Progress bar for skills

[masterekat]

I'd rather just see the percent to next level. No need for bars.

I think percentages would be more than fine.

I don't believe you need to know that you're 43.7% of the way to novice skill level from awkward skill level just to be able to roleplay - that's a BS excuse to legitimize powergaming.

No, you really don't. But it's nice for the player to be able to actually notice that their character is improving, especially types of characters that are defined by a certain skill. Besides, if a player sets a character on a 7 day tailoring project, doesn't touch the game for that entire week, and still improves that character, can we really call it powergaming? I guess in one sense it can be, but I think the players that are going to RP are going to do it regardless of whether or not we decide to add an extra number on the character page. I don't see a small change like this turning Cantr into WoW. The point is just to get players to log in for some reason.

[Snickie]

I have this weird phobia (as I'm sure many people do) of a project tick passing where I'm NOT working on something....even if it's something completely arbitrary, like collecting maple sap or changing a building sign. I do admit I like to see improvement in my characters' skills; that's why I try not to work too much on skills I'm already an expert at.

Having this feature wouldn't change me in any of that. It'd be just as frustrating to see, for a bad example, fighting at the top of the awkward skills for fifty days even while sparring as it is to see the numbers creep up very slowly next to fighting at the top of awkward.

Maybe, to keep it not so detail oriented, we could display it like damage and tiredness, where it rounds to the nearest integer, no decimal places visible.

[SumBum]

It might eliminate some of the anxiety (especially new) players have when their char works on something that hits one skill for decades and feel hopeless that they haven't seen that visual improvement of jumping to the next level. It might encourage (especially new) players who ditch chars that aren't at least skilled at fighting if they can see that something IS making a difference.

I think a little user-friendly addition to the screen will help far more than hurt. New users always ask if they're stuck with the skills they spawn; this will clue them in to the fact that they increase. The powergamers will power game regardless.

Only once have I been in the situation where a char of mine was cooking and moaning about how horrible they were at it and burning everything. By time the other player logged in, they saw that my skill had jumped up to efficient and told mine to quit whining.

[Oasis]

I wish there was an event visible to that player only, that their char has upped a level. I never notice, but would like to.

[Doug R.]

But as Seko already pointed out, the "levels" are meaningless creations of the programmers. If you go from novice to efficient, you're really not any better off than you were before you "leveled". All they are is indicators of general skill. I'm fine with a % being listed, but it should be of the whole skill scale, not based on these meaningless levels.

[muidoido]

That would be awesome!

[Piscator]

Yup, I think a percentage representing the actual skill should be fine.

[Snickie]

Would this also apply to strength?

[Mr. Bones]

But as Seko already pointed out, the "levels" are meaningless creations of the programmers. If you go from novice to efficient, you're really not any better off than you were before you "leveled". All they are is indicators of general skill. I'm fine with a % being listed, but it should be of the whole skill scale, not based on these meaningless levels.

I think that would work out fine, it would provide a reference of regular progress which is the whole purpose. For those that like to add the skill "level" into their RP, they could still assume that every 20% progress they would go up to the next one, and there wouldn't be any surprises to ruin their RP.

Would this also apply to strength?

That would be nice too.

[SekoETC]

I suggest putting the exact percentages on a separate page so that people hopefully wouldn't be checking them all the time. Besides, where would you stick a percentage in the character description that uses full sentences? "He's much stronger than average (99%)"? That looks ugly.

[Mr. Bones]

I suggest putting the exact percentages on a separate page so that people hopefully wouldn't be checking them all the time. Besides, where would you stick a percentage in the character description that uses full sentences? "He's much stronger than average (99%)"? That looks ugly.

Strength isn't as big a deal, I just think it would be awesome to have the percentage beside the skills. If this were implemented and whoever makes the final decisions on this sort of thing added strength in, then it would just be a bonus.

[SimpleMan]

I agree with you Mr. Bones 100%. I would love to see my characters progress in fighting so I'll know how hard I need to work at it.

[Snickie]

We would be keeping the "levels" for visibility to other characters, right? I mean, it could be awkward to read "She is in her forties and is 56% working on project "Farming to get potatoes"."

[danizappa]

Doesn't seem right at all for me. Imagine a char that reached 100% skill in phishing let's say... What that hell does that mean? It's just one more element that does not mean much to RP. 100% of what? Like if the perception of someone performing some task was meant to be talked about or perceived in terms of percentage. Silly and awkward. The goal does not justify the means. Its about ethics. We shouldnt compromise ethics.

[Mr. Bones]

The idea is that it would just be visible to the player as it is now, but that they can use this for their own RP purposes, like alter RP as they get better. Right now it's very hard to judge regular progress. That's what all the above comments meant about RP, it doesn't mean they would need to make your "percentage" visible to others. Also being able to see progress often would be great motivation for old and new players alike in my opinion. It's proven when a person can assess progress with their goals that they are more likely to stay motivated and focused. Many people choose certain things for a living, and it's necessary in Cantr to have people of all professions, I think it's just a small thing to keep these folks on the right track and allow them to enhance their RP at the same time.

The method everyone seems to be talking here, and I agree with it also, is to just put a percentage beside the skill itself. It's not bulky or fancy, just informative and effective.