Zero to hero does make sense, its just has been cheapened as a concept. The character is surviving and learning from things that would kill another human. He is the embodiment of extreme adaptability, because the alternative is death.
You are living in a couple months what it took decades for others to experience, you are experimenting with your magic, learning new spells, trying them on living breathing things that are actively resisting them, all of this while a murderer with an axe is trying end your life. Constantly asking more of your brain, casting powerful and mentally draining incantations, fighting warriors of equal or bigger prowess than your own , watching their movements, watching the enemy tactics, how they take those blows, you take it all in, you learn by watching and doing, or you die right there.
And yet in-setting wizards still take decades if not centuries of extreme dedication to studying magic and magic alone, without getting distracted by petty shit like brigands trying to brain them with an axe to get anywhere.
No matter how awesome and living on the edge you are you are no going to achieve such mastery just by being badass for maybe several months. If it was this easy everyone would be bending the reality with their mind - after all the %pcname doesn't have the monopoly for badassery.
That all the badass wizards are fucking old, at least in terms of age if not necessarily biologically, implies that it still takes a lifetime (or several) of pretty much balls out effort to become one, which implies you just can't do this shit in months while also braining goblins and running errands for various fuckwads.
If, and only if it comes down to either a carrot on a stick or a leash, ill take the carrot approach, but as i said before, this doesnt necessarily have to be the case.
It does if you have abstracted away the meaning and causal relations from your advancement system as is the case in XP system (I have stabbed 10 goblins, and my lockpicking skill improved).
If you strip your system down to a carrot, you have a carrot left.
The value of all things is subjective to the world you are playing in anyway.
Not XP.
The value of XP is strictly objective.
There is no such thing in a properly constructed RPG (c or pnp alike) as build or playstyle that eschews the XP.
Extra motivation to play the game is not a bad thing, lvl 9 spells were a nice thing to look forward to, but they werent the reason you played the game.
It's not an extra motivation to play the game it's an extra motivation to play the game in single particular way which just happens to be degenerate and full of derp.
If I'm fighting, I want my fighting xp; if I'm picking locks, I want my picking locks xp; If I'm fucking, I want my fucking xp. The PROGRESS is a fact then. Yes, it's that simple.
Augmented.
That analogy doesn't work because side-questing isn't a endlessly repeatable one-step "knee-jerk" action that can be likened to the push of a response lever. It's a complex series of unique events that tells a story and provides its own rewards.
You could say that it's more like baking your own food. You made it, so you can eat it.
...as compared to binge eating junk food.
Yet another way XP-junkies are like Hepler.
On the other hand, if you want to make an attempt to avoid it you're going to screw everything up. I mean imagine Morrowind's system, but, to level skills you have to spend 10 times more. I mean - it's good because you'd have to be really focused on the skills you want to raise if you want to be good with said weapon/something else. On the other hand - it would turn the game into grindhouse(which isn't fun) and after years of playing you'd be still able to make a demigod.
The main problem with TES system isn't the rate of progression but that it doesn't discriminate between tasks based on their difficulty (
which wouldn't be that hard to rectify).
Once you can't become master swordsman by stabbing crabs or master arithmetician by adding single digit numbers a lot the system becomes much saner and more manageable.
So maybe limit the amount of skill points you can rise? Well, then you're punishing some warrior that had to sneak past some enemies that were too strong for him, aka adapt to situation. Which is again, bad and unintuitive.
Actually, if skills retain their usefulness even at low levels and the limitation feels relatively soft, that isn't a bad idea.
I think you guys are overthinking this shit. A lot.
I murder shit in games because I want to, and because I can. This isn't a 'problem'. If my character is a psycho that runs around murdering stray animals and innocents... who cares?
Exactly.
So why do you feel the game is obliged to explicitly reward your playstyle in particular?
Incentives aren't absolute.
XPs kind of are.
If you have a quest to stop ogres from raiding the village, and solve it by killing the ogres, why shouldn't it give extra xp?
Why should it?
It was probably more difficult than other solutions.
Sucky quest design and uneven resolution mechanics isn't a problem with character development.
I've never gamed any NPCs or questees, and I've got all the IE games under my belt, some multiple times.
I never cheesed TES mechanics so it's clearly problem free as well.
How is disappearing entire security staff of a facility 'ghosting'?
Ghosting implies leaving no traces, several dozen people dead/unconscious/missing seems like it could indicate that some sort of intrusion took place.
Exactly.
the fact that it gives extra xp isn't inherently bad.
Why should you be rewarded for making life harder for yourself?
It's the opposite of excellence and opposite of smart.
If anything, close to optimal planning and execution rather than piling dumb and risky busywork on yourself should be rewarded.
Most XP is rewarded for exploring and completing objectives, and it is much more than 2/3 of the total obtainable XP in the game.
