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Good LB interview at VE3D
Jadar
Member Posts: 300
in Tabula Rasa
http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/765/765698p1.html
Not a bad interview, but it's best to take things Mr. Garriott says with a grain of salt. I remember some of the interviews he gave prior to the release of UO and he tends to be a little over enthusiastic, plays fast and loose with the facts, etc. Still. he mentions some game mechanics that I haven't heard about before.
Comments
I am absolutely ecstatic.
My liege said everything i had hoped for and preached about in the last few months around here and elsewhere... The ethical choices thruout the game that the player faces step-by-step determining what type of character you'll be... Infact the question the interviewer posed saying "after your character is all pimped out" made me crazy furious... why THE HELL should everyone's main and given for certain objective in end-game be to have the most pimped and combat effective ultra-robot ? Who cares ??! Why should combat power be the main reason to play an MMP when you've got interestin storytelling to follow, engaging puzzles (as i PRAYED the game would have, see the topic related below) and compelling choices to make about the events told ?
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good interview overall ... only thing that bothers me is the "shield drone" example. where the one character needs to run into the shield and destroy the shield while everyone else keeps him alive.
that makes me VERY leary ... sounds too tankish to me.
I understand where you coming from, but the point he was trying to make is that the enemy will have different tactics.
So, you encounter a squad of enemy infantry, they have some mortar with them that do massive damage to formations, so you have to spread out and take out the mortar squad ASAP.
Another squad has the shield drone, so one (or more!) need to go in and take it out.
Another squad has just personal weapons but they are super mobile, so they will disperse and try to flank etc.
So, I think we should take the shield drone only as 1 of many possibilities.
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime"
I totally see XApotheosisX 's point on the hatred for typical mmogs team tactics, after playing wow for more than a year every single aspect of a game shared with that one makes my bowels twist.
Good thing is, TR gameplay isn't revolved on raid tactics , on farming and spamming the dungeons...
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yeah I am absolutely in love with the sound of this game. my biggest fear is that it will boil down the follow.
The "tank" class buffs up his "photon" resists and runs up to the giant bane assault walker craft ( think AT-ST) and starts blasting it with his "grenade launcher with a+100 stamina and +100 hp" with his "taunt" attack. while the rest of his party stand 15 feet back blasting/healing away.
I hope combat is more chaotic/strategic. I understand that this is part RPG so some weapons/armor will have stats and I am fine with that. Also understand the fact that there will be classes, I just hope classes are not designated "tank" "DPS" "crowd control" "healer" either.
i guess i am hoping for more running around looking for cover and firing from the cover to keep the enemy pinned down. but we will have to see huh?
I hate argueing semantics but ....
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Tabula Rasa™ is a massively multiplayer online action game that takes you into the heat of battle at the frontlines of an epic war between a xenophobic alien race bent on galactic conquest and the coalition of rebel soldiers who've traveled across the galaxy to stop them.
Combining fast-paced action with the immersion of a role-playing game
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first off the Massive Multiplayer ACTION game should tell you that my statement is more true than yours. As well as the bolded/underlined part should tell you that while it will have SOME RPG aspects it will not be ALL RPG.
It really comes down to one issue - you don't have to aim your weapon. You target a mob and it stays targeted. You have to maintain 'line of sight' - obstructions will affect accuracy and damage, but you don't maintain any sort a bead on the enemy.
Thats a good point, another thing i was "irked" about in the interview was the whole (paraphrase) hiding behind something lowers your chance of getting hit (end paraphrase).
I had always thought this game would be more FPSish in the way cover and aim would work. Where as things like leading your target and moving would be more important that gear.
well they have talked about cover in the form of sandbags reducing damage, but that the bane would move to negate the cover.
They do have a soldier/commando/ranger line of combat classes and the specialist/biotech/sapper not so combat so I hope the soldier types are towards the front dealing most of the damage and the support classes are towards the back providing cover fire, healing etc. Yet obviously you want your specialists to also be able to take the fight to the enemy otherwise the whole thing just falls apart if your soldiers die.
From the class descriptions over at www.playtr.com it seems the specialists will be the crafters / healers / gadget people.
I have faith in Garriott and his team, and my fingers are crossed that this faith isn't misplaced.
re: not aiming your weapons -- I'm not sure just yet. I know Garriott has called it "sticky targetting" but the impression I got (and I could be way off-base, and I've not seen any combat video that contained the UI) was that you aimed and it would keep on the target you chose, but if you dragged too far over to another target, it would switch to that. Kinda a manual aiming version of "tabbing" rather than actually hitting the tab key, I suppose. Anyway, that's the mental image I got after reading some of the statements, and that sounds more interesting than tab+attack.
From the CuppaJo radio interview
also
and
So class and level (typical RPG concepts).
On the targetting
On shooting and cover
sounds to me if you adjust the sticky targetting you are just going to put yourself at a disadvantage. when someone has a "lock" on you and no matter how much strafing or moving you do you can't break it, compared to if you don't use it so you actually have to keep the recticule on them ... you're basically screwing yourself.
now don't get me wrong I don't (and never have) want the game to be counterstrike the MMO, where hitting "A" and "D" while as fast as you can while jumping determines who wins. I just don't think there will be a lot of movement by players in this game, I was hoping it would be more about NOT GETTING shot than having gear to take the shots. I was hoping there would be more "lay down some cover fire so i can move to a different location" instead of "I'll draw agro because i have 7k laser resists while the rest of you move to a different spot."
Oh well as i said hope i get into beta to see first hand how this game plays out.
well I suggest you head over to Stratics Tabula Rasa web site register for the forums and ask questions in the Tabula Rasa questions thread we do get responses every couple of days from the Community Manager - CuppaJo.
Although not every question gets answered.
I will post your question and let you know if we get a response.
We also have a nice Knowledge base thread with info gleaned from interviews etc.
sounds to me if you adjust the sticky targetting you are just going to put yourself at a disadvantage. when someone has a "lock" on you and no matter how much strafing or moving you do you can't break it, compared to if you don't use it so you actually have to keep the recticule on them ... you're basically screwing yourself.
now don't get me wrong I don't (and never have) want the game to be counterstrike the MMO, where hitting "A" and "D" while as fast as you can while jumping determines who wins. I just don't think there will be a lot of movement by players in this game, I was hoping it would be more about NOT GETTING shot than having gear to take the shots. I was hoping there would be more "lay down some cover fire so i can move to a different location" instead of "I'll draw agro because i have 7k laser resists while the rest of you move to a different spot."
Oh well as i said hope i get into beta to see first hand how this game plays out.
Agreed there would be no reason to turn sticky targeting down (or even off!) but there should be. I would propose increasing damage potential with a corresponding decrease in "Stickiness". I probably wouldn't choose a direct increase in damage as that might make the game latency dependent (but it could work). I would increase the critical percentage.