Carufin, as someone who's played EVE since beta, and is in one of the most powerful pvp corporations in the game, I can say that the pvp is by far the most enjoyable since UO.
The problem is, it's hard. I don't mean on an individual level, I'm talking about when you have fleets going, gangs of at least 10-15+ people. They're very hard to manoeuvre around safely, and as a result you often see novice pvpers camping gates. A result of a combination of their desire to get killmails but their inability to strategize.
PvE is larger than you think as well, but just not for all. While there are some hardcore mission runners who seem to love it, the real backbone to the pve in Eve are the producers, the manufacturers. For them, they're constantly "pvping" with each other economically, and it adds a lot of depth to Eve's universe.
Anyway, i have to run but I'll reply to some more posts later.
Originally posted by nexen It just has to have a fully open pvp system.
The problem with a virtual world and open pvper is you can't do a realistic version of it. In general people don't attack and kill other people in the real world because it goes againts basic human social pack animal instinct to do it. Being punished or other repracussions have little effect on why the average person doesn't attack another person. it just means that the people that would do it are put away or have to be quieter about it then they normaly would be and so the number of crimes they commit is reduced. That human instinct just can not be created in an online game, the lack of real contact with other players actuelly throws it radicaly the other way so that some people do things to other players online that they would never do in the real world.
Originally posted by nexen
The players themselves will be surrounded by people of similar minds; some will like this result, others will find it to be an extremely bland experience. Just like the real world would be an incredibly dull place if everyone was exactly the same, I imagine the same would be true for a virtual world.
Just because the players like the same playstyle doesn't mean they have anything else in common or will get on at all. All it really means is they like the same playstyle, nothing more, nothing less. I know in crafting communities I've seen everything from the extreme captialist that is trying to make as much in game money as possible and is perfectly willing to rip people off to do it to the semi scoialist who is just happy making stuff other players will use and enjoy, and everything in between those two extremes.
Originally posted by PhelanL EvE works because it plays like real life. There's reasons for killing people. You are defending your territory, you want that person's loot, etc. It's not just killing for the sake of killing.
People accept getting killed because of this and don't cry OMGWTFGRIEFHAX!!!!! (Well some do).
It's just that PvP is so pervasive in EvE that there is no escaping it. Everything in EvE is a competition against other players even if you just want to build stuff.
In most MMOs there's is essentially no reason for PvPing aside from the fun of it. PvPing in EvE it actually does something.
...and EvE PvP is actually fun, both sides of a fight have a lot to lose, their ships, implants, and even skillpoints if their clone isn't updated, so both sides are fighting frantically to win.
If there were more games like EvE and less like WoW I'd be a lot happier.
EVE works because it is mostly a PvPer game. Its great to see it doing well and I really like CCP but one of the reasons their are only 100k (or is it 150k now?) players is because it doesn't appeal to the larger PvE community. Personaly I'd hold it up as a perfect ecample of the niche games and unlike the OP I'd like to see more niche games of its quality.
Originally posted by Pantastic The problem with this is that it's a very bad idea from the game company's point of view. If they make an interesting encounter for this legendary creature, it's something that 1 person/group/raid (per shard/server) will get to complete one time, then the work they did on it is all for nought. Gaming companies don't like to spend lots of time, effort, and creativity making an encounter that occupies a tiny fraction of their playerbase for less than one billing cycle, it's just not worthwhile.Plus once the legendary monster is dead, who cares? Only people who happened to be at a level to really pay attention to it (when I was level 30, I really didn't care who got into a level 50 instance first) at the time it was killed will know, and even then it's just a one-time event, soon to be buried under whatever-else-you-do in that game. If there's a bunch of different 'legendary' monsters with similar abilities, you'd end up with one group of people ransacking all of them ASAP, plus a bunch of mildly different monsters don't feel like a single legendary monster.IMO this is an idea that sounds a lot better than it would be in practice; it's the kind of thing that works well for single/group games, but there are problems with it in an MMO.
You think too much level and raid oriented. What if that creature would be very powerful and only a group of players could bring it down?..... The creature would not be really in one specific dungeon all the time (like so many boring "bosses") but attack towns randomly and retreat to its secret lair each time the odds get unfavourable. Players would need to actively seek out the creature and collect hints where he might be. and then either lay an ambush or attack the lair directly, which may turn out to be very dangerous, maybe not because the creature is so hard to kill, but because maybe the lair puts them at a disadvantage (Icecavern, narrow passages,... ) If several such creatures would be roaming around I am quite sure that would occupy players for a while, plus as we know, even grim monsters have (often vengeful family members). One of a kind creatures could pop up then and when, too, with the same guidelines, only harder to find, reach and kill. With this even low level characters (if levels are used at all) could contribute indirectly to the kill (by exploration and info gathering).
Originally posted by Pantastic This is why i think Permadeath could be great, because you have a limited amount of time to make your mark on the virtual world.
But it sucks if you die to lag or an other technical issue. I would have no problem dying if I truly made a stupid mistake or bad judgement, but dying to a bug or to lag is already frustrating enough, let alone if death would be permanent.
Originally posted by Carufin Your admiration of EvE is...cute. But let's face it, EvE in the final analysis is a PvP game, purely. PvE consists of the same ten missions you do over and over and over again. Or mindlessly mining asteroids for days on end. And what of PvP in EvE? It consists of six to ten pimply-faced lEEtz0iDz camping a stargate and pwning every shuttle that comes through. The sight of a Battlecruiser might send them fleeing away with stinky boxers...... --a lot of blah cut out.--
The OP didnt want to discuss the merits or lack thereof of EVE, but the fact that EVE allows a lot of player freedom. He didn't say EVE was a great - get it, only that EVE managed to put PVElers and PVPlers together, partly due to its one-server structure, and that it offers freedom, which are true statements. On a side note you win the "most generializations in one post award" - congrats.
Originally posted by Carufin And every one of those sons of female dogs has full access to Mommy's VISA card.
With comments like that you only classify yourself as one of those pathetic morons you were talking about, who "flooded the internet".
@OP: Great post, but such a game you are talking about would be hard to design. I agree that with little choice comes great diversity (since lots of different people are "forced" o play the same game), and EVE profits atm from the fact that there is no other really good SF game out. If that would happen, then the population of EVE may change considerably (either PVP or PVE move). So all in all MMOs took a direction that will be hard to change, if possible at all.
------------------------------------------------------ Originally posted by Mandolin
Designers need to move away from the old D&D level-based model which was never designed for player vs player combat in the first place.
There's so much, and it's all so good, and I don't get the carebear vs griefer camp / battle feeling when I read. Makes me feel all spiffy.
These are all the comments I was too late to make...
"Do you think a world like this would need death? Because how would history progress if everyone is still alive persay? How do you get the sword of Legendary Bob if Bob still alive and carying the sword persay. Show the pregression of the timeline mean that your character would eventually die and you have to start a new one? I personally would love that in a game. Some kind of lineage."
"PvP yes but i don't want to be killed every 10 minutes by someone massively better than me"
With permadeath, chances are there won't bee many who live to be massively better than you. Also, if the devs are aware that "massively better" players are a problem (and they should be by now), they might finally opt to go for a more realistic scale, and let players compete on a reasonably even playing field.
Furthermore, if you get killed on a [Noob - Divine] ranged playing field, death means you start miles away from competitive capability. If you get killed on a [Beginner - Skilled] playing field you'll be able to compete from the start, as long as you don't overexpose yourself. (All depending on the rest of the game design)
There was some concern that allowing only the first players to kill Legendary Bob would rob other players of content. May be true. But hey, Legendary Bob's got feet, don't he? I would appreciate it if NPCs were taught the noble art of fleeing. Legendary Bob is smart, he has companions, if his hideout is discovered, he moves out.
Content provided by the Lord of Thugs and Criminals, Legendary Bob:
Find the mule (investigation, some NPC is leaking caravan schedules and guard routes) [repeatable as a convicted/killed mule will be replaced]
Defend the caravan
Track down Bob, and apprehend or kill him (not repeatable, but also not likely to succeed in a long time)
"These are massively MULTIPLAYER online games. People that play them want to interact with other PLAYERS not the objects in the game. As such, you have to design the economy (and ecology?) in such a way that players will have to interact with eachother in order to survive, otherwise this isn't going to work."
Excellent points. What could we do?
Encourage specialisation: Making it hard to maintain different skills at high levels, but easy to move from one to another (letting the old one drop a bit) will encourage a blacksmith to buy his raw materials from a specialist (miner) rather than wasting time mining his own metal (and processing the ore).
Make food a vital resource: Death by starvation is complicated, as offline characters will either starve, or gain an advantage by not having to eat. However, you could let energy drain steadily, and increase drain during activity, allowing very low energy to affect skill performance, and maybe also movement speed (half walkspeed, no running).
Make items deteriorate regularly, and more so with use: Craftsmen will be required to repair, or supply fresh items, thus maintaining a market for them.
So far we have:
Farmer -> Baker -> All [Food, daily requirement] Miner -> Blacksmith -> All [Tools, weapons, repairs]
The farmer needs tools. The blacksmith needs food.
Soldier Special role, unproductive. But if one group did choose not to have any soldiers, another group could choose to have a few and use these few soldiers to acquire the undefended group's resources. Provide weapons and training, and the need for a military won't have to be artificially implemented. (Artificial implementations: This faction is good, this other one is evil / A tribe of monsters will assault you, but never conquer you)
Provided you have PvP.
The soldier (and maybe the hunter too) requires somebody to patch up their wounds (demand for healer profession). And, as I suddenly remember to include: Carrying capacities, bulk and weight. Long distance transport is a profession on its own, and there's no point in mining all day if you're going to take the ore by hand to the forge.
Notice how the soldier, being unproductive, can only exist as long as he supports the society that provides him with the supplies he needs. Should he find himself unsupported, he will possess equipment (soon to be deteriorated) and skills that are irrelevant to his current needs (food and housing). He can either start the slow process of learning how to sustain himself, find someone else to join with, or go rogue - taking what he needs where he can get it. (Mostly, the soldier will benefit from supporting peaceful players - be they "carebears" or not - which gives many troublesome kids of all ages a distinct disadvantage: They don't support, but play to destroy)
A productive society will have room for luxury goods that aren't necessarily meaningful to the game mechanics, but indicate status. Only those who can afford to waste money will buy, and those who make them will have few customers. But maybe, just maybe people will actually show off their superior power by spending resources on expensive luxury.
Let the players be responsible for the economy, let them handle their own protection (primarily due to online / offline troubles, npc defence units do probably need to be available, but these should be of moderate numbers, and commanded and provided/paid for by actual players).
Most of these mechanisms depend on letting players have freedom to interact with eachother. Open PvP with significant consequences (death, injury) with available protection -military presence- provides incentives to maintain that military presence, creating a "market" for the soldier.
It also means that if you offend a large group of people, the large group of people has measures available beyond saying "I refuse to talk to you". Or even NOT saying just that, for obvious reasons. (This doesn't mean large groups of people should be mean, it is an incentive for anybody not to offend and insult randomly, which is a big problem nowadays).
If you kill somebody's ally, or useful companion or whatever, you will have made an enemy. This is a reason for you not to just kill people without standing to benefit greatly from it. The more reliable you are, the more allies and friends you might attract. The more friends you can point to, the less inviting you are as a target of unwarranted violence. Compared to PvP with no consequences (you get killed every 10 minutes, as I believe somebody said in this thread) the death rate will probably be rather low. Because lethal PvP is a good reason to find other solutions than fighting. Without ruling out the fight, and robbing players of a tool that makes sense in a logical world, and has a place in most functional economies.
You could take violence out, of course. I'd rather play a non-violent game where the kill is out of the question, than a game where the kill occurs every 10 minutes because it don't mean a thing. (I think that last phrase is a music quote)
The future: Adellion Common flaw in MMORPGs: The ability to die casually Advantages of Adellion: Dynamic world (affected by its inhabitants) Player-driven world (beasts won't be an endless supply of mighty swords, gold will come from mines, not dragonly dens) Player-driven world (Leadership is the privilege of a player, not an npc)
Excellent post, couldn't have written it better myself. Everyone always seems to complain about "the grind" in MMO's but I can only say one thing. You are trying to raise the level of your character and something needs to be done to get you there... What is that? Killing mobs, then more mobs, then more mobs yet... It's ALWAYS a grind, it's just whether you like it or not...
Originally posted by azreal01 Excellent post, couldn't have written it better myself. Everyone always seems to complain about "the grind" in MMO's but I can only say one thing. You are trying to raise the level of your character and something needs to be done to get you there... What is that? Killing mobs, then more mobs, then more mobs yet... It's ALWAYS a grind, it's just whether you like it or not...
Calling something a 'grind' isn't a complaint about combat, its a complaint about boring repatative combat.
Originally posted by Kormac With permadeath
With permadeath
Funnily enough seeming the OP was againts niche games, I can't imagin anything turning a game into a niche game faster then permadeath.
Originally posted by Azirophos You think too much level and raid oriented. What if that creature would be very powerful and only a group of players could bring it down?..... The creature would not be really in one specific dungeon all the time (like so many boring "bosses") but attack towns randomly and retreat to its secret lair each time the odds get unfavourable... One of a kind creatures could pop up then and when, too, with the same guidelines, only harder to find, reach and kill...
One of a kind creatures don't just 'pop up', though. Developers have to put in a lot of man-hours to create each awsome foe - art team comes up with a unique look and animations, quest team puts hints scattered around the world and any stepping-stone items, combat team comes up with interesting abilities, level design team puts together a complete lair mapped for people to delve through, and so on.
It's got nothing to do with levels or raids orientation, I'm not even sure what your starting comment is supposed to mean. It's the economics behind a game company making profit on a game with encounters like you want. MMO companies have a hard enough time making enough content to keep people occupied when each encounter can be run multiple times, how are they possibly going to keep up when they create content, then destroy it after it's been run once? Unless you can come up with an answer for that, your idea isn't going to work in an actual game.
This is not a problem in P&P games because encounters are far easier to make (I can create a P&P encounter in a few hours alone, don't need to animate art and the map is just some graph paper), the 'developer' is doing it as a hobby, and since there's a live person running it there's no need to do testing etc. All of the 'find the opponent stuff' doesn't even need to be pre-created, the human running the game can do it on the fly. But your $15/month is not going to pay for a human to be on the other end of encounters.
Originally posted by Pantastic This is why i think Permadeath could be great,...
You mixed up the attributions, that permadeath comment was something I quoted to respond to; my comment was that every game on the market has permadeath if you really believe it will improve your game.
their first born (games like DAoC and Anarchy Online) indulged in an incestous relationship. As with any good incestous family, for generations each new game would merge together and breed once more, producing more and more genetic faults as they continued. until they reach today, the likes of GW and RFonline, the equivilant of texan rednecks with 11 toes and 14 fingers.
Originally posted by Kormac [*] Make food a vital resource: Death by starvation is complicated, as offline characters will either starve, or gain an advantage by not having to eat. However, you could let energy drain steadily, and increase drain during activity, allowing very low energy to affect skill performance, and maybe also movement speed (half walkspeed, no running).
Didn't the OP want a non-niche game? Because I don't really see the broad appeal of a game where a large chunk of people are making food, and even the people actually adventuring have to carry food around (under the realistic encumbrance you mentioned) and worry about eating it on schedule. When I read stuff like this, I don't think 'ohh, cool game, I can't wait to spend all day baking bread in a game' or 'Sweet, now when I go out to fight monsters I can worry about bringing along enough food for the trip', I think 'that sounds incredibly boring'.
The soldier (and maybe the hunter too) requires somebody to patch up their wounds (demand for healer profession). And, as I suddenly remember to include: Carrying capacities, bulk and weight. Long distance transport is a profession on its own, and there's no point in mining all day if you're going to take the ore by hand to the forge.
EVE has a lot of this, and even its most fanatical players don't try to claim that long distance transport and mining are generally enjoyable for someome to do. How many people do you think 'mining all day' is really going to appeal to? Or just carrying Jim's ore to Bob? If I wanted to play a truck driver, I could play one IRL and get paid for it.
You could take violence out, of course. I'd rather play a non-violent game where the kill is out of the question, than a game where the kill occurs every 10 minutes because it don't mean a thing. (I think that last phrase is a music quote)
So sort of like the Sims, only you can't just manage your household of sims, you have to convince someome to run their sim as a farmer, someome else to run theirs as a truck driver, and someone else as a baker just so your own sim doens't starve when you're trying to make him do something you find interesting? I think you're vastly overestimating the appeal of this concept. You're trying to make a simulation of boring stuff from the real world, and I don't see how that's going to be anything but a niche game.
Originally posted by Pantastic This is why i think Permadeath could be great, because you have a limited amount of time to make your mark on the virtual world.
"But it sucks if you die to lag or an other technical issue. I would have no problem dying if I truly made a stupid mistake or bad judgement, but dying to a bug or to lag is already frustrating enough, let alone if death would be permanent."
Good point, maybe not permadeath, maybe just a limited life span. (sorry about the spacing, the mac i'm using doesn't seem to like the format.)
On the subject of permadeath, it could work quite interestingly if you transfered the Pharoh death system from Children of the Nile into MMO form.
That is to say, during your time alive you basically want to build yourself as prestiegous a tomb as possible. The better your tomb is (say, just being burried in the dirt compared to being buried in a great pyramid), the better your next life is (ie. when you make another character it'd start with a few extra skillpoints or whatever). So it'd encourage you to lead a productive life in a perma-death setting, and make death pontially slightly less painful at the same time.
Obviously adapt the whole egyptian thing to whatever setting the MMO would be in.
The other option in a permadeath system with aging, would be to allow you to make in-game famalies. In other words, you can have some sweet lurvin from the opposite sex and have children, and when you die your next "character" will be one of your kids. If you die with no kids, you start from a basic genepool again or something. This would add an interesting twist on the game, and helps a lot with easing the pain of death that tiny bit by being able to leave some sort of mark on your future character.
Originally posted by Pantastic One of a kind creatures don't just 'pop up', though. Developers have to put in a lot of man-hours to create each awsome foe - art team comes up with a unique look and animations, quest team puts hints scattered around the world and any stepping-stone items, combat team comes up with interesting abilities, level design team puts together a complete lair mapped for people to delve through, and so on. It's got nothing to do with levels or raids orientation, I'm not even sure what your starting comment is supposed to mean. It's the economics behind a game company making profit on a game with encounters like you want. MMO companies have a hard enough time making enough content to keep people occupied when each encounter can be run multiple times, how are they possibly going to keep up when they create content, then destroy it after it's been run once? Unless you can come up with an answer for that, your idea isn't going to work in an actual game.This is not a problem in P&P games because encounters are far easier to make (I can create a P&P encounter in a few hours alone, don't need to animate art and the map is just some graph paper), the 'developer' is doing it as a hobby, and since there's a live person running it there's no need to do testing etc. All of the 'find the opponent stuff' doesn't even need to be pre-created, the human running the game can do it on the fly. But your $15/month is not going to pay for a human to be on the other end of encounters.
Originally posted by Pantastic You mixed up the attributions, that permadeath comment was something I quoted to respond to; my comment was that every game on the market has permadeath if you really believe it will improve your game.
Ah, sorry about that, I may have confused the quote then.
Ok, I will clarify my points a bit (hopefully): Yes, creating special creatures (unique ones I only touched), would be a lot of work, but mainly to set up the hints for the players to follow (ie the quest itself). A creature could be based off the current model stock. Want a special bad mean wolf? Take the current ones, darken the texture, make his eyes glow red or green and in a short time you have all your grafics and animations (since you can use the basic wolves one) you need.
The same goes for any other creature you have in game. The unique ones could be based off basic creatures too, making their existence also a bit more logical in the world. All in all if properly done such "hunts" for special creatures (though could be a humanoid race too) would be very interesting if properly done and give rise to even a few new professions. How much work this would exactly take, and if it would be worthwhile is a matter we wont be able to clarify or even really discuss in these boards.. there are simply too many factors involved.
All in all the idea is not unrealistic and theoretically possible to implement in a game, though
------------------------------------------------------ Originally posted by Mandolin
Designers need to move away from the old D&D level-based model which was never designed for player vs player combat in the first place.
First lets get the notion that permadeath is a nich market concept.
Skill based versus level is niched
PVP vs PVE is niched
Sci fi vs Fantasy is niched
If you keep summing up the total worth of a game based on certain game mechanics implemented into it's system then there will always be considered "niche" products.
In order for a game to not be niched it would need to encompass all these features and every other feature possibly thought of. So lets get that out of our silly little heads of being niche or not.
What are some of the main complaints about MMOG and how to improve them.
Some of the big situations being grinding for exp, level vs skills, and class system.
Here are some of my thoughts
Implementing a skill based system that lets you train to a specific "Class" if you want to or not. Skills would be associated with one of the four basic food groups fighter, mage, cleric, thief. That would please both players that want the freedom of a classless system and be able to training any skill from any tree whenever they want and those who like the structure and goal orientation of class based systems by following a set of skills to a specific climax. This would allow devs to also balance out skills versus balancing out Classes. Which I would think would be easier. Since they can take each skill and weigh their affects in combination with other skills.
Grinding for exp has several ways of being fixed. I would like to see a 2 point system setup for this. Part A would reward a person by increasing their experience in the skill with each successful attempt causing the skill to improve naturally the success and experience would be calculated into a percentile for that skill. This is a good way for crafters to really show there stuff as they will be able to create items that help in improve certain skill sets or stats instead of just a generic overal blanket affect. Part B would be a Point system which would be given out as a reward for successfully finishing quest, missions, and tasks. The amount of points will depend on the difficulty of endeavors. In return the Points collected can be used to increase any skill by a 1 - 10% when used in a training session or challenge(challenges are issued between players).
You can shoot 2 consecutive shots at a target with 0 time interval between shots.
lets say you have a success rate of 25% for Quickshot when you use a Point on it you gain:
between 1 - 5% increase based on a combination of your current Stats Endurance and Dexterity, and how well you did in training session. if used in a challenge you get a bonus added for how well you do.
Training session and challenges would consist of minigames, puzzles, and atheletic events.
These are just a few of many options available that can implement in games
Originally posted by joereed1 Originally posted by PantasticThis is why i think Permadeath could be great, because you have a limited amount of time to make your mark on the virtual world.
"But it sucks if you die to lag or an other technical issue. I would have no problem dying if I truly made a stupid mistake or bad judgement, but dying to a bug or to lag is already frustrating enough, let alone if death would be permanent." Good point, maybe not permadeath, maybe just a limited life span. (sorry about the spacing, the mac i'm using doesn't seem to like the format.) People like you are why they won't be pushing out the edges of game play.
Originally posted by wjrasmussen Originally posted by joereed1 Originally posted by PantasticThis is why i think Permadeath could be great, because you have a limited amount of time to make your mark on the virtual world.
"But it sucks if you die to lag or an other technical issue. I would have no problem dying if I truly made a stupid mistake or bad judgement, but dying to a bug or to lag is already frustrating enough, let alone if death would be permanent." Good point, maybe not permadeath, maybe just a limited life span. (sorry about the spacing, the mac i'm using doesn't seem to like the format.)
People like you are why they won't be pushing out the edges of game play.
Have you ever come across an MMORPG that doesn't lag to hell sometimes? A limited life span for the characters would achieve the desired affect i was after, without a nasty lag spike ending in the permanent death of your character. If you want to make a case for permadeath please do, but don't pigeon hole people after reading 1 post.
Permadeath would make for a terrible, detached community.
Do you retain your identity and friends when your character dies or do you have to start over and make new friends?
If you retain your identity and friends then what's the difference between permadeath and a harsh death penalty that doesn't result in you creating a new character?
Oops, I died. Time to rez and repair, brb.
Oops, I died. Time to reroll, brb.
If you don't retain your identity or friends then what kind of community is going to form? Could you imagine playing a game with your spouse only to have one of your characters permanently die? Nobody is going to pretend like they don't know their RL spouse and can't remember their long time game friends.
Permadeath can't work in a MMO. If you want a harsh death penalty then look into something else... like losing your corpse every time you die (equipped and bagged items as well as carried cash fall to the ground for anyone to grab and eventually disappear). The result is the same (a harsh death penalty) without having to answer the difficult question of how to handle character relationships.
Last page I posted about having a kind of family structure, in which you 'reroll' as one of your children if you die, keeping your family name and potentially a kind of "gene pool" that gets refined and essentially improved through the generations...
There are ways of making permadeath appealable to the mainstream, you just have to stop thinking so conventionally.
Originally posted by nexen Last page I posted about having a kind of family structure, in which you 'reroll' as one of your children if you die, keeping your family name and potentially a kind of "gene pool" that gets refined and essentially improved through the generations...
There are ways of making permadeath appealable to the mainstream, you just have to stop thinking so conventionally.
I think that I know a good game for you, you should check out Adellion. It's not out yet, though.
We are trying to create a technological level that is similar to the medieval era in our own past, but since Adellion is not Earth, there may be some slight differences. There are legends and some records of past civilizations whose technology was more advanced than Adellion's current levels, but most of these were destroyed during the Great Sundering. If remnants of these old technologies are discovered, they could find their way into everyday use among the citizens of Airyiure. "
It is the family of your character in the game. When you start out, you may choose to belong to a pre-created family. Families will consist of a specific number of player characters and there will be a limit to how often they can attain new members. There is also the possibility of starting your own family once you are established in the game; this is possible even though you chose to belong to one at the start. All members of a family will have the same surname. Unique surnames must be earned in the game and can be bestowed upon family members by the Cultural Leaders. Families can form without unique surnames."
Yes, however after a new character is created they have a period, 1 week, where they cannot be harmed, harm anyone else or use any of the rogue skills. After this period is over they may be killed or knocked unconscious. If they are killed they experience a 'near death' stage and wake up in the nearest hospital currently controlled by their default culture. A player may have 3 of these experiences but the third time they die for good and must continue playing as their heir or choose a new character. If they have no heir then they must create a new character. Heirs inherit all the physical goods of their previous avatar. If a player wishes death the first time they die and not use their 'near death', that is also a possibility."
Your heir is essentially your future character, who will inherit most of your belongings when your current character dies. Procreation will occur between men and women. This procreation is a mutual consent that each player must agree to for the heir to be "born". Heirs will appear only after one of the parent dies permanently. You may choose to play the heir as another near relative if you feel its is not an appropriate time for your initial character to have a teenage child. This is the choice of the player."
Adellion is skill-based, not level based. Your skills will increase as they are practiced. However, the numbers will not be visible to the players. You will know you have increased (or decreased) in a skill by your ability to perform an action or create an item. The skills can only fluctuate by a certain amount each day. Differences between new characters and experienced characters will be much less than in other MMORPGs. There may be some brave and cunning leaders but no supermen in Adellion."
Originally posted by nexen There are ways of making permadeath appealable to the mainstream, you just have to stop thinking so conventionally.
No, there are not. You could make a game with perma death that appeals to a certain type of hardcore gamer, yes. You might even get alot of those hardcore gamers and do well but it will not be a mainstream success because you lose some of the core parts of an MMO that attracts people to them. The personalised avater of them, not their character, and there growth/achivement/leveling/progress with that character. Playing a family or new character after new character does not have the same attachment.
Hmm I have to differ on the attachment aspects that people put on these games. First and formost since not one MMORPG, not mud or mush but MMORPG has attempted to try it then how can you determine what works and what doesnt. In terms of a perminent death
There are too many assumptions being thrown out with out any stats to back them up.
If anything take a look as Phantasy Star series from Sega. That game implemented in part 2 i think a lineage system where you heir would continue your journey since the story spanned 3 generations i believe. That was awesome i didnt detached from the characters i played. If anything it gives you an stronger sense of accomplishment because you are becoming part of the history of the game itself. (this just my opnion)
I for one would be interested in a game that actually Lets you leave relics and even NPC's behind as your legacy. If I had an opportunity to retire my current character and have hime join the ranks of NPC's in the game for the remainder of his life that would be quite interesting. Or have items named after you due to the many adventures it has experienced down your family tree.
Some people always ask "what will keep me playing a game" Well as we can see MMORPG have a healthy life span of maybe 4-7 years tops maybe even less as more games come out that are made "easy" to play which makes their game life even shorter.
Of we all know the WOW phenomena been out +- 2 years and in less than have a year the majority of its customers have reached the max level and have nothing to do but raid and pvp. And the expansion doesnt seem to be adding anything different.
We are human beings. We are accustomed to seing things change over time. Nothing stays the same forever and all these MMORPGs that stick you in this sort of limbo state at the end will start to get to some people as they feel this sense of being stuck lingers in the air.
And lets not get into games that choose to through you into established history time frames like SWG and LOTRO has done and is about to do. How do you progress a game as a whole if you cant change the main story of the game. And what LOTRO is talking about that your adventure are sub adventures that happened at the same time as the main adventure and it helped the fellowship along is not sitting well with some including me.
Games that are based on such popular subjects as those should not get you stuck in that period unless its a standalone game where you get to experience the story by yourself. FOR MMORPG's where you want to have a dynamic community grow and in terms they want to affect the game over all is a very VERY BAD Mix.
It is funny how they want to give you the experience of playing in the time frame that those major events took place, but at the same time tell you that "you can look but you cant touch."
and you sir are a true visionary nexen , i just spen the last 4 hours trolling this site and other like it looking for an mmorpg to play suffice it to say i failed , yet again
i then thought of going back to the age of conan forums to kiss the devs ass and post spam to try and get in the beta. i decided against it rather i went looking for the thread i saw not too long ago with in game movies of AC , perhaps a game i could play till AoC or WAR.
only to stumble upon this thread. I hope to god your involved in the mmorpg industry @ some level lets hope for our sakes a lead game designer ^^
Ever since i first got caught up with this genre 3-4yrs ago with AC2 i always wanted something akin to what you so eleoquently described. The ability for the players to shape the world around them in its entireity this is what i want above all else freedom to game how i want. To be apart of a "living , breathing" virtual world
You hit the nail on the head with this thread of yours, you captured what i and many others always wanted from this genre but what we failed to articulate as you so skillfully have done
Lets just hope people within the mmorpg industry are as forward thinking and as innovative as you
Originally posted by War_Dancer Originally posted by nexen There are ways of making permadeath appealable to the mainstream, you just have to stop thinking so conventionally.
No, there are not. You could make a game with perma death that appeals to a certain type of hardcore gamer, yes. You might even get alot of those hardcore gamers and do well but it will not be a mainstream success because you lose some of the core parts of an MMO that attracts people to them. The personalised avater of them, not their character, and there growth/achivement/leveling/progress with that character. Playing a family or new character after new character does not have the same attachment.
Like I said, you have to stop thinking so conventionally. Permadeath can certainly appeal to non hardcore players, and it's perfectly possible to get casual players into it too. Think of a game with aging, permadeath and procreation. You can play as much or as little as you like, and your core achievements are passed on to your heir, which you play when your character dies. This hand-me-down-esque system can be as harsh or as lenient as you like, depending on what kind of players you aim for. Additionally, permadeath can be as harsh or as lenient as you like, by - for example - adding systems that make it very hard to actually be killed, but rather just knocked out and ending up in a hospital or something.
Yes, traditionally people look to play a personalized avatar of them. But people also make alts, and new characters in different games. Playing as a character that ages and eventually dies would create a much stronger player-character bond, almost like some very intricate tamagochi. And you'll still experience growth/achievement/levelling/progress, just on a different scale.
Comments
Carufin, as someone who's played EVE since beta, and is in one of the most powerful pvp corporations in the game, I can say that the pvp is by far the most enjoyable since UO.
The problem is, it's hard. I don't mean on an individual level, I'm talking about when you have fleets going, gangs of at least 10-15+ people. They're very hard to manoeuvre around safely, and as a result you often see novice pvpers camping gates. A result of a combination of their desire to get killmails but their inability to strategize.
PvE is larger than you think as well, but just not for all. While there are some hardcore mission runners who seem to love it, the real backbone to the pve in Eve are the producers, the manufacturers. For them, they're constantly "pvping" with each other economically, and it adds a lot of depth to Eve's universe.
Anyway, i have to run but I'll reply to some more posts later.
________
-nexen-
The problem with a virtual world and open pvper is you can't do a realistic version of it. In general people don't attack and kill other people in the real world because it goes againts basic human social pack animal instinct to do it. Being punished or other repracussions have little effect on why the average person doesn't attack another person. it just means that the people that would do it are put away or have to be quieter about it then they normaly would be and so the number of crimes they commit is reduced. That human instinct just can not be created in an online game, the lack of real contact with other players actuelly throws it radicaly the other way so that some people do things to other players online that they would never do in the real world.
Just because the players like the same playstyle doesn't mean they have anything else in common or will get on at all. All it really means is they like the same playstyle, nothing more, nothing less. I know in crafting communities I've seen everything from the extreme captialist that is trying to make as much in game money as possible and is perfectly willing to rip people off to do it to the semi scoialist who is just happy making stuff other players will use and enjoy, and everything in between those two extremes.
You think too much level and raid oriented.
What if that creature would be very powerful and only a group of players could bring it down?..... The creature would not be really in one specific dungeon all the time (like so many boring "bosses") but attack towns randomly and retreat to its secret lair each time the odds get unfavourable. Players would need to actively seek out the creature and collect hints where he might be. and then either lay an ambush or attack the lair directly, which may turn out to be very dangerous, maybe not because the creature is so hard to kill, but because maybe the lair puts them at a disadvantage (Icecavern, narrow passages,... ) If several such creatures would be roaming around I am quite sure that would occupy players for a while, plus as we know, even grim monsters have (often vengeful family members). One of a kind creatures could pop up then and when, too, with the same guidelines, only harder to find, reach and kill. With this even low level characters (if levels are used at all) could contribute indirectly to the kill (by exploration and info gathering).
But it sucks if you die to lag or an other technical issue. I would have no problem dying if I truly made a stupid mistake or bad judgement, but dying to a bug or to lag is already frustrating enough, let alone if death would be permanent.
The OP didnt want to discuss the merits or lack thereof of EVE, but the fact that EVE allows a lot of player freedom. He didn't say EVE was a great - get it, only that EVE managed to put PVElers and PVPlers together, partly due to its one-server structure, and that it offers freedom, which are true statements. On a side note you win the "most generializations in one post award" - congrats.
With comments like that you only classify yourself as one of those pathetic morons you were talking about, who "flooded the internet".@OP: Great post, but such a game you are talking about would be hard to design. I agree that with little choice comes great diversity (since lots of different people are "forced" o play the same game), and EVE profits atm from the fact that there is no other really good SF game out. If that would happen, then the population of EVE may change considerably (either PVP or PVE move). So all in all MMOs took a direction that will be hard to change, if possible at all.
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Originally posted by Mandolin
Designers need to move away from the old D&D level-based model which was never designed for player vs player combat in the first place.
There's so much, and it's all so good, and I don't get the carebear vs griefer camp / battle feeling when I read. Makes me feel all spiffy.
These are all the comments I was too late to make...
"Do you think a world like this would need death? Because how would history progress if everyone is still alive persay? How do you get the sword of Legendary Bob if Bob still alive and carying the sword persay. Show the pregression of the timeline mean that your character would eventually die and you have to start a new one? I personally would love that in a game. Some kind of lineage."
"PvP yes but i don't want to be killed every 10 minutes by someone massively better than me"
With permadeath, chances are there won't bee many who live to be massively better than you. Also, if the devs are aware that "massively better" players are a problem (and they should be by now), they might finally opt to go for a more realistic scale, and let players compete on a reasonably even playing field.
Furthermore, if you get killed on a [Noob - Divine] ranged playing field, death means you start miles away from competitive capability. If you get killed on a [Beginner - Skilled] playing field you'll be able to compete from the start, as long as you don't overexpose yourself. (All depending on the rest of the game design)
There was some concern that allowing only the first players to kill Legendary Bob would rob other players of content. May be true. But hey, Legendary Bob's got feet, don't he? I would appreciate it if NPCs were taught the noble art of fleeing. Legendary Bob is smart, he has companions, if his hideout is discovered, he moves out.
"These are massively MULTIPLAYER online games. People that play them want to interact with other PLAYERS not the objects in the game. As such, you have to design the economy (and ecology?) in such a way that players will have to interact with eachother in order to survive, otherwise this isn't going to work."
Excellent points. What could we do?
So far we have:
Farmer -> Baker -> All [Food, daily requirement]
Miner -> Blacksmith -> All [Tools, weapons, repairs]
The farmer needs tools.
The blacksmith needs food.
Soldier
Special role, unproductive. But if one group did choose not to have any soldiers, another group could choose to have a few and use these few soldiers to acquire the undefended group's resources. Provide weapons and training, and the need for a military won't have to be artificially implemented. (Artificial implementations: This faction is good, this other one is evil / A tribe of monsters will assault you, but never conquer you)
Provided you have PvP.
The soldier (and maybe the hunter too) requires somebody to patch up their wounds (demand for healer profession). And, as I suddenly remember to include: Carrying capacities, bulk and weight. Long distance transport is a profession on its own, and there's no point in mining all day if you're going to take the ore by hand to the forge.
Notice how the soldier, being unproductive, can only exist as long as he supports the society that provides him with the supplies he needs. Should he find himself unsupported, he will possess equipment (soon to be deteriorated) and skills that are irrelevant to his current needs (food and housing). He can either start the slow process of learning how to sustain himself, find someone else to join with, or go rogue - taking what he needs where he can get it. (Mostly, the soldier will benefit from supporting peaceful players - be they "carebears" or not - which gives many troublesome kids of all ages a distinct disadvantage: They don't support, but play to destroy)
A productive society will have room for luxury goods that aren't necessarily meaningful to the game mechanics, but indicate status. Only those who can afford to waste money will buy, and those who make them will have few customers. But maybe, just maybe people will actually show off their superior power by spending resources on expensive luxury.
Let the players be responsible for the economy, let them handle their own protection (primarily due to online / offline troubles, npc defence units do probably need to be available, but these should be of moderate numbers, and commanded and provided/paid for by actual players).
Most of these mechanisms depend on letting players have freedom to interact with eachother. Open PvP with significant consequences (death, injury) with available protection -military presence- provides incentives to maintain that military presence, creating a "market" for the soldier.
It also means that if you offend a large group of people, the large group of people has measures available beyond saying "I refuse to talk to you". Or even NOT saying just that, for obvious reasons. (This doesn't mean large groups of people should be mean, it is an incentive for anybody not to offend and insult randomly, which is a big problem nowadays).
If you kill somebody's ally, or useful companion or whatever, you will have made an enemy. This is a reason for you not to just kill people without standing to benefit greatly from it. The more reliable you are, the more allies and friends you might attract. The more friends you can point to, the less inviting you are as a target of unwarranted violence. Compared to PvP with no consequences (you get killed every 10 minutes, as I believe somebody said in this thread) the death rate will probably be rather low. Because lethal PvP is a good reason to find other solutions than fighting. Without ruling out the fight, and robbing players of a tool that makes sense in a logical world, and has a place in most functional economies.
You could take violence out, of course. I'd rather play a non-violent game where the kill is out of the question, than a game where the kill occurs every 10 minutes because it don't mean a thing. (I think that last phrase is a music quote)
The future: Adellion
Common flaw in MMORPGs: The ability to die casually
Advantages of Adellion: Dynamic world (affected by its inhabitants)
Player-driven world (beasts won't be an endless supply of mighty swords, gold will come from mines, not dragonly dens)
Player-driven world (Leadership is the privilege of a player, not an npc)
Calling something a 'grind' isn't a complaint about combat, its a complaint about boring repatative combat.
Funnily enough seeming the OP was againts niche games, I can't imagin anything turning a game into a niche game faster then permadeath.One of a kind creatures don't just 'pop up', though. Developers have to put in a lot of man-hours to create each awsome foe - art team comes up with a unique look and animations, quest team puts hints scattered around the world and any stepping-stone items, combat team comes up with interesting abilities, level design team puts together a complete lair mapped for people to delve through, and so on.
It's got nothing to do with levels or raids orientation, I'm not even sure what your starting comment is supposed to mean. It's the economics behind a game company making profit on a game with encounters like you want. MMO companies have a hard enough time making enough content to keep people occupied when each encounter can be run multiple times, how are they possibly going to keep up when they create content, then destroy it after it's been run once? Unless you can come up with an answer for that, your idea isn't going to work in an actual game.
This is not a problem in P&P games because encounters are far easier to make (I can create a P&P encounter in a few hours alone, don't need to animate art and the map is just some graph paper), the 'developer' is doing it as a hobby, and since there's a live person running it there's no need to do testing etc. All of the 'find the opponent stuff' doesn't even need to be pre-created, the human running the game can do it on the fly. But your $15/month is not going to pay for a human to be on the other end of encounters.
You mixed up the attributions, that permadeath comment was something I quoted to respond to; my comment was that every game on the market has permadeath if you really believe it will improve your game.
UO + EQ = mother and father of online gaming
their first born (games like DAoC and Anarchy Online) indulged in an incestous relationship. As with any good incestous family, for generations each new game would merge together and breed once more, producing more and more genetic faults as they continued. until they reach today, the likes of GW and RFonline, the equivilant of texan rednecks with 11 toes and 14 fingers.
Didn't the OP want a non-niche game? Because I don't really see the broad appeal of a game where a large chunk of people are making food, and even the people actually adventuring have to carry food around (under the realistic encumbrance you mentioned) and worry about eating it on schedule. When I read stuff like this, I don't think 'ohh, cool game, I can't wait to spend all day baking bread in a game' or 'Sweet, now when I go out to fight monsters I can worry about bringing along enough food for the trip', I think 'that sounds incredibly boring'.
EVE has a lot of this, and even its most fanatical players don't try to claim that long distance transport and mining are generally enjoyable for someome to do. How many people do you think 'mining all day' is really going to appeal to? Or just carrying Jim's ore to Bob? If I wanted to play a truck driver, I could play one IRL and get paid for it.
So sort of like the Sims, only you can't just manage your household of sims, you have to convince someome to run their sim as a farmer, someome else to run theirs as a truck driver, and someone else as a baker just so your own sim doens't starve when you're trying to make him do something you find interesting? I think you're vastly overestimating the appeal of this concept. You're trying to make a simulation of boring stuff from the real world, and I don't see how that's going to be anything but a niche game.
Good point, maybe not permadeath, maybe just a limited life span. (sorry about the spacing, the mac i'm using doesn't seem to like the format.)
Um, I know this has been brought up in similar threads, but there is a very inexpensive way to do a "proof of concept" test on these ideas...
Open a MUD
A lot of these concepts have been kicked around the MUD DEV mailing list at least a time or two.
MMORPGs are basically just MUDs with a graphical client. If you want to design MMORPGs, you should start with making a mud, mux, moo, etc...
On the subject of permadeath, it could work quite interestingly if you transfered the Pharoh death system from Children of the Nile into MMO form.
That is to say, during your time alive you basically want to build yourself as prestiegous a tomb as possible. The better your tomb is (say, just being burried in the dirt compared to being buried in a great pyramid), the better your next life is (ie. when you make another character it'd start with a few extra skillpoints or whatever). So it'd encourage you to lead a productive life in a perma-death setting, and make death pontially slightly less painful at the same time.
Obviously adapt the whole egyptian thing to whatever setting the MMO would be in.
The other option in a permadeath system with aging, would be to allow you to make in-game famalies. In other words, you can have some sweet lurvin from the opposite sex and have children, and when you die your next "character" will be one of your kids. If you die with no kids, you start from a basic genepool again or something. This would add an interesting twist on the game, and helps a lot with easing the pain of death that tiny bit by being able to leave some sort of mark on your future character.
________
-nexen-
Ah, sorry about that, I may have confused the quote then.
Ok, I will clarify my points a bit (hopefully):
Yes, creating special creatures (unique ones I only touched), would be a lot of work, but mainly to set up the hints for the players to follow (ie the quest itself). A creature could be based off the current model stock. Want a special bad mean wolf? Take the current ones, darken the texture, make his eyes glow red or green and in a short time you have all your grafics and animations (since you can use the basic wolves one) you need.
The same goes for any other creature you have in game. The unique ones could be based off basic creatures too, making their existence also a bit more logical in the world. All in all if properly done such "hunts" for special creatures (though could be a humanoid race too) would be very interesting if properly done and give rise to even a few new professions. How much work this would exactly take, and if it would be worthwhile is a matter we wont be able to clarify or even really discuss in these boards.. there are simply too many factors involved.
All in all the idea is not unrealistic and theoretically possible to implement in a game, though
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Originally posted by Mandolin
Designers need to move away from the old D&D level-based model which was never designed for player vs player combat in the first place.
First lets get the notion that permadeath is a nich market concept.
Skill based versus level is niched
PVP vs PVE is niched
Sci fi vs Fantasy is niched
If you keep summing up the total worth of a game based on certain game mechanics implemented into it's system then there will always be considered "niche" products.
In order for a game to not be niched it would need to encompass all these features and every other feature possibly thought of. So lets get that out of our silly little heads of being niche or not.
What are some of the main complaints about MMOG and how to improve them.
Some of the big situations being grinding for exp, level vs skills, and class system.
Here are some of my thoughts
Implementing a skill based system that lets you train to a specific "Class" if you want to or not. Skills would be associated with one of the four basic food groups fighter, mage, cleric, thief. That would please both players that want the freedom of a classless system and be able to training any skill from any tree whenever they want and those who like the structure and goal orientation of class based systems by following a set of skills to a specific climax. This would allow devs to also balance out skills versus balancing out Classes. Which I would think would be easier. Since they can take each skill and weigh their affects in combination with other skills.
Grinding for exp has several ways of being fixed. I would like to see a 2 point system setup for this. Part A would reward a person by increasing their experience in the skill with each successful attempt causing the skill to improve naturally the success and experience would be calculated into a percentile for that skill. This is a good way for crafters to really show there stuff as they will be able to create items that help in improve certain skill sets or stats instead of just a generic overal blanket affect. Part B would be a Point system which would be given out as a reward for successfully finishing quest, missions, and tasks. The amount of points will depend on the difficulty of endeavors. In return the Points collected can be used to increase any skill by a 1 - 10% when used in a training session or challenge(challenges are issued between players).
QuickShots (ranger skill:endurance:dexterity) pre-requisite: LongShot(figther skil:Strength) =50% skill rate, Nimble (thief skill:Dexterity) =50%
You can shoot 2 consecutive shots at a target with 0 time interval between shots.
lets say you have a success rate of 25% for Quickshot when you use a Point on it you gain:
between 1 - 5% increase based on a combination of your current Stats Endurance and Dexterity, and how well you did in training session. if used in a challenge you get a bonus added for how well you do.
Training session and challenges would consist of minigames, puzzles, and atheletic events.
These are just a few of many options available that can implement in games
Faranthil Tanathalos
EverQuest 1 - Ranger
Star Wars Galaxies - Master Ranger
Everquest2 - Ranger WarhammerOnline - Shadow Warrior
WOW - Hunter
That's right I like bows and arrows.
DELETED DOUBLE POST
Faranthil Tanathalos
EverQuest 1 - Ranger
Star Wars Galaxies - Master Ranger
Everquest2 - Ranger WarhammerOnline - Shadow Warrior
WOW - Hunter
That's right I like bows and arrows.
People like you are why they won't be pushing out the edges of game play.
"But it sucks if you die to lag or an other technical issue. I would have no problem dying if I truly made a stupid mistake or bad judgement, but dying to a bug or to lag is already frustrating enough, let alone if death would be permanent." Good point, maybe not permadeath, maybe just a limited life span. (sorry about the spacing, the mac i'm using doesn't seem to like the format.)
People like you are why they won't be pushing out the edges of game play.
Have you ever come across an MMORPG that doesn't lag to hell sometimes? A limited life span for the characters would achieve the desired affect i was after, without a nasty lag spike ending in the permanent death of your character. If you want to make a case for permadeath please do, but don't pigeon hole people after reading 1 post.
Do you retain your identity and friends when your character dies or do you have to start over and make new friends?
If you retain your identity and friends then what's the difference between permadeath and a harsh death penalty that doesn't result in you creating a new character?
Oops, I died. Time to rez and repair, brb.
Oops, I died. Time to reroll, brb.
If you don't retain your identity or friends then what kind of community is going to form? Could you imagine playing a game with your spouse only to have one of your characters permanently die? Nobody is going to pretend like they don't know their RL spouse and can't remember their long time game friends.
Permadeath can't work in a MMO. If you want a harsh death penalty then look into something else... like losing your corpse every time you die (equipped and bagged items as well as carried cash fall to the ground for anyone to grab and eventually disappear). The result is the same (a harsh death penalty) without having to answer the difficult question of how to handle character relationships.
There are ways of making permadeath appealable to the mainstream, you just have to stop thinking so conventionally.
________
-nexen-
Quotes from Adellion F.A.Q.
"Will the technology be purely medieval?
We are trying to create a technological level that is similar to the
medieval era in our own past, but since Adellion is not Earth, there
may be some slight differences. There are legends and some records of
past civilizations whose technology was more advanced than Adellion's
current levels, but most of these were destroyed during the Great
Sundering. If remnants of these old technologies are discovered, they
could find their way into everyday use among the citizens of Airyiure. "
"Will buildings, fortifications and even cities be destroyable?
Yes, but only player created cities can be destroyed and it will take a
long time to accomplish. Pre-created cities can be captured and held."
"What are these families?
It is the family of your character in the game. When you start out, you
may choose to belong to a pre-created family. Families will consist of
a specific number of player characters and there will be a limit to how
often they can attain new members. There is also the possibility of
starting your own family once you are established in the game; this is
possible even though you chose to belong to one at the start. All
members of a family will have the same surname. Unique surnames must be
earned in the game and can be bestowed upon family members by the
Cultural Leaders. Families can form without unique surnames."
"Is there permanent death?
Yes, however after a new character is created they have a period, 1
week, where they cannot be harmed, harm anyone else or use any of the
rogue skills. After this period is over they may be killed or knocked
unconscious. If they are killed they experience a 'near death' stage
and wake up in the nearest hospital currently controlled by their
default culture. A player may have 3 of these experiences but the third
time they die for good and must continue playing as their heir or
choose a new character. If they have no heir then they must create a
new character. Heirs inherit all the physical goods of their previous
avatar. If a player wishes death the first time they die and not use
their 'near death', that is also a possibility."
"What are heirs and where do heirs come from?
Your heir is essentially your future character, who will inherit most
of your belongings when your current character dies. Procreation will
occur between men and women. This procreation is a mutual consent that
each player must agree to for the heir to be "born". Heirs will appear
only after one of the parent dies permanently. You may choose to play
the heir as another near relative if you feel its is not an appropriate
time for your initial character to have a teenage child. This is the
choice of the player."
"Will there be levelling?
Adellion is skill-based, not level based. Your skills will increase as
they are practiced. However, the numbers will not be visible to the
players. You will know you have increased (or decreased) in a skill by
your ability to perform an action or create an item. The skills can
only fluctuate by a certain amount each day. Differences between new
characters and experienced characters will be much less than in other
MMORPGs. There may be some brave and cunning leaders but no supermen in
Adellion."
Check out more from www.adellion.com
Have fun!
Hmm I have to differ on the attachment aspects that people put on these games. First and formost since not one MMORPG, not mud or mush but MMORPG has attempted to try it then how can you determine what works and what doesnt. In terms of a perminent death
There are too many assumptions being thrown out with out any stats to back them up.
If anything take a look as Phantasy Star series from Sega. That game implemented in part 2 i think a lineage system where you heir would continue your journey since the story spanned 3 generations i believe. That was awesome i didnt detached from the characters i played. If anything it gives you an stronger sense of accomplishment because you are becoming part of the history of the game itself. (this just my opnion)
I for one would be interested in a game that actually Lets you leave relics and even NPC's behind as your legacy. If I had an opportunity to retire my current character and have hime join the ranks of NPC's in the game for the remainder of his life that would be quite interesting. Or have items named after you due to the many adventures it has experienced down your family tree.
Some people always ask "what will keep me playing a game" Well as we can see MMORPG have a healthy life span of maybe 4-7 years tops maybe even less as more games come out that are made "easy" to play which makes their game life even shorter.
Of we all know the WOW phenomena been out +- 2 years and in less than have a year the majority of its customers have reached the max level and have nothing to do but raid and pvp. And the expansion doesnt seem to be adding anything different.
We are human beings. We are accustomed to seing things change over time. Nothing stays the same forever and all these MMORPGs that stick you in this sort of limbo state at the end will start to get to some people as they feel this sense of being stuck lingers in the air.
And lets not get into games that choose to through you into established history time frames like SWG and LOTRO has done and is about to do. How do you progress a game as a whole if you cant change the main story of the game. And what LOTRO is talking about that your adventure are sub adventures that happened at the same time as the main adventure and it helped the fellowship along is not sitting well with some including me.
Games that are based on such popular subjects as those should not get you stuck in that period unless its a standalone game where you get to experience the story by yourself. FOR MMORPG's where you want to have a dynamic community grow and in terms they want to affect the game over all is a very VERY BAD Mix.
It is funny how they want to give you the experience of playing in the time frame that those major events took place, but at the same time tell you that "you can look but you cant touch."
Faranthil Tanathalos
EverQuest 1 - Ranger
Star Wars Galaxies - Master Ranger
Everquest2 - Ranger WarhammerOnline - Shadow Warrior
WOW - Hunter
That's right I like bows and arrows.
this thread is for the lack of a better term epic
and you sir are a true visionary nexen , i just spen the last 4 hours trolling this site and other like it looking for an mmorpg to play suffice it to say i failed , yet again
i then thought of going back to the age of conan forums to kiss the devs ass and post spam to try and get in the beta. i decided against it rather i went looking for the thread i saw not too long ago with in game movies of AC , perhaps a game i could play till AoC or WAR.
only to stumble upon this thread. I hope to god your involved in the mmorpg industry @ some level lets hope for our sakes a lead game designer ^^
Ever since i first got caught up with this genre 3-4yrs ago with AC2 i always wanted something akin to what you so eleoquently described. The ability for the players to shape the world around them in its entireity this is what i want above all else freedom to game how i want. To be apart of a "living , breathing" virtual world
You hit the nail on the head with this thread of yours, you captured what i and many others always wanted from this genre but what we failed to articulate as you so skillfully have done
Lets just hope people within the mmorpg industry are as forward thinking and as innovative as you
Like I said, you have to stop thinking so conventionally. Permadeath can certainly appeal to non hardcore players, and it's perfectly possible to get casual players into it too. Think of a game with aging, permadeath and procreation. You can play as much or as little as you like, and your core achievements are passed on to your heir, which you play when your character dies. This hand-me-down-esque system can be as harsh or as lenient as you like, depending on what kind of players you aim for. Additionally, permadeath can be as harsh or as lenient as you like, by - for example - adding systems that make it very hard to actually be killed, but rather just knocked out and ending up in a hospital or something.
Yes, traditionally people look to play a personalized avatar of them. But people also make alts, and new characters in different games. Playing as a character that ages and eventually dies would create a much stronger player-character bond, almost like some very intricate tamagochi. And you'll still experience growth/achievement/levelling/progress, just on a different scale.
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-nexen-