I don’t care what others have, it does not change or effect my game play. There is no PvP or pay to win. Honestly the more plots and skill I have the more I want to play.
Added; I’ve posted a lot in this thread, so maybe I need to clarify this: I still love the game and appreciate the devs work, effort, and involvement and transparency in these forums. I’ll still keep buying gleam club, upgrade my version when it’s available, and perhaps buy cubits here and there. But I personally don’t like this change, as it stands. I’d be more accepting of some of the modifications some have suggested in this thread, but prefer no change.
I would like to move your attention to timber crafting as well.
Both rock and trunk could be brought back in line with other blocks typical conversion rate (so instead of 18 to 50 for a mass craft, more like 36 to 50 or anything that is not as crazily easy as current state of things).
I agree 2xp points for a stone was too much but with different conversion rate I think 1xp could be put in place. It just doesn’t make sense to have activities that don’t give xp at all.
Also, I would love to see timber crafting to take some time rather than instant, in general make it identical to rock>>stone crafting (same crafting time, same xp).
I’d agree there’s more easily available rock, you could buy it for the lowest possible denomination in places before this became popular.
I also think the game has become more complex, added more systems and that’s required broader character skills, therefore demanding more XP from players. I remember a series of updates which made achieving the same character power much more work, if possible at all. Other systems too. Also I went from having 3 max chars that could do it all to a possible 10 and actively using 6 of them. So there’s more demand across the board than in EA.
Who’d click a crafting table if the fun things were rewarding? Only a small percentage of players is my guess.
I satarted doing this on my own, when i created my first alt it was a crafter. First thing he did was process a lot of materials, including stone, that I had been hoarding as I learned how to play and level up my main.
OK my crafter out leveled my main like, immediately. I didn’t even know we had XP buffs at that point. My reaction to this? Made a miner alt a couple weeks ahead of schedule =D Duh! No need to level up my crafter so it was mining time and since then my crafter has always had the most/highest levels and XP gain of any character.
When I moved and built a larger workshop, and after i found out what ‘coils’ were, I put in 20-ish tables and 6 refineries. It quickly became clear that the refiners were a bottleneck so the first and last rebuild of that workshop included 18 refiners.
I wasn’t breaking anything down to numbers. I wasn’t trying to game the system. I have more plots than I have building ideas right now. But apparently I’ve been a dirty exploiter from day 1. I mean, for <some deity’s> sake this sudden uproar and outcry about how this has been an ‘exploit’ all along coming now from the development team as well has certainly put me on a sharp edge regarding this entire ecosystem.
Nobody is being hurt here, except maybe the devs. And some of the same people (I’m sorry but …) who get upset that others who put in more time, attention, or effort have more than them in the game.
Why would there be any need for this? Who is being hurt by it? I mean honestly:
This is literally weeks of planning, tens of hours of work just to set up. Hours of clicking the queues. It requires a large ‘investment’ in plots to set up as well as the coin and time spent on the tools and the logistics.
Why would you not want to reward this player’s dedication to their end goal, and success in a huge logistical challenge?
I can only think of one reason that this would be a problem.
No? I’m at a total loss then as to why you wold find this to be a negative or exploitative behavior.
The player envy and other negative emotions that seem to have whipped this up into a sort of frenzy, and it seems very few people were aware of a participated in the discussion here in the last few weeks regarding the number of players who would like to see stone crafting times reduced, and stated repeatedly that they would be willing to sacrifice some XP to do it.
Somehow there’s no mention of this conversation which was in a thread that went to hundreds of posts. Just a bunch of sudden, frequently hypocritical, hype and anger on the forums. “I did it just to prove it’s wrong” type of rhetoric. People are presenting random data points with little to no context
This is the path that quickly devolve the whole thing into the mess that’s on display (again) in some of these threads.
I mean, this mess is a social issue, and boundless is full of mechanisms that enforce social play. And right now, yes wholly my obviously debatable opinion, the community here is not healthy. Many won’t care to spend too much time on a community where they are challenged regularly for their right to have an opinion, rather than their actual input or opinion.
I know this post will seem borderline or completely off topic to some and I apologize for that but it’s straight on topic of “how this came to be a giant problem” because in my opinion, and taking james’ word that this is not a decision driven by over-production of cubits, the largest problem here is not a problem with rebalancing the experience curve.
The discussion of “the current meta” vs ‘exploit’ will continue and the root cause may be contention over this:
This needs to either be thoroughly discussed until the players understand that this normal RPG mechanic is not encouraged here, and/or why. If this is a fundamental philosphy of game development here there could be very productive conversation. And this could be targeted.
Otherwise, we’re going to have this same conversation here in a few days, weeks, or whatever whatever when the “new meta” is developed. You can cut it off because many players will know from day 1 that they aren’t interested in a game where participating in all aspects of the game is actively discouraged.
Any of reworking the skill trees, splitting with attributes vs. skills, expanding single character development potential, and many other ideas I would never conceive of can be brought to bear on the issue without the fruitless runaround and generation of bad feelings that is happening by addressing the symptoms of this one at a time, ‘exploit’ after ‘explot’ over many months or years of endless hard feelings all around.
The game requires alts to experience even a medium portion of the full range of game play. But the current alting vs skill sheets option set are both limited in different ways. The end of the matter, though, for me and many others is that being required to replay the first 50 - 80 hours of game play at a “natural” new player pace even 4-6 times to have enough skill sheets and skill points to ‘grind’ efficiently and still leave room for experimentation or growth is not an acceptable requirement.
To be fair there are certainly a host of stereotypes applicable to what’s happening with boundless right now. It’s a turning point in the evolution of the product.
Anyways I’m afraid to even scroll up and see how long this has gotten. I appreciate that this is breaking out into some cooler and more focused discussions right now but I do feel like the whole thing is, really, a short term distraction from some very critical issues.
I have setup a macro for push/move to auto rocks in crafting tables. I use this exploit. It is an exploit.
You don’t have to gather stone, you can just buy them…or people will give them to you. I have gone to miners and just asked for stone, they don’t see the benefit for getting the levels/or just don’t care and will give me stone. I got 50k stone from a miner that was mining and had a bunch extra in their inventory, and then later messaged me and gave me the rest…so their inventory wouldn’t fill out while gem mining.
Ignoring how easy it is to access, how easy it is to craft and focusing on one person showing their path doesn’t exclude others just because it fits a narrative.
Stone is a byproduct of mining…and it rewards more exp then everything else you gather while mining (especially if you refine it after which is also free).
A byproduct of an activity, shouldn’t be more rewarding then the actual items you are seeking. It is out of balance…and lifting up the other items would just throw the entire system out of balance.
It isn’t healthy for the game to have rock to stone be the best way to level a character in the entire game. It doesn’t even make sense.
It is like going on to World of Warcraft and being like “Well I could go to a dungeon or group…but if I stand here and kill this pig in Elwyn Forest for 3 hours, I will be max level…” It isn’t balanced and it isn’t healthy for the game.
It isn’t just an abstract idea that is unmarried from the other components of the game.
Stone is not meant to be more rewarding for exp then every other item in the game. More rewarding them gems, metal, all creature drops and every activity in the game.
If every other activity in the game is balanced on how they game arc is supposed to flow…then stone is outstanding and needs to be brought in line.
Leaving in a game breaking exploit like this makes it so it is the ONLY way to really level. I have seen in it chat…there are threads here on the forum…“Ohh your new and need levels?? Ohh no don’t hunt…just go grab rock and turn to stones…get mass craft you will be 50 in no time”
If we remove stone > rocks…and the next highest amount of exp the person can get is 1000k a day from other activities…it is clearly out of line. People feel like they need to use the process to move forward and stop doing other activities in the game.
I am not saying this randomly, we have had guildmates leave…because pressing their crafting tables over and over isn’t fun…but they want to grind out 60 levels and that is the fastest way. They would have been fine playing the game in different ways (hunting sometimes, building, crafting) and engaging in diverse activities which keeps players engaged. Little goals that add up over time.
But if you know the fastest way, it is hard to not do it.
League of Legends gets major flack for not having their URF mode which is a hyper fast, all abilities no Cool Down death match…because while players say “WE LOVE IT GIVE IT TO US!!” every-time they released it they watched people quit in droves by getting burned out…it is too much too fast. The pace of the game is what makes it.
We love to scream about how much we want cake…but too much and it makes us sick.
Rock to Stones is OP, Broken and an exploit. It needs to be nerfed.
I think the crafting to 0 EXP is fine (I hope they make it instant craft though since no EXP). And I used this method…we all know it is broken…we just don’t want to ‘loose’ something that is game breaking. But we need to give it up.
Again, your 10 alts and 200 levels have no effect on my experience ( just an example) it would be a bad exploit or method if it effected directly other people in the game, but particularly in this game, it absolutley has zero effect on how someone else chooses to spend their time.
You are comparing a completely different type of game to this. That game is PvP and competitive. Another player leveling does not effect your game. You choose to do it or not for yourself. You do not have to use it. I give AOE tools, Persisting pies, brews and locations to noobs all the time. That helps them skip the leveling grind as well. So is that wrong as well? I don’t think so. I don’t force my help on them, but they appreciate it and they seem to be more interested in the game then as well. I still fail to see the negative effect on the games community.
Then raise the xp for other activities to make them attractive to players. Why is the solution to always make it take more time? And ultimately as a builder I need to start with rock craft it to stone and then refined and decorative. Why should a portion of this activity not be considered important enough to the process to earn me xp?
I can make 11 million EXP farming stone. A byproduct of mining…that some people don’t even want.
So if you aren’t mining/gathering stone…you aren’t leveling effectively…want skill pages, cubits or anything else? Well stone will get you there in 1/8 the time.
How could we raise the EXP rewards to honestly compete? Explore a planet get 20 million exp?
It is the only outlier. Why change the entire game because one block is not functioning within parameters? Just nerf it and move on…the rest of the game is working fine. (Although, I still do support Rocks to Stones being an instant craft if worth no exp now! Would be nice).
I don’t disagree that it’s out of balance. But to net 0 xp from the stone is not the answer. A lot of creative ideas in this thread already. I’m fine with modifications and reductions. But do we stall the game content to fix this minor thing??? Leave it as is and move on to something more fun. It hurts no one.
I just picked a random day. Your question is a trap. You are trying to use ‘break’ as a term that is required. I am not a dev, I was speaking flippantly.
I will amend my statement if you would like to be specific.
“Game Breaking Exploit” to “An exp exploit that throws off Game Balance for leveling as intended, using ‘other activities’ as ‘intended’ to provide a baseline for the exp curve across the game”
Of course it was a trap! Because your premise is absurd! This went on and on for ages, and hurt absolutely no one ever - and if it continued, it would continue to hurt No One Ever.
YOUR LEVEL DOES NOT AFFECT ME. And someone might argue that your plots COULD, but we’ve seen griefing from groups with plots, and we’ve seen griefing done with single plots. THERE IS NO PLOT REQUIREMENT FOR BEING A PAIN IN THE WAZOO.
I haven’t seen a single solution that doesn’t just take from somewhere else. Someone else’s gameplay or style. It is tough to be sure.
I am grateful that people are offering other solutions. And it is awesome that James is listening and trying to find the right approach.
No matter how it is changed, it is going to have an impact…just hope it doesn’t splash further into other activities (like changing food buffs which effect other activities)
Thats all up to the players, it had zero efdect on me and still does that others are eons ahead of me in levels. Ut was a very boring task, some xp made it feel worth it.
Just wrong thing to do, to balance a game that hasnt really brought anything new since launch, and again, did not notice other peoples levels or what they did with their time, devs need to elaborate on wtf.
personally I never got 11 million xp from doing this, never even used any teaching food until this weekend. If the problem is the amount of stone then fix the source of the stone. 3x3 aoe tools created all this stone so should that be nerfed? Because if this goes through then the furnace or bricks are the next exploit. We can chase every mechanic that players us to keep the game from being agonizingly slow.
The other point I want to make is I have certainly not read all the reviews on steam for the game, but the ones I have never say the game is too easy, but often say it is too grindy. So do we continue to suggest ways to reduce grind or just let it continue to get worse.