Staff of Elemental Mastery - The Burning Lands Chase Loot

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Benito, Oct 10, 2018.

  1. eqgamer Augur

    Or....let those who no longer raid but support the game to the fullest, rejoice. Hopefully it’s a copy of TBL and not RoS stuff.
  2. Tucoh Augur

    Cool, I figured there was a good reason.

    I don't speak for anyone else, but you've earned enough good will with your hard work that if the next expansion you just came out and said, "Look this enhanced minion stuff is ridiculous, we're doing something more simpler, albeit a little less interesting, so we have time to do a lot more." I'd wager that people would understand!
    snailish likes this.
  3. snailish Augur

    I absolutely could be off base.

    -Why design a baseline pet no one actually intends to use...
    -Why force a weaker earring onto 3 classes to justify the templatized foci...
    -You restrict the pet based on how the spell is acquired, if that is desired. This can range from insta-easy to tedious (i.e., immediately on vendors, requires currency, requires quest turn ins, rare drop, raid drop, etc.).
    -AA route can make sense, I don't see an issue with nearly anything being made into AA in respects to effects, alternate stats (various mod2 and so on)... especially if that thing has already become an "always in this slot" thing on gear.
    -old earrings don't focus the new pets, new pets are better so it shouldn't matter.

    It's valid to question if there should even be a difference between pets. It was an interesting flavor way back when it was brought in, when way more development time was put into things like that. Not sure it is a good use of even a sliver of dev time now --depends what the time would be used to do instead.
  4. segap Augur


    I think the problem there is that Beastlords, Mages and Necros favor different stats. It does seem the ear rotates between those desires expansion to expansion. Changing it to a type 3 aug that drops would provide more flexibility to players if the current EM system is desired by the dev team. But players would complain they have to loot one more thing than other classes.

    Changing the pet scrolls to be Rk I-III could be a simpler solution, but won't affect any AA based swarm pets. Some might complain that's a nerf. Making EM an AA would take away the distinction between group and raid pets. There's trade-offs to any change in how it works.
    snailish likes this.
  5. Brohg Augur

    ...would annoy necromancers quite a lot, they already have thrajillion type 3s competing for those 12 slots
  6. segap Augur


    But if the mythical dot revamp happens...
  7. smash Augur

    Changing it to a type 3 aug, does nothing to reduce the work for the devs, they still gotta make the thing of balancing stuff.

    Am afraid there no way to get around it.

    Only way as I see it is that the number of times that it is done. Can be done that, there more expansions where there no raise of levels. But as expansions come, the monsters become harder due to increased number of hps/stats, people get more pet AA for help.



    And for each increase, I guess they also need to balance the pet with the earring...maybe..

    I guess they could reduce the number of AA people are giving, or let them cost more, so if today you get 4 ranks each cost 50 AA, in future let them cost the max aa you can bank (220 atm), give them 1 rank and it cost 220 AA


    Now this has not directly to do with making earring and time for it.

    Personally, I am against everyone getting the increase pet, as it is not different than getting raid items, you only get it doing raids.
  8. menown Augur

    Possible solution to Dev time spent on pet foci:

    Step 1: Make focus only work on swarm pets, thereby reducing pet templates by 70%.

    Step 2: Create pet inventory window. Number of slots available is decided by Dev team. Back item can be continued to save time.

    Step 3: Create new item templates that are pet only. Spread these drops across namers in group content and raid chests in raids. These could be on the bonus loot tables, much like ornaments.

    This would take a bit of work up front, but upgrading armor templates from then on can be done through spreadsheet formulas. This idea also addresses a highly vocal demand from the community.
    Venau likes this.
  9. Gnomereaper Augur


    Any possibility of ever getting a clicker that summonses pet weapons?
  10. smash Augur

    Still does nothing to reduce the balancing job for the devs.

    And the pet window prob going to cost at least the same amount of work a pet earring would cost.

    Not to mention that if it was me that would make the window i would lower the power of pets.

    Why because pet items does not destroy when pet dies, so pet becomes more powerful, for me solution in that case reduce power.
  11. Sheex Goodnight, Springton. There will be no encores.

    I respectfully disagree, sir. If you want to flat out buy (BIS type) power, there is a server with special rules that can accommodate you.
    Sancus likes this.
  12. menown Augur

    Honestly, I would not know if this reduces or increases the balancing job for the Devs. The balancing job could be the simple part, but the coding for the templates could be the long tedious part. Or it could be the other way around, or both. I don't think you know exactly the answer to that either.

    I don't understand your second statement. Creating a pet window is a 1 time job. Creating templates for each pet and swarm pet going back 10 levels every time a new focus is created is in my opinion a lot more work that continues as long as expansions are being produced. Maybe you can clarify this statement for me.

    The last 2 things you mention are simply unfounded. You are making lots of assumptions here. I never said the pet inventory window needed to include all 23 slots.

    For example:
    (Random numbers used)
    Give conflagrant items a weight of 1 per.
    Pet Focus is given a weight of 5, for back item and template.

    Current potential max pet power = 19 conflagrant - 1 back (pet focus item) + 5 pet focus = 23

    New potential max pet power:
    Pet inventory = 4 slots.
    Give pet droppable items that go in pet inventory a weight of 2 per.

    (4 slots x 2 weight) + (19 conflagrant - 4 droppable slots) slots still available = 23

    A weighted scale can be used for any pet. The power of a group pet focus would then translate to a lesser weight for the pet inventory droppable items. Maybe 1.5? All of these numbers are artificial, but the bar would barely be moved for current pet foci and the implementation of a pet window.
  13. segap Augur


    Look at the context of my reply. It was in reference to the earring stats not being optimal versus other available, non EM earrings. There's a reason for snipping the quoted part of a reply.
  14. smash Augur

    You would need to make as many slots as a pet today can equip items in, or you reduce the value of the window, making the job half done.

    Then situation today, you equip pet with best ts stuff you can get, which gives pet like 60k+ hps 2k ac, i have no idea if those numbers are correct, that for sure increase pet powe in survival as well. I HOWEVER know that if pet dies those equipment are gone costing 50k+, so during a year i will not do that often only when absolutely necessary.

    Devs also know that and can balance pets being a bit tougher

    Now if same equipment survives, devs have to take that in consideration and balance from that point, which for sure makes pets weaker.

    Now the subject changed to pets and i dont think the op intended that.
  15. Gnomeland Augur

    I read Ngreth's post, but I still don't understand how it's so difficult to automate this in one database script. They have scripts for automatically upgrading monsters using a template, every expansion. Why don't they have the same for pets? It should be as easy as coming up with the names and the graphics for the new pet earrings, running the database script to add it and the corresponding pet templates and spells, and sending it to testing.

    It should take no more than a few minutes of work from a programmer. Even in case it does, the effort most certainly shouldn't scale linearly with the amount of levels added.
  16. IblisTheMage Augur

    Pet foci and the resulting pet level increase are key to my perception of being a pet class. Erhh playing one, I mean :).

    I am all for strategies that can reduce design workload, as long as pet foci are still part of the equation.

    Maybe automated testing, where a sandbox environment can run a 100 fights (with merc healer?) against some expansion related mobs, the task is then to select these mobs, load a stack of pet templates, and let the 100 fights against 10 mobs for each pet run over night...