Progressing backwards? (Level scaling)

[Hobo Elf]

At first I thought the level scaling worked well and was toned down, I especially liked that you'd start encountering entirely new monsters in old areas the more levels you gained. However now that I've played the game more I'm starting to see that they went overboard with it. In some areas it's on par with Oblivion's horrid level scaling.

My Occultist is level 22 now, I've been farming the Warden since level 18 or so. My damage hasn't changed significantly within the last 4 levels. I do now about the same amount of damage that I used at level 18. The only thing that actually has happened is that enemy damage has scaled up so while I kill them just as fast as I did before, I find myself also taking more damage than before. Progression has gone backwards, not forwards.

I just cleared out the cave to clean the poisoned water with my level 10 Soldier. If I go back to this cave with my level 22 Occultist all the enemies will be my level and the boss will be higher than me by a few levels, just as it was with my Soldier. So again there's the same problem here: there has been no real progression in terms of character development. I deal bigger numbers of damage and can take bigger numbers of damage, but this is mutual for my enemies. If you don't feel like you are progressing and going up in the food chain then why bother having levels at all? Especially so if leveling up only starts weakening you after a certain point? The real progression seems to only happens when you get good gear, which isn't bad, but defeats the purpose of leveling.

That's my though about level scaling in this current build. I know the scaling caps out, but I think it could cap out a bit earlier. I also understand that this degree of scaling might be balanced out with higher levels and uber loot in mind. I just hope it turns out well and GD doesn't become another Oblivion.

[TnJ]

I like the scaling how it is at the moment. You can get to level 25 in a number of areas. If things capped out lower you'd have fewer options. Level determines what loot can drop.

It also depends which skill you're working on...

If you max out a low teir skill like cadence, fighting spirit, the pets, phantasmal blade, etc, then you get extremely powerful very quickly. Any time you have to invest in a mastery level, your damage output doesn't really change a whole lot.


What useless crap did you spend 4 levels worth of skill points on if your power level dropped relative to the enemies? :P

[Hobo Elf]

Those are good points to argue for level scaling. Btw I didn't drop in power per say. Like I said I raised steadily in power with the enemies. It's just that my defense started to lag behind, being a squishy Occultist and all. I mostly specced in Blood Burst, Terrifying Gaze and my Hellhound pet to tank enemies and kill the odd Acid / Poison resistant monsters.

[powbam]

You are at a point where gear and the farming of, and components, takes on a greater role. Until they raise the cap in the next couple months (hopefully) this will be the only way you can improve upon your offense and defense. That and the tweaking of your build to maximize what is available.

Don't know if you make use of the GD forums but you will find better info and help there than here.

http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/index.php

[Pvtchaos]

Gear has a bigger impact the higher a level you get. Any level 5 character can do well even without gear, a level 22 character will do horrible with bad or "mismatching with his build" gear.

[Hobo Elf]

Pvtchaos님이 먼저 게시:

Gear has a bigger impact the higher a level you get. Any level 5 character can do well even without gear, a level 22 character will do horrible with bad or "mismatching with his build" gear.

Yup, this seems to be the case. Like I said in my OP I thought that it might be possible that the game will be balanced around characters with good loot instead of just the builds and levels. Can't say it's a bad idea; it worked well for Diablo 2.

But I still stand by my point that it's silly that if I kill the same enemies in the same area (be it farming loot or just grind) over and over again and level up and they scale with me but I don't get any good loot drops so things get a bit harder. But we will see how things pan out in the future. I understand that they are still tweaking loot drops and even thinking about how to change loot farming into something more than just boss monster rushing.

[DeMasked]

Enemies scale with your level to a certain point in most areas. Once you hit level 25 and backtrack to certain areas you'll find that the enemies will have a lower level.

If monsters didn't scale to some degree the areas to farm in would be far less then what they are now. Hallowed Hill and Depraved Sanctuary will have enemies higher then 25 so they yield more experience and better items (some unuseable).

[Giblix]

You go to the well with a lvl22 and fight lvl22 opponents? Hardly. There is a limit to level scaling. The ones in the well don't go beyond lvl 15. When you go in for the first time it'll be lvl 8-9 opponents at the lowest. As a lvl20+ character it still isn't interesting to play in the village and maps before that due to the limit opponents scale with you.

Scaling in GD works fine. It keeps things interesting and challenging even though you already completed the area... Untill a certain point. Then you simply have to go to a new area.

[Pvtchaos]

Go farm the bandit base, much tougher enemies and tons of blue drops there. Really a great place to farm, also theres a nice sword drop that has "summon a harbinger" as special skill.

[Hobo Elf]

I've been trying to farm the key the whole day but no drops. I already did the quest but chose the less useful option so I didn't get the key. I also tried getting the key from the cultists with another low level character and the key dropped after the first few guys.. Such horrible luck.

[Pvtchaos]

Yeah, got the key after 10 tries or so and get lucky with the sword on the 2nd drop. Also got alot of arcanist gear from that place, makes me real curious about that class.

[Hobo Elf]

I have like 3 Maiven's Books (+1 to all Arcanist skills) in my stash. Can't wait to see what it'll be. Probably a pure glass cannon?

[DeMasked]

Arcanist is defnitely more of a caster based mastery dealing mostly elemental and aetherial damage.

[TnJ]

Paring it with Occulist should be pretty badass since it already has an item waiting for it with +1 to both occultist and arcanist skills.

[DeMasked]

That and the raven gives a buff that increases % elemental damage which would help the arcanist' abilities.

[Justforvisit]

It was just the reason why I started the game a moment ago and stopped immedeatly afterwards. In the most parts it really is fun but when you feel like you're playing Oblivion all over....meh....