Games with character development basically need to deal with one problem, that is, the player's control of the values in the game. What are high-value path of exile items, what are efficient behaviors, and what goals are attractive? These prices all depend on the values formed by the players. If the player has clear values, the judgment of each content in the game will be clear, and the relevant player target experience will be easier to make, such as the sense of surprise and expectation of Dabao, the sense of accomplishment and so on. First of all, I want to analyze two aspects of values, one is complexity and the other is formation process.

1. The complexity of values

Let me talk about complexity first. Generally speaking, when judging the value of something, the more angles are considered, the more the division value of each angle, the more aspects of influence, and the more complex the values. Obviously when the complexity is too high, it will become difficult to judge and it is difficult to form clear values. But the higher the complexity, the larger the strategy space, and the good design will bring excellent strategy. Strategy games are usually considered more hardcore but very fun, for this reason. In the other direction, there are many designs that reduce complexity by adding some obvious value standards. Take equipment as an example. The rarity of equipment, such as white, green, blue, yellow and dark gold, has been widely used in various games. Players who play more games have basically formed a conditioned reflex. For example, equipment It can be said that the player’s combat effectiveness rating is basically no brainer when evaluating equipment. It is basically simplified to the extreme, and this is the result of the designer’s low expectations for the player’s abilities. Most of the time the two are combined, reducing the complexity in a single aspect and reducing the cost of a single learning, but maintaining a relatively high complexity as a whole to improve strategy.

2. The formation process of values

Next is the formation process, which can also be said to be the process of learning game knowledge. I think players will form values based on two aspects, one is life experience or past experience of similar games, and the other is the content seen in the game. The first category is based on life experience, for example, gold coins are worth more than silver coins, because the price of gold in life is higher than silver; based on past game experience, such as the concept of equipment rarity mentioned above, for MMO players and dark players Saying that it has become an inherent concept, basically does not need to re-teaching, as long as he sees it, he will incorporate it into his own values. If the design is in conflict with experience, it will bring some understanding costs and even misunderstandings, but the effect depends on the specific design level. The second category is to control the value formation process of this part by gradually opening the game content and designing the amount of content that is opened each time. Common designs such as opening the game systems by level, learning the level requirements of skills, and equipment Level requirements, the corresponding game content will be given to you after opening, and so on. A good formation process should be similar to the concept of flow. With the increase of play time, the integrity of values gradually improves, and the formation process of values at each stage is relatively smooth, and after formation, it can bring new pleasant games. Experience.

So what is the design of Path of Exile Currency ? In summary, the complexity is extremely explosive, and the formation process is basically ignored.

3. I don’t know how new players are going to play this game

The level of complexity has been written in the first three articles. The remaining levels and gameplay are also of similar complexity, not much to say. Regarding the design of the formation process, let’s not talk about the switch card part first. The more obvious ones are probably only the skill use level, the equipment requirement level, the sublimation and the craft station. All other concepts are all thrown to the player at the beginning:

Most of the equipment attributes can be seen in the early stage. Among them, the first 10 levels are open, and all types of equipment are dropped at level 1.

The skill gems are inlaid in the gem holes of the equipment. The holes have colors and connections, and the connection between active skills and auxiliary skills. The first two pictures tell the player. It is still a few of them with teaching; it is not obvious that there is, item level 50 Only 6 holes are available at level, but who knows if you don’t check the information...The 1000+ points in the talent tree will be slapped on the player's face after opening the talent disk;

Except for the Chaos Stone and the Sublime Stone, the currency may be dropped. The others can be dropped at level 1. I don't know what new players should do to see the transformation and transformation. It should be the most common to save and not use it. As for when learn……

There are still some very fragmentary ones that will not be listed. The design of this game is basically saying "I put it here and you study it yourself." It's hell for newcomers. We have always said that the first number played by a newcomer is definitely invalid, and you can’t understand how to play it if you copy other people’s strategies. However, if the player can be patient and study slowly, this game is a different look.

4. Endless learning

After the hell-style novice experience, the players who can stay should have a certain learning ability and are willing to study complex game systems. Then there is a long learning process, in which the player's values will experience repeated subversion. What I see, including my own, common behaviors for novices include:

Pick up all the equipment to sell, run between the map and the main city, and collect currency

No brain thinks legendary equipment is better than yellow outfit

Keep a storehouse of skill gems, thinking they will be useful in the future

Equipped with an active skill, hit 123456 and press once

Run all over the map and kill all the monsters before willing to move forward

Talent only points offensively, and often points out closed routes

Each of the above points, players will understand later, is unreasonable or inefficient behavior. However, these behaviors are consistent with the player's intuition, or in line with the experience that the player has gained in other games, then values will be subverted in these places.

The first time I felt that this game became fun, it was because I knew the seller’s formula. First of all, I found that everyone was trading with Chaos Stone as currency, and it was only because of very few drops. Then I checked the Raiders and found that a set of unidentified yellow outfits between 60-74 can be exchanged for two Chaos Stones. , Shit? ? In addition, 6-hole equipment can be exchanged for 7 craftsman stones, and 3 equipment of different colors can be exchanged for 1 phantom color stone. The value of the drop on the ground instantly becomes higher, and the drop experience is more than twice as good. After a few months of picking it up, it was because of the loss of the network too. At that time, I was very happy every time I dropped a chaos stone, and dropped a lofty stone felt like going to heaven. Basic income relied on these methods. Later, I learned that this kind of gameplay was called moving bricks, and it was indeed quite appropriate. There are still many players using this method to earn Chaos Stone. At this time, it can be regarded as the advanced stage of values, and there have been huge changes from the novice stage, and the speed of accumulating currency has also accelerated a lot.

I came back to play again a year and a half ago. There were a lot of people around me to play with and learn more about it. After having a certain understanding of equipment, I began to sell equipment, and I began to know what affixed equipment someone wanted, which legendary equipment was valuable and which was not valuable, knew that some gadgets could be sold for a lot of money, and so on, plus the understanding of drawing pictures. More and more, and more and more understanding of the building system, will form their own ways to make money, by this time, there is no motivation to move bricks anymore, because the efficiency is too low. At this stage, there will be basically no essential changes in values. What follows is to add countless scattered knowledge points and adjust them according to the changes in the game situation.

The change in the value system actually means that players have a deeper and deeper understanding of the game and a better understanding of the true value of items. Every time they learn about new things, they will have a greater or lesser impact on the value system. One thing is the same as the BD and equipment I wrote before. It is brought about by gradual learning. It will also change greatly with the changes of the season. When the BD is strong and there are more people playing, the value of related things will change. High, otherwise it will decrease. It is impossible for any player to say that he has a complete grasp of the value system of this game. There will often be some wonderful BDs discovered, and the market will be moved by the wind. In addition, the destruction of the studio by the merchants and the destruction of the studio is too much uncontrollable. Among the factors, it takes a lot of time and energy to pay attention to it all the time. It is too difficult. Maybe the Great Guild and the studio can do it with collective strength.

5. the design of the drop

In view of the complexity mentioned above, in terms of the drop rules, the design of Path of Exile is not complicated. There are not many magical hidden designs. The drop rate is estimated to be there. I did not verify it. It should be some control. The design of the drop, such as some restrictions on the drop of the rarest currencies, and the drop of the whole server (the mirror must have done it, otherwise, according to the probability, I know so many people who have played for so long, and someone should have dropped it), The other is to make different drop rates according to the estimated value (the difference from the actual value may be very large). After all, when the internal capacity is so large, even if it is purely random, the effect will not be bad. The main drops are designed around exclusive drops. For example, certain destiny cards will only drop on certain maps, certain BOSS will drop exclusive equipment, the season game rewards are divided into categories, and so on. Except for the huge amount of content, there is nothing special, but combined with the overall gameplay, you need to think carefully if you want to brush only certain things. This will be carried out in the next chapter.

There is another characteristic of the drop of Path of Exile, that is, there are many, especially many, too many to play without a filter. As a Treasure game, most of the drops are what players like to see, so there will be considerable drops in the early stage. All the monsters in the path of exile can drop most of the things (except for the exclusive drops mentioned above) Drop), the number of white monsters dropped is not much, about 5 will only drop 1-2 props, and there are 2 blue monsters and 1 or so, but because blue monsters appear in groups, it seems that they only fall There will be a lot more, and the number of yellow monsters ranges from 2-5, the legendary monsters are 5-10, and the plot chapter BOSS will be more, so at least it seems that the number of drops is quite considerable. Looking at these alone, it seems to be okay, but a major feature of the road of exile is that there are so many monsters. The monsters on one screen after the map is displayed are very common. Blue monsters and yellow monsters are also all over the ground, and then the number of drops will still be added. There is a bonus, and it can be increased by more than 100% at any time (you don't even need to count Dabao BD), and the dropped things can take up more than half of the screen. Is this the limit? No, in some gameplays, in order to allow players to focus on battles or running charts, the drops of monsters will accumulate and fall together after a period of process ends. Sometimes this process will be very long and the density of monsters has not decreased. Then when it finally falls, it directly covers the entire screen. It is really impossible to play without a filter. But the official doesn’t seem to think this is a problem. We will continue to do this kind of gameplay in the future. The filters are made by the players. Some players will adjust the filters spontaneously according to the changes of the season, just like the players who do POB (of course not Excluded is the cooperation with the government), this model has stabilized and has been in operation so far. Well, this kind of state can’t be replicated personally...Although the effect is really good, at least for non-newcomers.

6. The impact of RMT on the gaming experience

The enthusiasm of domestic players for RMT is much higher than that of foreign players. On the one hand, krypton gold games have been generally accepted in China. On the other hand, Chinese people have a strong desire to compete and become stronger. The faster the better, then RMT is naturally the best way. But just like playing a stand-alone game with a modifier, one step directly to graduation, this game is very easy to get tired, skip the stage of brushing pictures and playing treasures, directly buy a molding equipment to kill T18 and Sirus, the game is over. , Even if you lose a good thing, look at the transaction price and convert it into RMB, or compare it with the currency you bought, it’s not very valuable. Calculated according to the mid-season price, 3 yuan a sublime stone, the most expensive thing in this game, 300E at the top, 900 yuan, in all kinds of draw games, it is possible for any activity to be thousands of dollars. Nothing, let alone that most BDs in the road of exile will not exceed the cost of 30E, just for the sake of T18 and Sirus, there are many choices within 10E, but only 30 yuan, is it super boring to think about it? ? But what if not RMT?

Pure poe currency drops. I have played so many seasons. The highest drop rate is 1E per day. Sometimes you can sell a few Es when you drop a good equipment. I have sold 20E for the most valuable thing, and I have played the most. The expensive BD is the Guardian Scorpion last season. It took more than 60E. It was earned by brushing pictures and playing BOSS and playing various gameplays. It used my own understanding of the game mechanism and the time it took. , Plus luck. But when you link these to RMB, you will feel that you have been playing hard for tens of dollars for two weeks. Are you stupid? Of course not stupid, this is the result of forcibly linking things in the two value systems, one side is directly converted into RMB, and the other is the fun of playing treasures and accumulating. At this time, unless the two sides are matched, one side must collapse, and here is the collapse of the values in the game.