Level 12 sword for a level 24 quest

[moonknightgog]

Level 12 sword for a level 24 quest

So...I'm returned to talk about the loot and the level scaling/level requirements for items.
I completed the quest for Hattori, a level 24 quest and I was level 13 when I started (I finished it at level 15).
In return, I got a level 12 sword which is now basically useless to me.

Now, I can understand that a low XP reward is ok, because a quest is not played for the experience, but...at least give me a powerful sword without limitation that I can use. Because...basically that was the point of the quest. Geralt helped Hattori in order to have a powerful mastercrafted sword. And...he get a crappy sword in return.

So please...tell me that you see the issue here.

 

[nemanja_pozega]

Luckily in other aspects of pure GAMEPLAY (excluding witcher senses and not counting the story issues in Act 3 and other things deserving criticism) the game mostly shines.

But yes, I fully agree with you on this. If the quests and enemies have a certain level of difficulty that means that the game world is static in a way, it's fixed so to say. How illogical it is to not have fix loot and quest rewards, it simply boggles me. That items require you to be level this and that so you can equip them is also an issue. The all important immersion is broken because of it. From the top of my head, all the open world or pseudo open worlds games worth a damn IMO have completely static game worlds, (gothic, arcanum, fallouts (-3))...

I can't believe they decieded to go this rout.

 

[jj284b]

problem is - you can only use items of the same level or lower than your current level.. so all rewards are scaled towards your level... so, because your level was 13, you got the level 12 sword. (seems like items are appearing in certain bands, 3,6,12..etc)

I think it would be much better if items had fixed level instead, while you could increase the item level via smith/armorer. that would make all those manuscripts much more important, as it would allow you to reforge those weapons/armors to your level, while weapons you find would be fixed level only...

reforging option could cost a lot of money and could require additional material, therefore player would have to spend extra money upgrading his equipment, which would also solve the issue with way too much money available at certain point in game..

 

[foxyrick]

I was thinking the same two days ago, from the same Hattori quest. It's my third playthrough and I have not had a use for this sword once; the one I already have (on each playthrough) has been more powerful.

This time through I did similar to the OP doing the quest early on, although I was level 17 when I got around to starting it. Still got a useless sword.

I recall the armour from the master armourer's quest left me in a similar state... it would have been a downgrade from what I was already using that I had found... somewhere. I've still to do that one this time - later tonight if I get a chance.

It's a shame that doing a difficult quest for a great sword leaves us (or at least me) feeling a little cheated on the reward. It makes the quest more a matter of just getting it ticked off the list, rather than a useful and meaningful event.

 

[jj284b]

plus, he gives you ordinary "Sword of the Bits" or something.. in my last playthrough i already had a manuscript with the same sword that was higher level than the sword Hattori gave me..

 

[moonknightgog]

Luckily in other aspects of pure GAMEPLAY (excluding witcher senses and not counting the story issues in Act 3 and other things deserving criticism) the game mostly shines.

But yes, I fully agree with you on this. If the quests and enemies have a certain level of difficulty that means that the game world is static in a way, it's fixed so to say. How illogical it is to not have fix loot and quest rewards, it simply boggles me. That items require you to be level this and that so you can equip them is also an issue. The all important immersion is broken because of it. From the top of my head, all the open world or pseudo open worlds games worth a damn IMO have completely static game worlds, (gothic, arcanum, fallouts (-3))...

I can't believe they decieded to go this rout.

problem is - you can only use items of the same level or lower than your current level.. so all rewards are scaled towards your level... so, because your level was 13, you got the level 12 sword. (seems like items are appearing in certain bands, 3,6,12..etc)

I think it would be much better if items had fixed level instead, while you could increase the item level via smith/armorer. that would make all those manuscripts much more important, as it would allow you to reforge those weapons/armors to your level, while weapons you find would be fixed level only...

reforging option could cost a lot of money and could require additional material, therefore player would have to spend extra money upgrading his equipment, which would also solve the issue with way too much money available at certain point in game..

Yes, the problem is mostly the level requirement. Just...no.
Don't make a level requirement. Allow the player to use the power sword he found at any level, but also, make the most powerful sword only as exploration/quest reward.

 

[Tuco]

If they really wanted a level system in the game (and so level requirements attached to it) the most elegant solution for items could have been just adding some penalty for using items far above your level.
Whoever thought that scaling items to your level was a great idea made a tragic design mistake.

*ESPECIALLY* in a game where enemies and quests don't scale to your level, leading to hilariously mismatched scenarios like someone spitting blood to get rid of a very high level enemy guarding a treasure... And getting an item either scaled down to his level or not usable at all as result.

 

[moonknightgog]

not usable at all as result.

And, what is worse...when you reach the level that allow you to use that item...probably you have found a better item, or a Witcher item, which is better than that one.

 

[Tuco]

And, what is worse...when you reach the level that allow you to use that item...probably you have found a better item, or a Witcher item, which is better than that one.

Sure, but that's an entirely different topic altogether, more related to how randomized items almost inevitably suck compared to hand-crafted ones.
Level scaling is a separate issue.

 

[foxyrick]

If they really wanted a level system in the game (and so level requirements attached to it) the most elegant solution for items could have been just adding some penalty for using items far above your level.

Yes, sort of like learning to use the power of the sword you have found - it would get more powerful (up to it's own level limit/maximum stats) as your character rises in level. When your level exceeds the item's, time for another sword quest!

I don't have many things I find 'downers' in the game itself (meaning outside of bugs and technical issues) but this I find quite a major one really. That's relative - I mean it doesn't make me cry into my whiskey, but it could make me feel, 'Yay! I got a great new sword' instead of 'Oh, another sword I can sell for a few coins. I risked my life for this???'

 

[Tuco]

I don't have many things I find 'downers' in the game itself (meaning outside of bugs and technical issues) but this I find quite a major one really. That's relative - I mean it doesn't make me cry into my whiskey, but it could make me feel, 'Yay! I got a great new sword' instead of 'Oh, another sword I can sell for a few coins. I risked my life for this???'

The only reason I'm partially able to (mostly) ignore how bad the random, level scaled equipment is in this game is the fact that at least Witcher Gear is in the game... And that is unique, valuable, non-scaled gear

And let's be frank about it: once you get the gist of how things go in this game, you know that the Witcher Gear is pretty much the only one you should consider... And everything else is vendor trash.
Even when a major character serves you that item implying it's the most amazing shit since man discovered metallurgy.

 

[Rivdoric]

The only reason I'm partially able to (mostly) ignore how bad the random, level scaled equipment is in this game is the fact that at least Witcher Gear is in the game... And that is unique, valuable, non-scaled gear

And let's be frank about it: once you get the gist of how things go in this game, you know that the Witcher Gear is pretty much the only one you should consider... And everything else is vendor trash.
Even when a major character serves you that item implying it's the most amazing shit since man discovered metallurgy.

Completely agree.
Witcher Swords & Armor = What you want
Other = Don't care, just use what you find to level up until you can craft a Witcher equipment.

I played with the same level 12-15 armor & swords until level 22-23 and i had no real trouble. In fact, it is even better because using a sword or armor equal to your level, makes the game really easy.

So take it easy man, it doesnt deteriorate the experience

 

[Orpheal]

The scaling of the game is just terrible .. a level 24 quest shouldn't be completely at all at level 13 enemies in such quests should simply crush you to dust
... it should also reward you with stuff, that is usable around at level 24.
And you shoudl receive it first, when you character is at a level range, where the quest marker marks it as a green quest for you, so that enemies (whioh should also be scaled up within the quest to a fitting level don't one hit kill you, but are on all difficulty settigns still a challenging threat)

The overall terrible scalign system of TW3 is seriously somethign, that needs to get fixed ASAP so that you can#t outlevel enemies either so quickly, that enemies stay to the end of the game challenging, so that there exist also no leveling problems, in the end, devs said, that TW3 has no level cap as I heard, so there shouldn#t exist any diminishing returns, enemies have to scale up accordingly and quests/killed enemies always need to give you enough Exp, so that Geralt's progression doesn#t come to a forced stop due to running out of ways to gain more Exp.

Alot more things in this game should give Geralt also significant Exp Boosts like:

Whenever you read a new Book for the first time, geralt should receive an Exp Boos,t because he learned somethign new.
Whenever you kill a new enemy species for the first tiem, gettign a new bestiary entry, this shpould give Geralt an significant Exp Boost
Whenever you discover new ?-Places, this should give Geralt an Exp Boost
Whenever you locate a new Fast Travel Spot, this should give geralt a significant Exp Boost
Whenever you learn new Crafting Recipes, this should give you an Exp Boost
Whenever you upgrade your Potions, Bombs or receive new Tools (or upgrade them, would be nice to upgrade the Magic Lamp) and use them for the first time, like the Magic Lamp, this should give you Exp.
Whenever you eat/drink something for the first time, you should get a bit Exp

implementing also more quests later with more Expansions/DLC is naturally also a nice option, however, i think the listed uzp things there should get changed to, so that not only killing monsters and doing quests are the main ways of gettign exp besides of randonmly AXII-ing people in conversations to get sometimes some extra exp or doing those random ! -mini quests into which you can run into sometimes ind destroying monsater nests, helping caught people, liberatign places from bandits/monsters.

I hope, that 1.07. will fix this scaling mess of the game so that you actually will find fitting scaled enemies in a level 24 that are moving between the range of 20-27 (higher for bosses, leaders, special challenging stronger monsters ect.) quest with getting rewarded with level 24 stuff and not that you have to fight in a level 24 quests enemies that range between level 7 to 15 or so and at the end you get rewarded with lvl 13 stuff, like the OP stated for this example.

Such a scaling mess just shows, that the whole game seems to have received absolutely no quality testing, because would have seen TW3 enough/ fitting quality testing, the game would have never been released with such a big scaling mess that goes through the whole game.

 

[TheLocoMofo]

And let's be frank about it: once you get the gist of how things go in this game, you know that the Witcher Gear is pretty much the only one you should consider... And everything else is vendor trash.
Even when a major character serves you that item implying it's the most amazing shit since man discovered metallurgy.

This is my biggest issue with the game's loot.

Witcher gear is so good, you simply don't need anything else.

The disappointment every time I found a cool looking relic sword and seeing it's crappy stats...

Or finding all those weapon & armor diagrams and realising all I need to craft is witcher stuff...

 

[uhitanot]

Should follow borderlands exp approach

 

[Tuco]

This is my biggest issue with the game's loot.

Witcher gear is so good, you simply don't need anything else.

The disappointment every time I found a cool looking relic sword and seeing it's crappy stats...

Or finding all those weapon & armor diagrams and realising all I need to craft is witcher stuff...

Yeah, it's so bad I'd almost prefer if the extra loot just wasn't there at all at this point.
I mean, if they were going to remove all the random loot from the game (except maybe the low level stuff at the beginning) and replace it with even just 3-4 additional *useful* sets, capable of compete on even ground with the Witcher gear, I'd still count that as a massive improvement in the game's itemization.

@Orpheal I think you have some very confuse ideas about what we are talking about here.
There's no scaling in enemies levels. It's limited to the loot.
And while I could agree that some enemies/areas are in dire need of a rebalance, it's an entirely different discussion from the topic at hand.

I also happen to disagree with pretty much every single of your suggestions about what should reward you with exp.
For many reasons, and among them last but not least the fact that the thing this game needs is more way to outlevel its content.

 

[Fred-Sanity]

And don't forget that's a sword "capable of killing gods"

 

[Orpheal]

@ Tuco: No, I just took the discussion to another level by adding to the topic, that not just only the scaling of loot is weird in TW3, but also in certain other ways.
Because of enemies don't scaling up better (or in general), thats the issue, why the game feels in certain moments way too easy.and why we can outlevel at all this game.

Would enemies scale up appropiately to our character progression, then wouldn't exist also any problems with adding more classical RPG elements of gaining Exp, like I summed some most classical examples up there, that come to your mind, when thinking about the gameplay elements of TW3 that should give your Exp, because of Geralt learning simply somethign new or expereincing something for his first time, what means he gains new experience. Period, cause its logical.

It hasn't anything to do with it, that I want to see CDPR making the game even alot easier - no, just more logical and the fix for gaining more options of gaining Exp is making enemies scale up appropiately to you, so that they stay also constantly being challening enemies and that you get also appropiate rewards for killing something, that is alot stronger than you, because currently, there is absolutely no reward in the game for killing a Red Skull Symbol enemy and you are simply best with it to avoid fighting these enemies simply, because you get nothign at all for acceptign that challenge and defeating these monsters, while you are underleveled, not even somethign fitting, like an instant level up, to give you at least a little incentive to go try to kill something, that is stronger than you.


Do you seriously thought, that I suggest all these things, to dumb down the game? , No, my suggestions have hand and feet and would lead to an alot better balanced game, which feels also more entertaining, because it would give the player more the feeling that the things that you do in the game affect you and your progression of Geralt and that these thigns in the game aren't just wasted potential that didn't got used, like for example Alcohol in the game... why is it there?
In TW1 it was at least useful and had a reason for existance, because you needed it to make NPCs tell you things, they normally would tell nobody.

In TW3 its just useless garbage that you do best sell instantly for some super lousy crowns what is really sad and a real sign, of how you can dumb down things in a game to nothingness

 

[Exentryk]

In a game where enemies don't scale (level wise), this is how the loot system should have been:
- Equipment does not scale to player's level
- Equipment drops in chests and from enemies are not random
- Equipment has fixed levels and stats (Diagram based equipment can have changing levels though, see below)
- Player can use whatever level equipment they find at whatever levels without penalties
- There should be crafting diagrams for all equipment, and these should have adjustable levels. (Example - One should be able to make level 15 Assassin's Gauntlets if they are level 10, or level 45 Assassins's Gauntlets if they are level 40, with the SAME diagram. Being able to craft +5 levels higher gear should be good. Cost can be high for those.)

With these changes, players will be in control as to when and what equipment they want at what level. The only thing required would be to find the diagram for that equipment. Since these diagrams will no longer be random drops, and can be controlled via story and quest events, it should be easy to manage. You would also have another control measure in the form of master smiths and master armorers that will be required to make the good stuff.

This system also encourages exploration and gives people the satisfaction of killing stronger monsters and doing tougher quests early, because the rewards might be a 10 level higher sword, which is certainly higher than craft able items. Right now, you do a level 24 quest and get a sword two levels below you thus making the reward entirely useless.
This also adds more of a cost sink as people might want to update their craft-able gear after every level, or few levels.

In the end, this makes the world persistent. Enemies don't scale, equipment doesn't scale, and the world is independent of the player's levels. Players have more control, and the system overall is more satisfying.


Note: When I say equipment has fixed stats, that doesn't mean that all swords become unique. I mean a level 24 enemy should guard a level 24 Viper Sword, while a level 10 enemy should guard a level 10 Viper sword, etc.

 

[Orpheal]

good points Exentryk