Level restrictions on weapons

[The Man In Black]

I don't see an easy way to alert the player to it in game, at the moment, until after they've blown their cash.

So you don't see an easy way to put the required level down where the price is? ;-)

 

[PBarnum]

Either that, or, if there is a way to have the player buy it but not be able to use it (like it is now?)

Or, to buy it, only to instantly "drop" it and somehow return their money to them. Then with a big center screen message saying Level Required X.

 

[Evaan]

I meant a huge help sign that explains the tiers, like a price chart:

Level 3: 15 gold
Level 6: 45 gold
Level 9: 135 gold
Level 12: 270 gold

All weapons share the same price scale.
The dirk, the long sword, the two handed axe and the heavy war hammer all cost 135 gold. All of those are third tiers.

I happened to pick up a Maul somewhere, and took it to the store - it sold for 202 gold. That's 68 less than its retail price, meaning if the player does buy ie. a level 12 weapon, he can sell it back for 202 gold, so he doesn't blow all his money.

This could easily be solved if the merchant layout was different.
Icon to the left, name, price and level as text to the right, sorted in columns (i.e. all swords listed in column 1, across 4 rows).

 

[Jelly]

This could easily be solved if the merchant layout was different.
Icon to the left, name, price and level as text to the right, sorted in columns (i.e. all swords listed in column 1, across 4 rows).

That sounds like a good idea to me.

 

[Evaan]

Yes, but I'm not sure how doable it is.

Thothie is busy with more important things. This is of a cosmetic matter and really low priority, unless some of the other programmers we have available would like to give the job a try.

 

[The Man In Black]

I prefer my idea ;-)

 

[Evaan]

I'm confused as to what is your idea..?

 

[The Man In Black]

Where it tells you the price and such, throw in the level required. It would be a lot easier..

 

[Evaan]

Oh, yes, that would work perfectly.

 

[Thothie]

Where it tells you the price and such, throw in the level required. It would be a lot easier..

No idea how you'd do that either. The only reason you can display the price, is because its part of the core item properties that is sent to the client (Indeed, I think the only ones that are sent are hudsprite and price and the name.)

The level requirement is a script side constant - it is not part of the item registry until the weapon actually spawns. There's no way to pass that to the client, currently.

It *might* be possible to integrate it into the name, but due to the crappy way half-life fonts work, there's a good chance it'd be illegible... There might be a away to put a special character in the name, and have the client read everything to the right of that, and put that, and put THAT in a pop up description. However, I'm not sure if you can build string names prior to item registry - it may only accept the name property at script load, and thus wouldn't be able to add to it in automated fashion. In which case you'd have to do every script by hand and make sure the name string element and actual level requirement matched up.

 

[elfstone222]

I'm corssing my fingers there's some way to impliment it without needing toe media count to go up. This wold make money more useful at lower levels and slow down the power leveling a bit.

 

[Shurik3n]

I like the idea of weapon restrictions on high level rare items, but on low level store bought items I don't see the point - other than to make this like every RPG ever. It does pain me to see somebody who has been playing for a week have, or think they deserve to have, items that people who have been playing for years don't even have.

 

[Evaan]

The point is that low levels go by too fast, it gives the player something to look forward to upon his next three levels and rules out power leveling.

It also makes the weapons usable again.
As it was before, we could just have the beginner weapons, and one store bought weapon of each kind, because they would only use the best weapon to level anyway.

Mind you, weapons damage has increased some (and decreased some), so even though you don't have access to the best weapons from the beginning, you still dish out a good amount of damage.

It pleases me to see this many people favoring this system. I just hope it plays out as well as I think it will

 

[Thothie]

Well, since we haven't figured a way to warn n00b players before they blow every hard earned penny they have, I've disabled the level limits for all weapons under level 15.

It wasn't just the purchasable weapons you put level limits on, it was several of the higher weapons, and a lot of mid-level people are going to find they suddenly can't use their primary weapon until they are level 15.

I took off the level limits on Skull Blades, Hugger series, and FCK series, but I'm sure there's a bunch of others I missed where some people are going to be unpleasantly surprised. (Skull Blades particularly are for Thornland level nubs.)

I've ideas on how we might be able to pass a warning by integrating something with the item name, but I've not time to implement it now - maybe next month.

 

[Evaan]

If you purchase a level 12 weapon and find out you can't use it, you don't lose every penny, you lose 68 if you sell it back, and once scorned...

The majority of people is for this idea. I think it's a little disappointing it wont be featured because of newcomers wont be able to use the weapons they purchase the first two hours of their total play time.

You yourself said you reach 20 within 6 hours (granted, you know where to go). I was hoping this would stretch the low levels a little more, so the game doesn't expire too fast.

The low levels of the skull blade was set to level 9 (Dull version) and 12 (ordinary), not 15, so it was set fit for low level newbies.

I mean - you reach level 6 fighting the boars after hitting level 4 on the rats.
Really, the system isn't as harsh as you have it portrayed.

Edit: In any way, I trust your judgement, so it's probably the best choice for now.

 

[Thothie]

Well, the main issue is the counter-intuitive gold rip off with no warning. (Kinda hard to explain to someone why a rusty blade is easier to weild than a clean one). It's also not as if someone isn't going to try, repeatedly, to find some item they can use, only to lose more gold and get exponentially frustrated. I might be able to do something about that...

But I was originally under the impression the ramp system was going to be lower for the lower-end quest items. I mean... Some of these Level 15 are found in Thornlands - and many not even as deep as the Spiderqueen chest, so if these aren't for those under Level 15, I don't know who they are for.

 

[Matt PL]

good idea but to use calruin mace need 15 lvl blunt arms! wtf! 15 lvl for Calruin Mace oh noes calruin mace is not rare then why need 15 blunt arms lvl?

 

[ceriux]

i picked up a battle axe and it said i didnt have high enough of a level... but uhh i was still able to use it and cause damage with it and gain exp using it.

 

[Evaan]

I noticed that when having 12 Proficiency, but 11 Balance and Power, and the item required level 12 Proficiency.

Level 15 items aren't 15 because they are rare, it's because it's a good weapon. Quest items had 15 originally. Not sure what restriction Thothie put on them now.

I checked the chests now and noticed some of the level 15 items did appear in the Thornlands. Those should be level 12, then, or 9 or lower depending on their store bought counter part (ie. if one of the items is equal to say, the long sword, which is level 9).

Some quest weapons have four variations - Dull, Orginal, Sharp and Perfect.
The Dull version was level 9, the original was level 12, while he Sharp and Perfect were 15.

In other words, their stronger versions were meant for the 15 and above players, while the less quality ones were meant for lower players.
Edit: Wups! I double-checked now. Only one of the Dull weapons on one of the swords was level 9. Small arms is correct (9, 12 and 15).

 

[Thothie]

i picked up a battle axe and it said i didnt have high enough of a level... but uhh i was still able to use it and cause damage with it and gain exp using it.

Ye may get that because instead of going through every script and changing it - I merely set the base up to ignore any level requirement under 15.

*sigh* I dunno - I just don't like the idea of weapons commonly found in Thornlands being 15 - a place you should long have stopped visiting by the time you reach that level. I'll re-enable it in AUG2007b and see what hell breaks loose.

I looked into rigging an alert system to show players what the level requirements on items where before they purchased them, but as I figured, it'll require a client side patch, if it's possible at all, - and I'd rather not do a client-side update on a B patch - best that only the servers need to upgrade.

 

[Evaan]

*sigh* I dunno - I just don't like the idea of weapons commonly found in Thornlands being 15 - a place you should long have stopped visiting by the time you reach that level. I'll re-enable it in AUG2007b and see what hell breaks loose.

As I said, it's supposed to be 9 and 12.

 

[mnjx]

This is a silly unrealistic restriction, and a very sloppy way of forcing people to use weapons you should of implemented properly in the first place.

A weapon is a weapon, if you can pick it up, you should be able to swing it. A better idea instead of just not being able to swing the weapon, would be that it does the same damage as a cheap weapon until your skill increases.

I come from original EQ so i'm before the days of silly restrictions in RPGs such as 'required skill to wield', and that is one of the reasons im so turned off by modern MMORPGS. (yes, EQ never had weapon or armor restrictions untill after Verant left to work on eq2 (after kunark was released, the original dev team started work on eq2 and they left the new sony team to make the new expansions.))

 

[tehrilez]

Doesn't really matter, but I voted no.

If its a low level character and they somehow find a.. legendary item..


They will not be able to pick it up because of its weight/makes them so heavy they can barely move/the attack drains their entire stamina in one swing.


I would say instead of level requirements, just increase the weight of these rares.. noobs wouldn't be able to pick up something like.. say a granite mace or something.

It's not possible.

Plus, I don't want to install the next patch and say to myself : Omg wtfbbq I cant use half of my weapons now I cant use my GAXE or my Dark Armour, which I had trained for awhile just so I could carry and pay for the items in the first place..


It's like saying.. you're not a level high enough for a hat. Until you reach the next level, hat go on foot. It doesn't make sense.

 

[The Man In Black]

Increasing the weights hurt high levelled players, too. I prefer being light and such without having to bank after I get a new item ;-)

 

[Thothie]

This is, again, a limitation of the weapon registration... If I could cause failing to meet the level requirement just to make the weapon to utterly suck in your hands until you did, instead of being unswingable, I would.