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AmazingAveryAge of Conan AdvocateMemberUncommonPosts: 7,188
Originally posted by Remali
The real question is why i would want to build a city in the bk instead of "cheating" and building a pve city that cant be attacked but making attacks to other guilds cities in the bk?This is why i think there must be clear advantages of building your city in the pvp zone than the pve instances
PvE City Influences your BattleKeep, the better your PvE city the more resources your BattleKeep will have.
PvE City has a guild hall, and other facilites to socialize and craft, would you want to craft and get ganked over an anvil? PvE cities and defending from NPC's also let you "practice" combat on a large scale without the worries of skilled players eating you up! No to mention formation combat. So yes your PvE city can get attacked but only from organised NPC's and their hives.
The clear advantage you so speak of that is needed and the reason to build a BattleKeep in the Borderlands could be crafting goods, ontop of all the other things mentioned here. By looking at the dev tracker on www.bymitra.com I can see several reasons why I would want to attain and hold a Battlekeep in the Borderlands, not to mention the whole section in the official forums.
I think this is GENIUS to allow the guild to select the PvP time. It adds a little bit of realism in the way of being able to have your Army ready. In the Conan world, one could not just ralley 200 troops, and show up at a players town in 15 minutes. Wars took time, and prepairation. Everybody that was going to be attacked pretty much knew they were getting attacked, its just too hard to hide with all the siege weapons and masses of people.
Though raiding an opponents Battlekeep would be fun.. What would be the point of you building one? Just for the enemy to come burn it to the ground? It doesn't sound to me like people would want to spend all of their time gathering resourses and getting money to build a Battlekeep that is only there to be destroyed.
WoW that sounds like something I would have heard from the "Trammel" hippies. One word my friend, ADVENTURE!
Its EXCITING! You have this awsome battlekeep, now fight to defend it!!!!
I can see points that everyone is trying to bring across I do like the idea of "conflict windows" I must admit. I'm pretty open
I play Starport alot which allows your planets to be raided at anytime whether you're online or not. thats just how the game is setup. you can place turrets all around your camp to defend it
The good thing this is a 'shift of power'. It is also a total sandbox element.
there have been days I logged off and had a fortune. logged on next coupla days and saw it all ruined. i imeediately retook my stuff. this was fun
but most folks not down to get their morale tested like that. anyway im pretty open to try what they gonna do at this point
another idea to consider I wouldnt mind seeing PVP approached like raids whereas you invade property and the longer you hold it- the more riches you earn. since u already have a PVE keep i wonder why get attached to a PVP keep too? Anyway like i said before I'm open to whatever they doin
AmazingAveryAge of Conan AdvocateMemberUncommonPosts: 7,188
Originally posted by vajuras
I can see points that everyone is trying to bring across I do like the idea of "conflict windows" I must admit. I'm pretty open anyway im pretty open to try what they gonna do at this point another idea to consider I wouldnt mind seeing PVP approached like raids whereas you invade property and the longer you hold it- the more riches you earn. since u already have a PVE keep i wonder why get attached to a PVP keep too? Anyway like i said before I'm open to whatever they doin
Well after the demo that has just been released, personally I felt a little disapointed that it wasn't the full on player vs player event (which happened to be PvP mini games (new))
However, here are some finer points complied by Aelfin:
A video at Liepzieg demonstrated a simulated PvP siege battle (with NPC's taking over for the hundreds of players they didn't have available to actually play.)
You can have a look here Bear in mind that certain details happen much faster than they normally would, including the sight of the trebuchets reducing the walls to rubble in mere seconds.
1.) Doubled walls and more intricate gateway systems are possible. Precisely how much... creativity in these terms is available is still unknown.
2.) PvP and PvE sieges are won when the central keep or main hall is destroyed.
3.) after any successfully defended siege, there is a period of several days before anyone can attack you again. You can set this time anywhere between 3 and 7 days. Longer safe periods reduce the benefits guild members get from the city, while shorter ones maximize it, while of course forcing you to defend yourself more often.
4.) resource nodes must be captured and defended against your enemies as well. The safe time period for these after successful defense is only one day.
5.) An ingame mechanic for the hiring of mercenaries is in place for both sides of a conflict. Guild A could for instance offer X amount of money to various players willing to help defend or attack the keep and then teleport said mercs to an appropriate point on the battlefield. Some kind of bonus/leveling system was mentioned for particularly successful mercs.
6.) When the attacking forces closed in on the central keep, an NPC boss mob spawned to help defend it. This was just for the Demo purposes.
7.) Mammoths were displayed more as living battering rams than archer platforms as some people have been thinking. Also, there appears to be a new mount option, War Rhinos!
8.) Possibly the most important detail, the AoC engine is quite capable of handling siege conditions at this level of development without any noticeable lag. Now, the graphics were set to low, used computer specs are probably rather high, and not as many characters were onscreen as will likely occur during a real siege, but it still is quite promising.
Edit, just found part of a particular article explaining more (translated to english) from a Q&A session:
BORDER KINGDOM :
- 3 Border kingdom region (not 3 instances) per server with 3 battlekeep , 4 Forts and 6 ressources (gold mine and the such) in each border kingdom.
-150 players on the screen at the same time , without any lag.
-When a battlekeep is build, the guild must start with the Trade Post, following by other building depending on the prestige class levels of the players.
-A guild can't build every building, they need to make choices (resources,defences,offences...) (Beta test will make sure no build is stronger than the other)
-A battlekeep can't be attacked between 3h am and 12pm, outside these hours, attackers and defenders guilds choose when the fight will happen, However if the defenders refuse too often the combat, the maintenance costs of the buildings of their BK will increase.
COMBAT :
-When fighting , the remote classes (casters and archers) will be able to position in height, to allow them a greater range all in their offering a better defense. By counter the body to body classes will be able to help moving the sieging machines that have been build in place with resources.
MOUNT :
-Two types of mountings, controlled by the players, will be useful at the time of sieging, each one with a specificity:
- the mammoth: specialized in the destruction of the walls
- the rhinoceros: specialized in the destruction of the doors and the damages to the players in AoE
-The more mountings will have taken dash, the more the impact against the structure met will be powerful and thus the more damage, thus making it possible to create a breach in the enclosure.
NB: to obtain them at release , you will have pre-order AOC.
MERCENARY SYSTEM :
A.Condition:
- Level 60
- Not decided if it's gonna be for everyone or only for those not in guild.
B.How it work:
-a price is fixed between the guild and the mercenary (that is to attack or defend).
- Mercenaries have 5 levels depending on the number of battles carried out. The ultimate level allows the handing-over of an "ubber" item, at the visual level, but not of the stats, by Conan itself.
PVP :
- There are twenty levels PvP, the last level being very difficult to reach. And each level allows obtaining items or feats.
- PvP Classification in the Kingdoms Borders via a Web page
-- PvP Classification for the guild according to the number of kill
-- PvP Classification for a player without guild according to the number of kill located in a zone defined around him.
I just want to try and clarify a few things that people seem to be concerned about. Note: All of this is subject to change, and could become outdated at anytime.
There are 3 levels of PvP objectives in the Border Kingdoms
Resources, which have a turnover time of 24 hours
Forts, which have a turnover time of 3 days
Battlekeeps, which have a turnover time of 7 days
In a given region there may be 3 Battlekeeps, 4 Forts, and 6 or so resources, this is again based on my estimates during design and are rough. NOTE THIS MEANS EACH KEEP IS NOT AN INSTANCE BUT A PART OF THIS AREA.
No more than 9 Battlekeeps (meaning 3 different BorderKingdom regions) per server based on our early calculations of server population.
Holding PvP objectives garners various bonus's to the owner. Be it "buffs", resources, access to additional respawn points, in the case of the Forts and Keeps guildbank access etc.
No guild can hold more than one Keep, however on successfully destroying another keep if they hold one they will be entitled to a temporary additional set of bonus's
The basics of the system are two fold. Vulnerability Windows, and Capture Method.
Vulnerability Windows describes when something can be attacked, basically a window of time on a cycle. Owners of a PvP objective can change the time of a vulnerability window but it is limited in three ways.
1) it cannot exceed the time of the intended cycle (IE more than 24 hours for a resource)
2) it must be within server lockouts. (IE Not between midnight and 8am server local time)
3) the time can only be changed once per cycle (no flipping the time to be at 9 then flipping it to 4 at 3:45)
These guidelines are of course all there to make things as fair as can be and shut the doors on as many exploits as possible.
Capture Method
All resources use the same capture method.
This method is based upon "tickets" being accrued by having control of the central destructible object.
This may not be optimal for some people in some ways but again it alleviates many non fun elements. Let me give an example.
In some systems as soon as you "capture" the objective the window is over, this means someone rolls in at 4:01 on a window of 4-7pm and wins, game over pvp done.
In some other systems it matters who owns the objective right at the end. I hold the objective for almost 2 hours, another guild steamrolls me last 5 minutes, we lose.
Both of these were not acceptable to me so what we have is the "tickets"
Building the object accrues points while it is built. You can upgrade this to fortify it and give it other advantages.
If no object is built then Tickets can be gained through numerical superiority in the objects area.
Tickets are lost by deaths by your guild in the same area.
Tickets cannot go below zero
During the last portion of the Vulnerability Window Ticket gain will be doubled. (This gives you some chance of catching up if you did not hold onto the objective the entire time)
Ownership is tracked based on guild, a single individual cannot capture and hold an objective.
A guild may hold numerous resources and forts but only one Battlekeep
The Border Kingdoms is an open PvP area, this means that engaging other players is available at all times, except your own party or guild members.
Only one guild may win possession of an objective, however there is no limit to who wants to participate.
Yes this means you should be diplomatic and get help when defending/attacking, because you are going to have to give people reasons to want to help you. This also means controlling nearby forts is crucial to sieging to have fallback points for respawn for both defenders and attackers.
This eliminates problems with having "buddies" "alliance mates" "dummy guilds" you name it from declaring war and keeping an objective, especially a keep from being contended by people who really want to win it. This refers to the fact anyone can attack during a vulnerability window.
Depending on how long you hold out, you may have enough tickets to win a defense even if you are ousted eventually.
If you hold a nearby Fort or two you could also counterattack the keep etc.
Anyway I hope this clears up some things.
If I feel I completely missed something I may respond or edit the post however this is not an open all to "but what about" everything PvP related in this thread.
__________________
Athelan-NPC/Monster Designer, Behavioral Control Center/Combat Guru, Age of Conan
So thats where we are up to with information. But apparently I "spread propaganda and misinformation" so read into it what you will.
Anyone want to chat about where we stand now with the information given? Considering how well this topic started off?
Personally the lag issue bothers me, but I guess we will have to wait and see how that element pans out.
AmazingAveryAge of Conan AdvocateMemberUncommonPosts: 7,188
I also believe there is a very good chance there will be a seige showing from either:
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/
I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/ I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
There simply were not enough computers there to let players do the siege pvp, plus none of them really know how to play. They got a quick lesson and that was it, it was not as if they had been trained over and over on how to play, it would have looked horrible, the internet would have been so slow with all those people playing considering other games were being played online there, too. It just wouldn't have worked with a ton of players doing a siege.
AmazingAveryAge of Conan AdvocateMemberUncommonPosts: 7,188
Originally posted by Ghost12
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/ I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
No they didn't say that players would be playing "Seige PvP" but would be playing some PvP on the game floor (the new mini games), so what transpirered was right from their point of view. I don't think it was misleading but was more fan hyped into believing that it would occur. I was disapointed too as I expected some kind of take with more than 2 people simulating seiging, however, I am very happy with all the new information on the game that came out.
I especially find the concept of "Merc's" interesting and a welcome new addition.
Oh yeah the merc system is great. Players have been talking about a mercenary system for years and finally a smart company like Funcom picks it up Good stuff
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/ I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
Nope.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
Originally posted by siresper Originally posted by Ghost12 I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/ I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
Nope.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right? I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug
Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/
I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
Nope.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug
Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
Good thing I have plenty of both thanks for the applaud.
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/
I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
Nope.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug
Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
Good thing I have plenty of both thanks for the applaud.
You have to understand that there are likely simply not enough people in the beta for this just yet. Not everyone who has been accepted into the beta will log on at the same time and try the same things. Not only this but if you can't control what the actions are, you may have an entire siege go off without any use of siege weapons or mounts. The players may have taken it upon themselves to just melee it out. There are many variables to consider when using live players. How is the live players internet connection, how good is his/her computer. How skilled are they? It wouldn't be much of a showcase if all the players had little to no clue as to how to truly play their character.
Scripting it was honestly the better decision.
AmazingAveryAge of Conan AdvocateMemberUncommonPosts: 7,188
I don't think it could of gone down any other way at this stage of development.
I don't think it could of gone down any other way at this stage of development. Can we move on yet?
If you can cite solid evidence to the contrary, maybe we could move on Avery. But throwing insults and 'I don't agree but can't prove it so lets move on' posts hardly qualifies.
So... lets ASSUME that they didn't have enough players for a real live siege (though I'm hesitant to go to such a stretch). That would mean:
1) They haven't done any real testing of sieges at all
2) They have no idea of the strain that many players could put on their system
3) The screenshots with many players on screen at once were just faked with bots, and in no way show that the game can handle that many players
4) Combat too hard to understand was not the real reason for the delay (but you never heard that from funcom)
Are these all bots? Or are these players? If they are players... they obviously have enough players to show the kind of siege footage people were looking for. If they are bots.. I think they are obligated to say so. None of these characters in the pic are standing around doing nothing. Was this just another canned picture designed to deceive? If they had a dev ready to take a picture of this particular siege event, why not a video?
You can argue that they either have enough players playing at once or they dont. Either way, you bring along with it some interesting conclusions about Funcom. So which lesser of two evils are the extremists going to go with? Or shall we go with Avery's "uhh.... lets move on *exit stage left*
so um, roughly, how many people are in the beta currently? because if they've got ONLY 10,000+, and only 15% are logged on at any given time... i'm thinking that's enough to get some siege warfare going... especially when the beta board/login screens could say "we're testing siege warfare this week" or "we're testing siege warfare this week during the 1200-1800 gmt hours".
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Roughly there are very few in the beta currently. The two times they have had promised spots to users based on contests, those users are still not in, and they only offered like 150 spots for each of those events. They came out and said they were starting general beta, but it is safe to assume that they were actually still in tech beta. Again, there are not that many people in. Nowhere near 10k for sure.
How bout they don't have real players because there weren't more then a dozen computers up at the show and everyone there was a newb and wouldn't know the first thing about how to do the sieges and each siege was a 15 minute demo shown dozens of times per day over the course of a week so theres no way they could have people at the show playing the siege and even if you tried to make the argument 'why don't they just use the beta-testers,' I'd reply that A: telling your beta-testers to repeat a siege every 15 minutes for 12 hours a day for a week is a recipe for disaster and b: it would be laggy as hell considering the size of the show and the amount of bandwidth that would have been available, and and last, has anyone, EVER shown 100+ player sieges for ANY game in a trade show before? Nope.. didn't think so.
Sorry for that huge run-on sentence, but anyone who seriously expected them to have 100+ players demonstrating the sieges in 15 minute windows probably 30 times a day for a week strait, was laughably mistaken.
Heh, I wouldn't have expected them to do all that either. I don't recall ever asking for 100+ players at once. Only one that ever mentioned sieges of that size was funcom. But im of the mind that you should never say things unless you can back them up
One single demo.. with maybe 20-30 people max would have been fine. If not a live demonstration at the actual show than maybe a prerecorded event from beforehand and released during the event. 2 people and a bunch of bots.. nope, not a siege. Not even pvp. Pvp stands for player versus player.
They didn't have to show that same thing every 15 minutes for a week. Just once, record, playback for the audience. Maybe give some voice dialog from the devs during playback. Doesn't have to be an all or nothing thing. Never was. Thats just the extremist talking, trying to make simple things sound like impossible tasks to rationalize why it wasn't done. Someone wants more than 2 player sieges and all of a sudden they are asking for 200 player sieges. Well thats just more spin than I can handle.
I see a few other games that seem to have no trouble getting players together and recording footage. Funcom seems to have some difficulty. Which is interesting seeing as how its been in development longer and was originally going to be released in October before the pushback. You'd think this would give them a leg up on the testing. You'd think.
How bout they don't have real players because there weren't more then a dozen computers up at the show and everyone there was a newb and wouldn't know the first thing about how to do the sieges and each siege was a 15 minute demo shown dozens of times per day over the course of a week so theres no way they could have people at the show playing the siege and even if you tried to make the argument 'why don't they just use the beta-testers,' I'd reply that A: telling your beta-testers to repeat a siege every 15 minutes for 12 hours a day for a week is a recipe for disaster and b: it would be laggy as hell considering the size of the show and the amount of bandwidth that would have been available, and and last, has anyone, EVER shown 100+ player sieges for ANY game in a trade show before? Nope.. didn't think so.
Sorry for that huge run-on sentence, but anyone who seriously expected them to have 100+ players demonstrating the sieges in 15 minute windows probably 30 times a day for a week strait, was laughably mistaken.
Heh, I wouldn't have expected them to do all that either. I don't recall ever asking for 100+ players at once. Only one that ever mentioned sieges of that size was funcom. But im of the mind that you should never say things unless you can back them up
One single demo.. with maybe 20-30 people max would have been fine. If not a live demonstration at the actual show than maybe a prerecorded event from beforehand and released during the event. 2 people and a bunch of bots.. nope, not a siege. Not even pvp. Pvp stands for player versus player.
They didn't have to show that same thing every 15 minutes for a week. Just once, record, playback for the audience. Maybe give some voice dialog from the devs during playback. Doesn't have to be an all or nothing thing. Never was. Thats just the extremist talking, trying to make simple things sound like impossible tasks to rationalize why it wasn't done. Someone wants more than 2 player sieges and all of a sudden they are asking for 200 player sieges. Well thats just more spin than I can handle.
I see a few other games that seem to have no trouble getting players together and recording footage. Funcom seems to have some difficulty. Which is interesting seeing as how its been in development longer and was originally going to be released in October before the pushback. You'd think this would give them a leg up on the testing. You'd think.
They said they would showcase siege combat and they would showcase pvp. They did both. They let players PvP and they also did a scripted siege.
AmazingAveryAge of Conan AdvocateMemberUncommonPosts: 7,188
Originally posted by siresper
Originally posted by AmazingAvery
I don't think it could of gone down any other way at this stage of development. Can we move on yet?
If you can cite solid evidence to the contrary, maybe we could move on Avery. But throwing insults and 'I don't agree but can't prove it so lets move on' posts hardly qualifies.
So... lets ASSUME that they didn't have enough players for a real live siege (though I'm hesitant to go to such a stretch). That would mean:
1) They haven't done any real testing of sieges at all
2) They have no idea of the strain that many players could put on their system
3) The screenshots with many players on screen at once were just faked with bots, and in no way show that the game can handle that many players
4) Combat too hard to understand was not the real reason for the delay (but you never heard that from funcom)
Was this just another canned picture designed to deceive? If they had a dev ready to take a picture of this particular siege event, why not a video?
You can argue that they either have enough players playing at once or they dont. Either way, you bring along with it some interesting conclusions about Funcom. So which lesser of two evils are the extremists going to go with? Or shall we go with Avery's "uhh.... lets move on *exit stage left*
Its not about "proving" evidence, its about your assumptions and the showing they did, which wasn't up to your standards.
The thing is your assumptions are.... just that assumptions, based on your credentials, your knowledge of live events, and gaming know how at game events. Do these assumptions you make hold any weight? Well I respect your opinion but I do disagree. If you want to leave the insults at the door thats great.
I thought that you had a good responce from Straddden / mmorpg.com as from someone was actually there at the event and does this thing for a living. I thought the techicnal side of things was already discussed quite a bit. I wasn't backing out the stage door, I just felt that there were other elements / news from the show that would make for a "better" discussion.
Siresper, I don't know why you have to used words such as "decieve" , it instills something bad that Funcom has done. If I am allowed to have an opinion without being called a fanbois etc etc thats just how it comes across in alot of your posts, like you have some personal issue with Funcom (we know you have with AO) but I can look past this, as I don't think Funcom has deceived in ScreenShots or live showings. I think that if they had just made a video, people would question that it was bad, not natural etc etc I think it would be better to go the way they did and show it running real time. It really shows where the game is at. Its not about being the lesser of anything, with either "evil", its about they showed what they showed, if it wasn't good enough for you im sorry, we can't do anything about it now. Hence, in a topic about BorderLands PvP, we heard and saw new mounts, a merc system, details on fighing window, siege engines etc etc - wouldn't that be more worthy to talk about than what could of been?
Originally posted by Stradden
Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had.
Umm, just to jump in and make a point here.
Funcom, and everyone else that was demoing anything at the show behind-the-scenes, had to deal with a huge number of obstacles in terms of scheduling. Maybe a little bit of perspective on the way that things work at these shows would help you:
For me, I was moving from appointment to appointment, with no time in between. The same is true for the developers. These demos are scheduled in advance, often weeks in advance, and include a number of different press outlets. They didn't do just one presentation. They did half an hour presentations almost back to back for a number of days. As a press person covering this event, I don't have time to waste in a booth waiting while 200 live players are organized. Have you ever tried to organize 200 people online? It's possible, but it's exactly the kind of situation where things go wrong... a lot. Again, as a press person, I can't spend my entire day waiting while something like that is organized, and all of the planning beforehand in the world isn't going to help you. It's an on-the-fly job.
On top of this, the internet connection in the hall (or in any large, open space) is not reliable 100% of the time.
I have never been involved in a demo like that, for any MMO, that had live beta players.
I should also point out that we visited their booth on the show floor where I watched people playing live without any lag that I noticed.
There are a number of technical issues as well. Remember, they are sharing internet with every other booth in the complex.
Now, I don't have any particular feelings about Age of Conan, but your statement was extremely harsh when you clearly did not have all of the information. I hope that this helps.
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/ I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
Nope.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right? I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
Good thing I have plenty of both thanks for the applaud.
Hehe, next time I see a fact as opposed to an assumption from you, I'll take a big pause, and really applaud you, I'm just trying to recognize your effort, as it seems you like the attention to spur you on to new heights.
I'm just not sure exactly what you are trying to accomplish, because you arent looking for discussion, it seems you are just looking to start arguments with people who dont see things the same way as you. Oh...and gee...they dont see the same thing as you, and on an Age of Conan forum? Wow...never would have suspected that. Is it a cheap thrill, are you doing a public service? I'm just curious the motivation.
Either or, to each his own, because quite often those who find the blind fanboi's as annoying go to the complete other extreme, and then their opinions become completely worthless as well.
EDIT: You know what, Im gonna keep my trap shut in here. I think this argument is a bit ridiculous actually, there are way too many factors involved to see whether or not Funcom could do something live. However, I do find it odd that they could not do a recording session of maybe 15v15 people in a mini siege beforehand. Something fishy is going on...I mean come on a pushback for 5 months just for a combo listing? I beg to differ.
Comments
PvE City has a guild hall, and other facilites to socialize and craft, would you want to craft and get ganked over an anvil? PvE cities and defending from NPC's also let you "practice" combat on a large scale without the worries of skilled players eating you up! No to mention formation combat. So yes your PvE city can get attacked but only from organised NPC's and their hives.
The clear advantage you so speak of that is needed and the reason to build a BattleKeep in the Borderlands could be crafting goods, ontop of all the other things mentioned here. By looking at the dev tracker on www.bymitra.com I can see several reasons why I would want to attain and hold a Battlekeep in the Borderlands, not to mention the whole section in the official forums.
I think this is GENIUS to allow the guild to select the PvP time. It adds a little bit of realism in the way of being able to have your Army ready. In the Conan world, one could not just ralley 200 troops, and show up at a players town in 15 minutes. Wars took time, and prepairation. Everybody that was going to be attacked pretty much knew they were getting attacked, its just too hard to hide with all the siege weapons and masses of people.
WoW that sounds like something I would have heard from the "Trammel" hippies. One word my friend, ADVENTURE!
Its EXCITING! You have this awsome battlekeep, now fight to defend it!!!!
I can see points that everyone is trying to bring across I do like the idea of "conflict windows" I must admit. I'm pretty open
I play Starport alot which allows your planets to be raided at anytime whether you're online or not. thats just how the game is setup. you can place turrets all around your camp to defend it
The good thing this is a 'shift of power'. It is also a total sandbox element.
there have been days I logged off and had a fortune. logged on next coupla days and saw it all ruined. i imeediately retook my stuff. this was fun
but most folks not down to get their morale tested like that. anyway im pretty open to try what they gonna do at this point
another idea to consider I wouldnt mind seeing PVP approached like raids whereas you invade property and the longer you hold it- the more riches you earn. since u already have a PVE keep i wonder why get attached to a PVP keep too? Anyway like i said before I'm open to whatever they doin
Well after the demo that has just been released, personally I felt a little disapointed that it wasn't the full on player vs player event (which happened to be PvP mini games (new))
However, here are some finer points complied by Aelfin:
A video at Liepzieg demonstrated a simulated PvP siege battle (with NPC's taking over for the hundreds of players they didn't have available to actually play.)
You can have a look here Bear in mind that certain details happen much faster than they normally would, including the sight of the trebuchets reducing the walls to rubble in mere seconds.
1.) Doubled walls and more intricate gateway systems are possible. Precisely how much... creativity in these terms is available is still unknown.
2.) PvP and PvE sieges are won when the central keep or main hall is destroyed.
3.) after any successfully defended siege, there is a period of several days before anyone can attack you again. You can set this time anywhere between 3 and 7 days. Longer safe periods reduce the benefits guild members get from the city, while shorter ones maximize it, while of course forcing you to defend yourself more often.
4.) resource nodes must be captured and defended against your enemies as well. The safe time period for these after successful defense is only one day.
5.) An ingame mechanic for the hiring of mercenaries is in place for both sides of a conflict. Guild A could for instance offer X amount of money to various players willing to help defend or attack the keep and then teleport said mercs to an appropriate point on the battlefield. Some kind of bonus/leveling system was mentioned for particularly successful mercs.
6.) When the attacking forces closed in on the central keep, an NPC boss mob spawned to help defend it. This was just for the Demo purposes.
7.) Mammoths were displayed more as living battering rams than archer platforms as some people have been thinking. Also, there appears to be a new mount option, War Rhinos!
8.) Possibly the most important detail, the AoC engine is quite capable of handling siege conditions at this level of development without any noticeable lag. Now, the graphics were set to low, used computer specs are probably rather high, and not as many characters were onscreen as will likely occur during a real siege, but it still is quite promising.
Edit, just found part of a particular article explaining more (translated to english) from a Q&A session:
BORDER KINGDOM :
- 3 Border kingdom region (not 3 instances) per server with 3 battlekeep , 4 Forts and 6 ressources (gold mine and the such) in each border kingdom.
-150 players on the screen at the same time , without any lag.
-When a battlekeep is build, the guild must start with the Trade Post, following by other building depending on the prestige class levels of the players.
-A guild can't build every building, they need to make choices (resources,defences,offences...) (Beta test will make sure no build is stronger than the other)
-A battlekeep can't be attacked between 3h am and 12pm, outside these hours, attackers and defenders guilds choose when the fight will happen, However if the defenders refuse too often the combat, the maintenance costs of the buildings of their BK will increase.
COMBAT :
-When fighting , the remote classes (casters and archers) will be able to position in height, to allow them a greater range all in their offering a better defense. By counter the body to body classes will be able to help moving the sieging machines that have been build in place with resources.
MOUNT :
-Two types of mountings, controlled by the players, will be useful at the time of sieging, each one with a specificity:
- the mammoth: specialized in the destruction of the walls
- the rhinoceros: specialized in the destruction of the doors and the damages to the players in AoE
-The more mountings will have taken dash, the more the impact against the structure met will be powerful and thus the more damage, thus making it possible to create a breach in the enclosure.
NB: to obtain them at release , you will have pre-order AOC.
MERCENARY SYSTEM :
A.Condition:
- Level 60
- Not decided if it's gonna be for everyone or only for those not in guild.
B.How it work:
-a price is fixed between the guild and the mercenary (that is to attack or defend).
- Mercenaries have 5 levels depending on the number of battles carried out. The ultimate level allows the handing-over of an "ubber" item, at the visual level, but not of the stats, by Conan itself.
PVP :
- There are twenty levels PvP, the last level being very difficult to reach. And each level allows obtaining items or feats.
- PvP Classification in the Kingdoms Borders via a Web page
-- PvP Classification for the guild according to the number of kill
-- PvP Classification for a player without guild according to the number of kill located in a zone defined around him.
and a Dev quote:
Yesterday, 17:32:27 #1 Athelan vbmenu_register("postmenu_927312", true);
Developer
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: Lost in BCC Land
After watching this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TTsD...Ephp%3Ft%3D339
I just want to try and clarify a few things that people seem to be concerned about. Note: All of this is subject to change, and could become outdated at anytime.
There are 3 levels of PvP objectives in the Border Kingdoms
Resources, which have a turnover time of 24 hours
Forts, which have a turnover time of 3 days
Battlekeeps, which have a turnover time of 7 days
In a given region there may be 3 Battlekeeps, 4 Forts, and 6 or so resources, this is again based on my estimates during design and are rough. NOTE THIS MEANS EACH KEEP IS NOT AN INSTANCE BUT A PART OF THIS AREA.
No more than 9 Battlekeeps (meaning 3 different BorderKingdom regions) per server based on our early calculations of server population.
Holding PvP objectives garners various bonus's to the owner. Be it "buffs", resources, access to additional respawn points, in the case of the Forts and Keeps guildbank access etc.
No guild can hold more than one Keep, however on successfully destroying another keep if they hold one they will be entitled to a temporary additional set of bonus's
The basics of the system are two fold. Vulnerability Windows, and Capture Method.
Vulnerability Windows describes when something can be attacked, basically a window of time on a cycle. Owners of a PvP objective can change the time of a vulnerability window but it is limited in three ways.
1) it cannot exceed the time of the intended cycle (IE more than 24 hours for a resource)
2) it must be within server lockouts. (IE Not between midnight and 8am server local time)
3) the time can only be changed once per cycle (no flipping the time to be at 9 then flipping it to 4 at 3:45)
These guidelines are of course all there to make things as fair as can be and shut the doors on as many exploits as possible.
Capture Method
All resources use the same capture method.
This method is based upon "tickets" being accrued by having control of the central destructible object.
This may not be optimal for some people in some ways but again it alleviates many non fun elements. Let me give an example.
In some systems as soon as you "capture" the objective the window is over, this means someone rolls in at 4:01 on a window of 4-7pm and wins, game over pvp done.
In some other systems it matters who owns the objective right at the end. I hold the objective for almost 2 hours, another guild steamrolls me last 5 minutes, we lose.
Both of these were not acceptable to me so what we have is the "tickets"
Building the object accrues points while it is built. You can upgrade this to fortify it and give it other advantages.
If no object is built then Tickets can be gained through numerical superiority in the objects area.
Tickets are lost by deaths by your guild in the same area.
Tickets cannot go below zero
During the last portion of the Vulnerability Window Ticket gain will be doubled. (This gives you some chance of catching up if you did not hold onto the objective the entire time)
Ownership is tracked based on guild, a single individual cannot capture and hold an objective.
A guild may hold numerous resources and forts but only one Battlekeep
The Border Kingdoms is an open PvP area, this means that engaging other players is available at all times, except your own party or guild members.
Only one guild may win possession of an objective, however there is no limit to who wants to participate.
Yes this means you should be diplomatic and get help when defending/attacking, because you are going to have to give people reasons to want to help you. This also means controlling nearby forts is crucial to sieging to have fallback points for respawn for both defenders and attackers.
This eliminates problems with having "buddies" "alliance mates" "dummy guilds" you name it from declaring war and keeping an objective, especially a keep from being contended by people who really want to win it. This refers to the fact anyone can attack during a vulnerability window.
Depending on how long you hold out, you may have enough tickets to win a defense even if you are ousted eventually.
If you hold a nearby Fort or two you could also counterattack the keep etc.
Anyway I hope this clears up some things.
If I feel I completely missed something I may respond or edit the post however this is not an open all to "but what about" everything PvP related in this thread.
__________________
Athelan -NPC/Monster Designer, Behavioral Control Center/Combat Guru, Age of Conan
So thats where we are up to with information. But apparently I "spread propaganda and misinformation" so read into it what you will.
Anyone want to chat about where we stand now with the information given? Considering how well this topic started off?
Personally the lag issue bothers me, but I guess we will have to wait and see how that element pans out.
I also believe there is a very good chance there will be a seige showing from either:
http://www.game-tv.com/internerplayer
http://www.game-tv.com/externerplayer
In about 9 hours and 10 mins from the time of his posting.
If anyone is interested..
I knew it. They didnt have players there doing the siege pvp did they? I thought they would, didnt they say that? =/
I was really hoping they would have had some live PvP where a bunch of people at Leipzeig would go at it. Im sorry, but a simulated siege session just doesnt cut it, and especially the demo they showed us was pretty lacking. I know Im being kind of harsh, but i have my standards set high for this game.
There simply were not enough computers there to let players do the siege pvp, plus none of them really know how to play. They got a quick lesson and that was it, it was not as if they had been trained over and over on how to play, it would have looked horrible, the internet would have been so slow with all those people playing considering other games were being played online there, too. It just wouldn't have worked with a ton of players doing a siege.
I especially find the concept of "Merc's" interesting and a welcome new addition.
Oh yeah the merc system is great. Players have been talking about a mercenary system for years and finally a smart company like Funcom picks it up
Good stuff
Nope.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug
Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug
Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
Good thing I have plenty of both
Another thing that occured to me that they could have done pretty easily was record some siege footage before the event, from the beta servers. Just had some guilds go at it and just have a dev watch and record. Then release that video at Leipzeig. Sure they may not have the computers or players for the siege at the event.. but if it was recorded beforehand it wouldn't have been much of a problem, right?
I've been arguing all day of why they couldn't show actual live players in a siege so I'm not going to argue about that any more for tonight. Just thought I'd throw that out there as a big 'why couldn't they have done it that way?' sort of thing.
/shrug
Or you could simply argue that the game is still in Techinical Beta, not yet general, and there are not full guilds to participate in guild versus guild events. Dont let facts stand in the way of good arguments, I'll applaud this effort of yours!
thanks for the applaud.
You have to understand that there are likely simply not enough people in the beta for this just yet. Not everyone who has been accepted into the beta will log on at the same time and try the same things. Not only this but if you can't control what the actions are, you may have an entire siege go off without any use of siege weapons or mounts. The players may have taken it upon themselves to just melee it out. There are many variables to consider when using live players. How is the live players internet connection, how good is his/her computer. How skilled are they? It wouldn't be much of a showcase if all the players had little to no clue as to how to truly play their character.Good thing I have plenty of both
Scripting it was honestly the better decision.
I don't think it could of gone down any other way at this stage of development.
Can we move on yet?
So... lets ASSUME that they didn't have enough players for a real live siege (though I'm hesitant to go to such a stretch). That would mean:
1) They haven't done any real testing of sieges at all
2) They have no idea of the strain that many players could put on their system
3) The screenshots with many players on screen at once were just faked with bots, and in no way show that the game can handle that many players
4) Combat too hard to understand was not the real reason for the delay (but you never heard that from funcom)
Are these all bots? Or are these players? If they are players... they obviously have enough players to show the kind of siege footage people were looking for. If they are bots.. I think they are obligated to say so. None of these characters in the pic are standing around doing nothing. Was this just another canned picture designed to deceive? If they had a dev ready to take a picture of this particular siege event, why not a video?
You can argue that they either have enough players playing at once or they dont. Either way, you bring along with it some interesting conclusions about Funcom. So which lesser of two evils are the extremists going to go with? Or shall we go with Avery's "uhh.... lets move on *exit stage left*
so um, roughly, how many people are in the beta currently? because if they've got ONLY 10,000+, and only 15% are logged on at any given time... i'm thinking that's enough to get some siege warfare going... especially when the beta board/login screens could say "we're testing siege warfare this week" or "we're testing siege warfare this week during the 1200-1800 gmt hours".
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Roughly there are very few in the beta currently. The two times they have had promised spots to users based on contests, those users are still not in, and they only offered like 150 spots for each of those events. They came out and said they were starting general beta, but it is safe to assume that they were actually still in tech beta. Again, there are not that many people in. Nowhere near 10k for sure.
Heh, I wouldn't have expected them to do all that either.
One single demo.. with maybe 20-30 people max would have been fine. If not a live demonstration at the actual show than maybe a prerecorded event from beforehand and released during the event. 2 people and a bunch of bots.. nope, not a siege. Not even pvp. Pvp stands for player versus player.
They didn't have to show that same thing every 15 minutes for a week. Just once, record, playback for the audience. Maybe give some voice dialog from the devs during playback. Doesn't have to be an all or nothing thing. Never was. Thats just the extremist talking, trying to make simple things sound like impossible tasks to rationalize why it wasn't done. Someone wants more than 2 player sieges and all of a sudden they are asking for 200 player sieges. Well thats just more spin than I can handle.
I see a few other games that seem to have no trouble getting players together and recording footage. Funcom seems to have some difficulty. Which is interesting seeing as how its been in development longer and was originally going to be released in October before the pushback. You'd think this would give them a leg up on the testing. You'd think.
Heh, I wouldn't have expected them to do all that either.
One single demo.. with maybe 20-30 people max would have been fine. If not a live demonstration at the actual show than maybe a prerecorded event from beforehand and released during the event. 2 people and a bunch of bots.. nope, not a siege. Not even pvp. Pvp stands for player versus player.
They didn't have to show that same thing every 15 minutes for a week. Just once, record, playback for the audience. Maybe give some voice dialog from the devs during playback. Doesn't have to be an all or nothing thing. Never was. Thats just the extremist talking, trying to make simple things sound like impossible tasks to rationalize why it wasn't done. Someone wants more than 2 player sieges and all of a sudden they are asking for 200 player sieges. Well thats just more spin than I can handle.
I see a few other games that seem to have no trouble getting players together and recording footage. Funcom seems to have some difficulty. Which is interesting seeing as how its been in development longer and was originally going to be released in October before the pushback. You'd think this would give them a leg up on the testing. You'd think.
They said they would showcase siege combat and they would showcase pvp. They did both. They let players PvP and they also did a scripted siege.
If you can cite solid evidence to the contrary, maybe we could move on Avery. But throwing insults and 'I don't agree but can't prove it so lets move on' posts hardly qualifies.So... lets ASSUME that they didn't have enough players for a real live siege (though I'm hesitant to go to such a stretch). That would mean:
1) They haven't done any real testing of sieges at all
2) They have no idea of the strain that many players could put on their system
3) The screenshots with many players on screen at once were just faked with bots, and in no way show that the game can handle that many players
4) Combat too hard to understand was not the real reason for the delay (but you never heard that from funcom)
Was this just another canned picture designed to deceive? If they had a dev ready to take a picture of this particular siege event, why not a video?
You can argue that they either have enough players playing at once or they dont. Either way, you bring along with it some interesting conclusions about Funcom. So which lesser of two evils are the extremists going to go with? Or shall we go with Avery's "uhh.... lets move on *exit stage left*
Its not about "proving" evidence, its about your assumptions and the showing they did, which wasn't up to your standards.
The thing is your assumptions are.... just that assumptions, based on your credentials, your knowledge of live events, and gaming know how at game events. Do these assumptions you make hold any weight? Well I respect your opinion but I do disagree. If you want to leave the insults at the door thats great.
I thought that you had a good responce from Straddden / mmorpg.com as from someone was actually there at the event and does this thing for a living. I thought the techicnal side of things was already discussed quite a bit. I wasn't backing out the stage door, I just felt that there were other elements / news from the show that would make for a "better" discussion.
Siresper, I don't know why you have to used words such as "decieve" , it instills something bad that Funcom has done. If I am allowed to have an opinion without being called a fanbois etc etc thats just how it comes across in alot of your posts, like you have some personal issue with Funcom (we know you have with AO) but I can look past this, as I don't think Funcom has deceived in ScreenShots or live showings. I think that if they had just made a video, people would question that it was bad, not natural etc etc I think it would be better to go the way they did and show it running real time. It really shows where the game is at. Its not about being the lesser of anything, with either "evil", its about they showed what they showed, if it wasn't good enough for you im sorry, we can't do anything about it now. Hence, in a topic about BorderLands PvP, we heard and saw new mounts, a merc system, details on fighing window, siege engines etc etc - wouldn't that be more worthy to talk about than what could of been?
Umm, just to jump in and make a point here.
Funcom, and everyone else that was demoing anything at the show behind-the-scenes, had to deal with a huge number of obstacles in terms of scheduling. Maybe a little bit of perspective on the way that things work at these shows would help you:
For me, I was moving from appointment to appointment, with no time in between. The same is true for the developers. These demos are scheduled in advance, often weeks in advance, and include a number of different press outlets. They didn't do just one presentation. They did half an hour presentations almost back to back for a number of days. As a press person covering this event, I don't have time to waste in a booth waiting while 200 live players are organized. Have you ever tried to organize 200 people online? It's possible, but it's exactly the kind of situation where things go wrong... a lot. Again, as a press person, I can't spend my entire day waiting while something like that is organized, and all of the planning beforehand in the world isn't going to help you. It's an on-the-fly job.
On top of this, the internet connection in the hall (or in any large, open space) is not reliable 100% of the time.
I have never been involved in a demo like that, for any MMO, that had live beta players.
I should also point out that we visited their booth on the show floor where I watched people playing live without any lag that I noticed.
There are a number of technical issues as well. Remember, they are sharing internet with every other booth in the complex.
Now, I don't have any particular feelings about Age of Conan, but your statement was extremely harsh when you clearly did not have all of the information. I hope that this helps.
Hehe, next time I see a fact as opposed to an assumption from you, I'll take a big pause, and really applaud you, I'm just trying to recognize your effort, as it seems you like the attention to spur you on to new heights.
I'm just not sure exactly what you are trying to accomplish, because you arent looking for discussion, it seems you are just looking to start arguments with people who dont see things the same way as you. Oh...and gee...they dont see the same thing as you, and on an Age of Conan forum? Wow...never would have suspected that. Is it a cheap thrill, are you doing a public service? I'm just curious the motivation.
Either or, to each his own, because quite often those who find the blind fanboi's as annoying go to the complete other extreme, and then their opinions become completely worthless as well.
/shrug
Of course I'm sure you are on top of it.
EDIT: You know what, Im gonna keep my trap shut in here. I think this argument is a bit ridiculous actually, there are way too many factors involved to see whether or not Funcom could do something live. However, I do find it odd that they could not do a recording session of maybe 15v15 people in a mini siege beforehand. Something fishy is going on...I mean come on a pushback for 5 months just for a combo listing? I beg to differ.