In my opinion, I found only the last 10 levels impossible to solo (you really have too few choices at that levels, unsoloable). Other than that with the right knowledge of the correct animals to hunt at the right level, you can pretty solo up to 240 with no problems (i'm speaking of combat skills, ofc).
Of course, grouping is much more fun, but sometime, traveling solo is better for testing mobs and getting knowledge as your time don't depends by others.
My experience in Ryzom leads me to make a few observations:
1. It's not a game for instant gratification and easy casual soloing. It's not Guild Wars. Ryzom rewards time spent observing and learning. It rewards putting in an effort to meet people and learn from them. It can be soloed, and I spent most of my time solo, but teaming definitely makes things easier. Even when "solo", I was chatting with friends and guildmates, so I was never lonely. Ryzom is a rich and dynamic environment, with its own unique characteristics and methods. Spend the time to get to know it and you will probably come to love it with a fierce passion. If you are not interested in making that investment, the game may not be as fun for you as it is for me. Nothing wrong with that, there are plenty of great games that don't float my particular boat, c'est la vie.
2. In my opinion, Ryzom's best hope for long term survival is to locate and market to the correct people. Many of them are probably not playing games right now. I wasn't when I stumbled upon Ryzom. Also, there is a segment of the game-playing public that yearns for something richer, something that demands more from a player. That's another potential source of new blood. Ryzom is (was) and should be a game that fills a niche, a place in the gaming spectrum left hollow by its absence. Attempting to compete for players who wouldn't like Ryzom anyway is not a path to success.
3. Ryzom's best feature, by far, is the core playerbase. Yes, that means that the game isn't nearly as good if you play solo and never talk to anyone. It's also a fragile feature that the owners cannot directly control, but they've done a pretty good job of damaging it in previous incarnations. Those of us remaining are a pretty tough and obstinate bunch. We dearly, dearly want to grow our ranks, though. I believe there are many more out there waiting to be found.
Tossing my plugged nickel into the discussion about newbie areas:
I played Ryzom very, very briefly. I remember being baffled by the game, but that was entirely my fault; I didn't bother trying to find a manual and so just muddled along. I quit playing simply because of real-life affairs and I plan on giving it another spin -- a more informed spin, thanks to the links provided by folks in this forum. (Aw, c'mon now, group hug everyone!) I don't remember much about the newbie experience, so I can only speak in generalities.
When I first start playing an MMO, I want to get guidance on 'How to play the game.' This not only means instructions on how to do tasks -- harvest, fight, sell, craft, and whatnot -- but also the goals and activities the developers have in mind. In games like WoW this means questing. I learned early on that I should take quests to earn rewards, and I carried that behavior on throughout the rest of the game. The game reinforces this by having the quests direct you outward, so that you're steered to more advanced locations as you progress; by the time you reach a city you've probably got stuff worth putting on the Auction House, for instance.
Since Ryzom doesn't work like that (apparently) I think the newbie experience should be a bit different. I think Ryzom might benefit from a isolated tutorial area that operates mostly on a metagame (OOC, if you like) level. Basically, it'd be an interactive game manual, divorced from the world-at-large. You'd learn how to perform the game mechanics, and at the end it would set expectations for you: "Now go, explore Arys! You may wish to find a guild to support you in your travels... and support them in return. The world is a dangerous place, so keep your wits about you blah blah pep talk blah...." Basically, reinforce the idea that you're not going to get a lot of NPC guidance but should seek out other players instead. Now that they've got a grasp on how to interact with the game they can figure out which direction they want to go in: combat, crafting, harvesting, what-have-you.
After that you're dropped in a major activity hub, albeit one where you can wander off a little ways without getting slaughtered by hordes of ravenous beasts or harvesting nodes that melt your skeleton if you try to extract them.
Obviously, a player should be able to skip the tutorial "zone" if they're so inclined, such as a experienced player making another character.
Originally posted by Curate {snip stuff about WoW}Since Ryzom doesn't work like that (apparently) I think the newbie experience should be a bit different. I think Ryzom might benefit from a isolated tutorial area that operates mostly on a metagame (OOC, if you like) level. {snip very good starter area suggestions}Obviously, a player should be able to skip the tutorial "zone" if they're so inclined, such as a experienced player making another character.
Some time in 2006 (iirc) Ryzom introduced a new starter area that worked very much as you describe. It went through a few updates as well to make incremental improvements. Although it definitely served the purpose of tutorial and used quests to do so, as you suggest, it also had the unintended effect of giving new players a wrong impression of what the game would be like.
I think your ideas are spot on, but the implementation probably needs yet another iteration, to make a clear distinction in expectations between the quest driven tutorial of the starter island and the largely questless mainland.
If they offer a fresh server, a new start, then it should draw in a lot of people, but if they offer an existing 4 year old server, then I am not interested.
That's really weird. A server wipe would damage this game more then it would attract new players. A sandbox is what you make of it, not how it makes you. Like some other popular MMOs out there, where yes if you start late you will be at a disadventage, especially 'end game' wise. But as far as I understand Ryzom is always changing and evolving, there is no real end game like you see in other games. There is still raids and bosses and pvp both in duel form and while contesting for outposts (right?), but it's not driven by the game but by the players themselves.
You're asking to wipe the work of your fellow gamers, it's like asking an artist to pour water on their painting because you want to use the canvas for something else.
If they offer a fresh server, a new start, then it should draw in a lot of people, but if they offer an existing 4 year old server, then I am not interested.
That's really weird. A server wipe would damage this game more then it would attract new players. A sandbox is what you make of it, not how it makes you. Like some other popular MMOs out there, where yes if you start late you will be at a disadventage, especially 'end game' wise. But as far as I understand Ryzom is always changing and evolving, there is no real end game like you see in other games. There is still raids and bosses and pvp both in duel form and while contesting for outposts (right?), but it's not driven by the game but by the players themselves.
You're asking to wipe the work of your fellow gamers, it's like asking an artist to pour water on their painting because you want to use the canvas for something else.
I think people are forgetting that though a server wipe would be a shame, in essence, this game was over. Finished. Kaput.
What you all have is a second chance to play this game. If they wipe it is that worse than if the game just ceased forever? And keep in mind, you don't know what these developers are going to be doing. They "might" keep it as business as usual and they might take it in a completely different direction.
However, assuming that they don't, as I said, this is a second chance to play a game that you love(ed).
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I think your ideas are spot on, but the implementation probably needs yet another iteration, to make a clear distinction in expectations between the quest driven tutorial of the starter island and the largely questless mainland.
Iterating away:
1) Detatch the tutorial from the game world. You are NOT on some island on Arys, you are in That Place For the Teaching Of the Game Mechanics. Making it a plain gray area where you interact with simple geometric solids is probably extreme, but making it a (large) enclosed area called “Tutorial” where you get lessons from, oh, “The Shrub of Combat”, “The Tree of Crafting” and “The Lichen of Commerce” rather than NPCs might help. No one would tell you “These pantaloons are threatening the village crops! Go kill ten of them!” Instead, the Shrub of Combat would say: “On your task bar you’ve got a special attack power called ‘Thump’. Practice using that on the pantaloons to the north. Return to me when you feel like learning more.”
2) Teach players to be proactive rather than reactive. Apart from an initial nudge -- “Go talk to the three plants in front of you to learn about interacting with the world of Ryzom” -- the players are free to browse the lessons as desired. “Tell me about casting spells,” “Tell me about selling items”, etc. Once they’ve read a lesson it’d switch to “Remind me about X.” There’d be no requirements to advance (unless a lesson requires another lesson to precede it -- you have to read “Tell me about attacking things” before you read “Tell me about special attacks”, perhaps), and they can also leave whenever they want.
3) No rewards -- you leave just as you entered. You don’t earn anything for completing the lessons, so you don’t reinforce the “Do task, earn reward” mindset. Any items you gather as part of the tutorial either have no worth outside of the tutorial or (preferably) disappear once you head into the game proper. (Warn people of this beforehand or you'll probably have cranky players showing up who farmed the tar out of the tutorial area.)
4) Be as subtle as a sledgehammer about expectations. No matter what, people will leave the tutorial and ask the nearest person/chat channel, “What should I do now?” Other games have conditioned us, it’s not our fault, we’ll still try and make Tutorial Lesson = Quest. Still, put in a message about “You will not have quests to steer you, your make your own goals” as you depart so that the handful of people who read such things will have a clue.
…OK, so maybe less with the combat shrubs (boring day at work), but something along these lines.
As far as a server wipe… as long as I’m not alone and useless with my shiny new character while everyone’s elsewhere doing highly advanced stuff, then I don’t see the need.
4) Be as subtle as a sledgehammer about expectations. No matter what, people will leave the tutorial and ask the nearest person/chat channel, “What should I do now?” Other games have conditioned us, it’s not our fault, we’ll still try and make Tutorial Lesson = Quest. Still, put in a message about “You will not have quests to steer you, your make your own goals” as you depart so that the handful of people who read such things will have a clue.
Agreed. This #4 of yours is what was (is) really lacking the (once) current strating area, called Ruins of Silan, RoS.
It has (as the servers are slowly restarting, I'll keep the present tense for now) quests to make the players learn the mechanics.
That approach was OK, as you stated, most MMORPG players are quest-spoiled after all.
It had the very serious mistake to tell the player that there would be no quest system in the "real" world (There are "quests", but few and very special ones...). That, ofc, led the pre-spoiled new children to misexpectations.
RoS has some other, pply smaller, faults, too: it is too large (encouraging a longer stay than actually needed); it gives -for the expected player skills- uber item rewards (-> wrong expectations again, Ryzom is playerdriven itemwise, plus no market for crafted items on RoS); it does not encourage teaming by only having one single "boss" of a few that cannot be solo'ed; it doesn't give a correct impression of the four main "lands" the four civilizattions split into, including to only mentioning once that on RoS found friends are likely to be seperated upon leaving, which leads directly to the last fault I can remember right now: it has an option to be summoned to any capital of choice instead upon leaving (which breaks the immersion and has some other small disadvantages for crafters and their crafting plans and in terms of initial fame).
Apart from that, RoS is a very good idea. Ryzom is very hard to learn, especially if players are spoiled by questdriven and/or static other universes.
Those have to learn about beiong able to learn everything, about creating their own actions/spells/combos/call'em-howya-like, stanzas, and editing the predefined ones, about the differences of harvesting, about the interchangeability of crafting materials, about the two main religious! factions, and most importantly about the interaction with the other inhabitants of the planet, the difference between carnivores, herbivores and kitin and their common behaviour, as Atys is alive and interacts with itself - you don't have a combination of all that anywhere else.
RoS is needed for learning. It should only make very clear that it is there for that purpose only and that it's different from Atys. The problem with telling the player just that is: which casual player actually reads what the "system" is telling them? From my memory and experience with RoS 85% of all questions about mechanics itself have been answered by the system before...and have simply been skipped, clicked away...
How do you transmit information to a player that doesn't read?
Ooops... now I'm seriously offtopic, am I not? Too loquacious, too. Sorry...
*looks for the donkey hat*
...activating morph from silent reader to active poster... ...pending... ...pending... ...pending...
Originally posted by Sasi I think your ideas are spot on, but the implementation probably needs yet another iteration, to make a clear distinction in expectations between the quest driven tutorial of the starter island and the largely questless mainland.
P.S. Hiya Jack
Yay, my favourite topic... or at least the one I harp on about the most.
Ryzom's single biggest handicap is the false expectation that Silan (the noob island) builds in players and which the Mainland immediately dashes.
Silan is, in my opinion, an excellent starting area (except for the questlog bugs). It introduces all of Ryzom's non-standard features in a way that players of standard mmos are familiar with, i.e. "quests".
But when you're finished and you go to the mainland, there's no more quests because Ryzom's not that kind of game.
Silan is an enormous improvement over the old starter areas - but it is and will remain a half-arsed implementation until they add some kind of notification to players leaving Silan that steers them in the right direction.
4) Be as subtle as a sledgehammer about expectations. No matter what, people will leave the tutorial and ask the nearest person/chat channel, “What should I do now?” Other games have conditioned us, it’s not our fault, we’ll still try and make Tutorial Lesson = Quest. Still, put in a message about “You will not have quests to steer you, your make your own goals” as you depart so that the handful of people who read such things will have a clue.
This is what I've suggested before. I managed to pick all this up in my first few days of playing, but being told this (by the game) would reduce that "what the hell do I do now?" reaction upon hitting the mainland.
Here in the Ruins of Silan you have been guided with missions that helped you develop the basic skills and knowledge to survive on the mainland. Missions on the mainland take a different form. Completing missions will earn you favour with particular factions but are not necessary to advance your skills or earn experience points.
Experience points are earned through experience. You'll improve combat, crafting and harvesting skills by using them. You'll most often find it easier to do so by teaming up with other players.
You should also give thought to joining a guild. They can help you learn how to survive on the mainland and probably assist you with acquiring new and better equipment.
Be warned that travelling between the different lands of Ryzom is dangerous and most likely impossible for young homins like yourself. But older, more experienced homins can help you make those journeys and acquire teleport points which will then allow you to travel to those points instantly. When planning such treks, older homins usually advertise the fact in zone chat channels. You should listen for these and join treks as soon as you can, as they will both open up new lands for you to experience and help you to meet other homins.
Honestly, their best bet is making a new server. That way, old players get to keep their characters and newbies get a place where everyone's on equal ground.
Honestly, their best bet is making a new server. That way, old players get to keep their characters and newbies get a place where everyone's on equal ground.
That was done already a ways before all servers were closed...
The new server was "Cho". It was an international server, at least that's what was told. So there were four servers as a total: an english speaking server, a french speaking server, a german speaking server and Cho, the "international" server. Doesn't that combination sound comprehensable? *grin*
Some new players did start there, indeed - new ones split quite evenly into the then existant four servers, though. Still, the majority of Cho's population didn't recruit from spanish, russian or korean speaking people. It consisted very largely of vets from the other three servers who tried to get a kick out of a new start or simply wanted to try a different approach or face a new challange. (I had a few days of fun there trekking the whole world without any help, at least.) They knew their ways around and they quickly got ahead of the ones who actually started their first time on Atys. Or in other words: the vets started an arms race about the rulership of the outposts. They had no real time to care for inexperienced ones in action. (They did in words and with gear, if needed, though. Everyone in Ryzom does...)
At that time, real newcomers were recommended in the boards to start on some of the three established servers because they'd be helped to whatevertheywishedtolearn better there.
Cho was merged with Arispotle, the english speaking server, quite a while before closing all of'em down.
I still consider it to have been intended as test for whatever. I think it failed.
...activating morph from silent reader to active poster... ...pending... ...pending... ...pending...
Originally posted by yamiblade Honestly, their best bet is making a new server. That way, old players get to keep their characters and newbies get a place where everyone's on equal ground.
Maybe I'm beating a dead horse here, but I guess it needs a few more kicks.
"equal ground" is neither necessary nor desirable in Ryzom. A new player is better off with experienced players and characters around.
If your concern is that others will "be ahead of you" - whatever that might mean in a skill-based sandbox - then you will insta-lose anyway because the experienced players will "level up" their characters 6 times as fast as you anyway, in a great arms race for outpost control and resource monopoly. See other excellent posts in this thread for more discussion of the Cho experience.
On the other hand, established characters and politics give experienced players incentive to help you reach your goals rather than ignore you in a rush toward their own goals.
I know that in every other MMO you've ever played, everyone ignored you anyway, unless you could help them do something for themselves. Ryzom is not like that. It's not a bunch of people separately playing a single player RPG that just happens to have other morons getting in your way. In Ryzom, teaming makes *everything* smoother, and teaming with someone who knows good ways to do things, and can bail you out if things go awry, makes it all the better.
In other news, the devs have reportedly stated that they are trying really hard to keep from losing any character data. I apologize for not being able to reference something for you, as I have that second hand from another player who was in a chat session with "VL", the once and current dev lead. But I consider it reliable information.
The old servers (Aniro and Leanon in particular) have been online intermittently as the team works on the restart.
All of the real evidence points to a restart of the old servers with all of the characters intact. Personally, I consider that to be a best case scenario, and am quite excited at the prospect.
...underwater adventure and more they just never delivered on.
I always wondered how they would implement underwater adventures. It seems like the game engine was 2D. I remember swimming on top of the water, but I don't know how diving below the surface would have worked
Honestly, their best bet is making a new server. That way, old players get to keep their characters and newbies get a place where everyone's on equal ground.
They had no real time to care for inexperienced ones in action. (They did in words and with gear, if needed, though. Everyone in Ryzom does...)
At that time, real newcomers were recommended in the boards to start on some of the three established servers because they'd be helped to whatevertheywishedtolearn better there.
That doesn't surprise me. Part of what made Ryzom so good to play when I did, about a year ago, was the fact that there was an existing high level playerbase who, while they still had plenty of skills of their own to max, had already maxed a few and had nothing to gain by maxing more other than the variety factor.
So, in stark contrast to raid-grind mmos ala WoW where players are obsessed about getting that next piece of shiny loot which requires a massive investment of time, the Ryzom highbies could do their own stuff and have time spare to help and hang out with noobies.
That kind of game design, in my opinion, also helps to foster the kind of community that has evolved on Ryzom.
(I gave up on getting the quote block right) - - XoloX: “RoS is needed for learning. It should only make very clear that it is there for that purpose only and that it's different from Atys. The problem with telling the player just that is: which casual player actually reads what the "system" is telling them? From my memory and experience with RoS 85% of all questions about mechanics itself have been answered by the system before...and have simply been skipped, clicked away... How do you transmit information to a player that doesn't read?“
I don't know if you can, but I think you can at least reduce some problems by establishing a different pattern of behavior earlier on. What I was going for in my plant-based interactive manual was this process: “Select something you want to learn about > Get told how to do it > Get told where to do it if you want > Go do that until you decide to stop and come back to learn something else.” That's a different approach than “Get told to do something that has the veneer of being part of some story arc > Go do it, learning something in the process (maybe) > Come back and get a reinforcing reward and get sent on another errand.”
If you move people to a different pattern of working with the game, it might lighten some shock even if they don't bother reading any text. On the flip side, you still get the “Talk to NPC for direction” vibe, which may help ease people into the game.
Guess I'll be keeping an eye on this, but I got pressganged into playing WoW by some friends I don't see otherwise and I'm currently playing LOTRO. I guess it depends what they do to//with Ryzom.
Guess I'll be keeping an eye on this, but I got pressganged into playing WoW by some friends I don't see otherwise and I'm currently playing LOTRO. I guess it depends what they do to//with Ryzom.
Sheesh! WoW? You? What's next? Telling us you had a hand in DnD 4th edition?
IMO Ryzom needs to recognise what it is in order to succeed.
A niche, long-term investment game that is - and should be - about the role-playing, rather than trying to play catch up with the big boys.
Event-led plotline was a good idea, the Ring was an excellent idea, it just needed rewards to encourage people to use it , it was a great tool for the GMs to make story for the players too. Just needed a bit more work.
Invasions were never used enough.
A lot of what they brought in reeked of desperation and a lack of understanding of what Ryzom was or had become, PvP you couldn't escape, quest lines that outstripped crafted items, 'gambling' machines. Make it the premier RP game on the market and you'll grab a niche nobody else has and carve out a loyal, long term fanbase that doesn't depend on all these other things.
I'm probably sounding like a broken record by now, but Istaria/Horizons and its latest company Virtrium is a profound example of the kind of development paradigm Ryzom needs to survive and thrive.
- Virtrium's core (paid) team is very small, less than a half-dozen. - Their team is supplemented by volunteers. This includes devs in several fields and community correspondents. - They listen and communicate. This occurs via forums, support tickets, the community correspondents, and a monthly newsletter with additional email announcements when necessary. - They fix bugs first and foremost, but each patch also includes small content updates. - When revamping existing mechanics and content, they do so without sacrificing any of Istaria's spirit. - They adjust changes/additions/fixes at all stages of development from planning to post-release according to player feedback, but judiciously. - They make extensive use of a public testing shard. - They're finishing old projects, but with tweaks to make them more appropriate if necessary. - Although they can't place much focus on live events for now, on occasion they log in as GMs to spawn simple invasions, and they introduced two new holiday events that were firmly based in lore. - More lore is being released through multiple mediums: forums, in-game, emailed RP explanations for some patches, etc. - Overall, Virtrium is not trying to push Istaria toward millions or even hundreds of thousands of players. Instead they are nurturing it within its own niche, and they've stated this intent explicitly. - The development team is composed of people who have great familiarity with the game. Some of them were there when it was created and for years afterward. They know exactly what it is and what its history is, and they've learned from that history.
Virtrium is showing no signs of financial distress, even as they support three shards and active development on a population numbering only in the hundreds.
If Nevrax learned as well as Virtrium did, I believe they are our best option and I hope Spiderweb is a front for them.
Naysayers to the preservation of Ryzom's niche status should keep in mind that at this point two major financial issues Ryzom had are gone: debt and an oversized development team.
----------- In memory of Laura "Taera" Genender. Passed away on August 13, 2008.
Comments
In my opinion, I found only the last 10 levels impossible to solo (you really have too few choices at that levels, unsoloable). Other than that with the right knowledge of the correct animals to hunt at the right level, you can pretty solo up to 240 with no problems (i'm speaking of combat skills, ofc).
Of course, grouping is much more fun, but sometime, traveling solo is better for testing mobs and getting knowledge as your time don't depends by others.
Nickname registered on www.mynickname.org
My experience in Ryzom leads me to make a few observations:
1. It's not a game for instant gratification and easy casual soloing. It's not Guild Wars. Ryzom rewards time spent observing and learning. It rewards putting in an effort to meet people and learn from them. It can be soloed, and I spent most of my time solo, but teaming definitely makes things easier. Even when "solo", I was chatting with friends and guildmates, so I was never lonely. Ryzom is a rich and dynamic environment, with its own unique characteristics and methods. Spend the time to get to know it and you will probably come to love it with a fierce passion. If you are not interested in making that investment, the game may not be as fun for you as it is for me. Nothing wrong with that, there are plenty of great games that don't float my particular boat, c'est la vie.
2. In my opinion, Ryzom's best hope for long term survival is to locate and market to the correct people. Many of them are probably not playing games right now. I wasn't when I stumbled upon Ryzom. Also, there is a segment of the game-playing public that yearns for something richer, something that demands more from a player. That's another potential source of new blood. Ryzom is (was) and should be a game that fills a niche, a place in the gaming spectrum left hollow by its absence. Attempting to compete for players who wouldn't like Ryzom anyway is not a path to success.
3. Ryzom's best feature, by far, is the core playerbase. Yes, that means that the game isn't nearly as good if you play solo and never talk to anyone. It's also a fragile feature that the owners cannot directly control, but they've done a pretty good job of damaging it in previous incarnations. Those of us remaining are a pretty tough and obstinate bunch. We dearly, dearly want to grow our ranks, though. I believe there are many more out there waiting to be found.
===============================
Sasi
Guild Leader of Pegasus Foundation
in Ryzom
Tossing my plugged nickel into the discussion about newbie areas:
I played Ryzom very, very briefly. I remember being baffled by the game, but that was entirely my fault; I didn't bother trying to find a manual and so just muddled along. I quit playing simply because of real-life affairs and I plan on giving it another spin -- a more informed spin, thanks to the links provided by folks in this forum. (Aw, c'mon now, group hug everyone!) I don't remember much about the newbie experience, so I can only speak in generalities.
When I first start playing an MMO, I want to get guidance on 'How to play the game.' This not only means instructions on how to do tasks -- harvest, fight, sell, craft, and whatnot -- but also the goals and activities the developers have in mind. In games like WoW this means questing. I learned early on that I should take quests to earn rewards, and I carried that behavior on throughout the rest of the game. The game reinforces this by having the quests direct you outward, so that you're steered to more advanced locations as you progress; by the time you reach a city you've probably got stuff worth putting on the Auction House, for instance.
Since Ryzom doesn't work like that (apparently) I think the newbie experience should be a bit different. I think Ryzom might benefit from a isolated tutorial area that operates mostly on a metagame (OOC, if you like) level. Basically, it'd be an interactive game manual, divorced from the world-at-large. You'd learn how to perform the game mechanics, and at the end it would set expectations for you: "Now go, explore Arys! You may wish to find a guild to support you in your travels... and support them in return. The world is a dangerous place, so keep your wits about you blah blah pep talk blah...." Basically, reinforce the idea that you're not going to get a lot of NPC guidance but should seek out other players instead. Now that they've got a grasp on how to interact with the game they can figure out which direction they want to go in: combat, crafting, harvesting, what-have-you.
After that you're dropped in a major activity hub, albeit one where you can wander off a little ways without getting slaughtered by hordes of ravenous beasts or harvesting nodes that melt your skeleton if you try to extract them.
Obviously, a player should be able to skip the tutorial "zone" if they're so inclined, such as a experienced player making another character.
the new-ish starter area kinda does this, the old ones were nightmare's
Some time in 2006 (iirc) Ryzom introduced a new starter area that worked very much as you describe. It went through a few updates as well to make incremental improvements. Although it definitely served the purpose of tutorial and used quests to do so, as you suggest, it also had the unintended effect of giving new players a wrong impression of what the game would be like.
I think your ideas are spot on, but the implementation probably needs yet another iteration, to make a clear distinction in expectations between the quest driven tutorial of the starter island and the largely questless mainland.
P.S. Hiya Jack
===============================
Sasi
Guild Leader of Pegasus Foundation
in Ryzom
That's really weird. A server wipe would damage this game more then it would attract new players. A sandbox is what you make of it, not how it makes you. Like some other popular MMOs out there, where yes if you start late you will be at a disadventage, especially 'end game' wise. But as far as I understand Ryzom is always changing and evolving, there is no real end game like you see in other games. There is still raids and bosses and pvp both in duel form and while contesting for outposts (right?), but it's not driven by the game but by the players themselves.
You're asking to wipe the work of your fellow gamers, it's like asking an artist to pour water on their painting because you want to use the canvas for something else.
(,,,)=^__^=(,,,)
That's really weird. A server wipe would damage this game more then it would attract new players. A sandbox is what you make of it, not how it makes you. Like some other popular MMOs out there, where yes if you start late you will be at a disadventage, especially 'end game' wise. But as far as I understand Ryzom is always changing and evolving, there is no real end game like you see in other games. There is still raids and bosses and pvp both in duel form and while contesting for outposts (right?), but it's not driven by the game but by the players themselves.
You're asking to wipe the work of your fellow gamers, it's like asking an artist to pour water on their painting because you want to use the canvas for something else.
I think people are forgetting that though a server wipe would be a shame, in essence, this game was over. Finished. Kaput.
What you all have is a second chance to play this game. If they wipe it is that worse than if the game just ceased forever? And keep in mind, you don't know what these developers are going to be doing. They "might" keep it as business as usual and they might take it in a completely different direction.
However, assuming that they don't, as I said, this is a second chance to play a game that you love(ed).
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
Iterating away:
1) Detatch the tutorial from the game world. You are NOT on some island on Arys, you are in That Place For the Teaching Of the Game Mechanics. Making it a plain gray area where you interact with simple geometric solids is probably extreme, but making it a (large) enclosed area called “Tutorial” where you get lessons from, oh, “The Shrub of Combat”, “The Tree of Crafting” and “The Lichen of Commerce” rather than NPCs might help. No one would tell you “These pantaloons are threatening the village crops! Go kill ten of them!” Instead, the Shrub of Combat would say: “On your task bar you’ve got a special attack power called ‘Thump’. Practice using that on the pantaloons to the north. Return to me when you feel like learning more.”
2) Teach players to be proactive rather than reactive. Apart from an initial nudge -- “Go talk to the three plants in front of you to learn about interacting with the world of Ryzom” -- the players are free to browse the lessons as desired. “Tell me about casting spells,” “Tell me about selling items”, etc. Once they’ve read a lesson it’d switch to “Remind me about X.” There’d be no requirements to advance (unless a lesson requires another lesson to precede it -- you have to read “Tell me about attacking things” before you read “Tell me about special attacks”, perhaps), and they can also leave whenever they want.
3) No rewards -- you leave just as you entered. You don’t earn anything for completing the lessons, so you don’t reinforce the “Do task, earn reward” mindset. Any items you gather as part of the tutorial either have no worth outside of the tutorial or (preferably) disappear once you head into the game proper. (Warn people of this beforehand or you'll probably have cranky players showing up who farmed the tar out of the tutorial area.)
4) Be as subtle as a sledgehammer about expectations. No matter what, people will leave the tutorial and ask the nearest person/chat channel, “What should I do now?” Other games have conditioned us, it’s not our fault, we’ll still try and make Tutorial Lesson = Quest. Still, put in a message about “You will not have quests to steer you, your make your own goals” as you depart so that the handful of people who read such things will have a clue.
…OK, so maybe less with the combat shrubs (boring day at work), but something along these lines.
As far as a server wipe… as long as I’m not alone and useless with my shiny new character while everyone’s elsewhere doing highly advanced stuff, then I don’t see the need.
Agreed. This #4 of yours is what was (is) really lacking the (once) current strating area, called Ruins of Silan, RoS.
It has (as the servers are slowly restarting, I'll keep the present tense for now) quests to make the players learn the mechanics.
That approach was OK, as you stated, most MMORPG players are quest-spoiled after all.
It had the very serious mistake to tell the player that there would be no quest system in the "real" world (There are "quests", but few and very special ones...). That, ofc, led the pre-spoiled new children to misexpectations.
RoS has some other, pply smaller, faults, too: it is too large (encouraging a longer stay than actually needed); it gives -for the expected player skills- uber item rewards (-> wrong expectations again, Ryzom is playerdriven itemwise, plus no market for crafted items on RoS); it does not encourage teaming by only having one single "boss" of a few that cannot be solo'ed; it doesn't give a correct impression of the four main "lands" the four civilizattions split into, including to only mentioning once that on RoS found friends are likely to be seperated upon leaving, which leads directly to the last fault I can remember right now: it has an option to be summoned to any capital of choice instead upon leaving (which breaks the immersion and has some other small disadvantages for crafters and their crafting plans and in terms of initial fame).
Apart from that, RoS is a very good idea. Ryzom is very hard to learn, especially if players are spoiled by questdriven and/or static other universes.
Those have to learn about beiong able to learn everything, about creating their own actions/spells/combos/call'em-howya-like, stanzas, and editing the predefined ones, about the differences of harvesting, about the interchangeability of crafting materials, about the two main religious! factions, and most importantly about the interaction with the other inhabitants of the planet, the difference between carnivores, herbivores and kitin and their common behaviour, as Atys is alive and interacts with itself - you don't have a combination of all that anywhere else.
RoS is needed for learning. It should only make very clear that it is there for that purpose only and that it's different from Atys. The problem with telling the player just that is: which casual player actually reads what the "system" is telling them? From my memory and experience with RoS 85% of all questions about mechanics itself have been answered by the system before...and have simply been skipped, clicked away...
How do you transmit information to a player that doesn't read?
Ooops... now I'm seriously offtopic, am I not? Too loquacious, too. Sorry...
*looks for the donkey hat*
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Yay, my favourite topic... or at least the one I harp on about the most.
Ryzom's single biggest handicap is the false expectation that Silan (the noob island) builds in players and which the Mainland immediately dashes.
Silan is, in my opinion, an excellent starting area (except for the questlog bugs). It introduces all of Ryzom's non-standard features in a way that players of standard mmos are familiar with, i.e. "quests".
But when you're finished and you go to the mainland, there's no more quests because Ryzom's not that kind of game.
Silan is an enormous improvement over the old starter areas - but it is and will remain a half-arsed implementation until they add some kind of notification to players leaving Silan that steers them in the right direction.
This is what I've suggested before. I managed to pick all this up in my first few days of playing, but being told this (by the game) would reduce that "what the hell do I do now?" reaction upon hitting the mainland.
Here in the Ruins of Silan you have been guided with missions that helped you develop the basic skills and knowledge to survive on the mainland. Missions on the mainland take a different form. Completing missions will earn you favour with particular factions but are not necessary to advance your skills or earn experience points.
Experience points are earned through experience. You'll improve combat, crafting and harvesting skills by using them. You'll most often find it easier to do so by teaming up with other players.
You should also give thought to joining a guild. They can help you learn how to survive on the mainland and probably assist you with acquiring new and better equipment.
Be warned that travelling between the different lands of Ryzom is dangerous and most likely impossible for young homins like yourself. But older, more experienced homins can help you make those journeys and acquire teleport points which will then allow you to travel to those points instantly. When planning such treks, older homins usually advertise the fact in zone chat channels. You should listen for these and join treks as soon as you can, as they will both open up new lands for you to experience and help you to meet other homins.
Honestly, their best bet is making a new server. That way, old players get to keep their characters and newbies get a place where everyone's on equal ground.
Yah. I have to agree with most people that one of their biggest problems was the (lack of) good advertising and PR.
To be honest, the characters / avatars look really bizzare, and so they have to be even more creative in how they advertise.
That was done already a ways before all servers were closed...
The new server was "Cho". It was an international server, at least that's what was told. So there were four servers as a total: an english speaking server, a french speaking server, a german speaking server and Cho, the "international" server. Doesn't that combination sound comprehensable? *grin*
Some new players did start there, indeed - new ones split quite evenly into the then existant four servers, though. Still, the majority of Cho's population didn't recruit from spanish, russian or korean speaking people. It consisted very largely of vets from the other three servers who tried to get a kick out of a new start or simply wanted to try a different approach or face a new challange. (I had a few days of fun there trekking the whole world without any help, at least.) They knew their ways around and they quickly got ahead of the ones who actually started their first time on Atys. Or in other words: the vets started an arms race about the rulership of the outposts. They had no real time to care for inexperienced ones in action. (They did in words and with gear, if needed, though. Everyone in Ryzom does...)
At that time, real newcomers were recommended in the boards to start on some of the three established servers because they'd be helped to whatevertheywishedtolearn better there.
Cho was merged with Arispotle, the english speaking server, quite a while before closing all of'em down.
I still consider it to have been intended as test for whatever. I think it failed.
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New servers are good in theory, but splitting the already small community (hopefully not small for long!) isn't going to do much good I'm afraid.
Maybe I'm beating a dead horse here, but I guess it needs a few more kicks.
"equal ground" is neither necessary nor desirable in Ryzom. A new player is better off with experienced players and characters around.
If your concern is that others will "be ahead of you" - whatever that might mean in a skill-based sandbox - then you will insta-lose anyway because the experienced players will "level up" their characters 6 times as fast as you anyway, in a great arms race for outpost control and resource monopoly. See other excellent posts in this thread for more discussion of the Cho experience.
On the other hand, established characters and politics give experienced players incentive to help you reach your goals rather than ignore you in a rush toward their own goals.
I know that in every other MMO you've ever played, everyone ignored you anyway, unless you could help them do something for themselves. Ryzom is not like that. It's not a bunch of people separately playing a single player RPG that just happens to have other morons getting in your way. In Ryzom, teaming makes *everything* smoother, and teaming with someone who knows good ways to do things, and can bail you out if things go awry, makes it all the better.
In other news, the devs have reportedly stated that they are trying really hard to keep from losing any character data. I apologize for not being able to reference something for you, as I have that second hand from another player who was in a chat session with "VL", the once and current dev lead. But I consider it reliable information.
The old servers (Aniro and Leanon in particular) have been online intermittently as the team works on the restart.
All of the real evidence points to a restart of the old servers with all of the characters intact. Personally, I consider that to be a best case scenario, and am quite excited at the prospect.
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Sasi
Guild Leader of Pegasus Foundation
in Ryzom
I always wondered how they would implement underwater adventures. It seems like the game engine was 2D. I remember swimming on top of the water, but I don't know how diving below the surface would have worked
Anyway, I can't wait until it comes back!
They had no real time to care for inexperienced ones in action. (They did in words and with gear, if needed, though. Everyone in Ryzom does...)
At that time, real newcomers were recommended in the boards to start on some of the three established servers because they'd be helped to whatevertheywishedtolearn better there.
That doesn't surprise me. Part of what made Ryzom so good to play when I did, about a year ago, was the fact that there was an existing high level playerbase who, while they still had plenty of skills of their own to max, had already maxed a few and had nothing to gain by maxing more other than the variety factor.
So, in stark contrast to raid-grind mmos ala WoW where players are obsessed about getting that next piece of shiny loot which requires a massive investment of time, the Ryzom highbies could do their own stuff and have time spare to help and hang out with noobies.
That kind of game design, in my opinion, also helps to foster the kind of community that has evolved on Ryzom.
(I gave up on getting the quote block right) - - XoloX: “RoS is needed for learning. It should only make very clear that it is there for that purpose only and that it's different from Atys. The problem with telling the player just that is: which casual player actually reads what the "system" is telling them? From my memory and experience with RoS 85% of all questions about mechanics itself have been answered by the system before...and have simply been skipped, clicked away... How do you transmit information to a player that doesn't read?“
I don't know if you can, but I think you can at least reduce some problems by establishing a different pattern of behavior earlier on. What I was going for in my plant-based interactive manual was this process: “Select something you want to learn about > Get told how to do it > Get told where to do it if you want > Go do that until you decide to stop and come back to learn something else.” That's a different approach than “Get told to do something that has the veneer of being part of some story arc > Go do it, learning something in the process (maybe) > Come back and get a reinforcing reward and get sent on another errand.”
If you move people to a different pattern of working with the game, it might lighten some shock even if they don't bother reading any text. On the flip side, you still get the “Talk to NPC for direction” vibe, which may help ease people into the game.
Or not, whadda I know... ;-)
Guess I'll be keeping an eye on this, but I got pressganged into playing WoW by some friends I don't see otherwise and I'm currently playing LOTRO. I guess it depends what they do to//with Ryzom.
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What's next? Telling us you had a hand in DnD 4th edition?
Not exactly, but have written some stuff that's being converted for it.
Yeah, I know, WoW, but we avoid the PvP and it's mostly just a conference call once a week
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So... any news?? Heh.
I've played most of the available MMOs and Ryzom still captures my heart the most. I just loved it.
The vibrant world, the migrating (and fighting) wild life, the digging, the combat.. Just so damn cool.
I'd definitely come back when/if the game re-opens. I'd probably play my old characters on previous servers too.
Was Trueheart on Arispotle server for any old, old timers... Seems so long ago.. Ah the memories.
Such joyous memories.
"(The) Iraqi people owe the American people a huge debt of gratitude." - George W Bush.
Oh. My. God.
IMO Ryzom needs to recognise what it is in order to succeed.
A niche, long-term investment game that is - and should be - about the role-playing, rather than trying to play catch up with the big boys.
Event-led plotline was a good idea, the Ring was an excellent idea, it just needed rewards to encourage people to use it , it was a great tool for the GMs to make story for the players too. Just needed a bit more work.
Invasions were never used enough.
A lot of what they brought in reeked of desperation and a lack of understanding of what Ryzom was or had become, PvP you couldn't escape, quest lines that outstripped crafted items, 'gambling' machines. Make it the premier RP game on the market and you'll grab a niche nobody else has and carve out a loyal, long term fanbase that doesn't depend on all these other things.
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What Grim just said is truth.
I'm probably sounding like a broken record by now, but Istaria/Horizons and its latest company Virtrium is a profound example of the kind of development paradigm Ryzom needs to survive and thrive.
- Virtrium's core (paid) team is very small, less than a half-dozen.
- Their team is supplemented by volunteers. This includes devs in several fields and community correspondents.
- They listen and communicate. This occurs via forums, support tickets, the community correspondents, and a monthly newsletter with additional email announcements when necessary.
- They fix bugs first and foremost, but each patch also includes small content updates.
- When revamping existing mechanics and content, they do so without sacrificing any of Istaria's spirit.
- They adjust changes/additions/fixes at all stages of development from planning to post-release according to player feedback, but judiciously.
- They make extensive use of a public testing shard.
- They're finishing old projects, but with tweaks to make them more appropriate if necessary.
- Although they can't place much focus on live events for now, on occasion they log in as GMs to spawn simple invasions, and they introduced two new holiday events that were firmly based in lore.
- More lore is being released through multiple mediums: forums, in-game, emailed RP explanations for some patches, etc.
- Overall, Virtrium is not trying to push Istaria toward millions or even hundreds of thousands of players. Instead they are nurturing it within its own niche, and they've stated this intent explicitly.
- The development team is composed of people who have great familiarity with the game. Some of them were there when it was created and for years afterward. They know exactly what it is and what its history is, and they've learned from that history.
Virtrium is showing no signs of financial distress, even as they support three shards and active development on a population numbering only in the hundreds.
If Nevrax learned as well as Virtrium did, I believe they are our best option and I hope Spiderweb is a front for them.
Naysayers to the preservation of Ryzom's niche status should keep in mind that at this point two major financial issues Ryzom had are gone: debt and an oversized development team.
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In memory of Laura "Taera" Genender. Passed away on August 13, 2008.