Obligatory support items on Hard and Ragnarok

[Slayer]

Again, you don't need an SHC, a simple bloody barricade will suffice. It's ridiculous. If you chose to spend like 350k on bear armour instead of 13k on a barricade, lol, nah we don't want you in the server.

If ANYONE in the server says "I cant afford 13k on a barricade", I would take a look at their armour/items and just laugh. Usually they're snipers but you know where this is going.

The fact that they're in those hard servers anyway means they can, in 1 hard run you can use the assist xp on gold and get a cade.

[Maroon]

Again, you don't need an SHC, a simple bloody barricade will suffice. It's ridiculous. If you chose to spend like 350k on bear armour instead of 13k on a barricade, lol, nah we don't want you in the server.

If ANYONE in the server says "I cant afford 13k on a barricade", I would take a look at their armour/items and just laugh. Usually they're snipers but you know where this is going.

The fact that they're in those hard servers anyway means they can, in 1 hard run you can use the assist xp on gold and get a cade.

I suggest you take a look at what I have posted before, and review what you said. My post was directed towards the idea that people should have a SHC or higher in order to join. I was not talking about normal cades.
Furthermore, if you have read what I said, you would also have seen that I went deeper into the subject, and asked why there should be so many cades needed in the first place. Can't all aspects of the problem stated in this topic be solved by re-imagining the way hard and rag, and in particular their boss waves are handled?

Yes, with the way things are handled right now being in a run with 2-3 cade bringers is frustrating. I know, I've been there plenty of times, including today. I do not, however, think that mandatory support equipment is the way to go, whether it is a 300k or a 300 gold item you need. Adding such restrictions to what a player can do is something I personally am very much against.

Brainstorm imminent!
The catch to my own question of before though, is that I myself cannot think of even the slightest way to do things differently. Would more traditional boss battles from singleplayer RPGs work, with bosses with certain weaknesses that can be exploited through various difficult steps? Probably not. A more standard MMORPG way to handle instances, by having parties tank their way to a boss? Not likely. Fighting a massive boss with a huge group of players, Guild Wars 2 style? Sounds like an oversized Sleipnir fight (massacre) to me.
Changes like these, however, would fundamentally change everything NI is based upon, and make it a different game entirely. And that's not even mentioning the boundaries of Warband's module system.

Bah, I'm too tired to think of more options. Fact remains, I myself am against solutions like this one, and would argue to go deeper and change NI more fundamentally. But hey, who knows what the next patch has in store for us?

[Slayer]

[quote author=Slayer link=topic=25183.msg174140#msg174140 date=1397521131]
Again, you don't need an SHC, a simple bloody barricade will suffice. It's ridiculous. If you chose to spend like 350k on bear armour instead of 13k on a barricade, lol, nah we don't want you in the server.

If ANYONE in the server says "I cant afford 13k on a barricade", I would take a look at their armour/items and just laugh. Usually they're snipers but you know where this is going.

The fact that they're in those hard servers anyway means they can, in 1 hard run you can use the assist xp on gold and get a cade.

I suggest you take a look at what I have posted before, and review what you said. My post was directed towards the idea that people should have a SHC or higher in order to join. I was not talking about normal cades.
Furthermore, if you have read what I said, you would also have seen that I went deeper into the subject, and asked why there should be so many cades needed in the first place. Can't all aspects of the problem stated in this topic be solved by re-imagining the way hard and rag, and in particular their boss waves are handled?

Yes, with the way things are handled right now being in a run with 2-3 cade bringers is frustrating. I know, I've been there plenty of times, including today. I do not, however, think that mandatory support equipment is the way to go, whether it is a 300k or a 300 gold item you need. Adding such restrictions to what a player can do is something I personally am very much against.

Brainstorm imminent!
The catch to my own question of before though, is that I myself cannot think of even the slightest way to do things differently. Would more traditional boss battles from singleplayer RPGs work, with bosses with certain weaknesses that can be exploited through various difficult steps? Probably not. A more standard MMORPG way to handle instances, by having parties tank their way to a boss? Not likely. Fighting a massive boss with a huge group of players, Guild Wars 2 style? Sounds like an oversized Sleipnir fight (massacre) to me.
Changes like these, however, would fundamentally change everything NI is based upon, and make it a different game entirely. And that's not even mentioning the boundaries of Warband's module system.

Bah, I'm too tired to think of more options. Fact remains, I myself am against solutions like this one, and would argue to go deeper and change NI more fundamentally. But hey, who knows what the next patch has in store for us?
[/quote]

Err no, the playstile of NI will not change for a very loooooonggg time if at all. You seem to think that we have leet coders who can just change the mod to whatever they want 24/7 and only run on the mod.

Mate, if that were the case, NI would have a shitload more aspects to it and the "new loot system" would have been implemented a year ago.

The best time for NI IMO was when Huscarlton Banks was around because he was pretty much the only one that could write new code and create new things/methods into the mod. Now that he's gone, yea nah. Changing the way NI works will never happen.

[Yabu]

[quote author=Slayer link=topic=25183.msg174140#msg174140 date=1397521131]
Again, you don't need an SHC, a simple bloody barricade will suffice. It's ridiculous. If you chose to spend like 350k on bear armour instead of 13k on a barricade, lol, nah we don't want you in the server.

If ANYONE in the server says "I cant afford 13k on a barricade", I would take a look at their armour/items and just laugh. Usually they're snipers but you know where this is going.

The fact that they're in those hard servers anyway means they can, in 1 hard run you can use the assist xp on gold and get a cade.

I suggest you take a look at what I have posted before, and review what you said. My post was directed towards the idea that people should have a SHC or higher in order to join. I was not talking about normal cades.
[/quote]
Well, then force people to bring normal cades to a rag server? It ain't that hard. I'm fed up with spending hours on runs that fails just before the last boss. I play this game to win rounds, and I think I haven't beaten Ragnar in any of the 10 latest public runs. Much of this lies with too few cades, even though we had a tome on the servers.

EDIT: Realized I used experiences from hard servers, but I think it's mostly the same. Everyone over lvl 32 can afford a Normal cade or a Medic box, and if they don't bring it: make them.

[Slayer]

100% agree with yabu. If a anyone disagrees for whatever reason... Well I guess you don't do that many pub runs or you enjoy kissing ass.

[Maroon]

Err no, the playstile of NI will not change for a very loooooonggg time if at all. You seem to think that we have leet coders who can just change the mod to whatever they want 24/7 and only run on the mod.

Mate, if that were the case, NI would have a shitload more aspects to it and the "new loot system" would have been implemented a year ago.

The best time for NI IMO was when Huscarlton Banks was around because he was pretty much the only one that could write new code and create new things/methods into the mod. Now that he's gone, yea nah. Changing the way NI works will never happen.

Aw, man, for real? I thought developers were magical fairies that could sprinkle stardust over wishes to make them come true. Bummer.
Seriously, though, I'm curious what makes you so certain the playstyle of NI won't change in a long time. I'm pretty sure that it does shift with every patch added. 0.5.1 already reduced the strength of cades somewhat, 0.6.0 introduced cavalry, an entirely new playstyle. Sure, the changes I noted above are radical to say the least, and most likely impossible to code (hence the "And that's not even mentioning the boundaries of Warband's module system."), but I still think fundamental changes to NI will improve it so much more than just adding restrictions to players in order to fix a less efficient system.
I guess there isn't much to say against "demanding" a normal barricade or med kits from players, aside from personal standards.

Also, Slayer, people have opinions. If they don't have the same one as you, that does not automatically mean they like ass kissing.

[Tsukiyomi]

I think a simple solution to this in the short term would be to simply raise the lvl needed for Ragnarok mode.  @ lvl 32 for hard, yes everyone should be able to afford a normal cade or medic box.  The problem is that newer / more casual players reach the lvl 39 rag requirement and decide to skip over hard mode altogether for the much nicer xp and drops offered by rag.  @ lvl 39 one is simply not able to bring in t4 support regardless of the gold they have acquired.  When it comes down to it, hard mode gives plenty of xp and nice drops for leveling and gaining wealth. IMO rag should be for the more advanced veteran players looking for a difficult team challenge, not for people who have just reached t4 and have no gear or support items.  I play public servers quite often and enjoy helping newer players learn more and get further than they would otherwise on normal and hard.  However it is frustrating being on a full rag server as the only shc bringer (especially when I have to die 40+ times for tomes so the rest of the team can have any chance of beating thor/odin).  I don't necessarily think there should be a requirement that you "have" to bring in t4 support items; as stated by others, not everyone can/wants to afford such things right away.  However, I believe it is necessary to at least have the ability to bring such a thing in.  This way people could at least borrow a shc, barrel, tome, medic box.. whatever it happens to be from either a friend or their house.  I would suggest either raising the lvl requirement for rag to 50 (the lvl needed for t4 support) or lowering the lvl needed to bring in t4 support to 39.  This would eliminate any excuses as to why support "can't" be brought in by people and would hopefully increase the number of nice things seen in public runs.

*edit*  Perhaps implementing something where players could buy a cade in-game could help.  This would be similar to buying a horse in cav where you don't keep it after you die/respawn, but it would at least give newer players more options to help the team on difficult boss rounds. 

[Noname]

Another way to make more players bring cades could be to increase the drop chances for cade bringers a little (a little!) bit, eg 0,001% for bringing a barrel or tome. That was a reason for players to bring in some support - The drop chances already really low, so personally I would use every chance (Except hacking of course)  to improve my drop rates.

---

The better the support item is, the more increase for the drop rate.
(Just a suggestion  )

[Winter]

Another way to make more players bring cades could be to increase the drop chances for cade bringers a little (a little!) bit, eg 0,001% for bringing a barrel or tome. That was a reason for players to bring in some support - The drop chances already really low, so personally I would use every chance (Except hacking of course)  to improve my drop rates.

---

The better the support item is, the more increase for the drop rate.
(Just a suggestion  )

The opposite is already true, though.  Bringing a Tome decreases drop rate by 50%, a Barrel by 30%, a Small Ammo Crate, Heavy Platform, Short Heavy or Surgeons by 20%, Barricades, Platforms and Medic Boxes by 10%, and everything under (Small Ammo Crate, Simple Medic Box, Deployable Shield) has no loss.  I don't know what the Deployable Shield Sets do.

Okay, now read the above again.  Do you see how ridiculous that sounds?  Increasing rather than decreasing would be just as ridiculous.  Hmmm, you have baited me into posting... I guess I need to actually contribute now.

Now for my actual response to the problem.  Short Heavy Barricades require Tier 4.  Tier 4 requires level 50.  Why not just decrease the requirement to Tier 3 Engineer?  It seems a massive amount of players think Normal Barricades are worthless (come on, admit it, there are people that would rather have no barricades than Normal ones and have voiced so in servers MANY times), and Heavy Barricades are only marginally better because they can be used to cover windows but aren't typically used for the frontal wall because they obstruct Swadian shooters.  If players can access a good barricade that people actually use at a sooner time, it is more likely that they will be willing to spend the tiny amount of money needed to make one.  Why waste 20k on something no one will use and some others will complain about?  The fact that people often choose not to use them in the wall because people get STUCK on them is also a concern.  You need to place them separate from the Short Heavy Barricades, otherwise the risk of being stuck gets higher and higher.

The effect of hero class should also be looked at.  I know the argument is over Barricades in general, but let's be honest.  People don't buy Normal Barricades because people don't like them.  I can quote several people saying they are worthless, ugly, unimportant, should be unequipped, or that people should just drop them in spawn or let them despawn so they do not clutter the base.  Short Heavy Barricades are the real Hard and Ragnarok mode barricades.  People will rush to level 32 through Normal so they can go to Hard for better experience and drops.  This brings them up to T2 support if they choose to level that.  They will then rush to 39 for Ragnarok and Tier 4 class and Tier 3 support so they can get to even better experience and drops.  What incentive is there to level up to 50 other than Tier 4 support?  The old incentive of Class Points for hybridization is gone.  People would rather save up their class points, get their T4 gear with their Assist XP > Gold conversions, and have some fun with their equipment AND not have to spend money on a respec if/when they decide to finally get to level 52 and go hero.  Going hero costs 750k and TONS of experience that could have instead been spent on Gold.  Short Heavy Barricades cost a meager ~300k.  People aren't not buying Short Heavies because they cost too much, they are not buying them because there is no incentive to level higher than 39 other than them and eventually hero class, and to be honest I'd prefer a pretty new shield, Striped Armor and eventually Transitional Armor, and decent enough armor and gear not to be made fun of than continue pouring experience into something that gives no real boost for several runs so I can finally hit level 50, then spend another 150k assist experience (30k gold, not much but it matters at that stage), and then finally buy a good barricade.  If Short Heavy Barricades were Tier 3, players would be much more willing to spend the little ~300k to get them.  This paragraph is a composition of statements made by several low-mid tier players that are late T3 or early T4 that I have talked to.  This is what new players are thinking, just in case anyone is wondering why they aren't bringing barricades and how they could be so unhelpful to the team.

I am not saying my solution is the only possibility or even assuring you that it would work.  This is only another possible solution to a problem that isn't forcing people to do stuff that I want to be considered.  Several times when crafting Short Heavy Barricades for people that really want to help the team I have had the distraught response, "Oh, only Siege Engineer can use it?!"  It just doesn't make sense.

Sorry for the word wall, hope I give some people ideas.  Thank you for your time.

[-Perception-]

Good point Winter, I already mentioned that a few times in-game. Lowering SHC's requirement to t3 would really help making public Hard and Ragnarok servers more playable. Also, it would make the progression of engineer class more continuous:
t2 normal cade - t3 SHC - t4 wall cade and barrel