NW Fix (in General)

I think the best fix to the NW calculations would be to change the formula to a % based calculation instead of a constant calculation and use linear instead of exponential formula. In other words a +30 item would cause an addition of

30 * NW bonus for items bonus as a percentage

so if the item had a bonus of .001, the bonus would be 3%. If the char had a PR of 100K, the new pr would be 103K. If the char was 10K his new PR would be 10.3K.

Tattoos should stay as is and weapons might need a different formula since it has two pluses.

I agree with the sliding scale idea entirely, and have been thinking along the same lines myself. A noob's PR should go up by a whole lot if he puts on a +30 pair of DBs... but should Ranger's go up the same? I don't think so.

Why not? DB s give exactly the same bonus on any character used. These would give -30 pth to *anyone* using them, so shouldn't the PR increase be the same?

Cases could be made for items giving percentage increases though (CoI, Corns, Elven stuff, etc), as these benefit larger characters more than smaller ones.

But then whats the point in upgrading your equipment if it just raises your PR by a %? What you are suggesting would make the situation worse, not better. As it is, the more networth you have, the less it affects your PR. This makes upgrading your items worthwhile in the long run. Slapping a % on it will make it less worthwhile in the long run because everything else is exponential.

which = more top 20 players leaving or ditching their high MPR characters...

> But then whats the point in upgrading your
> equipment if it just raises your PR by a %?
> What you are suggesting would make the
> situation worse, not better. As it is, the
> more networth you have, the less it affects
> your PR. This makes upgrading your items
> worthwhile in the long run. Slapping a % on
> it will make it less worthwhile in the long
> run because everything else is exponential.
>
> --SilentButDeadly, 9:13 AM EDT
>
I do not understand your point. Bonuses from plusses are not exponential for most items and the equations should differ for those items that scale differently.

Tattos are excellent the way they are as their affect is closely tied to their NW. Do not change them.

Items like armor are just plain wrong the way they are now, since their affect is linear and their NW is exponential.

Weapons are wierd. I'm not sure what the affect of placing a 6 million NW item on a 1K character is, but I am pretty sure that it the cost (in PR) outweighs the affect. If the affect is exponential, then the cost should be too. Finding the right formula is tricky though.

This imbalance is a Bad Thing (TM). Because of this folks are no longer sinking cash into upgrades and items have topped out in effectiveness. Noone wants the high end items since their affect is so out of proportion to their cost. Many folks have bought their items up to that magical level and found they have tons of cash left they can't spend. When they want to do a strat change they can't unload their items except to a select few at the same basic power range. Higher level chars don't want it because it is too weak, and lower level chars cant afford the cost.

I have no idea what point you are trying to make, SilentButDeadly. But I can say this. If the cost = the affect, folks will start to want high end items again, the economy will flow nicely, because a bigger better weapon will mean a bigger, better character instead of an overrated character that can't fight other chars at it's own PR level.

I don't understand why, but everyone seems to think that the NW/PR link is linear and it's not. Larger characters are affected less by adding NW than smaller characters.

The NW penalty is linked to MPR. Higher MPR characters do NOT receive anywhere near 100% of the NW they wear as PR. For an extreme example inspect Gyaxx. His NW is almost 80 million, and he has about a 750k difference between MPR and PR, and some of that is a ToA!

If it helps in anyway to have the data, here it is:

Score / PR / MPR: 1,128,802 / 1,078,949 / 354,526
Net Worth: $79,729,369
Sign of Earth lvl 329,070 6,086,009

Linear is not 1-1.

y = 5x is linear.
y=1/100 x is linear. Not that NW is not directly added to PR, but a fraction of NW is.

y = x squared is exponential.
y = x*(x=1)/2 is exponential too.
y = 5x * (x+1000) + 1 million is exponential too.

NW increases more for each level so it is not linear. It may be logrithmic, exponential, or some other increasing scale. And PR seems to be scaled to NW in a linear fashion.

The point is that the PR cost of an item is NOT correctly weighted to its affect. This is obvious in some cases, such as putting +50 Mithril chain armor on a 1K character. The characters PR will skyrocket, even though the affect is small in comparison.

This is blatantly obvious regardless of whether the actual formula for PR is exponential or logrithmic.

In general, the way the formula stands the game penalizes for wearing gear the game considers too big or too small (this latter statement is only true for some minor cases such as not using up the free weapon pool or whatever it is called).

What is actually being argued by you, I think, its whether penalyzing a user for wearing over-large items is bad. SHOULD a 1K character be allowed to use a +60 MCM? I say yes, as long as their PR gets a boost similar to its affect.

Or are you saying PR is not scaled to NW in a linear fashion? You could be right. I am making some pretty basic assumptions based on what others have said and what I have observed. But the formula is far from obvious to me so there could be hidden factors I'm not aware of.

I CAN say that the formula is out of wack for high range items and is discouraging forging and trade. It seems reasonable to prevent folks from using items too big for their britches, but it is having a negative impact on the game in many if not most peoples opinion. The whole reason the PR bonus was added was so that folks couldn't don uber gear and fight totally outside their PR range. That will still be the result if the PR bonus matches the affect bonus, but still reward characters that have the uber gear.