Closed Discussion: RP XP

[Maiyannah]

Hi all,
One thing I would like to do is have experience awarded for roleplaying on the server - that is to say for socializing and emotes done in the name of RP.

I think this is a fairly non-controversial position; however the specific implementation can be up in the air, and rather than just going with whats most easy to program, I thought I'd solicit thoughts on what people would like to see in a RP XP system.

RP XP in most other places whom do it, is awarded on ticks based on message length.

This leads to a few questions:

1] Just how much XP do we want to give out for RP? A lot? A little? Somewhere in between?

2] How often do we want to award RP XP? Remembering that too frequently becomes a performance concern, but also, if we do so infrequently, then this will get lost on reset.

(Persisting ticks not yet awarded is possible but technically challenging. A challenge for after we have a minimum viable product, I think.)

3] Do we want players to know what exact XP values they are getting, or obscure them?

[wilkins1952]

For the amount I think a small tick of around 5-25 per increment is fitting, Based on message length and frequency of posting in each time interval, As for awarding it, Every 5 mins seems reasonable 12 ticks an hour and most people tend to rest every hour at least on average. As for if it should be visible personally I don't mind either way but I would want the option to obscure it at the very least. Just cause I like my level ups to be a bit of a surprise.

[Ouroboros]

My general opinion is if a person could go from level 1 to the level cap in, let's say three months, they could do the same with RP XP exclusively in six months. It wouldn't be a straight 50% of combat XP, because you'd realistically be getting far more XP from clearing dungeons back to back compared to whatever the frequency of RP XP is. I don't think disclosing the actual XP amounts is a worthwhile pursuit, because people engaging earnestly with roleplay on the server will be doing it for the roleplay and the XP will be a secondary reward, but if the amounts are disclosed inevitably people will attempt to optimize for RP XP income. Likewise I don't think disclosing general combat XP is a worthwhile endeavour; at most I'd recommend a 'banking' system where you aren't told how much XP you've gained until you've completed a dungeon, or stopped for a long rest, etc, but that's another conversation to be had.

Behind the scenes, I'd recommend a trickle system where it rewards a consistent amount of XP, but the actual messages informing players are infrequent. A per-message system rewards 'spammy' roleplay and while some people like myself lean towards very verbose and quickly typed messages, it's not ideal to have people being rewarded for filling the screen and shouldering other people aside verbally; maybe something akin to checking if a person has typed a message in the last five minutes, then tabulates those checks and informs them they've received RP XP once every ten-fifteen minutes, with some variable scaling based on nebulous character checks etc.

Perhaps add a multiplier up to a certain amount of characters nearby, as an implicit way of encouraging more than one-on-one roleplay; not a huge multiplier, like 3-5% per character nearby up to a maximum of 10% or something.

[Maiyannah]

Likewise I don't think disclosing general combat XP is a worthwhile endeavour; at most I'd recommend a 'banking' system where you aren't told how much XP you've gained until you've completed a dungeon, or stopped for a long rest, etc, but that's another conversation to be had.

I do agree though at the same time I strongly dislike systems that are so obfuscated no one ever really knows what's going on with them and if things are working as intended.

Behind the scenes, I'd recommend a trickle system where it rewards a consistent amount of XP, but the actual messages informing players are infrequent. A per-message system rewards 'spammy' roleplay and while some people like myself lean towards very verbose and quickly typed messages, it's not ideal to have people being rewarded for filling the screen and shouldering other people aside verbally; maybe something akin to checking if a person has typed a message in the last five minutes, then tabulates those checks and informs them they've received RP XP once every ten-fifteen minutes, with some variable scaling based on nebulous character checks etc.

Having an amount of XP per reward interval thats the maximum would probably solve this particular problem, so long as people realize that's the case.

Perhaps add a multiplier up to a certain amount of characters nearby, as an implicit way of encouraging more than one-on-one roleplay; not a huge multiplier, like 3-5% per character nearby up to a maximum of 10% or something.

I'd like to do this, though I'm not sure how doable it is without a performance impact. I do want to make sure there's at least someone around whom can hear them, though.

[wilkins1952]

I think explaining how it works on the forums and giving a broad overview is a good idea, But keep the specific values a little hidden that way it's clear if something is broken yet it's not that hard to avoid people abusing and gaming the system. Other than that yeah I agree with the other suggestion about more people around if possible more XP, And A banking system of sorts

[Maiyannah]

I suppose we can break this down into three concerns:

1] XP system obfuscation

I reluctantly agree that having it not entirely transparent is probably good for reasons of balance. The danger, however, is if we only reward on intervals, and the server crashes, xp up to that interval is lost. We can store this on the player with an object, but that does require additional scripting. This is something that's going on the 'want, but dont immediately need' list, I think.

2] RP XP intervals

I think every say 5 minutes is fine. Its not a lot of XP lost if you get set back five minutes of RP, especially if the RP is involved.

3] RP XP amounts

This will likely require tuning, and I'll be sure to program it in a way that the modifiers/amounts/etc can be changed easily in the code. I do agree with the concept of having more people around giving more xp, less people giving less. I do not know how easy that is to do without performance impacts but I can conceive of ways it would be done - just a matter of investigating whether they make the server cry or not.

[Ouroboros]

Unless the RP XP intervals are extremely large chunks in extremely spread apart intervals, like half a level worth of XP once every six hours, I don't think the concerns of lost RP XP due to crashes are particularly warranted, unless the server stability is constantly seesawing; in that circumstance I think there would be larger issues at play besides losing out on RP XP.

As for obfuscation; I think outlining the general progression rate is enough for a player base to be content; if you tell them that the same amount of time spent gaining combat XP is equivalent to one third as much or whatever in RP XP, that's enough information to still feel rewarded in what they're doing, but without the door being open to people trying to optimise chat banter to cruise for easy RP XP; provide enough information that people are encouraged to not specifically idle in populated areas emoting once every five minutes with *Scratches groin*, in other words.

[Maiyannah]

Unless the RP XP intervals are extremely large chunks in extremely spread apart intervals, like half a level worth of XP once every six hours, I don't think the concerns of lost RP XP due to crashes are particularly warranted, unless the server stability is constantly seesawing; in that circumstance I think there would be larger issues at play besides losing out on RP XP.

Correct, but I was talking more in general. Due to how the game works, we have to have larger periods of time between combat XP updates without taking a large performance hit. That's a little outside the scope of this particular discussion, however.

As for obfuscation; I think outlining the general progression rate is enough for a player base to be content; if you tell them that the same amount of time spent gaining combat XP is equivalent to one third as much or whatever in RP XP, that's enough information to still feel rewarded in what they're doing, but without the door being open to people trying to optimise chat banter to cruise for easy RP XP

I mean, I'm ultimately a woman whom is happy if we had the scripts entirely open, as a general FOSS advocate, so outlining the system is fine by me. My general opinion here is rules tend to end up made to get around dealing with specific bad actors. I prefer to make less rules, and just deal with the bad actors directly.

provide enough information that people are encouraged to not specifically idle in populated areas emoting once every five minutes with *Scratches groin*, in other words.

I feel called out!

But more seriously - this is why I am looking at making getting max XP per tick have to have several people around. With this being the case, they are going to be disruptive if they try to cheese it, and if they are disruptive, people are entirely within their rites to bounce them, or report them.

[wilkins1952]

I think obsfucation ingame is the best solution but if the scripts are freely open that's fine by me. More so the obsfucation ingame means that no one is exactly sure when they are going to level so there is a bit of a surprise to it. Which is somewhat enjoyable. So more the mentality that sure if you want to figure out what the exact XP system is, Feel free the script is right here, Otherwise you have the option to be as blind as possible just never looking at said script.

As for XP lost to crashes, I don't consider this a big issue, Is it frustrating, Yes. Is it the end of the world not really. At least not compared to stuff like losing weapons/Items/Gear due to crashes. If we can mitigate it we should otherwise just chalk it up to NWN gonna NWN.

[Maiyannah]

I think obsfucation ingame is the best solution but if the scripts are freely open that's fine by me. More so the obsfucation ingame means that no one is exactly sure when they are going to level so there is a bit of a surprise to it. Which is somewhat enjoyable. So more the mentality that sure if you want to figure out what the exact XP system is, Feel free the script is right here, Otherwise you have the option to be as blind as possible just never looking at said script.

Exactly. I feel having them open keeps us honest to people whom thing its doing something dodgy, but if you dont want to know how the sausage is made, you don't have to look.

This absolutely can lead to player min/max exploiting, but we can deal with problem players on an individual basis.