Hey guys,
My question/poll is related to mmorpg economy in a fantasy setting :
Imagine you crafted your best sword or armor set (crafting is easy, think Eve Online-ish easy, although you’ve got to find the resources, iron is common, mithril really isn’t).
How long do you, as a gamer, expect to use your equipment ?
I vote for forever. I want to beat every developer with my mithril sword into submission when they make clunky, fake tool-degradation systems.
If you do make some durability system make sure you can top it off (repair the item)
As SparrowsNest wrote, no matter how long as long as i can repair it not just one, many times.
But, how long? Then you need a system.
For example: 1 sword gives +1 hit point to a Goblin. Then, this sword gets -1 durability point while doing this.
So, your items will have hit points and durability points.
IF the sword reachs durability ZERO, then, there has to be some way to repair it,
so you need to add repair cost to this sword and npc_location for repair.
Then your system will look like this:
ITEM
SWORD
HIT POINTS
+1
DURABILITY
-1
DURABILITY_AMOUNT
100
REPAIR COST
10
BLACKSMITHS
Daigo, Romtyr
LOCATIONS
Black Mountain, Underground Facility#1
So, i can use this sword to hit 100 goblins before the need to find a Blacksmith.
Your question is way too open.
Are you asking to implement a limited-use property on weapons? As in, after 100 strikes, it is broken?
Based on Diablo 2, with the ethereal weapon system, it was very poor and since the greatest weapons were rune-crafted, apart from javelins which had an inherent bug, most ethereal weapons were used and then discarded. Since none stuck until late game, they were just a blip on the radar.
However, it sucked when bosses would drop good loot and it happened to be ethereal. It meant, you had to farm it again to get something similar that could get repaired. Basically, a downer.
Are you asking about a repair system and how long before you need to repair it?
I honestly never liked this system since it is a money sink and most games do not implement it on use but on death. Which makes no sense. If you die a lot, you are too poor to repair and therefore cannot play anymore? That sounds dumb.
Are you asking in terms of how long before you upgrade it?
Games like Etrian odyssey or golden sun would have you immediately upgrade weapons in the next town over. Something I deplore because it adds a grinding element to it where the player must get money.
Other games had the upgrade curve so low that it barely mattered like Paper Mario.
As @ said, I would say forever and based on the player’s liking. Warframe, a game I herald as one of the best of the century, has many different weapons of many different stats and damage and styles that honestly, the best weapon is often slightly better than another at doing that one thing. For instance, the rubico sniper is very good when modded at damaging eidolons but hardly anything else and does very poorly in crowds. The ignis is amazing for crowds, especially low levels but sucks at distance and higher level enemies.
Mind you, you don’t need to repair it, just mod it and keep it fed with ammo.
That is a new paragon that many games do not use which is modular weapons with slight specializations.
In warframe, I still use my 4 year old weapon, the Tigris, which is one of the hardest hitting shot guns in the game. Almost nothing compares to it imho but I rarely see people use it (it is a common shotgun).
Yop yop,
(Sorry for my bad english, I probably didn’t spot every mistakes)
I’m currently working on the game economy, especially on limiting hyperinflation.
My game needs money sinks, and one of them will be item decay (sorry Ninja =).
Item decay makes sense imho : look at the real world. Nothing is eternal (besides Bond’s diamonds 
I was wondering how far I could go into decaying equipment… Thus the question is open on purpose. It grants you the opportunity to voice your concerns and give ideas which is always a good thing 
Of course, the system I planned contains a repair mechanic (hoping it makes you feel better Ninja ?), as it is a good money sink (there are better sinks, but this topic is about item decay, I won’t derail the thread).
It does not contain hp and all, like** TheKingOfTheRoad** described, but the “breaking” is odds based (say 1/1 000, needs tweaking. I think odds based events aren’t bad in themselves) upon strike and quality tiered.
This avoids item instantiation, maintenance and numerous requests to the database at the cost of creating more scriptable objets (adding to them the breaking odds value and 2 links (to lower and higher tier items)) and item swapping once in a while. I believe that’s a good tradeoff.
The item created version is “brand new” tier 5. Player uses it to her content, once it fails the roll, player gets her warning, the item is swapped to the tier 4 version, the “still new”, etc… Note that only the tier 1 version looses stats.
Statistically (if my calculations are correct), loosing 2 tiers in a short span is very unlikely.
The layers exist to mitigate “bad luck” as well as the money sink excuse.
Repairing raises the quality by 1 tier for relatively small amount, by 2 tiers for a higher amount, you get the idea.
Item’s destruction also helps economy… I envision it as a partial destruction, more like an automatic salvage of the item so you retain most of the resources you’ve spent into the fabrication. You just need to find the rest, and pay for the reconstruction.
But this would only happen if you do not take care of your stuff.
Ok, you know (almost) everything, let the discussion begin ^^
You can have items that decays and indestructible items.
So, it makes sense to pursue a quest or mission or match
when as a player you gain this indestructible item based
on xp, gold, diamonds or killing a big boss. Then, this
indestructible item has a big value. It will be not the case
if all the items are indestructible.
Okay, one thing I can tolerate when it comes to durability, and that is the system in the Divinity Original Sin 2: weapons only degrade when they are contact ones (melee, etc), and if it is used for other than fight: like ruining doors and whatnot.
And ruins seamless gameplay. And annoying. I, personally, don’t play games with tool/weapon degradation systems other than the DOS2 (and it is tolerable, not enjoyable)
Here we are, talking about personal tastes besides thinking. Ruins seamless gameplay, lol.
Let’s do some research besides: in Pac Man things where like…
I will give CHESS as an example.
Your ARMY gets a LOT of decay in 20 movements
no matter how hard you try. And it’s fun, seamless
gameplay.
@ i personally love a match when decay it’s involved and finally
you get inmortal items.
THIS IS GOOD answer and adds depth BEFORE the personal taste part.
@ : "Okay, one thing I can tolerate when it comes to durability, and that is the system in the Divinity Original Sin 2: weapons only degrade when they are contact ones (melee, etc), and if it is used for other than fight: like ruining doors and whatnot."
Don’t mind that OP asked for personal opinion.
Literally:
So what’s your problem exactly?
Good for you. Vote for that. But it has nothing to do with me.
Oh, I didn’t know that now you’re the one who decides if an answer is GOOD or NOT GOOD. Next time I will ask your opinion on my opinion. (not)
@ Ok. Thanks.
Please guys, keep it civilized, we’re here for a constructive conversation.
No need to to fight for everybody’s right ^^
Just share and I’ll be happy
I agree. I will not quote @ again trying to explain some point telling him “this is good answer” before the “i personally hate decay system.” part. It’s a personal opinion. Chess it’s good game with decay system and reset system (play another match). Personally then, i like both systems. Let’s be happy, have a nice day.
EDITED:
I will elaborate.
How a Chess game has decay system?
The pawn tries to resurrect another piece
reaching the other side part of the board.
So, it’s REPAIR system or RESPAWN system.
(you see the point already i was trying to explain
before going to the grass).
But maybe Chess Game Designer was just nuts.
EDITED#2:
For the life of me it’s so good to see how your sword
brokes in the middle of a battle in first person and
you need to use your hands or switch for another
item while running from an horde of skeletons!
I was reading the link you provided.
It’s a good read, I’ll need to read it again.
As for reading, here’s a different angle if you will :
Extra Credit’s youtube chanel provides good videos, and even wikipedia has some points.
About chess, yep I’ve played a bit and I see where you’re going.
Is equipment breakage a key element of the gameplay mechanics? Just as an example of what I mean by this look at The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild. Weapons have a limit to how many hits they could deal before they broke as a way to force the player to constantly collect and switch weapons.
If equipment breakage isn’t vital to your gameplay mechanics (or to keeping the game economy balanced by sinking player resources) my general opinion is that gear shouldn’t break at all. If you need a mechanic that forces the player to expend resources there are always others you can use. Skyrim for example required you to recharge enchantments.
If you want to avoid hyperinflation or inflation, just deflate the economy.
In real life, this is not a thing because of debt but if your game does not have a debt system, then you can just deflate it.
If you owe the bank 10k but you deflate the economy, that 10k doesn’t deflate and becomes unpayable in the long term. Since our economies are based on debt (i.e. paying the interest only), we cannot deflate otherwise we will never be able to pay future interest.
In games, where there is no debt system, this works just fine! Many private WoW servers have a yearly 100 → 1% deflation event where you lose most of your gold. So people just spend it or lose it. And there is nothing wrong with it.
Otherwise, you can simply use money sinks in upgrades. Warframe has that also where if you want to enhance a mod, you need to spend cash. I typically have between 0 and 1 000 000 credits (the currency) because I can farm it fast and spend it fast on upgrades.
Image this scene. Robin fighting vs. little Juan. (SPOILER AHEAD).
You start as Robin, Juan destroys your stick. Then you go to the water.
When you start the Match again, you don’t have your stick anymore,
so you’ll have to use your fists.
Then, if you want your stick again, you will go to the forrest and find
a new one.
In my PERSONAL opinion to have decay and lost items it’s not that bad idea…
Has any game ever been better off by including a durability system?
Yes, check reality around you, it helps.