moment, each of the spots has groups of 5-8 people. And those who come to them simply write: "invite me pls" - and most often they accept it - because with a new player the group will start killing mobs even faster (and there is no shortage of mobs in the "large" spots).
If a large group did not have an increased amount of "total experience" compared to a small group - then there would be no problem.
But since you are given more experience just because you accepted a random player into the group - it makes no sense.

What motivation do players have to play in small groups in the current form of experience distribution? I don't see it.

Ludullu

Big groups should be rewarded more because they managed to gather more people at the same time and with the same goal.

Yes, this game is about full groups, so incomplete groups will have a worse time. Everything working as intended.

Noaani

Ludullu wrote: »

Big groups should be rewarded more because they managed to gather more people at the same time and with the same goal.

Yes, this game is about full groups, so incomplete groups will have a worse time. Everything working as intended.

While this is true, that reward should be based on them killing harder mobs.

Getting more people to take on the same content is lowering the risk. That is even true if - like me - you simply consider risk to be a function of time. This is because 8 players can kill solo mobs more than 8 times faster than a solo player can.

There should be a reduction in over all experience for killing solo mobs based on number of people in the group, so that groups wanting to maximize their effectiveness do so specifically by taking on content designed to offer them an appropriate level of risk.

Ludullu

Noaani wrote: »

While this is true, that reward should be based on them killing harder mobs.

Getting more people to take on the same content is lowering the risk. That is even true if - like me - you simply consider risk to be a function of time. This is because 8 players can kill solo mobs more than 8 times faster than a solo player can.

There should be a reduction in over all experience for killing solo mobs based on number of people in the group, so that groups wanting to maximize their effectiveness do so specifically by taking on content designed to offer them an appropriate level of risk.

And I definitely agree and expect this to be the case on release (and probably somewhere in P3).

Killing solo mobs is a self-regulating situation, as long as there are better targets for the group to kill. This is why I've been saying from the start that 3* mobs are way too damn easy. They're supposed to be the content that occupies full parties' time, but instead they're mass-farmed by said parties, while also being nearly the only type of mob in the POIs.

Solos and small groups shouldn't even be able to even touch 3* mobs, which would then properly separate pve farmers into their own niches.

Noaani

Ludullu wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

While this is true, that reward should be based on them killing harder mobs.

Getting more people to take on the same content is lowering the risk. That is even true if - like me - you simply consider risk to be a function of time. This is because 8 players can kill solo mobs more than 8 times faster than a solo player can.

There should be a reduction in over all experience for killing solo mobs based on number of people in the group, so that groups wanting to maximize their effectiveness do so specifically by taking on content designed to offer them an appropriate level of risk.

And I definitely agree and expect this to be the case on release (and probably somewhere in P3).

Killing solo mobs is a self-regulating situation, as long as there are better targets for the group to kill. This is why I've been saying from the start that 3* mobs are way too damn easy. They're supposed to be the content that occupies full parties' time, but instead they're mass-farmed by said parties, while also being nearly the only type of mob in the POIs.

Solos and small groups shouldn't even be able to even touch 3* mobs, which would then properly separate pve farmers into their own niches.

I agree with the generalizations of what you are saying, but not the specifics.

There should be fairly clear content for solo/duo players, but also for groups of 3 or 4, for 5 or 6, and for 7 or 8. This is more than any other game has had to have for base overland content, but is a direct result of Ashes having a larger group size.

3* mobs should be for average groups of 4 or 5, good groups of 3 or 4, or great solo/duo players.

They shouldn't be something a full group should be going after - but there should be 4*, 5*, 6* and probably 7* mobs to accommodate all group sizes.

Without that much granularity, group mobs in Ashes need to be designed for a group of 3 or 4 players to be able to take on, meaning a full group will mow them down.

Ludullu

Noaani wrote: »

They shouldn't be something a full group should be going after - but there should be 4*, 5*, 6* and probably 7* mobs to accommodate all group sizes.

Without that much granularity, group mobs in Ashes need to be designed for a group of 3 or 4 players to be able to take on, meaning a full group will mow them down.

If the current difficulty remains - we agree on this. I'd prefer if your 7s were the current 3s, 6s were 2s, 5s were 1s, 4s were just harder non-starred mobs and anything easier was just the difference of general pve population.

If Intrepid (and/or players) need better visuals to know the difficulty difference of that general population - sure, it can be even up to 10*s, as long as there is that difference.

Obviously rn there's barely any population at all, let alone with good AI or high difficulty.

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