Not saying FFXIV needs to do this but I would love to see a MMO with real death. Your character dies and that is it, they are dead, make a new character. Or give the character so many deaths, sort of how we do D&D in our house. Everytime you get -10 real death, and you get ressurrected your Con. score goes down a point if your Con modifer reaches 0 you are permanitly dead. Time to make a new character etc..
Well, I'm not waiting for XIV and nor willing to play it in future, but I hope it will get more wow-like dp anyways. I have always thought that xp-loss is for those crappy f2p grinding games.
Not saying FFXIV needs to do this but I would love to see a MMO with real death. Your character dies and that is it, they are dead, make a new character. Or give the character so many deaths, sort of how we do D&D in our house. Everytime you get -10 real death, and you get ressurrected your Con. score goes down a point if your Con modifer reaches 0 you are permanitly dead. Time to make a new character etc..
Dustin
I have played 'Iron man' characters in WoW, and while it IS exciting, it also kills grouping altogether, as I don't want to lose my character permanently due to someone else's error.
Let players have 'style' options when they make their character:
1 - Iron man - no res. Dead is dead. Quadruple xp and cash drops.
2 - Pacifist - No xp from kills. Triple xp from quests.
3 - Explorer - Major xp gains from searching new zones. First kill of each type of mob is worth 20 times the xp. No xp for kills past 20 of the same mob.
I an all for the same death penalty as FFXI EXCEPT I do not want to de-level. that made equipment a real issue, now i can't use my sword, and i can't afford the one i just sold...screwed!
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone www.spankybus.com -3d Artist & Compositor -Writer -Professional Amature
I an all for the same death penalty as FFXI EXCEPT I do not want to de-level. that made equipment a real issue, now i can't use my sword, and i can't afford the one i just sold...screwed!
What penalty for max level characters, then?
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Jaz, i have tired spellborn, and it is awesome. I wish it liked my video card better. I play several mmos at max settings and it is the only one that has video lag for me.
i love how we speculate on how they will do it and give our opinions like they matter.. because they don't square-enix will do what they want and we will play anyways that is how the system works. They make them we play, we complain or give suggestions they don't listen, do what they want and we still play and give them our monthly subscription. Some will play because its a new MMO, some will play because it is Final Fantasy, those who stick around will play out of enjoyment.
As for my perm. death suggestion, yes it makes me a hypocrite, with my above post, but I said I would like any mmo to have that, The reason is maybe if a mmo had perm. death people wouldn't take them so seriously. I know a guy who almost lost his job, apartment, and family over FFXI. He would skip home on lunch to play and such. It was quite crazy. The only thing I hate about death penality in FFXI or them having one in FFXIV is that other FF has ever had a death penality. You cast the life spell they come back and boom your done lol. Have fun
You can't separate death penalty from the rest of the game mechanics. If the game is designed to play like an arcade game, then a heavy death penalty will only appeal to masochists.
In my opinion, WoW is more successful than EQ because of its superior polish, not because of the death penalty level they happened to settle on. They eliminated the frustration of an arbitrary death penalty, but they didn't replace it with anything that added substance back the game.
If the desire is to make an MMORPG feel as immersive as possible, then death should be a very PAINFUL, but also very very RARE occurrence.
I think that EQ and (believe it or not) WoW both missed the mark. The problem is that when you have only a single hitpoint bar, then the only possible outcome of any fight is to be either partially dead or fully dead. I wish somebody would make an MMORPG where you have some of your 'hitpoints' as easily recoverable 'fatigue' points, but then after those are expended, the rest are harder-to-heal 'body' points.
If you fight cleverly, against appropriate level opponents, you should have practically zero downtime. But if you make a mistake, get an unexpected add, fight an opponent too tough, etc, then you should be slightly "punished" with some downtime. You should only actually die if you do something incredibly stupid - like pressing on after way too many fights in a row, or after you find even the 'easy' MOBs at the outside of a dungeon are causing you injury.
That would make an MMORPG less like an arcade game - with unlimited "lives" - and more like what most people think of when we think of heroic fantasy combat in books or novels. It would also add a lot to strategy because all fights would not have to be either trivial or deadly -- there would be a lot of space in-between for minor injuries. Think about it: if you were a heroic fighter going against a three-foot-tall kobald, OK, there should be very little chance he would kill you. But if you got even a hangnail out of the fight, you would consider that a "loss", and you'd want to avoid too many of those because they would build up over time or else you'd have to stop and deal with bandages and iodine. So you would have an incentive to be careful all the way through the dungeon, and not just in the "boss fight."
I can imagine a character who's super tough, or has super strength, etc. Or gnomes with rocket-powered rollerskates, or pretty much anything else a designer cares to put in their world. But frequent death? Frankly, I cannot imagine anything that breaks the immersion and believability of a world more than that. Yet, somehow, that is accepted as the standard paradigm in computer games. Most players (and apparently even game designers) never even stop to question it. Why?
The above post has an interesting proposition. A two-stage hit-points (HP) system would add some flavor to game.
I'll quickly summarize the post above for people that didn't understand it at first glance. The system would have two levels of HP. The first level would be capable of being healed by any healer class, or by recover items. The second level of HP would only be recoverable by staying out of battle for a time. Once the first level of HP has been depleted, the second level would start to get eaten away. Once both bars are zero, the character would expire.
Now, this would both promote a balance of combat vs. crafting. The system would be forgiving enough if you happened to be "one-shotted", but less forgiving if you toyed with danger too much. Players would feel less inclined to "grind", and with more people taking breaks, there would be more people to socialize with while waiting.
Since the system would be forgiving enough, dying should have greater consequences. Generally, have the player loose a little experience, but no item loss. Have additional penalties scale depending on how they died. Dying from same mob several times should force the player to bring help for that specific mob (only that mob). All other deaths should force the player to stay in town for a short while. No one likes to de-level or loose items, this is the trade-off.
I'd also suggest one more system, which would best be explained by its title, "misery loves company". If a player dies, he or she is automatically grouped with others that also have recently died. They could leave the group at any time, but there would be an experience bonus for leveling with the other members. This would also cancel any of the additional penalties of dying (except exp loss). The player would get this chance once per day to prevent abuse.
I like the above 2 posts a lot, heck you could get rid of dying all together and just make it impossible to keep fighting. I like the idea of 2 hp bars where only the first can be healed by potions/spells but the second is a very slow recovering bar that can take a long time to recover, at least an hour, preferably 3. and the lower the second bar is the less well you fare in combat. And once that second bar is completely depleted you become unconscious and even after you have gained some bar back you will still be so weak as to being completely useless in battle.
There is no reason for death in a game like this, as stated nothing can break immersion more than death. No great heroes die halfway through a story. and when they do they never come back, why should a game be any different?
Originally posted by Kai082 The system would have two levels of HP. The first level would be capable of being healed by any healer class, or by recover items. The second level of HP would only be recoverable by staying out of battle for a time.
That's not exactly what I had in mind. What I called "fatigue points" would recover automatically and very quickly - so fast that you could even partially recover while in combat. I don't want ANY punishment if a fight goes well. I even chafe at WoW's brief stops to drink - why am I punished with even a short "time out" if I the fights are going well?
In addition, I think the same pool should be used for attack and defense so that players would have to PACE themselves to know when to withhold attacks, and when to 'go for broke' without the system putting them in tight little straight jackets.
In-fight healing should be eliminated altogether. Most people don't realize it because it's so ubiquitous, but in-fight healing is the main paradigm that has "broken" MMORPG's and forced players into the tight little box of tank-healer-dps. The first step in designers "thinking outside the box" is to very simply GET RID OF THE BOX. The role of 'healers' and 'recover items' would take place only outside of combat - in a kind of mini-game unto itself. Also, the break between 'fatigue' and 'body' injury wouldn't have to be quite that severe. Even if you were careful, small wounds would slowly build up over time. This could allow gameplay to be frenetic for long periods, but then allow for flexible breaks in the action. If one of the players needed to go afk for a few minutes, it's not just wasted time for everyone else. The group can use the opportunity to set up "camp": bandage wounds, mend equipment, organize loot, etc.
(To eliminate the 'dps box' as well, I think shooting through your own men at MOBs should also dissappear. Again, that's just silly, and it can be replaced by a much more realistic mechanic. In ancient times, they didn't have lazer-guided missiles. Bows were used to first force a charge, and then try to blunt it. But then after melee was engaged, missile weapons had to be set aside. And there's no reason this common-sense mechanic can't be put into MMORPGs.)
I like the idea of 2 hp bars where only the first can be healed by potions/spells but the second is a very slow recovering bar that can take a long time to recover, at least an hour, preferably 3. and the lower the second bar is the less well you fare in combat.
Actually, what I had in mind was that your fighting strength would be proportional to the 'first bar' (i.e., the rapidly-regenerating 'fatigue points.') This would allow for very fluid combat, with a great deal of ebb-and-flow during the course of each battle.
If it took a very long time to recover your fighting strength, I think that might be discouraging to players. (And, btw, it wouldn't seem particularly heroic, either!) I see the body points as more like your "safety margin." You CAN continue to fight with them depleted if you choose to; you just have to be more careful for a while.
That way, there's no such thing as a "dedicated tank" character. The moron who runs to the front in every battle, spams his attack key and tries to get hit as often as he possibly can will simply have to change his "tactics" (if that word could even be applied to such incredibly absurd behavior.) MMORPG players would have to take turns sharing the glory for a change, instead of having the one guy who happens to have the 'leetest' armor try and take all the hits for everyone in the group while a team of nurses continually pumps gallons of fresh blood into his body through a firehose-size I.V.
Your system sounds like PotBS's*. Don't know if you've played but that's pretty much what they do for avatar combat. Though you can heal during fights.
The system is more limited than the one you likely have in mind, mostly due to avatar combat being a sub-game for PotBS.
A combat system without healing (or with very limited healing) would indeed be a change of pace for MMORPG's. I'm not certain FFXIV is the place for that system. White mages and white (healing) magic are a major part of the FF tradition. I do really like your idea, I just have a feeling it won't see the light of day in a FF game.
I am hoping they move away from the MMORPG holy trinity and move more towards the typical FF limited tactics.
I do mean limited. Your tactics often consisted of placing a character in the 'front' or 'back' row. Characters in the front row take and deal full damage with melee weapons. Characters in the back row take and deal ~50% damage with melee weapons. They can do full damage with spells (and in some games ranged weapons.) Most enemy AI's randomly tossed out damage, such that all characters took damage.
With any luck they'll move more in this direction with FFXIV. Everyone takes some damage during most fights. Melee characters protect ranged characters by standing infront of them. (In this case physically, blocking their access to casters.)
Life in a typical FF game is cheap, costing mere mana to restore. (Unless the unlucky character dies in a cinamatic, RIP Gen. Leo.) Thus frequent death isn't out of the picture, as death is generally easily reversed. Heck, in some FF games it could be 'cheaper' and 'easier' to let a character die and cast life on them then cleanse all the debuffs they'd accumulated. I know I've done it.
I would love to see the system you described put in place though. It sounds perfect for a game like APB**.
Death penalty should be balanced so that 1. It is tough enough that you wont want to use it as a cheap way to gate out of a dungeon. 2. It is not so tough that it makes it hard to find groups willing to take risks.
I agree with both of these points. Harsh penalties make grouping MUCH harder, and frankly, much less friendly. I think that when grouped, the run back is enough of a punishment.
For solo, xp loss is fine, but no deleveling - unless at max level (there has to be SOME penalty). A choice between xp loss or repair cost would be even better.
of course by this logic WoW should have awsome groups and FFXI should have had terrible groups.....
Your system sounds like PotBS's*. Don't know if you've played but that's pretty much what they do for avatar combat. Though you can heal during fights. The system is more limited than the one you likely have in mind, mostly due to avatar combat being a sub-game for PotBS.
With in-fight healing, there is no "system". If I recall correctly, PotBS tried to put some parrying graphics in - which was cool. But it wasn't very well implemented. And it all becomes pointless if there is no difference between long-term and short-term damage.
And you can't have that when combat is separated into a separate minigame. You just end up with the same arcade-like systems that all MMORPGs have: There is no strategic element. A fight has two outcomes: you live or you die; nothing in-between. Some games have you medding 4 minutes instead of 2, or drinking 2 potions instead of one. But that doesn't really matter; there's no real difference between one fight and the next.
Someone earlier had suggested that "body points" take realtime hours to heal. The complete system I have in mind is somewhat more complex than that, but it does have an element to it that can take hours - or even days - to recharge. A "good" fight results in essentially zero downtime, but when you get minor wounds you face the choice of going on (very few fights would begin at 100%), or stopping every once in a while to bandage up. Basically, you'd be entering each fight at a different level of readiness.
CRPG dungeon crawling has always been about a whole lot of little, often trivial fights, and then a huge 'boss' encounter at the end. What I'm suggesting would keep the small fights interesting, and also incorporate the "wearing down" effect that old-style dungeons had, so that you actually had to THINK about when to take a break and when to go for broke.
of course by this logic WoW should have awsome groups and FFXI should have had terrible groups.....
.......Which isn't the case, logic denied.
WoW has a death penalty. At high levels repairs can be very expensive.
I never played FF XI, but having to wait hours for a group to form doesn't sound like a good grouping game to me.
I played Wow and FFXI. Playing With a Pug in wow was like playing with retarted Monkeys flinging poo.
Playing FFXI you forced them to learn their roleor they quit the game.
I could spot a FFXI player 10 seconds into a Pug in Wow because they wernt retarted.
In FFXI you did have to wait a hour to get a group (I dident but i was a healer) But when you did it was Freaking Magic. No speaking later in the game was even needed. I knew my roll and everyone else knew theirs. We all looked around for Add's and watched out. Spells, and 2 Hours were used with almost Sage like Precision.
Nothing like that ever happend in Wow.. Maby raids but i never did those. Groups were nothing more than herding cats... this was with guild members... "Hardcore" Guilds ect. Dident matter.
So No. I dont want Wow with Big Eyes, Small Mouths. I want Final Fantasy. I want Groups of people who take Pride in their class's and Death is that Whorable Monster that will Ruin your Day. And no Wow dident have any death penilty unless you ran a billion raids and had some stupid expencive set. And even then It could be made up with a hour of harvesting the low level Crafting mats.
If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude; greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. Samuel Adams
of course by this logic WoW should have awsome groups and FFXI should have had terrible groups.....
.......Which isn't the case, logic denied.
WoW has a death penalty. At high levels repairs can be very expensive.
I never played FF XI, but having to wait hours for a group to form doesn't sound like a good grouping game to me.
I played Wow and FFXI. Playing With a Pug in wow was like playing with retarted Monkeys flinging poo.
Playing FFXI you forced them to learn their roleor they quit the game.
I could spot a FFXI player 10 seconds into a Pug in Wow because they wernt retarted.
In FFXI you did have to wait a hour to get a group (I dident but i was a healer) But when you did it was Freaking Magic. No speaking later in the game was even needed. I knew my roll and everyone else knew theirs. We all looked around for Add's and watched out. Spells, and 2 Hours were used with almost Sage like Precision.
Nothing like that ever happend in Wow.. Maby raids but i never did those. Groups were nothing more than herding cats... this was with guild members... "Hardcore" Guilds ect. Dident matter.
So No. I dont want Wow with Big Eyes, Small Mouths. I want Final Fantasy. I want Groups of people who take Pride in their class's and Death is that Whorable Monster that will Ruin your Day. And no Wow dident have any death penilty unless you ran a billion raids and had some stupid expencive set. And even then It could be made up with a hour of harvesting the low level Crafting mats.
Now here is a man who's play'd more then WOW ^^
And anyone that has play'd FFXI KNOWS that it had the best groups out of ANY mmo EVER!
Comments
So, you want it to be sloppy, incomplete, buggy as hell, unstable, and require an uber system to run?
lol you realy are trolling arn't you.....
FFXI was never any of those things.
Read what I was replying to.
"I would like this game to be nothing like WoW."
I was making no comment about FFXI at all.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Not saying FFXIV needs to do this but I would love to see a MMO with real death. Your character dies and that is it, they are dead, make a new character. Or give the character so many deaths, sort of how we do D&D in our house. Everytime you get -10 real death, and you get ressurrected your Con. score goes down a point if your Con modifer reaches 0 you are permanitly dead. Time to make a new character etc..
Dustin
Well, I'm not waiting for XIV and nor willing to play it in future, but I hope it will get more wow-like dp anyways. I have always thought that xp-loss is for those crappy f2p grinding games.
Well id like it to have a penalty where we would turn into a taco....permanantly
I have played 'Iron man' characters in WoW, and while it IS exciting, it also kills grouping altogether, as I don't want to lose my character permanently due to someone else's error.
Let players have 'style' options when they make their character:
1 - Iron man - no res. Dead is dead. Quadruple xp and cash drops.
2 - Pacifist - No xp from kills. Triple xp from quests.
3 - Explorer - Major xp gains from searching new zones. First kill of each type of mob is worth 20 times the xp. No xp for kills past 20 of the same mob.
GL getting in instance groups with #1.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
I an all for the same death penalty as FFXI EXCEPT I do not want to de-level. that made equipment a real issue, now i can't use my sword, and i can't afford the one i just sold...screwed!
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
What penalty for max level characters, then?
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Jaz, i have tired spellborn, and it is awesome. I wish it liked my video card better. I play several mmos at max settings and it is the only one that has video lag for me.
Dustin
i love how we speculate on how they will do it and give our opinions like they matter.. because they don't square-enix will do what they want and we will play anyways that is how the system works. They make them we play, we complain or give suggestions they don't listen, do what they want and we still play and give them our monthly subscription. Some will play because its a new MMO, some will play because it is Final Fantasy, those who stick around will play out of enjoyment.
As for my perm. death suggestion, yes it makes me a hypocrite, with my above post, but I said I would like any mmo to have that, The reason is maybe if a mmo had perm. death people wouldn't take them so seriously. I know a guy who almost lost his job, apartment, and family over FFXI. He would skip home on lunch to play and such. It was quite crazy. The only thing I hate about death penality in FFXI or them having one in FFXIV is that other FF has ever had a death penality. You cast the life spell they come back and boom your done lol. Have fun
Dustin
BTW thanks for the trolling taco comment
Actually, more like Vanguard's death penalty.
-Computer specs no one cares about: check.
-MMOs played no one cares about: check.
-Xfire stats no one cares about: check.
-Signature no one cares about: check.
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-Narcissism: check.
You can't separate death penalty from the rest of the game mechanics. If the game is designed to play like an arcade game, then a heavy death penalty will only appeal to masochists.
In my opinion, WoW is more successful than EQ because of its superior polish, not because of the death penalty level they happened to settle on. They eliminated the frustration of an arbitrary death penalty, but they didn't replace it with anything that added substance back the game.
If the desire is to make an MMORPG feel as immersive as possible, then death should be a very PAINFUL, but also very very RARE occurrence.
I think that EQ and (believe it or not) WoW both missed the mark. The problem is that when you have only a single hitpoint bar, then the only possible outcome of any fight is to be either partially dead or fully dead. I wish somebody would make an MMORPG where you have some of your 'hitpoints' as easily recoverable 'fatigue' points, but then after those are expended, the rest are harder-to-heal 'body' points.
If you fight cleverly, against appropriate level opponents, you should have practically zero downtime. But if you make a mistake, get an unexpected add, fight an opponent too tough, etc, then you should be slightly "punished" with some downtime. You should only actually die if you do something incredibly stupid - like pressing on after way too many fights in a row, or after you find even the 'easy' MOBs at the outside of a dungeon are causing you injury.
That would make an MMORPG less like an arcade game - with unlimited "lives" - and more like what most people think of when we think of heroic fantasy combat in books or novels. It would also add a lot to strategy because all fights would not have to be either trivial or deadly -- there would be a lot of space in-between for minor injuries. Think about it: if you were a heroic fighter going against a three-foot-tall kobald, OK, there should be very little chance he would kill you. But if you got even a hangnail out of the fight, you would consider that a "loss", and you'd want to avoid too many of those because they would build up over time or else you'd have to stop and deal with bandages and iodine. So you would have an incentive to be careful all the way through the dungeon, and not just in the "boss fight."
I can imagine a character who's super tough, or has super strength, etc. Or gnomes with rocket-powered rollerskates, or pretty much anything else a designer cares to put in their world. But frequent death? Frankly, I cannot imagine anything that breaks the immersion and believability of a world more than that. Yet, somehow, that is accepted as the standard paradigm in computer games. Most players (and apparently even game designers) never even stop to question it. Why?
The above post has an interesting proposition. A two-stage hit-points (HP) system would add some flavor to game.
I'll quickly summarize the post above for people that didn't understand it at first glance. The system would have two levels of HP. The first level would be capable of being healed by any healer class, or by recover items. The second level of HP would only be recoverable by staying out of battle for a time. Once the first level of HP has been depleted, the second level would start to get eaten away. Once both bars are zero, the character would expire.
Now, this would both promote a balance of combat vs. crafting. The system would be forgiving enough if you happened to be "one-shotted", but less forgiving if you toyed with danger too much. Players would feel less inclined to "grind", and with more people taking breaks, there would be more people to socialize with while waiting.
Since the system would be forgiving enough, dying should have greater consequences. Generally, have the player loose a little experience, but no item loss. Have additional penalties scale depending on how they died. Dying from same mob several times should force the player to bring help for that specific mob (only that mob). All other deaths should force the player to stay in town for a short while. No one likes to de-level or loose items, this is the trade-off.
I'd also suggest one more system, which would best be explained by its title, "misery loves company". If a player dies, he or she is automatically grouped with others that also have recently died. They could leave the group at any time, but there would be an experience bonus for leveling with the other members. This would also cancel any of the additional penalties of dying (except exp loss). The player would get this chance once per day to prevent abuse.
I like the above 2 posts a lot, heck you could get rid of dying all together and just make it impossible to keep fighting. I like the idea of 2 hp bars where only the first can be healed by potions/spells but the second is a very slow recovering bar that can take a long time to recover, at least an hour, preferably 3. and the lower the second bar is the less well you fare in combat. And once that second bar is completely depleted you become unconscious and even after you have gained some bar back you will still be so weak as to being completely useless in battle.
There is no reason for death in a game like this, as stated nothing can break immersion more than death. No great heroes die halfway through a story. and when they do they never come back, why should a game be any different?
That's not exactly what I had in mind. What I called "fatigue points" would recover automatically and very quickly - so fast that you could even partially recover while in combat. I don't want ANY punishment if a fight goes well. I even chafe at WoW's brief stops to drink - why am I punished with even a short "time out" if I the fights are going well?
In addition, I think the same pool should be used for attack and defense so that players would have to PACE themselves to know when to withhold attacks, and when to 'go for broke' without the system putting them in tight little straight jackets.
In-fight healing should be eliminated altogether. Most people don't realize it because it's so ubiquitous, but in-fight healing is the main paradigm that has "broken" MMORPG's and forced players into the tight little box of tank-healer-dps. The first step in designers "thinking outside the box" is to very simply GET RID OF THE BOX. The role of 'healers' and 'recover items' would take place only outside of combat - in a kind of mini-game unto itself. Also, the break between 'fatigue' and 'body' injury wouldn't have to be quite that severe. Even if you were careful, small wounds would slowly build up over time. This could allow gameplay to be frenetic for long periods, but then allow for flexible breaks in the action. If one of the players needed to go afk for a few minutes, it's not just wasted time for everyone else. The group can use the opportunity to set up "camp": bandage wounds, mend equipment, organize loot, etc.
(To eliminate the 'dps box' as well, I think shooting through your own men at MOBs should also dissappear. Again, that's just silly, and it can be replaced by a much more realistic mechanic. In ancient times, they didn't have lazer-guided missiles. Bows were used to first force a charge, and then try to blunt it. But then after melee was engaged, missile weapons had to be set aside. And there's no reason this common-sense mechanic can't be put into MMORPGs.)
Actually, what I had in mind was that your fighting strength would be proportional to the 'first bar' (i.e., the rapidly-regenerating 'fatigue points.') This would allow for very fluid combat, with a great deal of ebb-and-flow during the course of each battle.
If it took a very long time to recover your fighting strength, I think that might be discouraging to players. (And, btw, it wouldn't seem particularly heroic, either!) I see the body points as more like your "safety margin." You CAN continue to fight with them depleted if you choose to; you just have to be more careful for a while.
That way, there's no such thing as a "dedicated tank" character. The moron who runs to the front in every battle, spams his attack key and tries to get hit as often as he possibly can will simply have to change his "tactics" (if that word could even be applied to such incredibly absurd behavior.) MMORPG players would have to take turns sharing the glory for a change, instead of having the one guy who happens to have the 'leetest' armor try and take all the hits for everyone in the group while a team of nurses continually pumps gallons of fresh blood into his body through a firehose-size I.V.
'Firehouse I.V.' would make a good name for a band.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
After kopema's first post this is probably the most intelligent thread i have seen to date. This is how a forum should be. Everyone please take note.
Kopema,
Your system sounds like PotBS's*. Don't know if you've played but that's pretty much what they do for avatar combat. Though you can heal during fights.
The system is more limited than the one you likely have in mind, mostly due to avatar combat being a sub-game for PotBS.
A combat system without healing (or with very limited healing) would indeed be a change of pace for MMORPG's. I'm not certain FFXIV is the place for that system. White mages and white (healing) magic are a major part of the FF tradition. I do really like your idea, I just have a feeling it won't see the light of day in a FF game.
I am hoping they move away from the MMORPG holy trinity and move more towards the typical FF limited tactics.
I do mean limited. Your tactics often consisted of placing a character in the 'front' or 'back' row. Characters in the front row take and deal full damage with melee weapons. Characters in the back row take and deal ~50% damage with melee weapons. They can do full damage with spells (and in some games ranged weapons.) Most enemy AI's randomly tossed out damage, such that all characters took damage.
With any luck they'll move more in this direction with FFXIV. Everyone takes some damage during most fights. Melee characters protect ranged characters by standing infront of them. (In this case physically, blocking their access to casters.)
Life in a typical FF game is cheap, costing mere mana to restore. (Unless the unlucky character dies in a cinamatic, RIP Gen. Leo.) Thus frequent death isn't out of the picture, as death is generally easily reversed. Heck, in some FF games it could be 'cheaper' and 'easier' to let a character die and cast life on them then cleanse all the debuffs they'd accumulated. I know I've done it.
I would love to see the system you described put in place though. It sounds perfect for a game like APB**.
* Pirates of the Burning Sea
** All Points Bullitan
I agree with both of these points. Harsh penalties make grouping MUCH harder, and frankly, much less friendly. I think that when grouped, the run back is enough of a punishment.
For solo, xp loss is fine, but no deleveling - unless at max level (there has to be SOME penalty). A choice between xp loss or repair cost would be even better.
of course by this logic WoW should have awsome groups and FFXI should have had terrible groups.....
.......Which isn't the case, logic denied.
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WoW has a death penalty. At high levels repairs can be very expensive.
I never played FF XI, but having to wait hours for a group to form doesn't sound like a good grouping game to me.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
With in-fight healing, there is no "system". If I recall correctly, PotBS tried to put some parrying graphics in - which was cool. But it wasn't very well implemented. And it all becomes pointless if there is no difference between long-term and short-term damage.
And you can't have that when combat is separated into a separate minigame. You just end up with the same arcade-like systems that all MMORPGs have: There is no strategic element. A fight has two outcomes: you live or you die; nothing in-between. Some games have you medding 4 minutes instead of 2, or drinking 2 potions instead of one. But that doesn't really matter; there's no real difference between one fight and the next.
Someone earlier had suggested that "body points" take realtime hours to heal. The complete system I have in mind is somewhat more complex than that, but it does have an element to it that can take hours - or even days - to recharge. A "good" fight results in essentially zero downtime, but when you get minor wounds you face the choice of going on (very few fights would begin at 100%), or stopping every once in a while to bandage up. Basically, you'd be entering each fight at a different level of readiness.
CRPG dungeon crawling has always been about a whole lot of little, often trivial fights, and then a huge 'boss' encounter at the end. What I'm suggesting would keep the small fights interesting, and also incorporate the "wearing down" effect that old-style dungeons had, so that you actually had to THINK about when to take a break and when to go for broke.
WoW has a death penalty. At high levels repairs can be very expensive.
I never played FF XI, but having to wait hours for a group to form doesn't sound like a good grouping game to me.
I played Wow and FFXI. Playing With a Pug in wow was like playing with retarted Monkeys flinging poo.
Playing FFXI you forced them to learn their roleor they quit the game.
I could spot a FFXI player 10 seconds into a Pug in Wow because they wernt retarted.
In FFXI you did have to wait a hour to get a group (I dident but i was a healer) But when you did it was Freaking Magic. No speaking later in the game was even needed. I knew my roll and everyone else knew theirs. We all looked around for Add's and watched out. Spells, and 2 Hours were used with almost Sage like Precision.
Nothing like that ever happend in Wow.. Maby raids but i never did those. Groups were nothing more than herding cats... this was with guild members... "Hardcore" Guilds ect. Dident matter.
So No. I dont want Wow with Big Eyes, Small Mouths. I want Final Fantasy. I want Groups of people who take Pride in their class's and Death is that Whorable Monster that will Ruin your Day. And no Wow dident have any death penilty unless you ran a billion raids and had some stupid expencive set. And even then It could be made up with a hour of harvesting the low level Crafting mats.
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I like the current FFXI system.
Anyone who's played knows that the worst sound in the game to hear is when you downlevel.
But at the same time, it makes leveling up that much more special.
WoW has a death penalty. At high levels repairs can be very expensive.
I never played FF XI, but having to wait hours for a group to form doesn't sound like a good grouping game to me.
I played Wow and FFXI. Playing With a Pug in wow was like playing with retarted Monkeys flinging poo.
Playing FFXI you forced them to learn their roleor they quit the game.
I could spot a FFXI player 10 seconds into a Pug in Wow because they wernt retarted.
In FFXI you did have to wait a hour to get a group (I dident but i was a healer) But when you did it was Freaking Magic. No speaking later in the game was even needed. I knew my roll and everyone else knew theirs. We all looked around for Add's and watched out. Spells, and 2 Hours were used with almost Sage like Precision.
Nothing like that ever happend in Wow.. Maby raids but i never did those. Groups were nothing more than herding cats... this was with guild members... "Hardcore" Guilds ect. Dident matter.
So No. I dont want Wow with Big Eyes, Small Mouths. I want Final Fantasy. I want Groups of people who take Pride in their class's and Death is that Whorable Monster that will Ruin your Day. And no Wow dident have any death penilty unless you ran a billion raids and had some stupid expencive set. And even then It could be made up with a hour of harvesting the low level Crafting mats.
Now here is a man who's play'd more then WOW ^^
And anyone that has play'd FFXI KNOWS that it had the best groups out of ANY mmo EVER!
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