Chapter 4 - Experimenting with the game system
Li Shenyang took some times to get used to the control. Then he went to do the beginner's missions. The missions went from a simple finding an NPC, to finding hidden items of the children that were being scattered around the village.
Most of these missions are created in order to let the players get used to the control. After all, those items were sometimes being placed on top of a roof, and for players to get there, they had to climb, jump and if they failed, they will even lose health.
Luckily, Li Shenyang had the insight of taking some times to understand the game mechanic, so he didn't waste any time or potions from doing the missions. Soon, he finished the task within the beginner's village, and now, he was finally being sent out of the village. His task was to kill the wild boar outside the village that has been terrorizing the farmers. He was also given a basic beginner's equipment.
Most players would go out immediately, but Li Shenyang once again opened the character interface. Since he had done a few missions, he saw that there are few changes in his character's information.
[Name: YangShen]
[Bloodline: Human]
[Spirit Point: 950/950]
[Cultivation Level: Realm (0), Level (6)]
[Cultivation Rank: Mortal]
[Cultivation Path: - ]
[Basic stats:…]
Li Shenyang saw that all of his basic stats went from 10 points to 16 points. But he also noticed a small [+] icon beside each number. Seeing that the amount of Spirit Point read [950/950], Li Shenyang assumed that the points can be allocated on each basic stats, giving them a bonus increase. He tried to add it to his speed. The amount of Spirit point went from 950 to 850.
'So, one stat points are equal to 100 spirit points. This will really give players more flexibility over their stats. Not only that, they can attune their stats according to their playstyle… Those professional league will surely be something interesting to look forward to,' Li Shenyang thought as he placed everything into his speed. So, in the end, the stats of his speed went from only [16] to [16+9] with 9 being the bonus points that were added using the spirit points.
Of course, Li Shenyang is not blindly doing this for the sake of increasing his speed. The speed attributes increase the attack speed of the player, increases the player's movement speed, as well as skill cool-down reduction. When Li Shenyang read the game's information, he took an interest in one particular class. It was the Beast tamer class from Changming sect. From what he read and understood, the aggressiveness of the beast scaled with the players' attack speed. The higher the speed attribute, the faster and fiercer the beast will fight.
Of course, with just speed, you won't be able to deal any damage. To increase your damage, there are several factors that a player needs to take note of. The first one is the type and purity of the beast that the player is contracted to. Then, the strength attribute of the player, followed by the pieces of equipment.
Naturally, those are things that Li Shenyang can take time to think of. After all, he needs to reach the rank of Foundation Building before he can choose the sect.
Once he finished checking out his character information, he finally walked out of the village. The moment he steps out of the village, he could see the vast fields of the game. And there were several players who are rushing to kill the wild boars. Li Shenyang didn't bother to fight with them, so he went to a more secluded area and waited for the wild boars to spawn.
As soon as one spawned, Li Shenyang started to attack it. Li Shenyang wasn't trying to kill it right away but instead, he wanted to play around with the battle system of the game. According to their advertisement on their website, a well-timed attack would deal higher damage. Thus, Li Shenyang first experimented with each combo. He first, did a fast combo, then he increased the time difference between each combo. Because of this, it took him some time to kill even one wild boar. He continued to experiment with different time combination and found out that each combination has its own pros and cons.
For example, if he simply spammed the combo, he would only deal a minimal damage. But if he decided to slow down on the last hit of the fast combo, the boar would enter a dizzy state for a few seconds. Next, is the slow combos. It is slow, and it does deal quite a lot of damage. But since it was slow it would sometime miss its target. If this was against players, none of the combos would hit unless the opponent has other factor being taken into consideration such as speed debuff.
'In the end, the perfect combos can only exist in a perfect situation for such a combo,' Li Shenyang concluded. 'But those are only basic attacks. What if we can include the skills?' Li Shenyang wondered. A mortal only has one basic skill. It's called 'slash'. And just like its name, when a player used 'slash', it used their weapon to slash their enemies. Most players may think that whoever designed this skill is lazy but Li Shenyang actually liked it. 'Slash' didn't look any different than the basic attack. So who would know if the player used basic attack or 'slash' during PVP?
In order to confirm his hunch of skills being able to be mixed in between combos, Li Shenyang decided to look for a victim. Just then, another wild boar spawned and Li Shenyang's lips curved up into a smile. "Alright, you shall be daddy's experimental lamb!" Li Shenyang said excitedly.
After that, Li Shenyang spent a few more minutes of experimenting before finally satisfied with the result of he found. Skills can be mixed in between combos and it even increased the combo count. Li Shenyang is still unsure what the combo count is for, but he will figure it out one day.
Li Shenyang looked at his quest and noticed that the quest that asked him to kill wild boars has long been finished. His level also increased from level 6 to level 9. He went back into the village to hand the quest in and get his reward. But what Li Shenyang noticed was that he got to level 9 and yet his Spirit Point only increased a little. He stared at the number [73/973] with scrutinizing eyes. "It seems that the spirit point is actually not the experience point? Then what is?"
Li Shenyang didn't understand. He decided to delay handing in his quest until he understood the system which he had gotten wrong before. "This is why I don't really like playing MMORPG, ah! So complicated!" Li Shenyang complained as he went to consult the forum once more. He typed in the keyword of his question and tons of threads comes up, all with the same question.
[Experience/Spirit point with weird scaling?]
[I am already level 9, but Spirit Point is only 952]
[Help, I am confused. So what is this spirit point? I thought they were your generic XP point with different name]
Li Shenyang decided to check the topmost post with the most replies. He scrolled through the comments and saw that no one have an answer yet. Then at the bottom-most, there was a reply from the forum moderator before the thread was locked from further commenting.
[Xiaolongbao(MOD): The developer is aware of this problem. But it is not the error of the Spirit Point. Spirit Points are different from Experience Points. Experience points are used to increase your level. Spirit Points are used to increase your bonus stats. But in order to break through to a new realm, cultivators are required to collect enough Spirit Points to increase their realm. The higher your Spirit Point when breaking through, the higher the bonus you will get! In the meantime, the developer is trying to fix the missing experience information. You can still play the game as usual and there is no need to restart your client. Once it is fixed, the data will be automatically downloaded by the game. We, from the Lord of Supreme Immortal team, apologizes for the inconvenience caused!]
The post alone answered Li Shenyang's question. But things are getting even more complicated. He was just about to close the forum when he saw the little notification near his profile picture. Clicking on it, he saw that he received one new message. Clicking the new message open, he saw that it was a message from KStarMaster.
[KStarMaster: That is indeed me. It was a shame about what happened to King's Arena. I was looking forward to playing with you again. But it seems that we have a fate together since we met again in this new game. If you want, we can team up and explore the game together. If nothing goes wrong, my game ID will be: Qinglong. Looking forward to your answer.]
Li Shenyang stared at the timestamp of the message, then to the time stated on the lower right of his second monitor. The message was sent an hour and a half ago. Li Shenyang was speechless when he saw how fast time has flown. "Did I already spend more than an hour in the game?! What lies, ah! I didn't even do that much quest!!" Li Shenyang wailed, totally forgetting the fact that he spent most of his time in the game experimenting with his combos. They say time flies very fast when you do something you enjoy. Li Shenyang has yet to notice that he is enjoying the game.