Scrolling System Proposal

**NOTE**: This blog presents a concept that was later finalized and published as a feature card [here](https://playselene.com/features/scrolling/). Please note that the contents of this post will require testing during Alpha and be tweaked or changed entirely. This may not necessarily be the eventual system upon the official launch. The focus of this post is to share our draft thus far and hopefully get player feedback as to how it can be improved further. Before getting into what the newly revamped Scrolling System looks like, it is essential to understand why we have chosen to make this change, and what we aim to accomplish with our proposed solution. **Problem #1: Heavy RNG-element associated with scrolling** Let’s face it; scrolls in Maple are synonymous to RNG. It can range anywhere from being too easy (simply slapping scrolls on equipment and getting lucky) to be extremely difficult (no matter how many times you try luck isn’t by your side, and you keep failing them). This leads to a group of players who would instead not take the risk and spend time farming mesos, keeping their eyes on the market for a completed item to purchase, therefore barely participating in the scrolling activity itself. **How the Selene System can combat this:** While we recognize the importance of involving RNG to scrolling, we want to reduce the overall RNG of item upgrades by adding some non-RNG upgrade methods to the system. This can include grindy-activities, especially when it comes to perfect-scrolling an endgame gear. It also rewards players based on playing the game as opposed to depending purely on luck. *Grindy-activities does not only refer to farming monsters but include bossing as well - to combat mage-story from happening where players raise a mage character on the side to get ahead in farming. The Magician skill rebalance will also help combat mage-story further while not diminishing their multi-target abilities. Additionally, instead of scrolls being rare and highly valuable while equipment being commonplace, we feel it would be better to put more emphasis on getting the equipment while having scrolls be more accessible. This also means doing away with the “booming” feature found in cursed scrolls. Unlike before, players won’t have an inventory full of equipment to run through while scrolling. RNG-attributes will remain in each scroll, however failing them would mean trying again. There will be a system in place for protecting slots from being used up should a player want to protect their valuable items (White Scrolls, but obtained in a different way than usual). For the players who enjoy taking higher risks for more gains, Chaos Scroll is boosted to allow players to take an even bigger risk for greater gains. **Problem #2: Players do not bother upgrading their low-level weapons as scrolls are too valuable, and weapons tend to get replaced not too long later anyways.** As the current system stands, players not only have a wide variety of equipment to choose from every 5 - 10 levels, they also level up quickly - not needing to stop and think about spending time farming scrolls to upgrade their gears which would eventually get replaced, and spend that time grinding through levels instead. **How the Selene System can combat this:** Asides from scrolls having made more accessible, as previously mentioned, the total number of gear sets available will be reduced. The remaining ones would be tiered and made in a way such that scrolling lower-tiered equipment would be relatively easy and possible without needing players to sacrifice resources they could use on endgame gear instead. # Selene Scrolling System This scrolling system is nearly identical to base pre-BB Maple. Scrolls themselves remain almost the same, with some changes to their %-rates and attack boost values. White Scrolls functions the same as well, in terms of protecting slots, except they are now tiered and obtained via crafting using Monster Crystals (explained further under White Scrolls below). Monsters drop tiered Monster Crystals based on their level at a **10% drop rate**. Bosses will provide more Monster Crystals, scaled to their difficulty. Additionally, each equipment has a tier.  The table above reflects what type of Monster Crystal gets used for the different Equipment Tiers, as well as the level range of monsters dropping the various crystals. **Side note:** The specified equipment level will make for our gear progression as well, which will be covered in its dedicated segment under ‘Gear Progression.’ *Level 120 tier would be your Dragon Weapons with an adjusted level requirement *Level 140+ tier would be your endgame gears and weapons from various bosses with an adjusted level requirement ### Regular Scrolls Scrolls are nearly the same as they used to be, with a few changes.  Yes, we will introduce Scrolls for Cape and Shoes for Attack, though Chaos Scrolls still exist for a greater potential outcome. Players are still able to use the regular scrolls on their equipment directly as per usual without the need for any Monster Crystals, at the risk of losing a slot if it fails. Side note: The boost in attack from +5 to +10 max attack per scroll for weapons would be essential for the progressive post-bb expedition boss concept in Selene. It is a necessary buff compared to pre-bb servers that end with horntail, or at most pink bean as their final boss. This can be still be balanced as we scale the late-end game bosses in terms of their HP (surrounding increased damage output). Additionally, all weapons will come with their respective secondary stat requirement to equip them, at the same value as their level. (i.e. Level 70 Bow with 70 STR requirement, Level 120 Claw with 120 DEX requirement, etc...) ### Chaos Scrolls Chaos Scroll will exist to provide an avenue for risk-takers to gamble for higher stats. It will, however, have its effects extended from -5 till +5 to be -10 till +10 instead, to suit the updated scrolls boost. Weapons, as usual, need not be chaosed as they increase by +10 at 10%, while non-weapon scrolls benefit from up to +5 additional boost. ### White Scrolls White Scrolls also function as per usual in that using them saves the equipment from losing a slot if the regular scroll fails. Monster Crystals come into play here when you intend to use White Scrolls with the Regular Scrolls. #### White Scroll Fragments Due to the nature of our upgrade system being in tiers, we have to use White Scrolls in tiers as well. However, players coming into Selene from other servers would typically associate White Scrolls as an item used in individual units. The thought of requiring up to 5 White Scrolls to scroll once may be confusing. Therefore, we are introducing ‘White Scroll Fragments’ in place of White Scrolls instead. Basically, the more powerful the scroll, the more fragments it requires to be used.  White Scroll Fragments come from Monster Crystals via monsters/bosses. The number of Monster Crystals required varies based on tiers as follows:  # Overview At a glance, this is how the Upgrade System looks, including the White Scroll Fragments  Here is a quick 4-step process when applying White Scroll Fragments onto any piece of equipment using the above table as reference: **Step 1:** Which Tier does your equipment belong to? (Check Item Level) **Step 2:** What scroll are you trying to use on your equipment? (Check number of White Scroll Fragments required) **Step 3:** How many Monster Crystals do you need for each White Scroll Fragment? **Step 4:** What Monster Level range should you be fighting at to get your Monster Crystals from? ### Case Scenarios To help understand the way this works, here are four case scenarios. **Scenario 1: Scrolling a Level 10 Bow (Basic):** - Using a 90% scroll requires 1 White Scroll Fragment = 1 * 5 = 5 Basic Monster Crystals - Using a 50% scroll requires 3 White Scroll Fragments = 3 * 5 = 15 Basic Monster Crystals - Using a 10% scroll requires 5 White Scroll Fragments = 5 * 5 = 25 Basic Monster Crystals **Scenario 2: Scrolling a Level 50 Spear (Intermediate):** - Using a 90% scroll requires 1 White Scroll Fragment = 1 * 10 = 10 Intermediate Monster Crystals - Using a 50% scroll requires 3 White Scroll Fragments = 3 * 10 = 30 Intermediate Monster Crystals - Using a 10% scroll requires 5 White Scroll Fragments = 5 * 10 = 50 Intermediate Monster Crystals **Scenario 3: Scrolling a Level 90 Gun (Advanced):** - Using a 90% scroll requires 1 White Scroll Fragment = 1 * 15 = 15 Advanced Monster Crystals - Using a 50% scroll requires 3 White Scroll Fragments = 3 * 15 = 45 Advanced Monster Crystals - Using a 10% scroll requires 5 White Scroll Fragments = 5 * 15 = 75 Advanced Monster Crystals **Scenario 4: Scrolling a Level 140 Claw (Legendary):** - Using a 90% scroll requires 1 White Scroll Fragment = 1 * 20 = 20 Legendary Monster Crystals - Using a 50% scroll requires 3 White Scroll Fragments = 3 * 20 = 60 Legendary Monster Crystals - Using a 10% scroll requires 5 White Scroll Fragments = 5 * 20 = 100 Legendary Monster Crystals # Misc The following are not directly related to the upgrade system, but rather additional information/draft on other aspects of Selene; these include Scrolls Fusion and Gear Progression. ### Scrolls Fusion This enables players to combine two of the same type of scrolls to potentially create a scroll of a higher tier **at a 50% rate.** 90% Scroll + 90% Scroll = Chance of 70% Scroll 70% Scroll + 70% Scroll = Chance of 50% Scroll 50% Scroll + 50% Scroll = Chance of 30% Scroll 30% Scroll + 30% Scroll = Chance of 10% Scroll This enables players to make lower quality scrolls useful; players who are only intending to use 10%/30% scrolls would still keep and accumulate their 90% scrolls. ### Gear Progression Following the new Equipment Tier system, there will be a total of 7 sets for progression, which will involve changing the level requirement for some of them.  The table above is merely a draft proposal, keeping the lower level sets the same corresponding to their level while shifting the higher level sets with increased level requirements. Actual weapons and equipment involved can always be up for discussion for the lower tiers. # Conclusion In conclusion, we hope the proposed change to scrolling encourages players to partake in scrolling more than before, as well as utilize them throughout their gameplay progression instead of saving them specifically for late-endgame purposes. We have specific plans for the way endgame gears are obtained, as well as involving further upgrades on top of the available slots for scrolling exclusively for the endgame gears, however, they are only relevant from Level 200 onwards. More information on this will be shared in a dedicated feature card for 'Endgame Expansion'. As mentioned in the opening, this system is nowhere near finalized as we would have to see how it plays out in-game itself through Alpha, and ideally a better version in Beta prior to launch. This blog post is made a lot earlier in advance to receive player inputs on the system so we can tweak it further, if necessary, prior to Alpha itself. And as always, if you have any questions, suggestions, thoughts, or anything else, make sure to join [Selene's Discord](https://discord.playselene.com) and share those with us.