Diminshing Returns

[lavirylime]

I'm all for RuneScape having a diminishing returns algorithm applied to experience gain, once a skill level is beyond a certain threshold (could start as early as 30 or as late as 80). This means you can't repeat an action (e.g. mine iron ore) to an excessive degree (I don't have a hard limit set at the moment, but let's just put it at 700 for sake of discussion, that's 25 runs for a max inventory) and expect to get the same experience for all of them. Eventually the amount of experience you get from a repetitive skill degrades to ~50% (or lower, but 50% penalty sounds fine).

 

 

 

You need variety. Let's call it VP for "variety points" (simple, right?). You have to do different things to keep your VP at max in order to gain the max experience from a skill.

 

 

 

For mining: Player needs to mine have a variety of ores.

 

 

 

For smithing: Player needs to smelt a variety of ores and smith a variety of bars (actual item produced has no effect). Smelting and smithing are independent of each other, so switching from smelting to smithing will count as variety.

 

 

 

For fishing: Player needs to utilize different fishing methods. As far as VP is concerned for fishing, salmon=trout and swordfish=tuna=whatever else you members get with harpoons.

 

 

 

For cooking: Player needs to cook different foods. Different types of fish is variety. Different types of pizzas is variety. Alternating between fire and range also counts as variety.

 

 

 

For woodcut: Player needs to chop different trees in the same area, or the same type of tree in different locations. (Protip: there are willow logs outside of Draynor village)

 

 

 

For crafting: Player needs to craft items in different categories (e.g. jewelry, pottery, leatherwork...)

 

 

 

For firemaking: ...I'm actually reluctant to impose VP/DR on this skill, because on f2p there isn't much to do with it. But applying VP/DR to members only and not f2p would be unfair.

 

 

 

For prayer: Not affected if intertwined with combat. If purchasing bones, then bury multiple types of bones.

 

 

 

For runecrafting: either not affected, or player crafts at multiple altars. Haven't gave this one as much thought.

 

 

 

For magic: Cast different spells. Combat penalty goes as low as 25%. This should also take care of the people who complain about spidercasters. Switching between spellbooks counts for lots of VP, but only if you actually casted the spells (i.e. can't switch and then switch back without casting anything).

 

 

 

For magic/ranged: Use different safespots.

 

 

 

For all combat: Fight different monsters in the same location, or even better, fight the same monster in multiple locations (this is to benefit people who are hunting for a particular drop). Switching between modes of attack also counts as variety.

 

 

 

VP system does not apply when you are playing minigames, so GOP and FoG will not have the diminshing return penalty (though FoG would still retain the 50% exp reduction). In fact, if you take a break from powertraining a skill by playing a minigame, you're recharging your VP.

 

 

 

Training multiple skills at once will keep VP high for a LONG time. This means if you mine some silver, smelt them into bars, and craft them into tiaras all in the same "run" then you will still receive max xp. (Or for members, mine some ore [mining], superheat [magic] the bars [smithing], make arrowheads [smithing], cut some logs [woodcut], and make into arrows [fletching]... whew.)

 

 

 

Being a freeworlder, I have no solid understanding of reptition/grinding/powertraining in member skills, so I'm not sure how VP would apply to those, if at all. (With my bleak understanding of slayer, I don't think VP will affect slayer.)

 

 

 

And to balance out the crying that will inevitably ensue, a slight (no more than +10%, and even that's too much) across-the-board experience raise to the affected skills should do.

 

 

 

Yes, this *might* actually make getting 99 more challenging.

 

 

 

 

 

Thoughts? Is my intent well-presented? Anything I need to clarify? I'll be editing this first post with clarifications if needed.

 

 

 

You're allowed to disagree with things I've said. Feel free to take this thing apart with a wall of quotes.

 

You're not allowed to disagree with things I didn't say.

[mister_moocky]

Why? It would just make training inconvenient.

[Tesset]

Why? It would just make training inconvenient.

 

This. Also, This forces people to train inefficiently, and easily makes the game 10 times harder.

 

 

 

Besides, why would doing the same thing over and over again mean you get less experience from it, any more than doing something over and over again helps you in a different area?

[quelmotz]

The most important question: WHY?

 

 

 

You have to explain your motive. You can't just think of anything and say: "Hmm, I think this is not bad IMO, so I'll make a thread on it." You have to mention WHY it would help RuneScape, and why you decided to create it, etc.

[nerdboyxxx]

no. Just no. If I want to make it impossible to level, or train inefficiently, I'll just farm all the herbs I need for 99 herblore via rannar, or cook my way to 99 cooking with shrimp. I don't want to be forced to train inefficiently.

[Jeda45]

The only way I can see this being a possibly good thing is for max XP to be much higher than current XP (Like, current XP for a tuna is 100, right? Have starter XP be like 150 XP per for tuna, and minimum be like 75.) Because if after only one load, items began to drop in XP, then it would be like, under your idea,

 

1: 110 per

 

2: 105 per

 

3: 100 per

 

4: 95 per

 

5: 90 per

 

6: 85 per

 

Etc, as after only a few minuites you'll be getting a lower XP average.

 

And I think that it should be item made that counts, not bar used. Making a sword out of iron and making a sword out of adamantite is pretty much the same thing, except for physical effort (read: strength) involved. I still fail to understand why it takes ten times the knowledge of how to hit metal with a hammer to make two different types of plate armour...

 

And I think that technique shouldn't matter for fishing-spearing a shark is a totally different thing from spearing a tuna.

 

 

 

Melee definitely should not have this (Or perhaps vastly slower) (In RL: Isn't it better to lift weights for 10 minuites than 1?)

 

Same for Agility and Ranged.

 

 

 

Also, I think that it would be better for it to decrease over levels (Level 35 gets like 115 XP/Tuna, level 99 gets 50/tuna)

 

 

 

 

 

And finally: WHY?

[Riptide Mage]

Why change something that has been in place at the core of the game for 8 years?

[VEGHATERMEATLOVER]

Why change something that has been in place at the core of the game for 8 years?

 

i don't know... oh wait, what am i thinking about. oh yeh! wilderness, everyone hated that update. and why put a limit on trading also....

 

 

 

not many people cared about real world trading.

[Draconic]

Bad suggestion, but simply, WHY??

[Will H]

Why change something that has been in place at the core of the game for 8 years?

 

i don't know... oh wait, what am i thinking about. oh yeh! wilderness, everyone hated that update. and why put a limit on trading also....

 

 

 

not many people cared about real world trading.

 

Huh? If you didn't care about RWT in this game, you may as well not care about the continued existence of this game.

 

 

 

Back to the point, why is there a need for this? It's difficult enough getting level 99s.