29 réponses à ce sujet

[shaktiboy]

Edit 26-Dec-09: I stand corrected on my bent in the remaining original text of this OP. I do not recommend using this method to advance your levels because further research on my part has conclusively proved that Bioware's vague/ambiguous statements about level scaling in the FAQ, the game itself, and the Prima Guide all mask the true linearity and upper ceiling limits of their challenge scaling mechanics. In short, if you do this you *will* make the game too easy.  Even worse, it turns out that the story progression after Lothering in fact has a specific linearity if you want to have an optimum challenge throughout your progression, despite what Bioware's marketing monkeys would like to imply to the gaming community.  For details, see my post about 20 responses down  in this thread.

As a Yule present to the community, it's easy to overlook the various emissaries that appear in your party camp after you fully complete the mainline quests in each of the four major "Grey Warden Treaties" quest arcs.  Of particular interest is the emissary from the Dalish Elves, assuming you sided with the Elves and not the Werewolves.  Be sure to check out the Allied Supply Crates that are next to the emissaries.

Just saying because I looked all over teh interwebs for details on some oblique mentions here and there about the relationship between elfroot and exp. It took me a while to figure it out for myself.

Exploit? Unintended "bug" in the design of the perqs conferred by the emissaries?  I don't think so. I think Bioware fully intended that even console players should have a path available to them to move more quickly into a fully mature build so they could enjoy the bulk of the game with a mature build against the highest-level scaled encounters. It doesn't make sense to me to reach maturity only after you've already played 90% of the total content.

Modifié par shaktiboy, 26 décembre 2009 - 05:47 .

[sinosleep]

Isn't reaching maturity after 90% of the total content the way every rpg that doesn't have random/repeatable battles functions?

Modifié par sinosleep, 25 décembre 2009 - 08:57 .

[Peeker2009]

It seems a bit uneven that most of these items have to be collected as you travel (gems, runes and gold) and are therefore unexploitable imo, whereas elfroot can be bought in bulk. Is there a cap on how much of this stuff can be donated?

[amrose2]

Something I've always wondered is how do you measure the level of the troops? Or is this just a cover for giving you exp and not impact them at all?

[Sir Ulrich Von Lichenstien]

Sadly IMHO it just seems like a cover for boosting your xp rather than boosting the skill of the armies you can summon.

[Creature 1]

Peeker2009 wrote...

It seems a bit uneven that most of these items have to be collected as you travel (gems, runes and gold) and are therefore unexploitable imo, whereas elfroot can be bought in bulk. Is there a cap on how much of this stuff can be donated?

People have hit level 25 by donating elfroot. 

[shaktiboy]

amrose2 wrote...

Something I've always wondered is how do you measure the level of the troops? Or is this just a cover for giving you exp and not impact them at all?  

Sir Ulrich Von Lichtenstein wrote...
Sadly IMHO it just seems like a cover for boosting your xp rather than boosting the skill of the armies you can summon.

Not sure what you two are trying to say. Your foes scale to match your Warden's level, and your existing companions automatically scale to within one level of your Warden. When they level up, they get all the attribute, skill, specialization, and talent/spell points they would have if you'd leveled up normally.

For reference: http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Level

Yes, it's been reported that if you use a bona fide exp "glitch" exploit, such as the vials of darkspawn blood exploit (which has been fixed in the recent PC patches but still exists on the console versions of the game at this date), then your companions' skills/attributes/talents do not appropriately increment even though their level does scale up to one below you.

But that simply lends credence to my contention that the elfroot turn-in was purposefully designed and passed QA testing as a legitimate means to advance your warden and companions, because when you use this method, your companions' skills/attributes/talents behave exactly as they should.  Seriously: there are two layers of "dialog" with the Allied Supply Crates that no way, no how could have escaped QA attention as being somehow unintended or broken or glitched.

I'm not going to argue whether or not using this method is "correct" or "cheating", but it certainly was deliberately designed and intended. Elfroot is a commonly needed crafting material and there's no way the designer(s) of the emissaries and the mechanics of the Allied Supply Crates could have overlooked the fact that there would be an unlimited supply of Elfroot in the game. (As long as you choose to side with the Elves.)

My hunch is that Bioware expected few people to stumble upon this usage path, and of those who did stumble upon it, for even fewer people to want to take advantage of it. But they did expect some people to use it, perhaps to provide a useful boost for Hard or Nightmare mode?

But hey, I could be wrong. I posted this on the Bioware forums. Any Bioware spokesperson could come on here and add their two bits. Or if they do feel it's an unintended exploit path, they can choose to patch out the "dialog" options to turn in elfroot.

Modifié par shaktiboy, 25 décembre 2009 - 02:46 .

[shaktiboy]

Creature 1 wrote...

Peeker2009 wrote...

It seems a bit uneven that most of these items have to be collected as you travel (gems, runes and gold) and are therefore unexploitable imo, whereas elfroot can be bought in bulk. Is there a cap on how much of this stuff can be donated?

People have hit level 25 by donating elfroot. 

The fact that they put a soft cap into the current game mechanics to prevent you from going past level 25 is further evidence that they knew full well that some people would use the elfroot turn-in mechanic. Their current gameplay code prevents you from being able to overlevel past the enemy scaling/balance they designed into the current version of the game.

Oh, and to give an idea of the potency of this method, I took my level 13 warden to level 23 by spending roughly 50g on elfroot for this purpose. All my companions were leveled to 22 with full expected attribute/skill/spec/talent points for their manual level-ups, etc. Personally, it's been nice to play the remainder of the game with a full set of tactical options available to my parties. Also, strangely, I find that overall, encounters with enemies feel much more balanced. At level 13, things were feeling a bit too easy. I wonder if enemies that are scaled high to match high-level players are themselves bringing more auto-leveled talents (or better attack/defense/resistance, etc) to the encounters?

Also enjoyable now are the random encounters when you're traveling around the world map. At level 23 some of them have a nicely "epic" feel to them.

Modifié par shaktiboy, 25 décembre 2009 - 04:12 .

[_Tarekith_]

So you gain XP for putting items in the chests? I never realized that, was going to ask if donating actually made any difference to the end battle or not...

[_Tarekith_]

Hmm, just put 50g worth of elfroot into the chest and nothing happened, no XP gained at all. This is with the X360 version. I was level 19 already, but was curious how much I could boost this way. DId I miss something obvious?

[Grommash94]

Tried this on ps3, did not work. Guess it is only exploitable on the PC. And yet, it is an exploit...as BioWare did say that there was not enough content to reach 25.

[shaktiboy]

Did you talk to the Elf emissary first and ask him what you could do to help?

[Grumpy Old Wizard]

duplicate post.

Modifié par Grumpy Old Wizard, 25 décembre 2009 - 10:29 .

[Grumpy Old Wizard]

To each his own. I enjoy leveling by questing and defeating creatures rather than by buying elfroot to give to elves. Cheating ruins games for me. Some will consider the elfroot thing to be an exploit/cheat, and some won't. It is not something I would chose to do.

[shaktiboy]

_Tarekith_ wrote...

Hmm, just put 50g worth of elfroot into the chest and nothing happened, no XP gained at all. This is with the X360 version. I was level 19 already, but was curious how much I could boost this way. DId I miss something obvious?

I'm surprised you put 50g into it without checking the first donation to verify that conditions were correct for it to work for you.  When you select the dialog option to "Give all elfroot", it takes exactly 88 elfroot from your backpack and gives you exactly 720 exp in return. You can do one "Give all elfroot" and then choose the option to leave the dialog. Check your exp before doing this and then after; it should increase by exactly 720. You will get no visible feedback from the game

Also be sure that:

1. You have completely finished the Nature of the Beast quest line to it's finish and have sided with the Elves in the final outcome.

2. You have talked to Lanya back at the Dalish Elf Camp and followed the dialog option where she commits the Elves to help you in the upcoming battle.

3. You have returned to your Party Camp and talked with the Dalish Elf emissary over near the Allied Supply Crates (Emissary Caron is his name, IIRC). Choose the dialog option that asks what you can do to help the Elves prepare for the battle.

4. (not confirmed but logical) You have not yet started the Landsmeet. (Many side quests stop being possible to finish once the Landsmeet has begun, so the same might hold true in this case too.)

Assuming all four of the preceding conditions are met, you should be able to do one cycle of "Give all Elfroot" and then check your exp.

If anyone reading this on the 360 and PS3 platforms can positively confirm that this works or not, that would be useful info.

Modifié par shaktiboy, 25 décembre 2009 - 11:16 .

[Awaitingdoom]

Im on Ps3 and the first time I did this I gave a few gold and a few runestones and got about 3/4 of a level. The 2cnd time I did it I saved everything that could be turned in and did it all at once and got 1/16 of a bar! 1/16 of 1 bar, not level so I have now clue whats going on. Next time Ill try all the steps listed above first.

Modifié par Awaitingdoom, 25 décembre 2009 - 11:33 .

[Dasim4]

Personally I think it's only XP you get. I didn't give anything at all in my first playthrough and I gave a lot in my second and the armies were no stronger than they were in my first playthrough.

[shaktiboy]

Ya I'm pretty sure it's just a cute rp backstory to explain why they're giving you XP as a reward for turning in donations. It doesn't really change the strength of your armies in the final battle. Oh. now I understand what Amrose2 and Sir Ulrich Von Lichtenstein were trying to say farther up in the thread. Ya--it's only an exp gain for you (and indirectly, for all your companions too).



To Awaitingdoom: it would be awesome if you'd check your "before" XP and "after" XP after one turn-in of elfroot. Remember that the vendor in the Dalish Camp will have an endless supply of Elfroot for you for cheap (roughly 60s for a stack of 99), assuming you didn't side with the werewolves (in which case the vendor is not available). Please check just one turn-in of elfroot and let us know whether you got exactly 870 exp and the turn-in removed exactly 88 elfroot from your backpack. If it turns out to work like this on the PS3 then I'm willing to bet it's also the same on the 360 platform too.

[shaktiboy]

And note that I never tried turning in any other donation materials. If you only had a few runes, for example, when you turned in runes, I'm willing to bet you get nowhere near the exp I've described. The reason elfroot seems to give so much exp is because it's easy to load up on tons of elfroot and turn in a full 88 pieces with every "Give all Elfroot" donation. Chances are that Awaitingdoom had nothing near 88 pieces of whatever he was trying to turn in.

If I had to guess at the actual formula behind the donation rewards, I bet its the same for any type of item you can donate:

EXP = ([total items in the donation]-10)

In other words, if you turn in only 1-10 items in a "Give all..." operation, you get nothing at all. But for every one item beyond 10 in a "Give all..." operation, you're getting 10 exp per item.  So, if you have at least 88 items (which is the max one "Give all..." operation will remove from your backpack, then you're getting 10 exp * 78 items = 780 exp.

Modifié par shaktiboy, 26 décembre 2009 - 01:49 .

[Awaitingdoom]

I bought 2 stacks of elfroot before I did that turn in btw.

Also it will be a while before I can check this out.  All the character that have finished the game and havnt been deleted dont have a save before the final battle...

Modifié par Awaitingdoom, 26 décembre 2009 - 02:30 .

[System Shock]

shaktiboy wrote...
  Seriously: there are two layers of "dialog" with the Allied Supply Crates that no way, no how could have escaped QA attention as being somehow unintended or broken or glitched.
.

.. there are a lot of things in this game that "escaped" QA.

[shaktiboy]

System Shock wrote...

shaktiboy wrote...
  Seriously: there are two layers of "dialog" with the Allied Supply Crates that no way, no how could have escaped QA attention as being somehow unintended or broken or glitched.
.

.. there are a lot of things in this game that "escaped" QA.

Ya, I know how QA works and where they tend to take shortcuts and why. I bet trying to QA all the possible dialog paths and various outcomes was a real sore point between QA and Dev over there at Bioware, and explains some of the bugs we've seen.  But really, whoever was tagged with functional testing the design/outcome paths of the Party Camp emissaries and the Allied Supply Crate mechanics had and easy job because there's not much to test there. (Not to mention that any unit/component tests in the code itself would also be easy to design.) The test plan would have been extremely simple--no logical reason to have any holes in the test plan for those two features.

Talk to emissary for faction X and verify ability to get corresponding exp rewards from Allied Supply Crate donations:

• Don't choose "how can I help" dialog option and verify that donating to ASC produces no exp reward.
• Choose "how can I help" dialog option and verify that donation amount of 0 or 1 units in backpack produces no exp reward, but that donation amount of > 1 units in backpack produces 10 exp per every unit beyond the first.
• Verify that maximum units removed from backpack per donation = 88.
• Verify that dialog path allows infinite donation looping until user either chooses "Leave" or the user runs out of possible donation item types.
• Verify that each possible donation type appears in "Give all" dialog choices only if the player has at least 1 corresponding unit type in their backpack.

I mean, that's a slam-dunk test plan even if you're on a Scrum team and doing this on the fly in 5 minutes and you're not even a person with a QA background. The tech writer on the team or any of the devs on the team would have no problem dreaming up and executing a simple test plan like this in about 30 minutes.  My point being that this feature was too simple to mess up the testing on; therefore, the fact that you can donate elfroot for up to 870 exp per donation could not possibly be missed, and the designers of the Party Camp emissaries and Allied Supply Crate mechanics/rewards could no way, no how have overlooked the fact that one of the dialog choices would have an infinite supply available for purchase.  This is an "easter egg" fast path by design.

 

Modifié par shaktiboy, 26 décembre 2009 - 02:57 .

[shaktiboy]

 Welp, I just found detailed info about challenge scaling in this game that completely reverses my previous stance about this designed-into-the-game leveling mechanic being useful. In short, if you do this, you *will* be making the game much less challenging than it's designed to be, because Bioware has obfuscated how their challenge scaling is in fact very linear and has upper limits that you can blow right past if you level up prematurely or follow the story progression in the wrong order!

Here's a reprint of something I said over in the Campaigns forum when a thread there pointed me in the right direction to discover this new (to me) information.

------------------

You've heard lots of gripes about your challenge scaling mechanics, I'm sure, but my take on the main problem with challenge scaling is in the opacity of how it's done and the detrimental effect of that opacity:

• If you're looking for an "optimum" challenge level throughout the game progression, the areas you should visit are in this order based on the lower/upper limits of the challenge scaling in each area: Ostagar/Kokari (levels 3-5) > Mage Tower (level 6+) > Redcliffe (level 6+) > Brecilian Forest (level 7+) > Haven (via Urn of Andraste quest cycle, level 8+) > and only then is the remaining choice evenly split between Ozrammar and Denerim (both are level 10+ in challenge scaling). For details on this, see: http://dragonage.gul...allenge_scaling
• Okay so with the preceding background details about challenge scaling, why on EARTH do you not make this clear in game?  The game dialog and world map travel options after Lothering make it all too easy for a player to feel like they could go straight to Orzammer or Denerim and start in either of those areas first. Assuming they do so and manage to work their way through, by the time they go back to Mage Tower or Redcliffe or Brecilian Forest or Haven, etc, they are near or possibly have exceeded the upper limits of the challenge scaling in those areas.
• This attempt at making the game seem non-linear while masking the true linearity of your challenge scaling is the number one reason some people think the game is too hard and others think the game is too easy.  Why not make this linearity more obvious and guide players towards the best challenge progression?  Or why not make the challenge scaling truly equal among the four areas you can head to after Lothering?
• To compound things even further, you have one legimate, intentionally-designed game mechanic for zooming all the way to the soft cap at level 25. Not a bug; intentional design provided you make certain storyline choices. (Hint: it has to do with Elves, Party Camp emissaries, and elfroot.)  Again: clearly not a bug or exploit but a deliberately designed method to jump directly from level 7 to 25 if you're so inclined. And with all your public and ambiguous descriptions of level scaling, players who take this course are obviously blowing right past the upper limits of your challenge scaling for most of the encounters in the game except for certain boss fights. But they'll never know it unless they're research experts.

[/list]

Modifié par shaktiboy, 26 décembre 2009 - 05:45 .

[System Shock]

shaktiboy wrote...
 

• To compound things even further, you have one legimate, intentionally-designed game mechanic for zooming all the way to the soft cap at level 25. Not a bug; intentional design provided you make certain storyline choices. (Hint: it has to do with Elves, Party Camp emissaries, and elfroot.)  Again: clearly not a bug or exploit but a deliberately designed method to jump directly from level 7 to 25 if you're so inclined. And with all your public and ambiguous descriptions of level scaling, players who take this course are obviously blowing right past the upper limits of your challenge scaling for most of the encounters in the game except for certain boss fights. But they'll never know it unless they're research experts

I disagree with that. This elfroot thing is an exploit that was overlooked. Same as the Duncan-darkspawn blood exploit. The game makes it clear through the emissaries dialog that the idea behind giving the emissaries herbs, runes, money, etc is to have better troops once the final battle occurs, not for the main character to gain XP. And BTW, I didn't see any difference in the troops you get when you give them stuff and when you give them nothing. It also begs the question, what's the point to give to the emissaries? Just for the main character to gain XP? What about the runes, the money, the gems? Shouldn't tou get XP for giving those too?

It is a glitch. There are a lot of little glitches and off  things in this game, both in the story line and gameplay. Now, don't get me wrong, I am not bashing the game because, overall, I enjoyed playing it, but after playing KotOR I & II, Mass effect, Jade Empire,  I don't think it measures up to those games; and being a fan of the Elder Scrolls series and the Fallout series, I still think Bethesda is still a notch above in the RPG arena.


.. still, while I am not purchasing the DLC, I will probably purchase Dragon Age II  . 

[Grommash94]

And, as I said before, BioWare made it clear that there is not enough content to actually get to 25...