Thoughts on the Design of the Map System

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LSN wrote:

I like the ratio of 1:2 map:nomap content.

1. By "2" you obviously mean "1.61803398875."
2. Even then, this comment requires a hell of a lot more justification. Why?

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GeorgAnatoly wrote:

Very well done scrotie. I'll say at least for my personal preferences in what I'd like for the map system you hit the nail on the head 100%. But that's the problem, we're dealing with personal and subjective preferences about what the endgame should be and as evidenced by your dev quote they don't feel the same way.

I do hope we get some kind of dev response though. That could provide some valuable insight and would make for a very good discussion.

Well just think of what would happen after a few months. In that system that scrotie described, everyone would be swimming in maps who could afford to roll them high through RMT or trading items constantly.

This excludes way too many players again and therefore the devs cant like this idea. It is not thought through well.

Use your brain and you will get to the point that exactly for this reason the mapdrop-system still is as random as it is now. Otherwise only people who can afford to throw 10+ chaos on every map could sustain maps and everyone else would be left behind. Therefore (and for no other reason) we have this unrewarding system still in place, and the new system that scrotie is talking of is unviable.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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LSN wrote:

I like the ratio of 1:2 map:nomap content.

1. By "2" you obviously mean "1.61803398875."
2. Even then, this comment requires a hell of a lot more justification. Why?

no I mean 1/3rd of the time in endgame should be used on maps and 2/3 in the other randomly created content. This make 1/3:2/3 for me which is 1:2.

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GeorgAnatoly wrote:

Very well done scrotie. I'll say at least for my personal preferences in what I'd like for the map system you hit the nail on the head 100%. But that's the problem, we're dealing with personal and subjective preferences about what the endgame should be and as evidenced by your dev quote they don't feel the same way.

I wouldn't be so sure.

A large part of the OP is influenced by what I call "Rhys' Rubric," which describes the intent of the developers to develop the game for a "hardcore" audience along four axes: time, knowledge, skill, and emotion. Given those four objectives, you can isolate the primary tools for achieving player satisfaction: random areas/encounters, a varied economy though skill/item/build balance, smooth client performance, and personalization/user-generated content. Since the primary function of maps is to be an "endgame" — that is, to extrapolate the content beyond the actual story content — the axis they line up most with is the time/randomness axis. So far, many of GGG's decisions have been to have maps serve more on the knowledge/economy/balance axis, which I believe is unwise, as it's vital that maps function as the primary time/randomness workhorse, carefully avoiding decisions which impair its functionality in that department. However, my view of things isn't necessarily one they'd disagree with, because it does have a solid grounding in concepts which GGG, or at least Rhys, have already acknowledged are important to them.

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LSN wrote:

In that system that scrotie described, everyone would be swimming in maps

lol no. I think I made it pretty clear that the standards for sustaining 78s would still be high. I think you made that clear as well.

Scrotie I know it looks like I want to devaluate your idea but this is not the case. When thinking it through it just doesnt do the job well.

Btw. the full sentence I wrote was:
"In that system that scrotie described, everyone would be swimming in maps who could afford to roll them high through RMT or trading items constantly."


Your idea of the mapsystem is even more based on wealth of the player than the now system and therefore it is bad when looking at it from all perspectives even tho the first glance might blur and let it appear to be good.

The players who flip items frequently and have enough chaos wont ever worry about maps anymore and everybody who cannot afford to roll his maps high will be fucked and left behind again. Therefore (I repeat myself here) and for no other reason we have the quite random system of mapdrops now, that allows badly rolled 76 maps to drop 2x78 and the best rolled 78 maps to drop nothing.


I indicated in my recent feedback thread that there wont be a solution for the map-system because fixes on the one side will create new issues on the other end. This here proves it once more.

Very nice read Scrotie, i particularly enjoyed the new map affixes/suffixes you came up with.

Like stationary evangelist shields and the way you handled power charges.

I hope a dev has a glans at this, because this would indeed be a huge change to
risk vs reward and i think, it would end up killing a lot more players in a hardcore setting.
(which is a cool fresh breath of air compared to the "run pack size and fuck it grind")

Peace,

-Boem-

@lsn, there could be ways to tackle your problem you have with this btw, like making currency behave differently when utilized on maps for instance.

transmute on map = 1 mod

allt = 2 mod

alch = 3/4 mod

chaos = 5/6 mod

regal = 7/8 mod

This would highly reduce the overall cost needed to craft maps and allow targeted crafting of maps for the difficulty "you think" your character can handle.

Well, the idea seems good, given that it has a good reward-risk ratio that encourages running hard mods (and as many of them) for fun and profit. That way being rich would not matter as much as now.

But, Scrotie, you didn't answered about the whole item disponibility/less streaky levelling issue. If the system is fairer to skill, there would be massive changes to the economy and quality of life (and power) of the general population...How should the game adjust then?

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NeroNoah wrote:

Well, the idea seems good, given that it has a good reward-risk ratio that encourages running hard mods (and as many of them) for fun and profit. That way being rich would not matter as much as now.

But, Scrotie, you didn't answered about the whole item disponibility/less streaky levelling issue. If the system is fairer to skill, there would be massive changes to the economy and quality of life (and power) of the general population...How should the game adjust then?

Did you even read what he wrote?

He said rolling every map for 120%+(or was it 130%?) should ensure you a replacement. This is nothing else than forcing players to throw as many chaoses as needed on their maps. In opposite to the state the game is in right now it would only matter to be rich in order to guarantee you to never get out of maps anymore.

Therefore
"That way being rich would not matter as much as now." is completely missing the point my friend.



@boem:
"This would highly reduce the overall cost needed to craft maps and allow targeted crafting of maps for the difficulty "you think" your character can handle."

1. Consistency = most important
Orbs will never do different things on one item and another. This wont ever happen (for good reason).

2. Currency sink needs to be maintained.

3. Predictability for rolling maps this high would not be desired in order to keep the excitement high ("oh look there dropped this 78 map that I rolled on this map before, yawns")

4. Try drawing two 100% parallel lines on a paper. You wont ever make it and the lines would cross somewhere close in the end. Same applies to scroties system. With such an unflexible system you on the one hand either create too many or too few map drops for most of the players. This can be even splitted so that some players get constantly too many and other get constantly too few.

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LSN wrote:

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NeroNoah wrote:

Well, the idea seems good, given that it has a good reward-risk ratio that encourages running hard mods (and as many of them) for fun and profit. That way being rich would not matter as much as now.

But, Scrotie, you didn't answered about the whole item disponibility/less streaky levelling issue. If the system is fairer to skill, there would be massive changes to the economy and quality of life (and power) of the general population...How should the game adjust then?

Did you even read what he wrote?

He said rolling every map for 120%+(or was it 130%?) should ensure you a replacement. This is nothing else than forcing players to throw as many chaoses as needed on their maps. In opposite to the state the game is in right now it would only matter to be rich in order to guarantee you to never get out of maps anymore.

Therefore
"That way being rich would not matter as much as now." is completely missing the point my friend.

The likehood of getting six mods (for max quantity) is one in twelve. Running six mods would require skill. You could get more maps (on average) taking more risks. Seems fair.

So skill is rewarded. Yes, you need to be rich, but the way to get richer (ignoring trading) is having skill/taking risks that way. The system proposed is less concerned about being a currency think and more about having map variety.

This would work if the most powerful builds get nerfed, though, so they cannot run every mod possible without sweating...

@LSN: It wouldn't be an expected 130% for all maps, just for the highest maps (78s, 79s). The expectation would be that clever players would amass wealth on the path to 78s, by avoiding unnecessary rerolls during the build-up.

@Nero: You might want to check out the affix list in the spoiler of the OP. I'm fairly confident I gave every build something it doesn't want to see, but could still manage if played well.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

@Nero: You might want to check out the affix list in the spoiler of the OP. I'm fairly confident I gave every build something it doesn't want to see, but could still manage if played well.

What's your point? (I skimmed it the first time)