Ring - The Scoring System

[cloudy97]

This discussion reminds me of discussions on a NWN PW I played on and was quite involved in. The server was focused on RP, but it's much easier to give XP for a kill than for roleplaying. The MDM (master DM) didn't want to bribe players to roleplay by giving out XP for it, it should come naturally - because it was an RP server.

So the hack&slash people leveled several times faster than those who preferred to chat and intrigue in the town (the quests were like Ryzom: no XP) which lead to roleplayers questioning if the server was really aimed for roleplayers. After several attempts to distribute XP in different ways, we decided for flat rate. One RL hour in the game gave 200 XP.

The result was that because the hack&slashers couldn't control their XP flow they got bored and stopped logging on, and the server got too deserted for the RP'ers to roleplay in and the project sort of died after that.

So, while I can say clichés like "RP is a reward in itself" (which is true) rewards are important for the Ring to succeed. But it is a tricky question, because there are as many styles to play as there are players.

How would it work if the Adventure Master gained some XP (or cats) per player joining the scenario to distribute to the players in his/her adventure? Then it would be up to the AM to give a player who roleplay or who does something clever to bonk the player with some XP, to encourage (or bribe) him to continue.

I don't think the rewards need to be great, but they should be there.

[norvic]

Maybe a combination of the system as proposed although the lvl thingy looks abit weird, using a 250 skill in a 150 scenario should get less reward, and a flat rate time thing like Ulani said running in the background.

For sure hack n slash would get more reward and some peeps would exploit by just sitting logged in but that way pure RP gets somthing back.

Ringmasters should get a higher rate of background time related points.

[pronkyou]

Well... Why don't they impose character limits? like not being allowed to use higher level stanzas and such, so that you'd have to use your wits to get through something with limited ability, and the reward would be greater for the first group to get through that ring, and each subsequent group would recieve less of a reward... and the longer a ring went without rewarding the first group, the greater the reward would become.

Pros:
Uberpowering your characters and relying on character ability would be limited so that you'd actually be relying on player skill instead of amount of time spent grinding;

By allowing for a wait-to-reward system, more difficult rings that force players to use their knowledge would produce greater reward, and would thus be more desireable to attempt;

Being the first to crack a long timed ring would have its own fame amongst the community out of character as the player would have done something others had not;

Can't abuse this type of system because everyone would want to be the first to get the reward at some point, and unless the entire populous of ryzom held a conspiracy to not complete a particular ring first, someone would eventually set the curve;


Cons:
Authors could make very difficult rings that would easily be bypassed with knowledge of one simple thing, wait a few weeks, and tell their friends how to be the first to crack it. (There is a chance of others stumbling upon it though);

Possible boycott by making something impossible for anybody but 250s with the best gear, and then those 250s deciding not to beat it for a long period of time (thus a boycott);

Balance issues of risk vs reward;


If anyone can think of more pros or cons, please, do tell. My brain kinda hurts from analyzing my own work. XD

[Marjo]

It is clear from the discussion here that there is a general misunderstanding about the way in which the Ring Reward system works. I gathered your concerns for Daniel Miller, Producer of the Ring. He is preparing a document explaining how the system works in a little more depth and answering your questions. More to come!

[nephy13]

As far as Ring designers go, I don't see that there needs to be a reward beyond a rankings system, be that a mechanical one in-game or gossip-based one on the Web. There are plenty of maps out there for Quake or Neverwinter Nights to prove that there is plenty of kudos to be earned through such endeavours.

I am sure that rewards for developers will just encourage the development of poor quality content, be that hack-and-shash or not. What I fear most is the ring terminal being full of things thrown together half-heartedly by people who are primarily motivated by free stuff; I don't look forward to the amount of time I will waste playing complete tripe before I find a gem. Although a volunteer could be good or bad at the job, at least they are more likely to have self-motivation and pride in what they create.

A question: If I publish my scenario, so that anyone can host it, then who gets the points, hoster or author? If hoster, then it will mean people won't share scenarios, either for other people to learn from or to allow them to be more widely hosted. Frankly, I don't intend to leave my PC on all the time to run a scenario, but I would have no problem with other people hosting it if they thought it was good enough. Why not just host a popular scenario you find on the web, since you get all the rewards for none of the effort? Alternatively, if people keep hold of their sources to make sure they get their hard-earned rewards, then the only result will be a lack of skilled developers since there will be no good scenarios out there to learn from.

As far as rewarding players, I actually think that is unneccessary whether it be RP or not. However you allocate points, people are going to be able to grind their friends' Rings much more efficiently than they ever can on the "balanced" mainland. The reward for Ring players should be that it is going to have a lot more effort (developer hours creating it per player hour spent in it) put into it than the mainland ever could have. The mainland is so large and intended as such a time-sink that it would be impossible to individually script it all - Ring should ideally be the other way around. This is a lot less important than the developer/host getting paid, since I am already effective at ignoring powergamers and the like.