If duping were to be completely eliminated, would you want UT trading?


#41

The key thing to remember:

Tradeable does not necessarily equal easier to obtain.

Tradeable allows you (Deca) to have a lever to control the availability. If you judge an item too easy to obtain and is spoiling the game, you would reduce its drop rate so pushing up its value and lengthening the path to get it.

And you can set drop rates that would be brutal for players farming their own things (1/10000) but across the game population still means 1 or 2 a day get farmed.

Obviously every player sets their own goals, but speaking personally, knowing that an item costs x life gives a very clear short term goal: farm x life, to go and trade for the item. Or I can choose to “PPE” and go farm my own item. Under soulbound I have no choice, it’s farm my own or do without.


In general, it’s a sense of freedom to do what you wish with the loot you get. The UT Exchange sounds like it will help address individual farming frustration though it won’t fix where a friend desires an item and you loot a needless extra one that you can’t share with them.

The best thing about unsb is it lets players get ahold of any item on a whim. Lets say I just died with a ST set that I loved playing on. I have 3x spare items but not the ring. Unsb would let me get the ring through trading and then jump straight back into playing. This makes for a good combination with permadeath.

It brings every part of the game into play. If you love Sprite Worlds you can farm 2000 of them and honestly if you have that dedication to the game I won’t begrudge you trading your loot for a Crown.

(It’s true that a bad thing about unsb is it promotes RWT of items although please bear in mind that there currently already is RWT of whole accounts due to sb, so it’s not like soulbinding solves that. And Ring of Decades arguably one of the best items remains unsb and we get along fine with that.)


#42

Along those lines with the ST sets, I really think that there should always be some method through the tinkerer to exchange items within a single set. I know from personal experience how frustrating it is to literally have 4x of one of the items and none of the last item needed (curse you, Corruption Cutter!!). The only set I think that might be a problem with right now is the pirate set since one of the items drops from the Pirate Cave, but I am sure something could be worked out. When an ST already drops so infrequently, it would be really nice for duplicates to still be useful and exciting to see.


#43

I’m just going to throw out one random data point on UT trading:

Quiver of Thunder maxed out at about 200 def pots (and was traded at such, through use of a trusted middle-man, back in around ~2011 or thereabouts). So, keep in mind UT trade value has somewhat unlimited bounds…

Another thing, I’m worried about “controlled” UT trading, because I don’t trust the devs not to milk it for realm gold… I mean, I could see them charging gold to perform trades, etc… That would completely kill it for me.

Otherwise, I’m all for UT trading. Honestly, I don’t really worry about dupers, but that is an unpopular opinion I know. I’ve always just been content with the game, even when duping was completely rampant, it was just a much different game (and quite hilarious during that time period)… So I’m sort of leaning toward the support of UT trading, regardless of developer oversight (and preferably without), and regardless of the current state of security in the game. I’ve always been that way, and always thought that Kabam had really done this in effort to better monetize WC tops in nexus, and then ST’s… the game is a cash cow


#44

Please don’t disturb the game much with your fixes of progression. The game core is quite remarkably different than any other, and should be cherished to remain that way. (edited to remove comment on fame and balance fixes)

Edit: I’m mostly worried about the changes to progression, and hope you don’t try to make this more like path of exile or something…

Edit 2: Also on another topic, most players at or near “end-game” don’t really want something for their characters to become much more OP after 8/8, beyond the items and rare drops in the game. We don’t really want some major changes to add extensions beyond 8/8, and it goes against one of the main principals of rotmg, that early players and maxed players should not be far different (hence why the stats typically were very subtle, and have little major change on the players power). This principal almost all but went away with the introduction of abilities on pets, but still you guys should try to maintain the balance so new players can play with the pros, so to speak… Anyhow, I’ve been pretty worried from the Producer’s letter part 2, and hope you consider these viewpoints…


#45

How can I like this post a thousand more? Everything you said, from the beginning to the end, I was like

mhmm, mhm, mhhm, yeah exactly

You touched all of my hearstrings (new word for me), and now I’m just gonna say:

I A G R E E


#46

Yes. It’s an entire untapped economy just waiting to be utilised. It will give more flesh to farming rather than repeating the same dungeon ad nauseam and will give reason to collect items you do not want to use for another purpose other than feed power.


#47

I don’t think that viewpoint is as popular as you seem to think it is. The fame system is very broken, and has been basically forever. A complete overhaul is much needed. Balance in the game is completely out of wack with legendary/divine pets healing an absurd amount (and, even more broken, giving priests effectively limitless mana to heal and puri the group even more). Because of the ability to heal so rapidly, def and vit are basically ignored as stats in favor of having the highest possible health pool possible to avoid insta-pops, because if you survive a hit then you can almost certainly heal back all the damage dealt in a matter of seconds.

I am very glad that Deca is making strides to try to improve the game long-term, giving themselves more room to work. Porting the game to Unity was the first massive step in what I hope is a promising future for the game.


#48

This is an interesting point, as I think one consequence of UT trading is far worse drop rates. Why?

Right now there is a lot of inefficiency with UT/ST drops. You get e.g. three Juggs but no Ogmurs (which is what you really want). What do you do? Maybe you keep them in your vault and never use them. Maybe you put them on a Warrior but as you don’t like the class you don’t take care of it and die with them. Maybe you feed some or all of them, or drop them.

So with random drops a lot go to waste, as people get a surplus of items they don’t want/need and do not make good use of them. It’s even worse with ST items, when farming for that last item to complete the set and you get 2, 3 or more of an item you already have. Most inevitably get fed or dropped as most are useless on their own.

With UT (and ST) trading there would be far less waste. Almost every item dropped would end up with someone willing and able to use it; far more Warriors would be running around with Juggs, far more Knights with Ogmurs. To balance things out and bring usage back down to normal levels drop rates would have to be reduced. Significantly reduced, across the board.

The UT exchange should avoid this problem if it is inefficient: if e.g. it takes multiple rare UTs to produce the one you want (in theory you could introduce similar inefficiency to UT trading but it would be fiendishly difficult to design and likely very unpopular).


#49

Oh sorry I was trying to add, I am mostly concerned with changes to progression. I don’t mind a fame and balance update. The idea of making players stronger beyond 8/8, or exalted stats or whatnot is the worrisome part. It’s better to maintain the fear of death, the if you blink you die, sort of gameplay. The way progression works in this game is players make multiple maxed characters, so when one dies, they can either jump right back in or quickly rebuild. I don’t think the characters should become more and more overpowered into end-game - it completely breaks the early principals of the game.

As for fame rebalance, I’m onboard for that. Fame is broken for sure, no argument there, it just never mattered (and still doesn’t matter), to the main core of the game. The only time fame was really important was when you could buy ammy’s pre-duping, and it sort of made sense in the way the game was at that time. I don’t ever want to see the return of the amulet though, the game has been better off without it for sure (that was the real problem with duping by the way, duped amulets).

Balance is a touchy matter and should be handled carefully. I’m all for balancing content to get newer players into the game quicker, but it becomes much more difficult to “balance” near endgame…

And something that shouldn’t be forgotten is Rotmg is totally cooperative, so as long as balance is done is a way that helps the group (like, say for example if pets could heal any nearby players instead of the player who owned the pet), it will be ok in my opinion. Again, I just am mainly worried about the idea of changes to progression, and especially stat exaltation stuff.

Edit: One more quick point on stat exaltation / making 8/8 characters even stronger… No matter how long it seems the game mechanic would take for players to reach the new maximum, players would reach it very very quickly, and most players would be overpowered (unless the exaltation barely changes a players powers, hopefully it’s done that way). This would just divide new players off further. Like a second version of the pet release…


#50

*cultish chanting* IC/OoC, IC/OoC, IC/OoC


#51

remember this quote “ring of Decas is in the stock” imagine UTs, thats mean real world trading $$$ that would be bad. DECA no like that and could lead to possible lost of profit = less content?.


#52

That is why this thread is about if duping was eliminated. If the only source of Deca was the crystal cavern, it would be insanely rare and not easily traded for just a few glife. Real world trading sites make money from selling duped items, not ones that were legitimately dropped.


#53

I see, oh oh see!
I see, oh oh see!
I see, oh oh see!


#54

actually it’s ick, ook


#55

I cook


#56

What? It definitely won’t help new players.

  1. It cuts down all players, old and new alike. Every pet will suffer decreased regen. Everyone has to dodge more. Noobs would probably be the worst at dodging and will suffer the most.

  2. Just like Kiddforce said, the goal is to have players die more. Overall, this hurts new players the most. The people who have 120 vaults open can easily stockpile resources. If you have only 1 vault, you’re forced to carry a lot of stuff you’d rather not die with and, when you eventually do die, it hurts more. I always have struggled with vault space and I hate carrying these extra items on characters. In addition, I have wizards specifically for farming pots quickly and efficiently in glands. Noobs don’t have the luxury of multiple characters to help with the grind.

  3. We have heard the developers trying to create dungeon scaling where the ideal number of players is in the 20-30 range. This type of scaling promotes a selective environment as opposed to an inclusive environment. This hurts newer players. If it is determined that the most efficient way to run higher level dungeons (let’s say halls) is in 30 man groups, you best believe a bunch of discords (probably woland) are going to take 30 capable 8/8s. This means there will be more players willing to come than they need and players with lower pets and lower gear will be left out. We’ve all seen the discord messages for a “level 85 mheal priest”. Why would you expect it to get better?

The noobs will most likely tag along in a discord that fills the dungeon to 65 anyway, and the scaling will penalize those groups specifically (because Deca doesn’t like full dungeons for some reason).

I genuinely don’t see what you’re saying here.

It’s very simple. You are one of the testers. The testers want the game to be harder. The testers have stated that these terrible changes will make the game harder. A harder game is harder on noobs.

There’s basically no area where noobs come out on top.

UT trading would be a mechanic that helps noobs.

I agree with this completely. Like I said before, having to grind from the ground up is one of the worst parts of the game.

To illustrate this better, let’s flip the issue completely. Let’s say you can’t trade anything. What would happen to the realm youtubers like Sebchoof? I know for a fact he wouldn’t be able to put out as much content, because making replacement characters would become significantly harder. I don’t think anyone wants to watch him grind 30 Limon to max his dex. We want to see him soloing o3 and performing other cool feats.

Nobody likes grinding. I am certain everyone here would take a free deca ring if they were offered one.


#57

I think you underestimate the impact of this for experienced players. Yeah, new players might not know the patterns as well as experienced players, but they also don’t have a pet healing for 60+ hp every second. Remove that 60 hp per second, and suddenly the experienced player is on much closer footing with the new player. Now both new and old will have to dodge, instead of the new player struggling to dodge while the experienced player just tanks shot after shot becaues he knows his pet will heal him back to full. Honestly IC/OoC should be beneficial to a new player because if they step out of the fight for a few seconds they can get back up to full health and right back into it.

I remember very clearly being a blue star working my way through a UDL. I would take on a single room, then literally sit in a corner for 45 seconds to heal up enough to move on to the next room. Reducing those 45 seconds to 10 seconds is massive.

New players already die plenty often. I think the goal is to have players die more who currently only die once in a blue moon. Because a new player doesn’t have access to a strong pet anyway, as said before, it will not impact them as much.

Then why are NPEs/PPEs so popular? This is the part of the game that is most interesting to play and most interesting to watch for most people. If you disagree that is fine, but to say that it is objectively one of the worst parts of the game doesn’t really make sense. Almost everyone ends up going toward some sort of challenging mode like that once they get tired of endless key rushing.

Strongly disagree.

I do agree with this, but I don’t think it is any sort of proof toward people not liking grinding. The grind makes the reward much more satisfying. Sure, I would take a deca ring if I were offered one. But if I could just make my choice of equipment every time I made a new character and start with it 8/8 with all the UTs I could ever want? I would probably drop the game completely after a couple weeks.

This game is built around the grind, and is built around character death. I think that the UT exchange system is better than UT trading for that reason, and I think implementing a new combat system that will be more challenging to veteran players while not being oppressive to new players is exactly what the game needs, and I am impressed with Deca’s resolution to continue to pursue something along those lines even with backlash from many community members. Yeah, it will be a bummer to see so many of my characters die, as I am sure they will, but I look forward to the additional challenge it will bring and I especially look forward to seeing where Deca takes the game next.


#58

correct me if i’m wrong but i think that’s the point


the way you say that also makes it sound like right now, dodging is not necessary. this is exactly what ic/ooc is supposed to change. as of now, pets as broken to the point where players can just stand in one spot while their pets can heal off all the damage.
besides, new players(ones with and without pets) will learn to dodge more, so i don’t think it will affect them as much as you make it out to be


#59

While both groups suffer a regen nerf from their pets, this is literally a direct buff to vit and wis alike. Relatively, newer players rely more on their vit and wis for regen and less on pets; giving them a conditional 100% increase is a straight buff to petless players.
High-end players will have their pet neutered greatly, which cuts deeper into their regen relative to newer players, slightly bridging the gap between the two.

While the goal is indeed to have players in general die more, the nerf to pets specifically is tailored to hinder endgame players more.
And while they can indeed build back up faster than other players by stockpiling items, they currently barely need to use said items because they just…rarely ever die.

Obviously, having more items than you can carry is always a bad thing, and despite the amount of free vaults Deca has given away, I agree that it’s very easy to amass enough valuable items to fill them with. With UT exchange, this should help in letting players choose “hm, this item is rare, but I’m not going to use it, so I might as well exchange it for progress towards this item that I do want!”.

Alternatively, with higher drop rates thanks to more death, items become less of a “store in your vault and take out only when you’re maxed and decked out and absolutely sure you won’t die” and moreso “put it on a character you think can make use of it”.

Not the best example, but the point is that, with lower rarity on items, it becomes less arduous of a task to have to choose between two items for vault space.

This is a very tricky type of thing to account for, precisely because of the mix of “newer” and “older” players.
A group consisting of a mixed bag of fresh 0/8s with highlands gear, 2/8s with maybe a few high tier items, and those Epic Dream PPE Knight Full Void Set™ people will have their DPS more or less balanced out according to the current scaling (with that latter group making up for the former group’s lackluster DPS).

However, in a group consisting solely of experienced veterans, the scaling starts to fall behind. There’s no players to “make up for”, creating a ball of DPS that just obliterates content at such a rapid pace that lower drop rates are the only thing keeping them in check.

Finding a solution that makes the latter less oppressive while keeping the former at least somewhat viable without discouraging newer players is just really hard - but IC/OoC’s DPS-buff nerfs do help.
In the former group, they might have only a few pallies and warriors who probably aren’t able to permanently buff their teammates, while the latter definitely can.
By decreasing the effectiveness of their buffs, their DPS comes much closer to eachother, while (hopefully) still being a fair distance apart (since that’s also a problem - if a mixed group is just as efficient as an experienced group, why bother coming together like that?)

There’s just so many aspects that I don’t think there’s a true catch-all solution that satisfies both parties, not to even start on the very core of the game.

One final note:

Debatable, if said noobs can’t even acquire the asked-for price. Not entirely untrue, for sure - “lower-end” players may eventually scrape together enough to buy a UT, but otherwise, I can’t really see it solving the struggle of the newest of new players.


The General Chat Thread
#60

It is true that noobs will struggle to buy items at the start. However, lots of older players are generous in nature. I could see this as a positive for guilds where members share loot and for seasoned players that have more items than they can hold onto.

In addition, noobs could sell UTs items that they obtain, including higher feedpower items like candy coated armor.

For instance, last week I obtained an orb of conflict. I personally don’t think it’s very good, but I could trade it for the new oryx ut orb.

I wanted to respond more to the other posts made by Lazer and Fury, but it will go too far off topic.