ALLRIGHT wrote:I have never abused any healing mechanics of anything, and if I have I'm quite sure you would have been the first to tell me of it.
You, along with many other players with healing capabilities, did. Whether you realize it or not. The point really is that the system needs to be evaluated and rebuilt to prevent abuse. Penalizing individuals who have taken advantage of the easy experience healing brings will not fix the problem that it's very easy to get this experience.
ALLRIGHT wrote:Healers have a to hit penalty or its a bug, a level 60 should not have a to hit of 26 when other level 60's with no skill in a certain weapon have over 70 as I did before the change.
A large number of factors come into play to determine a character's attack rating. The base score for Healers is half of your level. Since you say you have an attack rating of 26, it seems likely that you're using a weapon that you don't have the ability for (-4 penalty). This penalty applies to all characters who don't have the ability for a weapon they're trying to use. You also appear to have no magical bonuses (from spells, Paladin leadership, etc.) or innate bonuses (weapon skills). The more combat-oriented classes start with a base score that's higher than Healers do, but that is a bonus to their class because of the purpose of their class. Healers are not penalized -- they simply have no class bonus.
Also, you can raise your attack rating by training your Strength and Agility ability scores, using weapons for which you have the abilities to, and improving your weapon skills.
ALLRIGHT wrote:A fair way of dealing experience should have been thought of before it was taken away. it would have avoided alot of angry people and avoided quite a few people wishing to leave due to one circumstance.
Many, many systems have been turned off temporarily before, such as magic (in whole and in part), stealing, abilities, and even portions of combat at any time where we need to stop a problem before it gets worse. Continuing to let this problem grow even worse is not an option. If you differ in opinion, private correspondence is the only appropriate method of feedback -- the message forums are not an avenue of argument with the staff.
If "quite a few people" are "wishing to leave" over this temporary adjustment, then it seems obvious to me that they either do not understand what's being done or they don't care about the problems its causing for the game and have no patience on waiting for a fix. Those people should re-evaluate if Eaxia Online should really be their role-playing home.
ALLRIGHT wrote:If you work a skill such as armor, it is the idea to get hit, are you not supposed to get those wounds fixed? or are you not supposed to get wounded while training skills?
Please read my previous post again. I believe I was clear that it's out-of-character for a character to attempt to get hurt, especially for the benefit of a healer who's standing idly, watching their companion get hurt, so they can suck up fast and easy experience. It's not out of character for a person to learn skills by practicing defensive moves in the presence of danger nor is it out of character to flirt with danger by engaging in many creatures (even though characters shouldn't technically be aware of 'skill levels' in the strictest sense). If someone were to take off their armor, sit on the ground and start making potions while creatures were biting and clawing at them, then it's clear that they are trying to make it easier for the creatures to hit them -- generating wounds that would previously earn healers a load of experience. This is what we are putting a stop to.
ALLRIGHT wrote:Healers can join a hunting party, however with a low to hit rating, they cant help much other than healing, and if there is more than two people in the group, nobody gets hardly any experience
Every bit helps. Not everyone in a combat party needs to inflict massive amounts of physical damage. Healers should be healing, though they're not completely restricted from acting as a combatant or other roles. You chose to be a Healer with the understanding that Healers heal and don't practice combat (as frequently as other classes).
As far as multiple people being in a group, yes you earn a little less experience per person in the group, but not a lot -- you only get penalized experience when someone in the group is much higher or much lower than someone else in the group or if you have a LOT of people in the group. Five people levels 21-24 hunting a creature that's level 22 will each gain more experience than three people levels 18-25 hunting the same creature. This balances out power-leveling. Healers also get a 50% bonus to experience in combat (yes, that's right -- you get 150% total of what other people get) to offset the fact that you ilkely can't participate as much in the role of a combatant.
ALLRIGHT wrote:I'm not sure if anyone has noticed but alot of the bigger characters have left for one reason or another, so there really isnt anyone to hunt with and those that remain are leaving eaxia as well.
To my recollection, of the six biggest people who don't play very often anymore over the past six months: 3 were hired as game staff, 1 has decided to reroll to a new name, 1 was permanently suspended from gameplay for extreme violations of our policy, and the last I'm not sure of -- perhaps this person did leave. I hardly think though that there is "no one to hunt with".
In the past few weeks since the rebuild, the average number of people playing has doubled to tripled on average and renewed subscriptions have increased 30%. We also get about a dozen new trial accounts opened every week. While it certainly isn't a revelation, new people *are* playing and older players *are* returning, so there should be plenty of people to group with.
I know you're among the higher-level characters, so your selection is limited -- that's just part of being "lonely at the top", or so the saying goes. The game *should* be more challenging the higher up you get -- not easier simply because it's easy and free to get an endless supply of experience from healing and resurrecting people. Think about that perspective for a moment.
ALLRIGHT wrote:Joining a hunting party with one person sounds like a good idea, but what if creatures dont teach you anymore? No exp from hunting, no exp from healing, what are you to do rely on skills alone to level?
"Temporary change" means "temporary change". The system is temporary offline until we make changes to it to help prevent players from being able to earn an unfair amount of experience disproportionate to the amount of experience that other people may get from hunting. There has to be balance before this system goes back into effect, but we're certainly not taking it away entirely.
And if a creature doesn't yield experience anymore, find one that does. At your level, that can be tricky since there are no hunting areas with creatures over level 56 (the highest jungatha), so you're in the same boat as the hunting classes out there who are waiting for more creatures.
ALLRIGHT wrote:I'm quite aware there is no changing the mind, it seems much like a parent taking away a toy because one child isnt playing correctly, however, I am curious as to when the new system is going to come out to allow healers to once again gain exp in the one thing they are known for doing? There seems to be alot of things still not done, so I dont see why there would be another thing that should be added to the list.
When we do have a update to this system available, there will be another announcement. This is a problem and we aim to fix it -- we're not just going to flick the switch and turn it back on because someone has found a loophole to lots of low-risk experience and are upset that we caught it. We also cetainly welcome *constructive suggestions*. If you feel you need to debate this further with differing opinions, do it privately -- I won't hold an argument here at our message forums.
I understand that for you, personally, this is your first experience with an online game like Eaxia Online and it may be frustrating to see systems come and go and change with such frequency. This is how our world goes -- things change, improve, etc. All of what we do change is for the improvement of the game world -- for you, our players. You may be too frustrated to understand how huge of a problem this is and that just waiting until we have something ready to fix it with is not an option. Read this entire post and then read it again. I welcome your opinions, thoughts, ideas, and even criticisms in a constructive and positive avenue.