Purple Rain (Full Version)

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big E -> Purple Rain (5/5/2016 7:35:10)

Hate to be a killjoy, but this spell needs a level lock. Otherwise everyone is just best off spamming the level 10 version. Noticed this as soon as it came out, now that we have Info Subs my theory is confirmed. The only difference between the versions is the SP cost, with the lowest version costing 1/10 of the top version. Even with a flat minimum 30% success chance when using the lowest version at level 150, the expected number of attempts for a successful rewind is far less than 10 meaning you'll be cheaper off spamming the level 10 spell until it works.

Easily fixed by applying the "cannot be used if your level is X higher than the spell's level" already used elsewhere. Please do NOT attempt to fix it via "maximum allowed rewind attemps per turn" as this will kill the spell's reliability and thus 99% of its strategic use.

EDIT: Corrected with level lock based on player, not monster



Thor -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 7:43:19)

I fully agree with this, but didn't even think of that. Good job seeing that, it really needs a level lock.



Andlu -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 7:48:35)

I think we need a lock based on the PLAYERS level
Not on the monster level
Since we can find level 150+ monsters out there



Thor -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 7:53:47)

Exactly^ That's what I thought he meant tbh



big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 7:55:06)

You're right about that Andlu, some monsters (Ziragat comes to mind) are tagged as absurdly high-levelled. Lock it so that if player outlevels the spell by more than 20 (or 25, for some leeway), it can't be used. Since it's there in the town shop, there is no reason not to pick up the next version right away.



Andlu -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 8:00:51)

One more thing that comes in mind is low levelled players that fight more high levelled monsters
And the opposite



Rayimika -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 8:29:46)

Haven't you guys heard of "creative use of game mechanics" thingy? Not everything NEEDS a level lock and most stuff that do are better off without it because aq is the only game where restricting players the higher level they are WASN'T the common practice when I joined and please don't make it one where moster defences increase wit level and to get expirience you've gotta relocate yourself to the next tier where you need to chop off more hp and actually deal less damage than the place you were at before. AQ imo should make their distinctive point by refusing to tangle higher level players as they don't with still rewarding exp for lower level monsters while the characters have absolute accuracy and say 50% blocking against those because thats what people often seek when looking for a fun online game to play and whats more if this trend continues I'm going to leave the community for the game I played when I saw AQ add first so theres that. Enough moglinberry juice.



ruleandrew -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 8:47:07)

To prevent abuse of the Purple Rain spell by casting a weak version instead of a appropriate level version. The player cannot cast this spell more than 4 times during one player turn if the player level is at least 20 levels higher than the spell power.

EDIT (big e)
I should include a hard lock on this spell as well as a soft lock on this spell.

The player cannot cast this spell more than 0 times during one player turn if the player level is at least 30 levels higher than the spell power.



big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 8:56:50)

@ruleandrew: That's exactly what I wanted to avoid. Even if you're doing everything right, if there is a maximum number of attempts, you have a finite chance of being just that bit unlucky. Purple Rain's selling point is its reliability - you can comfortably burn all your HP/MP for whatever strategic use, knowing for sure (with enough SP) that you'll get it back. Would you do it if there was a small chance it wouldn't work?

Hence why a level lock is needed - the alternative would make the spell so much less attractive.

@rayimika: Calm down, don't leave us, and please, use punctuation. Sure, there's plenty of room in-game for creative game mechanics. Except in this case it's more of a loophole abuse than a creative mechanic, since the level 10 spell is the best option to use no matter what your level. Meaning the higher versions are clearly underpowered. I agree with you on the "making game difficult for higher levels" part - sure, it gets annoying at times, but if it was harder at low levels instead, no one would join, right? ;)

But a case like here where a level 10 item is clearly better in every way than a higher level item no matter what the player's level? Clearly a balance issue.



Carandor -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 10:35:17)

There's nothing wrong with ruleandrew's suggestion. He's suggesting if you had the level 10 version and you're level 30+, you could only use the spell 4 times, which encourages people to upgrade to the higher (level 30) tier.



big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 10:57:44)

Oh derp, misread it as applying to any version. Fine. So a level 150 can cast the level 10 spell 4 times, and/or the level 150 spell any number of times (til it connects). That's fine. Doesn't really solve the problem though, since any player with two available spell slots can carry both spells, use the low version for 4 essentially free attempts, and then only use the level 150 version if the other one fails.

Besides, isn't it harder to code? Mine and Andlu's suggestion to just make it unusable once you've outlevelled it is so much simpler.



big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 11:39:04)

Actually, BKS, with the way the save roll system works the chance is always between 30% and 70% - even if you have "10 vs 150" in the save roll level. Use the level 10 spell at 150 and you're almost guaranteed the minimum success rate of 30% but that's still enough to make it usable and better than the other variants.



ruleandrew -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 11:47:29)

Big E, i knew about this problem based on the way the save roll system work. I want a soft lock and a hard lock on this spell. Soft lock is needed to warn the player that this spell is starting to lose its power.




Brasca123 -> RE: Purple Rain (5/5/2016 12:55:58)

agreed with big E, the spell needs a lv lock, the lower level version is clearly overpowered

@ruleandrew. i don't think that's necessary, a lv lock that is the same as lepre-chan's should be good enough



Ianthe -> RE: Purple Rain (5/10/2016 17:41:17)

Marking this as a FAQ so that it doesn't get deleted. I agree that something needs to be done, but I don't have the time right now.



Brasca123 -> RE: Purple Rain (5/10/2016 21:33:19)

thanks for looking into it IMR!



Ianthe -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 8:40:46)

Okay. Idea: give it a Lepre-Chan-style chance of instantly failing.

Take LC's level-lock multiplier, and give it a (1-mult) chance of instantly failing. So if LC's modifier is 0.6, then there's a 0.4 chance of insta-fail; otherwise, the spell goes on normally. If the multiplier is above 1, then there's a (mult-1) chance of the spell automatically succeeding.

Assume that you're a Lv150 player fighting a lv150 monster, and that CHA and LUK are equal.
  • LCMod is the multiplier from Lepre-Chan
  • Roll is the chance of success/the chance of the monster failing the roll, as per the normal status system rules.
  • Chance is Roll*LCMod (for LCMod < 1) or (LCMod-1) + (1-(LCMod-1))*Roll (for LCMod > 1)
    ##For >1:
    ####There is a (LCMod-1) chance of succeeding automatically.
    ####There is a 1-(LCMod-1) chance of the roll needing to succeed for the spell to succeed
    ####Add the two together.
  • ExpSP is (SPCost)/(Chance), the expected amount of SP you need to spend to get it to succeed.
    ##If there's a (Chance) chance of it succeeding, then it takes on average 1/(Chance) attempts to succeed.
    ##If it costs (SPCost) per cast, then on average it costs (SPCost)/(Chance) SP to succeed. 
    Level	10	30	50	70	90	110	130	150
Type	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	G
PowLvl	10	30	50	70	90	110	130	153
								
MPLvl	10	30	50	70	90	110	130	152
SPCost	4	7	11	15	20	26	32	39
								
Player	150	150	150	150	150	150	150	150
Buffer	20	20	20	20	20	20	20	20
AdjLvl	130	130	130	130	130	130	150	150
								
LCMod	0.07937	0.17989	0.30159	0.44444	0.60847	0.79365	0.81466	1.02929
								
Roll	0.3	0.3	0.3	0.34	0.38	0.42	0.46	0.506
								
Chance	0.02381	0.05397	0.09048	0.15111	0.23122	0.33333	0.37474	0.52047
								
ExpSP	168	129.706	121.579	99.2647	86.4989	78	85.3922	76.0279

    Looks pretty good?



    • big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 8:48:13)

    Looks very good, although complicated, must have taken some time. Thanks for the effort Imry! If this is preferable to a simple level lock, then sure, you have my vote to implement it :)



    Rayimika -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 8:48:24)

    Had to read it twice but this I still don't understand:
    quote:

    Add the two together.


    1-(LCMod-1) + (LCMod-1) = 1



    big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 8:50:26)

    quote:

    1-(LCMod-1) * success rate (depends on roll here) + (LCMod-1) * 1 (guaranteed success)


    EDIT: So ex. for Imry's numbers at level 150: 0.02929*1 + (1-0.02929)*0.52047 = 0.5345



    Rayimika -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 8:55:15)

    Why add if you should multiply cause there is a chance of both occuring?

    You succed the roll and get automatical victory at the same time:

    2*((LCMod-1)+Roll)-(LCMod*(1+Roll)-1) if LCMod>1 chance of success


    @below but the roll doesn't go to 98 it is 1-100 meaning that those 98% will still account for another scale of 100% and if you take the chance out of 98% based on scale of 100% you do not add it to 2% The idea behind these two formulas are that if 2(always and chance) occurencies happen at once they use up their chances of occuring.



    big E -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 9:05:59)

    'cause you have a 2% chance of having it succeed "for free" and a 98% chance of being dependent on a stat roll. Look up conditional probabilities if you're still unsure :)



    Brasca123 -> RE: Purple Rain (5/22/2016 9:41:07)

    too complicated for me to understand, but i noticed that the expected SP went up everytime, i think it is a good idea



    ruleandrew -> RE: Purple Rain (5/23/2016 3:19:34)

    The LCMod , Chance and ExpSP numbers are not right for the level 130 Purple rain and level 150 Purple rain.

    The LCMod, Chance and ExpSP numbers should be:

    Level 130 Purple rain
    LCMod~ 0.99993; Chance~ 0.45968; ExpSP~ 69.61364

    Level 150 Purple rain
    LCMod~ 1.22731; Chance~ 0.61366; ExpSP~ 63.55311



    Rayimika -> RE: Purple Rain (5/23/2016 5:08:15)

    So we had a talk with big E and we both agree on one thing if LCMod>1
    quote:

    you have to treat it as 2 separate 1-100 rolls:
    - One to determine whether you get the "free success" or not
    - One if you fail the "free success roll" which is your standard "does the monster resist?" roll

    The question is if you auto-succed do you still have to roll the second roll?

    I suggest to mark these as Roll1 and Roll2
    Roll1=LCMod-1
    Roll2=Roll/(2-LCMod) cause it won't occur when you win Roll1
    Roll1+Roll2+(1-Roll) doesn't equal 1 as it is necessary

    Instead 2*((LCMod-1)+Roll2)-(LCMod*(1+Roll2)-1)+(1-Roll)=1

    This is what I misunderstood when I read "add the two together" when IMR positioned Roll as
    quote:

    Roll is the chance of success/the chance of the monster failing the roll, as per the normal status system rules.

    when in fact there are 3 different ways to interpret this.



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