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Author Topic: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length  (Read 13437 times)

mayvind

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #25 on: August 29, 2008, 03:22:28 PM »
Short comment, Please turn the spawn rate up a bit, it was so good a month ago for few days. Now is slow again.

Bad_Bud

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #26 on: August 29, 2008, 04:12:02 PM »
Short comment, Please turn the spawn rate up a bit, it was so good a month ago for few days. Now is slow again.

I think they've said over and over that they havn't changed the spawn rates recently.

Ric

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #27 on: August 29, 2008, 04:50:43 PM »
With the bugs with spawn system in general creating tons of lag, I wouldn't be surprised if that's what's slowing down the dungeon spawns.

mayvind

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #28 on: August 29, 2008, 05:35:21 PM »
Short comment, Please turn the spawn rate up a bit, it was so good a month ago for few days. Now is slow again.

I think they've said over and over that they havn't changed the spawn rates recently.

what i mean is that they should, even though they never did they should  :lol:

ethinos

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #29 on: August 29, 2008, 07:52:25 PM »
Well, with hope, the new Domains coming in should have more dungeons for us to plunder and help keep the same few from being ravaged again and again and again, keeping the spawns low.
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Soren / Zarathustra217

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #30 on: August 30, 2008, 04:56:26 AM »
With the bugs with spawn system in general creating tons of lag, I wouldn't be surprised if that's what's slowing down the dungeon spawns.

Hmm, that's interesting. How did you learn that it's the bugs spawn system that's generating tons of lag? Naive me would have thought the lag generated the spawn system issues, but I understand that I am wrong in this assessment...

But then, no, the dungeon spawn rates have nothing to do with lag. Or bugs, as I'm aware. But judging from the logs of activity, perhaps people should just go more easy on the dungeon grinding - listen a bit to their XP message and stop pushing things to no reward for anyone? Atleast, from what I've observed analyzing this, that's the main thing keeping the spawns down. Pure and simple greed gone overboard. You won't in any way level up faster grinding to this extend, and the items you'll or anyone find won't ever be worth much.

That said, we are intending to expand with more dungeons to crawl for higher levels, especially in the new domains - hopefully giving the mid level dungeons more rest. Inevitably though, as we've expanded far beyond what our current server setup is capable of, it's going to create some lag at peak hours.


Axel

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #31 on: September 02, 2008, 05:53:10 AM »
Quote
The role-play of interaction for dungeons is still there.  Usually what happens is, I'll gather a group of PCs to adventure with, and then as we're deciding on a place to go explore, I start sending tells to all the players I know frequent dungeons to see what's been hit/not hit so we don't get dissappointed when we find nothing at a particular chosen dungeon.  The IC interaction is never really affected by this, and in all honesty, most people don't even realize that I'm carefully taking a small OOC measure to insure we have an enjoyable dungeon crawl and not a bore-fest.

But here you're talking about in character interaction in your party. I'm talking about your party having a reason to interact with other parties. You're probably right that most people in your party don't even realize that you're taking away their chance of interacting with others on the server away from them.

Quote
Except the problem with that, Axel, is that seems almost unrealistic ICly.  The idea of sending scouts in-characterly to check the 'spawns' feels on par with me just sending a tell saying "What's the spawn like?"  Realistically, no adventurer is ever going to say "Awh, only battle devourers and not skeletal?  We're not doing this!"  It just seems like a goofy thing for a thrill-seeker to say.  Any thrill-seeker would go for a thrill, even if the spawn was bad.  The point is that OOCly, the players don't want to fight monsters that are half their challenge rating.  So to prevent this, and to make things easy, people check with each other on a tell-scale.  Sending scouts just doesn't seem comfortable:

"What are we waiting for?" 
"We sent a scout to see if it's worth doing the dungeon."

You're pretty convincing here, Ric. It's not like sending scouts out to see if an enemy is present is actually used in the real world. It's just unrealistic. I can totally see how that kills your immersion in the game world.

Quote
I may have worded this wrong.  I'm not saying that 'obstacles' are bad.  What I'ms aying is there are no obstacles when you enter a dungeon on low-spawn, therefore the adventure and fun becomes boring.  When there is a low spawn, the 'thrill' and motivation for a party drops, especially among the veteran players who know the difference between a high spawn and a low spawn.  In a low spawn, the players force themselves to do the dungeon anyway, and the tells begin circularing about how boring the hunt is becuase the spawn is low.

But why do you force yourself to raid a dungeon that isn't challenging? Why don't you use that time to find a dungeon that is challenging instead? It almost sounds like you're deliberately trying to make your own experience lousy and then blame it on you having to stay in character. Would your character really go to some dungeon full low level monsters and squish them? Wouldn't s/he be bored doing that?
« Last Edit: September 02, 2008, 05:55:52 AM by Axel »

Rex

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #32 on: September 02, 2008, 08:20:18 AM »
I would say, form a party, find the guy raiding all the dungeons and razing them down to nothing, and curb stomp that guy.  Then, you get the Adventure, and your group is not wasted.  Honestly though I have not been having a problem finding a dungeon that's challenging, it's finding one I can even stand a chance of surviving in that's my issue.  :D  At least, one that I can survive in that's appropriate to my level.

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Ric

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #33 on: September 02, 2008, 10:29:28 AM »
But here you're talking about in character interaction in your party. I'm talking about your party having a reason to interact with other parties. You're probably right that most people in your party don't even realize that you're taking away their chance of interacting with others on the server away from them.

There are no 'other parties' 3/4 of the time, Axel.  Most people solo-grind and go from dungeon to dungeon.  We're not missing out on amazing role-play interaction with anyone.  Chances are, if we pass the person who just did the dungeon we were going to, that person is invisible and/or zooming past us with a haste/ex-retreat spell.  And in the other instance, if a person I asked said they cleared our dungeon 3 hours ago, then we're definetely not going to have a chance at interaction, there.  We're just going to work our way there, only to find nothing.

Quote
You're pretty convincing here, Ric. It's not like sending scouts out to see if an enemy is present is actually used in the real world. It's just unrealistic. I can totally see how that kills your immersion in the game world.

Except, Axel, if I send in a scout all the way up to Baratak and to investigate the purple dungeon and we wait at the Lady's rest for at least an hour, only for him to go "There's an army of skeletal archers at the entry!  We should go and slay them!"  And all the un-knowing players are going "We must!"  I'm going in my head "It's not a challenge, its a waste of time, that's a medium-spawn."

Quote
But why do you force yourself to raid a dungeon that isn't challenging? Why don't you use that time to find a dungeon that is challenging instead? It almost sounds like you're deliberately trying to make your own experience lousy and then blame it on you having to stay in character. Would your character really go to some dungeon full low level monsters and squish them? Wouldn't s/he be bored doing that?

Maybe because ICly some characters in the party won't ignore the fact that there's monsters in here, regardless of challenge?  Think about it.  You go into a crypt filled with low-spawn undead.  Of course I'm going to go "Well this stinks.", but the paladin, cleric, and druid in my party on the other hand are going "Can't ignore these!  Come on!"  And no, I'm not so desperate for loot that I'd ditch people becuase they want to go and I don't.  This instance I'm talking about doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen.  There are times when high levels are forced into situations where they've gotta do the low junk.  When it's just me and the party I frequently travel with who don't have these sort of IC-restrictions, then yes.  We do go for a dungeon with high and ignore the low.

And Rex, you just need to party up.

Axel

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #34 on: September 02, 2008, 11:04:35 AM »
There are no 'other parties' 3/4 of the time, Axel.  Most people solo-grind and go from dungeon to dungeon.  We're not missing out on amazing role-play interaction with anyone.  Chances are, if we pass the person who just did the dungeon we were going to, that person is invisible and/or zooming past us with a haste/ex-retreat spell.  And in the other instance, if a person I asked said they cleared our dungeon 3 hours ago, then we're definetely not going to have a chance at interaction, there.  We're just going to work our way there, only to find nothing.

Resume: other people grind dungeons, ...

Quote
Except, Axel, if I send in a scout all the way up to Baratak and to investigate the purple dungeon and we wait at the Lady's rest for at least an hour, only for him to go "There's an army of skeletal archers at the entry!  We should go and slay them!"  And all the un-knowing players are going "We must!"  I'm going in my head "It's not a challenge, its a waste of time, that's a medium-spawn."

... Can't judge spawns, and ...

Quote
Maybe because ICly some characters in the party won't ignore the fact that there's monsters in here, regardless of challenge?  Think about it.  You go into a crypt filled with low-spawn undead.  Of course I'm going to go "Well this stinks.", but the paladin, cleric, and druid in my party on the other hand are going "Can't ignore these!  Come on!"  And no, I'm not so desperate for loot that I'd ditch people becuase they want to go and I don't.  This instance I'm talking about doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen.  There are times when high levels are forced into situations where they've gotta do the low junk.  When it's just me and the party I frequently travel with who don't have these sort of IC-restrictions, then yes.  We do go for a dungeon with high and ignore the low.

... puts all sorts of weird restrictions on themselves.

How exactly is this the spawn rate's fault, Ric?

Rex

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #35 on: September 02, 2008, 11:12:42 AM »
But here you're talking about in character interaction in your party. I'm talking about your party having a reason to interact with other parties. You're probably right that most people in your party don't even realize that you're taking away their chance of interacting with others on the server away from them.

There are no 'other parties' 3/4 of the time, Axel.  Most people solo-grind and go from dungeon to dungeon.  We're not missing out on amazing role-play interaction with anyone.  Chances are, if we pass the person who just did the dungeon we were going to, that person is invisible and/or zooming past us with a haste/ex-retreat spell.  And in the other instance, if a person I asked said they cleared our dungeon 3 hours ago, then we're definetely not going to have a chance at interaction, there.  We're just going to work our way there, only to find nothing.

Quote
You're pretty convincing here, Ric. It's not like sending scouts out to see if an enemy is present is actually used in the real world. It's just unrealistic. I can totally see how that kills your immersion in the game world.

Except, Axel, if I send in a scout all the way up to Baratak and to investigate the purple dungeon and we wait at the Lady's rest for at least an hour, only for him to go "There's an army of skeletal archers at the entry!  We should go and slay them!"  And all the un-knowing players are going "We must!"  I'm going in my head "It's not a challenge, its a waste of time, that's a medium-spawn."

Quote
But why do you force yourself to raid a dungeon that isn't challenging? Why don't you use that time to find a dungeon that is challenging instead? It almost sounds like you're deliberately trying to make your own experience lousy and then blame it on you having to stay in character. Would your character really go to some dungeon full low level monsters and squish them? Wouldn't s/he be bored doing that?

Maybe because ICly some characters in the party won't ignore the fact that there's monsters in here, regardless of challenge?  Think about it.  You go into a crypt filled with low-spawn undead.  Of course I'm going to go "Well this stinks.", but the paladin, cleric, and druid in my party on the other hand are going "Can't ignore these!  Come on!"  And no, I'm not so desperate for loot that I'd ditch people becuase they want to go and I don't.  This instance I'm talking about doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen.  There are times when high levels are forced into situations where they've gotta do the low junk.  When it's just me and the party I frequently travel with who don't have these sort of IC-restrictions, then yes.  We do go for a dungeon with high and ignore the low.

And Rex, you just need to party up.

Sorry, I don't party with just anyone in the name of clearing a dungeon.  My standards are rather High.

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Kendaric

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #36 on: September 02, 2008, 11:40:48 AM »

And Rex, you just need to party up.

Sorry, I don't party with just anyone in the name of clearing a dungeon.  My standards are rather High.

~Rex


Partying will often be restricted because of IC things... not every character wants to party up with wizards/sorcerors or certain races. Ignoring such IC reasons will certainly make things easier, but it also breaks immersion and RP which is hardly desireable.
What we really need are some dungeons in each level range that are geared to non-caster classes. This could be achieved by various means, such as applying a high spell failure chance on entering and/or creatures with high spell resistance or magic immunity so people have to rely on mundane weaponry.

Ric

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #37 on: September 03, 2008, 12:21:44 AM »
If you don't want to party with other people becuase of your character's lack of being social, then that's your problem, sorry to say.  The server's dungeons were designed to be beaten by means of partying and/or using good tactics.  If your character's afraid of witchery and such, then maybe he shouldn't even be going out exploring outside of the city, period.  Becuase most of the stuff lurking outside of the city make PC witch-craft look like child's play.  And it's been said in previous servers by devs themselves that having anti-magic field areas isn't going to happen, becuase the idea of such doesn't happen in a low-magic setting.  The characters aren't what make the server low-magic, it's the setting.  The casters aren't nerfed, it's the # of casters that's nerfed in the land.

There are no 'other parties' 3/4 of the time, Axel.  Most people solo-grind and go from dungeon to dungeon.  We're not missing out on amazing role-play interaction with anyone.  Chances are, if we pass the person who just did the dungeon we were going to, that person is invisible and/or zooming past us with a haste/ex-retreat spell.  And in the other instance, if a person I asked said they cleared our dungeon 3 hours ago, then we're definetely not going to have a chance at interaction, there.  We're just going to work our way there, only to find nothing.

Resume: other people grind dungeons, ...

Quote
Except, Axel, if I send in a scout all the way up to Baratak and to investigate the purple dungeon and we wait at the Lady's rest for at least an hour, only for him to go "There's an army of skeletal archers at the entry!  We should go and slay them!"  And all the un-knowing players are going "We must!"  I'm going in my head "It's not a challenge, its a waste of time, that's a medium-spawn."

... Can't judge spawns, and ...

Quote
Maybe because ICly some characters in the party won't ignore the fact that there's monsters in here, regardless of challenge?  Think about it.  You go into a crypt filled with low-spawn undead.  Of course I'm going to go "Well this stinks.", but the paladin, cleric, and druid in my party on the other hand are going "Can't ignore these!  Come on!"  And no, I'm not so desperate for loot that I'd ditch people becuase they want to go and I don't.  This instance I'm talking about doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen.  There are times when high levels are forced into situations where they've gotta do the low junk.  When it's just me and the party I frequently travel with who don't have these sort of IC-restrictions, then yes.  We do go for a dungeon with high and ignore the low.

... puts all sorts of weird restrictions on themselves.

How exactly is this the spawn rate's fault, Ric?

Simple:  The rates remaining slow create low-spawn instances and not high-spawn.

Soren summed it up though pretty clearly:

But then, no, the dungeon spawn rates have nothing to do with lag. Or bugs, as I'm aware. But judging from the logs of activity, perhaps people should just go more easy on the dungeon grinding - listen a bit to their XP message and stop pushing things to no reward for anyone? Atleast, from what I've observed analyzing this, that's the main thing keeping the spawns down. Pure and simple greed gone overboard.

And he's right, and I can believe that.  Unfortunately, it's not a single player's fault in this matter.  The design of the system is completely dependant on the entire player-base's combined rates for dungeoning.  If Player A & Player B say "The spawns suck, let's wait about 8 hours and then do it again" and player C mid-way through that waiting period (who's not with A & B) says "Oh man, this dungeon's nearly full-spawn, I'mma raid it!", then the end result is Player A & B coming back and going "Bah, someone hit it before us!"

It's sad, but that's the way the system is.  I can honestly say that there's gotta be a good number of people who routinely have their own 'times' for hitting dungeons.  Becuase all those times for hitting dungeons conflct with each other, the odds of finding a full spawn are rare.  What's sad is that in most cases, it depends on how many players are online.  On a day where the server's been empty nearly the full day (special days for euros or Americans, who knows), you'll usually find a lot of dungeons growing without being raided.  Now on a Friday-Sunday when the server's at 30-40 players?  Forget about it, those dungeons are gonna be mollested, unless the DMs are running all sorts of crazyness (which they usually are lately and thankfully) that keeps most players occupied with other things than looting.

The lever suggestion that Rex suggested?  Honestly, the way our community blows through dungeons at unregulated times?  It'd probably be the best change we could ask for, with the exception that it would make a lot of dungeons feel completely OOC.  After that, there's only one other suggestion to make:  Up the rates until it's fast enough that players can go at any time without worrying that much about the rates.  Keep it fun, keep it without making dungeoning a chore and struggle over being on time.  It worked for those 2 weeks I mentioned that were later considered 'bugged'.

kenpen

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #38 on: September 03, 2008, 12:22:38 AM »
It's a matter of reasonable expectation, and structuring things so that reasonable expectation is met, for the most people, in the shortest amount of time.

For example... let's see... Roch's bard took a party to Barovia the other day. Walked all the way, RPing with these other lowbies who decided an adventure was right up their alley! Took them foreeeever to get there. All of them excited, happy to be going on some epic quest (even though, as they slowly walked along, some of them figured out that Roch was level 2 or so and were like "WTF, mate?")

Once they got their, Roch let them in on the fact that his epic quest was to fetch Grimshackle some dyes. Because Grim is a lazy bastard.

How disappointed do you think these people were? I'm not sure. If any of them are reading this, they can chime in. But I'm willing to bet any exciting expectations were dashed when they were forced to rely on their own devices, and the party began to split up. I'm sure fun was had along the way, but after a 45 minute walk to Barovia... unless you're with REALLY entertaining people, it gets dull and you start to look forward to the end, where the excitment will happen. If no excitement happens you might have had a few fun moments, but ultimately you go to bed dissatisfied. It's like watching 20 minutes of "adult entertainment" with no money shot. :-P

If you get people together for a nice adventure, it's best that - at the end - an adventure occurs. And, no, walking around in circles while members of your party slowly get bored and log other characters, or simply log off entirely, isn't an adventure. Adventure is where you GO OUT and SOMETHING EXCITING HAPPENS. Maybe in the olden days, just going out was exciting. But, once you've been around the block a few times, it's not a thrill unless something happens while you're out there... which usually requires either DMs or challenging spawns. So before I go out, I try to save myself a good forty minutes by checking around and seeing OOCly what everyone is doing, or has done. I don't want complete realism, where everyone sits around in some inn and waiting for someone to come gather a party all the time.

As far as parties go, unless there's some epic big run happening, I try to keep the party to 3-5 people. God forbid I meet other groups of people wanting to join me. Usually they just run around and get killed by accident, or they decide they want the one decent item we find, and then I have to decide whether it's worth more for me to be nice to them, or just to kill them in their sleep for it. :-P

Bad_Bud

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #39 on: September 03, 2008, 03:08:40 AM »
The lever suggestion that Rex suggested?  Honestly, the way our community blows through dungeons at unregulated times?  It'd probably be the best change we could ask for, with the exception that it would make a lot of dungeons feel completely OOC.  After that, there's only one other suggestion to make:  Up the rates until it's fast enough that players can go at any time without worrying that much about the rates.  Keep it fun, keep it without making dungeoning a chore and struggle over being on time.  It worked for those 2 weeks I mentioned that were later considered 'bugged'.

Other than continue the back and forth arguing about character interaction, dungeon spawns, parties, and stupidity (of which I'll at least say that if you are somehow expecting to hit a max spawn every day or every other day, you're probably overzealous), the only reasonable suggestion I can come up with, in direct contrast to the unreasonable addition of levers mentioned above, is this:

Spawnrate=1.0;

if(PlayersOnline>10)
     Spawnrate+=((PlayersOnline-10)*0.04);
« Last Edit: September 03, 2008, 03:10:20 AM by Bad_Bud »

Axel

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #40 on: September 03, 2008, 06:09:38 AM »
Other than continue the back and forth arguing about character interaction, dungeon spawns, parties, and stupidity (of which I'll at least say that if you are somehow expecting to hit a max spawn every day or every other day, you're probably overzealous), the only reasonable suggestion I can come up with, in direct contrast to the unreasonable addition of levers mentioned above, is this:

Spawnrate=1.0;

if(PlayersOnline>10)
     Spawnrate+=((PlayersOnline-10)*0.04);


Hey, it's not fair to use reason in an argument like this. You're cheating. ;)

On a more serious note, scaling the spawn rate by the number of players online could be a good idea, at least if all dungeons are routinely hit so bad that they all have a low population.

One of the ideas behind the spawn system is that players should be able leave an impression on the world, e.g. if a group a heroes kills all the wolves along a road then they should be able to tell other adventurers that the road is safe to travel. Having a too high spawn rate wouldn't make this possible, and a too low rate wouldn't be fun. I other words: the system is designed so that a dungeon/encounter is low some time after it has been hit, to make people go to different dungeons.

Reading that the population at some dungeons sometimes are low just confirms that the system is working as it should. Of course, if the entire monster population of the server is always low, then there might be a problem with either the spawn rate or the rate that the spawns are killed. It's all a question of balancing impression left by players on the world and action.

I guess that's enough seriousness for now. Back to the silly discussion at hand. :D

Simple:  The rates remaining slow create low-spawn instances and not high-spawn.

Sorry, but it doesn't. Both low spawn rates and high spawn rates will eventually result in a high dungeon population.  High spawn rates will just result in a higher dungeon population faster. If it is true that:
Quote from: Ric
Most people solo-grind and go from dungeon to dungeon.
Then having a higher spawn rate really won't help at all. People would just clear out the encounters as fast as they spawned and we wouldn't have gotten anywhere.

Furthermore, it seems that you and your party is not willing to move from a dungeon with a low population to a dungeon with a higher population. I'll have to rewrite your own remark a bit to give an answer to that.

Now, if you don't want to party in dungeons with high spawn because of your character's lack of understanding of the world, then that's your problem, sorry to say.  The server's dungeons were designed to be beaten by means of partying and/or using good tactics.  If your character's afraid of scouting and such, then maybe he shouldn't even be going out exploring outside of the city, period.

Soren / Zarathustra217

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #41 on: September 03, 2008, 06:35:30 AM »
In extend:

The variable population spawn system is intended to be roleplay oriented rather than the typical dungeon crawl you find on MMORPG or similar. This means you have to revise your way of thinking about going on adventure to a more in character, less aggressive approach. You wouldn't normally run the country-side thin until you bump into something powerful and evil. Rather, the adventure typically arrives at you, so to speak. Imagine this situation:

Bromil, a seasoned warrior, stands in front of the Morninglord church, having a casual talk with old friends. A younger person arrives, joining the gathered people, greeting them. This is Valduil, a ranger, who's just been on a walk through the woods, gathering herbalism ingredients.

Bromil: Valduil, well met *greets him with a nod*

Valduil: Well met indeed, all. I see you are enjoying the good weather - nice to see the sun shine for a change.

Bromil: Aye, 'tis been raining all summer, it has. And how about you? What news bring you from your travels?

Valduil: Was in the Sullen Woods, but left the place quickly. The place was swarmed by evil spirits! Also noticed that a few pale figures was standing outside a cave in the south eastern part?

Bromil: Really? *looks to the others* Perhaps that's worth take a look at. I hate those bloodsucking scoundrels, and who knows, perhaps they might have horded a bit of a treasure we can liberate them from.

Bromil and his fellowship prepare to go out and investigate...


Whether you want to play it like this, or in any way similar, is entirely up to you. But this is the option you've been given... :)

kenpen

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #42 on: September 03, 2008, 08:07:01 AM »
I like how the abberations now spill out of the demonologists and begin ravaging the countryside. Nothing like a fat noisome lump of flesh to make you quiver.

Bad_Bud

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #43 on: September 03, 2008, 09:21:03 AM »
The variable population spawn system is intended to be roleplay oriented rather than the typical dungeon crawl you find on MMORPG or similar.

Heh heh... and you could make the Vallaki peasants and nobles have a spawn rate, too.  Then the monster PC's could attack and scare the city with noticeable results.   :twisted:

Ric

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #44 on: September 03, 2008, 10:01:23 AM »
Variable dungeons are nice like that.  It's random, so you don't know what you're going to get. 

~

I guess that's enough seriousness for now. Back to the silly discussion at hand. :D

I hope you're not serious, as that's pretty insulting.

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Sorry, but it doesn't. Both low spawn rates and high spawn rates will eventually result in a high dungeon population.  High spawn rates will just result in a higher dungeon population faster. If it is true that:
Quote from: Ric
Most people solo-grind and go from dungeon to dungeon.
Then having a higher spawn rate really won't help at all. People would just clear out the encounters as fast as they spawned and we wouldn't have gotten anywhere.

Furthermore, it seems that you and your party is not willing to move from a dungeon with a low population to a dungeon with a higher population. I'll have to rewrite your own remark a bit to give an answer to that.

Now, if you don't want to party in dungeons with high spawn because of your character's lack of understanding of the world, then that's your problem, sorry to say.  The server's dungeons were designed to be beaten by means of partying and/or using good tactics.  If your character's afraid of scouting and such, then maybe he shouldn't even be going out exploring outside of the city, period.

And again, you did not understand my point.  The restriction was a scenario I've been placed into. This, in no way means that I actually restrict myself with barriers all the time.  90% of times I'm adventuring, I am doing what's been bolded.  But shall we go back to what I've been saying in nearly all my posts?  Most hunters and thrill-seekers are doing the same thing.  And since rates remain constant, the over-flowing of people looking for an adventure result in very rare occurrences of finding a good spawn.

Now, if I"m not mistaken, the idea of basing the spawns on server-population has been pondered numerously.  This is a good suggestion, but I'm still wondering why the suggestion never actually goes in.  It would keep things from being OOC, while at the same time, solving the issue of spawns being less on a usual high-populated server day.

Axel

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #45 on: September 03, 2008, 12:04:03 PM »
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Variable dungeons are nice like that.  It's random, so you don't know what you're going to get.
No, Variable doesn't mean random. Those are two different concepts.

I hope you're not serious, as that's pretty insulting.
I'm being very serious. The spawn system of PotM can basically be seen as a nonlinear time invariant difference equation with the number of kills as input and a negative gain. Debating whether the size of the resulting population is due to players killing too many dungeon denizens or due to the gain of the difference equation being too small is rather silly.

Especially since this whole conversation is moot unless we assume that the population in the dungeons is too small. In your first post you argued brilliantly that the population in three or four dungeons were lower than they were when there was a bug in the system. I have yet to see any good arguments that this lower population of dungeon denizens is too small.

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And again, you did not understand my point.  The restriction was a scenario I've been placed into. This, in no way means that I actually restrict myself with barriers all the time.  90% of times I'm adventuring, I am doing what's been bolded.  But shall we go back to what I've been saying in nearly all my posts?  Most hunters and thrill-seekers are doing the same thing.  And since rates remain constant, the over-flowing of people looking for an adventure result in very rare occurrences of finding a good spawn.

No, I probably didn't understand your point. I went back through your previous posts as you suggested and tried to figure out exactly what your point was, but without luck. Perhaps you should try to rephrase it, because even though it is obvious it is clearly not getting into my thick skull.

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Now, if I'm not mistaken, the idea of basing the spawns on server-population has been pondered numerously.  This is a good suggestion, but I'm still wondering why the suggestion never actually goes in.  It would keep things from being OOC, while at the same time, solving the issue of spawns being less on a usual high-populated server day.
Okay, now we're back where we started. Again you claim that low spawn rates result in people going OOC without giving any good arguments.

mayvind

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #46 on: September 03, 2008, 01:30:13 PM »
I like how the abberations now spill out of the demonologists and begin ravaging the countryside. Nothing like a fat noisome lump of flesh to make you quiver.

I liked it too and was victim to it, Morag got killed by 3 fat abberations......
« Last Edit: September 03, 2008, 01:32:16 PM by mayvind »

Ric

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #47 on: September 03, 2008, 02:34:50 PM »
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Variable dungeons are nice like that.  It's random, so you don't know what you're going to get.
No, Variable doesn't mean random. Those are two different concepts.

First of all, I wasn't asking for the dictionary definition of the word "Variable".  I'm an english major, I know what it means.  I'm saying that the concept of the dungeon functions in a way that everytime you go there, you don't know what you're going to get.

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I hope you're not serious, as that's pretty insulting.
I'm being very serious. The spawn system of PotM can basically be seen as a nonlinear time invariant difference equation with the number of kills as input and a negative gain. Debating whether the size of the resulting population is due to players killing too many dungeon denizens or due to the gain of the difference equation being too small is rather silly.

Especially since this whole conversation is moot unless we assume that the population in the dungeons is too small. In your first post you argued brilliantly that the population in three or four dungeons were lower than they were when there was a bug in the system. I have yet to see any good arguments that this lower population of dungeon denizens is too small.

Here's an argument:  GO log in as a player and spend 2 weeks dungeoning and see for yourself what players including me are talking about.

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Now, if I'm not mistaken, the idea of basing the spawns on server-population has been pondered numerously.  This is a good suggestion, but I'm still wondering why the suggestion never actually goes in.  It would keep things from being OOC, while at the same time, solving the issue of spawns being less on a usual high-populated server day.
Okay, now we're back where we started. Again you claim that low spawn rates result in people going OOC without giving any good arguments.

Did I say that people were going OOC?  No.  What I'm saying is that the atmosphere of the setting would not be lamed in comparison to generating an OOC lever used to set the spawns.

Kaspar

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #48 on: September 03, 2008, 02:49:45 PM »
Lets calm down a little bit.  :D

Axel

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Re: Spawn Rates ~ Insane Length
« Reply #49 on: September 03, 2008, 03:23:42 PM »
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First of all, I wasn't asking for the dictionary definition of the word "Variable".  I'm an english major, I know what it means.  I'm saying that the concept of the dungeon functions in a way that everytime you go there, you don't know what you're going to get.
Congratulations on completing you major.

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Here's an argument:  GO log in as a player and spend 2 weeks dungeoning and see for yourself what players including me are talking about.
Given that I'm a single person, there's no way I could get enough data during a two week observation to support such a claim. Also, since I'd probably be biased towards action-oriented play I'm not sure that my observations would be objective.
I'd rather have some sort of qualitative assessment of this.

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Did I say that people were going OOC?  No.  What I'm saying is that the atmosphere of the setting would not be lamed in comparison to generating an OOC lever used to set the spawns.

Actually, what you said was "It would Keep things from being OOC, ...". I'm sorry, but I'm no Sherlock Holmes. From that snippet of text it's pretty hard to deduce that you were talking about the spawn-lever mentioned earlier.