SET FREE THE ASCENDANCY POINTS (or rework the lab) [New ascension methods/lab rework ideas]

I bet it's those 5 guys with their millions of alt accounts again.
And to those five guys i have to say GGG will never change the lab! Well no more than they already have, that is! I know cause i am arrogant and that gives me psychic abilities so that i can read GGG's mind.

"

Pyrokar wrote:

I bet it's those 5 guys with their millions of alt accounts again.
And to those five guys i have to say GGG will never change the lab! Well no more than they already have, that is! I know cause i am arrogant and that gives me psychic abilities so that i can read GGG's mind.

What build is that? Pain Attunement? Sounds OP.

"

EnjoyTheJourney wrote:

There's a pinned post in the feedback forum for the beta devoted to reactions from beta participants to changes in lab. A nifty idea was suggested by one poster, which is to remove ascendancies from lab and to convert uber lab into an end game map.

To develop the idea a bit further, the "cheese" to lure in players for uber lab could be that it's a longer map, leading to more possibilities of map (and other) drops. If a version of lab in act 8-ish offered enchants and other diversions, then that could be it for lab for the game.

This idea still leaves a need to work out how to ascend. But, at least this idea would make lab truly optional for the first time since its inclusion in the game. And, those who like lab in its current state would still have access to it.

I did some spot checks of posters saying that they disliked labyrinth and most all were not named on the list. Over 330 threads discussing labyrinth problems with over 910 posters in support

What this means to me is that it's further verification that there are many that dislike labyrinth but have not yet mentioned that in a labyrinth thread in the Feedback and Suggestions forum or in the Labyrinth Development Manifesto thread, Changes to the Labyrinth.

"

Fruz wrote:

"

Turtledove wrote:

So, yes balance changes can be reasonably considered to be design bugs.

No.

A bug is an unexpected outcome from the programming team.
Balance changes do not fall in this category at all, period.

Now, you are either ridiculously showing your bad faith, or that previous "argumentum ad verecundiam" was nothing but thin air.
In both cases, there seem to be an honesty issue here.

It's early in the day and so your post is at least literate. Thank you for that. I don't know what gives you the idea that balance changes are not done by programmers?

"

Turtledove wrote:

It's early in the day and so your post is at least literate. Thank you for that. I don't know what gives you the idea that balance changes are not done by programmers?

They usually are, and that's because it's very hard to land a job strictly as a game designer so you have to know the abc at least. But they don't have to be, few game modders are competent programmers, you don't have to be one to work with game resources and play with numbers.

Well, even if you have to mess with the code a bit, for instance spell and ability scripts for NwN are written in C but it's fairly self contained so I was able to do the spell overhaul just fine and I'm as much a programmer as a formula 1 driver.

"

Turtledove wrote:

"

EnjoyTheJourney wrote:

There's a pinned post in the feedback forum for the beta devoted to reactions from beta participants to changes in lab. A nifty idea was suggested by one poster, which is to remove ascendancies from lab and to convert uber lab into an end game map.

To develop the idea a bit further, the "cheese" to lure in players for uber lab could be that it's a longer map, leading to more possibilities of map (and other) drops. If a version of lab in act 8-ish offered enchants and other diversions, then that could be it for lab for the game.

This idea still leaves a need to work out how to ascend. But, at least this idea would make lab truly optional for the first time since its inclusion in the game. And, those who like lab in its current state would still have access to it.

I did some spot checks of posters saying that they disliked labyrinth and most all were not named on the list. Over 330 threads discussing labyrinth problems with over 910 posters in support

What this means to me is that it's further verification that there are many that dislike labyrinth but have not yet mentioned that in a labyrinth thread in the Feedback and Suggestions forum or in the Labyrinth Development Manifesto thread, Changes to the Labyrinth.

the fact most professional streamers either keep silent on the lab or hate it shows we might not even be in the lower 49%.

Willing to eat shit doesn't mean you like it.

But according to the lab lovers definition, every hooker chooses to do her job because she loves it not because of the loot.

"

raics wrote:

"

Turtledove wrote:

It's early in the day and so your post is at least literate. Thank you for that. I don't know what gives you the idea that balance changes are not done by programmers?

They usually are, and that's because it's very hard to land a job strictly as a game designer so you have to know the abc at least. But they don't have to be, few game modders are competent programmers, you don't have to be one to work with game resources and play with numbers.

Well, even if you have to mess with the code a bit, for instance spell and ability scripts for NwN are written in C but it's fairly self contained so I was able to do the spell overhaul just fine and I'm as much a programmer as a formula 1 driver.

I thought perhaps GGG had mentioned a "Balance Team" or something like that. If so, I'd assume that the Balance Team function would be more closely related to testing than the code development. Meaning that their larger effort would be testing more than coding. If the Balance Team actually makes code changes then they could be dual function team that does both testing and some coding, as you suggest. If so I'd guess that they consult with the developers.

edit: The reason I assumed they might have a balance test team is because it would be a very good thing for PoE. For example, the labyrinth release introduced a bug where monster projectiles would bypass body armor. There was a big thread about this and a GGG developer mentioned in the thread that he found the bug and that the bug source was introduced when the ascendancy classes were added. He was going to fix it by cleaning up and reorganizing the way that damage was calculated. This story demonstrates the need for a balance team test function. It also demonstrates that balance changes can be more complicated than just playing with some number range constants in the code.

"

Turtledove wrote:

It's early in the day and so your post is at least literate. Thank you for that. I don't know what gives you the idea that balance changes are not done by programmers?

Because that's a different task / job completely.

You don't needgame design knowledge to program what you are being asked to, and you don't need programming knowledge to design/balance a game.
Of course, small companies might not always have enough resources to have have completely separate teams in all cases maybe, and even bigger companies surely have some "middle man" to communicate between the twqo.

The same way software programmers and network administrators are not the same thing
The same way advanced testing is not done by the programmers, ideally.

"

Turtledove wrote:

edit: The reason I assumed they might have a balance test team is because it would be a very good thing for PoE. For example, the labyrinth release introduced a bug where monster projectiles would bypass body armor. There was a big thread about this and a GGG developer mentioned in the thread that he found the bug and that the bug source was introduced when the ascendancy classes were added. He was going to fix it by cleaning up and reorganizing the way that damage was calculated. This story demonstrates the need for a balance team test function. It also demonstrates that balance changes can be more complicated than just playing with some number range constants in the code.

But such a thing isn't related to balance, it's just a bug, as you said.
I bet the the programmers never intended those projectiles to bypass body armour, why would they ?
If the balance guys asked them to have it behave like that ... then we could call it balance, but I really don't think that it was the case.
And there is one thing that shows the clear difference between bugs and balance issues :
the patchnotes.
Those are not in the same category.


PS : I am trying to avoid using "development team" as development can be rather abstract compared to coding/programming and can include the graphic designers, balance, etc ...

"

Fruz wrote:

"

Turtledove wrote:

edit: The reason I assumed they might have a balance test team is because it would be a very good thing for PoE. For example, the labyrinth release introduced a bug where monster projectiles would bypass body armor. There was a big thread about this and a GGG developer mentioned in the thread that he found the bug and that the bug source was introduced when the ascendancy classes were added. He was going to fix it by cleaning up and reorganizing the way that damage was calculated. This story demonstrates the need for a balance team test function. It also demonstrates that balance changes can be more complicated than just playing with some number range constants in the code.

But such a thing isn't related to balance, it's just a bug, as you said.
I bet the the programmers never intended those projectiles to bypass body armour, why would they ?
If the balance guys asked them to have it behave like that ... then we could call it balance, but I really don't think that it was the case.
And there is one thing that shows the clear difference between bugs and balance issues :
the patchnotes.
Those are not in the same category.


PS : I am trying to avoid using "development team" as development can be rather abstract compared to coding/programming and can include the graphic designers, balance, etc ...

The context of the last paragraph statement added in the edit was "The reason I assumed they might have a balance test team is because it would be a very good thing for PoE." That paragraph needs to be understood within that context.

Regarding your patch notes comments, the terms being discussed are not black and white. Different organizations and points of view can refer to these terms in different ways within different contexts. That means that a certain definition within one context is not the correct definition for all contexts.

"

Turtledove wrote:

What this means to me is that it's further verification that there are many that dislike labyrinth but have not yet mentioned that in a labyrinth thread in the Feedback and Suggestions forum or in the Labyrinth Development Manifesto thread, Changes to the Labyrinth.

Again are you forgetting that Chris says its completely fine if you don't like the content? Every game I've ever played there always something that is perhaps out of your comfort zone or something you rather not deal with. For some of you its the lab, for others it can be leveling in general, it could be the grind to 100.

You do it because you want the sickass AC points that is a massive power spike, if you aren't willing to do the content\challenge then you are playing the completely wrong game. D3 just released the necromancer you can do play a dead game if you want.