Make XP Pots last a certain number of quests instead of minutes

[Purr]

Feels like one of the reasons for zerging is people not wanting pots to tick down (also discourages grouping). Why not give a fixed number of quests that each level of xp pot works for (so one might work for 5, one for 10, one for 50, etc)?

This might be a way to help fix the later changes to how xp is rewarded.

I have a solution to people using pots when pulling saga rewards, except maybe to code it such that you get it for "quest and saga completion" rewards and each saga would tick it down by one.

 

[Alco]

No. This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. You are trying to change other people's playstyle (zerging) because you don't like it. Yes, XP pots are more efficient when zerging, but the reason I zerg - and I expect most others - is that after 16 or so years I have no desire to flower sniff my way through a quest I have done a thousand times.

 

[rabidfox]

I've suggested this same type thing many times with my request being "add new XP potions that use charges instead of a timer (while keeping the existing timed based ones around too, let players decide which type they want to run at any given time)". Don't force players to use any given type, just offer more options to appeal to various players and their perferred playstyles.

 

[Ying]

XP pots have worked fine for 15 years. People 'zerg' because they've run a quest 100+ times, so there's no reason to stop and sniff the flowers. Instead it's about challenging themselves to run a past life faster than they've run before. I value my time. I'm going to run a quest in the shortest amount of time, regardless if I'm running an XP pot or not.

Changing XP pots to quests completed rather than time has it's own problems.

 

[Purr]

No. This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. You are trying to change other people's playstyle (zerging) because you don't like it. Yes, XP pots are more efficient when zerging, but the reason I zerg - and I expect most others - is that after 16 or so years I have no desire to flower sniff my way through a quest I have done a thousand times.

I'm a zerger, too. I don't care about zerging. I care about incentives and rewards from an economics standpoint. Right now, the game incentivizes ending a quest instead of waiting 30 seconds for someone who joined the group to get to the quest. That's a bad incentive.

If you've got a proposal to fix the problem of the incentivization of not grouping or ending before everyone is in because other people will waste your xp potion time, let me know.

How would this actually affect your play personally that you're hostile to it?

 

[Dergex]

One of the issues with this suggestion is that if you did it, you would need to tie it to a quest being started, not completed. Because of that failures of quests would cause a 'charge' to be wasted. If you didn't do this then people would tend to farm slayers and other optional quest rewards to trigger XP gain without starting a quest. It's fine just as it is.

 

[rabidfox]

I wish we could pause XP (and other pots) so when helping someone out that they wouldn't tick down.

 

[mikarddo]

Not a good idea as it would lead to people wanting to avoid shorter quests.
"No, I dont want to run that, I am on an xp pot, I only want to run longer quests".

 

[Dude]

Feels like one of the reasons for zerging is people not wanting pots to tick down (also discourages grouping). Why not give a fixed number of quests that each level of xp pot works for (so one might work for 5, one for 10, one for 50, etc)?

This might be a way to help fix the later changes to how xp is rewarded.

I have a solution to people using pots when pulling saga rewards, except maybe to code it such that you get it for "quest and saga completion" rewards and each saga would tick it down by one.

Would entering a wilderness area count as one quest, so we could just farm all the slayer, rare encounter, and explorer objectives on one charge?

How would this impact bonuses to things like XP stones, which get the bonus in public areas?

 

[Dergex]

I wish we could pause XP (and other pots) so when helping someone out that they wouldn't tick down.

This would be a really great feature, though may be a bit annoying to implement. Honestly I think XP pots are in a decent place as they are right now.

Honestly, if I were to go about revamping XP pots, I'd probably make them function like an 'XP Bank' where you gained double XP until the XP bank was empty. With each potion granting you a different amount of XP into the bank. That way every last drop of the potion would be used. The downside is that it would technically nerf the maximum possible XP that you could squeeze out of a potion, given the right team and speed running quests. But provided the amount they put into that bank was a significant amount it would be fine.

 

[Ying]

The moment you allow people to pause XP pots, then someone will complain that they forgot to turn it back on. See the history of bravery bonus as an example. Any change that is likely to generate customer support tickets isn't gonna get added.

 

[Bunker]

Recommendation: purchase 600 hours of xp pots at 50%, and drink them all. Then go quest.

 

[comfy]

I wish we could pause XP (and other pots) so when helping someone out that they wouldn't tick down.

I've often considered this; to be able to pause them, but not be able to resume unless in a public area. Disregarding implementation complexity, I think that would be the most fair way to do it.

 

[rabidfox]

The moment you allow people to pause XP pots, then someone will complain that they forgot to turn it back on. See the history of bravery bonus as an example. Any change that is likely to generate customer support tickets isn't gonna get added.

Yeah, that's exactly why they wouldn't do it. I'd still love to have it; but there's many things I would love to see that will never happen because it's not worth it on their end to support and/or spend the dev time on.

 

[Buddha5440]

If you make XP pots active for a set number of quests there will be, VERY quickly, a list of what quests you should run for each pot. This will further negatively impact grouping and pretty much insure all LFM's will be posted by Zergers.

'I'm running a Superior/Sovereign I/Sovereign II quest line.'.

No thank you. Unless you want to further separate the new players from the vet/zerg/reaper or die players (I put "vet" first because a lot of us are more than willing to help new players (zergers and reaper or die...not so much)).

 

[Purr]

Would entering a wilderness area count as one quest, so we could just farm all the slayer, rare encounter, and explorer objectives on one charge?

How would this impact bonuses to things like XP stones, which get the bonus in public areas?

That's a good point. I hadn't considered how much people rely on those final bonuses in Orchard, etc. for that 2nd reincarnation. I think my initial idea would be harder to implement than I'd first considered.

 

[Purr]

Whew! Definitely a lot of things I hadn't first considered. Thanks for all the feedback!

 

[Dergex]

I still think that the most reasonable re-implementation of XP pots to make it so that they're not 'wasted' is to make it so that consuming one gives you an 'XP Pool', and you earn double XP until that 'XP Pool' is empty. The important balancing act they'd have to do there is figure out what a good amount of XP for that is. It'd be a real balancing act to make sure it doesn't completely kill the efficiency compared to using a pot right now.

 

[Mand O'Lin]

Zerging is not just for people running pots. Most people I see are not running pots, they are simply trying to get the greatest XP/min they can achieve. The cost-benefit analysis (with time as the cost) is simply not in favor of running most optionals or achieving XP bonuses. The thought being :
If I can complete the quest in X time for Y xp, why would I spend 3X for 1.2Y? It is a fair point, although even with the lives and years of running quest I still like to squeeze the xp out of a quest.

 

[Douglas Glyndwr]

Zerging is not for everyone. It would be nice to have a per-quest option, but not a wholesale replacement.