Chapter 7 Potential Threshold
A quiet and desolate ancient town in the wilderness.
In the center of the town, at a crossroads that has been abandoned for who knows how many years, in front of the earthen platform that serves as the birthplace, three white skeletons, each with their own unique patina of age, are facing each other.
"Wait, I remember there's an initial skill called 'Identification'..." Skeleton No. 2, with a sweet voice, slapped his head, lowered his head to check the character panel that only the player could see, raised his right bone claw, and snapped his fingers at Qin Guan and Skeleton No. 3.
"Got it!" Skull No. 2's jaw creaked, and he seemed very excited. "I can see your IDs!"
Qin Guan's forehead was full of question marks: "Huh? What did you say? What kind of identification technique?"
"Oh, yes, there is also the identification technique." The rough-voiced Skeleton No. 3 seemed to have remembered it, and after doing something, he also snapped his fingers at No. 2 and Qin Guan, "Eh? Vanilla pudding? You are obviously a man... Wait, judging from your voice, you are not the shemale boss Cao Da from Station B, are you?"
Qin Guan didn't care about being recognized at this time. He was so anxious that he almost jumped on the spot: "Wait, why do you all have initial skills? Why don't I have any? How does this work?"
This confused No. 2 and No. 3: "Isn't it right below the character panel?" "Yes, you can see it by calling out the panel."
Qin Guan quickly called out the character panel he obtained after selecting the game character...
On the left side of the panel is Qin Guan’s character information:
"ID: Vanilla Pudding"
"Race: Undead"
"Gender: Female"
"Level: 0"
"Potential: 37"
On the right side of the panel is the taskbar that shows the inactivated status and cannot be opened, the inactivated achievement information, and the personal log.
And then it was gone.
"No! My panel only has my character information, task bar, achievement information, and personal log. There is no initial skill you mentioned?" Qin Guan was so anxious that he was sweating. "Is it because I chose a female character? I can't play a shemale character?"
"That's impossible. Then will the players who like to play shemale accounts still play?" Skeleton No. 2 said strangely, "You really don't have an initial skill panel? There is an entry for usable skills right below the potential value, and there is an initial skill called 'Identification' in the entry?"
Qin Guan was stunned.
After checking his character panel again, Qin Guan had a bad feeling: "Wait... the potential value is the same, except that there is no potential value below... What are your potential values?"
Skull No. 2 said, "48."
Skull No. 3 looked at No. 2 in surprise: "Isn't this potential based on race? Is there also an individual difference? I'm 42."
Qin Guan’s chin almost dropped to his chest. “Fuck… I, I’m level 37—what the hell, my character’s potential is so low that I can’t even use my skills? Damn, I need to cancel my account and choose again!”
In the computer room with only one server on Earth, Yang Qiu, who was watching the three people, shook his head secretly: "It's useless to cancel the account and choose again, brother... It's not the character's problem, it's your mental strength that is not up to standard."
In order to allow players to have an experience close to a "real game", Yang Qiu, after many attempts, chose to imitate the idea of alchemy puppets to transform the "game characters" provided for players to choose.
Of course, there is still a big gap between game characters and real alchemical puppets - this kind of self-propelled combat auxiliary tool that only alchemists can afford requires at least thousands of gold coins of magic materials to build a sturdy and durable body, engrave more than fifty magic runes to match a diverse combat system, and also has a built-in magic crystal as the core drive.
Game characters don't need to be that sturdy and durable. With the player's soul controlling them, the most expensive built-in core can be saved; in other words, Yang Qiu only needs to work on the matching runes.
It's easier said than done, but researching this set of matching runes really gave Yang Qiu a headache - he could push the runes as hard as he could, since as long as he made a set of these matching runes, he could copy them in large quantities. However, the most important thing was whether the player's mental strength could bear and drive them!
If you install the engine of a family car on a tank, it will break down!
So... Yang Qiu could only carefully select the runes to be used, first cut them into a weakened version, and then pick and choose to put together a rune array that is as less picky as possible...
Finally, the rune array engraved into the game character includes the three basic runes of "Spell Detection", "Elementary Meditation", "Elementary Battle Roar", and "Elementary Wind Control", in addition to the two essential runes of Spirit Brand and Resurrection Summon.
The character panel that the player can see (including character information, task bar, achievement information, personal log) is the materialization of personal information loaded in the mental imprint rune. It can be displayed after the player's soul activates the mental imprint. Anyway, it is just a very simple materialization of information and will not increase the consumption burden much.
The real consumption is the runes such as "Spell Detection" and "Primary Meditation". Players with less than 40 potential (mental power) cannot activate them...
Players who meet the 40-point potential requirement can activate spell detection and use the initial rune "Identification", but there is also a limit on the number of times it can be used, which is the built-in CD...
Of course, the purpose of setting these thresholds is to extend the time players spend online, not to drive players away.
Moreover, potential (mental strength) is not fixed and can be increased. The player's soul in the "game" process is equivalent to "running and exercising" for the soul, and can be improved to different degrees depending on individual growth.
In other words, as long as you are hardworking enough, there will definitely be a day when you can use your skills...
"Looking at this situation, the difference in potential values after materialization will still dampen their enthusiasm... Should we add a description of the randomness of 'character quality' to save face for these players? Hmm... Let's also add a description that game characters cannot be changed, so that they will misunderstand their own weakness as bad luck."
Yang Qiu stroked his chin and thought about how to apply the patch. Inside the undead spawn point, Qin Guan searched for a long time but couldn't find the option to delete his account. He covered his face with his hands in dejection.
"Don't be discouraged, maybe there is a bug. How can you not be able to use skills if you choose the wrong character? Just exit the game and email the producer." Skull No. 3 advised.
Skeleton No. 3’s ID is Give Me Medicine, and his real name is Yao Hengyi. His real occupation is a construction engineer and a light game enthusiast. Although he is not a fan of Qin Guan, he has watched Qin Guan’s videos.
"Yeah, and the official hasn't said whether the data will be deleted during the closed beta test. If they are, we can just change characters when the closed beta test starts." The female player of Skull No. 2 also comforted her, "Speaking of this, have you noticed that today is the first day of the launch of the game "Otherworld", but there are still only three of us online. Who knows, the game may go bankrupt after the closed beta test is over..."
"Oh my god!" Give Me Medicine and Qin Guan jumped up at the same time.
On Earth, Yang Qiu in the computer room silently covered his chest.
Number Two, do you feel like you are a bit cruel...
"It would be a shame if this game went bankrupt!" In the spawn point of the undead, I took medicine and said something fair, "Although there are bugs, this game is really strong, and the details are very good. It's amazing that a VR game can achieve this level! Damn it, why don't you help make a video to promote it and invite more people to play it?"
"I started recording videos when I chose the character, and I'm still recording now." Qin Guan said, "The personal log in the panel is used to store screenshots and video information. I guess the official also hopes that players will help them as tap water."
Number Two was delighted: "Hey, can I be on camera?" He then made a scissors gesture to Qin Guan, pulling his bony jaw downwards, as if he was trying to smile...
Qin Guan & Give me medicine: "..."
"Forget it, why don't we first take a look at how to play this game... Well, it's a rare chance for the three of us to meet together on the first day of logging in, why don't we team up?" Qin Guan said.
"Of course I have to." The casual fan of the show immediately responded to Give Me Medicine.
“Okay, okay. If I were to play alone, I wouldn’t dare to walk around this spawn point. I’m not very good at horror games.” Number Two also said.
The function of inviting players to form a team is a must. After forming a team, players can see each other's ID and health bars.
There is no numerical display on the health bar - after all, this is not a real online game, and there is no way to calculate the ability to withstand attacks based on the health bar. So Yang Qiu thought about it and decided to display the battle damage in a bar. When the battle damage reaches a certain level, it is considered a death and the player will be forcibly recalled by the resurrection summon... The main reason is that they are afraid that players will be so reckless that they can even turn a thousand-year-old skeleton into pieces, so they take insurance in advance.
The three players who formed a team walked out of the birthplace and looked around the deserted town curiously.
"This place... is so shabby!" Skull No. 2 sighed. "Compared to the ruins exploration videos I've seen, this place is like a paradise on earth. Where did the artist take the scene from?"
"The birthplace of the undead has to have this kind of atmosphere." I think I appreciate this deserted town. "Compared to it, Undercity is too clean and tidy. It doesn't look like a place for the Forsaken at all..."
As they were talking, the three of them walked around a ramshackle wooden house.
Be it Qin Guan who was recording a video with his character's built-in first-person camera, or No. 2 with a look of curiosity, or I want to take medicine with a look of satisfaction and surprise, the chins on the three skull faces all dropped neatly.
There was a zombie squatting on the side of the cabin.
A half-rotten wax zombie.
Only half of his head had flesh, and most of his body was covered in dark blue skin, with a small part of his body being exposed white bones. He was wearing a tattered pullover and pants whose material was unidentifiable and whose hems were half torn. He was sitting in front of the dilapidated cabin with his hands on his knees.
The three players were just ordinary young people who had only seen corpses in horror games or horror movies. They were caught off guard by the sight of such a weirdly rotten, half-waxed zombie, and were all stunned instantly...
The zombie hugged his knees and slowly raised his head, looking at the three players with his lifeless eyes.
At this moment, Qin Guan seemed to see a big "danger" word painted on his head, and the word was bright red...
"Hey, fellow countrymen." The zombie spoke eerily, uttering Chinese characters stiffly, "It seems that you have just woken up from eternal sleep. Would you like to help me do something? I can give you clothes as a thank you gift."
Player 3: "...(° △°(° △° (° △° )"
