Battlerage

Sena

Battlerage abilities don't cost endurance or willpower (mine didn't, at least), so the only reason you're seeing more endurance and willpower drain is because you're hunting more efficiently. You're wasting less time moving around and finding more denizens, because every denizen is the equivalent of multiple denizens now. It's a good thing.

Katzchen

@Sena not if they've taken that into account when balancing xp and gold bonuses, which it sounds like if they haven't already, they will when they get more info.

If it takes 3x longer to kill something, but you get 3x the gold and 3x the xp, that's good. If it takes 5x longer to kill something and you get 3x the gold and xp, maybe not so good.

Granted, you will use more cures, I'd noticed I'm going through a ton of moss, but figured that's largely the event as well.

Sena

I hope they try to balance it so highly efficient bashing now is roughly the same xp/gold per hour as highly efficient bashing before, even if that means that normal/casual bashing is naturally more efficient than it used to be. If old casual bashing is the point you try to balance new bashing around, then it's a nerf for the more skilled hunters.

Halos

The class pages on the wiki all have battlerage ability info added to them now! 

Alchemist

Apostate

Bard
Druid
Infernal
Jester
Magi
Monk
Occultist
Paladin
Priest
Runewarden
Sentinel
Serpent
Shaman
Sylvan

celebrate

Jules

Klendathu said:

Lots to take in, a few coding challenges, but I wholeheartedly believe this is a positive change. Those who say bashing was boring now have additional challenges.

Alaskar said:

Hell, it's pretty easy to code something to automatically use it if you have it.  

 
Etc... etc... From what I am seeing here and in conversations in-game, the guys who not only understand the game mechanics on a deep level, but are also pretty solid coders seem to be loving this.  And... there should be things for them, although to be fair they already have almost exclusive access to the best part of Achaea - its combat system, so it seems pretty awful to sort of lock the plebes out of hunting too, although I doubt that was directly the intent.  It does look like it could make groups pretty fun, though, and in general, it looks like it IS fun for someone who actually has the skillset to deal with it.  

Also, I just thought we were trying to move away from automation somewhat, or at least not make people who aren't pretty proficient at both coding AND game mechanics feel absolutely hopeless not just at player combat, but at hunting.  

Anaria

I'm sorry to say this because I appreciate that some effort is being made to make bashing less tedious... but I don't like this change. As has been said in above posts, it has made fights longer and less rewarding. Grouping remains a bad idea if you actually want to advance. And the abilities themselves have no connection to the "real" abilities your character learns in the three primary class skills. It all feels very artificial to me.

I think once the novelty of having one or two more bashing commands to type during a denizen fight wears off, the extra effort and time bashing will now require will outweigh any aspect of fun this change brings. 

If are you determined to stick with it, I would respectfully suggest tweaking it so that it is at least on par with the old system in terms of time investment.

Vakvyr

You'd think in this day and age people would stop having wrong opinions.

Aodfionn

Halos said:

The class pages on the wiki all have battlerage ability info added to them now! 

Alchemist

Apostate

Bard
Druid
Infernal
Jester
Magi
Monk
Occultist
Paladin
Priest
Runewarden
Sentinel
Serpent
Shaman
Sylvan

celebrate

invalid, "because secrets"

Jaybles

Anaria said:

I'm sorry to say this because I appreciate that some effort is being made to make bashing less tedious... but I don't like this change. As has been said in above posts, it has made fights longer and less rewarding. Grouping remains a bad idea if you actually want to advance. And the abilities themselves have no connection to the "real" abilities your character learns in the three primary class skills. It all feels very artificial to me.

I think once the novelty of having one or two more bashing commands to type during a denizen fight wears off, the extra effort and time bashing will now require will outweigh any aspect of fun this change brings. 

If are you determined to stick with it, I would respectfully suggest tweaking it so that it is at least on par with the old system in terms of time investment.

From the solo basher's perspective, I'd say the time investment is lessened (and exp/gold gain increased) with how efficient it is being able to get more out of a single area instead of having to area hop before. This is with the 2x exp in mind as well. 

Anaria

Jaybles said:

From the solo basher's perspective, I'd say the time investment is lessened (and exp/gold gain increased) with how efficient it is being able to get more out of a single area instead of having to area hop before. This is with the 2x exp in mind as well. 

I have not found this to be the case. 

Aerek

Jaybles said:

From the solo basher's perspective, I'd say the time investment is lessened (and exp/gold gain increased) with how efficient it is being able to get more out of a single area instead of having to area hop before. This is with the 2x exp in mind as well. 

I have found this to be the case.

It takes longer to clear an area, but that area nets a much larger reward. The old "gold per hour" ideas assume several different areas are open for hunting. I could clear Dun in 20 minutes and make 10k, but then if none of my other bashing grounds were full, my earnings stopped.

Now I can find Dun full, clear it in 40 minutes, make 30k, and it doesn't matter if any other grounds are open. Takes longer to clear an area, but it's a positive gain because you don't need multiple areas to reach a satisfactory result.

Bluef

Alaskar said:

That was a rather, uhm, dramatic post. 

True. You don't have to use rage. But it will take you forever to kill anything now without it. 

You had mentioned 5 curses in your post. Prior to battlerage I'd have to sling 10-12 swiftcurses to kill something. Now it's something like 30-50 swiftcurse per denizen, depending on the denizen. And I only get maybe 40 rage on average per denizen, so basically I have to run around and kill a bunch of things before I can really start killing things. 

The spam....oh, gods the spam. I have not even attempted to group hunt under this system. I don't think I could handle it if its this bad with just one person/shaman.

The solo basher's experience IMO is terrible. Less time investment? No. It takes twice as long to clear any area now. That's not an improvement because it feels so damn slow and clunky. Any perception of what's being gained right now is also incredibly skewed by the double experience bonus. I'l give you that the gold increase is nice but again, we're using double the curatives so....it's not that nice. You have to factor these things in to the overall experience. 

Now, when I said I died "100 times" that was a bit of an exaggeration. But I have died more today than ever before on a single day when I was not PvPing. In fact, I can't recall the last time I died hunting prior to today's changes.

I'm a squishy siren with an INT focus trying to fight mobs that have way too much health. I can't tank them. I can't tank even a small group of denizens anymore. It's not that their damage increased; it's that I used to be able to weaken/kill them before much more quickly and now they're still at 80% health while I'm being bludgeoned.

I figured out that I can still hunt as long as I hunt things that are considerably smaller...which will likely give me no real Xp after this weekend. I can't say I'm excited about that.

Also it's not easy to code something like that. I don't have any coding background and wouldn't know where to begin making something like that. Moreover, I don't know if I want to automate my hunting. I thought automation was frowned upon and yet every conversation I have heard about this new hunting system today involved how to automate it. Ernam would be proud. 

As for the tone of my post, its wholly appropriate. I was an avid hunter beforehand, and I think these changes suck. I have a right to that opinion. It's not set in stone. I don't want to hate the changes, but from the excessive willpower drain (which was already terrible and wasn't in any way mediated by megalith, trans philo, and a circlet) to the necessary coding (which I am not equipped to do) to the fact that my 1,200 credit crit pendant now seems as worthless as an old shoe....I don't have a lot to be hopeful about in regard to them.

I don't game to problem solve like those who PvP. I do it to unwind and roleplay. I won't touch upon the RP introduction of this new skillset was because I wasn't there for it, but I will say that coming into the realm after the fact to find out that you can bind new spirits for no obvious reason is really terribad.

I feel especially sorry or anyone who has been long dormant and wakes up soon only to find that the shop they rented out is up for auction, their trade skills have poofed, their House is gone to the Renaissance, etc. Because now they also have to sit down to figure out how to hunt again too.

It's not surprising that everyone who I've spoken to that's really excited about these changes are all people who avidly PvP in groups and have a deep understanding of coding and game mechanics because that's what it takes to get the most out of the system. To me, that is just going to create more in-game disparity between those who have the skillset to deal with the changes and those who don't. It does make those who feel absolutely hopeless at player combat, feel like hey now we suck at hunting too! Go us!

Atalkez

Bluef said:

Alaskar said:

That was a rather, uhm, dramatic post. 

True. You don't have to use rage. But it will take you forever to kill anything now without it. 

You had mentioned 5 curses in your post. Prior to battlerage I'd have to sling 10-12 swiftcurses to kill something. Now it's something like 30-50 swiftcurse per denizen, depending on the denizen. And I only get maybe 40 rage on average per denizen, so basically I have to run around and kill a bunch of things before I can really start killing things. 

The spam....oh, gods the spam. I have not even attempted to group hunt under this system. I don't think I could handle it if its this bad with just one person/shaman.

The solo basher's experience IMO is terrible. Less time investment? No. It takes twice as long to clear any area now. That's not an improvement because it feels so damn slow and clunky. Any perception of what's being gained right now is also incredibly skewed by the double experience bonus. I'l give you that the gold increase is nice but again, we're using double the curatives so....it's not that nice. You have to factor these things in to the overall experience. 

Now, when I said I died "100 times" that was a bit of an exaggeration. But I have died more today than ever before on a single day when I was not PvPing. In fact, I can't recall the last time I died hunting prior to today's changes.

I'm a squishy siren with an INT focus trying to fight mobs that have way too much health. I can't tank them. I can't tank even a small group of denizens anymore. It's not that their damage increased; it's that I used to be able to weaken/kill them before much more quickly and now they're still at 80% health while I'm being bludgeoned.

I figured out that I can still hunt as long as I hunt things that are considerably smaller...which will likely give me no real Xp after this weekend. I can't say I'm excited about that.

Also it's not easy to code something like that. I don't have any coding background and wouldn't know where to begin making something like that. Moreover, I don't know if I want automate my hunting. I thought automation was frowned upon and yet ever conversation I have heard about this new hunting system today involved how to automate it. Ernam would be proud. 

As for the tone of my post, its wholly appropriate. I was an avid hunter beforehand, and I think these changes suck. I have a right to that opinion. It's not set in stone. I don't want to hate the changes, but from the excessive willpower drain (which was already terrible and wasn't in any way mediated by megalith, trans philo, and a circlet) to the necessary coding (which I am not equipped to do) to the fact that my 1,200 credit crit pendant now seems as worthless as an old shoe....I don't have a lot to be hopeful about in regard to them.

I don't game to problem solve like those who PvP. I do it to unwind and roleplay. I won't touch upon the RP introduction of this new skillset was because I wasn't there for it, but I will say that coming into the realm after the fact to find out that you can bind new spirits for no obvious reason is really terribad.

It's not surprising that everyone who I've spoken to that's really excited about these changes are all people who avidly PvP in groups and have a deep understanding of coding and game mechanics love these changes because that's what it takes to get the most out of the system.

To me that is just going to create more in-game disparity between those who have the skillset to deal with the changes and those who don't. It does make those who feel absolutely hopeless at player combat, feel like hey now we suck at hunting too! Go us!

I'm not sure who is telling you to automate anything, or really why. These changes have been relatively easy to incorporate for me. I'm like you, I don't have a coding background and what I do know I've learned here. I just have a few simple aliases that help me out a lot. My attacks went from doing 7-8% per, down to 1-2% per on any denizen worth mentioning.

From what I've noticed, most classes got 3 damage attacks, and 2 affliction attacks. For my hunting purposes, that's Stun and Weakness. To be the most effective, what I've been doing is attacking the mob building my Rage until it gets to shielding. Ideally right before, 22-25%.

Being that you can string these attacks together, and also follow them up with your normal attack - I've been able to stun/slash then have the rage to do a full combo of my damage attacks. Since they are able to crit, nearly everytime I've done this I've killed the mob.

I'm not sure what Shaman skills are, but I don't see how these changes have really hurt your hunting. If you have a lvl 3 crit pendant, you're still critting at the same rate just for a reduced amount due to mob health. If you save your Rage, for a pre-determined combination, then you'll probably be more efficient overall. I'm not sure using one attack per round or something is the best way to use them.

Yes, it is slow. Yes, you are going to struggle tanking the same things you used to. That's the point. Realistically hunting at the higher tier was ridiculously easy in dform and in lesser for most people. These changes have made it so that 1 Dragon can't wipe out all of Annwyn/UW/Vertani in an hour or whatever hunting. This will open up more areas to more people. Gold drops have increased, talisman drops have increased and from my understanding they will be looking into increasing the essence of the denizens as well. Overall, coming from a person that absolutely hated hunting before, I think the changes are good.

Rangor

1. Hunting grounds will No longer be perma cleared.
2. Did elder dragon talisman droprate get a boost?
3. Did mob essense also get increased?

Tharvis

Rangor said:

1. Hunting grounds will No longer be perma cleared.
2. Did elder dragon talisman droprate get a boost?
3. Did mob essense also get increased?

1. probably
2. yes
3. tables will be flipped if they haven't, so I assume it has been

Morsul

I think the problem Bluef is running into is that she's equating progress = how many areas you cleared. You can see this in her latest post. Quote: "It takes twice as long to clear any area now."

Let's take this example. In the old bashing system, each Minia pixie nets 1% experience, takes 1 curse to kill, which is around 1 second. You use 1 health sip and 1 herb to heal and cure for this 1 pixie, and you get 10 gold as a drop.

With Battlerage, each Minia pixie now nets 5% experience, but takes 5 curses to kill and 5 seconds of time. You use 5 health sips and 5 herbs to heal and cure for this big bad pixie, and you get 50 gold as a drop.

That's the ideal vision of Battlerage (which it fulfills quite well). For the solo basher, nothing changes in the long run with what you earn. The pixies take 5 times more to kill, but also gives you 5 times more in exchange.

The best thing about this change is that the number of mobs in the game, in terms of quantity, has not changed. There were 100 individual pixies before, there are still 100 individual pixies now. But each pixie has more quality and value, so while there are still 100 individual pixies, compared to the old bashing system, these pixies are now worth 500 pixies.

You don't need to clear an area to get the same amount of progress as it relates to time invested. It is going to take some time to get used to, but this is overall a very great change.

P.S. I didn't even factor in walking time. 1 pixie worth 5x more essentially means you kill 5 pixies without any time lost in between walking to those 5 pixies. In the old system, you kill 1 pixie per second, maybe spend 1 second travelling to the next pixie, which again takes 1 second to kill.

P.P.S. The one major flaw, I suppose, is that if you don't manage to kill that 1 pixie worth 5 times more, you don't get any experience, as opposed to the old system wherein if you kill 3 pixies and die on pixie #4, you still got experience from the first 3.

Katzchen

I don't know why essence should be changed. It'd be good to see shrines not being able to be dropped 3 at a time from anyone who's been solo hunting in dragon for an hour.

Bluef

Some people have elaborate timers set up. Echoes. Some people are entirely automating the attacks. I just used aliases today to test it out. I don't have the wherewithal to figure out how to do anything beyond that. 

For me, I need to be able to hit a denizen with 30-50 swiftcurses, which is a LOT of willpower and mana loss. There are also 3-5 swiftcurses in between each set. Willpower was a problem for shamans prior to the change. It's an even bigger one now.

Saving rage to use at the end would be great, if worrying about whether I can stand there and take 30 more hits wasn't a problem. To even get to where a denizen is down to 25% or so, I have to be able to withstand a lot more bludgeoning now. I have a Level 2 Girdle, SoA, and just about every other hunting artie you can think of; tanking that damage is still incredibly difficult to do. I don't know how people without those things would manage it. 

My crits are definitely not the same. I had a crit tracker installed long before this and I was getting 42-45% crit chance. Now I'm somewhere around 25-30%. That's a huge difference. Bug report came back, "That's the way things are intended to be." Hrm.

The slowness of the new hunting system is the biggest turnoff for me. It's not more realistic. It's just...lame. People complained about what a grind hunting was before...this is far worse. Compared to every other IRE game, we have the slowest, more boring bashing now. I invested a lot in hunting artefacts and now I probably won't even use them because who wants to bash like a slow, weak turtle? Not me.

And what am I supposed to bash? So far I've found that the only things that don't kill me are creatures that previously I would have considered targets for people level 60-70. I tested things all month and I cannot hunt any talisman area except for the Vertani now and even then I have to run in some placed and end up losing all my rage, which makes the thing I was trying to kill even more difficult to combat. Soooo I'm a dragon that can't hunt dragon areas. How is that realistic?

Bottom line: The new hunting system is not attractive as a means of entertainment to me. I get why the change may be a draw to some people, but when you're used to fast attacks and solid damage such a change doesn't feel like realism. is A lot of the fun and and engagement of hunting as a pastime is gone for me. I hunted my ass off to get dragon so hunting would be easier and relaxing. Now it's stressful and frustrating. 

When I consider how much cheaper, easier, and more enjoyable other console and online games are to play, I struggle to understand why I should continue to make investments in Achaea. Again, I'm not trying to be a total downer...but we're a text game. Instead of keeping things simple, everything has become so complicated, even hunting.  

Antonius

You might be using more curatives per kill, but you shouldn't be using anywhere close to twice as many gaining the same amount of gold as before, unless you're just really inefficient at killing things now.

Jarrod

If you're bashing somewhere you can't stand in room and kill whatever it is, you're not bashing efficiently to begin with.

Fix your habits before blaming the system.

Saeva

I'm into it. Makes me pay attention to what I'm doing! I don't even have nice scripts. I just have aliases. And it rulez. Thanks admin.

Morsul

Hit/run bashing is definitely the least efficient way of bashing. Let's say you're a piddly newbie who's bashing Manara gnolls. Each gnoll gives you 10% experience, but it takes you 10 curses to kill said gnoll, at 1 second per curse. You have to run every 2 hits or else that goddamn gnoll drinks your blood. That's 10 seconds of actually killing the gnoll, with running 5 times, let's say 5 seconds more. 15 seconds for 10% experience.

On the other hand, let's say you bash Minia pixies. Each minia pixie gives you 1% experience, 1 curse to kill, 1 second. That poor pixie has no chance of killing you. You don't spend 5 more seconds running. 10 seconds = 10 pixies = 10% experience, as opposed to 15 seconds = 1 gnoll, 10% experience.

Even if you bash "lower than your level", you're still going to bash more efficiently, and thus translate to more experience per time invested.

Bluef

Morsul said:

I think the problem Bluef is running into is that she's equating progress = how many areas you cleared. You can see this in her latest post. Quote: "It takes twice as long to clear any area now."

Let's take this example. In the old bashing system, each Minia pixie nets 1% experience, takes 1 curse to kill, which is around 1 second. You use 1 health sip and 1 herb to heal and cure for this 1 pixie, and you get 10 gold as a drop.

With Battlerage, each Minia pixie now nets 5% experience, but takes 5 curses to kill and 5 seconds of time. You use 5 health sips and 5 herbs to heal and cure for this big bad pixie, and you get 50 gold as a drop.

That's the ideal vision of Battlerage (which it fulfills quite well). For the solo basher, nothing changes in the long run with what you earn. The pixies take 5 times more to kill, but also gives you 5 times more in exchange.

The best thing about this change is that the number of mobs in the game, in terms of quantity, has not changed. There were 100 individual pixies before, there are still 100 individual pixies now. But each pixie has more quality and value, so while there are still 100 individual pixies, compared to the old bashing system, these pixies are now worth 500 pixies.

You don't need to clear an area to get the same amount of progress as it relates to time invested. It is going to take some time to get used to, but this is overall a very great change.

P.S. I didn't even factor in walking time. 1 pixie worth 5x more essentially means you kill 5 pixies without any time lost in between walking to those 5 pixies. In the old system, you kill 1 pixie per second, maybe spend 1 second travelling to the next pixie, which again takes 1 second to kill.

P.P.S. The one major flaw, I suppose, is that if you don't manage to kill that 1 pixie worth 5 times more, you don't get any experience, as opposed to the old system wherein if you kill 3 pixies and die on pixie #4, you still got experience from the first 3.

Not exactly. I didn't need to clear an entire area before. I did it because I liked hunting. Now hunting is like standing in a vat of molasses and pointing my imperious finger through the ooze while giant beings impervious to damage pummel and stab me. I don't want to clear an area because it is boring as hell. It's also frustrating to know you used to be able to clear an area in 20 minutes and look up to see you've been in the same zone for almost an hour. These are perceptual issues, sure. But perception is what frames our gaming experience. 

Antonius said:

You might be using more curatives per kill, but you shouldn't be using anywhere close to twice as many gaining the same amount of gold as before, unless you're just really inefficient at killing things now.

If it used to take me 10-12 curses to kill things and now it's taking me 30-50 curses plus battlerage attacks...of course I'm using way more curatives. What I ate/sipped today was easily double what I used prior for curing. 

Jarrod said:

If you're bashing somewhere you can't stand in room and kill whatever it is, you're not bashing efficiently to begin with. Fix your habits before blaming the system.

Two posts in a row telling me that I'm bashing inefficiently and it's my own fault that the new system isn't working awesome for me. Lol.

Morsul said:

Even if you bash "lower than your level", you're still going to bash more efficiently, and thus translate to more experience per time invested.

I understand your logic but it doesn't bear out in actual testing. I am barely gaining any experience with the Double XP in those areas. When that goes away, it'll be like bashing at a Penwizian level. Boooooring.

Bluef

Daeir said:

Typically speaking double the curatives used on a mob that has apparently triple the health that it used to have is really not all that surprising, especially given the base xp and the gold rewards themselves are almost doubled.

It's not surprising, no. But the gold reward is not really upped then either. You're going to use a larger portion of it to restock unless you've taken remedies/harvesting or their alchemic equivalents. 

Morsul

@Bluef said:

If it used to take me 10-12 curses to kill things and now it's taking me 30-50 curses plus battlerage attacks...of course I'm using way more curatives. What I ate/sipped today was easily double what I used prior for curing. 

What you ate/sipped today may be more than what you used up before, but the rewards have also been increased. The idea is no net change between now and before, even without the double experience. Now, democracy has its faults, but considering around 50 people have said they now get more per time invested as opposed to the two or three who say otherwise, I'd say the change has actually increased overall net gain across the board.

Atalkez

@Bluef

 31948  Baleful Edge                         a two arts sword
    77159  a scrying bowl                       N/A
   111442  a long, elegant ebony pipe           N/A
   117842  a long, elegant ebony pipe           N/A
   118227  a ring of flying                     N/A
   136333  a jolly Ironbeard dummy              a ventriloquist's dummy
   211416  an elegant diamond vial              N/A
   270117  a Ceylonese ring                     N/A
   285403  a Ceylonese bracelet                 N/A
   291479  a hunter's belt                      N/A
   323411  a dragonskin quiver                  N/A
   334099  a swift ghost bat                    N/A
   383089  an earring of Sinope                 N/A
   408006  a pair of eagle's wings              N/A
   463192  a glittering ring of vitality        N/A
   471496  an enchanted pebble                  N/A
   485753  a long, elegant ebony pipe           N/A
   487262  a pair of Ogre's Gauntlets           N/A
[Type MORE if you wish to continue reading. (91% shown)]
 5434h  4235m 75%e 16400 79.9 0 Sanya
[File continued via MORE]
   508952  a swift ghost bat                    N/A

+-Legate Atalkez al'Dejan-----------------------------------------------------+
| Level  : 80 (79.9%)  "Logosian"                                             |
| Age    : 95          Birthdate: 20th Chronos, 588AF     Class: Blademaster  |
| Gender : Male        Race     : Dwarf Miner                    Full member  |
|                                                                             |
| XP Rank: 728         Explorer Rank: 331     Combat Rank: 6                  |
+-Vitals----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Health  : 5434/5434   Willpower: 16400/16400 Strength : 13 Intelligence: 12 |
| Mana    : 4235/4235   Endurance: 18134/23600 Dexterity: 10 Constitution: 18 |
|                                                                             |
| Rest    : fully rested                       Bleeding : 0                   |
| Hunger  : utterly satiated                   Sobriety : completely sober    |
| New Msgs: 0                                  Timeout  : 65000 minutes       |
+-Resources-------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Gold                   Credits           House Credits  Mayan Crowns        |
|   Holding: 0             Unbound: 2       Room: 0        Unbound: 0         |
|   Packs  : 101130        Bound  : 28                     Bound  : 0         |
|   Banks  : 1421000         Lessons: 59                                        |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

I don't even have a crit pendant. My attacks are doing 1-3% per and I can hunt Sidhe better now than before the changes. I don't feel like you've given it much of a chance because you're slower and you feel weaker. Also, what areas are you referring to that you're not even able to get the mob to 25%? Shaman bashing is better than BM bashing according to Sena's numbers prior to these changes.

Quite honestly, they nerfed Dragon level hunting by lowering how quickly you can hunt, but by doing so they buffed every other levels bashing abilities. You can still hit and run just fine. If that means hitting once just to keep Rage going and walking out again to heal, then that's what it means. Rage resets when you hit the denizen, so keeping it up isn't very difficult as long as the mobs are close together.

Bluef

Morsul said:

@Bluef said:

If it used to take me 10-12 curses to kill things and now it's taking me 30-50 curses plus battlerage attacks...of course I'm using way more curatives. What I ate/sipped today was easily double what I used prior for curing. 

What you ate/sipped today may be more than what you used up before, but the rewards have also been increased. The idea is no net change between now and before, even without the double experience. Now, democracy has its faults, but considering around 50 people have said they now get more per time invested as opposed to the two or three who say otherwise, I'd say the change has actually increased overall net gain across the board.

You don't seem to want to acknowledge this, but I've already explained that they haven't really increased. I have to bash lower level denizens, and even though all denizens are now worth more experience, I am barely getting any XP from them even with the Double Xp. When the Double XP wears off, I won't be seeing much gain at all that way. As far as gold goes, that's straight profit because I have harvesting/remedies. But for anyone else who doesn't, that extra gold will go toward restocking curatives. It's a balancing act. They're not going to give us uber fast Xp gain so we have 1,500 dragons in the realm anymore than they'll give us extra gold without a balancing gold sink.

Bluef

Atalkez said:

@Bluef

 I don't even have a crit pendant. My attacks are doing 1-3% per and I can hunt Sidhe better now than before the changes. I don't feel like you've given it much of a chance because you're slower and you feel weaker. Also, what areas are you referring to that you're not even able to get the mob to 25%? Shaman bashing is better than BM bashing according to Sena's numbers prior to these changes.

Quite honestly, they nerfed Dragon level hunting by lowering how quickly you can hunt, but by doing so they buffed every other levels bashing abilities. You can still hit and run just fine. If that means hitting once just to keep Rage going and walking out again to heal, then that's what it means. Rage resets when you hit the denizen, so keeping it up isn't very difficult as long as the mobs are close together.

I came into the realm around 3 pm today. I left at 5 am. In between stocking the shop and gathering herbs, I hunted for 6 hours or so (willpower regaining about every 30 minutes because the drain was so bad), testing where I'd hunted before and then hunting old zones where I hunted on my way to dragon because I couldn't tank things in Azdun, Istarion, etc. anymore, especially the dragon talisman drop areas. Hitting and running was not efficient. It made hunting even more agonizingly slow than it already was. It also frequently re-set rage because before going back in I have to regen health. If I got hit with one web or stun when I re-enter, then rage poofed. But that was the only alternative because there was no way I could stand there and trade 30-50 blows with those denizens. That'd be like standing there and letting a knight smash on me in PvP. I had an incredibly hard time getting enough rage to pull off these combination attacks everyone is talking about too. I finally did it but only on lower level denizens because I just kept dying over and over again to the ones that used to be level-appropriate for me. Overall, the experience was not enjoyable. I did feel slower and weaker. In the end I wondered why anyone would invest a ton of time into hunting like that at my level? I just don't get it.  

Atalkez

Bluef said:

Atalkez said:

@Bluef

 I don't even have a crit pendant. My attacks are doing 1-3% per and I can hunt Sidhe better now than before the changes. I don't feel like you've given it much of a chance because you're slower and you feel weaker. Also, what areas are you referring to that you're not even able to get the mob to 25%? Shaman bashing is better than BM bashing according to Sena's numbers prior to these changes.

Quite honestly, they nerfed Dragon level hunting by lowering how quickly you can hunt, but by doing so they buffed every other levels bashing abilities. You can still hit and run just fine. If that means hitting once just to keep Rage going and walking out again to heal, then that's what it means. Rage resets when you hit the denizen, so keeping it up isn't very difficult as long as the mobs are close together.

I came into the realm around 3 pm today. I left at 5 am. In between stocking the shop and gathering herbs, I hunted for 6 hours or so (willpower regaining about every 30 minutes because the drain was so bad), testing where I'd hunted before and then hunting old zones where I hunted on my way to dragon because I couldn't tank things in Azdun, Istarion, etc. anymore, especially the dragon talisman drop areas. Hitting and running was not efficient. It made hunting even more agonizingly slow than it already was. It also frequently re-set rage because before going back in I have to regen health. If I got hit with one web or stun when I re-enter, then rage poofed. But that was the only alternative because there was no way I could stand there and trade 30-50 blows with those denizens. That'd be like standing there and letting a knight smash on me in PvP. I had an incredibly hard time getting enough rage to pull off these combination attacks everyone is talking about too. I finally did it but only on lower level denizens because I just kept dying over and over again to the ones that used to be level-appropriate for me. Overall, the experience was not enjoyable. I did feel slower and weaker. In the end I wondered why anyone would invest a ton of time into hunting like that at my level? I just don't get it.  

Well you have to keep in mind there are going to be growing pains with anything new.

You're still looking at it as a time vs reward thing in comparison to how it was for you previously. The system is 2 days old, there will be changes. Rage probably will start lasting longer, and possibly slowly decay versus outright decay after a timer.

Truly though, these changes are a precursor to what Achaea is going to become. I think they want to get away from the 1 man army feel and have a more immersive community as a whole. 1 person being able to clear entire areas, giving no one else even an option for that area, wasn't necessarily balanced.

These changes have made it so that a high-level area is a challenge for a Dragon instead of "critcity let me see how much gold I can make in an hour today". Hunting shouldn't get easier when you level up, it should get harder. Previously it was skewed in the wrong direction in that as a Dragon with a pendant you weren't even threatened except by big rooms or honours mobs.

I think @Jarrod is probably right at this point about bashing areas. If you want to solo hunt and not have to hit and run, then hunt a 70-85 area. If you want to hunt to bigger places, then be ready to hit/run a lot or bring some partners. That's the entire point! Either way, you're getting the same returns gold wise. As far as xp, once you're Dragon does it really matter if you get .00125 or .0125 per denizen?

Kog

For anyone who doesn't want to code, it'll become trivial once rage gets added to GMCP. I already track based on a trigger, then try to send every attack I have enough rage for (collide, onslaught, bulwark, not in that order) - I just gag the extra spam and go on my merry way. I ensure high uptime on my buff, ensure I'm always throwing out damage on cooldown/resource (because saving it wastes DPS), and I'm overall better off because I have 2-3x the chance to crit when things come off cooldown. I'll allow that every class is different, and that some classes probably require more in-depth work than Runewarden does, but that's to be expected with any system.

Also, group hunting is amazing now. Make friends, work out complex strategies, take a lower level friend hunting, whatever. That extra bit of damage really does help.