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Server Mods: Why increase max level?


warcryr

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For unofficial servers, I believe default server setting for DifficultyOffset is 0.    With the DifficultyOffset set to 0, wild dinos will range from level 1 to level 30.

For official servers, I believe the default server setting for DifficultyOffset is 1.  With the DifficultyOffset set to 1, wild dinos will range from level 1 to level 120.

From the above statements: I'm gathering that by increasing the max dino level, it is intended that this increases the difficulty of the game.   This is understandable, as encountering a higher level dino, will be more difficult than a level 1 dino to "play" against.

For modded servers, I've seen where the max dino level is 240, and some even have the max dino level extending over level 1000!  

 

Why increase the max level?  I'm assuming it's to increase the "difficulty" of the game.  But if this is the intention, why not increase the base level, so that level 1 dinos are more difficult, and inherently, level 120 dinos more difficult as well?  

The way I see it, by increasing the max dino level, you are increasing the margins between the quality of each dino on the island.   Whereas by a 30 level difference between the base level dino and the max level dino, you'll have dinos on the island that are significantly more powerful than others already, and by increasing the max dino level to something like 240, you are making some dinos ridiculously more powerful than other dinos on the island.  

 

I'd like to ask:  Why increase the max level? (opposed to what I've suggested above: why not just increase the stats at the base level?)

 

Btw: This is a serious question, I'd like to understand the reasoning/logic behind increasing the levels.  Thanks

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44 minutes ago, warcryr said:

For unofficial servers, I believe default server setting for DifficultyOffset is 0.    With the DifficultyOffset set to 0, wild dinos will range from level 1 to level 30.

For official servers, I believe the default server setting for DifficultyOffset is 1.  With the DifficultyOffset set to 1, wild dinos will range from level 1 to level 120.

From the above statements: I'm gathering that by increasing the max dino level, it is intended that this increases the difficulty of the game.   This is understandable, as encountering a higher level dino, will be more difficult than a level 1 dino to "play" against.

For modded servers, I've seen where the max dino level is 240, and some even have the max dino level extending over level 1000!  

 

Why increase the max level?  I'm assuming it's to increase the "difficulty" of the game.  But if this is the intention, why not increase the base level, so that level 1 dinos are more difficult, and inherently, level 120 dinos more difficult as well?  

The way I see it, by increasing the max dino level, you are increasing the margins between the quality of each dino on the island.   Whereas by a 30 level difference between the base level dino and the max level dino, you'll have dinos on the island that are significantly more powerful than others already, and by increasing the max dino level to something like 240, you are making some dinos ridiculously more powerful than other dinos on the island.  

 

I'd like to ask:  Why increase the max level? (opposed to what I've suggested above: why not just increase the stats at the base level?)

 

Btw: This is a serious question, I'd like to understand the reasoning/logic behind increasing the levels.  Thanks

On a side note, a 240 max may not be anything special, depending on whether they are referring to wild levels or max tamed levels.  On "Official" servers, the theoretical max for a wild is 120 and for a tame it would be 241 assuming someone with admin authority did a dotame or forcetame on an animal and then level it 61 times.  For no admin, assuming you could tame a 120 and gain 59 levels, for a 179 tame, and then level 61 times, that would take you to 240.  However, after doing some random checks, trike is the best I could find for leveling on official, and that would be 120 + 58 + 61, for a max level of 239.  So, if someone has posted the max level is 240, if they are referring to tame, than that is nothing special.

Now, some servers do allow more post tame levels, some have have higher wild levels, and others do both.  But, there are other settings, mods, etc. that can be taken into account.

For my next server, I want to do higher levels wilds(210 or 240 max), but make the really low levels and really high levels rare, make taming about not losing levels(instead of gaining), have more level ups, and each stat level up would be smaller increments.  If possible, I would make the higher levels even more dangerous and harder to tame.

But in may example above, a tamed 90 leveled to a 120 would might not be as good as a wild 120, depending on where the levels for the 120 went.

More levels does not always equate to more power, depending on other settings on the server; it is not necessarily a binary result.

So, in my example things would generally be harder, not easier.

But, for some, they like having lots of levels and that makes some players feel good; and for them, I say more power to them.  I cannot look down on someone who is playing the game in a way this enjoyable to them; so long as they are not griefing other players(because then, you are not really playing the game).  Again, this is not a binary solution.

 

However, you do bring up an interesting concept, and one that I am going to take into consideration for our next server.  And that is, adjusting the baseline, which could also result in adjusting the wild and tamed levels up.

 

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6 minutes ago, BigWolf said:

Due to the way stat increases work, I find the higher the 'difficulty' level, the easier the game is

 

Taking unmodded for example

A tamed level 30 will find it harder against a wild level 30, than a tamed 120 will against a wild 120

I agree with that. 

Player vs dino, the higher difficulty can be harder, but either when you have to go toe-to-toe or in the cost of resources(arrow, bullets, etc.)

Tamed vs wild, the higher difficulty makes it easier, because of the tame bonuses; plus more advantage to the tames that have saddles(especially higher tier saddles).

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Yes, it is all about the tames.

I know how I play, and I think most people who play on a server with max 240 dinos, you seldom go anywhere not on a dino or with one following you. 

Who doesn't want to tame the highest level they can find? On one of these servers, you can tame a level 240 and level it up past 300. 

Riding a level 350 dire wolf that can kill anything is a blast :)

Although the one time I got separated from my Quetzal and killed by a level 240 saber tooth really sucked :)

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17 hours ago, FantasticGuy1 said:

Cuz people like having lvl 3000 invincible argys because challenge. I guess

This.

 

I like to watch Sl1pg8tor's (name spelled right IDK?) YouTube channel, but those settings are not entirely 1:1 with ARk's official server. ;)

Playing on Godmode and using cheat commands, I see him ride dinos with like 3000% dmg and attack whole packs of highlevel dinos, literally killing every dino in 1 blow.

 

I guess it is fun. Although I get it why players on such servers get bored within a week.

 

 I would like a challenge though. Imho lower levels should be MUCH more dangerous.

A lvl 95 player without weapon should simply NOT be able to put down a lvl 4 trike. Because....just look at the animal.

It would just give you 1 knock and you're a goner. On official servers I see high(er) levels just punch dinos out, even raptors.

Normally they should rip you to shreds.

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1 hour ago, D4u2s0t said:

Because sometimes it's fun to hop on your level 800 argy, spawn about 50 gigas inside the volcano and go to town.  :-) 

Heh, we still have a tough of a time with alphas. I am going to agree that "lower difficulty" settings are not easy. Running a default dedicated server with max dinos at 36. I am currently building up a kibble tamed 34 argy that tamed out at 50 leveled to 57. 1000 hp, 200% damage and 2000 stamina, I was able to get a level three alpha raptor bloodied before I had to give up. 

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59 minutes ago, Tindalen said:

Heh, we still have a tough of a time with alphas. I am going to agree that "lower difficulty" settings are not easy. Running a default dedicated server with max dinos at 36. I am currently building up a kibble tamed 34 argy that tamed out at 50 leveled to 57. 100 hp, 200% damage and 2000 stamina, I was able to get a level three alpha raptor bloodied before I had to give up. 

Here's a tip.  Keep plenty of raw meat in your bird, and force feed the meat from it's inventory.  It will recover health :-) Also, a great thing about fighting alphas on an argy is you can learn the distance so you can whack it on the top of the head, but it can't hit you.  Takes practice, but try to stay over it's head so it's just within reach.

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On 5/17/2016 at 2:30 AM, NukeZX said:

This.

 

I like to watch Sl1pg8tor's (name spelled right IDK?) YouTube channel, but those settings are not entirely 1:1 with ARk's official server. ;)

Playing on Godmode and using cheat commands, I see him ride dinos with like 3000% dmg and attack whole packs of highlevel dinos, literally killing every dino in 1 blow.

 

I guess it is fun. Although I get it why players on such servers get bored within a week.

 

 I would like a challenge though. Imho lower levels should be MUCH more dangerous.

A lvl 95 player without weapon should simply NOT be able to put down a lvl 4 trike. Because....just look at the animal.

It would just give you 1 knock and you're a goner. On official servers I see high(er) levels just punch dinos out, even raptors.

Normally they should rip you to shreds.

Yeah, watched his channel but I felt the quality of the vids went down when he started doing more of that modded stuff and left the original series in the dust.

It's not that I don't like mods it's just that godmode, 3000% stat everythings, what's the point?

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is it possible that part of the reason for increasing the level, rather than re-scaling the stats is because it affects tame time?

so if to "make it harder" I make a level 1 be stronger, it will still only take 5 minutes to tame (because the pseudo-math is 5 minutes times 1 level).

 

whereas, if I raise the bottom level from 1 to 100, now it takes 500 minutes to tame a level 100 thingy.

which in turn makes it harder to tame that strong animal as you are left vulnerable for longer.

granted, some people speed up the tame time so they don't have to wait forever.

 

I think part of Ark gets easier, when you have tames.  and once you have tames, it gets easier to get more tames.  it's possible that factors into the idea behind increasing level to raise difficulty.

 

Though as BigWolf notes, the math backfires on that.

 

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Straight difficulty mods aren't really "difficulty mods" because of the way Ark deals with stats.  I used to play the Difficulty 80 mod, and it was actually easier than regular Ark.  Then I found Dino Overhaul and everything got better!  What I like about DO is that it not only raises the level cap to 1000, but the modder removed vanilla dinos and made his own with their own stat progression.  What's the point of a level 600 trike on vanilla progression?  They one shot nearly everything, have millions of food, and can carry 5000 units around.  There is literally 0 challenge left on those settings.  DO changes it so that a trike spends its points on melee damage and health, with a little weight, while also reducing the amount that the dinos get per level.  Now that 600 trike isn't OP, but still packs a punch.  You still get eaten by carnos and raptor packs, but you can hold your own.  It's usually only a couple of days behind the standard release cycle (provided the dev kit is up to date) so new dinos are added roughly when they are in vanilla.  Since they use vanilla spawn nodes, it isn't immune from these ridiculous overspawn issues.  Using custom dinosaurs has its benefit though, since they never were effected by the enforced level lock.

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