PC Perks System and Level Gates

[WolfyBlah]

They are not level-gates! There is a big difference!You can have lvl 10 int at lvl 27.

This is a way more open progression. Though I feel they should give more skillpoints per level or make every attribute cost 1 (2 at lvl 5&lt

But that is a balance issue.

So any perk that requires 10 int is level gated to 28.

 

[beHypE]

So any perk that requires 10 int is level gated to 28.

And your point is..? You want lvl 5 perks available level 2 ? I mean YES stuff is level gated, it's the very definition of progression. It's the same in every RPG, there's stuff you can't equip because you don't have the requirements, and you need to get to a higher level before you do. Implicitely everything is level gated unless you have a game where 100% of the stuff is available on your first minute of gameplay. What's wrong with that, do you just want to be right for the sake of not losing an argument ?

What I see is that we come from a lvl 100 static level gate to a lvl 28 dynamic level gate, which means you have the choice to have it "soon" if you specialize into it, or you take the slower approach and spend some points elsewhere and unlock it maybe level 35, 40 ? Still better than 100, and it is dependent on what you choose to do, not only what level you are.

 

[omegarte]

I wish TFP would go back to 5 levels for the starter quest instead of the current 4, especially with more points needed for higher attribute levels. I need that extra point early game for stamina/health perks!

 

[WolfyBlah]

And your point is..? You want lvl 5 perks available level 2 ? I mean YES stuff is level gated, it's the very definition of progression. It's the same in every RPG, there's stuff you can't equip because you don't have the requirements, and you need to get to a higher level before you do. Implicitely everything is level gated unless you have a game where 100% of the stuff is available on your first minute of gameplay. What's wrong with that, do you just want to be right for the sake of not losing an argument ?
What I see is that we come from a lvl 100 static level gate to a lvl 28 dynamic level gate, which means you have the choice to have it "soon" if you specialize into it, or you take the slower approach and spend some points elsewhere and unlock it maybe level 35, 40 ? Still better than 100, and it is dependent on what you choose to do, not only what level you are.

So... what you are saying is that there are still level gates?

 

[Eyegore]

In previous alphas a dedicated team of players could unlock concrete and even steel on day 1. Just as a reference for how good those designs were.

I unlocked concrete in one day too. I just went to home depot and bought a few bags, mixed it up in a 5 gallon bucket, and used it to build a wall. I had no experience, and it was actually pretty easy. Turns out it wasn't really locked to begin with, in real life. Why is this locked again? Now apply that 'woke' reasoning to everything in this game. Examples: Why do we build bicycles instead of looting them from garages and stores? Why do we build mini-bikes and now cars(!?)...at least we don't have to build guns anymore. Wow, that was dumb.

 

[OnlyMeiya]

Here is a poll to express your feelings regarding character progression. You can vote for multiple entrees.
The first three entries are for the perk system.

In A17 the system is 100% points based. All progress is purchased via points earned from leveling up. In A16 in addition to perks that could be bought with points there were also skills that auto-advanced without the player having to spend anything (although they could if they wanted). If the player engaged in the activity related to the skill they would advance and grow stronger in that skill.

The next two entries are for how wellness advances now vs before.

For the purpose of this poll wellness is being defined as the player's maximum health and stamina up to a possible full wellness of 200 each. In A17 health and stamina increase by spending points in Fortitude and Agility. In A16 health and stamina increase by eating food and vitamins.

The next three entries are for level gates.

Are the level gates currently just right in how they pace advancement or should they be lightened up or removed altogether?

The last two are for level caps.

Should players be able to max out their characters during one playthrough or should they specialize each time?

As a player who's played roughly 4600 hours into the game here is my opinion on it.

Purely point based system pulls us back to "farm zed to progress" Which makes the game linear, prior if you wanted to combat zed and increase your mining skill manually, you could do that (At and end game penalty since level up points are finite), but you could also hide away and take a break from killing zeds to mine and farm resources with limited conflict, gaining up skill points manually. I personally loved the combination and feel its more balanced to other play styles. Now I kill zeds to learn how to cook.

If you removed the exploits to gaining wellness in A16 (spam pain killers/tea or cold clothing/sitting in water and eating stew) the A 16 Wellness felt more balanced, and the perks to increase wellness maximum and minimum truly felt like end game perks, now the only way I'll increase it is to make point choices, which will break down eventually into a "META" build (Most effective tactical advantage (Tactics /available)where most players will likely start build in similar progression to optimize the leveling up progress.

I believe that a single major specialization and enough points to likely spec into other categories for efficiency at late game are the best choice, this adds replay value and lets the players truly have a choice when it comes to multiplayer, if all players can do the same thing then no one is truly special and in single player if all players can learn everything then replay value is lost and the game gets pretty stale as players don't have to think about skill decisions.

Anyway that's my 2 sense.

I like the new perk system over A16.I'm glad max health and stamina are separated from eating food.

I would like level gates removed.

I would like too few points to buy everything

I like the new perk system, but I dislike it doesn't give me the ability to work up things like mining via actually mining, that just makes me spend points.

I dislike how the new stamina mechanics work, The more you use stamina the stronger your body should become and adapt to the usage, increasing lung capacity, ect, but here its complete the opposite, I use stam therefore I get hard cap decreased, when I should be rewarded for these actions and therefore not using it should decrease them due to atrophy. If you don't use it, you lose it.

I agree with level gates being removed. Don't cage the players into linear progression.

I agree with limited points, with the ability to still gain eventually enough through repeated quest grinding (which is another good thing to keep you busy in the end game )

 

[Aldranon]

A slight change to the current system might be what many(?) people want.

1) Leave the current experience points for gaining Attributes only.

2) But, you can only increase Perks in each category by doing them. Call it "Training Points" or something like that.

3) You can gain Training Points faster if some one near you is a "Master" (maxed out at that Perk)

So, with #3, a new player can catch up and be useful to the team, quicker. Sorry SP, as always you are the lone wolf.

 

[Trunks_Budo]

I prefer the current perk system.

I definitely prefer the fortitude and agility aspect as opposed to the wellness system.

I dislike level gates, I think they should all be completely removed to allow the maximized creative freedom of leveling players.

(even intellect crafting-based ones which were implemented in the update today; If people want blade traps by day 10, let 'em have 'em. That's what a specialization is, there shouldn't be limits on a player's creative freedom.)

I think we should let players achieve all perks by the end. The thing is, if you specialize in one or two attributes, you'll miss out on the other attributes for a large portion of your world exploration. Even if you can eventually unlock everything, you'll spend a lot of the game missing out on many things. Invest heavily into intellect and fortitude, you miss out on the juicy benefits of strength and agility, etc. Allow creative freedom, that's what I say, I love creative freedom and choice. Choosing the ability to farm more effectively and regenerate health passively, over increased carry capacity and head-blow damage, is a HUGE sacrifice, but that's what I like about it. You can be better at some things and worse at others. If you invest only in intellect until level 25 and become able to make steel tools and blade traps, then you'll only begin to scratch the surface on agility, strength, fortitude, etc. That's a lot funner to me

 

[Zadwanaa]

I prefer the current perk system.
I definitely prefer the fortitude and agility aspect as opposed to the wellness system.

I dislike level gates, I think they should all be completely removed to allow the maximized creative freedom of leveling players.

(even intellect crafting-based ones which were implemented in the update today; If people want blade traps by day 10, let 'em have 'em. That's what a specialization is, there shouldn't be limits on a player's creative freedom.)

I think we should let players achieve all perks by the end. The thing is, if you specialize in one or two attributes, you'll miss out on the other attributes for a large portion of your world exploration. Even if you can eventually unlock everything, you'll spend a lot of the game missing out on many things. Invest heavily into intellect and fortitude, you miss out on the juicy benefits of strength and agility, etc. Allow creative freedom, that's what I say, I love creative freedom and choice. Choosing the ability to farm more effectively and regenerate health passively, over increased carry capacity and head-blow damage, is a HUGE sacrifice, but that's what I like about it. You can be better at some things and worse at others. If you invest only in intellect until level 25 and become able to make steel tools and blade traps, then you'll only begin to scratch the surface on agility, strength, fortitude, etc. That's a lot funner to me

Wait, did they reduce the level cap from 300 to something else? cause otherwise.. you can max everything by level 225? 245? something like that

 

[Drengor]

I am strongly disappointed in the new model. Some of the perks (bonus materials for mining, etc) work fine as perks, but the removal of skills is ass.

You most definitely should not be able to max everything. Where exactly the line is (60%?) is debatable. However, as it stands, maxing a large portion of the int perks is required to unlock everything, severely sabotaging the system.

Don't really care too much about the wellness... either system is ok.

I'm not fond of level gates. There's little joy in scavenging anymore. With the RNG, scoring a needed book early, or even finally finding it when you've been looking for it for days, was an event. Now it's simply where can I find more zombies.

 

[skullpoker]

Here is a poll to express your feelings regarding character progression. ...

Are the level gates currently just right in how they pace advancement or should they be lightened up or removed altogether?

Interesting that Dev's could have this poll to look at and go entirely against what their customers want.

You can vote for multiple entrees.

I vote for the chicken marsalla, roast beef, and swedish meatballs. For sides, I vote for brussel sprouts and glazed carrots.

 

[konva]

Well, the answers speak for themself in pool, but one isnt clarified enough, level cap means you cant buy all points, this is very fine if you play on server with good population or with friends, if you play single player, it may f*cks your game, or maybe not, cant tell, but there should be option for server admins or for single player settings, that you will be able to set your custom cap within some low and full range

 

[Telosbudo]

Why'd b240 reinstate level gates when they removed them 2 days prior in the previous update???

Didn't even bother to include level gates in the perk system patch notes:

"Perks grant you specific abilities and higher perk levels require certain attribute levels. Attributes have 10 levels and most perks have 5 levels."

Is there a way to remove level gates in the perk system by editing the xml file?

 

[Telosbudo]

Well, the answers speak for themself in pool, but one isnt clarified enough, level cap means you cant buy all points, this is very fine if you play on server with good population or with friends, if you play single player, it may f*cks your game, or maybe not, cant tell, but there should be option for server admins or for single player settings, that you will be able to set your custom cap within some low and full range

I agree. Can someone confirm if we can edit level gates in the xml?

 

[Darellion]

What's up with everything (except bicycles thankfully) being level gated again? I thought the move was away from level gating. The poll certainly showed that players prefer not having level gates. Now, no iron tools until 20, no steel until 60, Minibike - nope not until 35(?). What the actual hell?

 

[Telosbudo]

What's up with everything (except bicycles thankfully) being level gated again? I thought the move was away from level gating. The poll certainly showed that players prefer not having level gates. Now, no iron tools until 20, no steel until 60, Minibike - nope not until 35(?). What the actual hell?

I concur. What The actual hell, indeed!

 

[mr.devolver]

How about this:

If you want gates, remove player level gates, implement category level gates instead and let the players level up the base categories automatically.

Example: Player wants to unlock some recipe in Intellect category. Say the recipe they want to unlock requires Intellect 5. Instead of waiting for player level 20+, they can either spend points to improve their Intellect and then spend points to unlock the recipe, or they can boost their intellect automatically by doing stuff that requires intellect like crafting, science, whatever and then spend their points to unlock the recipe they want in that category.

This way players will still have to play the game to get that pesky gyrocopter, but they will be free to play the game the way they want instead of being forced to play it in one particular style.

Why are the gates bad in general? Because you can never have a poor quality bicycle, it always starts with higher quality, so what's the point of giving it any quality in the first place? This is just an example, you may laugh all you want, but when you think deeply about what I was trying to say by that, you will know that level gates (either category level or player level) make the abilities of all the players the same in the end.

At least in case of base category level gate system where you could boost your category level by doing stuff that falls in that category, you would have fewer frustrated players who don't want to kill bazillions of zombies to learn how to craft a bicycle.

 

[madmole]

As a player who's played roughly 4600 hours into the game here is my opinion on it.






Anyway that's my 2 sense.

I like the new perk system, but I dislike it doesn't give me the ability to work up things like mining via actually mining, that just makes me spend points.

I dislike how the new stamina mechanics work, The more you use stamina the stronger your body should become and adapt to the usage, increasing lung capacity, ect, but here its complete the opposite, I use stam therefore I get hard cap decreased, when I should be rewarded for these actions and therefore not using it should decrease them due to atrophy. If you don't use it, you lose it.

I agree with level gates being removed. Don't cage the players into linear progression.

I agree with limited points, with the ability to still gain eventually enough through repeated quest grinding (which is another good thing to keep you busy in the end game )

There are so many problems to skill grinding. The biggest issue was how to sandwich it in between governing attributes (creates interesting diseases, debuffs, and buffs) and perks. Then you have to do grindy things to level up your skill which would be a gate between attributes and perks. Coming up with fun ways to progress skills and balance all of it made it too complicated. We had it in, but it sucked.

The current system you can just play the game and get better how you want. You aren't spam crafting stuff to craft better, you aren't getting hit to increase your armor skill, you aren't breaking legs to improve agility. That system made players jump through hoops and do immersion breaking activities more so than buying what you want to be better at currently does, and over complicated everything.

 

[madmole]

How about this:
If you want gates, remove player level gates, implement category level gates instead and let the players level up the base categories automatically.

Example: Player wants to unlock some recipe in Intellect category. Say the recipe they want to unlock requires Intellect 5. Instead of waiting for player level 20+, they can either spend points to improve their Intellect and then spend points to unlock the recipe, or they can boost their intellect automatically by doing stuff that requires intellect like crafting, science, whatever and then spend their points to unlock the recipe they want in that category.

This way players will still have to play the game to get that pesky gyrocopter, but they will be free to play the game the way they want instead of being forced to play it in one particular style.

Why are the gates bad in general? Because you can never have a poor quality bicycle, it always starts with higher quality, so what's the point of giving it any quality in the first place? This is just an example, you may laugh all you want, but when you think deeply about what I was trying to say by that, you will know that level gates (either category level or player level) make the abilities of all the players the same in the end.

At least in case of base category level gate system where you could boost your category level by doing stuff that falls in that category, you would have fewer frustrated players who don't want to kill bazillions of zombies to learn how to craft a bicycle.

We're adding parts to traders and loot, so an INT 1 player can craft a brown vehicle if he wants and the long term goal would be for any low attribute character to be able to succeed at the game.

 

[Kattla]

I'm not fond of level gates. There's little joy in scavenging anymore. With the RNG, scoring a needed book early, or even finally finding it when you've been looking for it for days, was an event. Now it's simply where can I find more zombies.

I wasn't too found of it either. It sounds terrible, at least on paper, the current level gating.

Then i started playing, and.. no, i don't find it too bad anymore. I find that the crucibel to make

steel is probaly gated way to high, since steel is used in other recipes, like mods, and for repairs.

With the current level gating, even the magazines, at least some, can be quite useful. And with

the nerdy glasses, +1 crafting level, i can make purple stuff for selling with only int 8. Maybe

even INT 7, with glasses and magazine for int perks.

If anything, the current system is heaps better then what we started experimental with.

Though, you be right in that it requires fighting zombies. But, levelling seem to be easier

the higher one gets in level. Just play the game and the levels seem to just fly by anyway.