I've always liked the idea of allowing the players to control the number of creatures in their rooms themselves. Maybe a craftable widget is in order. A player could craft something to limit the number of creatures that stay in a room allowing them to move up the ladder without having to risk getting mobbed by the normal engagement caps. Likewise a player could craft something that raises the normal engagement cap (of course after a certain number the additional creatures wouldn't increase the learning but would still increase the difficulty).

A default engagement cap of say 4, a minimum a player can limit in their room of 1 and a maximum they can attract into their room of say 8. Have an overall limit for the total number of creatures allowed in that section based on what the system can handle and if the players start hitting this then those with the higher numbers in their rooms have their creatures bled away to stay under said limit.

Their would still be a niche for warhorns and other guild abilities to increase the frequency of the spawn while this generally crafted widget affects personal engagement caps.



Then again I've always wanted rangers to be able to create stalking dummies for use while sniping and what not. The creatures come in and engage the dummy, and eventually destroy it, while the ranger snipes away without having to worry about the creature up and leaving halfway through.

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Caution: may scream about HUGE DRAMATIC AMAZING SIGNIFICANT loss

Group hunting should not be forced on people. Here, the solution is 'move or group hunt'. People are moving. Playing as an empath primary tends to give you a different view of the game than any other guild, and usually starts from a perspective of someone inclined to group hunt (empaths being primarily support based characters due to healing and no combat aspects). For an empath, group hunting is a great thing.

For most players, it's an inefficient training method and a bitter pill they don't want.

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Pants.

>> Group hunting is really, really not that terrible.

I agree with you. It's fun to hunt with friends. However, an empath holding 8 mobs in a room is really not a friend. Unless you are suggesting that you go befriend said person and then hunt with them.

But then your hunting tactics is probably at odds with theirs. If they have 8 in the room for a reason, killing them is probably going to affect their training. And, having 8 in a room means you are going to be fighting 4 of them. Some players cannot handle 4, and if its a gen cap of 3 that might not ever see 4 until 3+ people are in the area.

With that being said, if someone is being a jerk and holding all 8 mobs in the room. I'd just go take them.

>>if some one is being a jerk and holding all 8 mobs in the room. I'd just go take them.

This. I get why this situation is annoying, but I've never really understood the angst some people have over this. I don't run into this situation too much, but when I do I ask them to kill some and share first, if they don't want to play nice then I make them share by killing the critters for them. It's good for interaction and hunting.

The most I've had is 68 gryphons. I assisted multiple times, and was told it was not a bug. I imagine this is some sort of non-invasion record.

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You've reached the uninformative help match I haven't written yet.

http://i.imgur.com/fBq8R.jpg

I know I'm responding to this nearly a month late, but this bothers me so much;

>I hate group hunting because I want to train combat skills, not empathy skills. The screen scroll is ridiculous, there's not a method for sharing loot equitably, and I'd prefer to hunt alone. Until you've hunted in the same room or area as my empath, try not to paint all empaths with the same brush.

Nothing about group hunting negatively impacts ANY of this. Don't want to see other peoples combat scroll? COMBAT will toggle that off. Want to share loot equally? Just have your loot routine occur at the end of every kill, and/or look at how much you've earned and use the SHARE command to ballpark the coinage.

I don't mean to single you out here BLUESUADESHOES, because so many bloody hunters across the realms do this, but a large number of our skills are actually EASIER to train if there are multiple hunters in the room. Stealth, any AoE effected skill, and a more steady stream of critters to kill...

Honestly, it bugs me that people refuse to share hunting rooms, and the obnoxiousness to which people will go to drive you out of their hunting room is so eye roll inducing.

>>a large number of our skills are actually EASIER to train if there are multiple hunters in the room.<<

We're just going to have to agree to disagree. I don't mind, and actually invite and encourage hunting with ONE other player. I absolutely detest hunting with more than one, for all of the reasons I've already mentioned. I've been on group hunts with various orders like ODS, Theren Guard, etc. who want combat empaths along and the experience has been abysmal in every way conceivable. I will share with one, but beyond that, my level of obnoxiousness to drive the third person out of the room usually ends up with someone dead, and I kinda like it that way. It keeps things interesting, but I shouldn't have to be forced into group hunting. Ever.

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"EMPATHS RULE ELANTHIA -- ALL SHALL LOVE US AND DESPAAAAAIR" ~GM Melete

I know it's a first come first serve basis and if you're in a room first, it's yours, AND I understand that some hunting activities can be disrupted in a group scenario, such as people skinning/looting your kills, or someone killing critters you were trying to dance with. My sense is that it all averages out (rather quickly) in terms of money and xp, and then quickly climbs ahead due to higher room gen, the benefits of killing something that's not facing the attacker, and being able to teach. Coupled with some spells or abilities training better in a group hunting situation, and I very much prefer it. Locking stealth takes less than half the time with another hunter in the room, and any room AoE will skyrocket the related skills xp. d

My main is a Necromancer, and hunting with people means I don't use a handful of spells, so, if anything I understand this better than most other guilds. It still annoys me.