Will DST have XP character unlocking system? Either way, it should be made harder!

[XirmiX]

Looking at wiki, the current DS XP system is way too easy. It's way too simple for someone to survive like 8 days in each run and unlock a new character. Through that, players will get new characters and won't learn anything new.

It looks to me as if DST has completely removed the idea of XP system. I thought it was great. Great, but too easy, which simply just makes it a waste of time to implement in DST what so ever.

I thought about it and the way the XP system could be much better and harder would be if:

* If you die, you would get 4 XP for each day you survived (or somewhat that amount) instead of 20. This means that you would need to survive 480 days to unlock the last character (for RoG, which is Wigfrid).

* Each time you die/escape, you can only unlock 1 character each run. So, say if you reached day 480 or over in RoG DS without ever unlocking any character, you would only get Willow unlocked.

* Say you had Willow unlocked and had her and Wilson as characters available to you. Then you escape or die at a run and had survived 40 days (mathematically, if you instead of getting 20 XP for each day get 4 XP for each day survived, you'll have 8 days with 20 XP equivalent to 40 days with 4 XP). Say you had already survived 40 days in one of your previous runs to unlock Willow. Normally (with 4 XP idea in place) you would then need to survive 40 days in your next run to unlock Wolfgang. But what I thought would make it a challenging is if you had to achiever the total amount of 80 days in a single run. So you couldn't just survive 40 days in your next run to unlock Wplfgang, but would need to get at least 80 days survived to unlock him. So basically the XP counter would start from 0 every time you die (but your previously unlocked characters will stay unlocked even if you die less than 40 days; you won't lose Willow as unlocked because of that, the already unlocked characters would be perma-unlocked).

* If you have command console enabled, you could not unlock any characters while it's enabled during your runs.

If the XP system was as hard as this, people would be more eager to try and get their characters unlocked as well instead of just wanting more content. Because what strives ypu to play the game more at your first tries of the game is to try and unlock more characters. When all characters are unlocked for you, you sinply want more content. Having the XP system much more harder and making even the biggest professionals wanting to unlock them would make the game something that people want to play for enjoyment and for "completioning" instead of just playing in one world for thousands of days, never moving on because you can't be asked to start over again now. That's me, btw and really I found the character system fascinating until it became too easy and done in a few moments. I just had to survive a few days to unlock Wigfrid and it sort of saddens me with the triviality of theXP unlocking system.

How we could still have the XP system and have it also harder in DST? A lot of players have already played with characters which in single player game are far in XP chart. Temporarily locking players' worlds until they unlock the specific character they play as in their world would seem like the simplest way to go for it. What if you have 5 worlds already made and you have there played with characters which you haven't yet unlocked and don't want to delete any of your worlds? You can always move your worlds in the files, but if you don't want to or are not capable of doing so, you could still always play on other peoples' hosted servers.

What do you guys think? I know this would temporarily make us all Wilsons, but hei, some people play with the same characters in a certain world anyway. And thisnwould only be temporary. Bet that it wouldn't even take a week till there would be first people to reach cap fair and square. It just aimply makes it all so more interresting if you actually need to try and learn new skills to unlock more characters for yourself.

[Dipps]

XP would be useless on DST, at least the way it's implemented right now. I can already see that there would be hosts that give godmode to players, and they'll just farm days that way.

[Tumalu]

tl;dr one-sentence version:Making it take a massive amount of days to unlock characters adds nothing to the game (It's long and pointless, not harder at all) and locks people out of characters they likely even already unlocked/earned on singleplayer, and is closer to antagonizing the playerbase than making a game that isn't about completionism feel more fun.

 

There's a couple issues. First, in DST, many of the players have already done extensive Don't Starving; there's not much purpose to locking the characters away from them, especially if you're going to have to survive HUNDREDS of days (and then permadie, possibly) to unlock more. And making it take even more time sounds awful. 480 days to get Wigfrid? Isn't that SIXTY FOUR HOURS of gameplay? That's obscene. A lot of people with any interest in playing Wigfrid (or just filling out unlocks) would probably stand still with godmode on for 3 IRL days.

 

Second, for newbies it's not "so easy" to survive extended amounts of time (this may be different in DST where they can piggyback on others?), and while it's good to space characters out and make you feel like your first several learning deaths are still rewarding, the character unlock system never felt like it was supposed to be some longterm trek. Once you're able to survive past winter, you'll most likely get every remaining character at once on your next death. And that's how it should be. Once you're alright at the game, the point is having fun with the game, not trying to pad out playtime to get to the character you actually wanted to play.

 

You're like "oh, it'll make people play for completionism!" What? Don't Starve isn't a completionism game; the devs actively dislike achievement-type things and wrote a big article about why they think it detracts from a gaming experience. You play Don't Starve because you like the game, and for goals you set for yourself, because when the devs gave people explicit ingame goals they beelined towards them and then stopped playing after reaching them.

 

Other things you suggest are also problematic; you say people should be locked out of worlds -they're already in- until they unlock that character. That would be actively antagonizing the playerbase for no good reason. "Oh, hey, see that cool world you've had going? You can't play it anymore. Git reqt!"

 

Not only that, but the extended unlock time is just a pointless grind type of thing. It doesn't add to the experience. In fact, it detracts from it, because you lock people out of characters they might want to play. It's especially a kick in the face when the time is so long, and a lot of the people already 'earned' them in Singleplayer DS playtime.

 

Grinding towards levelups makes sense in RPGs because you're powering up your team and it's a integral part of the game anyway. In Don't Starve, the levelups are more in place for a completely different purpose, and after you've gotten used to the game that purpose has already run it's route.

 

Once you can survive long-term, locked characters are just a pain. The EXP-unlocked characters are a very shallow gameplay mechanic and once you're not a newbie anymore, it's not a cool method; but that's okay, because in single-ds you get them all right away at that point. The characters that are actually unlocked by ingame methods are cool, sure, but "survive 400 days" is not a fun or interesting thing to do to unlock someone.

[XirmiX]

@Tumalu you might have a point. But then it gives a question; why was the unlocking system in game in the first place? Though I see that 64 hours of gameplay just to unlock one last character might be problematic. That's like a quarter of the time I've spent in the game myself. While I'd agree for people setting their own challenges and having to try different approaches also with mods and such, I feel that unlocking original characters in a more 'completionist' is something that would intriege players to strive for playing. I'm not too strong about having such hardcore system implemented, but I guess I see the game differently. I hope that I don't go overboard with these kind of ideas while planning out the mod projects. And yes, a system sort of like this is what I was planning for my mod project, but now that I look at things, may be things shouldn't be so hardcore. One thing, though which the mod project I was planning on doing would be a "Storymode" type (Like the Survival, Endless and Wilderness modes).

Okay, tmi and I'm probably going off topic here...

[Tumalu]

The unlocking system is important for both easing and rewarding new players in the game. Wilson is a simple, easy to understand character to start as. Instead of having 10 characters dumped on someone who already has no idea how to play the game, they're slowly introduced to them one at a time as they learn.

 

It also makes it feel less harsh when you die. The initial "NOOOOO" of your death is counterbalanced by the excitement and reward of unlocking a new character. Since a lot of people aren't hardcore and hyped up about dying and losing everything they've worked for, that's a really good way to soften the blow. And then, by the time they've unlocked everyone, they're enjoying the game for what it is~ (Or have already decided it's not their thing, but)

 

The thing is, once you're good at the game and living past winter, making it 60+ days, etc, you aren't as likely to die and you don't really want to lose your world on purpose just to unlock more characters. (The point of the game is living, after all!) As well, since your worlds last so long, and you're -already- familiar with the game, you likely want to pick certain characters and not just try new ones out because they're new. The system stops being beneficial. Even when you get a new character, they're not as bright and shiny anymore because you already know the game fairly well. At this point, it's better to just have the freedom of choice.

[imsomony]

If the XP system was as hard as this, people would be more eager to try and get their characters unlocked as well instead of just wanting more content. Because what strives ypu to play the game more at your first tries of the game is to try and unlock more characters. When all characters are unlocked for you, you sinply want more content. Having the XP system much more harder and making even the biggest professionals wanting to unlock them would make the game something that people want to play for enjoyment and for "completioning" instead of just playing in one world for thousands of days, never moving on because you can't be asked to start over again now. That's me, btw and really I found the character system fascinating until it became too easy and done in a few moments. I just had to survive a few days to unlock Wigfrid and it sort of saddens me with the triviality of theXP unlocking system.

 

When I played the original DS, I didn't play-die-repeat in order to grind out my XP so I could play someone other than Wilson. I maxed out my XP and unlocked all the characters before ever even changing from Wilson. I would play-die-repeat in order to learn the game mechanics and figure out how to survive.

 

I die more in DST than I ever did in DS. I can go off on my own all roguelike and survive just fine, but playing co-op, mistakes are easy to make in the name of helping your fellow players. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I HAVE STARVED   . Also, I don't play this game all the time - it's one of my favorites, sure, but I have hundreds of games in my library begging for attention, a full time job, and part-time school. I can play for specifically allocated periods of time, but not consistently. Lets also not forget that hosts tend to restart worlds when things go terribly wrong and/or when new content is introduced.

 

If I were stuck playing only a single character until I dedicated an entire day playing only this game so I could get enough XP for the next one? And then repeat that many more times to unlock them all? I don't think I'd play. Or, I would use the exploits mentioned by @Dipps, and @Tumalu to get all my characters back.

 

So, yeah, I disagree. While XP made sense in singleplayer to give us a reward after dying, I don't think it has a place in DST - not in its original form, but especially not reworked to be harder. I'd rather see the devs focus on game content where the difficulty is challenging all the characters perks. Keep the game focused on PvE and co-op survival, not individual ranking.

[Dougles]

When I do play Don't Starve Together, I do so casually with IRL friends. However, because we don't play together that often, we would probably end up being all Wilson (if the XP system was in DST). That sounds pretty lame and boring to me.

 

As of now, we all try to pick different characters. I think that's overall better.

 

 

[leonseye]

I don't see why you're trying to put an artificial limitation on unlocking characters that most people have already unlocked in standalone DS.

 

It doesn't really seem to add anything but frustration to the game, especially since the characters are all somewhat balanced against one another.

 

It's not like unlocking a character will suddenly make the entire game easymode, since any character that has strengths also comes w/ drawbacks (except for Wilson, of course, who is unlocked by default).

 

The characters exist to fit different playstyles, that is why they're locked, but easy enough to unlock as long as you spend a bit of time w/ the game.  I've always assumed that this is so that you can familiarize yourself w/ the mechanics of the DS world, and once you're acquainted w/ what might be giving you difficulties, you can pick a character that best suits your style of play.

 

Making it harder to unlock the characters actually seems to go against the intended design mechanic.  The characters that are supposed to be hard to unlock (Maxwell and Wes) remain so.

[Harold]

It's a great idea if you ask me. At least some challenge.

[Pyromailmann]

I liked the xp system in DS. But in DST (well, I'll just shorten it).

We'd have thousands of Wilsons running around screaming, especially in various languages.

[ryouryou]

I'm pretty sure that the main reason for the unlock system in single player is to provide some early relief to the harshness of the permadeath mechanic. Players that might normally be like "WOW, my stuff is GONE? Screw that!" and stop playing the game will be comforted by seeing that bar go up, going "Oh, hey, well I unlocked a new guy, so maybe I should try them next time."


And Willow is the most noob friendly and positioned second, right where she can be helpful to people dying of darkness and winter. 

But yeah, I honestly thought it was there to add a reward/comfort for dying, not to be a harsh grind in any way. 

[jbeetle]

I liked the xp system in DS. But in DST (well, I'll just shorten it).

We'd have thousands of Wilsons running around screaming, especially in various languages.

I didn't actually like it. I liked the anticipation of "who am I going to unlock next" but even that wasn't great. Plus, who was unlocked after another was completely arbitrary (other than maxwell, obviously)

[CaptainFun]

I'd rather see XP unlock skins. Players should have a few characters off the bat since many players will probably be DS vets. 

[jbeetle]

I'd rather see XP unlock skins. Players should have a few characters off the bat since many players will probably be DS vets. 

Now that I could totally get behind....don't know how they'd get around using console commands to grant all skins...which I don't have a problem with, it just wouldn't be worth the trouble of tying them to xp if a simple console command would make it pointless.

[Silxer]

I'd rather see XP unlock skins. Players should have a few characters off the bat since many players will probably be DS vets. 

 

That's what I was thinking before I saw your post. 

[RalphKastro]

it just wouldn't be worth the trouble of tying them to xp if a simple console command would make it pointless.

like character unlocking in SP? 

[jbeetle]

like character unlocking in SP? 

Yes. and character unlocking I dislike even more since it's not just vanity, and it's not like any one character is supposed to be better than another.

[Johnny5isAlive]

Looking at wiki, the current DS XP system is way too easy. It's way too simple for someone to survive like 8 days in each run and unlock a new character. Through that, players will get new characters and won't learn anything new.

It looks to me as if DST has completely removed the idea of XP system. I thought it was great. Great, but too easy, which simply just makes it a waste of time to implement in DST what so ever.

I thought about it and the way the XP system could be much better and harder would be if:

* If you die, you would get 4 XP for each day you survived (or somewhat that amount) instead of 20. This means that you would need to survive 480 days to unlock the last character (for RoG, which is Wigfrid).

* Each time you die/escape, you can only unlock 1 character each run. So, say if you reached day 480 or over in RoG DS without ever unlocking any character, you would only get Willow unlocked.

* Say you had Willow unlocked and had her and Wilson as characters available to you. Then you escape or die at a run and had survived 40 days (mathematically, if you instead of getting 20 XP for each day get 4 XP for each day survived, you'll have 8 days with 20 XP equivalent to 40 days with 4 XP). Say you had already survived 40 days in one of your previous runs to unlock Willow. Normally (with 4 XP idea in place) you would then need to survive 40 days in your next run to unlock Wolfgang. But what I thought would make it a challenging is if you had to achiever the total amount of 80 days in a single run. So you couldn't just survive 40 days in your next run to unlock Wplfgang, but would need to get at least 80 days survived to unlock him. So basically the XP counter would start from 0 every time you die (but your previously unlocked characters will stay unlocked even if you die less than 40 days; you won't lose Willow as unlocked because of that, the already unlocked characters would be perma-unlocked).

* If you have command console enabled, you could not unlock any characters while it's enabled during your runs.

If the XP system was as hard as this, people would be more eager to try and get their characters unlocked as well instead of just wanting more content. Because what strives ypu to play the game more at your first tries of the game is to try and unlock more characters. When all characters are unlocked for you, you sinply want more content. Having the XP system much more harder and making even the biggest professionals wanting to unlock them would make the game something that people want to play for enjoyment and for "completioning" instead of just playing in one world for thousands of days, never moving on because you can't be asked to start over again now. That's me, btw and really I found the character system fascinating until it became too easy and done in a few moments. I just had to survive a few days to unlock Wigfrid and it sort of saddens me with the triviality of theXP unlocking system.

How we could still have the XP system and have it also harder in DST? A lot of players have already played with characters which in single player game are far in XP chart. Temporarily locking players' worlds until they unlock the specific character they play as in their world would seem like the simplest way to go for it. What if you have 5 worlds already made and you have there played with characters which you haven't yet unlocked and don't want to delete any of your worlds? You can always move your worlds in the files, but if you don't want to or are not capable of doing so, you could still always play on other peoples' hosted servers.

What do you guys think? I know this would temporarily make us all Wilsons, but hei, some people play with the same characters in a certain world anyway. And thisnwould only be temporary. Bet that it wouldn't even take a week till there would be first people to reach cap fair and square. It just aimply makes it all so more interresting if you actually need to try and learn new skills to unlock more characters for yourself.

 

OH NO! No, No, No. NO! x100,000,000. Faaaaaar too many games go down this road. It isn't adding anything to the game, it isn't making it harder, it isn't improving the game in ANY way. It's just pointless fodder. This is the kind of tactic that Free To Play games usually take, except in those cases there would also be a "handy" little option to pay REAL MONEY to either unlock the character immediately, increase the amount of XP you earn, or half the amount of XP you need. The second I see a game with these tactics I uninstall it because I know it'll take far too long to do anything without throwing money at the screen.

 

So please, no pointless additions that do nothing more than draaaaaaaaaag out something for the simple goal of extending playtime. If a good dev wants to extend the playtime of their game they add new content to it, they do not make the old content a pain in the ass to deal with, that is the sign of a bad and unimaginative developer that just desperately wants people to play their game for as long as humanly possible.

 

Oh and also, 

 

 

* If you have command console enabled, you could not unlock any characters while it's enabled during your runs.

 Dude that is just being a kill joy. If people want to cheat, let 'em. It doesn't affect anyone but them.

Oh look at me I'm writing in white. How fancy. ~~~~~

[XirmiX]

OH NO! No, No, No. NO! x100,000,000. Faaaaaar too many games go down this road. It isn't adding anything to the game, it isn't making it harder, it isn't improving the game in ANY way. It's just pointless fodder. This is the kind of tactic that Free To Play games usually take, except in those cases there would also be a "handy" little option to pay REAL MONEY to either unlock the character immediately, increase the amount of XP you earn, or half the amount of XP you need. The second I see a game with these tactics I uninstall it because I know it'll take far too long to do anything without throwing money at the screen.

So please, no pointless additions that do nothing more than draaaaaaaaaag out something for the simple goal of extending playtime. If a good dev wants to extend the playtime of their game they add new content to it, they do not make the old content a pain in the ass to deal with, that is the sign of a bad and unimaginative developer that just desperately wants people to play their game for as long as humanly possible.

I wasn't thinking about the game going THAT far when I suggested this. Though, your post reminds me of how a one game that I played is like and that it's the reason I hate it... Tanki Online, that's the one!

[bountygiver]

I don't know why people are complaining about difficulty here, I found DST is actually harder that DS (unless your team cooperate and communicate very well), you got more mouths to feed, more resources to be used while the game balances other stuff by nerfing a lot of stuff in combat.

 

After playing for a few months of DST, I went back to DS a bit and found it is so much easier there (esp. combat), adventure mode has nothing on me when you can survive joining a server in winter and live (without those items lying nearby like adventure mode does)

[applebottom]

After playing for a few months of DST, I went back to DS a bit and found it is so much easier there (esp. combat), adventure mode has nothing on me when you can survive joining a server in winter and live (without those items lying nearby like adventure mode does)

We noticed same.