Time limits or not?

[Tarix]

The current game of Overkill has time limits per day.  This is mostly to give everyone a chance to play.

In a multiplayer game this is no longer necessary.  You could have all the players online at once all playing at the same time.  This is good because it means there could be more player-to-player interaction.

So my question is:

Should we limit the players ability to play the game at all?  And if we don't then what are the implications?

For example if you think we should get rid of the time limit then should we also get rid of the game reset after a single person defeats Overkill?

[Wycco]

I say no to unlimited time.

Time limits give everyone an equal chance to compete.  Unlimited time would mean, those who have all day to play would kill Overkill every time and set all the records.

[Tarix]

Time limits give everyone an equal chance to compete.  Unlimited time would mean, those who have all day to play would kill Overkill every time and set all the records.

Time limits are one way to give everyone an equal chance.  Unfortunatly limiting people by time means that you have to develop an optimal playstyle.  This is not friendly to new players at all.

I would be much more in favor of per-day level limits, per-day movement limits or some other limitation rather than time.  Or if we must limit by time, maybe we need to redefine when the clock starts and stops.  (Like football!)

For example it helps build a community if you have time to talk to your fellow players once your "turns" are used up.  One reason the ingame message systems aren't heavily used is because it takes up too much time.  I always admired Hawk because he always took the time to write a personalized toe tag.

I'd like to steer the discussion towards alternate limits rather than time-based ones.

[spatula]

I happen to be one who can usually log more time than others, but I feel there should definately be a limit.  movement based limits would also hurt the novice player, who spends his moves trying to find a hole up/down, ect.  perhaps a kill limit per day?  this would allow all the hoped for conversation whilst limiting unfair advances..

[Tarix]

I happen to be one who can usually log more time than others, but I feel there should definately be a limit.  movement based limits would also hurt the novice player, who spends his moves trying to find a hole up/down, ect.  perhaps a kill limit per day?  this would allow all the hoped for conversation whilst limiting unfair advances..

I've heard that they are going to implement a "fatigue" system in World of Warcraft.  If so, then let me be the first to rip them off.

I'm thinking it would work something like this.  You get N kills per day at 100% xp.  For each kill over that number you would start getting less xp.  You would always get some XP, but at some point you're just really grinding it out.  Of course there would be plenty of in game messages to let you know maybe fighting isn't the answer.

As you cease fighting, or maybe some other criteria, old kills would fall off and thus you could be under your limit again.  Also, if we do the fall off thing that means the longer you go over your fatigue factor the more you must rest to get full XP again.

If you hate this idea, don't worry, it's just an idea at this point.

[slackerboy]

I kind of like the fatigue idea.  Would you only apply it to kills or to combats?    i.e. If you run away in the middle of a combat and don't get experience points...

 Just a thought.

[Tarix]

I kind of like the fatigue idea.  Would you only apply it to kills or to combats?    i.e. If you run away in the middle of a combat and don't get experience points...

Probably the same as bravery.  So at a first sighting you can run for "free".  Any initiation of combat means it counts.

[mindphaser]

Wouldn't you also have to apply this to say how much they walk around as well?  I mean if the person has 5 hours to kill, he could easily spend it tracking down the oracle with a trikorder as well. (or in tandem with 1-4 other poeple....)  

Overall it's a good method to limit movement / kills per day.  Although I wouldn't mind seeing the players level be able to increase their max. fatigue ....

[Tarix]

Wouldn't you also have to apply this to say how much they walk around as well?  I mean if the person has 5 hours to kill, he could easily spend it tracking down the oracle with a trikorder as well. (or in tandem with 1-4 other poeple....)

Possibly, but the general idea is not to punish people if they are spending a lot of time reading and writing messages.  So if they are standing around in the Wastelands doing nothing I wouldn't want their fatigue counter going up.

I think it'll be very tricky to balance.  It's one of those things that I'll have to implement so we can see what the effect is.

[FlyingAvatar]

Possibly, but the general idea is not to punish people if they are spending a lot of time reading and writing messages.  So if they are standing around in the Wastelands doing nothing I would want their fatigue counter going up.

I think it'll be very tricky to balance.  It's one of those things that I'll have to implement so we can see what the effect is.

What is the problem with just standing around the wasteland?  

Item scavenging, perhaps?  It seems to me like it would be over complicated to say when fatigue would take place other than combat.

[Tarix]

What is the problem with just standing around the wasteland?  

Nothing, unless you start punishing players for it.

Item scavenging, perhaps?  It seems to me like it would be over complicated to say when fatigue would take place other than combat.

Yes, but there's a bunch of ways to advance your character besides combat.  Oracle hunting comes to mind.  Would you really want to try and compete against someone who can Oracle hunt more hours per day than you?

[Dumple]

Time limits give everyone an equal chance to compete.  Unlimited time would mean, those who have all day to play would kill Overkill every time and set all the records.

To dig up a dead thread: I agree.  I like the fact that I can play doors for an hour a day and be competitive.  Well, *I* can't, because I'm not all that good at them.  Also, playing for a shorter period helps prevent boredom and burnout.  

I think a time limit is not a bad system, because it's easy to understand: "n minutes a day, but time pauses while you're in the message system".  Other action limits (like the Imperial Focus Points in early versions of Master of Orion 3) can be hard to get right...and I'd rather see energy spent adding more levels or cooperative party formation or tasty stuff like that.  

Or I suppose you can make it an option, and run one game with action/time limits, and one "no limits, drink your coffee" server.

[Tarix]

I'd rather see energy spent adding more levels or cooperative party formation or tasty stuff like that.  

As long as time limits exist the likelyhood of several players being online at once approaches zero.  Also, the less players online at once the less likely two will be at the same spot.

Still until there is a better solution we will end up with time limits.

[Phreak]

I agree with the observations above.  As I see it, time limits cause several problems:

1) Discorages use of in game messaging
2) Makes it less likely for multiple players to be online at the same time
3) Discorages friendly play

What I mean by 3 is that when you have a time limit, you are encoraged to develop an optimized playing style, taking care to only do things that are most beneficial to yourself.  Having no time limit encorages a more casual play style.  For instance, a player might think twice about breaking another player out of prison or other friendly acts when there are more beneficial uses of their limited time.  With unlimited time, a player can feel comfortable simply wandering around casually and having fun.  This may include some time simply sitting around in the complex waiting for another player to show up to go adventuring with.  

Problem 1 can be fixed by suspending time while messaging, but 2 and 3 can only be fixed by removing the time limit completely.  One of the reasons ( maybe the only one? ) for keeping the time limit is to level the playing field between players who have different amounts of time to dedicate to the game.  I think that this is a falicy.  Given the same amount of time, one player can still make significantly 'better' use of that time than another player, so the field is still not really level.  

For these reasons, I think that the time limit should be removed.  At the very least, it should be suspended while in the complex or a base to encorage messaging.

[GaryBavarski]

I'm not sure how I feel on removal of time limits... I think it's cool to have them because it's another interesting aspect of the game you have to worry about while playing - in addition to disease, holes, getting slayed in the wasteland, etc. There's nothing worse than finishing off an enemy far away from the complex, and all of a sudden seeing "your watch is beeping" - which, don't get me wrong, sucks, but it's my fault because I wasn't paying attention, so I guess I deserve to get killed/looted, etc.