Light/full Party buff

[Rentahamster]

and what is this negative unintended consequences and bad behavious you talking about?

Do I need to explain this again? I posted about it in this thread multiple times, and even the OP elaborated on this issue.



Let's say you are solo. You add another member to your party to make a duo. Your battle effectiveness increases accordingly to the ability of your partner and you ability to work together as a team.

Let's say you add another member to make your party a trio. Your battle effectiveness increases accordingly to the ability of the third party member and your ability to work together as a team.

Let's say you add another member to make a party of 4. Your battle effectiveness increases accordingly to the ability of the 4th parth member and you ability to work together as a team. In addition, you are granted an additional bonus for no apparent reason, other than the fact that you reached the arbitrary number 4.

That 4th member could be anyone, and you'd still get the party buff. It would be a crafter, it could be a rank 1 alt, it could be someone AFKing back in town. It doesn't matter. You can add a completely useless party member to your party, and while normally, this would be a hindrance to your party since you're just carrying dead weight, with the party buff in place this otherwise useless party member actually increases your overall effectiveness just by being there.

Functionally, your party is still a trio, but it is rewarded with buffs just by adding a useless member to it.

Is it fostering good gameplay to reward players for adding useless members to their party? No.

Is it necessary for dungeon content balance to have to resort to crutches like a party balance buff? No.

Look, this isn't a huge issue. The debate about the party buff is insignificant when compared to the other problems this game has.

That doesn't mean I can't point out bad design decisions when I see them.

[Aver]

That doesn't mean I can't point out bad design decisions when I see them.

Noted and agreed, but at the same time, why remove it? Fix it.

As a person, I don't like having a feature added just to have it removed arbitrarily, be it for a game or console, software, hardware - the human mind just isn't wired to like that. So instead, one takes a system that seems a little rushed and easily exploitable and makes it worthwhile by adding two or three simple checks. Is the 4th/8th person in the same zone? Are they an acceptable level range with regards to the party? Are they DoW/DoM? If any of these are no, poof no buff. There, problem fixed.

[Aver]

Because some people will find anything to complain about when they're bored.

Zone/level restrictions make more sense than just outright removing it. I'm usually solo/duo, so it's rare I get the buff, but when I do it makes me happy to be in a party. It's a mental thing, not a game-balancing/breaking thing.

[Chardrizard]

realistically no one is going that far to invite crafters/uselessppl for an insignificant buff, it is a possible scenario but it is not gonna be something that everyone does like "abandoning leves".

Is it fostering good gameplay to reward players for adding useless members to their party?

what is good gameplay? it's subjective.

sure, it might be a bad design, but it is a bad design that people actually enjoys, removing it would cause nothing but setting these people to rage mode and ensues another angry thread.

[Rentahamster]

what is good gameplay? it's subjective.

It's subjective yes, but that doesn't mean one can abandon all sense of logic in one's analysis of what it is to have good gameplay.

If someone honestly thinks that being rewarded for adding an AFK person to your party is an example of "good gameplay", then that person needs his head examined.

hmmm I see your point now, yea I have no idea in this regard tbh.

Thank you.

[Ilean]

If someone honestly thinks that being rewarded for adding an AFK person to your party is an example of "good gameplay", then that person needs his head examined.

So the mechanic can be exploited, oh noes!

Other than that you are whining about something that AFAIK, hasn't been proven to have any impact on whatever little content there is now.

[Rentahamster]

Other than that you are whining about something that AFAIK, hasn't been proven to have any impact on whatever little content there is now.

It's not whining, it's analysis. I've been careful to word my posts in a logically consistent and meaningful fashion, but it that still sounds like whining to you, then I don't know what to tell you.

Throughout the thread I have already shown it to have a detrimental impact on the area of player incentives. It is not good design to reward players for actions that would have otherwise be detrimental to themselves. Another example of this phenomenon occurring in-game would be getting benefit from failing your leves on purpose.

[Shikaree]

Maybe instead of complaining about party size buffs, how about we instead focus on fixing thaumaturges so they can't go out and solo a good deal of the nm content we have currently?

[Asmeret]

I'm not exactly sure how EXP/SP is distributed, but this is how I think it should work. There should be a range around a monster that you have to be in, in order to get EXP/SP. While in that range, your party members effect your EXP/SP per kill, and you effect theirs. Likewise, players have their own range from one to another. If you are in range to a player, you gain a small buff, scaling with the number of party members around you. That way people who AFK effect the EXP/SP of the party so that it can't be abused by those just wanting to get the buff. One person = No buff, Two people = 1.25%, Three = 2.75%, Four = 4.5% or something along those lines. Anything to actually promote players to play with eachother.

[Asmeret]

We know the point you're trying to make, but you're coming off as others have said. If you don't want to be perceived that way, try changing your attitude.