Remove ECL

[sharkinajar]

I feel like ECL is needlessly punishing. Back when there weren't apps or it was app-lite to play an app subrace, it made sense to have something like that holding players back.

Now with the return of it all being full app, it just feels unnecessarily punishing. After all, all it does is increase the amount of time spent questing to get closer to other people's levels. Which means less RP, and more grinding.

It also adversely effects how xp is gained from enemies at a crazy amount. You get fractions less.

I do see why originally it was in place... but I just don't see any good reason to keep it. I'd rather spend more time with the RP and interacting with others than having to add 2x the amount of time into quests just to be at the same levels of others. Argument that the stats make you a level higher doesn't exactly apply, especially since the power mainly comes from levels.

It's forcing those cool apps and players that really wanted to play something special have to spend countless more hours just doing quests instead of doing things cool and special.

[Knockknock]

+1.

(lol)

Agree wholeheartedly. Haven't personally be affected by ECL, but always felt it was a needless drain. The application process is your screening opportunity, seems silly to get approved for a perk only to labour under a grind. Understand there's an argument to be made for increased power and balancing it, but if the player can't be trusted with it, don't approve them.

[Miss_Behaviour]

I've got +1 ECL. It feels so bad I was convinced I had +2 and made Spiffy check. A waste of valuable storyteller time!

People won't stop asking me "Still?!" when I tell them I'm lvl 7. It's been going on for days but it feels like an eternity of embarassment.

Save me!

[Prof. Misclick]

You want stat perks and other benefits then ECL. If you don’t want ECL make whatever cool concept and rp it appropriately.

You can say your mom told you her great aunt was an aasimar and think that you are as well. Or the family story about the deal your ancestor made with a devil and now you carry some curse/boon.

Apps for subrace were put back in since we had so many of them at one point it was city of subraces not city of Arabel.

[V-Rage]

I agree with removing ECL.

The only time it's really been city of subraces is back in V5 when we had appless weeks and everyone wanted a subrace or maybe at the start of chapter 2 when the Precept had a prelude heavily supporting subraces.

It made sense for ecl when subraces were app lite but now they are full app I'd get rid of ECL

[Echo]

@prof-misclick said in Remove ECL:

You want stat perks and other benefits then ECL. If you don’t want ECL make whatever cool concept and rp it appropriately.

This.

[Satyrsfaction]

Am I hallucinating orrr was there a system in place way back where a DM could give you tokens that would make you level faster ??

More of those for rad roleplay would help combat the ‘RP being seen as a detriment to character building and competence’ thing, maybe on a tip of the hat or multiple player basis ?

[Darlene Te'len]

i have played vanilla characters and ECL, my ECL ones have always felt better, and seemed to have no issue advancing in game.

the vanilla ones take a bit more effort on my part

and about the tokens, i think you are right they existed in arabel in the past, good ones and bad ones

[greenlung]

@knockknock said in Remove ECL:

+1.

(lol)

Agree wholeheartedly. Haven't personally be affected by ECL, but always felt it was a needless drain. The application process is your screening opportunity, seems silly to get approved for a perk only to labour under a grind. Understand there's an argument to be made for increased power and balancing it, but if the player can't be trusted with it, don't approve them.

+1 to this, if you’re worried about someone abusing powerful perk don’t give it to them - which is why you have the app process.

[Knockknock]

@prof-misclick said in Remove ECL:

Apps for subrace were put back in since we had so many of them at one point it was city of subraces not city of Arabel.

I'm not sure what this has to do with the removal of ECL. The number of subraces in game at any one time is in the gift of the DMs, as is who gets to play them.

It's double jeopardy. Go through an application process and then also incur a heavy progress penalty.

App characters then have to spend a disproportionate amount of time grinding out quests to move through levels instead of role-playing, doing events or whatever else.

I just don't see what the benefit is. It's the DMs saying you can have this perk, but you have to wear handcuffs.

Is it meant as a deterrent? Less people apply for subraces because they don't want the faff of ECL? Just make it clear you're adjusting the approval criteria. I'm sure as a community we'd sooner see a slightly more stringent approval process if it meant once you were approved, you didn't have to grind to advance.

[sharkinajar]

@knockknock 100% how I feel about it. Definitely agree with knockknock here. It's a pointless suck of time.

[Miss_Behaviour]

Wouldn't be so bad if we had some kind of time-based xp tick like a lot of servers do. Some prefer to just have DMs grant small bits of xp (50-100xp) just as they hop between players seeing what kind of rp they're up to. It reduces the dependency on questing/combat so you don't feel bad about missing a day of questing in favour of a day of plotting, scheming or just gossiping.

I still agree with the rest of the arguments against ECL, but if DMs are adamant on keeping ECL, then at least give us a compromise to make it feel less of a quest grind.

[Seter]

I dont mind the ECL. Seems fine to me for the perks I am getting :)

[A Former User]

The downside of a very tough app process is that you may have to say „no“ to apps that you might otherwise feel are okay. That can be unpleasant, in particular if you would like to help people and also give them some advice on how they might improve their app to get it accepted.

Things like „we already have X“ would probably sound kind of lame as a reason to someone who has already spent a lot of time thinking about a concept, background, etc.. In the longer run, it might contribute to making the server more „elitist“ since writing applications (a bit like pretty much all proposals/applications in real life) will always require practice in „app writing“ - and knowing people (who give you feedback, encourage you to even try, etc.)

[O-louth]

@silversquirrel

Dms do not have issues saying no. And it is a legit reason to turn Down an application (even now), that there are too many aasimar IG at present. Perhaps Said dm can then help the player figure out a Way to make the concept work still. (Perhaps your aasimar paladin could be a knight errant of X instead.)

I would love to play a subrace. But the ECL breaks me every time. The issue is the Way, imo, that EXP breaks at level 8. Until level 8 it flows. At level 9 you only get DM and End quest EXP. So either make the exp at the level less steep (which would help both normal and ECL concepts), or remove it.

[Echo]

@silversquirrel said in Remove ECL:

Things like „we already have X“ would probably sound kind of lame as a reason to someone who has already spent a lot of time thinking about a concept, background, etc.. In the longer run, it might contribute to making the server more „elitist“ since writing applications (a bit like pretty much all proposals/applications in real life) will always require practice in „app writing“ - and knowing people (who give you feedback, encourage you to even try, etc.)

Not sure what this has to do with removing ECL.

If you dont want ECL, dont apply for a race that has them. Find a way to tell the same story with a "normal" race. If you want the perks that come with a special race, then you must accept that ECL is part of the package.

[A Former User]

Merely stating that if you need to make apps harder as a consequence of removing the ECL, then this may have other effects as well. From what I understand, the ECL appears to have worked fairly well with respect to reducing the number of applications that care a lot about the power of characters.

@echo

[Echo]

@silversquirrel gotcha!