Icarus_Factor

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Guys its cheating.

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Guys it's not cheating.

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NinjaPirate knows what he's talking about. Its clear that the guy has a professional attitude and knowledge base.

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Ahh, classic; "The guy who agrees with more is quite obviously correct. I mean, just look at him being all agreeable with me and stuff! How could he be wrong?"

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To Icarus and the bunch please tell me what is cheating?

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Sorry, but that question has no simple answer. It's quite complex, and often strays into the realm of opinion, as we see evidence of here in this thread. In the end it's up to the developers to decide what they think is within the rules of the game and what is outside the bounds, and to adjust the mechanics accordingly.

As it stands, PLing is a perfectly legitimate application of the rules and mechanics of grouping and XP distribution. We have no way of knowing what the developers actual intentions are, without making some pretty serious assumptions; they could very well condone PLing in all its forms as a means to level up your ALTs as well as help out your newbie friends who want to "skip" the low level content and get right to the beefy stuff. You may not think this is the "right" way to play the game, but as they are not breaking any established rules, it's unfair to call them cheaters or liars. Lazy? Perhaps; but that's about it.

Being afk and still collecting points in a game. If a person is Pling at the station it would be possible for them to be at the supermarket shopping. How is this playing a game?

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Ever play Sim City? I've probably put more time into that game "AFK" than I have at my keyboard.

What about EQ, DAoC, etc.? Ever have a friend give you any equipment or money that you didn't directly participate in the acquisition of? Technically, that's "advancing" and "gaining points" while AFK -- you weren't there, so why should you benefit, right? Well, you should benefit because your friend has agreed to donate his time to your advancement, even though you didn't contribute. Same situation, just different means to measure the acquisition of power/points in question.

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How is a mechanism that encourages players to NOT play the game ever anything but a bad thing?

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So, by your (still flawed) rationale, if I login to chat with my friends, that constitutes "bad game design." I guess they should take out the chat feature unless you're actively fighting, since it encourages people to "not participate int he game." Right? Makes sense to me, at least based on your "my opinion of gameplay design is the only right one," kind of logic.

How is your definition of "playing the game" more right than anyone else's? If someone wants to "play the game" by getting PL'd to 20 before they start hitting the streets to fight some crime, why is your way better than theirs? They are having fun, they are in the game, they are interacting with people and accomplishing goals; granted, perhaps not in the way you "think they should," but what difference does it make to you?

They pay their money to "play the game," however they see fit to maximize their enjoyment. If that means wandering the streets seeing the sights while a friend of theirs is off sweeping up villians and passing off the XP, why must you take issue with this?

No, it's not illegal.
^^ Fact.

But it is poor game design.
^^ Opinion.

It's not a matter of not "understanding" your defintion, it's a matter of totally disagreeing with it. Your whole argument is predicated on the assumption that PLing is a "form of cheating." You have done nothing, nothing to support this claim.

It's a clever application of the rules, yes, but isn't that what powergamers are all about? You're not being forced to participate, nor are you being affected by the result -- as noted by your various failed attempts to show how PLing somehow affects people who don't do it.

You might not be jealous, but if that's not your motivation then what are you left with except that you don't "think" people should be allowed to do it? In other words, all your arguing is that, in your opinion, it's not a legitimately way to level.

Well, I hate to be harsh, but your opinion is irrelevant. Until you can show that PLing is cheating in some concrete manner, or that it somehow adversely affects those that are not participating, then you simply have no argument beyond "I think it should be," and frankly, that's no argument at all.

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......jealousy? WHY, do you think would ANYONE be jealous of someone who is too sad and weak and lazy to do it themselves?

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Wow, that's an easy one. Same reason people do it in the first place; they want high levels and they want them fast. When they see someone getting PL'd while they're doing it the "old fashioned" way, well, need I say more?

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Gaining experience (knowledge or skill resulting from observing or acquaintance with facts or events) through inactivity is unnatural and thus the definition is achieved.

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Haha, I love this quote. "Thus the definition is achieved."

Yes, sure. That is, provided you can define what "natural" is in terms of gaining XP in the game. Which you can't, because you're not a [censored] developer.

Kind of indicative of this entire argument.

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If you take another look at the developers own words of how to gain experience (posted in my previous post for your convenience) standing in the train station dancing for 4 hours is not listed.

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Yes, but grouping with someone who is arresting villians. That is on the list.

Just so happens you can do both.

Now, please, make it stop.

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I say remove the xp scaling for SKs and remove the level limit for earning xp in a group.

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I say start your own MMORPG if you want what "you say," to matter much.

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Whoops, there I go again. Thinking I'm on a discussion board. I must be terribly mistakened. My apologies for taking up your time with my opinions.

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This ceased being a "discussion" after the 5th reply, give or take. Now it's just people contradicting you and you piling straw after straw on this pile of hay you call an "argument" against PLing.

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How many did you convince in this thread? Hmm, lets count...1 no, not 1, um 0. Yeah thats it. 0.

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I don't have to convince anyone. "My way" is already how the game works. I could care less if you "agree" with that or not, because it just is.

Haha, this thread is still going?

PLeveling is not against the rules. It's part of the game. It's a feature. It's recognized and allowed by the developers.

You may not like it, but it's not your game. Now, you can go on for 8 more pages coming up with asinine excuses why you think it's "bad," but until you get job at Cryptic or a magic wand of mind control, your opinion is better kept to yourself. You obviously aren't convincing anyone. Not surprising considering the weak attempts thus far.

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The Dev team IS working to stop all exploits and power leveling cheats out there

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Please, provide a link to this information. Anything the developers have ever said indicating they are "working to stop" power leveling, or even that they think it is an issue that needs addressing would be greatly appreciated. A post? A news item? A patch note? An interview? I'm talking specifically about power leveling, not about XP exploits - because until the Developers indicate otherwise, powerleveling does not fall into the same category as an XP exploit, whether you like it or not.

Or, is this another case of "I want it, so it must be so?"

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Just because they are aware of such techniques does not mean they have any truly accurate way of accounting for them that is realistically usable.

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Already responded to this, friend. There's no such thing as "true" and "accurate" here. We're talking about OBJECTIVE EVALUATION of data.

It's not like the developers plug this data into a mainframe, it beeps, buzzes, crunches a few numbers and spits out a little card that says "Increase HP of minions by 17.6%. Reduce END cost of Tanker primary powers. Cook microwave popcorn until popping slows to one pop per 2.7 seconds."

No. They look at the numbers. They consider them, along with a whole host of other information, and they decide OBJECTIVELY what to do. There's no "accurate" or "true" method for making these decisions. It's their opinion of the data, and that opinion is weighted with full knowledge of the fact that some people level incredibly quickly (PLed, Powergamers), some level incredibly slowly, and the average player levels incredibly averagely.

The notion that PLing is going to "skew" the Developers decisions is simply silly. Just as the notion that people who log on just to chat with friends are "skewing" the data in the opposite direction.

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Your wings have melted on that one. Players that don't know how to play get you killed. Then, you have to deal with debt because there is no one to help you cheat your way out of it. Think first speak second.

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Muahaha. By that (totally illogical) rationale, "being stupid" should be against the rules, too.

Sorry, man, you can't make it against the rules for people to play poorly.

Plenty of people who have worked their way to 50 "legitimately" are still going to be bad players. This is unfortunate, granted, but it's not an argument against power leveling.

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They may try to make allowances for it but there is no way to compensate completely. The complexity of such filtering would make data mining all but impossible. The best they can do is come up with a fudge factor to try and compensate but this is not an accurate method.

So, perhaps you should try again.

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Haha, okay; we're not talking about solving calculus equations here, man. There is no such thing as an "accurate method" of looking at this data and trying to decide how to much subtle changes to the game mechanics, XP, minion statistics, etc.

It's all a matter of the developer's ability to interpret the numbers. They look at them, they think about them, and they think about what they want to do as a result. In the end, all of the data available to them is included in this decision, including knowledge of the people who level faster than average and those that level slower than average.

In the end, the argument is moot anyway, because for all you know players who are leveling very slowly are more than compensating for those that are leveling "too quickly."

Should we make "taking your time" illegal too? That skews the numbers, too, right? It should be considered "cheating" to log on and not get XP all the time, right? By your rationale, that makes perfect sense. Nobody should be allowed to spend a lot of time online without gaining XP, because that "skews the numbers" and affects everybody right?

I'm trying to think of a way to make it more clear how illogical this line of reasoning is, but I can't. I think I've done all I can at this point. It's up to you to open your eyes.

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It has been stated previously. The rate that players level and total character levels are data points that the devs use for analyzing game content and mechanics. If the developers make changes to the the content to limit the rate of advancement or skew zone developement to favor one caste of player over another it holds the potential to negatively effect others.

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*snore*

Please read a thread before posting in it. This point has been made (and clearly refuted) about 6 seperate times in this post.

The developers do not look at numbers and "data points" in a vacuum. They are fully aware of certain techniques which speed the rate of advancement beyond that which is achievable by the "average" player, just like I'm sure they are fully aware that certain types of players are leveling much, much more slowly than the average person (poor power choices, dying too often and accruing prohibitive debt, etc.).

These are the "extremes" and/or outliers; when analyzing any data set the outliers are all but ignored in drawing any final conclusions, and there's no reason to believe that the developers don't do exactly that.

They want their changes to target their core audience, not the few hundred folks who happen to "enjoy" sitting at a train station while they watch TV in another room.

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Finally it helps create situations where people with high level characters simply do not know how to play them because they never had to learn.

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And? Don't group with them if they can't play their characters well.

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The fact is, on most servers there are only a small handful of people who have actually earned a L50 character at this point. Yet the devs use these numbers to determine things like the rate at which they want people to hit 50 and the rate at which they want to give out rewards like Epic AT’s.

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Yes, and they do this with full knowledge of PLEVELING and its affects on the rate at which people are able to reach level 50.

The developers don't work in a vacuum, you know? They have access to all the information you do, and rest assured they're not making decisions about XP rate based on how fast someone can be PL'd to 50.

Try again, please.

The developers are fully aware of PLing. What makes you think they would not take that into account when analyzing the numbers and deciding on changes?

These forums are hilarious. One minute the developers are Gods, incapable of error, the next they are mindless zombies who don't know how their own game works.

Fact: Some Joe Blow sitting at the train station milking XP from his buddy has no effect whatsoever on you or the future of this game. If you don't like it, get over it.

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Is PLing a Form of Cheating?

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Is this thread a form of Trolling?

Seriously. I rarely skip reading threads before posting, but 3 pages for this topic?

No, no it's not. Topic over. That was easy, wasn't it?