[X] My Assistant

Does anyone have any notable results from the coupons yet?

Does anyone have any notable results from the coupons yet?

7 HGC - all from magnificents....

14 HGW (staffs), mostly mags, and 2 junk legendaries

Legendary Shocking Oak Staff of the Earth-walker
Legendary Tempestuous Oak Staff of Focus

Not done todays arenas yet

(IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif) By the way lololo16, I wanted to get you Karma points but I don't know how to do it.

You see his post, with his avatar ? You see under it the date he joined and his current level ?

You see on the right of his level that "+K" ? You just click on it (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

People are still playing HV? How cute. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif)

People are still playing HV? How cute. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif)

yes, they are - it's quite a good game, still.

yes, they are - it's quite a good game, still.

No, it isn't, actually. But it's strangely addictive to certain kinds of minds (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

dudes, I did spend a lot of real money on this little game... who would ever have guessed that such a low-graphics minigame could be so addicting?

We can still try to add our own graphics some day through the scripts. Add some (hentai) thumbnail images for each monster. The owners and/or players can upload the images we want to see.

And add some sounds, this would probably help our play too. For example we might hear a chopping noise when we hit a monster, and/or a screwup noise when we miss (so we appreciate Overpower and Penetrator more).

We can still try to add our own graphics some day through the scripts. Add some (hentai) thumbnail images for each monster. The owners and/or players can upload the images we want to see.

And add some sounds, this would probably help our play too. For example we might hear a chopping noise when we hit a monster, and/or a screwup noise when we miss (so we appreciate Overpower and Penetrator more).

Auditory feedback is actually a pretty good idea for making the game feel more interactive; add a little visual effect on crits - say a screen shake (or just shake the specific monster's box) perhaps - and it'll enormously improve the play experience.

Auditory feedback is actually a pretty good idea for making the game feel more interactive; add a little visual effect on crits - say a screen shake (or just shake the specific monster's box) perhaps - and it'll enormously improve the play experience.

dude, at the rate we're hover-attacking it would be a continuous wall of sound

dude, at the rate we're hover-attacking it would be a continuous wall of sound

How else shall we hear the lamentation of their women?

This post has been edited by kamio11: Oct 10 2020, 02:19

at the rate we're hover-attacking it would be a continuous wall of sound

Indeed, that's why I originally said "and/or" so that maybe we could only be bothered to hear a missing noise. Presumably everything would be optional anyway. Or instead of a noise, we could see a subtle flash or something if we miss a monster.

If you think about, one of the most lucrative genres of gaming (collectibles cards such as magic the gathering, and yugioh) which has created an entire industry of retail stores worldwide, has similarities with this game. They just got some people to draw pictures to put on their cards. If we put random pictures for our monsters it could be similar (well not quite, this game would need some serious updates that allow us to customize our monsters more meaningfully).

If you guys, one day, get to adding lots of images and possibly sounds, I think it would be a good idea to make that part of the game optional (togglable).

Sure, one reason is the wall of sound which fast players would be constantly exposed to. But I also think it may be unnecessary to spend more bandwidth on every most casual player all the time. The audiovisual extras could be implemented as very cheap hath perks, relatively cheap trainings, or something like that.

I’m sure I would pay 10 hath for the images perk, but not for the sounds perk. That’s just my opinion, though. And my only ways to get hath are from artifacts or by buying with credits.

***

Ever since I learned that nobody buys below-average gear (and extremely few people buy even averages or superiors, except maybe some beginners at the bazaar), I have been pondering about the inflation problem of Hentaiverse. I may be the only person on earth who considers it a problem, but... heh, perhaps somebody will find my thoughts entertaining.

This is going to be an essay. You should skip it if you consider it irrelevant. TL;DR: I am discussing different types of what I call in-universe inflation or in-world inflation, and contemplating measures that could potentially be taken against it and a couple of other problems in Hentaiverse.

I admit that Hentaiverse manages to be strangely addictive. I am not a gamer, and have previously spent this much time on extremely few videogames of any kind. Then again, would I have given up by now if it was not for the prospect of making (modest amounts of) credits that have uses outside the game itself? Probably.

I have faced the undesirable effects of in-universe inflation before, in tabletop roleplaying games. As the characters get tougher, they can often make ridiculous amounts of money or other valuables without anyone stopping them. RPGs (not only gamemasters but official game materials as well) typically react to this by throwing harder and harder enemies at the strengthening players. This is, in my opinion, undesirable inflation of sorts: it leads to a situation where run-of-the-mill thugs are tougher than most bosses were earlier, questioning the credibility of the whole setting.

Why are different kinds of in-game inflation so common? I believe the reason is that it is just too handy a way to react to the advance of player characters. The player characters are heroes, so they are pretty tough themselves to begin with, and most often it is not a good idea to kill them realistically often. Realistically often even for exceptionally tough fighters, that is.

In story-intensive roleplaying, the high road would be to increase the complexity of the surrounding universe. Instead of introducing unlikely tough common thugs, the gamemaster should introduce better enemy masterminds who are able to make normal common thugs appear in the right place at the right time, thus making them more dangerous. Important supporting non-player characters should have problems, including social problems, that require serious attention from the player characters. And so forth.

As far as I understand Hentaiverse (and I admit I do not understand it very well), here the main problem is how the amounts of goods, especially weapons, keep accumulating. Simultaneously, the discussions revolve around the experiences of rich veteran players. Many of the veterans are surprisingly positive and helpful towards newbies, but in a way, this just exacerbates the problem. As there is a constant flux of free or very cheap weapons, restoratives and other goods from veterans to newbies, the first 150–300 levels are increasingly seen as a meaningless grind towards the "real game", which is all about the speed of killing on PFUDOR difficulty. A level 97 player can shrug off and bazaar a drop that would have become his most valuable possession some years earlier. Soon he will realize that for most items and equipment pieces, the bazaar is no bazaar, more like a smelter. If crude weapons are this common, even the NPCs of this game world should have stopped buying them long ago.

Experts have described Hentaiverse as "very well balanced", and for most part I agree with them. I also admire the complexity of a mostly text-based game that has so many different aspects such as the trainings, the shrine, gear upgrades and gear potencies.

When examined from my point of view, the main shortcoming of Hentaiverse is its lack of social interaction. However, I have pretty much accepted this deficiency. I can imagine how boring it would get in the long run if I needed to engage in template discussions with bazaar NPCs. On the forums and over mooglemail, the amount of real interaction is satisfactory, and what it lacks is, so I believe, strongly linked to the second worst shortcoming of the game.

Yes, that would be the in-world inflation. I have no easy fix in mind, and if I had one, I would probably advise against implementing it. It would change the foundations of the game so drastically that it would lead to an in-world economical chaos, and probably to several dedicated players leaving for good. I do not wish to see that.

And still, it keeps bugging me that this game could be more fun in the long run, especially for us newbies, if goods were harder to obtain, not easier. If the game world somehow reflected the facts that...

1. Gear has to be produced by someone, with skill, from raw materials that have to be obtained. As it is now, the game is giving the impression that weapons and other goods magically grow inside monsters, although some wordings try to hint at monsters obtaining them from fallen adventurers.

2. Gear cannot always be repaired. To some extent, sure. But does everybody else really consider it a good idea that quality gear is practically indestructible? Furthermore, in real life, gear may also be lost so that it will never be found again. (As far as I understand, there are only two ways for gear to be destroyed: when it accumulates enough at the bazaar, which takes care of most low-quality equipment, and if its owners quit the game without selling their goods, which takes care of a fraction of high-quality equipment.)

3. When people are killed they die. It is obvious that Hentaiverse battles are fought following some sort of "danmaku rules", preventing both PCs and monsters from dying "for real". (If you have no idea what I’m talking about, that is a Touhou reference. You can consult the Touhou wiki.) Still, I think there should be tougher penalties for dying in-game, such as loss of all equipment and items carried at that moment, or loss of some, or a notable deduction of one or more attributes. That would also strongly encourage players to flee more often instead of getting themselves killed, which I would consider a big improvement.

This post has been edited by Katajanmarja: Oct 12 2020, 18:13

I'm gonna read your post fully later when I finish work (I promise), but one thing that caught my eye

I think there should be tougher penalties for dying in-game, such as loss of all equipment and items carried at that moment, or loss of some, or a notable deduction of one or more attributes.

Attributes wouldn't work with the current system as you stop gaining spending exp at 500

As for losing gear, do you mean actual worn gear, or gear dropped during the battle? Both are horrible ideas, but the former specifically is horrendous

Both are horrible ideas, but the former specifically is horrendous

If it was the former,
Perhaps many users will dislike it and quit. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/cry.gif)

This post has been edited by taro_: Oct 12 2020, 18:17

...

FYI: there would be basically no bandwidth usage on audiovisual feedback; a very small amount would be used to transfer some small sound files, which would be cached by the user's browser, and pretty much any visual effect could be achieved through Javascript and CSS. The bandwidth usage would likely be smaller than what is currently expended on the game's icons for spells, buffs and monster letters.

Re: balance discussion, there's a couple things to respond to.

Inflation is a problem in HV, but unlike tabletop RPGs, online video games are often self-regulating through several mechanisms: the primary one is the assumption of an expanding playerbase (new players, or new characters, act as new demand), another would be credit sinks (on HV presently: only the 1% gp/hath exchange tax and trainings), and a third would be hoarding (collectors holding onto either large sums of money or very valuable items, essentially taking them out of the economy).

It's true that the playerbase is not expanding at a rate that actually affects the regular economy in this way, but there's really a second effect causing that: at mid-high level, almost everyone is funnelled into the same playstyle (mage), so while most melee goods fall in value, many mage goods appreciate. Gear is a slight exception to this, where most equips fall in value... except elec, wind and holy gear in particular (again, same effect - most people move into these elements rather than fire/cold/dark).

One might think that balancing the styles would fix inflation in this regard - more desire for melee gear in particular would be good to stabilize prices... a little. But if things were perfectly balanced, likely all equips would fall in value, because there just isn't enough demand through new players (who are forced to acquire equips for progression), none through new characters (multiple accounts not allowed), and not enough through hoarders (limited resources mean only the very richest will bother acquiring sets for multiple playstyles, besides new players experimenting with cheap gear). Reducing drop rate even further would just be masochistic, though. It's a difficult problem to address without making gear untradeable or giving it a limited lifespan in some way.

You suggested death costing equips - I think in the current iteration of HV, such a modification would kill the game stone dead. It takes many months to even buy good equipment - not due to resources, but because they simply don't drop often enough for a steady supply of specific equipment to appear on the market. Then it takes a ridiculous amount to fully upgrade it (somewhere around 250m for a full mage set currently) - that kind of money is equivalent to somewhere around $300 at current star prices, and through daily arena play only, it would take many, many years to accumulate that kind of capital if not for very, very lucky drops.

A little while ago, mods teamed up to summarise the current state of the game and make a reference of HV's biggest issues available to Tenboro. We broke it down to five major points: credit inflation, rising monster difficulty, the monster power level curve in battle, forge material scarcity, and melee balance. I won't go into too many details - I really don't feel like getting into arguments over people's opinions on these things, we already have a 700-page suggestion thread full of 'buff my account, and nerf everyone else's plz' type posts. But I can say that admin is aware of these major issues at the very least, and that things I consider fixes for some of them were already planned years ago (before even the current patch).

First of all, thank you for giving thought to a newbie’s ponderings. I am not seriously trying to get any changes implemented; I’m little more than another casual player who wanted to share some observations. Lestion, I truly appreciate the way you are trying to break down the mysteries of Hentaiverse for me. (The same goes for certain other people, including Angaver, who have done it elsewhere.)

I really don't feel like getting into arguments over people's opinions on these things

Invisible Pink Unicorn save my soul if I stirred up a major argument of that sort in this community! But I was really happy to read what you shared.

Inflation is a problem in HV, but unlike tabletop RPGs, online video games are often self-regulating through several mechanisms

we already have a 700-page suggestion thread full of 'buff my account, and nerf everyone else's plz' type posts

All I can say in my defense is that I am not primarily interested in a scenario where I get richer. More like, I would be enthusiastic to keep playing even if my real income per battle dropped by 50% but at the same time the game could provide a fuller illusion of a fantasy world, especially with a logical explanation regarding where all the stuff actually comes from and where it ends up. Psychologically, being able to sell a higher percentage of drops to real people or even just virtual NPCs who actually use them for something would be a great plus, but that in itself says nothing about the price level. I am quite used to the idea that "normal" fantasy worlds are full of poor people who have never even seen a gold coin.

In other words, the gist of my essay is: If Hentaiverse was greatly modified to fight inflation, what would be the best way to strengthen in-world "realism" in the progress? Do we even want that to happen? If not, what are the reasonings behind that? If yes, what are the likely pitfalls?

As for losing gear, do you mean actual worn gear, or gear dropped during the battle? Both are horrible ideas, but the former specifically is horrendous

If it was the former,
Perhaps many users will dislike it and quit. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/cry.gif)

If we talk in-world "realism", the logical choice would of course be both. "What, you are still alive, with all your limbs and all your skills, and you are not happy?!"

But of course I realize that penalties too harsh compared to players' time and money input make no sense. What Taro says above, I worded it myself like this:

I have no easy fix in mind, and if I had one, I would probably advise against implementing it. It would change the foundations of the game so drastically that it would lead to an in-world economical chaos, and probably to several dedicated players leaving for good. I do not wish to see that.

Angaver’s comment about attribute penalties is good:

Attributes wouldn't work with the current system as you stop gaining spending exp at 500

Of course, that is only a question of how much one wishes to tweak the system or the penalties themselves.

For instance, the attributes could go down and then regenerate slowly after each death – albeit so slowly that for a low-level player it would make more sense to grind extra experience than to just stand and wait. For a high-level player, having to abstain from the hardest challenges for a bit could be a healthy reminder of a few things, but that is just my opinion.

This post has been edited by Katajanmarja: Oct 13 2020, 14:55

what would be the best way to strengthen in-world "realism" in the progress? Do we even want that to happen? If not, what are the reasonings behind that?

Realism = too much mindspace IMO
I think you miss how much people (i am the people here yeah) enjoy braindead side of HV. You know like old school 8-bit vertical shooters (Zanac, yamaha MSX... good times good times...).

I think you miss how much people (i am the people here yeah) enjoy braindead side of HV. You know like old school 8-bit vertical shooters (Zanac, yamaha MSX... good times good times...).

Yup, that’s very likely. There’s a reason why I jumped at the chance of abandoning videogames altogether when I was younger and somebody introduced me to tabletop RPing. Not only because videogames tended to be boring for me – also because I was bad at playing most of them. Later, I gradually returned to videogames as I realized that a single-player strategy game can actually be more hooking than a poorly planned RPG session. Even if one is not especially good at playing!

There’s a lot in the world of gaming that just does not speak to me at all, and I am not seriously expecting anyone to adjust Hentaiverse to my personal needs if I’m alone with my thoughts. But online chatting like this can still be fun.

Also, I think that realism is better off with quotation marks. Those who maintain that fantasy is "meant to be unrealistic" are not completely wrong. But be it a game, a comic, or a book, I usually crave complexity for the fictional world – the illusion that it is "realistic" according to its own inner logic and swarming with life.

Against this background, I am finding it fascinating that Hentaiverse has been able to get me hooked in the first place. The people who have participated in designing it and its relation to the rest of the E‑hentai community deserve more than a little respect. It has been a huge undertaking.

This post has been edited by Katajanmarja: Oct 13 2020, 14:59