Nerf the Academy

[De-Legro]

I'm pretty sure you do.  I haven't looked at the code, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's just a d100 roll with the skill percentage modifiers tossed in and the modifiers based on your duel style choice.

Thinking back to this, I will assume that tournaments use a subset or similar code to duels. Anyone that watches tournaments closely will have seen that characters of lesser skill frequently beat characters of higher skill, even of much higher skill.

[Zakilevo]

Yeah I can back this up. Lost to someone of 40% when I had 75%. Call that a BS! joking :)

[Tom]

Stances make a good difference, but you profit more from them when you have the skill to exploit the advantage.

Knowing the numbers, if I had 50% in swordfighting, I wouldn't feel comfortable going into a duel with someone I know to have 90%. But I certainly wouldn't hesitate against anyone +/- 20% or so.

Also I know that with luck I can win against that 90% guy. If the stance choices are on my side, my chance wouldn't even be half bad. Still well below 50:50, but still high enough that if the guy goes around challenging people like me to death duels, he'll end up dead himself sooner rather than later.

[Indirik]

Nonetheless, my suggestion was not specifically to encourage duels (though that was one of the reasons), it was more to encourage more useful and fun behavior for everyone.

Assuming that everyone agrees to your definition of "useful and fun".

[Indirik]

That training is so long and grueling is one of the reasons why people either don't do any at all, or do quite a lot of it. The result is that people either have around 5% swordfighting, or around 90%, with relatively few in-between.

Well, that's just not true at all. A random sampling of 25 random characters on Atamara reveals a average sword fighting skill of 29%, with a median of 25%. Only three had >50%, and only two <10%. I'm sure Tim or Tom, with uber-SQL-Fu could do much better at it than I could.

And besides, doesn't that really make sense? Most people are passable skilled enough to not hurt themselves. Some barely know which end is the pointy end. And a relatively few are experts.

And therefore, dueling is always full of scandals and whining, because the ones with 90% will go around challenging everyone 'till death, and the ones with 5% will never accept any challenges. Or pretty near.

Pardon my coarseness, but, umm... Duh. That's why trial by combat isn't very popular with those who don't have much skill at it. The purpose of dueling isn't to prove who is right, or whose cause is just. It's to enforce a politeness and circumspection to people's behavior, because they know that to be impolite or rude could cause them to have to back up their words with their life. We have that reasonably well modeled in game mechanics. What we don't have is the player culture to fulfill society's part of the equation.

[Indirik]

Thinking back to this, I will assume that tournaments use a subset or similar code to duels. Anyone that watches tournaments closely will have seen that characters of lesser skill frequently beat characters of higher skill, even of much higher skill.

I remember when Alex Davies trained one of his characters to about 98% swordfighting, then got knocked out in the very first round of the tournament. I'm fairly certain that the guy who beat him was a relatively unskilled character.

[LilWolf]

A solution: nerf the crap out of the academy.

Good way to kill off the infiltrator class completely.

And have you actually tried to gain skills by training at the academy? It's not exactly fast as is. They're closed quite often and getting improvements in skill aren't exactly guaranteed. Heck, constant battles will probably get your skills up faster even now.

Further more skill in sword fighting isn't what's stopping duels from happening. It's people not caring about the consequences of refusing a duel.

[Solari]

Good way to kill off the infiltrator class completely.

And have you actually tried to gain skills by training at the academy? It's not exactly fast as is. They're closed quite often and getting improvements in skill aren't exactly guaranteed. Heck, constant battles will probably get your skills up faster even now.

Further more skill in sword fighting isn't what's stopping duels from happening. It's people not caring about the consequences of refusing a duel.

Improve the skill gains from performing various infiltrator actions or otherwise lower the probability of getting caught?

[LilWolf]

Improve the skill gains from performing various infiltrator actions or otherwise lower the probability of getting caught?

There's already an infiltrator thread about doing it, but really, the academy isn't any sot of a problem that needs nerfing in my opinion.

[Jens Namtrah]

When de Legro, Indirik, Lil wolf, and myself all agree that the issue with swordfighting skills/dueling is one of culture, not mechanics, then I would go out on a limb say we have a disparate enough set of people to say we have the root of the problem.

I think it is time to change this topic to one of, "How can we influence the BM culture to get more realms/players to think this way"

I will start the ball rolling by saying, "get rid of the law about dueling - making it clear it is a matter between characters, and not something for the Judge to be involved in"

It doesn't eliminate things like the king saying "no dueling" and the Judge handing out fines, but it sets the tone for the direction the game should be going.

[Zakilevo]

I agree. I mean why is duels bannable? Were duels banned during the medieval ages?

[De-Legro]

I agree. I mean why is duels bannable? Were duels banned during the medieval ages?

Yes, depending on the exact age we are talking. But that ignores the reality of the game, EVERYTHING is bannable, the trick is maintaining your position after you ban people. As a Judge I could ban people for using a word I don't like, for sending too many consecutive messages etc. So the answer is dueling is bannable because the noble population in general won't protest out a judge for issuing the bans.

When de Legro, Indirik, Lil wolf, and myself all agree that the issue with swordfighting skills/dueling is one of culture, not mechanics, then I would go out on a limb say we have a disparate enough set of people to say we have the root of the problem.

I think it is time to change this topic to one of, "How can we influence the BM culture to get more realms/players to think this way"

I will start the ball rolling by saying, "get rid of the law about dueling - making it clear it is a matter between characters, and not something for the Judge to be involved in"

It doesn't eliminate things like the king saying "no dueling" and the Judge handing out fines, but it sets the tone for the direction the game should be going.

I think the whole "law" mechanic that Judges have needs to be revised. They cover such a narrow spectrum of offences and I've seen multiple times people argue that a Judge can't issue a certain ban because it isn't one of the 4 things you can make "illegal" by game mechanics. Already we use the Judge Bulletin and Wiki to extend a realms laws, so apart from notifying the Judge of a breach, which so far as I can tell in most cases the breach will give a similar message to the entire realm, what purpose does this feature serve now?

[Chenier]

Boost all hero's SF gain from combat?

Would indeed  help. I've never noticed a hero to increase his swordfighting skills through combat alone as it stands.

[Jens Namtrah]

I think the whole "law" mechanic that Judges have needs to be revised. They cover such a narrow spectrum of offences and I've seen multiple times people argue that a Judge can't issue a certain ban because it isn't one of the 4 things you can make "illegal" by game mechanics. Already we use the Judge Bulletin and Wiki to extend a realms laws, so apart from notifying the Judge of a breach, which so far as I can tell in most cases the breach will give a similar message to the entire realm, what purpose does this feature serve now?

I would prefer to dump the whole GM laws part, and will make a case (that I've made many times before) in another thread arguing that rulers and Judges need to RP their positions more and not let mechanics do everything for them.

But for this thread, let's just focus on improving the culture of dueling in the game, so we don't get another infamous 50page thread that never turns into anything solid.

[Norrel]

There's been a lot of good points in this thread, so maybe nerfing the academy isn't actually such a great idea. I dunno.

But what about boosting skill gain from combat? Any opposition to that idea?