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I should probably add to this, but the goal of the milestone system was to make people play more, and that's not what it accomplished, but rather the opposite. People never played more for the boosts, they just played less so it was easier to get, and whenever it was close, people just went into normal difficulty to spam kills, which was somewhat against the spirit of the milestone system (and as Ryan said, once double EXP was hit, everyone then got on and double EXP stayed for at least 2 weeks due to the increased activity).
I mean it makes sense, why play during normal times when you can focus on something else and play at another time when it's more worth it?
It was a great idea in theory, but I think the implementation and frequency of the boosts ended up doing more harm than good.
Of course, just taking away boosts doesn't do any favours because people aren't just going to turn around and say "oh, I guess there's no more boosts, guess I will play now", so we'll be replacing the system now with something else that encourages people to actually get on when they feel like it, instead of waiting for a "better time" to play.
Another thing is, Ephinea is supposed to be a non-boosted server that replicates the feel of the official game, and the constant boosts every month took away from that. While boosts are fine, the double EXP boost is so significant that many players felt it just wasn't worth playing otherwise when you could wait for double EXP to come on (along with everything else).
This is also why the EXP Curve discussion is happening. People loved 2x EXP especially for starting out, as it cut out the tedious N-VH grind to get into Ultimate with the rest of the playerbase, and made levelling up alternate characters less of a chore, and since the majority of players obviously don't care about N-VH, we figured why not implement a solution to make that grind less of a chore while getting rid of the issues with the milestone reward system.
Speaking of the replacement, right now we're considering the following (note that this is not set in stone):
What we're thinking is that each week there will be a minor boost with no strings attached (no need to "earn" it, not that the milestone rewards were ever actually "earned", they just happened), so something is always happening and each week has a small purpose to it, but none of the rewards are large enough that's it "not worth playing until the next boost".
Week 1: Drop Anything Rate +25%
Week 2: Rare Enemy +50%
Week 3: Rare Drop Rate +25%
Week 4: EXP +25%
And repeat.
During events of course, this system may be disabled, stacked or continue on as normal, and bigger boosts may be applied. This will only be during the big events though (Christmas, Easter, Anniversary), the three minor events (Halloween, Valentine's and Summer) will just have the rotation go through as normal.
We don't have anything against surges and are well aware people will flood online when something is happening, but ultimately the milestone system ended up discouraging players from playing normally, as doing so would just make it so the boosts were less frequent.
I mean it makes sense, why play during normal times when you can focus on something else and play at another time when it's more worth it?
It was a great idea in theory, but I think the implementation and frequency of the boosts ended up doing more harm than good.
Of course, just taking away boosts doesn't do any favours because people aren't just going to turn around and say "oh, I guess there's no more boosts, guess I will play now", so we'll be replacing the system now with something else that encourages people to actually get on when they feel like it, instead of waiting for a "better time" to play.
Another thing is, Ephinea is supposed to be a non-boosted server that replicates the feel of the official game, and the constant boosts every month took away from that. While boosts are fine, the double EXP boost is so significant that many players felt it just wasn't worth playing otherwise when you could wait for double EXP to come on (along with everything else).
This is also why the EXP Curve discussion is happening. People loved 2x EXP especially for starting out, as it cut out the tedious N-VH grind to get into Ultimate with the rest of the playerbase, and made levelling up alternate characters less of a chore, and since the majority of players obviously don't care about N-VH, we figured why not implement a solution to make that grind less of a chore while getting rid of the issues with the milestone reward system.
Speaking of the replacement, right now we're considering the following (note that this is not set in stone):
What we're thinking is that each week there will be a minor boost with no strings attached (no need to "earn" it, not that the milestone rewards were ever actually "earned", they just happened), so something is always happening and each week has a small purpose to it, but none of the rewards are large enough that's it "not worth playing until the next boost".
Week 1: Drop Anything Rate +25%
Week 2: Rare Enemy +50%
Week 3: Rare Drop Rate +25%
Week 4: EXP +25%
And repeat.
During events of course, this system may be disabled, stacked or continue on as normal, and bigger boosts may be applied. This will only be during the big events though (Christmas, Easter, Anniversary), the three minor events (Halloween, Valentine's and Summer) will just have the rotation go through as normal.
We don't have anything against surges and are well aware people will flood online when something is happening, but ultimately the milestone system ended up discouraging players from playing normally, as doing so would just make it so the boosts were less frequent.
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TaoChaos
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What about utilizing the random luck system towards those boosts? Meaning, there is a separate luck system that says 1.2exp for [newman] [female]. It should have a twofold effect:
1. More players log in each day to check the forecast (so you automatically increase player activity)
2. Characters are rotated to benefit the most from the status (which also encourages additional chars to be created to maximize the benefit, which increases play time and retention because there are more investments to maintain)
This should decrease player surges for exp week boosts (I know you said that wasn't a major concern).
Of course, that still kills the core idea of Ephinea not being a boost system.
But when I log in, there are three things that dictate what I do:
1. the difficulty level of open games
2. the daily forecast
3. items I may be hunting
The third is least important, because I'd rather play with others that hunt items solo (that's why I'm here and not on my GC, right?)
The second is next down the chain, because I haven't really noticed a benefit from the luck system, sometimes I play with extraordinary luck and at best find a def mat in ult, and an unlucky char gets nothing but rares \_(^_^)_/
The first is most important, because if I want to level my vhard char and all the open games are ult, then I switch to an ult char to join in. If the forecast isn't ideal and the open rooms are sparse or on too easy of a setting, I'll probably go play a different game. Which on the one hand is like "well who gives a sh** if TaoChaos is playing?" but from a marketing perspective the question is "how do we increase player activity for people like TaoChaos?"
The first question outweighs the second, methinks.
1. More players log in each day to check the forecast (so you automatically increase player activity)
2. Characters are rotated to benefit the most from the status (which also encourages additional chars to be created to maximize the benefit, which increases play time and retention because there are more investments to maintain)
This should decrease player surges for exp week boosts (I know you said that wasn't a major concern).
Of course, that still kills the core idea of Ephinea not being a boost system.
But when I log in, there are three things that dictate what I do:
1. the difficulty level of open games
2. the daily forecast
3. items I may be hunting
The third is least important, because I'd rather play with others that hunt items solo (that's why I'm here and not on my GC, right?)
The second is next down the chain, because I haven't really noticed a benefit from the luck system, sometimes I play with extraordinary luck and at best find a def mat in ult, and an unlucky char gets nothing but rares \_(^_^)_/
The first is most important, because if I want to level my vhard char and all the open games are ult, then I switch to an ult char to join in. If the forecast isn't ideal and the open rooms are sparse or on too easy of a setting, I'll probably go play a different game. Which on the one hand is like "well who gives a sh** if TaoChaos is playing?" but from a marketing perspective the question is "how do we increase player activity for people like TaoChaos?"
The first question outweighs the second, methinks.
Ayria
Member
This doesn't make any sense.
People played (surged?) during 2x Exp because it's quite frankly overpowered, but much like during events are prone to burnout and only tend to stick around for 2 weeks or so. People may feel discouraged from playing when such an overpowered boost is inactive, but there were never sustained calls for people to stop playing in order to make a milestone more attainable. People should have had this in mind however, as unsealing during 2x EXP was always a good way to fuck the server over.
The milestone system can only be expected to be active in cycles of a few weeks at a time and encourages surges by design. We can't consistently beat our own kill-count by a percentage week in week out. If the frequency of boosts is the issue, tweak the goal %s.
You've identified a major issue with the milestone system, in the fact that normal bth and maxs added to the counter, but discount the fact that it's always inflated by unsealing alts. People spammed for the milestone rewards because they wanted them, they were encouraged to play, you just left the door open to a ridiculously optimal (but undesired way) to do so. The solution? Implement the same protections you did during the event. Cut off kill logging for characters above a certain level in normal, hard and very hard. (Or only count ult kills, but it'd be nice for newbros to be included.)
Saying people were never encouraged to play in order to reach milestones is quite absurd. There were always calls of "only xxxxxx till DAR/EXP" on the forums, discord and lobbies when the time came close. Not all groups gave a shit, but some got excited at least.
You've completely removed the player influenced element in the proposed system and left it to random chance like daily luck. I understand that you may dislike people gaming things, but expecting people to not play as optimally as allowed is a mistake. Removal of kills from overleveled characters both discourages mindless spam to reach goals, but by discounting unsealing kills goals will be much closer for people to attain through normal play, encouraging them to hit it.
A random system by design doesn't accomplish the goal of encouraging people to play as it's completely out of the players hands. Sure it'll be a nice boost to have, but when they're 100% guaranteed every week and require nothing on the players part to attain, they don't promote people to play in the slightest. People will identify the boost that suits their needs and simply be discouraged from playing in that style when it's not active. (MaxS if EXP week, TE/PoD if rare week, preferred hunt if DAR week or just do whatever you feel like because the boosts aren't exactly game breaking)
If there is no way for us to actually have an impact on how often, or how good, a boost is we aren't encouraged to play for it. You're just randomly increasing the rates and hoping it's enough to get people to log in, instead of allowing players to log in to earn the boosts themselves.
Think about closing the door on some of the loopholes and toning down the EXP boost instead of throwing the whole thing out. The milestone system encourages play, it's just the kills are so inflated by maxS and BTH kills they're pretty much the only ones that matter. Clearing normal quests 4p, even at TA speeds, is hilariously suboptimal for killcount compared to just one guy BTH unsealing in block 2.
A milestone system that changes weekly DAR/Rare Mob/EXP that ranges from 10 - ??% Something with a potential huge payout for an absurd number of kills would be nice, but staff here would sadly never let it happen.
Hell, you could even add goals for adding certain MAE/Fiasco/Halloween or other quests during some weeks. DAR RDR EXP are hard to get people excited about.
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Mille Marteaux
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The system we're working on has no random elements to it. There are four boosts lined up that go in order (numbers aren't finalized, but they're likely to be accurate):
+25% DAR
+50% rare enemy appearance
+25% RDR
+25% EXP
These boosts cannot be extended nor overlap with each other, one simply ends and the next one begins. There are no kill counters or anything - it's automatic and everyone can benefit from it in any way they wish.
After EXP boost, it loops back around to DAR and repeats. This way each week has a sort of purpose to it, and due to the predictable rotating nature, you can plan out any long-term plans you may have - like if you're hunting Psycho Wand, you could do Oran for DAR week, then move to Purplenum if you want for rare enemy appearance rate week.
We've considered putting the kill level restrictions up similar to the event restrictions, but it doesn't solve the basic problem of people relaxing for two weeks and then rushing for a relatively easy two weeks of doubled EXP.
Another thing we've considered is having it just be on static kill amounts, but that would need to be adjusted based on active population and kill rates - if the population increased enough, we'd have to increase the kills required, and people would absolutely hate seeing things be "nerfed" like that.
If you have any other suggestions, you're free to lay them on us. I thought that the details of the new system were already mentioned somewhere in public during discussions, but they could have just been missed.
+25% DAR
+50% rare enemy appearance
+25% RDR
+25% EXP
These boosts cannot be extended nor overlap with each other, one simply ends and the next one begins. There are no kill counters or anything - it's automatic and everyone can benefit from it in any way they wish.
After EXP boost, it loops back around to DAR and repeats. This way each week has a sort of purpose to it, and due to the predictable rotating nature, you can plan out any long-term plans you may have - like if you're hunting Psycho Wand, you could do Oran for DAR week, then move to Purplenum if you want for rare enemy appearance rate week.
We've considered putting the kill level restrictions up similar to the event restrictions, but it doesn't solve the basic problem of people relaxing for two weeks and then rushing for a relatively easy two weeks of doubled EXP.
Another thing we've considered is having it just be on static kill amounts, but that would need to be adjusted based on active population and kill rates - if the population increased enough, we'd have to increase the kills required, and people would absolutely hate seeing things be "nerfed" like that.
If you have any other suggestions, you're free to lay them on us. I thought that the details of the new system were already mentioned somewhere in public during discussions, but they could have just been missed.
Dark Nephthys
Member
Yea I agree on the exp rate boost seems kind of low when compared to the other boost. I'd suggest maybe 50% EXP would be more fitting and wouldn't be to insane while also making people looking forward to that week. Also just wondering, do you guys have a random estimation of when this might be implemented?
Eva
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I get what you're going for - it makes sense to encourage people to play more consistently - but as one of the people you're targeting with this change (someone who mainly plays during events/boosts) I'm pretty sure I'm just going to play less from here on out. It's not like my personal playtime or preferences matter for the server/admins, but I have to imagine a good number of people will fall into the same camp.
The power curve of the old system could definitely use some tweaking, but I don't see how this isn't a pretty substantial nerf. I guess it boils down to this: is your goal to get people to log more hours, or play more consistently? Ideally you'd be aiming to do both, but this change seems to address consistency at the expense of hours played.
Will I personally play on a more consistent basis from now on? Sure. But will I log as many (or more) hours now that one of my major incentives to play in a given period is gone? Don't see why I would.
Just my 2c. Also, this latest event was excellent. Thanks all!
The power curve of the old system could definitely use some tweaking, but I don't see how this isn't a pretty substantial nerf. I guess it boils down to this: is your goal to get people to log more hours, or play more consistently? Ideally you'd be aiming to do both, but this change seems to address consistency at the expense of hours played.
Will I personally play on a more consistent basis from now on? Sure. But will I log as many (or more) hours now that one of my major incentives to play in a given period is gone? Don't see why I would.
Just my 2c. Also, this latest event was excellent. Thanks all!
Ayria
Member
Ok. They still don't encourage play, having it set in stone with fixed dates makes it even more dull.
Want to address anything else?
Ayria
Member
Again I'm sorry.
There will be no experience rush when you remove 2x EXP.
People relaxing for a week or two is how the milestone system is designed. It's literally the same thing you'd observe if more people played during the boost. We as a server cannot sustain beating our killcount every week by a certain %, it's not possible.
We get a boost, people start playing more.
We keep the boost a few weeks.
Killcount now too high to realistically beat or people burnout and stop playing, either way we lose the boost.
More people stop playing because no boost.
We have no boost for a few weeks, killcount too high to beat.
PSO lobby trolls proudly state they won't play till boosts are back, (reality is there aren't enough people logging in to beat it anyway)
Killcount drops till those playing can beat it.
We get a boost, people start playing more.
Repeat.
If the period of this cycle is undesired, change the % needed to beat killcount and limit unsealing kills.
Your proposed system is just a random rate boost. It doesn't encourage people to play more or less, it just forces the OCD ones to only grind EXP during EXP week.
You either need wao boosts or a system that encourages play to actually...
At the moment you're nerfing the wao boost and removing the player interaction and blindly hoping it fills the same design goals.
The issue seems to be the rates are too strict to get people to play during vanilla weeks with no buffs, don't entirely remove the player aspect or you make a boring system that doesn't encourage anything other than OCD.
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Mille Marteaux
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We'll look into it. I agree that 25% is a bit weak after looking over the numbers again.
iceman288
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I'm not overly proud of it, but I am also one of those who only tends to play more during the 2x boosts otherwise I burn out. Just being honest, I would probably play less if 2x exp went away. As a mostly casual player, it's taken me almost a year to get one char to level 200 and that's with playing mostly during those boost times. It would take me forever to level a character if it went away to the point I don't know if it'd be worth it.
It's also entirely possible that most of you could say I don't really provide much value to the server as a casual player, so it doesn't really matter what I think. To that, I say "touche!".
Just wanted to share my two cents because I like the server and I want it to do well, but if there's anyone out there like me, they might not stick around without that big experience incentive and I think that could hurt the server overall. It seems to me that when I've described the milestone system to new players, they are generally excited about how it works and enjoy it as it is.
It's also entirely possible that most of you could say I don't really provide much value to the server as a casual player, so it doesn't really matter what I think. To that, I say "touche!".
Just wanted to share my two cents because I like the server and I want it to do well, but if there's anyone out there like me, they might not stick around without that big experience incentive and I think that could hurt the server overall. It seems to me that when I've described the milestone system to new players, they are generally excited about how it works and enjoy it as it is.
Vmufan
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I say the boost should be per account, mainly based on personal killgates that carry over
- On week one, DAR boost starts at 20%, but if you reach your personal killgate for the week, then you get an extra 10% (30% total) and 10% exp if you unlocked the previous week killgate
- On week 2 you start with 30% rare enemy appearance, and get an extra 20% if you reach the killgate (50% total) and 10% DAR if you unlocked the previous week killgate
- On week 3 you start with 15% RDR and get an extra 10% if you reach the killgate (25% RDR total) and 10% Rare enemy appearance if you unlocked the previous week killgate
- On week 4 you start with 20% exp boost, and get an extra 10% if you reach the killgate (30% exp boost total) and 10% RDR if you unlocked the previous week killgate
With this system:
1.Casual players get a small weekly boost
2.Players that do a lot a play during the week will get rewarded with a boost for the remaining of the week, plus a small bonus for the entire following week.
3. It encourages you to continue playing to get small boosts and keep the ball rolling
- On week one, DAR boost starts at 20%, but if you reach your personal killgate for the week, then you get an extra 10% (30% total) and 10% exp if you unlocked the previous week killgate
- On week 2 you start with 30% rare enemy appearance, and get an extra 20% if you reach the killgate (50% total) and 10% DAR if you unlocked the previous week killgate
- On week 3 you start with 15% RDR and get an extra 10% if you reach the killgate (25% RDR total) and 10% Rare enemy appearance if you unlocked the previous week killgate
- On week 4 you start with 20% exp boost, and get an extra 10% if you reach the killgate (30% exp boost total) and 10% RDR if you unlocked the previous week killgate
With this system:
1.Casual players get a small weekly boost
2.Players that do a lot a play during the week will get rewarded with a boost for the remaining of the week, plus a small bonus for the entire following week.
3. It encourages you to continue playing to get small boosts and keep the ball rolling
TaoChaos
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It would be interesting for tracking purposes to see how player activity changes depending on the weekly boost. Maybe players aren't only drawn to exp boosts. I would love to see more rare enemies, plus their drops are usually so sweet (looking at you mr. hildetorr who dropped a gaddam monofluid
) that I would rather play that week.Here's a random idea, what if the 4th week was a wildcard that boosted whatever week you got the most kills in? So you earn your own reward, and everyone gets their choice for what is most appealing.
+25% RDR
+25% rare enemy appearance
+25% EXP
+50% Wildcard
Week 4 can be twice as strong of a boost because it was earned. It also implements a surge week so you can capitalize on the added boost with more players.
I don't know how easy it would be to implement, but what if the wildcard week also combined the boost of the party, eg one person gets RDR, 1 gets rare enemy, and 2 get exp boost, so the party gets:
50% RDR
50% rare enemy
100% exp (that seems OP, so maybe there is a dropoff for stacked boosts, or even simpler, no boost stacking so it would just be 50%)
Also, thanks for engaging in the conversation with us. Regardless if our suggestions are used, it's fun to brainstorm about a game we all love.
