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Rift: Serious playability problems....
Hi all,
No this isn't a flame. It's a serious comment.
Does anyone else playing Rift find the frequency of "rifts" and "invasions" too high? Boy I sure do. And apparently on my server the players have gotten sick of fighting the invasions, and simply let the zone fall.
I'm only level 15 or so. And this is related to Sanctum and it's adjacent zone.
But the upshot of it is that from my standpoint, I end up dealing with blocked roads, quests that cannot be completed, and serial deaths related to either:
1. Ganked by invasion MOBS trying to go somewhere.
2. Ganked by invasion MOBS, while fighting invasion, in a public group because no one bothers to watch the casters.
Of course my expectations are a little high being a veteran of EQ, DAOC, EAB, EvE, WoW, EQ2, LOTRO and STO. MMO's in general haven't really grabbed me in a while because fo "sameness" between titles or lack of creative *new* gameplay. The nearest hit is STO- because I'm a Star Trek nut.
But I'm kinda unhappy with Rift. I'll give it more time. But today was an exercise in logging on, trying to fight an invasion, losing, and then hanging out waiting for people in the zone to take care of business. It never happened. So it was a paralized game experience where I had to wait around or die repeatedly (a waste of gp).
I'm wondering what others happen to think?
As an aside, I am pretty unhappy with the coding of this game. There's no reason a Phenom II X4 945 and Quad SLI (2 * GTX 295 ) shouldn't run this thing smoothly with all settings sort of "medium". 30 FPS in an empty stone hallway is silly. Out in the open I get up to 50 FPS with settings on Ultra. But still... I would expect this kind of thing from games that were coded for console and then ported to PC. Not a PC only title.
/off rantaculous frustration
Comments
This is what i already expirienced in the beta and never bought Rift.
Rift playerbase might get bored realy fast, hope they prove their players the oposite, but i also said Rift population might drop off rapidly after 2 or 3 months.
Same as Warhammer and Aion.
What you describe as problems is the reason I like how the game plays in the open world. In fact, things were a bit boring heading up towards 50 zones and having no invasions to fight of. With the latest patch that allowed for a lenier thresshold in invasions in higher territories I get to see invasions there as well, which is great.
Perhaps the whole game mechanic is what you don't find appealing and like the friend that didnt buy kept him away.
Actualy I like the rifts and invasions just fine. But they happen too often. So often that players are ignoring them.
It's a risk reward issue I'm seeing. The rifts and invasions should be at a frequency where players are not going "Oh man not another one". Which is something I've heard from many players on my server.
When a rift or invation happens, it should be with a frequency low enough that everyone goes "Yea!! Let's go!!". But if the zone is busy, and they happen constantly, people will ignore them and eventually go away because they can't end the invasion.
As a reference... it's sort of like playing DAOC, but being locked in realm versus realm and having no way to get out.
But the feeling I have after experiencing an invasion that has lasted all day, is the same feeling I had when it was time to leave RVR in DAOC, and go level.
Too much of a good thing maybe?
But it's "DYNAMIC".. coupled with a "TOP NOTCH" game engine, how can you not love it more than your first born?
/irony
Your Rifts complaint is really what attracts me to the game.
So what is a nuissance for someone can be a kick to someone else.
But if this is really a problem, it could be you have to re-assess if this game is really for you.
On the performance issue.
This is where I have to agree with you. While the performance did go up during betas and I also saw an increase at release, sometimes the fps numbers really baffle me.
Open world gets me good fps while Meridian shows me some really bad ones. It looks like the longer I stay there the slower the game gets. Memory leak? Buffer issues?
I don't know. I do give feedback on these issues with detailed reports of what is going on.
Edit:
Saw your replay to X.
Good point. Maybe a little tweeking would be a good thing.
I have no idea what triggers an invasion. Perhaps it's just a population limit.
The thing is, if you have an hour or two per day to play, it's nice if you can participate in an invasion when you get to play. Besides, the invasions usually target player town spots and quest hub settlements. As long as you have your quests, you can relatively easily avoid the invasion events and focus on questing. You'll only have to deal with them if they have taken over your quest hub.
Bottom line, both players that want to participate in invasions, but don't have tons of free time and those who want to avoid rifts can be happy. There is a compromise of course for both. How big depends on each one of us individually.
With the compromise I mean that those who want invasions may still end up in a slow time of the day or at the time where an invasion finished and won't see another for a while. Those who just want to do the quests have to deal with invasions only if their quest hub is invaded and taken over, which is not usually the case.
i tried this game
its not worth it tbh
even if it was F2P i wont give it a shot again :P
GL dude xD
And oh how I tried to like Warhammer. Really really tried.
I suppose the core of my frustration is the lack of real original game ideas. WoW was a refinement and dumbing down of EQ, which had it's roots in the MUD scene. But these days it's all copy-cat titles with no new concepts. Companies are taking WoW and bolting on all kinds of "thingies" in order to make things different. But no one pays attention to building a new concept, and develop it with the attention it might deserve.
I played EVE Online for a long time. And were I not burned out on it (permanently) I'd go back. At least it's original. But it's also a career.
Thanks for listening to me vent.
Ok, now you lost me.
You created a post telling us concerns about the number of Rift invasions.
You get some feedback.
Now somebody posts a clear dislike for the game and you feel he is supporting your op?!
Then you go on about the lack of innovation in games as a whole.
Explain to me again what the point of your op was?
Thats one of the upcomming choices that are going to make mmo's creaters scratch behind their ears, if Arenanet can create a mmo like GW2 with no fee's why would people still pay 12 or even 15 euro a month to play a game thats of less quality.
Thats around 17 to 20 dollar a month to keep playing a game -_-
GW1 was alot of fun, but had some major disapointments when it came to the mmo feeling.
GW2 is going to fix that and create something totaly new.
BtP or FtP is the future i think.
Rift aint worth the sub in my opinion, way to expensive when there are so many good other games / mmo's comming out.
I think my original post summed it up.
I do apologize if you feel I was attacking your choice in games. I was not.
Be well.
I think the rift just work like any other mob spwan rate on other games. The server detects a great number of players using them so it keeps a high level of spawn rate, when the game advances and less people are leveling there will be much less rifts. The usual.
Whats gonna define the success of this game is the developing team's ability to evolve the game and improve it with new ideas, not what haters or lovers come to say in a forum
Lets see what GW2 will provide before setting our expectations so high we're only get disappointed.
For now Rift has provided all features in their feature list. That's a big step, because most developers so far have fallen into the trap of envisioning stuff that may not make it in the final game for whatever reason, yet they use them to create positivve hype for their game. So while the feature list may seem small compared to other games, it was proven with the release that it was a truthful list and not the usual wishful thinking and features to come "eventually".
By the way, nothing worth in life is ftp. You always pay for it, one way or the other. Eventually you'll come to realise that your most precious commodity in life is not money, but time. Those so called ftp games capitalise exactly on that time shortage parameter.
You are not attacking anything.
I was just wondering what the point of this thread was.
Is it about the number of invasions?
Is it about the lack of innovation?
Is it about being burned by predecessors?
Ah...
Specifically it is about the *frequency* of rift/invasions. They need (in my opinion) to be tweaked back a bit. It's a good idea. But it shouldn't be the whole game.
My other comments were just being conversational.
Edit: Also I don't feel burned by past games. They all have strengths and weaknesses.
I have this terrible feeling GW2 will be the next painted turd. Not because it is a bad game, but because people are expecting it to cure cancer, save starving children in Africa, solve the global economic crisis, and permanently end the quest for the perfect game.
I mean, I am excited about it, but I hear this over and over again. People talk about it like they have already played it, and I am not saying it won't create something totally new, and fix an mmo issue that is there, without a doubt, but I think the fact that the hype for GW2 is already through the roof and the game doesn't even have a release date could be a problem,,,,
I dont get this......realy.....people are talking all over the forums like: "we want more dynamics".......the Rift dynamics are so that it reply's to how many people are in that zone.
iow, if you are alone there should be no invasions at all.......if the invasions are all over the place it also mean there should be enough players in that zone to fight it.
If the players choose not to fight it......it will spread and hubs will be taken.
You want a button to popup you very own questgiver?
I love the fact that things happen in this game i have no control over......if i have to fight the invasions off for 30 minutes befour i can turn in my quest then so be it.
as for the performance......yeah i seen people having probs with that......but i get about 50+ in open world and about 35 in busy towns or raids.
and i just use a single GTX470....and i have 4 gig of ram.
So its not realy THAT bad.
Maybe you should try another server.
On Shatterbone we never have any trouble stopping the invasions, even in the 10-20 area. Always plenty of people that want to participate.
"There is as yet insufficient data for a meaningful answer."
What OP thinks is an issue, I think is a feature.
The whole point of the game is to fight Rifts..hence the name.
I hope they keep the Rifts and invasions frequent and don't give in to folks who want a carebear game they can just run through with no thought.
They do settle down a bit later at higher levels...btw.
Level 15 is pretty low level. You don't even have all your souls yet.
Play to lv 30 and see what you think then.
the rifts make the game more fun i think you need to switch servers tho
The number of rifts scale with the number of players in the zone. Plus you dont have to fight them.
I think you're missing his point.
Even if he could pop up his own quest giver, it does him no good if no one else is interested in fighting to take the town back. He won't be able to turn in his quests which can, thus, become a serious hindrance over time. Even if people do get together and take the town back, they'll go back to ignoring the next wave to come through (as he states) and the town will be overrun again.... back in the same situation.
I could definitely see that getting old, even though I like it in concept. It's something I was wondering when I was reading how they can show up any time and how they can stampede and take over towns, etc. My thinking was "okay, players will tend to want to move beyond certain parts of the game to get to end game faster... what's going to happen when people no longer feel it's worth their time to clear out towns because they could level faster doing something else?
It really does become similar to PQs in WAR. There were all these PQs taking place in WAR... for nobody... because no one bothered to do them, or those who wanted to couldn't find enough people to help.
The difference is, PQs don't spawn hordes of mobs that can take over a town and basically lock players out of turning in quests. If players decide they're not interested in a given PQ in WAR, all it means is you may have to skip that one and maybe find one with more people at it. In Rift, however, if people are deciding they're not interested in doing "yet another rift" because they want to just move on and get out of that area or whatever... the rift gets too large, mobs come out and take over a nearby quest hub... well now it *is* affecting other players.
You'll say "So then players fight them off!! That's what the game is about!!" The thing is, as the OP states... people aren't fighting them off. They're not even interested in stemming the invasion at its source, which is what results in it happening in the first place.
It's one of those things that sounds great on paper, so long as the players follow the script the way they're expected to. As we all know, especially in MMOs, players seldom "follow the script" a developer has written. They always end up doing something different.
Back in the day when I played Neverwinter Nights, a friend of mine ran a PW (persistent world) that he had created. Part of his system was a dynamic spawning system in each non-city zone. The mobs would spawn at a level appropriate to the highest level player in the zone at a given time. This way they, ostensibly, would have a worthy fight on their hands. The problem was, the higher level players would pass through that area and, thus, affect the mob levels up to, say, level 15. Meanwhile, a level 5 player comes running through, before the level 15 has left the area... It often resulted in lower level players being unable to get through those areas 'til the mobs despawned... which was 5 minutes after the zone was completely free of players. It created a serious problem for all the but higher level players.
My friend asked that if a higher level player is running through a lower level area and sees the mobs are spawned at their level, to please kill them off so lower level players wouldn't be affected. Mind you, this would have taken seconds more of their time as, even when scaled up, the mobs in those lower areas were still pretty effortless for higher level players. Of course, people being the self-centered bastards they can tend to be, hardly anyone did. They were only concerned with their own deal. He eventually had to adjust the system.
I see an echo of that in the Rift system. Great, it's dynamic and rifts scale based on how many are in the area. Again, sounds great in theory. However, it assumes that everyone in the area is going to be bothered to go and help fight it back. If the OP's post is any indication... that's not necessarily the case. And, again, having seen how many typical Western players react to such scenarios, I have very little trouble believing it.
The great thing about such systems is that it encourages players to cooperate. The downside is that it requires players to cooperate which is pretty counter-intuitive to Western culture, where it's typically "all about me". "All about me" typically means, "if it doesn't help me level faster, it's only slowing me down and isn't worth my time". Sadly, many gamers have been conditioned to believe that no matter how dynamic, epic, intense, interesting or unique content is, if it doesn't help them level faster or give them superior gear rewards, it's "useless" and not worth their time.
I would definitely agree that if the rifts are that numerous and quest hub invasions are too seldomly dealt with, and it starts to become a problem for too many players, that Trion likely will have to deal with it in some way. Maybe keep the frequency of rifts as they are, but make town invasions less frequent.
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
I have to agree with you, I want many rifts, I want them to take over quest hubs and I don't want them to relent unil/ players can drive them back.
As of now I have yet to see any hub or any sort stay "taken" for long.
Heck, he other night the group I was in kept bouncing from "taken hub" to rift to the same "taken hub" without even pausing.
edit: OP, I don't mean to minimize your concern and I completely understand your frustration but everything you list is a "plus" on my side.
I love it when I'm going down the road and I see waves of invasion forces coming toward me. I want a world where anywhere I am can be a danger.
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
I just don't see that happening on my server. So if players come to shatterbone they will experience other players constantly combatting the Rifts and invasions.
Also, there are items one can get (I believe they are still in game) that allows players to summon an opposing force to thelp them. Players should be getting these.
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
Beautifully stated. Exactly.
And it's the frequency that needs to be tweaked. I'm not saying that it needs to be removed from the game. The server I'm on is highly populated, and that means it spawns rifts and invasions *constantly*.
If the players become desensitized to the event because it's *always* happening, then fighting the invasion off is meaningless- it becomes either the whole game or something t be ignored.
An invasion as a constant presence in a zone is too much. But the constant *threat* of invasion is probably more appropriate- and it's more likely that players fight the invasion if it were an *event* and not a constant presence.