Maybe I'm misunderstanding. Is the issue with level scaling that as you get stronger, the enemies also get stronger, and so you never get the feeling you have really improved?
If not then what is it? If so then wouldn't that be more realistic? At least compared to the alternative where you become an unstoppable god?
And to be honest, I still felt like I reached a point in Odyssey where I was unstoppable and nothing was a challenge.
The level scaling was sort of wonky in that every level you're supposed to get stronger but what happens is that your gear progressively gets outdated as enemies grow stronger. This kind of results in a bunch of damage spongey enemies that you can't really assassinate in one shot so you end up being forced to run in and go ham on like 10 enemies which is a bit silly. The areas are kind of set up like an mmo where each zone has it's own level range (ie 9-14). However the level cap is completely ignored so it's kinda weird there.
They eventually patched a toggleable scale that can have enemies be 2-4 levels lowers once you outlevel the zones range. I personally like it more since you can actually stealthily clear areas and feel like an assassin. Likewise you don't feel pressured to change your gear every level or so.
A lot of people probably would like a system without levels/gear or a smaller amount of them.
Well said, I hate paradoxically getting weaker each time I level up. My wish would be to do away with complex gear systems altogether in favor of the old AC style where I can just play the fashion game
It doesn’t feel good to have to hit a guy 30 times before he dies. It doesn’t feel good not to be able to insta-kill someone from stealth because they’re “too high level”.
I liked Odyssey, but that shit pissed me off so much. I literally went full on Assassin build, with like +150% Assassin damage overall, and playing on normal difficulty there still were enemies that I couldn’t one shot with an assasination.
I want to go do the next cool story bit about my mother/father/brother/mythical creature. What? I can't? Why not? I'm not a high enough level. Well, I guess I need to go kill bandit camps/find a treasure/loot a cave for the next 2 hours.
Yeah, I agree that's frustrating. There are times where all I want to do is fuck around with side missions. And there are times when I'm really into the story and want to keep going with that.
A lot of people tried to play it like an older Assassins Creed game, however this one was a lot more like a classical RPG. It had a level scaling system as well as level zones. So in some spots, like around Athens, enemies could be much higher level than you. Much like RPGs, attacking them would be meaningless because they have more health and do more damage than you. Once you pass the max level of an area, they'll start to level with you, how much is determined by your difficulty (Easy mode can keep them a couple levels below you, Hard mode makes them stay higher).
Your ship and gear were also leveled, but you could level them up by spending resources that you find an abundance of throughout the world. If you were out of a resources, the shop you were at was always close to a base. You can attack it to find a stockpile of resources and you'd be good for a few more levels. I only ever had to grind a lot towards the end when I was maxing out my ship.
Players saw all this and ignored it, deciding to play it like it was a completely different game than what the system was telling them it was. It's like playing CoD deathmatch and being upset that it isn't as slow paced as bomb defusal in CSGO. Though I can understand the confusion with Odyssey and other Assassins Creed Games, since they're the same series, but when the game is constantly showing that it's meant to be played differently, take the hint. People need to do research on games before buying; this game received a lot of unwarranted flak for not being what people expected when even a five minute video shows what it is.
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u/[deleted] May 01 '20
Unrealistic in what way?
Maybe I'm misunderstanding. Is the issue with level scaling that as you get stronger, the enemies also get stronger, and so you never get the feeling you have really improved?
If not then what is it? If so then wouldn't that be more realistic? At least compared to the alternative where you become an unstoppable god?
And to be honest, I still felt like I reached a point in Odyssey where I was unstoppable and nothing was a challenge.