The Way of the Warrior

[Willem RedBeard]

[i]The following is taken from my Military Way papers, and this post may quickly become out of date, but I will work to keep my Military Papers up to date. Also note, take no offense if you are a stat grinder, this isn't directed at you, but instead is for those that consider themselves honourable/valiant warriors or are simply interested in maintaining balance as the game clearly intends. I am have nothing against grinders as people, I just want to help those that would like another way to learn another way to fight and train without getting so many losses.[/i]

[b]Balance - A Warrior's Way[/b]

(A list of those supporting this general idea is at the bottom of this document, if you wish you have your name added or removed from this list, please contact me. Also note that this paper is evolving quickly and changing constantly as I receive comments from people, so feel free to check back again later.)

[b]Foreword:[/b]
I am frustrated with the current state of "training" for battle and I know I am not the only one. Currently, any new mp5 character needs to get HUNDREDS of losses before they can even engage in any battles, otherwise their honour will quickly drop to below -500. (I have also heard this problem is evident in mp3 and mp4, so don't stop reading if you are not mp5.) I understand and know WHY this happened, but that is not the issue at stake here, just ask me if you want to know my theory. Thankfully, recent changes to the honour system when attacking between alliances has allowed a path for this to be fixed. Even if you are not in an alliance, you still do not have to fall prey to negative honour. Yes, it might be the more difficult path, but it is the good and honourable path for a warrior to follow.

[b]The Goal:[/b]
To return balance to the fighting system, to promote real fighting, to help players learn how to effectively use their creatures, to learn how to setup a good ritual and counter-rituals, and ofcourse to have fun while doing all of this.

[b]How this will happen:[/b]
By you taking a stand and getting involved. Do not simply setup a hundred rituals on defense with only trees. Why would you do this in the first place? To get losses...but if more and more people are close to balance, then you won't need to do this. I do not object to giving away wins upon request, but farming losses is not the answer either. If you consider yourself a warrior, protector, guardian, battlemaster, fighter, or are just interested in learning how to fight effectively, then I ask you to join rank with me and begin the battle to regain balance. I will take the lead and am already working to restore balance to myself. I am still over 300 wins (3043:3363 as of May 17) away from being balanced, but I will do what I can to correct this situation fully as fast as I can. If you join me in this endeavour and need honour to continue, you may ask me at any time and I will give you a win. Remember, it will not be easy at first, but when more and more of us are balanced, it will not be so bad.

For now, I am going to setup shop at Willow's, the old training/stat grinding location. If you are interested in training in a new way, come visit me there. This is an ideal location, it is close to the official Dojo and Wind's Sanctuary. But this isn't about avoiding all of the other fighters, and segregating ourselves, you can be honourable right where you are, so if you are most comfortable at the Gazebo of Equilibrium, or the Golden Globe Gazebo, or somewhere else, just stay there and hold honour close to your heart with joy.

[b]Final thoughts:[/b]
Obviously, the fighting system will not be completely fixed unless Mur himself intervenes, but that doesn't mean we can't strive to do our best. All I ask is that instead of mindless grinding for stats and wins, that we actually engage in battle! You don't have to be balanced to do that. What is the point of high stats anyways? There are some boasting rights that come with high stats, but you (the normal player) will never hope to beat the true stat grinders. So leave them to their fun and game. I have nothing against them, honestly, but just let them do their thing, don't be sucked into their world. Whether or not the system is flawed, I don't care. We can fight the imperfect system, because any true warrior knows what is right and what is wrong. This world is all about balance. Don't worry about stats, they will come when you have fought many hard earned battles. I will hold in high regard anyone that is balanced, much more so than if their attack stat is many times greater than mine is, but they have no real honour to speak of. If you want to train in battle, then do so, but don't just mindlessly chop down trees, how will that teach you anything?

[b]Honourable Warriors and Supporters:[/b]
Falen Angel
Gauge
King Bull
.Kragel.
.MRD.
MRWarrior
Phantasm
Sagewoman
Sir Blut
Sparrhawk
stormrunner
Thomas the Titan
Tzaroth747
werewolfer
White Reaper
Willem RedBeard
Windy

*my edits so far have only been to add names to the list as I get them, I may make more drastic changes as thoughts come together*

*New edit to add some stuff to the goal and to soften some of the wording*

Edited May 18, 2009 by Willem RedBeard

[Burns]

you obviously don't know how that whole business started... one of the few privileges of the veterans XD

when i started on 5, there were some old-school warriors, and they were great.
they had defs that really made me run off in horror like a chicken with its head chopped off, and by that time there were no overpowered creatures, just REALLY good rits ;-)
there was no way for a newbie to survive in that system, NOO WAAY, absolutely and totally NOOOO WAAAAYY, and we HAD to set dummies to keep our vit up for fighting whenever we left a sanctuary.
[now everything is different, and lateron you'll see why]

this way, we were getting a lot of losses in no time, and getting vics against real defs was hard back then, with xp limit still at 2.2 (or 2.4, can't remember), and so we forsake balace never to return again.
and once this thought started to grow in us, that balance was inevitably lost for ever [i was like 200-300 on losses side back then], we decided that it was time to make a change, to have a revolution in the system, and after some time, a lot of people followed suit, and after some time we had a bunch of extraordinarily active people who stopped caring for their balance and set a bunch of trees (remember, no overpowered creatures, there were about 3 people in the whole game who were able to properly kill a forest, who had both the stats and the knowledge to destroy it) for the newbies to bash on, so they could raise their creatures and fight in our lines lateron themselves.

in the long run the idea grew famous, and almost all the people who EVER tackled a forest for easy wins and xp decided that the best thing to do was to create one for themselves, and we could all happily help training up the newbies creatures so they had realistic chances on the old elite.

unfortunately, the old elite left, but the idea stuck around, and after some time, someone [no names] realized that it was EASY to gain stats through high-honours, and the effect multiplied itself.

that's the history of the off-balance realms, which started about 260 days ago...

and even though i like your approach, don't call forest-setters dishonorable, because in a time when you were still asking for the way to the aramory, we were already doing our best to be honorable and kind helpers instead of self-righteous bastards who had nothing but their own personal gain in mind...
we could as well have played on in the 'Fighter style' that was common, kept our secrets to ourselves, bash training groups to get easier xp and set defs that were not killable with anything less than a bunch of maxed archers and grasans, but we did something else, something BETTER...

and if you want to revive the old system, with creating a bunch of elite players who idle with combat-defs on so that the poor newbies lose all they have and in the long run the fun of the game, fine, but consider this as my very personal declaration of war on those combat defs, and they will be wiped out whenever i find the time for clearing willow's... those ideas do not fit the current honor and fighting system, as losses and vics are not distributed at the same rate!

PS: nothing personal, you know... it's just some very old frustration with the combat-defs that finally finds an enemy *hehe*

[Liberty4life]

hmm ya have good point, but truth is, will people follow that idea and will realm get balanced on theirs own without mur's intervention, i guess i am only one balanced, and i am balanced for VERY VERY VERY LONG time, or to be precise, i am balanced since perpetual balance got implemented, gaining stats its hard (impossible) for me in this way, but i can manage my creats, and upgrade them as i need them and when i need them without any problems and still stay at max honor

[Willem RedBeard]

Thank you Burns, that was a most excellent reply and filled in some gaps in my knowledge. I'll have to look over what I wrote again, but I did not intend to propose being elitist or to promote setting up our strongest defenses at all times.

Here were my observations/comments from a relatively new mp5 player.
-I started mp5 being fairly balanced, but nearly all battles I fought cost me hundreds of honour each time. Why? Because I haven't been amassing losses.

-I'm a fairly active player and I enjoy fighting, so it only took me somewhere between a few days and a week to get enough losses so that I could train. Because having losses has been entrenched for so long now, to train properly, you now need to get somewhere between 500 and 1000 more losses than wins.

-I worked with the system for a few weeks until I was happy with my stats and am now working to regain balance. What did I gain out of this? Yes, I trained well and gained some decent stats, but honestly because all I fought was trees, I didn't learn how to fight against different rituals very well, I didn't experiment with new things very much. I just setup rituals that I knew would give me maximum experience from trees and hit the attack button as many times as I could. I stuck with it, because I like to balance my roleplaying with actual stats, but in the end all I gained was stats and still feel unprepared when to comes to actually fighting another person with rituals.

-I've chatted with a few people already, and perhaps my wording of a few things was a little strong. I don't actually dislike stat grinders or those that mass losses. My message was directed towards those that want another way to train. A way that will bring losses and wins into balance, as well as fighting knowledge (making counter-rituals, selecting the proper creatures, etc) and stats into balance.

-If all you want is monster stats so that you can crush everything with a single grasan, then I think the best way to do that is to train with the experts. As I have said already, but I want to say again, I have nothing against stat-grinders. Hell, I should probably be considered a bit of a stat-grinder myself and had some fun chatting with everyone at the GoE while I did it. But I know there are people that want something else, and I want to help them.



I don't know if I have address all of your concerns yet Burns, but I'll keep a close eye on this thread and try to do what I can to make my view and intentions clear. I wish no hostilities, except those of fun rivalries and that of exciting combat.

*edit for spelling mistakes

Edited May 17, 2009 by Willem RedBeard

[Burns]

delay your plans from willow's to wasp's activation chamber or oak fort and i'm fine with it, you won't hurt any newbies or bypassers there...

if you do that, i might as well go and help you a bit, i'm sick of trees myself ;-)

it's just your idea of reviving willow's as a place of scaring newbies that got me to boiling point within an instant...

edit: and a bit that you spit on my idea of setting martyr-forests (i may not have been the first to do it, but i was amongst the first to idle at willow's with trees up for newbies to chop...)

Edited May 17, 2009 by Burns

[Willem RedBeard]

[quote name='Burns' post='31353' date='May 17 2009, 03:17 PM']delay your plans from willow's to wasp's activation chamber or oak fort and i'm fine with it, you won't hurt any newbies or bypassers there...

if you do that, i might as well go and help you a bit, i'm sick of trees myself ;-)

it's just your idea of reviving willow's as a place of scaring newbies that got me to boiling point within an instant... [/quote]

Ahh, but I am friendly and want to help newbies! My intention is not to create a super strong fighting force where only the best may train. No offense, but I think this is actually how I see what the Gazebo of Equilibrium has become. True getting wins maybe easy there, but honestly, it's mostly full of idle people and a few older and hardcore people that chat about mostly non-combat and often non-MD related things. My personal impression, as a still young MD player, is that this is more likely to drive me away, then having a location dedicated to battle, training, and having a good time doing these things.

I want something easily accessible to everyone, where no matter your experience, creatures, age, or anything, that you can come to and learn how to setup good rituals, how to train your creatures and stats, and just generally to fight. Balance between wins and losses can be maintained, and only needs to be broken if you are aiming to get the bonus experience from having a much lower win:loss ratio than the person you are attacking.

I wrote my Military Papers this morning, and perhaps there was a bit much fire in my heart at the time, but as the idea bounces around in my head and with the input of everyone else, I am hoping that this idea will take hold and become something that is useful, new (or perhaps the rebirth of something old), and different.

If you know me, you know that I am friendly, kind, and helpful to new people. I would NEVER promote anything that might turn people away from playing this game.

Edit/PS: I've just edited a few things in the original post, not much, mostly just the goal and a few words here and there.

Edited May 17, 2009 by Willem RedBeard

[kamate]

[quote][b]The Goal:[/b]
To return balance to the fighting system, to promote real fighting, to help players learn how to effectively use their creatures, to learn how to setup a good ritual and counter-rituals, and ofcourse to have fun while doing all of this.[/quote]

i agree about "To return balance to the fighting system" part because those might be needed nowadays.Just that when you do things for a long time, i dont think the balance will still be there or at least be the same like you first wanted it to be.
i just dont get it much about "to promote real fighting, to help players learn how to effectively use their creatures, to learn how to setup a good ritual and counter-rituals," part, mostly the "and ofcourse to have fun while doing all of this." part. care to elaborate?

let us hear everyone's thought about these little startup question i got..

1)why do you want to fight@battle?
2)why do you want to win the fight@battle?
3)why do you want to lose the fight@battle?
4)why do you want to train your creatures?
5)how the answers to the above questions give you the fun you wanted?

this may sound irrelevant, but if you really think about it, you'll at least see something i'm trying to point out regarding Willem RedBeard's idea.

Edited May 18, 2009 by kamate

[Kragel]

Willem RedBeard

Thank you for making this topic! I have for a very long time thought it dishonourable to farm loses and have mentioned it several times also ...

this goal is a worthy one that has my FULL backing anything i can to do help you in spreading this thought into the hearts and minds of more and more new and old people alike you just let me know

truly the only way a balance will be brought to the game it to fight with honour and show those grinders and stat farmers that it is a time for a change

fighting should be used to train and as a part of your role and lvling your creatures ... not as oooh i have the highest stats and i can kill anyone in a 0 round fight almost every time

Kudos Willem

thanks again for this topic

Kragel
The Metal Mage

[Willem RedBeard]

Hopefully other people will contribute and speak up as well, but I'll enter my thoughts on these questions.

[quote name='kamate' post='31361' date='May 17 2009, 06:54 PM']...
i just dont get it much about "to promote real fighting, to help players learn how to effectively use their creatures, to learn how to setup a good ritual and counter-rituals," part, mostly the "and ofcourse to have fun while doing all of this." part. care to elaborate?[/quote]

Yes, I would love to elaborate. Currently, in MagicDuel, the spot to train is pretty much limited to the Gazebo of Equilibrium. I don't think I'll get much argument on this point. A typical day of training for the two weeks that I trained there consisted (for the vast majority of the time) of chopping down trees and putting up more trees on my defense, so I would keep getting enough losses. What did I gain out of this? Stats and wins/experience for my creatures. Oh and I learned how to drain bursts and kill trees REALLY well. Perhaps it was my fault for not asking for help to learn how to fight properly, but the environment at the GoE certainly didn't foster or actively encourage such questions.

So, now that that is out of the way. I'll get to the questions, then look back over everything and see if I've answered everything.

[quote]1)why do you want to fight@battle?[/quote]
I want to fight because it [i]can[/i] be enjoyable. As dst and others have said before, the fighting system is one of the most developed and complete features of Magic Duel. That and I just love the competition and excitement of pitting my rituals against those of other people and learning how to better combat certain rituals. Combat is also a tangible way of ranking strength and resolving conflicts within Magicduel. I love Roleplaying and the fighting system can easily be integrated into Roleplaying. It will be hard to do, but I hope to promote the link between the fighting system and roleplayer.


[quote]2)why do you want to win the fight@battle?[/quote]
Winning brings the glory of victory, knowing that you have bettered your opponent, along with the stats/experience gained, and wins needed to grow creatures. Also, when you finally overcome that really tough defense, you have learned something new.

[quote]3)why do you want to lose the fight@battle?[/quote]
Losing a fight is also good. You can examine the battle report and see what you did wrong and learn from it. It is also humbling and gives you something to strive for, only one person can be the absolute best. For everyone else, the losses remind us to keep working hard. Also there is the less tangible answer of: "balance". Anyone with the slightest bit of experience with Magicduel, knows that balance is a key part of everything.

[quote]4)why do you want to train your creatures?[/quote]
Almost everyone like to get new things and improve. Each time I level up a creature, it shows me what I've done and the effort I've put into it. At some levels creatures change completely, for me, as a young player, I'm still leveling up creatures that I've never seen at max level before. Very exciting!

[quote]5)how the answers to the above questions give you the fun you wanted?[/quote]
The answers above show that there's more to fighting than just counting stats, having the most tokens on a creature, and being a lumber jack all day. I enjoy the other aspects of battle, and currently there is no avenue of support for these things, which is why I have started this movement.

[quote]this may sound irrelevant, but if you really think about it, you'll at least see something I'm trying to point out regarding Willem RedBeard's idea.[/quote]
*nods* I have seen something, my ideals and thoughts are not for everyone... not everyone enjoys the same kind of fun that I do. I know the joy of grinding stats and getting better and better as fast as possible, but I want more than that now. The fighting system is complex enough in Magicduel, that I think we can do more with it...if we want to. Or we can let it rot and stagnate into what it currently is.

Afterward: There will always be someone better than me and there will always be a faster way to get "better" and win every fight, but that has little to do with what I am proposing, so if you start arguing about that, you are arguing the wrong topic.

*edit for small things and spelling mistakes*

Also, certain people that I know support this, may have noticed that I'm not basing my arguments solely on the cause of maintaining "balance". I am doing this on purpose. Balance is of critical importance in the world of MagicDuel, and to those that know this already, I don't have to make the argument. For those that choose to ignore balance, there's not point in arguing something they don't care about, so I make different arguments.

Though seriously, all I should have to say is "balance" and this whole discussion should end.

Edited May 18, 2009 by Liberty4life

[dst]

Nice idea but unrealistic.
As long as I have more advantages from the unbalance thingy I will never get my balance straight. Several methods of countering those "advantages" have been proposed but none implemented. I don't even know if they were ever considered as an idea. So why bother? Just to teach noobs how they can win a battle with max 500 ve on all 6 crits? Why? As some of the players say:this is a ROLE playing game. So why bothering teaching someone how to fight? Everyone "predicts" the decline of stat grinders. Well...in this case I will take the info with me . I am too selfish to share it. If everyone wants to know something then that one should experiment (or ask others).

You are ranting so much and hard about stat grinders but when it comes to HC or when you want to know how to defeat a certain ritual who do you turn to? The role players? Ha! Give me a break! You ask one of the grinders. Why? Cause we have the knowledge. It's easy to put some sentences between 2 stars and pretend that you are RP-ing but to actually read a battle log it's not that easy to do.
So spear me about honor and learning how to fight and all the bla bla. Get back to stars and blue writing and all that stuff you do for RP. This IS a RPG, isn't it?

Also for the last 2 weeks I think (maybe more) I have pretty tough defenses up. And guess what? Except eigger who wants to prove everyone that he can defeat me, nobody attacks. Or if they do, they attack to check my rit (if it is trees or not).

As for the forest it was I who made the first rit with 6 trees (yeah I am bragging about it) although the idea belongs to No one who saw the outstanding potential those trees have.
And as some of you know, No one brought the trees rit to a new level. I am waiting to see who will be the first to copy that also.

[Willem RedBeard]

Hi dst, thanks for the reply, but I'm not sure you even read my post. Please read it again and explain to me where, a: I repeatedly bashed and put down stat-grinders (I mention once that I don't feel that getting mass losses is the way to go), and b: where I said the goal was to teach people how to be unbeatable fighting machines.

Edit/P.S.: Hint - the goal is not to recreate what the stat-grinders do but while maintaining balance. It's very different from that, which I think I've explained in great detail already. You may not think the idea will work, but at least address the issue as presented, don't argue against something I didn't even propose in the first place.

Edit2/P.P.S.: And even if it was only about balance and none of the other stuff, there is already nough supporters to make it happen, so perhaps its time to start making helpful suggestions and critiques instead of just saying it won't happen.

Edited May 18, 2009 by Willem RedBeard

[Burns]

how do you think your battle grounds would work?
there are not enough players who enjoy fighting that much to keep an active willow's community, and when they feel bored, they set a bunch of good defs (like dst is currently setting her rusty on max vit) and idle out, and all those who pass by and attack get nothing but broken rits, dead creatures and the feeling that they will never win...

and, to touch another issue, you won't be able to keep your community together, all the rits and their counters have already been there and there are a lot of people who share what they know, there is no need to invent the wheel again, and with that being so, your training is damned to fail because there will be nobody left to train after a week...
just the occasional newbie passing by and ignoring those jerks with their deadly defences, walking on to a place where he can get easier wins and xp for his creatures... it's true that you don't learn anything about real combat that way, but most won't be interested in learning about real combat anyways, they will most likely never need to set an effective rit

plus, another truth being told, most people gather wins and xp not for showing off, but for training new mobs to a higher level, and you don't train mobs in a deathmatch :lol:

*like sthe growing list of supporters and looks forward to afternoon...*

[kamate]

well, your above post make me delete the reply i was working on nothing much actually, just more arguments about the idea and how it can be achieve considering the fighting/honor system that we have now.

and seriously, what you're trying to get is a good thing, a "balance" that we lack now, in other words, the balance you're trying to get would be hard for now because when you get your balance, doesn't mean everyone else get theirs as well. lots more factor to take into consideration such as alliance and the new token that got in play.

and i still dont like it when kragel said people that farm losses is dishonorable when he is also taking advantage of the easy wins. i guess you just dont like it because it doesnt favor you much for now. it doesnt favor me too before, but i works towards it.

one of the thing the people who want to work towards this idea of getting the balance, you can start by not attacking people with trees, and put up the warrior-way defense rit(and since you guys dont like the stat grinder much, you can put 0% so it can be a real "balance" fight). with good starts and supporters, we probably see it become a trend soon, i hope.

[i]*actually, beside dojos and training ground that require us to follow certain rules, any place where we can attack someone else is a training spot, it just happen that nowadays people just sit at GoE and some even idle there.[/i]

[dst]

Hmm..I think I got carried a way a bit.I started replying to your post then I remember about the others who are pro RP-ing and I started ranting.

To summarize:
1)The idea is not bad BUT it is unrealistic. Several times Mur reset the win/lose counter with the same effect: after a while almost everybody was unbalanced. Why? 2 reasons:
-players like me use this exploit for their own benefit (I always said it and I always will)
-weak/new players that gain loses because of players who train using them
It's a vicious circle.
2)Everybody says this is a role playing game. And stat grinders (which after all are the ones with the most fighting knowledge) are seen as a disease and everybody wants them out. Isn't this a hypocritical situation? You ( i mean in general not you Will) hate us but then you ask us to share knowledge. Why should I do it? Why would I bother teaching players how to fight? Or even put up a good rit to make them search for a counter (which also means teaching)?

I am done teaching since I am sick of players asking me things in PMs or even in chat and then saying that I should leave the game since I am a stat grinder and this is a RP game.

So my message is: I will NOT support this initiative. Moreover, probably when I will start stat farming again I will not care (like I never do ) who I am attacking and since 99% of the time I win and when I fight I really fight (like 200-300 fights in one day) imagine in a week how many loses someone will gather (if they remain idle even if they have strong rits). And imagine that I am not the only one doing this. As long as there will be few who will not care about the balance what you want to implement will not be possible. Maybe I will attack someone just to screw his/her balance. Why? Cause I can


Le: Will, I hope you are not taking this personally. I am combating an idea not a person If I sound a bit harsh is merely because this is the way I think and write. I don't really like the soft and diplomatic way of debating

[Willem RedBeard]

*edit: this post is in reply to Burn's last, working on dst's new one now... just saw it.*

[quote name='Burns' post='31375' date='May 17 2009, 10:28 PM']how do you think your battle grounds would work?[/quote]

Having a new place to do this is only a thought, and not the central cause/idea that these people have lent their support to. They have lent their support to fighting in such a way that balance is maintained. Perhaps it won't have a central location or even all of the other stuff I've talked about, and if that stuff never materializes, that's fine. What the list represents are people who value one of the core aspects of Magicduel: balance. There are some people that only fight. There are some people that only roleplay. I am perfectly happy to let both of these groups do what they want, I am forcing nothing on anyone. What I am hoping to do, is provide support for those that wish to battle and train without having to become unbalanced. You can roleplay with a thousand blue asterisks, or you can have stats greater than Mur himself. I really don't care, you are free to participate in or ignore this.

Also, concerning the topic of "battle knowledge": it is likely true that many rituals and counter rituals are known out there, but they are known to a select few, and this knowledge is not being actively spread.

Who said anything about a deathmatch? I merely do not want to be a lumberjack and forest keeper for the rest of my time in magic duel.

Oh and I too look forward to seeing the list of supporters grow, it is very exciting to see that some people still care about balance.

[quote name='dst' post='31377' date='May 17 2009, 10:38 PM']Hmm..I think I got carried a way a bit.I started replying to your post then I remember about the others who are pro RP-ing and I started ranting.[/quote]

Very understandable, I am in a strange position, as I associate myself with both the stat-grinders and the RP'ers and haves dreams of one day seeing the two halves more closely intertwined, but that is for another day.

[quote]To summarize:
1)The idea is not bad BUT it is unrealistic. Several times Mur reset the win/lose counter with the same effect: after a while almost everybody was unbalanced. Why? 2 reasons:
-players like me use this exploit for their own benefit (I always said it and I always will)
-weak/new players that gain loses because of players who train using them
It's a vicious circle.[/quote]

Mur has made a recent change to the honour system among alliances that I am hoping to use to a least provide an avenue to maintain balance and honour. You are free to continue exploiting the system, and I have nothing against you doing that. My proposal is not for everyone in Magic Duel. It probably won't work well for stat-grinders, it's a fact, and I've gotten over it. I think you might be slightly wrong about your second point though. These players currently have no choice. If they want to battle at all, they have to get losses, otherwise their honour will quickly fall past -500. It's not because people attack them all of the time, it's because they setup trees for the express purpose of getting losses and purposely idle where everyone trains. If they had the option of not having to mass losses, then why would they? Most players don't get enough losses to really benefit from the super high honour bonus anyways. At least I only did on rare occasion, and as I have said before, I trained quite extensively for a few weeks.


[quote]2)Everybody says this is a role playing game. And stat grinders (which after all are the ones with the most fighting knowledge) are seen as a disease and everybody wants them out. Isn't this a hypocritical situation? You ( i mean in general not you Will) hate us but then you ask us to share knowledge. Why should I do it? Why would I bother teaching players how to fight? Or even put up a good rit to make them search for a counter (which also means teaching)?

I am done teaching since I am sick of players asking me things in PMs or even in chat and then saying that I should leave the game since I am a stat grinder and this is a RP game.[/quote]

I'll just say it once more, I have nothing against stat-grinders. I know that wasn't directed at me personally, but I just want to make it abundantly clear. I have always placed a very high value on the knowledge of "elders" and those more experienced. I am sad that you feel this way, but I also understand... in the short time I have been here, I have seen the way stat-grinders are thought of by the rest of the population.

[quote]So my message is: I will NOT support this initiative. Moreover, probably when I will start stat farming again I will not care (like I never do ) who I am attacking and since 99% of the time I win and when I fight I really fight (like 200-300 fights in one day) imagine in a week how many loses someone will gather (if they remain idle even if they have strong rits). And imagine that I am not the only one doing this. As long as there will be few who will not care about the balance what you want to implement will not be possible. Maybe I will attack someone just to screw his/her balance. Why? Cause I can [/quote]

I think this is the only part of your entire post that I don't like. I can understand you not supporting or helping in any way, that's fine. Oh well, I was starting to think that we could at least somewhat peacefully work together, or at a minimum co-exist, but maybe that won't happen. Though as a side-note. I've been working towards balance while at the Gazebo of Equilibrium for the past week, and I think it would be very easy to maintain balance. Though my observations on this are skewed by the fact I am in an alliance and so can't be attacked near as often. Still I have not been in an alliance very long and previously definitely had to work at getting losses. Most people don't attack if you don't have trees up. Some still do, but it's not that many.

As with all things, in the end, time will be the final judge. Though I am already very happy to see the response (positive and negative) and support for returning to balance. If it takes Mur to interveen before it will fully be fixed, than so be it, but I am glad that some people are trying to make the situation better with what they have been provided.

Let me just end this post by saying that, as strange as this may sound, I actually understand your position and have an odd respect for what you do. Magicduel is very much about everyone doing what they want to do and contributing in their own way to make a very unique and enjoyable experience. I enjoy challenges and being different, which is probably a good part of why I'm being so vocal about this to begin with.

*edit: sleep time for me, so it'll be a while before I respond to any more posts*

Edited May 18, 2009 by Liberty4life

[Liberty4life]

i say, remove high honor bonus if defending player has less wins than losses and give penalizations (if someone cares to work out this idea, no problems), rebalance whole realm and balance issue is solved, or there is another way, make ally and non ally player to have same amount of actions and rounds in fight, this will result in more players joining alliances and then honor wont matter anymore

as for teaching new players how to fight, ya need more fighting competitions, for now there is only hc, and we all know how it looks like today, soon we should get torch thing, well competitions are the ones that make it hard, coz everyone gives theirs best, and other can learn from it, why everyone gives theirs best? becoz of reward for the best, its all simple, its all so selfish

[Thanatopic]

The carrot on a stick is the only method that proves effective in changing the hearts and minds of people. Offer something people want in, in exchange for the thing you want. Personally I find that fact disappointing ,but whatever, that's a different discussion. So , offer up weekly bracket tournaments. One may only enter if their profile is balanced, each MPlevel has it's own bracket. Winner gets a spell-doc, silver coins, gold coins, well aged creatures, or a neat little RP item.

This would serve your cause in a two major ways. One, it will encourage people to be balanced, since it has a reward beyond the obvious experience bonus. This will start slowly of course, so I'd have weaker prizes until you really get registrations going. Two, it will create a social forum in which those of like minds can meet and exchange knowledge and ideas. This is the real 'subversive' part of it, the part that digs into hearts and minds and changes the way people are.

Also, it allows for an interesting roleplay avenue, something that is difficult to find believe it or not. It feels like unless I want to roleplay as someones father or son, or in some other way work myself into a preexisting roleplay 'clique' , i find myself sitting idle a lot, clicking names and seeing whether it's worth attacking them or not.

So there's my suggestion for you Willem, and I'll give it whatever backing I can. I have little in the way of rewards, but my character can offer up manpower, and a voice. I'm not balanced yet, but It's something I've been striving for, though when I just get bored and idle in Marble Dale or The Gazebo of equilibirum it makes it hard.

[Nex]

hmm, i wonder.... since when were the mightiest of warriors categorically labeled "stat grinders". i think, aside from the obvious flaws in the honor system, we have a problem with the mentality of some "roleplayers". you know, pejorating a veteran warrior by calling him/her stat grinder is an example for bad ooc gibberish. i support trying to integrate rp and battle again, and there are a lot of ideas out there that sound promissing.

as for sword/sheath balance: reduce or remove honor exp, reduce potential honor loss by the % bonus for balance (meaning that those who maintain perfect balance [i]never lose honor[/i]). see how it works out.

[phantasm]

I think one of the points of this is the idle player. I'm not sure how this was started, but now I see alot of people are idle for far longer than they play. Is that the way idle was meant to be? I personally do not idle much, because to me idle is like sleep. If you sleep all the time and are active very little isn't that kinda....lazy?

Don't get me wrong I am very new to this game compared to alot and know less than i would like to about the mechanics. When platyers are idle for 8 hours at a time eventually, if they set up "balanced" rits, their rits run out and it becomes a solid barrage of losses. Therefore when you log back on to play for 2 hours, you have a ton more losses and as we all know at MP4 and MP5 actual Victories are much harder to come by than losses.

Am I looking at all of this wrong? I agree with alot that Willem has to say and have always been a balance player. We are all guilty of tree setting at times (my favorite is tree and 2 unholy priests as soem know). Like DST said (i can't belive I'm agreeing with DST) Tree choppin isn't a bad thing as long as its done in MODERATION.

With the implementing of the 20x rits I feel people have grown lax and set up rits for 8 hours of trees. if you have 4 trees, set up one tree and some matars as deff, times 20, you arrived with 80 rits set up and waiting to be chopped away at. Now as an RPer or as a Warrior can you honestly tell me that you do not find that as a little lazy? Just my opinion and I have been known to be wrong before

[Burns]

part of it may be lazyness, but the greater part, the reason why people like eigger, UP, No one, dst, Cutler and me have been doing it for sooooo long is to help new players forming better and more mp5-like armies...

i totally understand why you want a revolution back to balance, because most of you have never known what struggling for wins means, there have always been trees to chop on one side or the other for you...

as i have already tried to explain, balance-reality looks different, weaklings don't leave a sanctuary and strong/experienced players set rits you don't kill by coinincidence... or by knowledge, for that matter, there are some rits that are NOT beaten by another ritual, but ONLY by brute force...

and we are experienced enough to set rits in a cycle that will always give you the counter's counter waiting in line if you ever manage to break the first of our defs LOL

[Jazira]

I would also like to return to being balanced, for I have more than 1100 losses, and just over 500 wins.

I am not sure if this training will remain as you intend it, but you have my support and participation - when I am not needed elsewhere

[Lifeline]

i know this sounds totally wrong coming from me because i have 2k losses more than wins since almost the beginning of this year. i never expected it to turn out like that. when i started getting 2k losses more than wins only 3 other players had 1000+ losses more than wins and the rest was at about 300losses more or close to balance. but 2 months later a lot of people started to follow and gained huge amount of losses as well and by now almost everybody on mp5 has 1000losses more than wins.
but i would also welcome a rebalancing of the realm and if possible a barrier as to how off ur win/loss ratio can be. for example not allowing more than 500 losses more than wins or vice versa.
this cant be fixed by players trying to rebalancing the realm themself. a lot of players are using this unbalance for the purpose. they wont go through the trouble to regain 1000victories and as a result loose all the benefits they had from the unbalance.

so let me propose another idea:
but first let me quickly summarize why most players wont fix their win/loss ratio. huge advantage because of it. and they would have to gain at least 1000victorys to be back at balance which takes months to do and they themself would have nothing from going back to balance - they would actually hurt themself with it. and many other reasons.
so lets see if we the community can as a whole and not a few selected players influence this game and mak a big change happen. lets make a list of people who would like a rebalaning of the realm and something that prevents it to get unbalanced again. collect as many names as possible so that mur will see how many players would like a change. in my opinion this is the best idea to try to "fix" this situation.

i know that MD is NOT a democraty but i doubt that if we collect 100+ names of players who would greatly appreciate a change mur would ignore it. especially since this cant be fixed by player initiative at all.

[Willem RedBeard]

Let me just start this post by saying that the response to this idea has been amazing! Hopefully, my words have been transparent enough to show that I appreciate all feedback and am really grateful just to see everyone talking. So, here we go!

[quote name='Thanatopic' post='31391' date='May 18 2009, 03:42 AM']The carrot on a stick is the only method that proves effective in changing the hearts and minds of people. . .[/quote]

Definitely a great idea and perhaps it will become necessary to do this. MRD has, in a way, reversed this idea, and only allows people that are close to balance (don't give him less than -250 honour) to participate in his questions. More of a punishment for those out-of-balance, but it is still incentive to stay balanced. I LOVE the idea of having tournaments and battles, where there are prizes and rewards for the winners, much like the heads contest, but on a smaller scale and with more rules. (Rules not to limit, but to make it fun, instead of just an "anything goes" free for all). Again this will take time to develop, and right now, I think what this cause mostly needs is the support of people. I've been speaking a lot recently, so I can't remember if I'm repeating myself, but one thing I would like to say [b]it that it's not just about now massing wins to return to so-called balance. That in it self, would be unbalanced.[/b] It is about starting now, wherever you are, to do something besides EXCLUSIVELY having trees up and farming losses.

I also think Phantasm made a wonderful point... there is nothing wrong with tree rituals being setup to help a weaker player. This is an act of charity from the stronger player, and is often necessary to help out the less experience warriors. At the same time I would to rebuff this next thought:

[quote name='Burns' post='31403' date='May 18 2009, 05:13 AM']part of it may be lazyness, but the greater part, the reason why people like eigger, UP, No one, dst, Cutler and me have been doing it for sooooo long is to help new players forming better and more mp5-like armies...

...

i totally understand why you want a revolution back to balance, because most of you have never known what struggling for wins means, there have always been trees to chop on one side or the other for you...[/quote]

Actually, all through my experience in mp3 and mp4, NO ONE had trees up, and most people always had damaging rituals on defense. I learned by trial and error which players I could sometimes beat and which I had trouble with. I fought my way through both of these mp levels, then I got to mp5 expecting the biggest challenge ever. For weeks people had been warning me to wait longer in mp4 to get my creatures leveled up. Then I get to mp5 and the only thing I had to do was chop down trees. NOW, before anyone gets all riled up about how EASY we have it and how HARD it used to be, let me say this: Perhaps it was hard back then to get wins and experience, but the situation now is just ridiculous. There is no challenge, there is no battle, there is only being a lumberjack. I don't want the old system of everyone putting up their best defense, and I hope I've made that point clear. I want interaction between the defender and the attacker. Not mindless ritual setting, but battles and an exchange of ideas. I KNOW I've said this before, but some of the older players aren't listening. Not all of us have ridiculous stats, insane creatures, perfect knowledge of rituals, and unbeatable defenses. Infact probably more than 99% of us don't. So, this might sound a little harsh, but break out of your bubble and see what the rest of the players in Magicduel are like. I was arguing for at least 30 minutes yesterday with someone, and all he kept doing was making examples based on people with either super-high stats, crazy tokens, or creature combinations that 99% of us don't have. Not all of us have these things. Hell, I'm over a hundred days old now, and yes, I have a rare creature (tormented soul), but it's hardly strong and unbeatable. Everything else I have is ordinary. My stats are only better than the average MD player because I trained HARD at the gazebo of equilibrium for 2 weeks solid. In terms of the percentage of players out there, I bet my stats are close to the top 10%. They aren't even that high, and that's my point! Most players out there don't battle at the moment because there is no point.

Sorry for that long rant, but I felt it was necessary to get a point across.


[quote name='Nex' post='31393' date='May 18 2009, 04:06 AM']hmm, i wonder.... since when were the mightiest of warriors categorically labeled "stat grinders". i think, aside from the obvious flaws in the honor system, we have a problem with the mentality of some "roleplayers". you know, pejorating a veteran warrior by calling him/her stat grinder is an example for bad ooc gibberish. i support trying to integrate rp and battle again, and there are a lot of ideas out there that sound promissing.

as for sword/sheath balance: reduce or remove honor exp, reduce potential honor loss by the % bonus for balance (meaning that those who maintain perfect balance [i]never lose honor[/i]). see how it works out.[/quote]

I won't defend other people's choices of words, but I only started called a certain group of people "stat grinders", after they called themselves that. Please remember, that I also attach no negative connotations to the term "stat grinders" and have nothing against them. I am merely hoping to offer another route to enjoying the fighting system then the one that currently requires new mp5's, or anyone that wants to battle at the mp5 level to get hundreds (and often thousands) of losses.


[quote name='Lifeline' post='31408' date='May 18 2009, 06:33 AM']i know this sounds totally wrong coming from me because i have 2k losses more than wins since almost the beginning of this year.
...
but i would also welcome a rebalancing of the realm and if possible a barrier as to how off ur win/loss ratio can be. . .

so let me propose another idea:
...
so lets see if we the community can as a whole and not a few selected players influence this game and mak a big change happen. lets make a list of people who would like a rebalaning of the realm and something that prevents it to get unbalanced again. collect as many names as possible so that mur will see how many players would like a change. in my opinion this is the best idea to try to "fix" this situation.

i know that MD is NOT a democraty but i doubt that if we collect 100+ names of players who would greatly appreciate a change mur would ignore it. especially since this cant be fixed by player initiative at all.[/quote]

Personally, I don't care how unbalanced someone has become. EVERYONE is welcome to support this idea and movement towards balance in fighting. If starting today, someone with 4000 more losses than wins, wants to support this, I will gladly accept your name and put it on the list. I mentioned this earlier in this post, but it's getting very long, so I'll say it again: [i]this is not about getting your wins and losses balanced as fast as possible[/i], it is about changing your attitude towards getting needless losses and throwing off the system. I fully expect that until Mur makes a change that it will be impossible for the fighting system to be balanced. Yes there are way to get a Victory and not a Loss, but it's tricky and would require win-farming. I am personally getting my ratio fixed, so that other attempting to do the same may use me as a band-aid solution in case they need some honour to continue their journey to balance.

Hopefully, Mur will one day make a change, but until then, let's do what we can. Balance is important in Magicduel. It's time to work towards it again. I KNOW it is human nature to do whatever is easiest, and I don't propose that I am somehow an angel that miraculously does everything perfectly. But I know that it is possible to stand up and do what needs to be done. To not fall into traps and set ways. To do something different.

Thank you to all that have been listening to my ramblings and involved in this idea. It is a great joy to me.

*edit: I apologize if I don't reply to every post, and chopped up some of the quotes from other posts. I love to write and discuss these things, but it also takes a lot of time. Time on my part to write, and time to read...hell, and I know the longer a post gets, the fewer people that read it.

Oh and if you want your name added to the list of supports, please either message me in game or send me a message through the forum. I don't want to mistakenly add your name to the list and I don't want to miss people either, so I'd rather it just be an explicit message "Yes, please add my name to the list". I like it when things are straightforward and clear

Edited May 18, 2009 by Willem RedBeard

[dst]

And the change is here. I am so curious how it will work... From the first test it looks good ^^.

[Burns]

yep, it's going to be fun... for those who already have some stats and creatures...

i wonder how the mp5 newbies will react, but time will tell

and, truth being told: for an active player, that range should be enough to play on and on...
just in the next few days/weeks there will be a bunch of people struggling back into mur's range, constantly killing anything moving and kicking on corpses and stuff...
i'm looking forward to it XD