87 replies to this topic

[Deval]

Stop insulting each other both of you, or I will have to lock this thread. This is a discussion I feel is important to Nightmist in regards to the presence of pacifists and how they are used, and for that reason I am leaving this thread open, when ideally, I should have locked it.

Stop insulting each other.

[DarkLord]

Put it like this I've played this game since let me think Knights were in use when I first started so that's been a long time. I've only trained 3 archs in my whole time playing I'm not bitter or really do I care it's not that big of a deal if people can use something to their advantage then let them. Your making a big deal out of nothing but then look who started it.....

[PureMourning]

Hope your not talking about me. btw this is Fossae.

Edited by PureMourning, 13 June 2004 - 08:08 AM.

[lowmion]

you are so on crack. the catholic church is a church. catholicism is a religion. the comparison is not apt. anywhere. especially in a game.

Unless you're looking for a comparison to a class that has a deity?

--------------------------

As posted on the 'sister' version of this thread,

Paci's are good the way they are,

They allow non-multiple alt capable pc's and connections, and solo Rp'rs they ability to make the same kind of gold as those that have recent pc's and fast connections, and they allow Rp'rs the same chance without their having to compromise their way of playing the game.

So again even if they weren't meant to be able to compete with a 10 crit's party gold making ability, they can in a more sedate fashion, this is GOOD, it helps stop elitism and makes the game more even for all players.

Sorry if you feel upset that some-one can now own in 3 months the items that took you 2 years to get, but why would you wish that misery on any-one?

At least with this class any-one can CHOOSE to have one with little regard to stats.

If you CHOOSE not to own one then so be it, but it's YOUR CHOICE and every-one play's in a manner that suits themselves the best, if they not for you then cool, I wont hold it against you.

[DarkLord]

I'm talking about who ever brought this whole thing up. Nightmist has always had a curve with once class or another and their will be no changing it sorry to say I've played games harder and more balanced than this one, but I like nightmist. It's said to hear people whine about someone and what they can get from the game. It's not thier fault that it's set up in the favor. I just see that Nightmist hasn't changed much from it's roots and things never will untill everything is re-worked. THat's my two cents though.

[Despair]

I don't like how much gold pacifists have brought into the game either, and as Andy says everyone and their mother now has a cobalt it makes the best weapon ingame seem less special to own.

My suggestion to stop pacifists completely killing the game is, to make a couple of minor changes to them.

1) make it so they don't recieve any gold when they kill a monster.

2) give them a meditate spell to recharge their mana if necessary.

3) give them quests to recieve them armor and spells and make it so they can only do these quests one time.

just an idea . . .

[lowmion]

Just how many 10 million gold Cobalt Staff's of the Winds do you believe have been bought by Paci's , come on, /csl

It would be quicker sitting on the roller and rolling a few 6 stats, (whilst sitting in the clan house, like most ppl that have bought them).

Ok so the paci might get the SK drop or the DG drop 250k and 160k respectively, thats still a heck of a lot of Boss drops to be gotten by 1 crit vs the 40 or so other cirts in there at the time.

I cant see what all the fuss is about, sheez, lol

[dognapot]

pacifists through history!

found another funny one.

pandilex sez...

Good. I'm glad you have problems getting equipment and gold from other characters to your pacifist.

The class is designed to have no interaction with your alts. Why not try buying all the spells and equipment with the money he/she earns? It is much more entertaining. This is how I am playing mine, and this is how it is intended to be

really? no interaction with your alts? i'm just so crazy. i'm finishing this post in babelfish. i can't believe that this is such a longstanding problem. they make gold, and give it to thier alts. it's not the way they were intended to be. so why not fix them? we know what needs to be modified. i've always seen this class as unfinished, but very close to being finished. changing pacifist's wealth transferring abilities would do alot to resolve thier character flaws. as they are now, it's like having a fighter who casts magic, or an orc that's sexy. it's just not working out right.

babelfish sucks. who can understand thier translations.

i'm finissant ce poteau dans le babelfish. i can't croient que c'est un problème si de longue date qu'ils font l'or, et lui donnent à alts. thier it's pas la manière ils ont été prévus pour être ainsi pourquoi ne pas les fixer ? nous savons quels besoins pour être i've modifié toujours vu cette classe comme non finie, mais très près d'être fini changeant des capacités de transfert de richesse de pacifist's ferait l'alot pour résoudre les pailles thier de caractère. comme elles sont maintenant, it's comme avoir un combattant qui moule la magie, ou un orc that's it's sexy n'établissant pas juste bien.

[Crane]

I don't like how much gold pacifists have brought into the game either, and as Andy says everyone and their mother now has a cobalt it makes the best weapon ingame seem less special to own.

My suggestion to stop pacifists completely killing the game is, to make a couple of minor changes to them.

1) make it so they don't recieve any gold when they kill a monster.

2) give them a meditate spell to recharge their mana if necessary.

3) give them quests to recieve them armor and spells and make it so they can only do these quests one time.

just an idea . . .

1... If that's implemented then what's the point?

2... They have /tribute

3... Take a look at the Nightmist Development area.

[Despair]

1... If that's implemented then what's the point?

2... They have /tribute

3... Take a look at the Nightmist Development area.

You completly missed my point . . .

Pacifists were originally made so players could move around and role play etc. without being killed as soon as they step out of town.

However they have become a really really powerful gold producing machine that has completely unbalanced the game, and everyday pacifists are running around the museum care free earning 100's of k's of gold.

My suggestion still allows them to do the main things they were intended to do, but stops them from being abused.

[Crane]

And what about the people who use only Pacifists and no other crits? If they can't get gold they won't be able to even start properly... no gold for buying armour and spells.

[Despair]

And what about the people who use only Pacifists and no other crits? If they can't get gold they won't be able to even start properly... no gold for buying armour and spells.

did you even read my post Crane

"3) give them quests to recieve them armor and spells and make it so they can only do these quests one time."

thats how they get their armor and spells

[Charon]

And what about the people who use only Pacifists and no other crits?  If they can't get gold they won't be able to even start properly... no gold for buying armour and spells.

did you even read my post Crane

"3) give them quests to recieve them armor and spells and make it so they can only do these quests one time."

thats how they get their armor and spells

That means these pacifists would be going into these quests with little or no armour... leaving them succeptible to the monsters that can attack them in the meantime.
That armour is necessary for a pacfist against monsters... because the monsters can hurt the pacifist without it being able to stop them.

And for a pacifist starting out, there are no spells initially which can dent the damage the monsters do... plus if you are suggesting a pacifist get the spells by the same means, that pacifist is going to have a pretty hard time getting new spells aswell.

I was under the impression we wanted to make life hard for pacifists, not nearly impossible

Other characters dont have to fight simply to be allowed to do anything.
Armour/Spells gained by drops are bonuses for other classes, not necessities.

In the extreme- If a fighter couldn't get his sword (where fighting is his 'spell') until he'd first completed a quest... what sort of quest could he/would he complete?
To a lesser extent- If a pacifist goes on a 'quest' to earn Greater Pact/Shield Self/Depurate Undead... etc... that quest would have to be both relevant to the ability... and presumably prove that the ability was needed.
Pacifists would end up fighting with each other for a scroll of DU the way alts gang up on each other at other bosses...

With a difference. A halberd is a nice addition to a crits arsenal, but isn't necessary. They can fight with similar weapons doing slightly lesser damage without too much trouble...
DU holds a significant increase over, for example, Salve. DU is NECESSARY for a pacifist... a Halberd isn't TRULY necessary for a fighter.

Plus someone would have to take the time to write, plan and programme these quests... and make them interesting ^^
And make each quest for each spell/piece of armour unique
There are a LOT of spells/pieces of armour... that would take a LOT of planning and a LOT of time.
And then the coding which only allows one at any time on top of that.


The annoying thing about this is that I actually like the idea I just see it more as a supportive element... In my opinion your idea just really isn't practical in the scale you intend it :s

--

I believe tribute is better than meditate... because tribute costs them something.
I know you want to eliminate money from pacifists in its entirety... then, sure, meditate is a good idea... but I think, again, that ENTIRELY eliminating a pacifists ability to make money is extreme.




So in a bid to hurt myself greatly, may I suggest a modification or two (or three) to the existing system which aren't too massive.

• Rewrite the formula for DU, the most used pacifist spell. Make it do less damage for the same amount of mana. I know my lesser damage-mana ratio cuts down my money earning ability, so this would exploit that quite well.
  
  Salve is cha*2+lv+(0-4)
  DU at the moment is cha*3+lv+10+(0-4)
  
  Instead we could try something like cha*2+lv+10+(1-4) or cha*3+lv+(1-4)
  Both of these would deal more than Salve... making DU worthwhile... but less than the current DU, making paci's attack things more, therefore use more mana during attacks. The extra mana would have to be bought/tributed for, hence lowering the pacifists income.
  
  
• Tribute at the moment is mana=money/5
  So lower the mana gained somehow... mana=money/6 (rounded up) for example... the pacifist would have to tribute slightly more to get the mana they require, and in the long run, that would have an effect.
  
  
• Give tribute its error back. Give the deity a chance to give a pacifist unwanted heath. That used to mean pacifists had to tribute more aswell... if we gave that ability back to the deity... pacifists again have a slightly lesser income.

I don't really want to think what all of these together might do to my non-abused, occasionally-roleplaying pacifists already lowered income, but it might lower pacifist "abuse" to some extent, at least in the money stakes.
Which is, if I understand correctly, what the issue is here.

Theres no need to make pacifists devoid of money... to solve your problems, surely we just need to cripple their ability to make it slightly... my suggestions would do that.
Maybe they aren't the drastic solutions you want... but I'm sure they could work, and if they didnt have substantial effect, tweaking my 'solutions' is somewhat simpler ^^;;

Edited by Charon, 14 June 2004 - 01:51 AM.

[Charon]

everyday pacifists are running around the museum care free earning 100's of k's of gold.

I still maintain that normal alts can do the same... ^^

[Despair]

I still maintain that normal alts can do the same... ^^

Normal alts do it at a risk, but on a side note I do think the modern art in the museums gold should be lowered slightly as gold is made way way to easy with alts

Edited by Despair, 14 June 2004 - 01:44 AM.

[Gaddy]

Jimmy has spoken, and let it be so.


Means what he said was a brilliant idea imo. Pacifists could still play and get their stuff, but wouldn't simply stay on 2nd floor to make gold to give to their alts. They would have things to do and such and they could be that whole 'roleplaying' thing that they were suppose to have been made for. THEY WOULD ALSO EXPLORE to complete the quest, teach new players their way around game and such if they wanted to use pacifists.

Problem is...they've already put so much gold in...I don't really see how it can be fixed, but keep them from putting even more gold in makes sense, it's going to be dumb when the gold in nightmist matters as much as the gold in a game like Diablo 2 LoD.

[dognapot]

buh? despair, you're going way too far. yeah gold is sort of the problem but it's only one half of it. it doesn't become a whole until the gold is transferred to alts, because for one, it's a solo class, and two, you can't prevent gold being used by murderous alts. so just keep the gold from leaving the pacifist, and it's no longer a problem. i don't mind if pacifists were number 1 on the rankings, it wouldn't mean much to me other than they'd be number 1 on the gametime, monster kills, and experience rankings too. but that's just a grand tribute to wasting time.

[Gaddy]

I like Jimmy's idea better than just keeping pacifist from giving the gold out.

Not that I have a problem with them having gold, just that it would keep them from simply sitting in one place to make it. Send them on cool quest like trips and such, allow them to explore, FORCE them to even. Rather than having a bank crit for your account, have a crit that learns the game. For those of you who know the game well and still like pacifists- it still has quests it can do to make it entertaining.

As for this whole argument of armor being needed- If you're a new player, you can't afford the armor anyway, it is easier to complete a small quest than it is to make the gold for the armor. If you're an older player...even easier.

As for the spells that a pacifist 'needs', I highly doubt that a level 19 spell would be made a 1-a-day spawn, I doubt there would be an over high demand for spawn rate of it.

Edited by Gaddy, 14 June 2004 - 06:47 AM.

[Bean]

How about charons ideas fellas... since you skipped them over...

[lowmion]

I take it that none of you are stuck with an 'older' pc operating system?

and a slow dial-up connection, hooking into the server from else-where other than England, (this is an international game).

If you did have say win9*, and your average ping was 600ms, and you could run a maximum of 3-4 alts, (highly lagged), but 2 crits at a time was the most efficient form you could use, you'ld understand just how important paci's are to keeping things fair.

With their ability to 'harvest' gold at a rate that's a heck of a lot slower than a 10 alt party, they allow those that have the slow connection and old o/s a chance of being able to compete.

[i dont use mine to do that all the time, you'll find me in 'forrest of soul's' with Jz up helping noob's and friends for hours]

Plus if you think about it, they're 1 crit therefor 1 connection to the server, not 10-15 connections used by a multi-alt capable person.

This then takes more load off the server when ppl are on their paci's and increases 'game enjoyment' for the rest.

If you do succeed in pushing through these changes to paci's then there must be a compromise given to keep the game fair to all user's, say a 6 alt limit.

In other words ;
You the multi-alt capable user's are giving up YOUR ability to 'farm gold' as much as those that arnt capable of multi-alt connections are being FORCED to give up their ONLY way of competing.

If you brought in that kinda of alt restrictions into the game, so that ALL players had the same capabilities REGARDLESS of connection speed and o/s ,(operating system), then I'ld FULLY support your proposed changes.

You do want ALL player's to be on equal standings, don't you?

So that it all comes down to player stratagy, clans, friends, etc

Edited by lowmion, 14 June 2004 - 09:03 AM.

[Teh_Fluff]

How about charons ideas fellas... since you skipped them over...

I wasn't originally going to post here and I have read everything that has been said and so far I think that Charon's suggestion is the best, and I have to say Bean I really do think their skipping her suggestion which is sad because its one of the best ones yet really.

[Despair]

Charons idea is the most practical and easiest to enforce, but I still stand strongly against a class that is invincibile being able to get rich without risk . . .

in response to my idea about pacifists having to do quests for their armor and spells Charon wrote:

That means these pacifists would be going into these quests with little or no armour... leaving them succeptible to the monsters that can attack them in the meantime.
That armour is necessary for a pacfist against monsters... because the monsters can hurt the pacifist without it being able to stop them.

The quests could easily be balanced according to level, pacifists get sooth to begin with anyway and dont get Salve for several levels, so they wouldnt be starting much differently.

Perhaps their initial quest before anything could be to go find their guild master who would give them a one time only set of basic armor. . .

And on another note, it was mentioned that pacifists have tribute, tribute could still be used . . . all gold they recieve when killing a monster could be automatically tributed

[Fossae]

I would just like to ask how many people usually run around on 10-15 alts?

[Angelus]

I don't care that they have loads of gold i don't care that they have uber items. I just don't like it how they can just transfer it all to a normal crit and buy power. Next you will have someone with 10 arch thiefs just cause he spends his days in museum on a paci.

If you can just make it that paci's can't be given stuff besides mana (cause thats all they really need, food and water they can make themselves). And paci's can't give stuff, not even if they die it will always stay on the paci...unless they delete it.

I always thought paci's were made to explore and role play without getting your ass pked the second you move out of town. But looks to me like they are made to sit endless hours in museum farming gold, for what? It's a solo class, what do they need money for...

[dognapot]

angelus has the right idea.

[Gaddy]

I would just like to ask how many people usually run around on 10-15 alts?

12, but they sure don't all log on to go fight modern art sculptures. Most I can run on 2nd floor = 8-9 crits ---8 hitters and a camo druid for leading. I don't do that though, it just takes too much effort to move every second and flip though 4 boxes and move again and repeat.

The reason I am on 12 quite a bit is due to heading for Chronos, Gnome Caves, under Harabec, bosses, and other places where I feel running 12 crits acually makes a bit of sense. (chronos and gnome caves both have monsters that don't die to 10 crits hitting in one round, and definatly need 2 clerics for both, where under harabec you've got to make sure to round many of the monsters otherwise they try very hard to kill you.)

So ya, 12 crits for playing the game the way I enjoy playing- which is just to gad. (gad = my favorite word, not my nickname or something- "to wander about seeking amusment")...not to make gold with.



edit- more on subject, I didn't skip Charon's ideas, I simply looked at them and noticed, "these are the same as what my ideas were, cause them to have to tribute gold so that they make less gold"...I posted them at the begining of thread I think, so obvioulsy, I support Charon's post. I simply didn't post so because, since you both have read the whole topic, you already know I support it, and I didn't wish to claim the ideas as my own, stolen, because Charon's are different in some ways just acomplishing the same thing.

I agree also with what Charon said, Jimmy's ideas sounded like more fun than pacifists simply being made to make less gold.....making less gold still makes them sit around in one area for their whole time of being just to be bank crits, which I don't think pacifist should be, they ought to be a class that does stuff. Also have to agree though, all of the coding and stuff for making quests for spells and armors is basically something I don't see ever happening. (which maybe 1/4th the # of spells and armor since diff. bosses could drop 3/4 different items with %s on them)...

Edited by Gaddy, 15 June 2004 - 02:01 AM.

[Gaddy]

I wanted to post this separate from everything else I said so it can be short and people will actually read it-

Why do we have to look at ways of making them less effective bank crits rather than making them an actual class that does stuff?

[dognapot]

i don't know about everyone else, i just think it would sort of cool to have pacifists work the way they were intended to. after they get to that point maybe they can start moving towards being a class that does some more stuff. however, at the moment, players have the choice of playing lots of other classes that do stuff that is infinitely more exciting than killing modern art sculptures but still feel that maybe killing 5000 or 10000 of them is a great idea. that makes me think that the motivation of bling is greater than the motivation of playing a cool class. so however cool pacifists can be, they're still a tool to make a million gold pieces with no risk and relative ease and that'll be thier most popular purpose.