PK Logs.

[Shadowmaster]

What are the point of these when every single item/skill/spell etc. is concealed in some way shape or form?

Ex: Jim's something does something to you.

If you are trying to attract new players, showing them your mud in action, rather then some edited madness might be a good way to start.

Just my 2 cents.

[Lexi]

On the other hand, some things should be left to discover in game. How fun would it be to learn all the secrets from logs, ehh?

[Ajindaar]

Those who know what's been concealed understand what exactly was going on. Those who don't have these informations though still can learn much from combat logs as they show different (yet general) tactics people use against certain opponents.

[WagesofSin]

On the other hand' date=' some things should be left to discover in game. How fun would it be to learn all the secrets from logs, ehh?[/quote']

Actually, I think it would be pretty darn fun. I'd be able to stop dying and focus on strategy rather than getting a death due to lack of game knowledge.

[Pali]

What you need to remember is that only cabal and quest abilities are edited (with the exception of certain pieces of eq). We simply have had the bad luck of the recent PK logs being between caballed and qrace/qclass people. Look down past the first couple logs, you'll see plenty that aren't heavily edited at all.

[Shadowmaster]

Those who know what's been concealed understand what exactly was going on. Those who don't have these informations though still can learn much from combat logs as they show different (yet general) tactics people use against certain opponents.

What tactic do I learn in a log that displays someone using something that did something to someone?:confused:

[Pali]

You learn that people of that cabal/qrace/qclass have abilities that you must find out in game, and if you're fighting them, you should be more cautious in battle since you don't know exactly what they are going to pull on you. (And yes, even the older players here learned this stuff the hard way. Forum logs have been edited in the same way for years.)

[Shadowmaster]

Devil's Advocate

What you need to remember is that only cabal and quest abilities are edited (with the exception of certain pieces of eq). We simply have had the bad luck of the recent PK logs being between caballed and qrace/qclass people. Look down past the first couple logs' date=' you'll see plenty that aren't heavily edited at all.[/quote']

Just to pick a random log, Taiem v. Suunmar, we have a blademaster (not a quest class) editing his class skill affects (critical brain strike), I see items with shocking flags having their names edited, I see one WM cabal skill used, but the damage it does is left, I see another WM skill being used, but the echo of it happening is edited, even if the effect is not. I see a Savant power being used, but the echo(While quasi-edited) shows clearly what is happening.

I can understand being editing logs, but why post a log editing the echos for these powers, but leaving in the actual effect of these powers?

[Pali]

Critical strikes have ALWAYS been under the "experiment to find out affects" rule, ever since blademasters were implemented. Similar to DKs and malforms, or clerics and DIs/Holy hands, or warrior lores, you've got to experiment in game to find out what these do. My apologies for forgetting about the several non-quest/cabal skills that also fit under this.

Try reading logs that AREN'T decked cabal elders fighting it out. Maleik vs Cylandas has VERY little editing. Same with Grom vs Szaun, or the Necromancer vs Blademaster fight, or many others. Yes, certain logs will have a lot edited, but that's the nature of the game. Not everything is meant to be spoon-fed to you on the forum.

[Ajindaar]

The problem with pk logs is that you have to cut out/edit some parts to conceal certain things and to take care of not erasing too much info so you can still get a clue of what could have been the reason for thisandthat to happen.

[Shadowmaster]

So that I understand.

Critical strikes have ALWAYS been under the "experiment to find out affects" rule, ever since blademasters were implemented. Similar to DKs and malforms, or clerics and DIs/Holy hands, or warrior lores, you've got to experiment in game to find out what these do. My apologies for forgetting about the several non-quest/cabal skills that also fit under this.

Try reading logs that AREN'T decked cabal elders fighting it out. Maleik vs Cylandas has VERY little editing. Same with Grom vs Szaun, or the Necromancer vs Blademaster fight, or many others. Yes, certain logs will have a lot edited, but that's the nature of the game. Not everything is meant to be spoon-fed to you on the forum.

So what you are saying then is that the existing playerbase should just hope that any new player coming to FL must have years of their lives to devote to rolling up combo after combo just to learn what each non qclass/qrace is capable of? When they are done with that, they will then cycle through the qclass/qraces as well? Upon which they can then begin to worry about tactics.

Or am I misunderstanding you?

[Ajindaar]

The point is, guy X flies in and attacks you. You attempt to trip and get told that their feet aren't on the ground. Tadaa, you just learned that you can't trip a flying opponent and won't attempt that again the next time you fight a flying opponent. Repeat this principle several times and you have a nice amount of knowledge you worked for. You advance, join a cabal, earn skills, spells, equipment and learn to put their effects to use. Then, one day, you stand above 2/3rds of your pk range, and they suddenly reveal all the nice things you worked so hard for, putting everyone and their pet elf on the same niveau as you. Wouldn't you prefer keeping things the way they are now, meaning putting effort into a project and experiment actually benefiting you?

[The Lemming]

So what you are saying then is that the existing playerbase should just hope that any new player coming to FL must have years of their lives to devote to rolling up combo after combo just to learn what each non qclass/qrace is capable of? When they are done with that, they will then cycle through the qclass/qraces as well? Upon which they can then begin to worry about tactics.

Or am I misunderstanding you?

The people that do that go one of two ways. They either get bored and disapear or become very strong in pk.

There is another way to play actually and this is how I have done it. Roll up the class you want to play. Fight against other people when you want, and RP the rest of the time. Fighting against another person is just as viable learning as doing it yourself (assuming they use the skills you want them to). This way you learn and more importantly have fun...that is still what the game is about right?

[Deykari]

So what you are saying then is that the existing playerbase should just hope that any new player coming to FL must have years of their lives to devote to rolling up combo after combo just to learn what each non qclass/qrace is capable of? When they are done with that, they will then cycle through the qclass/qraces as well? Upon which they can then begin to worry about tactics.

Or am I misunderstanding you?

You are exaggerating. The PK logs section is not the be all and end all of PK learning. Case in point, I could probably reel off the affects of many of the skills, how they are used, how they should be used. Some qrace stuff too. I know what I should do "in theory".

Yet, I am not a good PKer.

It is not about knowing what skill does what neccessarily, there is just some sort of "X factor" that comes with experience with PK. Things you do that little quicker, you relax and can concentrate more, that type of thing.

Again, the PK logs section is not the be all and end all of PK learning. People can learn from them, and those who know about what skill X and skill Y does, good for them.

The best learning I have done, is from logging my own battles and analyzing those. There are no restrictions imposed upon those are there?

Dey

[Shadowmaster]

Thanks

Case in point, I could probably reel off the affects of many of the skills, how they are used, how they should be used. Some qrace stuff too. I know what I should do "in theory".

Yet, I am not a good PKer.

You just made my point that actually seeing these items/skills in a log won't make anyone overpowered or reveal information that unbalances pk. Thanks

[Deykari]

The point of them not being shown is that they are meant to be kept secretive. It is part of the special status that these qrace/qclasses/cabals have.

Dey

[The Lemming]

Dey is a special case...

[Deykari]

Quiet, you.

Dey

[Kyzarius]

just consider them practice for fighting when your blind

i find personally, that some logs are edited better than others, in the necro ones i tend to comment on the situation as well as edit things but leave the gist in...

like..

Something does something real scary,

for an item that causes fear...

another example is the editing of suumnar's cabal power "you forget your grocery list" or something to that degree, this let you know what happened in general, but left out what skill it was, and the exact extent of the effects.

The comments and such though i believe help a lot when reviewing a log, and the ones without any comment quickly turn into a colorless blurr of someone does something to someone...and yes i agree this is very difficult to decipher and glean any tact from.

The best way to learn is to log all of your own fights. With Vorqwuith and my current character i log every fight. And with every fight i go back and review everything that happened. This taught me the importance of highlights on spells crashing as well as when to use what and not to fill a buffer of commands

To your earlier comment about new players, this mud is one you dedicate to or you leave, in truth if a new player is not putting out the effort to learn they will be PK fodder or go elsewhere. If they are going to stay they will, but if not having all the answers on a map in front of them makes them not want to stay...then this isnt the type of player FL seems to attract and flourish from.

Anyone can read a spoiler, it takes a different kind of person to try things and learn from them.

[Goomf]

The point is for new people to experiment. That's the incentive they give.

Of course, there's a drawback to this. Some of the elite pkers know all of the skills and spells and whatnot and what they do. You can chalk it up to experience, but that doesn't negate the fact that it indirectly keeps up in the top and everyone else in the bottom. Something to consider.

For instance, I've played a lich, so I know most of the downsides and upsides and the various tactics on how to fight/play a lich. I'd probably have more success against them than most people. On one hand, I deserve to know about that since I went through the encounter. On the other hand, the imms have to hear constant whining and stuff from the pbase about this skill or that skill being too overpowered.

I do find that editting the pk logs to such great degree is absolutely absurd. People take out the aesthetic portion of them but leave the effects? Whoopeee do, I sure as hell don't know what that skill does now, who has that skill, which cabal has that skill, etc. I sure as hell don't know that a warmaster can do oblits now.

Absurd.

[Shadowmaster]

You said it better then I.

Of course' date=' there's a drawback to this. Some of the elite pkers know all of the skills and spells and whatnot and what they do. You can chalk it up to experience, but that doesn't negate the fact that it indirectly keeps up in the top and everyone else in the bottom. [/quote']

This was my point. Newer players aren't going to become elite fast enough to offset the loss of experienced players if it takes 3+ years just to learn what every class is capable of. Not even including qrace/qclass.

I do find that editting the pk logs to such great degree is absolutely absurd. People take out the aesthetic portion of them but leave the effects?

Again, exactly my point. What difference does it make to edit out the echo of you doing a ***DEMOLISHES*** from skill1 if you leave up the overall result (big damage)? I just don't understand the logic and it feels good that I was not alone there

[Goomf]

Let me add another point. The intentions for editting the pk logs are all good IF FL has a bigger pbase OR has newer people coming in all the time. Unfortunately, neither are the case. It's idealistic to think that most people doesn't know which items does the shocking bite affect or what some savant/warmaster skills do. Granted for a new class such as lich where people are still trying to figure out the gung ho of the class it makes sense. For skills and cabals that's been around for 7 years? Cmon.

[Pali]

Shadowmaster, within six months of playing here I could've told you what every non-questclass/race was capable of doing. I knew that battlemages have slow, blades, and terra shield. I knew healers had divine retribution (and that at the time it couldn't be up with protective shield). I knew that dks were the only class in the game with iceball. I knew clerics had spell turning, that evils had minister where goods have portal. I knew the basic tactics to use as any class/race combo against any other class/race combo.

I learned this from playing a pacifist healer, a ninja, and an invoker to 50. How did I learn this? Because I used the healer to learn my way around the game, learn what a lot of eq does, and how to stay alive in pk. I used the ninja to learn patience and how to find and track people. I used the invoker for massive PK experience, battling at least 5 enemies every day. I STILL don't know exactly how malform boosts weapons, by virtue of never having a level 50 dk that did well enough to get a high level one. I still don't know what every DI does for clerics, but experience (having them used by allies and enemies alike) has taught me most of them. I've never had a vampire, but I know almost all of their abilities, weaknesses, and how to fight them, because I've known and fought so many.

That's how I learned. Forum logs were fun reading. Not something I studied for ideas.

EDIT: And yes, I take pride in what I have learned. You learn SO much more from battling yourself than watching someone else's. I put a lot of time and energy into learning this game, and I don't like the idea of people learning everything on the forum when nobody in the past did.

[Anume]

Rephrasing spells instead of taking them out does just what you are complaining about: letting newer players see "AH, that WM/Savant has some cool skill that will hurt me really bad/ let me forget things (?)". He still does not know what spell/skill it is exactly and how it is best used. For that, he has to roll up a WM/Savant and experiment. This "half-editing" gives some incentive to learn and it also makes the log more fun to real for the more experienced player in my opinion. If you prefer I can go back to editing them to "Something happens, you have to figure out what yourself." again. There you see what we Imms get for trying to make the read a bit more fun and investing quite a bit of time into checking and double checking logs. And then the pbase wonders why there are no pk logs around. I think I have enough of posting some for a while as well now.

[Shadowmaster]

I understand.

I put a lot of time and energy into learning this game' date=' and I don't like the idea of people learning everything on the forum when nobody in the past did.[/quote']

I understand your point, but don't be shocked when one day you look up and realize you've been fighting the same 10 players over, and over, and over, and over again, because it is likely that no new player is going to spend years learning a text based MUD just to catch up to those of you who have played/fought every class. In the rare event that they do, chances are, the MUD will have lost one or more experienced players over that same period of time, and the net result is less skilled players.

If you have any desire of increasing the playerbase, it may be prudent to consider actually revealing what non qclasses/qraces can do rather then saying "Go play one and find out yourself". Ideally you want the MUD to have loads of elite players, rather then a select few who are only elite by virtue of having played here since day 1.