Darkfall

Originally posted by Shadowoak

Originally posted by Ihmotepp 

 There is nothing "natural" about swing sword a bazillion times, and eventually sword skill increases.

This is how the Dungeon Siege games worked. Use skill= increase in skill eventually.

I would do things like this. One mob pops up from the ground, some kind of worm thing that is immobile, but spits acid at you. Now, my sword skill was pretty high, so I COULD run up to it, and kill it in a couple of sword swings, and that would be that.

That would be the sensible thing to do right? But I wanted to raise my bow skill, which was low. So instead of killing the thing in a couple of whacks, I'd shoot 20 arrows into it, so my bow skill would increase.

What's "natural" about that?

I'd prefer to just hit the creature a couple of times and kill it, but then I'd waste all that use that could be going towards increasing my bow skill.

If I had points to spend, I'd whack the creature with my sword, be on my merry way, and when I got some skill points I'd spend them increasing my bow skill, which to me, makes much more sense.

 

Nothing natural? Are you kidding?

 

Is it more natural to gain a level by using solely your sword, level up by putting all points in bow mastery, and suddenly you become expert with the bow?

 

If you want to kill said worm with your sword, kill it with your sword. If you want to get better with your bow, hit it with your bow. I don't understand the unnatural thing you're getting from this.

 

Besides, in this example, it's good to use your bow, if you want to become good, not only your character, because you also get better, since it's an fps. You get a better feeling of how the bow works, the aim, the leading you must apply to hit your target, etc etc. And I guess the same goes on magic-using.

No, I am not kidding. IMO, this is completely unnatural.

I can kill this mob with one smack of my sword. Why, in a "natural" i.e. realistic setting would I not go ahead and do that. What possible motivation, realistically could I have for not killing a menacing monster as fast as possible?

In a use = skill increase system, instead of killing this mob with one whack of my sword, I might shoot it 20 times with my bow.

Why? Skill increase.

That's natural? Hardly.

Natural is I go to a target range, and if I want to get better at using a bow, I shoot 8 bazillion arrows at targets. I don't "practice" while I'm trying to stay alive. That's silly.

But again, it's a game. If it's fun, then it's fun. If we wanted realism, we could play real life.

Don't believe me? Go find someone that hunts deer with a bow and arrow, and tell them you want to go hunting, but you've never used a bow before. They will send you to the range, not hope you get good practicing shooting at deer and wounding them.

Originally posted by Greek_Matt

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by Greek_Matt

What's "natural" about it is that this is the way real life works. If you want to get better at something, you have to practice it... usually by repetitive action, as it turns out. I personally don't find this particularly "fun" but it is nonetheless realistic.

 

I disagree. It's not realistic at all.

Imagine any actvity that requires lots of practice. The Practice is boring repetition, not real performance.

If you area  boxer, you don't practice by having real boxing matches. You get in a sparring ring and practice, and you hit a bag over and over.

If you are going deer hunting, you don't get good by simply running off into the woods and shooting at deer over and over. You go to a range, and shoot targets, over and over.

If you are going to be a ballet dancer, you don't just get on stage till audiences like you, you go to a studio and dance in front of a mirror over and over.

If you want to be a good race car driver, you practice going around and around the track with no cars, before you enter a real race. You don't just start racing, and get good while you're racing.

So no, there's nothing "natural" about getting good doing something without boring practice, which is how things work in the real world.

The boring practice is where you get good, but you're not saying that's in the game, you're saying you get good while in the act, not "practice". Again, very unnatural.

But that's ok, because games aren't supposed to be "natural" they['re supposed to be fun. If they were like real life, our characters would have to go to the bathroom every so often. That would be very natural.

 

I think now you're just getting into semantics. Aventurine is attempting to create a realistic environment, within which you improve your skills by using them repeatedly, but still within the context of a computer game. Yes you're right, the essence of improvement comes from drilling simple activities (or indeed from being taught by someone, something I'm not aware of MMO games having really touched on yet). But this is still the same basic concept, that of doing something to get better at that thing.

By contrast, the system you prefer (and I'm not saying it's better or worse, just different) is completely abstract - which of your skills you use doesn't need to have any bearing whatsoever to which of your skills are improving. This is completely unrealistic. Not inferior (in my opinion anyway), but without even a tenuous link to the real world. Fact is, Aventurine are committed to implementing the former system in Darkfall, and that's not going to change. Unless they decide to scrap the whole thing and start again.

Again.

 

In the real world, we get better at things by boring repetition, called "practice".

My system isn't "abstract". It's straight out of most Paper n Pencil roleplaying games.

You fight tons of bad guys, monsters, etc. Now you have enough money and experience to train to the next level, gain the next skill. You decide to get better with the bow, so you go to a monastery where Kung Fu Moncks train you for months in the art of becoming one with the bow, which is represented by how many skill points you spend on bow skill, or leveling up in a class that uses bow. Now, back to adventure....You don't actually spend time shooting targets for months, because it would be "realistic" but boring.

IMo, much more "realistic" than people train to get better at something, but never "practice".

What do you think is happening when you BUY a skill from an NPC in teh first place? How is that so "realistic"?

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by Shadowoak

Originally posted by Ihmotepp 

 There is nothing "natural" about swing sword a bazillion times, and eventually sword skill increases.

This is how the Dungeon Siege games worked. Use skill= increase in skill eventually.

I would do things like this. One mob pops up from the ground, some kind of worm thing that is immobile, but spits acid at you. Now, my sword skill was pretty high, so I COULD run up to it, and kill it in a couple of sword swings, and that would be that.

That would be the sensible thing to do right? But I wanted to raise my bow skill, which was low. So instead of killing the thing in a couple of whacks, I'd shoot 20 arrows into it, so my bow skill would increase.

What's "natural" about that?

I'd prefer to just hit the creature a couple of times and kill it, but then I'd waste all that use that could be going towards increasing my bow skill.

If I had points to spend, I'd whack the creature with my sword, be on my merry way, and when I got some skill points I'd spend them increasing my bow skill, which to me, makes much more sense.

 

Nothing natural? Are you kidding?

 

Is it more natural to gain a level by using solely your sword, level up by putting all points in bow mastery, and suddenly you become expert with the bow?

 

If you want to kill said worm with your sword, kill it with your sword. If you want to get better with your bow, hit it with your bow. I don't understand the unnatural thing you're getting from this.

 

Besides, in this example, it's good to use your bow, if you want to become good, not only your character, because you also get better, since it's an fps. You get a better feeling of how the bow works, the aim, the leading you must apply to hit your target, etc etc. And I guess the same goes on magic-using.

 

No, I am not kidding. IMO, this is completely unnatural.

I can kill this mob with one smack of my sword. Why, in a "natural" i.e. realistic setting would I not go ahead and do that. What possible motivation, realistically could I have for not killing a menacing monster as fast as possible?

In a use = skill increase system, instead of killing this mob with one whack of my sword, I might shoot it 20 times with my bow.

Why? Skill increase.

That's natural? Hardly.

Natural is I go to a target range, and if I want to get better at using a bow, I shoot 8 bazillion arrows at targets. I don't "practice" while I'm trying to stay alive. That's silly.

But again, it's a game. If it's fun, then it's fun. If we wanted realism, we could play real life.

Don't believe me? Go find someone that hunts deer with a bow and arrow, and tell them you want to go hunting, but you've never used a bow before. They will send you to the range, not hope you get good practicing shooting at deer and wounding them.

You just focused on the first thing I said and you just discarded the rest? Is that your way of reading other posts and then arguing about them?

ok ok, another example.

Who's better at shooting deers? One that has spent his whole life practicing at shooting, or someone that has actually went out and killed a deer?

Originally posted by Shadowoak

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by Shadowoak

Originally posted by Ihmotepp 

 There is nothing "natural" about swing sword a bazillion times, and eventually sword skill increases.

This is how the Dungeon Siege games worked. Use skill= increase in skill eventually.

I would do things like this. One mob pops up from the ground, some kind of worm thing that is immobile, but spits acid at you. Now, my sword skill was pretty high, so I COULD run up to it, and kill it in a couple of sword swings, and that would be that.

That would be the sensible thing to do right? But I wanted to raise my bow skill, which was low. So instead of killing the thing in a couple of whacks, I'd shoot 20 arrows into it, so my bow skill would increase.

What's "natural" about that?

I'd prefer to just hit the creature a couple of times and kill it, but then I'd waste all that use that could be going towards increasing my bow skill.

If I had points to spend, I'd whack the creature with my sword, be on my merry way, and when I got some skill points I'd spend them increasing my bow skill, which to me, makes much more sense.

 

Nothing natural? Are you kidding?

 

Is it more natural to gain a level by using solely your sword, level up by putting all points in bow mastery, and suddenly you become expert with the bow?

 

If you want to kill said worm with your sword, kill it with your sword. If you want to get better with your bow, hit it with your bow. I don't understand the unnatural thing you're getting from this.

 

Besides, in this example, it's good to use your bow, if you want to become good, not only your character, because you also get better, since it's an fps. You get a better feeling of how the bow works, the aim, the leading you must apply to hit your target, etc etc. And I guess the same goes on magic-using.

 

No, I am not kidding. IMO, this is completely unnatural.

I can kill this mob with one smack of my sword. Why, in a "natural" i.e. realistic setting would I not go ahead and do that. What possible motivation, realistically could I have for not killing a menacing monster as fast as possible?

In a use = skill increase system, instead of killing this mob with one whack of my sword, I might shoot it 20 times with my bow.

Why? Skill increase.

That's natural? Hardly.

Natural is I go to a target range, and if I want to get better at using a bow, I shoot 8 bazillion arrows at targets. I don't "practice" while I'm trying to stay alive. That's silly.

But again, it's a game. If it's fun, then it's fun. If we wanted realism, we could play real life.

Don't believe me? Go find someone that hunts deer with a bow and arrow, and tell them you want to go hunting, but you've never used a bow before. They will send you to the range, not hope you get good practicing shooting at deer and wounding them.

 

You just focused on the first thing I said and you just discarded the rest? Is that your way of reading other posts and then arguing about them?

ok ok, another example.

Who's better at shooting deers? One that has spent his whole life practicing at shooting, or someone that has actually went out and killed a deer?

That's the experience factor. That's not how you gain a skill, that's how you learn to implement it to your best advantage.

There's no wrong or right answer. It's just what you prefer, like chocolate or vanilla. If you like chocolate better than vanilla, I'm not going to tell you that you are wrong, because chocolate is more realistic.

If you like to do something over and over to increase the skill, and you think that's fun, nobody can say you're wrong.

I like to spend skill points. To me, it's more realistic, and a lot more fun to build your character, and it doesn't give you incentive to do things over and over just to increase the skill.

I would much rather shoot 8 bazillion arrows, gain skill points, then spend them on my sword swinging skill, if that's the way I want to build my character. Much more freedom in building a character that way.

For me, it's like people that complain about gold pieces dropping when you kill a wolf. I don't need to skin a wolf and get wolf pelts. I can imagine that I found gold pieces near by, from other adventurers that were killed by the wolves. I can use my imagination.

I can imagine that I went some where and practiced in increase my sword swining skills. I don't have to swing a sword 8 bazillion times in the game to be "immersed".

I also like beer with lots of hops, like Samuel Adams Boston Lager, while some people prefer a nice pale ale instead.

Originally posted by Ihmotepp 

 In the real world, we get better at things by boring repetition, called "practice".

 My system isn't "abstract". It's straight out of most Paper n Pencil roleplaying games.

You fight tons of bad guys, monsters, etc. Now you have enough money and experience to train to the next level, gain the next skill. You decide to get better with the bow, so you go to a monastery where Kung Fu Moncks train you for months in the art of becoming one with the bow, which is represented by how many skill points you spend on bow skill, or leveling up in a class that uses bow. Now, back to adventure....You don't actually spend time shooting targets for months, because it would be "realistic" but boring.

IMo, much more "realistic" than people train to get better at something, but never "practice".

What do you think is happening when you BUY a skill from an NPC in teh first place? How is that so "realistic"?

 

Ihmotepp you are coming across as clueless as to the real world outside of your own particular environment.  What you refer as practice is actually doing the activity in a controlled environment.  Not everywhere at all times have such controlled environments existed in order to allow "practice" to take place.

If I were starting a new job as a bricklayer my boss wouldn't make me build practice walls for six months in order to get up to standard.  I would practice on the job.  Maybe doing less important garden walls to start with but I would be doing the actual task.  I wouldn't be able to build walls for six months and then suddenly be able to lay concrete perfectly as a result.  Don't talk to me about college courses as that's clearly not how it has always be done, and still isn't everywhere.

If I was a child soldier drafted into a third world army my target practice would be shooting real live enemies in actual real battles, not on a practice range.  I would get good at it or I would die.  Simple no practice needed.

If I got a job in a abattoir are they going to give me a fake cow to practice on? Nope.

In WWII did all soldier get trained in the use of fire arms? Nope.  Some of them didn't even handle one until they looted off the corpse of one of their dead comrades.

I hope you get the point as I could list pages of activities like this.

Practice and doing something for real are the same thing, the only difference is the environment you do it in.  In Darkfall you can do what you refer to as practice, duelling or casting spells at brick walls, whatever you want.  Personally I will practice in the field as it would boring otherwise.

It is obvious if you thought about it which system is more realistic, if you don't like realism then don't play.

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by Greek_Matt

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by Greek_Matt

What's "natural" about it is that this is the way real life works. If you want to get better at something, you have to practice it... usually by repetitive action, as it turns out. I personally don't find this particularly "fun" but it is nonetheless realistic.

 

I disagree. It's not realistic at all.

Imagine any actvity that requires lots of practice. The Practice is boring repetition, not real performance.

If you area  boxer, you don't practice by having real boxing matches. You get in a sparring ring and practice, and you hit a bag over and over.

If you are going deer hunting, you don't get good by simply running off into the woods and shooting at deer over and over. You go to a range, and shoot targets, over and over.

If you are going to be a ballet dancer, you don't just get on stage till audiences like you, you go to a studio and dance in front of a mirror over and over.

If you want to be a good race car driver, you practice going around and around the track with no cars, before you enter a real race. You don't just start racing, and get good while you're racing.

So no, there's nothing "natural" about getting good doing something without boring practice, which is how things work in the real world.

The boring practice is where you get good, but you're not saying that's in the game, you're saying you get good while in the act, not "practice". Again, very unnatural.

But that's ok, because games aren't supposed to be "natural" they['re supposed to be fun. If they were like real life, our characters would have to go to the bathroom every so often. That would be very natural.

 

I think now you're just getting into semantics. Aventurine is attempting to create a realistic environment, within which you improve your skills by using them repeatedly, but still within the context of a computer game. Yes you're right, the essence of improvement comes from drilling simple activities (or indeed from being taught by someone, something I'm not aware of MMO games having really touched on yet). But this is still the same basic concept, that of doing something to get better at that thing.

By contrast, the system you prefer (and I'm not saying it's better or worse, just different) is completely abstract - which of your skills you use doesn't need to have any bearing whatsoever to which of your skills are improving. This is completely unrealistic. Not inferior (in my opinion anyway), but without even a tenuous link to the real world. Fact is, Aventurine are committed to implementing the former system in Darkfall, and that's not going to change. Unless they decide to scrap the whole thing and start again.

Again.

 

 

In the real world, we get better at things by boring repetition, called "practice".

 

My system isn't "abstract". It's straight out of most Paper n Pen