A humble request: Remove "zero xp" from the (otherwise) cool equipment

[Xindaris]

Maybe this is a difficult concept to grasp for somebody somewhere, but I kind of want to be able to actually use the really cool, difficult-to-obtain equipment, and making some of it give the player zero experience for having it equipped basically makes the item useless--unless the player has already reached a hypothetical level cap, which I doubt happens without deliberate grinding? I can't even decide to only use this stuff when I'm really having trouble (say, with that optional boss fight, you know the one, even if I don't) because those are exactly the things that award the most experience! It made me regret finishing the drill quest because my "reward" consisted of replacing a pretty good piece of equipment with one that I absolutely cannot use ever. The biggest kick in the face is that the item description says it "grows with the wielder" but the wielder literally cannot grow while holding it.

In my opinion, XP reduction and especially zeroing it out belongs where it is in the Kingdom Hearts series: As an optional modifier which the player can choose to take on purely for the extra challenge. It has no business being tacked on to an otherwise nice piece of equipment, and it's an especially bad fit for something that's supposed to be a reward. Like, I understand if you want to prevent the item from being overpowered, but maybe make the penalty something that applies in the moment rather than taking a player who's not grinding off of what appears to be the intended level progression of the game?

Maybe the worst part of this decision is that a player might equip something carelessly and not even notice the XP reduction until they've gone a fair ways forward through the game, by which point they're severely underleveled and having way more trouble with the combat than they should be. But this is admittedly hypothetical.

Well, I wrote all of that in "sarcsatic gamer language", but it's not like it ruins the game or anything. Just an aspect of the design that I don't personally understand at all.

[Electro Spaghetti]

It comes down to NOT wanting to over-level while waiting for new content, which is why all zero-exp items are endgame. If you're using them, you're probably either at or nearing the end of the game, so there's not much progression left to do.
The final boss is level 60, and once you've squeezed all you can out of boosters you'll hit level 70, which is already very overleveled.
However, you'll still need to grind for money and tradeables if you want to get the best gear available, so zero-exp simply stops you from later complaining all the postagme and new content is boring and easy because you hit level 100 while grinding out gems.

[Azure Fang]

Originally posted by Electro Spaghetti:

It comes down to NOT wanting to over-level while waiting for new content, which is why all zero-exp items are endgame. If you're using them, you're probably either at or nearing the end of the game, so there's not much progression left to do.
The final boss is level 60, and once you've squeezed all you can out of boosters you'll hit level 70, which is already very overleveled.
However, you'll still need to grind for money and tradeables if you want to get the best gear available, so zero-exp simply stops you from later complaining all the postagme and new content is boring and easy because you hit level 100 while grinding out gems.

I'll just leave this here:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1748409923

[Xindaris]

I mean, that's maybe a great idea in theory anyway, but--again--seeing "zero xp" on a piece of equipment makes it totally useless to me. If you're telling me that most or all of the really "good" endgame equipment has that, then it basically makes there be no such equipment at all from my perspective. I'd rather wear level 1 equipment than not be able to level up.

If someone wants to grind items but not xp then they should have a totally optional zero xp modifier to apply for that purpose, not something tied to a piece of equipment which somebody who, y'know, isn't doing that might actually want for a boss fight or something.

[wervyn]

Only the equipment designed for grinding materials or money (which is to say, the equipment you want if you're trying to 100% your collection) has XP reduction, specifically to balance out the two orthogonal types of grinding you'd want to do. By the end of the current game this is a complete non-issue anyway, if you really want to level to 99 just go kill 40,000 hedgehags, you don't need any particular weapon for that. If you are not interested in materials or money grinding, then you are correct: the Drill series and the Burglar's Rope are useless to you, they are strictly worse equipment than other options in their tier.

[Xindaris]

I think maybe the point you're missing is that, in particular, the highest-tier drill and at least one other piece of equipment (a sword I saw for trade in basin keep iirc) have stats that are superior in combat specifically to other equipment I have available, when item grinding is not even on my mind, and I would very much like to be able to use those stats without the weird penalty of not being able to level up. Again, if someone wants to stop leveling up then an optional modifier would be a far better fit than tacking it to equipment like this. Or, like, something similar to the botanist's hats and the "treasure chest" armor pieces where (1) the combat stats aren't superior to similarly-leveled equipment and (2) it's not treated as the reward for an otherwise fun quest line.

I don't really understand how item and level grinding are inherently or in any way need to be orthogonal to each other, too? I mean--again, in kingdom hearts say, they're things that happen at the same time in the late game (I'm thinking of trying to get the ultima weapon synth ingredients), and I don't remember ever hearing anyone complain about that?

It's also occurred to me that describing it as a way to help people not be overleveled for upcoming content sounds like a stopgap measure for a game that hasn't got an ending to its main story yet. Using something for that end sort of makes sense, but the game has progressed beyond that point now and it feels like a weird holdover to me if that's the reason for it.

I don't know why I keep replying to this, I know it's like 3 or 4 pieces of equipment at most.

[zepeup]

Well the Theory is that by the time you're in the endgame almost every enemy will only give 1 exp, thus equipment stats wouldn't be important for grinding levels since optimal exp grinding would be to just kill whatever died in one hit while in large number. While grinding for Items will still have you facing relatively powerful, if under-leveled enemies. The Devs saw the conflict with these two types of grinding and gave the highest tier "looting" weapons the Zero exp penalty so people would have to decide what type of grinding they'd do and have a better focus on it.

However I can see why this would be slightly annoying if you had just reached the endgame before doing all the side quests or were under-leveled. Still though I see no reason for it to be changed since the Spiral Drill and the others are only marginally better than the Pre-endgame items, and it's not like losing 5% of your potential damage is that much of a deal.

[Grzemek]

Even Warkeeper and Shuddering Cleaver offer better combat stats than Infinity Spiral Drill, not to mention stuff from Rhombus Square or Arena (you don't need a very good score to buy just the weapons from Arena). If infinity drill is a weapon that has the best stats out of all your weapons then time to do some chest hunting in Sapphire Ridge or suck it up that your design vision is different from RadicalFish's. Zero XP on an item-farming weapons is not SOLELY a downside, it's a mixed bag.

When you call Shizuka she tells you that enemies in the final area are level 55 (60? I can't remember what she says) and you should be ok around that level if you have on-level gear. But farming for Rhombus Square items can easily put you at 67-66 and those 2-3 circuit nodes you would pick up make a world of a difference. So Zero XP is not just for postgame, but even for current content.

I totally understand how you can be discontent about this modifier, though.

[Xindaris]

I keep telling myself not to respond to this anymore, but I just can't let this stand: Zero XP on any equipment, whatsoever, is solely a downside in exactly the same way that any stat-lowering effect (where having more of the stat has no downside) on any piece of equipment in any game is solely a downside. I feel like that's obvious and doesn't need explanation. Like, unless you're gonna tell me that there's a boss later on that gets harder the higher in level the player is, there is literally no way for gaining XP to ever be a bad thing.

Perhaps to give you some context to my situation, I am currently at the point in the story where I've unlocked rhombus square but not done whatever you have to be alone to do at sapphire ridge, and I want to wait to do that thing until I have gotten all of the treasure chests (of which I only have sapphire ridge left) and completed all the available sidequests (largely to appeal to my obsessive completionist streak). I have absolutely no intention of ever grinding material items to trade for equipment because that sounds extremely tedious and dull. The arena and some new quests came into existence since I reached this point in the game (actually I particularly stopped playing for a bit to wait for the promise quest to get a conclusion because I wanted closure on that before finishing the main story), and I tried the arena out but I doubt I want to seriously do every single thing in that too, at least not at this time.

That being said, I generally appreciate it when the reward for a questline is something I can actually use, and again, for me personally, infinity drill turned out to be something with otherwise nice stats that I cannot use because it has a negative trait that still makes absolutely no sense to me, despite the efforts at explanation here. Basically: Anything you can say Zero XP is good for from the player's perspective could've been achieved equally as well (or in my opinion way better) by making it an optional modification the player turns on or off totally separately from what they have equipped. I do appreciate that from the developer's perspective some of these reasons make sense, but I still feel like maybe those purposes could've been served in a better way.

[KING DADDLE DINGO]

I just caught that this even existed before finishing up some quests in Sapphire Ridge, definitely lean towards Xindaris' camp that Zero EXP means I'll probably not be using the items which kinda sucks cause I liked the drill quest and paid more attention to the items description than what buffs it added.

Crosscode's been pretty great with letting engage with its systems how you like (example: you can be into item crafting or just buy items), but the NoEXP buff is a tiny icon and text in the corner of the equipment menu. For something as significant as not gaining EXP in an RPG that's something that should have a little more heads up not something you can potentially notice after hours of play. If they just added a tutorial screen when you equip items with NoEXP that would dappen the bitterness you get from realising it after the fact and prevent the forum queries of why there not gaining EXP.

[R.Heart]

Originally posted by KING DADDLE DINGO:

I just caught that this even existed before finishing up some quests in Sapphire Ridge, definitely lean towards Xindaris' camp that Zero EXP means I'll probably not be using the items which kinda sucks cause I liked the drill quest and paid more attention to the items description than what buffs it added.

Crosscode's been pretty great with letting engage with its systems how you like (example: you can be into item crafting or just buy items), but the NoEXP buff is a tiny icon and text in the corner of the equipment menu. For something as significant as not gaining EXP in an RPG that's something that should have a little more heads up not something you can potentially notice after hours of play. If they just added a tutorial screen when you equip items with NoEXP that would dappen the bitterness you get from realising it after the fact and prevent the forum queries of why there not gaining EXP.

Probably not wrong, I feel like at least once a month is a new thread asking "Why am I not gaining XP?" This, along with special modifiers like Extra Dash, Appetite, Botanist, basically any modifiers that don't assign values by percentage like the others, it wouldn't be bad if say, they were given a flickering icon, or a special color, in the equipment screen so they stand out a bit.

As for the Zero XP modifier itself: I feel like at worst, zero XP gain is not a fair trade-off for such a small bump in item or money gain. To put another way, if you only raise your gains by 30% while suffering a 100% loss in XP gain, the value proposition isn't even worth using it. You're not saving time on grinding equipment, if your goal is improving stats. What little time you might save gaining 30% more money or item drops is then added back in, when you have to go grinding a second time in order to get your level up to snuff. It's a bit of a smack in the face to boot, because as you level you gain less XP from beating up the same enemies anyway. And I think this is why it's just "zero" instead of say, 50% reduction: Giving 0.5 XP points per kill at the far extreme doesn't "fit" with the neatly cut system. It's going to round off to a whole number, so it becomes basically all or nothing. And that's why I think it's a poorly balanced weapon/modifier. If it was a traditional RPG setup where you gain a fixed amount of XP from every enemy, and your level requirements go up instead, it might make 'some' sense. The more i think about it, the more I think it would make more sense if it just had garbage to mediocre stats instead of just slashing your XP gains to nothing. Just my 2 cents.

[Tsuki Zero]

I dunno if there is, but maybe there could be a final (DLC-tied) upgrade to it that removes the Zero Exp and ascends it.

[idiot5k]

you can also just remove the zero xp modifyer yourself. right mouse click on crosscode go to propertys and browse trough local files>assets>data. in this map you will find a file with all items in the game. just look trough the file for the drill (it might be hard to find as litterally all items including toggable stuff like boosters are in here and its not exactly organized by type or by when you are supposed to find it). once you found it remove the zero zp modifyer save it and done.

[bugfragged]

Personally, I think the concept of a item drop boosting equipment with Zero EXP is fine, but using the iconic Gurren Lagann drill for it is wrong, since you would expect the drill to be an offensive weapon with the Momentum modifier. It would have been better if the farming equipment was named something related to luck and had its description indicate that it should only be used for farming purposes.

Also, the 30% drop boost can be useful in long kill streaks, due to the law of large numbers. And you can use other drop boosting gear like Plate of Chests to stack the drop rate even higher.

[zman9000]

Originally posted by Xindaris:

Maybe the worst part of this decision is that a player might equip something carelessly and not even notice the XP reduction until they've gone a fair ways forward through the game, by which point they're severely under leveled and having way more trouble with the combat than they should be. But this is admittedly hypothetical.

not a hypothetical, that's me lol
on my first play-through i didn't quite get all the extra side modifiers, and i mainly just equipped whatever gave me the most of the main stats. at some point the second to last drill upgrade was my main weapon, and then i did the final drill quest and just kept the drill on. and i kept it on for a LONG time. at some point i got really confused cause i noticed my level hadn't gone up in a while and i think i may have even made a post on the forum asking if my game was bugged.

when i found out i think i made a rant post, and then almost quit the game cause i had spent so much time grinding trying to level up not knowing that there was something blocking it.

i also feel the same about zero exp gear. might as well not have it at all. and the drop rate boost doesn't help with lowering over all grinding time at all. i'm pretty sure it would need to be closer to 50% for it to break even. i'd have to do a lot of math to find the exact % for breaking even, but i'm pretty sure its more then 30%.

so the only thing it gives you is pretty much worthless, and the debuff makes it even worse.
and while its pretty good when you get it, none of the stats are even close to up to par with similar level gear. all around i think its the worst piece of gear in the game even without the debuff. its not worth the time or effort it takes to get it honestly...