My struggle with XP lockdown

[sneakyone]

Disclaimer

First of all, love the server. It's very beautifully built and there's lots of custom content that make the core game so much better.
I've also met lots of great players. Actually everyone I've RPed with have been awesome and have really put lots of effort to their characters.

However one thing that I truly don't understand, and what I'm seriously struggling with is this XP system. I tried search and read old topics and rants about it, and still simply could not figure out why it's there.

I'm propably poking a touchy topic here. Hopefully nobody gets mad because this is not directed against anyone personally and I hope the discussion remains strictly so. However I do feel like this is something I have to get off my back. Either I get convinced I'm wrong about everything, or I get convinced this is not a place for me. Or just maybe the team might reconsider the necessity of this whole system.


Without further rambling, here are some of my issues with this RP XP system:

"RP XP" does not encourage RP
At least for me, most interesting character evolving happens organically when I do what my character would normally ICly do, which often is exploring and adventuring. When this artificial lockdown kicks in and completely removes all motivation to go out and do your thing, and it really hurts RP. Being forced to sit in square, get bored, talk with other people who are bored and just wait for ticks.. with nothing in common to do, it only leads to goofiness and forced "RP". Worse yet, I often find myself go to places that my character would ICly avoid, only because that's where majority of people linger. Last but not least, it might lead you to sign up for event with a character that would never, ever be there ICly.

It discourages activity
This is my biggest issue. When I lose all motivation and incentive to go out, what am I supposed to do? Socialize with random people for OOC reason? I hate to say this but, to me (at the moment) it makes this feel like a social server.

It severely restricts creating new characters
If you play any kind of adventurer type of character, you propably want to level up at some point to get into new places. Having only one reliable source for progression requires that you log in for 2+ hours every day. For me at least, it means that if I ever want to level up my main character, I can propably never have more active characters than that. If you make alt and play that for a month or so, you can never "catch up" no matter how active you are, because progression at that point goes static speed.

It limits players' ability to create storylines
This is related to previous point, not being able to keep multiple alts up to speed. Say if I wanted to make a short-term evil peep/group to spice things up for others? Now you got no chance as it takes a year to get relevant. Sure you can beg for DMs to help with that, but you'd still lose all the joy of doing the usual journey. It would be like playing a NPC. Maybe I'm just used to players doing stuff like that instead of everything being up to DMs.

It splits already small playerbase
Traveling with old characters who are already at epics or reached level cap is out of the question. You simply can't reach high enough level to A) be within the 5 levels if you want to train with them or B) to be able to contribute at all when going to epic dungeons. Sure you can chat with them while stuck in the square but it's not even half of the fun if you can't have common activities.

It puts unfair and unnecessary stress on both players and DMs
This one is pretty self explanotary. Also, even if DMs did overtime dropping their own PCs and running quests, some players would still miss chances to join them. Players stress about lost chances to join events and sometimes even for just logging in. I do like the idea and possibility to request personal events/quests, but I don't like the thought of making those even partially for XP reasons.

In the end of the day, this is just a game and it should be easy to approach and fun
Daily tics, scheduling for events and all the application bureaucracy makes it feel like a part time job. You find yourself logging in even when completely unmotivated or too tired to do anything and just do some zombie things for those ticks. IMHO those who enjoy full-time socializing would NOT lose anything even if this system was removed, but it would make things more fun to those who enjoy being active.


I am not saying that leveling up should be easy and fast. Personally I enjoy it taking a proper time and I prefer high difficulty where you need a party to go with and get to RP with them. As long as it's there, available and up to players to decide when they want to train and have something meaningful to do.

"Yeah but the powerlevelers..."? As long as I remember, there has always been whining about powerleveling, but in the end of the day it has only been an issue on super slow xp, high PvP servers. I've been told that here PvP is just about non existent, and it always requires consent. So even if someone decided to powerlevel, who would it hurt? Some people love to level up faster, some slower, as long as everyone does it how they get most fun of their time, right?

If the reason of this system is to keep epic characters rare.. then I just don't get it. Is majority not supposed to ever get to see epic areas? If it's a power/balance thing, isn't that why cap has been lowered to 30?


Am I the only one getting absolutely crushed by these downsides?

[Wolfgar]

This might be hard to see for someone new to server but even existence of the 300 daily fairy xp is actually huge progress and it got the leveling experience and speed to rather comfortable levels, on top of that you have pretty fast early game which allows you to try out builds, characters and concepts before you pick those you like to stick with when the progress slows down. It's balanced out so event xp are very welcome and significant boost and players have motivation to want to be involved yet those who cannot still aren't left completely stranded and have some means of progression.

Honestly I think it's exactly where it should be. We'll never see uncapped xp on CD and I don't think I'd want to. For longest time I've been proponent of playing only single character and found it bit unfair but in the end it did motivated me to make couple more characters and I found out I'm actually having more fun. Current system is perfect in a way that even if you have IRL stuff and can't play half of the day you can still keep up with everyone else on at least one character. If you have more time well you can have 2-3 characters that will still progress nicely. Or army of alts.

This is a system that takes in consideration that none of us is in their teens anymore, most of us not even in their twenties. It offers pretty fair compromise to allow people to progress and live their lives.

Point by point:

"RP XP" does not encourage RP

- It encourages you to log in and play, it's only up to you what you like to do. You can RP. You can run dungeons. You can run around collecting balls. And that's the BEST thing about it.

It discourages activity

- If I get into fun RP or go into dungeon I enjoy I honestly don't care if I'm getting ticks or not. Neither should you. If you want to keep progressing and have more time it allows you to progress few different characters at even pace with their friends and allies. Also social servers are bad? It's characters living their lives. Being social is part of it.

It severely restricts creating new characters

- Actually it had been exactly the opposite for me. Afer being player of one single character for good 15 years this system was what made me to try some new ideas, builds and characters and I'm having more fun for it in the end.

It limits players' ability to create storylines

- You can still do that. Early levels are unlimited and quick so you can even get new alts up to speed and try out character concepts and builds before you decide what you want to put time and effort into and that's great. Also as personal pet peeve please keep in mind there are players who simply do not enjoy player conflict, making antagonist disposable baddies is fine if that's the style you enjoy, just make sure everyone else involved is on board with that. Another option if you want to create storylines for other players is to consider DM application! That's what DM's on CD are supposed to be after all, the storytellers. DM program will give you all the tools needed to make stories for other players.

It splits already small playerbase

- The playerbase is largest than ever! You can find groups in almost any level range easily these days. Also the level range works bit differently. You add up level (including ECL) of all characters in the group, then divide it by the number of characters to get average. Everyone up to 3 levels from the average gets full xp, 4 is 50% of the xp and 5 from the average is none. This means it's not as limited as you might think.

It puts unfair and unnecessary stress on both players and DMs

- December is not good example being hectic for almost everyone but there are plenty of events to go around and choose from, we're covering more time zones now too.

In the end of the day, this is just a game and it should be easy to approach and fun

- I absolutely agree with that sentiment but I really believe the current system makes that fair compromise to have fun for everyone. From one extreme of having no fairy to the other extreme of completely unlimited combat XP the current system sits right in the middle. Sure the "most fun" might be in different spots for different players but it's the compromise so everyone is close enough to still have fun instead of being ideal for one player and terrible for another.

[Sir Ven]

First of all, let me say thank you and well done for a well-written, clear and thoughtful post.    It's respectful and polite while clearly raising your thoughts and concerns.     I'd like to respond in kind with my thoughts.  Like your own disclaimer, these are just my thoughts   They're not intended as an attack, or argumentative, either towards Sneaky who started this conversation, the server itself or anyone in it. 

"RP XP Does not Encourage RP" / "It discourages activity"

I agree, it doesn't encourage RP - I agree, if anything, I think it discourages it.

 People will go and idly walk about the server, taking one transition every 5 minutes or so to go and get their ticks, there's also the now-infamous "Turns a page in their book" emote, which many suspect (rightly or wrongly) as being a way for people to mostly afk while their character is reading, with an excuse to occasionally emote and get their ticks.   These behaviours do not add to RP, they tend to detract from it - as someone may try to RP with the AFK-ish 5 minute explorer, or page-turner, only to get no response, become frustrated and give up.    I admit, this has happened to me enough times that if I see someone standing in the street, or standing in the square with a book I often don't even try to say hello.  I just walk on by and look for something else to do.

 - That being said.  RP is kind've the name of the game, for me at least.  It's why I'm here.   I don't particularly need an incentive to RP.  The RP is the Incentive.   I suspect regardless of the system you use there will always be some manner of flaw in it which will encourage people to get xp with the minimal amount of effort, so I'm not sure this makes CD's system particularly flawed. 


It severely restricts creating new characters

On this point, I respectfully disagree.  There's a constant turnstile of new characters pumping into the server on a pretty frequent basis.   From new players and old players alike, there's almost always people in your level range available to play with and adventure with, allowing for new dynamics and the exploring of new stories. 


Yes, it means that if you were hoping to catch-up with someone, that's going to take you a while (but not impossible, since levelling gets progressively slower as you need more and more rp xp for each level).  It also means that if you have alt-itis and want to play several characters, while your friend(s) play just 1 you're likely to fall behind, but I would suggest that's likely true of any xp system.  The more you play, the more xp you get, generally speaking.

It limits player's ability to create storylines

(Here's my controversial bit)  I agree that limitations on players' ability to create their own storylines is an issue, but I don't think it's because of the XP system.   When it comes to storytelling I tend to feel that levels, while they can play a part, aren't hugely significant.   

To give an example, there was a story/situation not that long ago where my character, with I think 7 to 8 levels on their potential threat/rival was in real danger.    For my part, as long as the other character/player was clever about it, I'd have accepted (quite literally) a knife in the back.    In other words a conflict that relied on story, cunning and guile rather than the game's combat engine.    Okay, to be fair, we went out of our way a little bit to blur the lines on some skill checks and things in favour of being able to let the story continue, than being particularly picky and bringing it to a premature conclusion -but in my mind, that's just being a good sport, regardless of level. 

All that being said, the story came to an end, without a conclusion when we reached a point in the story where we all felt a DM's input and oversight was appropriate.   Not least because there was certainly the potential for NPC powers/forces to be involved and apply pressure in one way or another.    No DM wanted to pick up the story and so a build-up of months fizzled out and remains unresolved.   Subsequently, the player on the other side of the story largely seems to have given up on CD and moved on to other servers. 

There are other examples where a character's story hasn't been properly approved or vetted by the staff on CD in advance, usually with newer players to the server.    This can result in character's story being vetoed when they do hit the radar, with players reacting by giving up on the character, or the server entirely.   - Once again there's no accusation or blame here.   The newer player made a mistake and didn't realise the need to apply or get approval, the staff are just applying the rules equally to everyone in order to protect the integrity of story telling across the server.   Yet, without blaming anyone, the fact remains that the character/player driven story simply ends.

Of course DMs are volunteers and they're people with real lives and their own pressures.  It's not reasonable to expect or demand that one will pop-up as required whenever and for whatever asked.  Not saying that's wrong, not at all.  I often feel quite protective towards our DMs and hate to ever feel like I'm bothering them or wasting their time,  but I do think it is worth identifying the impact and cost of relying on DMs for significant story telling. 

My point is, I believe This is why the server can feel like a social server.  Not because of the Xp system, but because without DM oversight and/or prior approval a lot of stories simply cannot be told and DM's time and interest is finite.   The stories that can be told are ones of friendships, rivalries and romances. 

"But Ven, are you saying players can't do anything meaningful without a DM?"

That depends on your definition of meaningful.    My answer is, of course not!   - but my answer may still have you feeling like it's a social server.


 Feredir went through a crisis of faith and soul searching without a DM, which eventually lead him to converting to Eilistraee.  It was one of the most difficult decisions of his life, to turn his faith and prayers not to a god within the Seldarine, but to one literally exiled from the Seldarine, it involved numerous conversations with his nearest and dearest and spanned a period of months.    Julian is similarly going through a period of soul-searching right now, realising that he's not quite as "Free and honest" as he perhaps thought he was.   This has significant implications for his faith and strikes at the core of who he thinks he is, I don't honestly know what the outcome of this story will be (my favorite bit) and I'm looking forward to seeing how it pans out. 

But these are only meaningful to my character.  They're not significant in any broader sense.  Whereas even something as relatively 'safe' as a Yuletide party, a scavenger hunt, friendly duels/tournament, games in the hot springs, a charity fashion show, or a potluck at the Immerflow oaks (to name just a few examples from this year), have required a DM to either set them up or run them, or both.   Anything more significant and everything that may touch on the lives of an NPC or have an NPC react to it in any way, requires a DM, with no guarantee of a DM being available or willing. 

 There are very good reasons why staff oversight of storyline is important and valuable.   I'm not advocating for a mass change of policy or practice.  CD's storytelling and DM system allows for huge sweeping stories of truely epic significance such as our server plots and some very, very interesting personal plots and stories, which can have character-altering outcomes.    Yet, like any system it isn't perfect and it isn't for everyone and I can't help but feel like we do ourselves a disservice if we don't acknowledge that. 


I've already said a lot, so I'll leave it there - but to say again:   Please, please, this isn't intended as an attack or criticism of anyone.  I wouldn't be playing on CD if I didn't enjoy myself and see its merits and positives.   

[sneakyone]

Dec 21, 2021 5:35:45 GMT -5 Wolfgar said:

This is a system that takes in consideration that none of us is in their teens anymore, most of us not even in their twenties. It offers pretty fair compromise to allow people to progress and live their lives.

Point by point:

"RP XP" does not encourage RP

- It encourages you to log in and play, it's only up to you what you like to do. You can RP. You can run dungeons. You can run around collecting balls. And that's the BEST thing about it.

It discourages activity

- If I get into fun RP or go into dungeon I enjoy I honestly don't care if I'm getting ticks or not. Neither should you. If you want to keep progressing and have more time it allows you to progress few different characters at even pace with their friends and allies. Also social servers are bad? It's characters living their lives. Being social is part of it.

In the end of the day, this is just a game and it should be easy to approach and fun

- I absolutely agree with that sentiment but I really believe the current system makes that fair compromise to have fun for everyone. From one extreme of having no fairy to the other extreme of completely unlimited combat XP the current system sits right in the middle. Sure the "most fun" might be in different spots for different players but it's the compromise so everyone is close enough to still have fun instead of being ideal for one player and terrible for another.

We certainly have completely opposite view on this. For me this doesn't seem like a fair compromise at all, it feels like a very strict reachout towards passive/social playstyle only. 

"- It encourages you to log in and play, it's only up to you what you like to do. You can RP. You can run dungeons. You can run around collecting balls. And that's the BEST thing about it."

There would be encouragement to log in even more without this system, it just kills motivation to do most of that. If some people would like "free xp" for their RP, I wouldn't mind them keeping the ticks. Though if possible I'd opt out of it myself because I don't get any enjoyment for leveling up for picking up snowballs.

Also I don't mean to bash social servers. If people just want to chitchat it's all fine with me, as long as they have fun. I don't care if they get free xp for doing so. It's not my thing though.

[Meadows]

It may not work for you, but it's the healthiest system for the server overall

I'm not sure how long you've been playing NwN or how many different servers you've tried, but each roleplay server needs to find a delicate balance between : allowing people to level at a certain pace to keep their interest and dopamine hits, but also making sure they don't hit max level too fast and abandon their character once they 'run out of things to do' aka leveling. Therein lies the problem: leveling should not be your only thing to do.

As a server you also have to CATER to two different types of players: casual vs. consistent, those who can only game a little vs those who can sit on all day long

If you take away caps and RP xp requirement, people can and will shoot to max level, claim they're bored, make tons of alts, not engage in long-lasting RP or simply move to another server. You kind of have to protect players from themselves. It's not just powerlevelers who do this, regular players are tempted as well.

Thus, the current 'daily login' is a pretty genius system to keep people engaged and logging onto the server. Because as everyone knows, server pop numbers attract more logins, which generates RP. If you remove daily login numbers, server pop will dramatically drop, kiss your random RP encounters goodbye- no matter what other benefits you think will happen from removing the Daily RP XP system, keeping the server pop high is one of, if not the most beneficial thing you can do to generate RP. Regardless of all your other points, which are valid in many ways, this game is old, every player is different with different needs and we can't be idealists, but the one thing we all agree on is we want to play on a server with people. Population attracts activity and new blood. It's self-sustaining.

Not being able to engage in RP because of your Level is entirely made up

All the other stuff you think prevents RP like level difference, traveling with high levels, etc. is in your head- literally nothing outside an extremely achievable level 12 is preventing you from hanging out with them or even surviving in a dungeon. Switch to a bow to stay alive and 'help', become a healer with kits for the front line (no level requirement), keep invis potions on hand. Ask to be an apprentice. If you're higher level use less magic, RP training them in a lower dungeon, use cheap wands. On a high magic server where easy access to UMD, spells, elemental protect, dr items, stoneskin etc exists, there is no real excuse to hanging out with any level you want. They're all made up. I played for years on a level 1-40 server where everyone mingled all the time, the whole 'sorry i cant rp with you ur outside my level range' concept some servers have is bizarre and mindboggling and entirely manufactured by the server's culture. The only thing I can think of is the dungeons that don't let you enter until level 17, and that's only 10 dungeons, and I hope to god you're not only friends with epic levels bc of the dungeons they go to.


Other Forms of Progress
If you find yourself upset by one system, instead of wishing or asking for it to change, you can also just ask or look for alternatives. It sounds like you want a sense of progress and are frustrated you don't have that. I want to say that I agree with you, any server with level caps, RP requirements need multiple systems beyond RP XP to keep players truly engaged. CD has Bounties, as well as Forum Requests for events, items etc. but it could use more. You could ask for or do different things for progress like:

-An exploration XP system
-A crafting system (which I hear is being worked on- volunteer to help test it out, or bug/push whoever's on the project)
-Join a guild or start one. There's like, 3 new Yulash guilds.
-Host an event, or series of events relative to your character's goals. If you think most sources of RP are 'irrelevant' to your character or forced/OOC for them, you will have to CREATE your own sources
-Start a character business
-Start a unique character journal- write in it while you're IG
-I don't know if you're aware of Bounties, but try to find the dungeon list on the forums, they're another system of progress
*Most of these don't even require a DM 

Again, I don't know how much of an NwN RP veteran you are, but if you're frustrated by a system that everyone else seems to function with and has kept the server bustling, you may need to find other sources of progress and roleplay outside of it. You have a lot more control, power and creativity than you think you do, and no matter what great things you imagine will happen if this "restriction" is removed, you'll probably end up just as disappointed and bored without it as with it, because the problem is you're viewing leveling and dungeons as your only goal or source of RP.  

I also want to say something a little controversial which is:

Many of us spend way too long on this game. Having an enforced stop point for daily progress encourages us to chill out, go cook a meal, stretch our legs etc. It does not stop any other form of RP progress like the abovementioned projects, which can be accomplished without grinding, or levelup at all.

You will also find this same 'limiting' or 'cap' xp system in place on other top servers, like Ravenloft,  so I'm afraid it'll be hard for you to avoid. You may have to reevaluate your play style and server needs entirely.

[Jazzmyra]

Chiming in with a little bit the admins like to say, the goal on this server is the journey not the end level. CD is all about characters growing and becoming more full fledged over time, and as someone who since soon three years knows only this server, I... Disagree, with basically everything. I have about 15 characters, most of them somewhere in between 13-19. I always come up with altohism. Do I regret creating new characters? Nope, not at all.

As meadows said, and from what I heard from those who switched to CD from other servers, CD is easily among the most fair and fun places with a generous yet not too fast forwarding level system that encourages RP between all different sorts of people and levels. And with the current number of players in all different level ranges, it's hard for me to imagine finding people to do content with is difficult.

[nr]

I know the server, has in the past gone through multiple systems of levelling;  When I initially played, you began requiring roleplay xp much earlier and there was no daily fairy - you maybe, got xp if a dm happened to see you, and you were in the square when they were there - I think I reached about level thirteen or fourteen in about a year, and of that xp a marginal fraction was from any source other than the occasion, scarce, event.  I know at one point, they went the other route, and let people reach sixteen, before there was an xp requirement, and people literally flew threw levels. What you see now, is probably the best compromise, for what folks want to achieve - a paced levelling experience, where high levels are still readily achievable, where the bottlenecks are temporary and relatively few, and surely not as much of a halt to progression as some of what came before.  I'm saying all of that, because, having experienced what came before, this is a 10/10, would play again, A+, #1, delight of a gaming experience, and that will colour my opinions.



  "RP XP" does not encourage RP

If someone doesn't feel like roleplaying, there is no system that will encourage them to roleplay; You could entirely pull the system, and it would create no more rp for its absence. What it does do is slow progression and encourage you to interact with other people on some level; Sure, you could wander around exploring, random kill mobs endlessly for two and a half hours and burn your ticks down, but its just as much a encouragement to take time to create narratives, build relationships, with other characters - so you do have more reasons to involve yourself in plots and all of those other things that are intended as the primary form of character advancement.



   It discourages activity

I would argue it is a social server, in the sense that you're intended to socialize (although, hey, burn down those xp ticks any way you like). To me, characterizing a slowed pace of advancement tied to 'time in', or getting involved in storylines, as a social server would be a lot like comparing the server you describe as being an action server. Honestly, its probably more complex than that. I would say, the system discourages activity, if the activity you primarily enjoy is whapping things, which is fine, but at the same time the server admins have time and time again said that the server's primary method of advancement /is/ events, storyline involvement, all of that, and not whapping things.



   It severely restricts creating new characters

There are people on the server, that I swear have 30+ character vaults, as interest comes and goes; I have quite a few myself, I always tend to come back to the same few as my interests change, or the people I'm playing with dabble in their own ideas; The system, will slow you down if your intent is to grind out a ton of alts, when you have a few free days here or there, but from my perspective thats not necessarily a bad thing.



   It limits players' ability to create storylines

I'm more than happy to be corrected here, but in part I think the system is there to /discourage/ that kinda thing; Rolling throwaway villains, intended to foil pcs as you hop between six different narratives on other characters; Really, that supposed to be the domain of dm's here. Also, what you describe, would actually create an environment where people wouldn't even really consider the consequences associated with conflict - because you can just  grind up another character.  Here, if you're at odds with a player, there is the incentive to treat the scenario with the respect it deserves - because absolutely everyone has invested a great deal of time and effort into our shared storylines.



    It splits already small playerbase

I feel that, but there will always be a division among players, if the system divided the players between those that had the time to sit down and dungeon grind to 30, and those that preferred social interaction in the square? There would /still/ be a divide. Its actually why so many people roll alts, so they can travel with people, as well as do the square interaction thing. There is just no perfect system for what you're describing, aside from a shorter, fixed, level range. I don't want to sound dismissive, but to me this is just a case of 'it is, what it is'.



   It puts unfair and unnecessary stress on both players and DMs

The dm's here, generally sign up because they /want/ to run events, run content, murder player's beloved characters, and the number of them seem to keep growing, so I wouldn't consider that particularly a concern. Regarding the weight put on players, the daily log-in, the feeling that you need to sign up in events, I'd argue theres probably a like number of players who would be stressed by the thought that they have to run the lava goblins, again, and again, and again, to catch up to their friends who have been powering through it relentlessly and chasing ahead. In both systems, the source of stress is largely self-inflicted. At high levels, you miss a week of xp ticks? Big deal. I lost a month and change around the time of a surgery, but to be honest once you hit epics, you get used to being parked in a certain level range for longer periods, and your friends ability to outpace you is somewhat tempered by increasing requirements of rpxp. They will never fly that far ahead of you, unless you're fond of long vacations.



   In the end of the day, this is just a game and it should be easy to approach and fun

This is very subjective, for some people the pace of levelling as is, probably seems atrociously fast, for those people - being forced to interact in a setting where the people they rp'd with yesterday are suddenly master swordsmen a week later, might be unfun, or jarring, or knock them from the setting. There is no system, that will be ideal for everyone, and so CD has gone a fairly middle of the road approach with a mixture of combat xp, time in, and participation rewards. Does everyone adore the particular split of that mix? Of course not, but the same would be said any way they cut it - it certainly seems to be the system, that provides the most fun, for the most people though.

[Wolfgar]

Dec 21, 2021 9:55:20 GMT -5 sneakyone said:

We certainly have completely opposite view on this. For me this doesn't seem like a fair compromise at all, it feels like a very strict reachout towards passive/social playstyle only. 

"- It encourages you to log in and play, it's only up to you what you like to do. You can RP. You can run dungeons. You can run around collecting balls. And that's the BEST thing about it."

There would be encouragement to log in even more without this system, it just kills motivation to do most of that. If some people would like "free xp" for their RP, I wouldn't mind them keeping the ticks. Though if possible I'd opt out of it myself because I don't get any enjoyment for leveling up for picking up snowballs.

Also I don't mean to bash social servers. If people just want to chitchat it's all fine with me, as long as they have fun. I don't care if they get free xp for doing so. It's not my thing though.

I think that minset is the entire problem really - the very "traditional" mindset of in DnD you get xp for killing things. But if you look at almost any modern pen and paper system pretty much all abandoned this idea. Because it's nonsence. The name of the thing is experience. Well anything can be experience. You're way more likely to improve your persuade by talking to people rather than bashing things over the head. Sure most characters are adventurers and that's why there's still combat xp element but I've always found idea of smashing things until you ding concept that fits much better into mmorpgs than experience focused on Roleplay.

I've been DMing pen and paper games since what... 2001 I think and I've never used the per kill experience once in any of my games, instead rewarding players based on their activity, actions, what their characters learned and how they've developed. And that's RP xp. On CD you can see the xp being split between combat, the deeds done (the DM events) and personal development and growth and that's the xp fairy. All of those together make sense way more than just picking one as the best and only one.  Why the idea of character getting experience for picking snowballs seems weird? Because my character while picking snowballs found playces they had no idea existed and learned way way more than from punting gobblins around for couple of hours. Exploration is none less wonderous than combat. Even if the character already knows the places and just jogs around for two hours I heard that's actually how you level up your physique in real life.

[sneakyone]

Dec 21, 2021 11:04:32 GMT -5 Meadows said:

It may not work for you, but it's the healthiest system for the server overall

I'm not sure how long you've been playing NwN or how many different servers you've tried, but each roleplay server needs to find a delicate balance between : allowing people to level at a certain pace to keep their interest and dopamine hits, but also making sure they don't hit max level too fast and abandon their character once they 'run out of things to do' aka leveling. Therein lies the problem: leveling should not be your only thing to do.

As a server you also have to CATER to two different types of players: casual vs. consistent, those who can only game a little vs those who can sit on all day long

If you take away caps and RP xp requirement, people can and will shoot to max level, claim they're bored, make tons of alts, not engage in long-lasting RP or simply move to another server. You kind of have to protect players from themselves. It's not just powerlevelers who do this, regular players are tempted as well.

I have played NWN since it came out in 2002, it was my main game until 2012 and after that it's been on/off thing. I had 3 very long time servers, each of them had level cap at 40 and it was "relatively" fast to get there, maybe a little too fast for my taste tbh.

I agree it's important to keep people interested and engaged in long-term stuff, but there are other ways to do that than completely freezing the play. IIRC, all those 3 servers had some sort of ascension system at level 40. People, if they wanted, could make application for starting over if they wanted to keep the storyline going or change build or for whatever reason. Some did many iterations, some decided to stay at 40. For me hitting the level cap has never been end of the game, vice versa that's when you finally have doors open for all of the world.

I've been DMing pen and paper games since what... 2001 I think and I've never used the per kill experience once in any of my games, instead rewarding players based on their activity, actions, what their characters learned and how they've developed. And that's RP xp. On CD you can see the xp being split between combat, the deeds done (the DM events) and personal development and growth and that's the xp fairy. All of those together make sense way more than just picking one as the best and only one.  Why the idea of character getting experience for picking snowballs seems weird? Because my character while picking snowballs found playces they had no idea existed and learned way way more than from punting gobblins around for couple of hours. Exploration is none less wonderous than combat. Even if the character already knows the places and just jogs around for two hours I heard that's actually how you level up your physique in real life.

I have played PnP few times, a friend of mine was really deep into it long ago. I never enjoyed it myself, it was way too "hardcore" stuff for me. NWN is not strictly following DnD rules either because it was meant for broader audience. That's also one thing that needs balance so that hardcore roleplayers and common folk can enjoy it.. that's of course unless the server aims to be ultra realistic RP simulator.

[Edge]

For me hitting the level cap has never been end of the game, vice versa that's when you finally have doors open for all of the world.

I think that's the big issue here. The idea that the world doesn't "open up" or "become available" until you reach the level cap is completely the opposite of what CD has always wanted. Instead the server is designed to open up slowly, as you gain levels you can access more of the server more safely, traveling farther from the server centers and into more dangerous territory - the farther you get from Arabel, the more dangerous things you're likely to encounter. (Yulash will be this way as well eventually, though it's a little haphazard at the moment.) And of course if you're skilled, lucky, or daring, you can head out earlier than expected into dangerous territory.

To be blunt, very little happens at level 30 on CD. Almost no DMs run events for those level ranges, and those who do only do so relatively rarely; of the non-HWC (i.e., Full Server Plotline) events this past year, I can think of maybe two or three series of events balanced around upper-Epic PCs, one of which only just had its first event last week. There's no dungeon content or extant loot for the 25+ tier yet, though it is in the works in several places. There's currently nothing available to or accessible solely to a level-30 PC that isn't available far earlier - currently somewhere around level 22-23 for Lava Goblins at the earliest, sooner if you're gutsy.

Instead, the majority of CD's activity tends to be around the mid- to late-teens. Most events are run for the level 12-18 range, that's when the in-game bounties and the majority of dungeons are balanced for, and that's where the majority of PCs tend to end up spending the majority of their time, many being retired or set aside for new/different PCs as they near or pass the Epic threshold. Which is exactly what the XP system was created to do, and exactly what it does - letting PCs get up to the level 10-12 range relatively quickly, the level at which the server actually does open up and allow them to explore the world more fully, then keeping them in that teens-level sweet spot for an extensive period of time, in which characters can build up the development and experiences they need to before reaching level 20 and applying for ascension into Epic.

If you come to CD expecting to hurry to 30 and only then have "doors open for all of the world", you will be exceedingly disappointed and miss out on almost everything the server has to offer.

[Fire Wraith]

So to add to what several others have said, here is my basic take. I've played on a lot of servers with different paradigms, including "race to max level in order to participate" and "fixed level" where you start at the max level, with no leveling at all. CD's paradigm is one of gradual progression over time, of a developing story where characters begin as junior adventurers and eventually progress to becoming great heroes (or anti-heroes/villains). I find that having that progression happen organically to a degree is far more interesting and far more compelling than simply writing a backstory. Many times I've written up a concept for a new character to find that it simply doesn't work the way I'd thought, or that it wound up going in an entirely different direction. My longest running character is an example of this, and one who is still shaped by their experiences (old ones and more recent ones alike) to this day. And while that sort of thing isn't impossible in other leveling paradigms, my experience has been they're not as conducive to it, generally.

As the limits encouraging RP - no, there's really no way we can force people to be inventive or creative or anything. What we can do, is heavily encourage participation in things that are conducive to roleplay, stories, and so on. At one point we completely restricted it to that - you'd only get XP from Quest participation, or from a DM specifically seeing you engaged in roleplay. We found that had drawbacks, and over time we tweaked things to what we have today, where as long as you're active you'll earn a small amount of baseline XP. Can you just wander aimlessly and still earn it? Sure, but wouldn't you have a lot more fun doing so in a way that was participatory? Find a group to run a dungeon, even if it's not something you get combat xp for. Go find some people to talk with, even if it's about minor things - get to know those characters! And in the end if someone deliberately refuses to RP at all, and just mindlessly grinds - well, that's why there's a sanity check at level 20. We've only had it happen a couple of times in the history of the server though, thankfully.

What I would generally suggest is, find a way to get involved. Find a group to join in-character, or even see about making a new one if you can find a few like-minded sorts.

[Aliana]

With any progression system, you have tradeoffs. You're never going to have general 'parity' with higher-level characters unless you have full leveling with combat experience or a level cap of 3 like some of the weird servers I've played for a total of 2 minutes.

The problem I would identify wouldn't be that it paces levels. As long as everyone in the past leveled at this rate or slower, then like it or lump it's a fair and proven system.

The issue more open to criticism are that it acts to restrict the maximum while having no catch-up. The existence of a tribe of proud never-twenties is acknowledged but the desire to push characters toward their most complete realization is a staple of the roleplaying game genre and isn't diminished to a subjective matter of taste by a minority achieving mid-level nirvana.

For people not embracing this mindset and desiring to move at the 'reasonable' pace that is set then it can reduce the number of characters they are willing or able to spend a few hours a day on. I can well agree that it would have unforeseen consequences to carelessly change how experience is rewarded as a blank cheque but it seems as though the best way to play a second character is either to split your focus every single day regardless of other preferences or obligations or simply to weave whatever cool roleplay idea you had into your first character.

Weekly Roleplay Experience instead of Daily
Weekly bonuses for characters that have been played a fair bit maybe only a day or two that gets you to something like 1500 for the week

I would steer clear of making caps fill up faster for characters identified as lagging because you can do less meaningful roleplay with a 'half day' in my opinion

[Philosophy]

Like some other veteran players in this thread, I remember the days before the XP faerie was added. Then, reaching level 15 required a fair amount of time and fortitude. The upper teens were fairly rare, and the highest level characters on the server were in the low-mid 20s.

Needless to say, when I returned to the server after several years of hiatus with my own character, just shy of level 20, I was struck by a sense that progression is now trivialized.

But that's a good thing.

The introduction of the XP faerie was a boon. It absolved DMs of the need to monitor general RP and pass out experience, freeing more of their time up for plots. And it gave players a reasonable baseline progression mechanism so they didn't necessarily need to chase after limited slots in DM events that otherwise might not intrigue them. A win-win.

This conversation boils down to incentive structures. Any RP server's systems should, broadly, incentivize active and compelling roleplay while disincentivizing behaviors that are unduly disruptive or ultimately tedious for either players or staff.

With that in mind, here are my thoughts on the above, mostly in response to OP:

"RP XP" does not encourage RP

This is true in a strict sense; the XP faerie incentivizes people to log in every day and produce at a minimum tepid one-line emotes, or move around a bit, but nothing more. It's not clear to me that this is a preferable state of affairs to simply allowing people to remain silent and still get some of their XP. Certainly, I've felt that doing a dungeon, with a great deal of movement and area transitions, is a faster and more reliable way to hit the daily cap than standing in the square and chatting, where you might post too slowly to trigger the next tick of XP, or what-have-you.

I think that removing the checks for active chat events (and possibly movement, as well) would actually incentivize more of a willingness to engage in public RP, rather than less. It would put standing around and talking, with enough time to compose more detailed posts, on equal footing with other behaviors. Not a huge issue for me since I type a lot and rather quickly too, but definitely for some. Much more of an issue for me when I have a character in Yulash and there's no one around to type at, however.

It discourages activity

Disagree. One of the strengths of a server like CD is that you can log in and with some reliability find some public-facing character conversations. I say this having a lot of characters on a certain social server where I'll argue this kind of always-on popcorn entertainment is actually somewhat less accessible.

It severely restricts creating new characters
Agree. Alting on CD and expecting your alts to progress is something that is ultimately going to be a multi-year proposition, or maybe a bit quicker if you have nothing going on in your life and spend 16 hour stretches logged in. Maybe that's desired for some reason I can't fathom - but it's one of those things that strikes me as unduly tedious for players when it doesn't have to be.

It limits players' ability to create storylines
Disagree. The hard distinction between staff members and players is what really does this. CD is a very traditional RP server, much like others in the Myth Drannor 'family', and as such players really have no control over the game world without the explicit approval of staff. DM plotlines shape the collective narrative - and player initiatives only do so when they attract DM oversight.

There are arguments for and against, but it is what it is, and I highly doubt this norm is changing.

It splits already small playerbase
Somewhat agree, if we suppose that participating in dungeon crawls or joining the same events is the sole means of interaction between characters. It's a major one - but not the only one. Can RP with a high level on a low level and vice versa just fine. For better or worse, though, EE has given this creaking old relic of a game a new lease on life - and the slow decline of more niche servers has lead to consolidation. I think CD's playerbase is doing just fine right now.

It puts unfair and unnecessary stress on both players and DMs

So, in this case, we're not really talking about the XP faerie so much as the whole model. Broadly agree with this. The bottom line, IMO, is that DM'd events should be compelling on their own merits, and that they should not be a vehicle for cynical XP acquisition. There's of course a (valid - I mean, it's NWN) concern over favoritism, but there's also the more simple reality that good storycraft can stand on its own.

With that said, I doubt anything is going to change about the granting of XP as it pertains to events. I'll simply suggest that the staff might have an easier time distinguishing between sincere interest in certain plots and tepid involvement for the sake of experience if a change were made. And, as a result, reduce the possibility of humoring people who aren't there for genuine reasons.

In the end of the day, this is just a game and it should be easy to approach and fun

For me this is the most important point in the thread, and it's the one I'll actually make some suggestions about. A long time ago, a close friend of mine wrote the XP faerie script for CD - and as far as I can tell, it's remained pretty much unchanged since then. We went off to start our own server and made a few changes that were ultimately positive, in my view, and intended to make our XP system more approachable. The below are variations thereof - and they were mostly well-received, so they can work.

Suggestions:

1. Change the daily XP faerie cap to a weekly XP faerie cap. Aliana mentioned this above. Completely agree. Miss a few days during the week? No problem, people have jobs. Just catch up on the weekend or whatever. Can preserve the exact same rate of automated progression while providing players more flexibility. Easy win.
   
2. Make things easier for alts by having some multiplied XP weekends, or something to effect, where you can double or triple your faerie XP during that time period. This shouldn't hasten the pace too drastically for main characters, but may incentivize people to log in with their less frequently played characters and catch up. Not too certain of the details - would require a bit more thought. Could script it up such that the bonuses apply only to the lower level characters in any given vault, too, maybe.
   
3. Put combat XP and event XP on equal footing, with the XP faerie as the sole means to acquire what is presently referred to as "DM XP". Likely controversial and probably won't happen, but it strikes me as both a win for potentially overworked DMs and for players who either can't attend many DM'd events or ultimately don't have an interest in <insert current main storyline>. There's nothing wrong with that, IMO. Not every event fits every concept - and when players dogpile for the sake of XP, it can turn a plot that might be more focused into a less coherent soup.

Ultimately, I will say that the current state of affairs is hardly a deal-breaker. But I do come at this from the perspective of a veteran with some ideas, rather than a new player who might be shocked at this style of progression.

[Wolfgar]

The weekly xp cap rather than daily gets discussed every few months and the arguments against it are always the same, instead of showing up daily some characters would only appear once a week and then disappear, less activity, less interest and so on and I kinda agree with all of those. But then you have daily xp with the stress to catch up and make it and people hopping from character to character to get their ticks everywhere and... it almost makes me think day is too short and week is too long. In a way something like 2-3 days would probably be ideal. It's not as intuitive than day or week but it'd take away stress about missing a day and give you more time to spend on single character without missing on another while not having the long pauses of weekly cap.

I like current system but this is the only change I think could be really positive.

[Aliana]

I really enjoyed Philosophy's post.



While I will say even causing mobs to give 1xp/kill overcap would result in bloody-minded genocide on my end and probably isn't the best way to handle-things it might be nice if there was some way to substitute for Event XP by completing a weekly quest for dungeons within your level range. With this amount being subtracted from less 'regular' rewards.

Dec 22, 2021 8:59:58 GMT -5 Wolfgar said:

The weekly xp cap rather than daily gets discussed every few months and the arguments against it are always the same, instead of showing up daily some characters would only appear once a week and then disappear, less activity, less interest and so on and I kinda agree with all of those. But then you have daily xp with the stress to catch up and make it and people hopping from character to character to get their ticks everywhere and... it almost makes me think day is too short and week is too long. In a way something like 2-3 days would probably be ideal. It's not as intuitive than day or week but it'd take away stress about missing a day and give you more time to spend on single character without missing on another while not having the long pauses of weekly cap.

I like current system but this is the only change I think could be really positive.

I think the sad truth is that this is simply more noticeable when it's an absence of several days versus someone saying 'Well I have to go touch myself for 8 hours or the Dancing Lady will not grant me her boons' to quote something one of my characters might legitimately use to disentangle herself from a gathering so I could balance out my progression.

Where engaging roleplay occurs this actually heavily penalizes characters that stay the course with what they are doing. I'm not sure Weekly Caps would obviate this problem. Perhaps allowing the experience fairy to dole out 900 XP in a single day and simply refreshing the cap by 300 every reset would be the best solution.

If a strict weekly cap then a rate of 15/tick with 10/tick and 5/tick as you begin to frontload.