Roll Over Forest Fights

[Nightwind]

ok, a few things, what you are requesting, would have to have these elements.

on death, turns = 0
on newday, X% of turns remaning are saved up, and rewarded back to you last thing on the newday page. (before it's reset to 10 + earned)...

possibly the limit is caped at an amount equal to the donator bar bonus. Possibly raised for 0dk people.

as for code... i've a differt project this weekend

[Ohtaren]

A different approach might be to use...a candle. Something like Burn Yellow Candle - lose 5 forest fights. Then, for the next 3 or 4 game days, you start with an extra forest fight. This bonus would be reset whenever you killed the dragon. Also, you couldn't burn the candle on a day that you received extra turns from it. This way turns are not completely wasted, yet there is a loss associated with carrying them over.

[Skaak]

Originally Posted by Ohtaren

A different approach might be to use...a candle. Something like Burn Yellow Candle - lose 5 forest fights. Then, for the next 3 or 4 game days, you start with an extra forest fight.

Unfortunately, I don't think that this would fix the problem of being restricted to only 10 forest fights every game day and thus not being able to spend much time if you want to, and also being killed in PvPs too much to advance (although I personally haven't had this problem yet). An item that takes away fights, and then grants a few on following days wouldn't allow much customization of time spent playing, nor would a single extra fight every day likely do much to offset the experience penalty of being a farmie. I really think that it has to be rollover, although as I've said earlier I don't think all unspent turns should be rolled over, etc. etc.

On a different train of thought:

Personally, I'm a little stuck on whether or not rollover turns should only occur if you log in and don't use all your turns, or if there should be rollover if you miss a game day. Of course, if the system didn't keep track of days spent resting (and thus turns you get rollover benefits from) then players would undoubtably want to have days not logged in to rollover by default. However, this has potential balance issues.

On the other hand, if people would rather just have a few more turns every day without having to log in earlier to get them, then not allowing game days that the player doesn't log in for to rollover would be annoying. Perhaps it would be possible to offer players the option when they log out of doing the normal "retire to the fields" or "retire to study/rest", so that they could choose whether or not they were planning on using a game day without logging in.

Thoughts?

[Skaak]

For clarity and future reference, here is exactly what I'm proposing for rollover forest fights, culled out of the various posts I've made in this topic. There are two scenarios:

Scenario #1:

Players only receive rollover fights if they log in and don't use their fights up. When they log out and fights are left over, these fights are stored in a rollover variable. When they log in if there are fights in the rollover variable, a percentage of them (perhaps scaled based on DK's, so for example 90% for a farmie, 75% for 3 DK's, etc.) is added to their current day's fights as long as this doesn't increase their total fights past a cap of whatever (so if they normally get more fights than the cap, none will ever roll over).

Pros: don't really have to worry about rollover screwing up the day count (and thus speed records are not compromised). Players can choose to use multiple short gaming sessions or one longer session if they so desire.

Cons: players still have to at least log in, which puts farmies at just as much risk for PvP experience loss and doesn't really give a lot of options when scaling playing time. Bank interest FF requirements can create a conflict of interests.

Scenario #2

If a game day passes and the player does not log in, a percentage of the fights the player would have received that day are rolled over when they next log in, as long as they don't receive fights past a certain cap. This would just need to check when they last logged in against the current game time (and factor in how many game days per real day), then add a percentage (again, could be scaled) of forest fights to the current day's worth. If desired, it could also add a "day of rest" to their number of days to offset speed quirks (although the cap also offsets speed quirks).

Pros: farmies can play a larger number of turns without getting farmed as much, allowing easier growth. Low DK players can customize their playing time as they wish.

Cons: speed records start to become an issue (although a well-balanced cap combined with scaled percentages of rolled over points could make this point moot). There are more calculations and variables to fight out for this one. "Days of rest" are possibly a concern.

Notes:

The scenarios don't have to be separate. The system could default to one, unless the player chose the other. Of course, the whole thing gets more complicated to code, and also for players to understand. But properly balanced, I actually would prefer an integrated rollover system. If I had to pick one, I think I would choose scenario 2 as the one I like second best to integration, despite that it would be harder to implement properly.

Due to the finite cap, rollover would not affect people past a certain amount of DK's. Presumably at that point, they would have enough forest fights every day to not be feeling short-shrifted.

Some of the things that prompted me to come up with these scenarios are more or less moot on other LotGD servers due to different amounts of turns granted, game days per real day, etc. However, I still think it's a very worthwhile system to put into place (even if not every server uses it), and it makes IC sense to have more energy if you rest for a day or part of a day. Plus, the most people play on Central and a rollover system as I've described would make it much more friendly for farmies (in my opinion), and thus make new players more likely to stay. I was stuck at level 10 for a few real days, as others have described, and it was no fun. I'm just lucky you don't lose levels when your experience drops past what was required to get the level.

So there it is all in one convenient, if ginormous, place. Feel free to tear these scenarios up, put them back together in new ways, or just insult me to my face for not having a bit of brevity. Unless I need to argue about or clarify this proposal, I'm done with this topic.

[SaucyWench]

We actually discussed this at length with MightyE and Kendaer/Moonchilde a little while back.

We've decided not to put it into the core release just now - but that doesn't mean we never will. Central, unfortunately, already has a lag spot at each new day as players all madly try to play turns, that can last ~2 hours. If some of the players have extra turns from their previous game day 12 hours earlier, pandemonium...

On a related note we rejected allowing players to store turns for a fee (or as a donator buy) because it felt like players could then save them up as long as they paid big $$. While we don't deny we try to get donations here, the game is not about megaprofit and if it started to feel money-driven, LOGD would lose a lot of appeal for many of us.

It also raises an issue on whether it should be just bad luck for those players. The players that made an effort, after all, should be rewarded. I'm not saying I am against this at all... just showing that there are two sides to the story.

[Skaak]

Originally Posted by SaucyWench

We've decided not to put it into the core release just now - but that doesn't mean we never will. Central, unfortunately, already has a lag spot at each new day as players all madly try to play turns, that can last ~2 hours. If some of the players have extra turns from their previous game day 12 hours earlier, pandemonium...

JCP said discuss, I have discussed.

I don't really have any great suggestions for the lag problem, but Waugh had an interesting idea that I expanded on (for me it's the middle of the first post on the second page of this topic; not sure if everyone has the same posts-per-page, though). Here's the link.

Anyway, I really think that rollover could help the game out if there's ever a way to get around the lag.

Originally Posted by SaucyWench

I'm not saying I am against this at all... just showing that there are two sides to the story.

Aye aye, captain!

[Furion]

Ah, but there one way. As long as we're adding turns here, we could use Waugh's suggestion of giving a few bonus turns to those who don't log-in at particularly busy times, like 11:30 and 12:00-2.

*Note: above times represent half an hour before New Day, and the 2 hours following the New Day, whichever time zone you may live in*

[Waugh]

Moi? Heh, seriously, 1 or 2 turns perhaps. Encourage waiting to login.

[Furion]

Oh, I didn't think of that. I was like, why 1 or 2? But then I realized it's one or two every day.

[Waugh]

It needs to be a little bonus for helping balance the server load, while not being a punishment for playing an hour either side of the new day. (Lets face it, I am an Inn sleeper, and spending money once on it per real day is better than twice)

So, I might be saving a couple hundred dollars per real day in Inn fee's by waking up, playing into the new day, and sleeping. The benefit from gaining a couple extra turns, if this idea was put into play, definitely needs to outweigh the benefit of playing before, during and after new day. ™