Point-Buy Character Creation

[xximrtwoixx 104]

I recently heard Rocket talk about group play dyanimcs like spawning with a group and how this can really unbalance the game for players not in a group. This as well as some additional thoughts for things that I constantly see requests for inspired me to write this proposal.

Point Buy Character Creation

-What it is: These systems give a player a set amount of points to purchase skills, perks, etc when they create a character. This is usually found in RPG systems and has replaced random stat generation because people will only game those systems until they have maximised a benefit from them.

How it could work in DayZ:

- Points you get: You start with X amount of points to purchase different "perks" these don't have to be IG skills necessarily but could be benefits that players desire. To generate the ever needed pool of tears that the Hive servers require for cooling these points could be set to only regenerate every 24hours for a given player ID, this would punish people that constantly die.

-What you do with Points: Skills would be one obvious avenue for points to be used, (This thread isn't about skills or their place in DayZ, but if they were/are included you could purchase them with point buy) starting equipment could also be purchased with these points (weapons, food, packs, etc), starting locations (Group, city, country, specific. They could have different values), Immunity to the Z virus (if infection were to be included), etc. (Anything and everything that a player may attribute value to could be included.)

- The effect of point buy in DayZ:

This would introduce a way to balance out players spawning on their group, ie it costs all your points to do so. Players that have a harder path, ie alone in a random locaiton, can outfit themselves to a degree that would assist them. In the end this type of system could provide a measured reward v risk for players to take and satisfy some of the complaints that are constantly posted. The system is also capable of being balanced or fine tuned over time, if starting weapons are an issue then remove ammunition or increase their cost to purchase, etc. Rewards can also be introduced like survive for x days and recieve a bonus x points at your next spawn, etc.

[SmashT 10907]

No thanks

[santiagoaquino6@hotmail.com 37]

I don't like it. If anything, I think points for skills should be earnt throughout the game to improve your current character and make permadeath feel like more than a slap on the wrist.

[starwarsfan@gmx.de 450]

No thanks

[NFK 102]

A point based character creation system would just feel like every other RPG out there. If (and it's a big if) the game were to have some kind of skills/perks/whatever, they should be randomly generated on character creation. To prevent suicide for better rolls, put them on a 10-15min timer. Any death sooner then the timer elapsing from creation till death results in the same stats on the next life.

[xximrtwoixx 104]

No thanks

Nice feedback, do you have ideas on how to balance out the ability for players to spawn at their base or with their group?

I don't like it. If anything, I think points for skills should be earnt throughout the game to improve your current character and make permadeath feel like more than a slap on the wrist.

As noted in the OP point buy can be used for many other things outside of "skills/Perks" or traditional RPG like elements. I myself am not a fan of learn by doing or improve by doing skills as it simply becomes a game of farming skills via gamey actions. But as stated in OP this isn't really about skills and their possible inclusion in DayZ but rather a mechanic that can be used to balance out the ability for players to spawn at their base or with their group. I would prefer that skill points be earned for time alive as this rewards playtime and also bypasses a players ability to farm skills, their only action would be to leave their character IG while AFK and the drawbacks of such would make that acceptable IMO.

A point based character creation system would just feel like every other RPG out there. If (and it's a big if) the game were to have some kind of skills/perks/whatever, they should be randomly generated on character creation. To prevent suicide for better rolls, put them on a 10-15min timer. Any death sooner then the timer elapsing from creation till death results in the same stats on the next life.

IMO players would still game the system even if there was a counter as your play character would/could represent a significant amount of play time and certain skills especially in terms of groups would be more desirable so min/max would still be used. As stated in OP this goes beyond skills/perks though as it could be used to deliver equipment, manage your start location, or any other number of things players would attribute value to. Thus creating a benefit/draw back approach that would balance out selecting to spawn at your base or with your group.

[hatfieldcw 184]

I hate the idea of points, it's too much to balance, and it'll inevitably lead to a "right build" that everyone will copy and paste. No go. You want new abilities? Find a toolbox.

As for spawning with your clan, that's not my cup of tea. If I had my druthers, I'd try to minimize players forming teams before starting to play. A big part of the game for me is being alone and having a chance to meet people who can help or hurt my chances. If I have a reliable team of helpers already lined up, then the risk/reward calculations for dealing with strangers is quickly skewed all the way over to "God will know his own". For the sake of the sociological experiment, I think the game might benefit from a "quick play only" kind of system, where you don't know where you'll spawn, who you'll meet or where your neighbor/brother/coworker is. You can't be sure your tent is on this server, you can't know where you left the Ural, you don't get to carry anything with you, either from the real world or from previous plays. Death is a huge problem then, and survival takes its rightful place at center stage. It costs you some, since you can't play with buddies you know, but you can play with buddies you meet.

Letting people spawn in as a platoon just reduces the challenge and takes the focus away from surviving and puts it on... what? Hoarding loot? Massacring solo players and smaller groups? Fixing up all the vehicles and tucking them in the woods? The game gets crappier and crappier the better you do at it. The problem with DayZ is that it's too easy to reach escape velocity and leave the game behind. Then you're in some kind of dumb limbo, where you can't enjoy just staying alive anymore, your actions have no more reward to offer and all you can do is dick around.

You spawn in, you tell your friends where you are, they send a guy on an ATV to collect you and you're geared up and in your shantytown within fifteen minutes. That's not easy enough for you? Even if you don't have a tent city and some vehicles, your buddies can meet you with a gun and a map and some food and drink and medicine within ten minutes from almost any starting point. You had something better to be doing during that time? You want to spawn in, take a 1911 and an AKM from a pal's pack and start sprinting for the NWAF?

Edited August 27, 2012 by Beez

[xximrtwoixx 104]

I hate the idea of points, it's too much to balance, and it'll inevitably lead to a "right build" that everyone will copy and paste. No go. You want new abilities? Find a toolbox.

As for spawning with your clan, that's not my cup of tea. If I had my druthers, I'd try to minimize players forming teams before starting to play. A big part of the game for me is being alone and having a chance to meet people who can help or hurt my chances. If I have a reliable team of helpers already lined up, then the risk/reward calculations for dealing with strangers is quickly skewed all the way over to "God will know his own". For the sake of the sociological experiment, I think the game might benefit from a "quick play only" kind of system, where you don't know where you'll spawn, who you'll meet or where your neighbor/brother/coworker is. You can't be sure your tent is on this server, you can't know where you left the Ural, you don't get to carry anything with you, either from the real world or from previous plays. Death is a huge problem then, and survival takes its rightful place at center stage. It costs you some, since you can't play with buddies you know, but you can play with buddies you meet.

Letting people spawn in as a platoon just reduces the challenge and takes the focus away from surviving and puts it on... what? Hoarding loot? Massacring solo players and smaller groups? Fixing up all the vehicles and tucking them in the woods? The game gets crappier and crappier the better you do at it. The problem with DayZ is that it's too easy to reach escape velocity and leave the game behind. Then you're in some kind of dumb limbo, where you can't enjoy just staying alive anymore, your actions have no more reward to offer and all you can do is dick around.

You spawn in, you tell your friends where you are, they send a guy on an ATV to collect you and you're geared up and in your shantytown within fifteen minutes. That's not easy enough for you? Even if you don't have a tent city and some vehicles, your buddies can meet you with a gun and a map and some food and drink and medicine within ten minutes from almost any starting point. You had something better to be doing during that time? You want to spawn in, take a 1911 and an AKM from a pal's pack and start sprinting for the NWAF?

IMO abilities through gear is easy mode, you complained about how easy the game can be, don't you agree that being able to have your friend pick up your mechanic ability off your dead body and give it back to you contributes to this??

Again though this isn't just about skills, you could buy whatever you like with points, all they are is a form of curency that allows you to purchase things. I understand what you mean about "right" build but that comes from your experiance with RPG type of games like D&D, in a game where there are no active abilities there really isn't an advantage to be had. Player one hates starting with out a weapon and plays alone, he uses his points on an axe/crobar, player two plays with his friends and hates walking back to them so he uses his points to spawn on them. Player 3 hates the DM that takes place in large cities so he uses his points to spawn in the country. This is simple stuff looking at the current/early game build. This could be vastly expanded though and I think thats where your missing things, your only looking at the current system with its current limitations.

End game is easy now or non exhistant really, thats a product of lack of content and design flaws that stem from the fact that this was not meant to be played for an extended period or by so many people. As things are tightened up and content is added there will be more things that will require groups, thus spawning on your group or at your base location would really mean alot. For example the end goal for world structure has been stated to be EVE like single servers, can you imagine having to spawn in a random location when it would take days of playing time to walk to a given location? People would respawn over and over to get closer and that results in wasted server resources, it would be better to maximize play time and preserver resources to simply let players spawn on their group/base. Look at how people respawn now and like you said it really isn't that far of a walk, people are lazy and will exploit whatever they can. I think my suggestion for a point buy system would combat this by providing a benefit for other players that don't see any value in using a powerfull ability.

To your underlined section:

Your not going to be able to eliminate pre formed groups/clans or stop people from playing with the people they have played with before this would ruin imersion and your ability to work toward anything IG. You will also always have to deal with the fact that an hour or two of co-operation is never going to be worth a day or weeks worth of playtime, (Side note as long as gear is the only value of a character then this will be re-enforced) and because players can kill each other so easily trust will never be extended to randoms by established or successfull groups/players. The only random friendly encounters will be when players don't have anything to lose, and this won't ever change.

I do agree that survival needs to become more of an "active" task, but again look at the mechanics in place now its simply to easy to survive. There is unlimited everything, food never spoils, and a single person can carry everything and thus posses all the skills needed to survive alone. It doesn't matter if your in a group or not, after the first few hours you've "Won" the game, and thats all that your quick play session would yield a few hour independent play sessions. IMO thats crap, I want to work toward something thats what persistence is about and what makes perma death great because you have the chance to actually lose stuff, well not your skills because those are on your tool belt.

[Faceman Peck 93]

No ty mr OP, no skill points no buying system. Although I like suggesstions both good and bad, I think it would do more harm than help

[bazbake 456]

The trick with stat balancing is that, at some point, you will encounter munchkins. And you have to be a bigger munchkin than the munchkins if you don't want them to break your game in about one day. You know those people who server hop to find the best loot because they're not satisfied just playing the game? Or the ones who figured out how to dupe 15 AS50's? Or the folks that figured out that tents could effectively cancel out permadeath? They'll exploit stats the exact same way as soon as you give them the opportunity and they'll claim it's exactly how the game was meant to be played until the Powers That Be go in and rip the guts out and change the code. This is why, eight years later, WoW is no doubt still nerfing hunters just because one person figured out a way to take a shitty build and make it ridiculously powerful.

Safer to just make sure everyone starts off in an equally shitty situation and tell them to figure their way out of it. Then again, there are a pile of game-breaking issues with gear alone that they need to deal with before stats even come up for discussion.

[hatfieldcw 184]

The skill system would be a good counterpoint to the persistence of inventory if persistent inventory were a legitimate part of the game. Without scripting and duping and Alt+F4, the genuine loss of gear would become a real factor, and so there'd no longer be a need for skillpoints and classes to balance it out. I say the better game would be one where gear cannot be obtained illegitimately, can degrade or be damaged and must be replenished from in-game sources from time to time.

Your not going to be able to eliminate pre formed groups/clans or stop people from playing with the people they have played with before this would ruin imersion and your ability to work toward anything IG.

I disagree, but I concede that this game might not be the best place to tackle that problem. The current playerbase is the one that played and stayed during the game's transformation into what it is, so it can be assumed that they like what they're playing. I'll keep waiting for something big to come along.

[BuffaloGent 2]

gtfo please

[Statik (DayZ) 2695]

I feel that this would take the realism right out of DayZ.

[frankyes 6]

No.

[TheDesigner 1197]

No thanks

Although I could argue all day about how this isn't a good idea, I'm sure you are also willing to die (metaphorically) defending this suggestion.

Edited August 28, 2012 by TheDesigner

[xximrtwoixx 104]

I don't see why everyone immediatley identifies point buy with skills, it is a mechanic that allows players to choose benefits at pre-determined and balanced rates. These benefits don't have to be skills, read the OP, they can be whatever you want. Clothes, weapons, food, starting locations, etc. etc.

Group mechanics are being worked on, one of those that Rocket has mentioned is spawning with your group or at your base. A point buy system that allows a player to choose this option and other players to choose other options is IMO the only way to balance out the availability to choose to spawn with/near your group.I am for him including this ability because I really don't enjoy playing running simulator, and I'm not playing with randoms.

The trick with stat balancing is that, at some point, you will encounter munchkins. And you have to be a bigger munchkin than the munchkins if you don't want them to break your game in about one day. You know those people who server hop to find the best loot because they're not satisfied just playing the game? Or the ones who figured out how to dupe 15 AS50's? Or the folks that figured out that tents could effectively cancel out permadeath? They'll exploit stats the exact same way as soon as you give them the opportunity and they'll claim it's exactly how the game was meant to be played until the Powers That Be go in and rip the guts out and change the code. This is why, eight years later, WoW is no doubt still nerfing hunters just because one person figured out a way to take a shitty build and make it ridiculously powerful.

Safer to just make sure everyone starts off in an equally shitty situation and tell them to figure their way out of it. Then again, there are a pile of game-breaking issues with gear alone that they need to deal with before stats even come up for discussion.

I agree that persistent storage does have an effect on perma death, the crux is that without persistent storage and higher level activities that can be based on that persistence players will never "get off the beach" they will revert to DM because the task of building pretty much anything when you can die at any time is simply to daunting for people to handle. Much of the game play focuses on obtaining items, and if more of the group activities focus on building things this means gathering more things, thus persistence of items will never go away. I agree that much of the loot system and gear/inventory needs to be reworked but if persistence is in to stay then the only way to add value to a character's life would be through skills.

Munchkins or min/maxers will always be there and people will always figure out the best way to exploit a system, the thing with point buy is that it can't really be exploited it is a transaction its the things that are bought that can be exploited. Skills and what should or shouldn't be included in a skill system is for a different thread, I'm advocating that a point buy system is what should be used for character generation because as long as there are no active or unique abilities its simply player choice as to what they use their limited currency to obtain first. Ie a flannel shirt 10 points or a winter jacket for 100. Both are in game lootables but one keeps you warmer. Also the min/max pvp builds will never fit into DayZ so I don't understand why people are afraid of them, one bullet does and hopefully will always do the same damage to a 1 minute character or a 30 day character.

The skill system would be a good counterpoint to the persistence of inventory if persistent inventory were a legitimate part of the game. Without scripting and duping and Alt+F4, the genuine loss of gear would become a real factor, and so there'd no longer be a need for skillpoints and classes to balance it out. I say the better game would be one where gear cannot be obtained illegitimately, can degrade or be damaged and must be replenished from in-game sources from time to time.

I disagree, but I concede that this game might not be the best place to tackle that problem. The current playerbase is the one that played and stayed during the game's transformation into what it is, so it can be assumed that they like what they're playing. I'll keep waiting for something big to come along.

Persistent inventory is a legit part of the game, even if tents worked the way they were supposed to the gear would stay in them for 2 or 3 days after a characters death. Amassing gear/food is one of the main activities of the game, thats what scavenging is. AltF4, hopping, and even scripting have really only sped up the loot buble in the game, because items aren't finite they are just harder to find nothing is really rare. Everyone will eventually find something good, and good players/groups farm spawns so they end up with even more, the good things never get thrown away and pretty soon they are not rare at all. This has been sped up, but it would have gotten here eventually, there aren't enough sinks for loot in the system. I agree that this could be addressed with more sinks like damage to gear, wear on gear, dependent items like batteries, etc. But the economy is screwed so long as everythign is infinite and people can also store it. This is rather off topic I guess, but many things are connected.

[xximrtwoixx 104]

*Bump*

[slartibartfast (DayZ) 77]

Why do you want to punish players that 'constantly die'?

You would punish a survivor after he is unlucky enough to spawn a couple times in sniper alley?

This seems a little harsh.

No points to allocate.

No xp to gain.

No skills to improve.

No trade system.

no class system.

No thanks.

Don't most players spawn in their groups anyway. Who cares if you respawn away from the group? Your no more than a 15 minute run back away, or most decent clans will have transport come pick you up.

[ChazSchmidt 4]

I extremely dislike any form of building stats or picking starting location because it takes away from the game.

The only way I see something like this working is having an achievement system and having certain rewards that are strictly aesthetic, like skins. Even this has its flaws because some may argue that certain skins or whatever would help you blend in etc,etc.

[colekern 1364]

I think we should leave the skill system to Rocket.

[Captain"hawkeye" 0]

I like it

[theozzyoscar333 3]

this isnt an RPG anyway, its an open world survival-shooter

[adamtheheretic 106]

No thanks

What he said.

[xximrtwoixx 104]

Why do you want to punish players that 'constantly die'?

You would punish a survivor after he is unlucky enough to spawn a couple times in sniper alley?

This seems a little harsh.

No points to allocate.

No xp to gain.

No skills to improve.

No trade system.

no class system.

No thanks.

Don't most players spawn in their groups anyway. Who cares if you respawn away from the group? Your no more than a 15 minute run back away, or most decent clans will have transport come pick you up.

Everyone should be equally butt hurt, if there is no punishment for immediate death with this type of system people would choose x spawn die/kill then do it again, a punishement for immediate death would resolve this.

Yes lets ensure everyone is always able to do anything/everything and no one is specialized in anything. Lets keep classes/skills as items because they are easy to replace....

That is what your saying, everyone should be a SF soldier who moonlights as an ER MD and restores car's/helicopters on the weekends.....

You don't spawn with your group if they are alive and your dead, or if you all decided to start new characters you would not be together. I do agree about the car/clan, but from what I can tell the grouping mechanics Rocket has talked about appear to be more in line with helping ad-hoc play than standard clan/group play.

I extremely dislike any form of building stats or picking starting location because it takes away from the game.

The only way I see something like this working is having an achievement system and having certain rewards that are strictly aesthetic, like skins. Even this has its flaws because some may argue that certain skins or whatever would help you blend in etc,etc.

Please elaborate how these take away from the game, otherwise it simply an opinion with little to no merit, I like blue so thus red sucks....

As you said nothing can be 100% advantage free, yes there are retards who would wear bright orange by choice, but I don't think they should be catered to.

I think we should leave the skill system to Rocket.

This isn't really about a skill system, as it states in OP this type of character generation allows a player to have a limited amount of choice when it comes to building their character. As I stated skills deserve their own thread, possibly many one for each skill, this is about a mechanic that gives you choice at spawn in a balanced way.

this isnt an RPG anyway, its an open world survival-shooter

Survival =\= Shooter

These are two completely different types of games, I'm sure you've played shoot games, they are round based, a given life/round lasts a very limited amount of time, you interact with players/world by shooting them.....

Survival games are slow, there are many ways of interacting with players/world, rounds/lifes last as long as you are able to keep your character alive.

I agree that its not an RPG, I wouldn't say it is a shooter either, you could play it like one because you can shoot things, but your throwing away alot of the other content that makes up the game then.

[colekern 1364]

This isn't really about a skill system, as it states in OP this type of character generation allows a player to have a limited amount of choice when it comes to building their character. As I stated skills deserve their own thread, possibly many one for each skill, this is about a mechanic that gives you choice at spawn in a balanced way.

You misunderstood. I meant that Rocket said he would like to start experimenting with something like this. It's not that this isn't a bad system, it's that Rocket just has a heck of a lot more time to experiment with it. Plus he's the creator of the game, and he knows what would ruin or improve the game.