theworldofdreams.com

Seems like few players might be, interested to have a little change to Benson and his cool gamble-potions

How about if:
Benson would sell 2-3 different kinds of potions to go with. Generic weapon/armor oil which would cost that 100-150 points and 10000-15000 gold pieces and would be slightly more powerful. And then a bit more special oil which you could apply to clothes(even not exceptional ones, you can't make exceptionals anyhow), it would cost somewhere between 200-300 points and 20000-30000 gold pieces, item quality would be something like the benson oil makes now mostly: fine, durable and rugged...very slight chance for tempered and indestructable ones.
More stuff to prevent buff-flood is to drop the points got from the magics to max of 7-8 points/magic item.
This might seem very awful to some players, cause you don't get tons of magics all the time to drop to Benson.
And oh: how about if Benson would give you more points for the few first(3-8 magics) and then some less for the rest of them? This would give the players with not tons and tons of magics a little balance, i hope.

My ideas always have alot of flaws, but this is what my aching back forced me to do.

Examples what i was thinking about:
5 cloth oils would need 1000-1500 points(125-187.5 high quality magic items if the max points would be lowered to 8 points/magic), 50000-75000 gold pieces.
Would end up getting something like: 2-3 fine/durable buffs and maybe 1-2 rugged ones. Slight chance of getting tempered too.
You would actually have to do stuff to get the potions, somewhat high risk gambling even.

My ideas always have alot of flaws, but this is what my aching back forced me to do. If there's something that is totally impossible: I must say that i don't have any idea what i'm writing about then.

Another idea for Benson...what if we drastically increased the number of points we needed, but also greatly upped the stakes? For instance, instead of needing 100 points, make it 1000 but guarantee that our item will be useful...like at least a weapon of power if not destruction.

Hell, I wouldn't even mind if we upped the points to 5000...or more even...but I REALLY hate turning in tons of items and then paying 10k for an item as bad as or worse than the ones I got rid of to start with. Rather than a gambling system (which I've never won at yet), I would personally prefer a reward system where I know that if I turn in enough stuff, I will eventually qualify for something really good.

What if Benson were point based all together? We could have a point menu...say at 1000 points anything you pay for will be a low quality magic...
5000 points gets you a medium magic...10000 points gets you a really good magic...25000 would get you "uber" magics.

Just a thought from a non-gambling sort.

perhaps getting a quality modifier based on the number of oils used would be the simplest approach. if you like to gamble just use one at a time if you prefer a more certain outcome use 5 or even 10 on a single item.

The higher you push the minimum reward, the smaller the market becomes. I don't agree with the idea of "guaranteed" magic gain, because like it or not, the point of Benson isn't, I believe, to *get* magics, but rather to *give* them to him.

-M

Yes, you are quite right Marius. You get rid of magics and it's a moneysink as well, too.
Just adding up the points needed/gold cost with a small enhancement to potions might give a little flavor to it.
Atleast i think it would, perhaps it doesn't.
It's also true that guaranteed ubermagics would be a bit lame, but just a teeny weeny bit more useful items in a of way increased points/gold needed might be nice.

You are right marius, but at the same time I see this as a step for the exact same cause! I've heard several people mention they dont use benson because they dont get anything in return. If there was an increased chance of getting something even remotely useful they may change their minds on the subject! Thus all those bensonish items they have stockpiled and are unsure of what to do with, besides selling for 1 gold on the auctoneer, would actually get destroyed and stop taking up item count space on the server. Like what was originally intended I think!

You have a chance to get an Indestructable Plate [armour] of Invulnerability.

You have a chance to get an Indestructable Studded Leather [armour] of Magery.

For 10k and things you'd throw away anyway, isn't that a blessing enough? Benson is, I think, one of the cleverest ideas for item management that I have seen, in any shard. The thing with Benson is you have unlimited chances to try, so just keep hunting and giving him items and before you know it, you'll get that item you want.

-M

Yes true, but the problem still remains there are a lot of those people who refuse to use him, they need to rework him somehow to get everyone to want to use him! Either that or start up something else to get rid of magics so that their all being taken care of in a simular fashion!

Azalin wrote:Yes true, but the problem still remains there are a lot of those people who refuse to use him, they need to rework him somehow to get everyone to want to use him!

I admire your attitude, but I'm still of the opinion that if "it aint' broke, don't bugger it up"

Also, changing Benson means that players who used him before may not use him then, and then the original goal is flawed because there'll still be people who won't use Benson, for whatever reason. What it comes down to is that no matter how good Benson is, there will still be people who won't use him.

I think one of the biggest reason people don't use Benson is because they choose not to go all the way to Yew to use him. Sure enough, many people can gate, but if you're new to the shard and you "grow up" not using him, then it's a bit of a challenge to just start - though, there are exceptions.

But basically what it comes down to is there will always be people who won't use Benson, and the question is: is it really that important to *make* people use Benson? I don't give him (Benson) all my magic items, even if they have no use to me.

I like to use my 'Benson' items for these reasons:

- Giving to Benson (duh)
- Giving to newer players / newer characters
- Roleplaying reasons (Marius and his Black Staff of Power, etc)
- Just generally hoarding

I think if we encouraged more charity (especially with the Newbie Box) rather than worrying about what we get from Benson and if it's worth it, Magic Items would have a little more even spread, rather than everyone going "oh, it's not an indy mage buff, i'll throw it away", which really bothers me.

-M

Personally, paying 10k for a useless item is no blessing as far as I can see. I don't have tons of money lying around to keep throwing away on a "chance" to get something decent.

I also slightly resent the implication that because some people would like to get good magics from Benson, that they must be miserly hoarders who are not helping the new players...that we only care about ourselves and are not attuned with the WoD spirit...yada yada yada.

I like Bassett's idea but I would keep normal Benson oils exactly how they are, I would simply add more levels for better potions. This would suit both groups. Those that like the gamble can stick with the normal potions. Those that want more specific results could look to save for a higher level potion.

This is a rough idea of what I was talking about:

lvl 1
100 points and 10k gold ---- Normal Benson Oil
400 points and 40k gold ---- Enhanced Benson Oil
800 points and 80k gold ---- Blessed Oil
1200 points and 120k gold -- Cloth Oil


The enhanced Benson oil would work very much like the current (normal oil) the exception would be that the enhanced oil would have a better chance of producing higher end items.

Blessed Oil would basically need to be used on a new item and it would bless the item making it never show signs of decay. This could be tricky if the bless oil is too easy or inexpensive but I am just throwing out figures for the sake of the example.

Cloth Oil self explanatory, though I would make these the toughest to get simply to provide a balance.

Ok, i'll post my little oil test here:
Item test #1
5 mauls:
rugged silver maul of quality and macefighting and lightning
fine silver maul of quality and cursing
fine maul of quality and macefighting
rugged maul of might and feeblemindedness
fine maul of quality

Item test #2
5 bows:
fine bow of quality
fine bow of quality
fine bow of quality and cursing
durable bow of maiming and clumsiness
durable bow of power*

Item test #3
5 platemails
fine platemail of defense
platemail of defense
fine platemail of mining
durable platemail of protection**
durable platemail of guarding and poison protection

Item test #4
5 swords
durable scimitar of maiming and feeblemindedness
tempered katana of swordsmanship and dispelling
rugged cutlass of swordsmaship and cursing
durable longsword of might and swordsmanship
broadsword of quality

Item test #5
5 random items
durable firebow of might
rugged platemail gloves of guarding
durable heater shield of parry
tempered warhammer of might and macefighting
fine kryss of maiming and fencing

This kinda shows that there are two ok-good items there
*easily pays off the oil when sold, maybe even two or three.
**pays off one oil.
Rest of those are: junk.
Something, like adding points needed/gold cost would be nice if it would give a slightly increased chance of better items.

As soon as something enters the public domain, it's nearly not as good as theory would suggest. Benson, AG, .games .. all these are good ideas, but they don't last and they're ultimately not the best venture. Giving players access to MORE magic items for HIGHER gold costs is only going to push the economy higher and higher.. look at the ridiculous prices houses are going for.. WoD's been succesful insofar as it's managed to keep it's economy under control for five years.

I am adamantly against giving players access to more benson oils, but if it were forced upon me to comment about it, I would say that if such a thing were to happen, the "value" of magic items should significantly drop as a result. Thus, you would need a lot more magic items to accrue 100 benson points, or possibly that benson points decay over time, so that there was only a small enough window to collect what will eventually be unbalancing items.

Tweaking Benson isn't the right idea. Benson isn't about getting magic items, it's about getting rid of gold and magic items. I believe that 'enhancing' him is a very critical error for the long-term survivability of the shard.

I say again: Benson isn't about *getting* magic items, it's about giving them to him for a small reward. You aren't supposed to make money off benson, you're supposed to keep money from ruining the game.

How will enhancing benson benefit WoD? Definately, it will make some *players* better off, but how will it better WoD?


-M

I have to agree with Marius, I personally dont think benson needs any changing at all. I spent months and months gathering magics to get my very first potion from him. When I used it I placed it on my dagger (weapon of choice) and it gave me a .2 skill increas and I loved it, some may think its a crappy "reward" but I think the best part about it was I spent so much time with friends gathering the items to turn in. So in my opinion benson needs no changing at all.

I dont know , I am still dissapointed I havent gotten a fluffy blanket of sleepiness outta benson yet.