The one character per server per account restriction that SWG had, was the biggest direct cause of me quitting the game (months before the CU or NGE). In a game that was about the freedom to explore different characters and profession trees, it pretty much eliminated any freedom I had to create another unique character.
i thought this was one of the things that was a good mechanic, it built the community and you got to know merchants and other players by their name. if you wanted to change your build you were able to when ever you wanted, not log in some twinked alt, there was nothing keeping you from doing so.
I'd have to say the point and click movement systems found too reguraly in F2p games. I'd also have to say excessive grinding to level because there isnt enough quests.
(AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH wins big broadway dance part, but finds out it CATS.....AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH)
All my opinions are just that..opinions. If you like my opinions..coolness.If you dont like my opinion....I really dont care. Playing: ESO, WOT, Smite, and Marvel Heroes
MMO forums where thousands of people who do not play MMO's can dictate how to dumb down MMO's and ruin the experience of people who actually play these games.
How else would you suggest a story/character to progress?
I like questing, but know quite a few people that like to progress by PvP or just grinding mobs. Questing is not a must, actually
That depends.....
I don't see a whole lot of people lining up to play Lineage 2 which basically offers you that. Lots and lots of that actually...
IMHO the dumbest mechanic ever for the player but the most ingenious for the Dev is the "kill / fetch task". Once they got us to "love" them and do them like hamsters on a wheel, the genre fell apart.
It always boggled me that the same people who bash games like Lineage 2 for it's grind and lack of quest are the ones playing WoW doing all those assorted faction grinds and daily kill task...errr...quest for years on end...which is 10x the grind L2 could ever hope to be.
The most disappointing thing in MMOs so far is their total inability to capture either an RPG world OR a virtual world. Instead we have Stat manager programs with avatars.
Female characters that look like Playboy bunnies wearing 500 defense armor that you wouldn't let them go out in public wearing - were you their father.
Not saying it isn't fun to look at - but it certainly is dumb.
Female characters that look like Playboy bunnies wearing 500 defense armor that you wouldn't let them go out in public wearing - were you their father.
Not saying it isn't fun to look at - but it certainly is dumb.
I will have you know that those thongs are made of steel and built for protection.
Female characters that look like Playboy bunnies wearing 500 defense armor that you wouldn't let them go out in public wearing - were you their father.
Not saying it isn't fun to look at - but it certainly is dumb.
I will have you know that those thongs are made of steel and built for protection.
I will make you know, that that is exactly the reason no one takes fantasy seriously.
Where the hell are those feminists, when you need them?
I hate WoW because it made my plush hamster kill himself, created twin clones of Hitler, punched Superboy Prime in reality, stared my dog down, spoiled my grandmother, assimilated me into the Borg, then made me into a real boy, just to make me a woman again.
Originally posted by Goronian I will make you know, that that is exactly the reason no one takes fantasy seriously. Where the hell are those feminists, when you need them?
Speaking of another subject no one takes seriously.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Best game mechanic of all time? Probably the Jedi system in SWG. Destroyed that game.
Fixed.
Taking them out and changing the game to suit people like you killed that game........... true story. 250,000 out of 500,000 (or so) subs lost in 4 months. To date, the biggest MMO Exodus in history.
You must have a foggy memory. Here's what the Jedi mechanic in SWG was.
You grind for months to get these really really rare drops off these really really rare mobs. These drops then tell you what profession you have to max out. You max out that profession by (guess what) grinding at your skills for another month or so, then you go back to grinding for those rare drops, then they give you the next profession you had to master, another few months of grinding.
Finally, after all this horrible grinding, you get a Jedi, yay! Oh wait... there are literally HUNDREDS of other Jedi now? Oh good, so the game is just BountyHunter vs Jedi online! Great game! Weren't Jedi supposed to be uh.. rare?
Grinding is apart of the MMO genre. Every game has it and that seems to be your issue. The fact that the Jedi took the time to get to that point was pure dedication and they deserved what they got. If that was your goal when you originally started the game, then why were you trying to play Jedi Online? That method made it to where not every SoB could be a Jedi and there really weren't that many. Even if you look into the lore of the SWG time period, Jedi really weren't all that rare and in the time period of KOTOR and before that in SW:TOR , Jedi were extremely common.
It was in no way Bounty Hunter vs Jedi online. If that's what you thought, then you probably should have tried to do something else.
It was in fact 450k players at peak but nobody cares for +- 50k now.
Simply put the jedi system killed all socialization in the game.
There was grind in SWG well before the holocron madness.
But at this point players stopped having fun and worked to master professions.
Specially by all its side effects. Linearity, Class, Levels, Tiers, Limitations, Nerfs, Caps, End Game, Instances, Staticness and the list goes on and on on how not to make an MMORPG. Everything is how it is mainly because the notion of balance. I could link most of the posts on this topic to the main root, balance.
When a game is thought with "balance" in mind you have the dozen or so worst possible mechanics agregated, everything has to addapt to it. Its an impossible task.
I remember a time when people simply didnt discussed about balance, the notion of balance didnt existed, things were what they were, games design didnt bent over to it, it wasnt a problem, because in the end the positive effects outweighted the negative effects. Old problems were fixed with old solutions, nowadays those old problems could be fixed with new solutions without having to suffer from the old solutions side effects.
A whole specrum of design decisions are based on the "balance", it is a core structure and everything depends on it because MMORPGs evolved from Everquest Philosophy of MMORPGs design decisions.
Originally posted by Goronian I will make you know, that that is exactly the reason no one takes fantasy seriously. Where the hell are those feminists, when you need them?
Speaking of another subject no one takes seriously.
I do. I have bigboobophobia. When I was a kid, I was trapped in a closet for eight months, with nothing, but Romantic Collection and Conan covers to pass my time. I still cry, when I see a woman, with more, than a B size. When I see female Night Elves in WoW I scream, like a little girl and hide in a cupboard.
Anyway... Back to the topic.
I hate WoW because it made my plush hamster kill himself, created twin clones of Hitler, punched Superboy Prime in reality, stared my dog down, spoiled my grandmother, assimilated me into the Borg, then made me into a real boy, just to make me a woman again.
Originally posted by Interesting I remember a time when people simply didnt discussed about balance, the notion of balance didnt existed, things were what they were, games design didnt bent over to it, it wasnt a problem,
And I remember when players learned how to utterly break games that did things that way, and games had to change to survive.
Stealth = Invisibility and attack-power advantages.... if you are going to be a low-health-toon jumping @$$-munch, the game should not give you any other advantages... other than your "invisibility"... in the middle of an open road, in broad daylight, even.
Monsters dropping money or items that they would never normally have on their person.
I wholeheartedly agree with this one. Holy shit! That wolf had an Axe in it's stomach!
Stealth - Which type of stealth mechanic? The one where you can just disappear in broad daylight?
Bingo! sorry shouldve been more specific. more to the point, invisibility as a means to stealth. ofc 3rd person will always mess up normal stealth (read: your wits), but still. I hate invisibility.
The one character per server per account restriction that SWG had, was the biggest direct cause of me quitting the game (months before the CU or NGE). In a game that was about the freedom to explore different characters and profession trees, it pretty much eliminated any freedom I had to create another unique character. The profession grind to unlock the jedi character was also quite idiotic though I never cared enought about it to bother.
I'm not sure about that game but I recall that UO siege perilous had a one character per account for that server. This was great in some aspects because it forced you to rely on a crafter if you didn't fit it into your template and vice versa. This was a huge reason(imo) that the community in SP was so tight. Yeah yeah, I know some did second or more accounts to get around this.
Monsters dropping money or items that they would never normally have on their person.
I would have to agree.
Sovrath did you finally give up on L2?
Yes, I no longer play L2.
It never really went toward a place that interested me and in the end the economy was just too tough for how much work I was willing to put into making money. That alongside the fact that I found it very hard to do what I had done for years which was find a nice spot and solo for a while as I had done since I started the game.
Nothing in L2 seemed logical or fleshed out. Just tacked on.
I've moved to Aion as my permanent game now. I realize some people say it's grindy but coming from L2 it's like a walk in the park.
So I'll add that as another bad mmo mechanic... though not really a mechanic: Expanding a game in a way that makes sense to the game world as well as expanding a game so that you don't lose the sense of community.
Too many games have it so that the community is too spread out. I realize that there are some technical reasons for this as having a game where the entire server's population is in one place might not be fun for the developer or the player.
But there should be some revisiting to old areas so that there is always some life in them.
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Comments
Level loss after death.
XP loss doesn't bother me. Gear wear doesn't bother me. Running nakers back to my corpse doesn't bother me.
Harsh death penalties don't bother me.
Friggin' losing a level sure tweeks my nickers though.
I could be 1 point from a new level. Have a bad run and go back to 0 xp for the level. It wouldn't bother me. But losing a level does.
D&D Home Page - What Class Are You? - Build A Character - D&D Compendium
Cash shops.
i thought this was one of the things that was a good mechanic, it built the community and you got to know merchants and other players by their name. if you wanted to change your build you were able to when ever you wanted, not log in some twinked alt, there was nothing keeping you from doing so.
____________________________
TheCore
I'd have to say the point and click movement systems found too reguraly in F2p games. I'd also have to say excessive grinding to level because there isnt enough quests.
(AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH wins big broadway dance part, but finds out it CATS.....AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH)
All my opinions are just that..opinions. If you like my opinions..coolness.If you dont like my opinion....I really dont care.
Playing: ESO, WOT, Smite, and Marvel Heroes
LOL
You made me smile.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
Gear Grind.
Alright here's a recap.
I only took the first mechanic mentioned, though many of you expressed your disapproval of many mechanics.
This'll make it easier for people to say what they don't like.
7- Illogical Loot
4-Point and Click
4-Stealth(invis type)
4- Voice chat
4- Forced Grinding
3- Harsh death penalties
3- Dumb mobs
3- "Bind on Pickup"
2- The Holy Trinity
2- Unbreakable stuns
2- Forced Questing
2- AoC fighting system
2- Lack of harsh death penalties
2- EQ2 Group exp debt
2- Gear dependency
2- Dumbed down quests
2- Classes
2- Raid dungeons
1-Ragnarok Online "Rebirth"
1-WoW's phasing
1- Permadeath
1- Lockout timers
1- WAR public quests
1- AC2 Vitae
1- MMO forums
1- Super easy solo content
1- Long instances
1- Unlimited jumping
1- EvE real time skill gain
1- Achievements
1- "loot chasing"
1- Placeholders
1- Instancing
1- Autoattack
1- Full loot
1- Heirloom gear
1- Instant Auction Houses
1- Jedi System in SWG
1- Content gating
1- Forced downtime
1- Pet classes
1- FFA PVP
1- Centralized high-level character zones
1- /consent EQ1
1- Fast paced combat systems
1- EQ mana recovery
1- Repeatable quests
1- Faction npcs
1- Marriage systems
1- Cash Shops
1- One character/server
How else would you suggest a story/character to progress?
I like questing, but know quite a few people that like to progress by PvP or just grinding mobs. Questing is not a must, actually
That depends.....
I don't see a whole lot of people lining up to play Lineage 2 which basically offers you that. Lots and lots of that actually...
IMHO the dumbest mechanic ever for the player but the most ingenious for the Dev is the "kill / fetch task". Once they got us to "love" them and do them like hamsters on a wheel, the genre fell apart.
It always boggled me that the same people who bash games like Lineage 2 for it's grind and lack of quest are the ones playing WoW doing all those assorted faction grinds and daily kill task...errr...quest for years on end...which is 10x the grind L2 could ever hope to be.
The most disappointing thing in MMOs so far is their total inability to capture either an RPG world OR a virtual world. Instead we have Stat manager programs with avatars.
Female characters that look like Playboy bunnies wearing 500 defense armor that you wouldn't let them go out in public wearing - were you their father.
Not saying it isn't fun to look at - but it certainly is dumb.
I will have you know that those thongs are made of steel and built for protection.
I will have you know that those thongs are made of steel and built for protection.
I will make you know, that that is exactly the reason no one takes fantasy seriously.
Where the hell are those feminists, when you need them?
I hate WoW because it made my plush hamster kill himself, created twin clones of Hitler, punched Superboy Prime in reality, stared my dog down, spoiled my grandmother, assimilated me into the Borg, then made me into a real boy, just to make me a woman again.
Speaking of another subject no one takes seriously.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Fixed.
Taking them out and changing the game to suit people like you killed that game........... true story. 250,000 out of 500,000 (or so) subs lost in 4 months. To date, the biggest MMO Exodus in history.
You must have a foggy memory. Here's what the Jedi mechanic in SWG was.
You grind for months to get these really really rare drops off these really really rare mobs. These drops then tell you what profession you have to max out. You max out that profession by (guess what) grinding at your skills for another month or so, then you go back to grinding for those rare drops, then they give you the next profession you had to master, another few months of grinding.
Finally, after all this horrible grinding, you get a Jedi, yay! Oh wait... there are literally HUNDREDS of other Jedi now? Oh good, so the game is just BountyHunter vs Jedi online! Great game! Weren't Jedi supposed to be uh.. rare?
Grinding is apart of the MMO genre. Every game has it and that seems to be your issue. The fact that the Jedi took the time to get to that point was pure dedication and they deserved what they got. If that was your goal when you originally started the game, then why were you trying to play Jedi Online? That method made it to where not every SoB could be a Jedi and there really weren't that many. Even if you look into the lore of the SWG time period, Jedi really weren't all that rare and in the time period of KOTOR and before that in SW:TOR , Jedi were extremely common.
It was in no way Bounty Hunter vs Jedi online. If that's what you thought, then you probably should have tried to do something else.
It was in fact 450k players at peak but nobody cares for +- 50k now.
Simply put the jedi system killed all socialization in the game.
There was grind in SWG well before the holocron madness.
But at this point players stopped having fun and worked to master professions.
Huge difference.
Stealth is quite silly in MMOs.
Binb to player items is quite silly... specially without any decay. Might as well not have any crafting or economie at that point.
Dumbest MMORPG mechanic ever made.
Balance.
Specially by all its side effects. Linearity, Class, Levels, Tiers, Limitations, Nerfs, Caps, End Game, Instances, Staticness and the list goes on and on on how not to make an MMORPG. Everything is how it is mainly because the notion of balance. I could link most of the posts on this topic to the main root, balance.
When a game is thought with "balance" in mind you have the dozen or so worst possible mechanics agregated, everything has to addapt to it. Its an impossible task.
I remember a time when people simply didnt discussed about balance, the notion of balance didnt existed, things were what they were, games design didnt bent over to it, it wasnt a problem, because in the end the positive effects outweighted the negative effects. Old problems were fixed with old solutions, nowadays those old problems could be fixed with new solutions without having to suffer from the old solutions side effects.
A whole specrum of design decisions are based on the "balance", it is a core structure and everything depends on it because MMORPGs evolved from Everquest Philosophy of MMORPGs design decisions.
I dont expect people to understand it.
Speaking of another subject no one takes seriously.
I do. I have bigboobophobia. When I was a kid, I was trapped in a closet for eight months, with nothing, but Romantic Collection and Conan covers to pass my time. I still cry, when I see a woman, with more, than a B size. When I see female Night Elves in WoW I scream, like a little girl and hide in a cupboard.
Anyway... Back to the topic.
I hate WoW because it made my plush hamster kill himself, created twin clones of Hitler, punched Superboy Prime in reality, stared my dog down, spoiled my grandmother, assimilated me into the Borg, then made me into a real boy, just to make me a woman again.
And I remember when players learned how to utterly break games that did things that way, and games had to change to survive.
Not sure if things have changed, but unable to buff people outside your group has always bugged me in EQ2.
EQ1-AC1-DAOC-FFXI-L2-EQ2-WoW-DDO-GW-LoTR-VG-WAR-GW2-ESO
Stealth = Invisibility and attack-power advantages.... if you are going to be a low-health-toon jumping @$$-munch, the game should not give you any other advantages... other than your "invisibility"... in the middle of an open road, in broad daylight, even.
Stealth - Which type of stealth mechanic? The one where you can just disappear in broad daylight?
Bingo! sorry shouldve been more specific. more to the point, invisibility as a means to stealth. ofc 3rd person will always mess up normal stealth (read: your wits), but still. I hate invisibility.
Stealth was fine in DAoC
I would have to agree.
Sovrath did you finally give up on L2?
Auto-attack.
I'm not sure about that game but I recall that UO siege perilous had a one character per account for that server. This was great in some aspects because it forced you to rely on a crafter if you didn't fit it into your template and vice versa. This was a huge reason(imo) that the community in SP was so tight. Yeah yeah, I know some did second or more accounts to get around this.
I would have to agree.
Sovrath did you finally give up on L2?
Yes, I no longer play L2.
It never really went toward a place that interested me and in the end the economy was just too tough for how much work I was willing to put into making money. That alongside the fact that I found it very hard to do what I had done for years which was find a nice spot and solo for a while as I had done since I started the game.
Nothing in L2 seemed logical or fleshed out. Just tacked on.
I've moved to Aion as my permanent game now. I realize some people say it's grindy but coming from L2 it's like a walk in the park.
So I'll add that as another bad mmo mechanic... though not really a mechanic: Expanding a game in a way that makes sense to the game world as well as expanding a game so that you don't lose the sense of community.
Too many games have it so that the community is too spread out. I realize that there are some technical reasons for this as having a game where the entire server's population is in one place might not be fun for the developer or the player.
But there should be some revisiting to old areas so that there is always some life in them.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo