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Questions from a company produceing a new MMORPG
T.GEnt
Member Posts: 14
T.G Enterprises is a new Company. Formed by mainly friends and family. We are seeking to enter the MMORPG market with our Flag Ship MMORPG. We dont want to release a lot of information on this game at the moment as we are still in development stages. We have our races/cities/nations and back-story ready and will be working on the classes and quests/npcs next. But we would like some feedback from yourselves about what sort of class system you think would be best. At the moment we are looking at a class/skill system together. As in there are classes but also within the classs you will be able to level up your skill with certain weapons. The crafting system we have I think is probably going to be an entire separate game in itself for the complexity of it but it will also be able to be very user friendly for the people that dont want to mainly craft. So the question we have for you guys is: What sort of leveling/class system would you most like to see?
The web site and forum will be up in about a month once we have a few legal issues ironed out.
T.G Enterprises. Bringing you the next Great MMORPG.
Comments
Before I indulge you with alot of feedback I need a few questions answered as the feedback has to be tailored toward the style that the game is.
Is it PVP? Thus far you claim you are going with a skill based system which lean's me toward believing as much but a definitive answer would be nice.
Based on the previous assumption, I am going to speculate there will be PVP for the moment, and roll into the second question. Is there full looting? with the possiblilty of some restrictions? Obviously this would imply that items and gear are esaily attained and or primarly player made and while they weigh into the formula of combat they are not the sole determining factor in who wins.
You mention a crafting system, are you planning on going with the EQ/wow standard of harvesting nodes or a more realistic system where you can actually chop on trees etc?
A blend of EVE and UO systems would be fantastic. EVE's over-time system has a great deal of benefits, and UO's ability to mix and match any skills to design a character to your liking is excellent. EVE depends too much (for skills) on the real-time system and UO depends too much on grinding out a skill until it is at the desired level. Somewhere between those two is, in my opinion, the desired medium.
If you are going to go the class route, which is fine with me as well, make sure the classes are very distinct. In a class-based system I generally prefer to have many choices and each of the choices is very unique.
I do not like skill tree systems.
I think class system like that was used in TES3: Morrowind will be interesting.There are few different classes
that are already completed,but also player will have the ability to create his own class by combining all the skills and stats available to create his unique class.In the MMORPG there must be more then about 30 skills,
I'm sure.So, thats my opinion,and now I have a question:what about the technical part of the game-is it completed or in progress?
Lebbb
the class and skill system sounds a lot like Daoc to me, which leads to cookie cut characters for most efficiency. It's still good, but personally I like to see more customization.
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-Anarchyart
All you friggin suburban white kid wannabe poobutts that are in love with G-Unit are sad and pathetic. Find your own identity
Thats a good question....I understand that you don't want a straight skill based system due to grinding it takes to increase many skills. And I admire that you are intending to avoid the simple lvling based system which makes a player good depending on how long he plays which really bothers many players.
I don't know how many would share the same desire, but I like a game where the skills allow me freedom to customise my character!
Lets say I wanted a Warrior...to focus totally on attack! I get him 2 swords and give him duel wield and give him as much agility as possible to allow him to dodge some attacks. Now I distribute the skills depending on the equipment I desire....but lets say I use light armour for this guy cause he's not a tanking Warrior and heavy armour requires strength not agility....hes a fast moving hard to hit duel wielding Elf with agility and speed in his favour. Its just cool that way! I have a character like that in Irth Online (Beta Stage II). Its a good mix, thats what I and some of my friends have thought.
Anyway I think you understand what I am trying to get at here....in truth I am not comfortable with having to be a specific class when starting a new character and all attributes belonging to that class are practically layed out for me already. In WoW, the only use of a Warrior is to be a tank. That I hate.
So here is what could be possibly done...since I may understand your desire to produce clases.....try to allow the the player to customise his character as much as he can without restrictions....but of course he sticks to the class he assigned himself to be.
For Example: I choose to be a Warrior......I am only allowed to use Melee weapons, shields and armours...cannot use wands, staffs, bows and the such which are different. Then I start playing gain exp and lvl up. I am then permitted to choose a skill and increase some of my attributes. I decide to focus mainly on Agility, a very little on health and a very little on stregth aslong as I have enough exp points to do that. Warriors should never be given mana btw! It looks bad for a game. Anyway I carry on playing as I said I would, possibly getting skills such as duel wield, a skill that ables me to use throwing weapons (like small daggers or possibly small axes...suits a warrior more) hopefully have enough stregth to carry 2 good swords...i said hopefully because ive been mainly focusing on agility....and here is where the agility comes in. If agility gives the potential for you to a chance of avoiding to be hit by melee and some other attacks and possibly getting better chances at criticle strikes. This is what i'd do in my own game. Anyway if you could allow to customise our character's like that I think many ppl would be interested in what you have to offer...so long as everything else is good. Remember always to have a skill cap so ppl dont spend too much time on the same skill....and an attribute cap aswell. Up to 100.00 is the best cap you could have. If you read around the forums there are many ppl longing for a game like this. Me too....we miss the old Ultima Deeply are waiting forever for a game like it.
Anyway its my personal view of the best type of system. Problem is it really encourages grinding.
BTw Dekoth....check out Irth Online...you can literally chop at a tree and it will be gone...for a few minutes or so, then respawns lol...but its really cool
The trees also have motion and the devs have worked out the problems they caused before! Also the forests look quite impressive although a little empty, but thats cause they are still focusing on features.
They admitted to the lack of content and bugs arising...for the reason that over the past few months they added 100s of features into the game. Now they are focusing a little more on content and bug fixing and have really polished the game a lot. Check it out, and don't get a bad impression straight away...you need to see the potential the game has...its very cool...ppl say its the new Ultima Online game.
I'd be suprised if there weren't its still in Beta...it should be in closed beta....its not ready...it hasn't been completed.....its still in heavy development.
They fix the most important bugs and identify sources of net lag and everything. The devs and the beta testers work together....you should visit their channel and look at them go on about what bugs they have found and the devs reply what they shall do about it.
As I said before at this stage we dont want to give away a lot of information as we have some legal issues to iron out. Nothing that will stop the game being produced its to do with Publishers.
Firstly I would like to thank you all for your replies. And most of all for your questions. This is the type of feedback the company has been looking for. I will answer each question to the best of my ability if there are any questions I feel I shouldnt answer at this stage I will let you know or if I feel another member of the Team may have better information than myself on a particular subject I will get them to answer.
Dekoth:
There will be PVP. In my experience in MMORPGs PVP is an essential part. We intend our game to have a new dynamic system than a lot of the current games on the market. What I mean by this is that, The PVP areas wont be separate to the normal game world like a lot of games are now a days. I would like to explain in detail about this as I feel this is one of the areas that will bring a lot of players to our game. All I can say at the moment is that the PVP in our game will not just be a gank fest as most games are. There will be a Reward system For killing players. It wont be called reward system but I cant name that either at the current time as its directly linked to the name of our game, which I also cant divulge due to legal reasons. The PVP will have a point and there will be a goal in mind. All but a few towns will be totally attackable and Destroyable. Depending on how much damage you do the town depends on how fast the townspeople can repair it if they can at all. When I say townspeople I just dont mean NPCs. This is where crafting will also become a big part of the game. All NPCs are killable and depending on what building are also destroyed will depends on whether they spawn at all.
As to will there be body looting, this is working on our system at the moment but we are unsure about adding it into our release version. This is one of the issues we would like feedback on. We are thinking of having a body looting server and non-body looting server. A lot like the PVP and Non PVP servers on most games now.
We want our game to have a realistic and yet very unreal feel to it. We have decided to go with the style most 2d games use to gather resources, which will be if u want to get ore you go to a mine. Then you actually mine from the wall and the more you mine the bigger the mine will get. This may change on release as we are having small glitches with this. At the moment we have Crafting professions split up into 2 groups. Gathering and Crafting. Each one will affect the game world in some way. Like you mentioned if you were Gathering wood then you would chop at a tree with an axe and the tree will eventually disappear. But unlike most games on ours trees dont just disappear once they have been felled. You will need to learn how chop the tree up once its on the ground as well as just the ability to fell the tree.
Ianubisi:
Thank you for your feedback. I have played eve and the system is very good but I dont think that system would work well for this game. U.O system is one of the reasons we want to go down the skill system route. As there is a distinct lack of these games out there at the moment. There are a few on the horizon and we will be watching them closely to see how they develop. We would like to make something new to Online Games. A new system to level your character. I know this has been said a lot by many different companies and then they release a clone of something else. That is the main reason for posting on this Forum. Hopefully with help from people that actually play the games we can develop something new.
Lebbb:
I have never tried TES3: Morrowind but your feedback is very good. I will put this forward to the Team Tomorrow and see what they think.
As for the Technical side all I can say at this moment is our Engine is working well, we have some small glitches with some of the programming. We estimate that once we have decided upon what sort of levelling system to use that we could start Alpha testing in about 2-3 months. We have a working class system on our engine at the moment but it only has 2 classes and limited skills. We only made them to make sure they would work well with the engine. If there are anymore technical questions you have ask away and I will get the lead Programmer to reply.
Siphons:
Thank you for your feedback. The current system we have in mind is probably what you would call cookie cut but we had about 70 different classes in the design stage. I cant say a lot at this stage as the reason for me posting was because the Team thought that it might be to much work in a short time and people would rather a more customisable character. Our system would have been that when you make your character you can choose from One of 9 professions then at level 20 u could choose from another 6-9 professions depending on what your first choice was. Then at level 40 there would be 4-5 choices then at 60 there would be 3-4 choices and at 80 there would be 2-3 and then at 100 there would be 5-6 again. The class system we thought was very more in-depth and a lot more choice than most games out there.
If you have anymore questions on this system feel free to ask J
Mikey0114:
It is very strange but your idea is nearly the exact same as what we have scrawled on the white board in the office. Our Lead Programmer went through your idea today as a possible change to our class system. We have 3 other ideas on there as well but from the feedback here it seems that your idea might be what we end up going with.
Thank you all again for your feedback and your questions. If you have anymore feel free to reply here.
Gary
Director of T.G Enterprises
T.G Enterprises. Bringing you the next Great MMORPG.
Well I am actually suprised to hear that....That question you asked is quite a bit of a challenge, which requires a lot of thinking. What first came up in my mind which was mentioned in a previous post was the Eve's Skill based system where you learn skills over time online or offline. But your first post gave me a big impression that your game was a fantasy and that system of over time only suited eve really.
So then I was left with one massive blank! Spent a good 15 minutes thinking and read through your post again. The difficulty was you wanted each character to remain the same class throughout its life, and not change....lets say from a melee fighter to a spellcaster. So then I thought, what if you chose to be a "Warrior" but not the usual general warrior you find in a game like WoW where he's purpose is no different from every other warrior in that game. The player has the benefit and the challenge of making his owntotally customised character...and the more features and attributes and skills there are available the more experiments they could perform and god knows what people may come up with. Well thats exactly what went into my head....the possibility of experimentation!
Anyway I understand why you said it was strange, I typed things just after they came out of my head and didn't have the patience to go over it. Also the heat in Malta at the moment is like hell came for a visit....its hard to think clearly in these conditions, and some times I just look forward to the cool winters :P
Anyway seeing as your a British Developing company (this would be my guess again) I would really like to follow up on this game you are revealing soon. For some reason I find some British Developing companies to make some of the best games, and so I have faith in them.
Wish T.G. Enterprises the best of luck for this project!
As a fyi I am talking about fundamental flaws in the overall game not bugs and glitches. I have been beta testing mmorpgs since 97, i assure you I consider bugs and glitches normal in this early of a stage. Honestly I would really consider Irth in more of a Alpha stage then a real beta stage. Do not get me wrong I think it has potential to be a good solid game I just see some problems with the system they want to implement and how they are going about it. Of course like anything else opinion is always subjective.
Feedback,
Interesting thoughts, a couple from me now.
First before I get sidetracked I am going to address body looting. It either gets implemented from the start or it will never be implemented. The reason I touch specifically on this is, the Game mechanics Must support it else it will become a handicap for the game. What do I mean by this? Simple lets use EQ as an example Full looting would never work in this game because Items take excessive periods of time to attain. As well Items make a Dramatic difference in the power of your player Avatar, obviously for these reasons Full body looting would be a disaster to implement in this style game. Unfortunatly most MMORPG's out currently have adopted this system because they focus more toward PVE then PVP, obviously in order to maintain PVE content over an extended period of time Loot must be difficult to attain, and worth the effort.
In a PVP environment that is designed to revolve around a players skills and how they developed their skills, full body looting is a must in order to give incentive in the form of people push themselves to learn good defence at the minimum and it gives a real sense of accomplishment from a PVP perspective. Honestly rewards systems such as titles and such granted for number of kills without any other real incentive push more for a Grind pvp ala WoW. However it must be noted as I mentioned earlier Items Must not Be as important as they are in EQ type games, this is a Very delicate balance to strike. UO in the early days did a good job of this, in a sense its actually better at it now because even a character with nothing can gather enough coin in a short period of time to buy a decent full set of gear if they lose everything.
Griefing must be curbed...There are numerous ways to accomplish this, primarly anyone who chooses to be an Agressive Player killer should accept Very harsh penalties. I was a UO Pk back pre trammel, I honestly thought the penalty for Murder was far too light. The only situation where harsh penalties should not apply are Guild wars and such, but for someone to go murderer status they had better plan on accepting some extremely hard times, I would happily go so far as to say until they build a certain amount of Kharma for example that any town would be Kill on Sight they would have to subsist entirely on anything in their house should they have one. Also New players should be protected, I would state from experience that a timer on the new player status is not enough. Some players simply learn slower then others, I would state that there are two ways to flag yourself PVP available..#1 being your skills have reached a certain level, #2 being you voluntairly renouce your new player status. I may be a Pk but I have a seriously high level of animosity toward players who prey on others who have no chance of defending themselves.
Skill balance, this one is touchy simply put. Its difficult to strike a balance where skills make a relavent difference by raising them without interefering with player skill being the determining difference in a fight. Suffice to say I will post my feelings on the matter like this. If a player low on the skill tree and low in personal skill goes against someone high on the skill tree and low in personal skill, the person high on the skill tree would obviously win, If both players are even, then the one with the most skill wins ( Fyi quick thinking and tactics are rolled into my definition of skill for the time being ). If a player low on the tree with alot of skill goes against someone high on the tree with low skill, the skilled person should have a difficult time, but sustain a reasonable chance of defeating the person high in skills.
Also in reference to skills, I as well am agreeable to custom classes, honestly I am not a fan of prefab character classes, I think templates are find for the average player and those template's effectively give the player a start in the skills deemed most important to that template. However I think any well designed PVP game must include the ability for the player to use a custom template and to pick and choose the skills they deem most important to them.
As far as crafting, you mentioned caves getting bigger and such. Its a great idea in theory, however honestly in practice I assure you its a bad idea. The better system here honestly is to have a certain amount of resources spawn in a given area on a timer. That timer can be based on numerous variables but nonetheless its a tried and proven method. Its still far better in this form then most games are doing right now and makes reasonably logical sense while maintaining the integrity of the game world.
I am going to stop at this point, if you are interested in hearing more inquire specifically what you are interested in. Feel free to PM me if its going to get long, I am more then willing to provide information based off my experience over the years.
There are two types of people in this gaming world: those who like PvP and those who don't. Therein are many different tastes, some want full and open PvP and some want Realm vs. Realm (PvP with a reason).
The main things I would say to include is to give all those people some option. Have a standard server and a hardcore server. The hardcore server should have open PvP and full corpse looting. This will make a lot of people happy and give you a lot of customers. The normal server should also have PvP but not open, and there should also be the option to just play PvE with no ganking for those who just don't like it.
And then theres the crafters. Make crafting that is full blown as in different resources and ways of harvesting those resources. But also make it so that mobs and npcs drop weapons armor and trinkets.
Pretty vague, but with some of everything you can't really go wrong.
It cannot happen, its a nice theory but its idealistic at best. in order for that to happen the PVP servers would literally need to be the game redesigned from the ground up, otherwise the PVP ends up being the complete joke it is in just about every mmorpg on the popular market. Honestly more people might participate in free open PVP if the system is designed right to begin with, as i said a game that is not designed for it, yes people are going to find it an irritation and not want to participate. However as a note, a properly designed pvp game is not going to support PVE in the manner that level based games do, and from a pure PVE perspective simply will not maintain the longivity of a broad player base over a period of time. So you are left with two choices, you make the lesser popular PVP game, make it balanced, make it where griefing is curbed as much as possible, and make it where someone dieing is not set back for a week and you end up getting a fairly large pvp player base and convert a few former PVE only because they did not realize how much more enjoyable fighting another player was. Or you compromise like everyone else, and put in an excellent pve and half assed pvp.
Thank you again for all your feedback. I will have a lot of info to take in to the office tomorrow. Again ill reply to each person.
Mikey0114:
but what part of Malta are you from as I have a couple of friends from there 
Your ideas are very good. I will be taking your post printed out with me tomorrow to show our Lead Programmer.
Thank you for your confidence in us. If you would like to P.M me your email I will be happy to send you information on the website and game as soon as we are cleared to do so.
Also a little of topic
Dekoth:
To address your first issue which is body looting. The items in game some will be hard to obtain because they will only come from very hard quests/bosss or master craftsmen. This is one of the reasons we are unsure about body looting. I think we will end up going into alpha test with this implemented and see what our testers feel about the system. If it doesnt work it will be removed. Again I will be taking your post into the office tomorrow to see what the Team think.
The reward system I was talking about will have tittles but it wont be like some games out there where that is all it is. The reward system actually has a reason for being in game. As I said on the other post I cant explain a lot about this as it is directly linked to the basic storyline/name of game. I know this must be frustrating to you guys that I cant explain a lot at this moment in time, so I apologise.
Hopefully there wont be an issue with griefing in game. We have a system set up to stop that but again I cant go into a lot of detail at the moment.
Skill balance is a hard thing to achieve to make it exactly balanced. We have a few balanced classes working at the moment. But I think its 95% sure that we are going to change this system now. So hopefully after 2-3 months of testing and then alpha testing we can get the balance correct.
Our system has had problems with our initial idea of making caves bigger as you mine as I said in the other post. So The Programmers and Artists are trying to sort a better solution out.
Thank you for your offer of help. You are exactly the type of player we are looking for feedback from. If u would like to offer any other advice feel free to PM me. I will get the Lead Programmer to contact you tomorrow with any questions he might have.
Anarchyart:
PVP is a main part of our game. I understand there is a lot of player's out there that dont want to PVP and that is fine. But unfortunately the world in which our game is set is filled with conflict. The PVP does have a reason but again I cant explain the reason. But it is a lot like RvR. But I would say more world shaping than the standard RvR.
There wont be open PVP in every map. Mainly because the lower level maps are for the new players to learn how to play the game. But the rest of the game will be open PVP. But for the players that dont like to PVP there are ways to stop Enemy players from entering your part of the map. (I cant explain more at this stage but it is one of the world altering decisions players can make)
Mobs and npcs will drop items. Some mobs might drop crafting materials but realistically what are the chances of a dragon say guarding some wood? More like they would be guarding some treasure. So if you slay the dragon you get the treasure.
Thank you all again for your feedback if you have anymore questions feel free to ask and I will answer in the morning.
Gary
Director of T.G Enterprises
T.G Enterprises. Bringing you the next Great MMORPG.
Dekoth I think I'll agree with both you and Anarchyart about this topic on PvP. Anarchyart is right that people have very different tastes...you either make a game to suit the need players who enjoy PvE and limited PvP and no harsh death penalties. Or you make a game to suit the need of the players who love Pking without limits or restrictions (obviously I don't mean without a Justice system to have some kind of consequence for pking your own ppl). But you can't have the game being hosted on lets say 2 servers 1 for open pvp and the other for limited pvp. I agree totally with Dekoth on this fact. Also that PvE games with limited PvP should be played with a lvling based system. Skill based is more for competition.
But I myself would rather make a game that either was PvE and FFA Open PvP with the loot system, a character improvement system which was skill based, a justice system without loop holes...the works.
Or else a game which was totally PvE no PvP included. Believe it or not, I am sure there is a great demand for those types...like Horizons and Dungeons and dragons. I tell you there is nothing more fun then going on a quest with personal friends of yours, chatting on ventrillo and focusing on teamworkl and strategy and accomplishing something together. And no mega guild raiding an area to ruin it all. If I play a game just for the PvE, I don't want to see PvP. I am sure there are a number of people who would agree with this. I think thats the reason behind there being PvP servers with the same content of PvE and limited PvP and RP servers which are totally PvE....also remember they should be Lvl based. Well those are 2 types of servers that host WoW. Now in my opinion those games suit the more PvE types of players really. I think game developers are failing to notice that the PvE games which have limited PvP are not enough to fill the appetite that PvP pkers desire in a game. We want a game without restrictions (with a Justice system to punish pkers for killing their own ppl). And thats why they fail to attract us....its like they believe they can attempt balancing a game that is on a very fine line between pvp and pve....put just a little more weight to one side and it will fall....I hope you understood that lol.
Anyway to The Director of T.G. Enterprises - Malta is a little spec of a country when you look at an Atlas....On the Atlast the word "Malta" is bigger then all the three islands put together, just to remind you how small the country is. Because of its small size practically everyone knows everyone here....you make best friends out of total strangers. Anyway I live in the residential part of Malta, the village is called Lija.....Then there is Attard, Balzan and other bigger villages around it.
Hi there, im very glad to see that you seem really interested in the feedback of actual players. I'll try to answer as helpfully as I can.
Now, I'll tell you right away, I'm a PVP player. Take my feedback how you will, because if you're doing a PvE game with a PvP background most of how I feel wont really matter to your game
I like your idea of making towns and the like completely destroyable, and I really like the idea of the players being able to have a say in the defense and upkeep of said towns. Now, as far as full body looting goes.. if you're afraid of that, you can come up with a compromise. To me, the game in recent history who got PvP the most right was Asheron's Call. Basically.. most quest and hard to gain items were flagged for no-drop. Anything randomly dropped/looted off monsters were fair game. Now, if you implement a system where everything worth having is gained from a hard chain quest/master crafter, this raises a problem. If items are rare and hard to obtain, people will cry and pout if theyre droppable. Basically, your PvE playerbase might take a hit.
To be honest, I'm not a fan of how I think your looting system will work. Unless I'm mistaken, youre wanting to stick away from full-drop because everything is so rare. Now, if you take it from an Asheron's Call approach, you can make some items non-drop and make everything else fair game.. and of course, these non-drops will be very hard to obtain. AND these non-drops need to not be the best items in the game, i.e., risk vs. reward. If a player wants to go all out in the best armor/weapons for his class, these need to be droppable, at least, the majority of those items do. If someone is able to go out in the best of the best and not worry about dropping anything, theres a problem, and that'll make the game suffer IMO.
Please, please stay away from a full "justice" system as your reward. I think its great as a side reward, as in a warrior who has significantly singled himself out as a defender of his race/town/faction/whatever should be given a rank and some limited privileges.. maybe reduced cost at vendors, maybe able to wear the towns symbol, or faction specific armor.. but thats it. People at the end of the day arent gonna be satisfied with a justice system if thats all thats rewarding them. "Oh, would ya look at that, I have 10 whole honor points over Leet_Mage_Dude.. sweet", is not as thrilling as knowing that your enemy tried to encroach upon YOUR land, and you made him hurt for it.
Also, death penalty. This is another thing lots of major MMOs have been sticking away from. WoW makes you run back to your corpse and thats it??? Come on, thats laughable. The death penalty needs to be something that gives the losing player an adequate time out. Working off penalties, the inability to go PK for a while, whatever, but it needs to be more than just running back to the point of your death.
Another thing I'd like to say... if you want this game to compete, you need to make it geared towards PvP. To be honest, no matter how great your PvE is or how innovative the class/questing system is, how immersive your lore/world... you're not gonna be able to tear the full-PvErs away from the juggernauts of MMOs such as WoW and EQ2. We PvPers may seem like a small market, but if you have a quality game, we'll stick to it, because lets face it, theres not a single current gen game on the market that adequately satisfies our PvP desires in a game.
I'm not sure if I helped you at all with this, but i sure hope I did
Well what you had to say got me thinking about somethings....such as Full looting, the death penalty....turning into a ghost....and I really need to explain to you what I meant by Justice system!
Let me start with what I called the Justice System....supposively the meaning of Justice is to punish people for the crimes they committed. Now I have no idea how this game will be in truth, but if it is Open Free For All PvP, then a justice system is needed. So that lets say any Pker whos killing players on the same side as his or committing crimes to the players on the same side as he....he gets whats comming to him....punishment. Lets say he's killed a lot of ppl, pickpocketed a lot of items, destroyed houses and his Karma is -20.....because of all the crimes he's committed. -20 means he's done more damage to his civilisation/faction/alliance...whatever you want to call it...the group thats supposively on his side. What happens so is he is an enemy of his own faction....bountys maybe put on his head, NPC guards would kill him at an instant site....he would be in a way exiled till his Karma went back up....by doing whatever he had to do for his own ppl. If he wanted to remain an outlaw...he'd probably be on the run. Anyway thats just feedback incase you decide to create an Open PvP game.
Now About the Death Penalty....I thought that full body loot was a Death Penalty...I mean it should clasify as one....its not exactly something not to be upset about loosing all your loot. But other then that I think the after life (even though its cool)...but being a ghost is a horrible idea for a PvP game...especially with conquest included in it. Reason being a guild chooses to attack a big village and take it for themselves....normally these would be hard to take...but they could use undetectable spies....ghosts....and thats the reason why I would never agree to include becomming a ghost and heading back to your body a death penalty. Its a horrible idea for this type of game T.G. Enterprises are trying to make. The problem is you could limit communication (ingame) while being a ghost....but sitll I could communicate with my friends over ventrillo or else MSN. The feature of becomming a ghost ruins a game which has PvP and conquest of land within it.
As for the looting system I am not a great fan of Asherons Call's idea of rare loot being unable to be lost. There is no fun in that. What I do admire is the way WoW restricted used rare items from being traded.
For instance: If I am a full lvl character with a Warrior fully equiped with rare items except my boots are not rare and I have extra rare items in my backpack which I have no intent on using...but could sell or trade them with friends. I wouldn't be really upset about loosing the items i dont have equipped if I die...And the items which I do have equipped I am able to keep because they are bound to my Warrior and only my Warrior is able to use them....same rules as WoW. A rare item should be bound to a player when he equips it (no other player may even hold that item in their inventory...there is no way for another player to ever get their hands on that item, they just have to find a totally new one)....so that when the player dies he respawns with those items bound to him. Saying that, all the items that are rare and never have been equiped but are in my inventory, can be lost if I die....traded and used by another player or put up for auction. Now about my boots which are equipped but not rare...I loose them after I die...because they are not a rare and can't be bound to me like the other rares which I had equipped are.
Last but not least....you are right about what you said that they should make it more geared towards the PvP "PKing" community which right now are as desperate as hell for a new game. But just be aware that a game should never attempt to please both markets unless it has 99% probability that both the PvP and PvE will be balance out. Read previous posts of mine to see what I mean. If you want to make a game which provides a new style of PvE....then exclude attempting to appease the PvP Hardcore Pking market aswell.......unless you are 99% sure that the game will be balanced for to suit both.
Mikey - my apologies, I should've been more clear. My reply wasn't directed towards you, in fact, at the time I made it I hadn't read your post at all. What I said was more of a broad, generalized viewpoint on PvP, not something made to go against what you said
That said, let me bring up a couple things you said in your latest reply. You said you liked WoW's item system.. the fact that good armor/loot was bind-on-equip and then therefore could only be used by the player who wore it first. And you said you didn't like Asheron's Call's system of good loot being no drop. This confuses me.
If you had a game thats geared towards PvP, you absolutely cannot do it how WoW did it. If I'm reading what you're suggesting right, then anything the player has on and wants to keep for himself wouldnt be droppable. I'm not a fan of that, because that means that a player can always be ensured that his "uber" armor and weapon that is near and dear to him can never be lost. That is detrimental to a PvP game and would add a lot of kamikazes.. By that I mean, people who know they have nothing to lose, why not enter a PvP land or attack someone if theres no chance of losing what they worked for?
I am in agreement with you with the justice system though, of course there should be punishments for "team killing". To be honest I always liked an open-guild system.. as in I could join up with anyone and that guild could then declare war on whomever they liked. I dont like being clumped together with people simply because we liked the same looking avatar at character creation... but this is something I could overlook, as it does add a more realistic feel to the game.
But back to my original point (I get off track, heh), team killing SHOULD be punished and you should get negative points in your "honor column" and what have you.. people who are repeat offenders could be banished from faction towns, etc. But what I was saying is an honor system can't be the only way to reward PvPers, because its kind of a flimsy reward (imo). We want something tangible.. hell, we want trophies from those whom we have defeated
In reply to the confusion you had...WoW doesn't feature players dropping their loot. Asherons Call does....thats just to straighten something out....I just like the idea of an Item being bound to you for as long as you want....rather then items which just cannot be possibly be looted even if they haven't been equipped at all and can be shared with other players even if bound. From what I read about asheron's call....the items that cannot be looted, I was given the impression that you can share them with other players and the such. With WoW's rules a sword which is bound to you can only be used by you and only you. If you do equip it then it cant be used by anoyone...or looted if it hasn't been equipped (ever) then it can be lost, shared or traded.
My favourite would still be full body loot....harsh yes but thats what you get for not insuring your valuable items. I myself think its something UO revolutionied MMORPGs with. Anyway, my worry about this is if the game includes you being a ghost in the after life...I hate it! This is another problem that is brought up by the ghost. So you respawn as a ghost at a graveyard and have to go back to where your corspe was killed and left. Imagine the player who pked you is waiting for you to return to your corpse and res yourself up and then attacks you again. In Pre Tremmel UO's rules after you die all your insured items are uninsured....and remain in your corpse so when you had return to life your the player who pked you attacks and loots your valuable items which you didn't have chance to reinsure. Thats unfair in my own opinion. Some people encounter the same PKer over and over and over again....with the player never allowing that player to properly have a chance. I hate that. Its unpleasant behaviour, not fun and competition. Thats why you need a justice system without loop holes and I must repeat this....no after life as a ghost right after you die. They can be used as spies on villages that are about to be raided.
I don't really like my idea either of what loot may be dropped and bound items not dropped...I just wanted to let you know about the differnce...but unfortunatley correct me if I was wrong cause I haven't played Asherons Call....just read the features and game info.
The Topic does seem to of gone of topic some what but lucky for me it has steered itself into another topic that we would like feedback on.
Mikey0114:
In reference to the PVP/PVE issue. We want our game to have both. But PVP is a very big part of the game. The PVP is what will alter the game world around players. The PVE will just be there for players to gain items and to level there characters skills/levels.
The Justice system isnt the usual system for us. As there are factions in our game. But saying that it is possible for someone from one faction to change to another faction but doing this will alter your character a lot and for a short time (until you act upon your faction change) you can PK anyone of the faction you used to be. I hope this is explained well because the actual proper explanation is a lot easier to understand but again goes into legal areas.
To sum it up when u make your character you will have to choose from one of 2 factions (alliances) and in that alliance there are smaller Factions but you can only PK people from the opposing main faction. The story we have developed is evolving and in the future alliances will change in the factions and with future updates you may find friends who used to be allies are now sworn enemies. Again these Alliance changes will depend on character Choices in game.
Regarding items that are bound to characters. We intend to have no Bound items but we do intend to have no trade items. Once they are equipped you cannot trade them. But they are not bound to that player. What I mean by this is in essence they are bound but are loot able. There will be a way for player to Insure certain items they wear for a short time but it isnt the usual cash charge to Insure items. It is to do with the Reward system but again I cant go into a lot of detail.
Aqualung343:
First of when I played games I hated that all the best items was from quests. I liked the way the 2d games did it which was that all mobs in game had a chance to drop good gear. Obviously it would depend on the level of the mob to what you got.
Also we have a unique upgrade system for items. I dont think any other game has ever tried it the way we are. But again I cant explain a lot at the moment.
As to the reward system. There will be things to single people out. But the main aim of the reward system is to help your faction in some way. I think when games just do PVP and try and flog it off as Faction wars yet your faction gets nothing from your PVP actions only the player does. Our reward system is geared towards a more faction reward system than a single player reward system. Basically the more points a faction masss together the more reward they gain. Sorry I cant explain a lot at this stage.
The death penalty is still being worked on at the moment. It wont be a ghost system. You will be able to Bind your spirit to certain objects (sorry I cant say what yet but again its to do with the main story) when you die you can respawn at the location you bound yourself.
Thank you again for your replies. The Team is still unsure on what Class system to use but the PVP issue has brought a lot of heated Discussion in the office today.
Gary
Director of T.G Enterprises
T.G Enterprises. Bringing you the next Great MMORPG.
Thanks for the response. I like how your PvP/PvE is balanced and am interested in the rest of the features you have mentioned.. would definitely be interested in Beta Testing/Buying this game from this point.. of course I still want more info
Well, I guess it's too late to suggest realistic advancement. A double system, with a set of attributes (strength, intelligence, dexterity, etc) and skills (barehanded, one handed melee, two handed melee, etc) and maybe a third which provides more of an edge than a great advantage (the same way you are more familiar with one particular weapon, you will be slightly better with it than with something that is just similar) (this would be like one handed short sabre, two handed long sabre, blah blah etc). As you fight with your battle axe, for instance. The more you fight, your strength slowly raises. In addition, your two handed melee increases, etc.
But your system seems to be nothing like that
Just idling meh brain.
One thing tho, combat. The two biggest problems with mmo combat, in my opinion (and yeh it's just my opinion, but noone but dedicated mmo ppl actually ENJOY mmo combat, you get a fps player or a rts guy on a mmo and he'll fall asleep in combat, whether he enjoys the crafting or not) are the flawed controls, and tanks. By flawed controls, I mean BORING controls. I get that some people LIKE point and click type combat, and don't want to have 'twitch' combat because they are bad at it. But even if you choose point and click (plz don't, for the sake of HUMAAAAANNNNIIIIITTTTTYYY!!!!)(lol), try to make it entertaining. For it to be entertaining, you don't just need good animations and flashy graphics, but you need a lot of stuff going on, to keep the player occupied during combat (your player should never sit back and have a drink, or a bite of their supper, during combat). I don't really know how you can do this with point and click, it's by nature rather dull, but you could try. I suggest 'twitchy' tho
As for tanks, it's a terrible thing in the game. Your 'skills' which you build up should never make you invulnerable. What i mean is that skills should not be so important that it comes to a point where, in a fight against a much lower level character, it doesn't even matter if you're any good at the game, just that you have a lot of skill points. A twitch system can handle this problem easily, by just adding fairly realistic damage (guy slips his rusty, dull, lvl 1 short sword thru a gap in your "Shining Armor of Glory and Godliness" and pierces your neck, you're just as dead as if he had hit you with a giant fireball). Basically, you shouldn't go the way of most mmos, where your 'skills' you build up exponentially raise the abilities of the avatar. It should be an enhancement, but never anything which makes you an invulnerable tank.
Just some of my opinions. I know they don't represent the 'mainstream' of the mmo crowd, but it would be nice to see a mmo for once which can draw guys from the fps and rts and all other gaming groups.
SO you having any outside testers in your alpha?
Remember kids, when you see the lava coming, duck and cover!!!
You really should reconsider on the ghost system. Honestly its amazing the amount of fun one could have in ghost form in UO, honestly its one of the aspects that made death less of a drudgery in UO as opposed to games that you have a specific spot where you reappear on death. Here are a few specific reasons on why I like a well implemented ghost system.
1) If you die in a nasty place and somone has the resurrection ability near you then you can get ressed. However like any good game you appear without your stuff so then it becomes a matter of figuring out how to get your stuff back before someone else grabs it. This to me reinforces a bit of player responsibilty, I have found that people are less inclined to do stupid things like Intentionally training large numbers of npc's on to other players as a psudo grief tactic when they have something to lose themselves. I also am against systems where when npcs run out of their normal aggro range they wont attack anyone else once they lose interest in their primary target, this is as artifical feeling as it gets and EQ2 and WoW both did this and it just destroyed immersiveness from my perspective. I simply did not care when somone trained past me, heck I actually would wait for someone to do it because I knew I was 100% safe then. Honestly if you are dungeon diving and someone runs by with a pack of mobs you should be anything but safe, but again referring to the player responsibility thing, If the player stands to lose his own gear they are not as inclined to do stupid things.
2) Say somone Pk's you..Ok your annoyed first thing you want to do is figure out how to get back at them. What more devious trick then to keep your ghost invis instead of appearing for a res and potentially follow them back to their house where they are stashing your ill gotten goods. Now you know where they are based, you go get yourself ressed, equip up and then start hunting them to return the favor. Now however instead of relying only on chance you have a area to hunt and reasonably expect to catch them, but the difference is the Advantage is now in you favor because you are specifically looking for them.
There are also Tons of other tricks you can play while a ghost, most of them harmless, some of them funny, but all in all honestly they add an entertaining aspect that mmorpgs have been devoid of for a while. Death penalties are one thing and should be implemented. I feel penalties for Pkers should be exponentially more severe then for someone dieing to a npc PVE style, however the thing that continually disappoints me is that Devs continue to make the death experience not only miserable but artificial to the point of destroying immersiveness. Sure the Penalty is going to be a setback, and it should be..but there is honestly no good reason to make the experience of being dead miserable as most games have it right now.
Now concerning body loot and bind items, One of the best systems I hear of a long time ago from a dev for a game that went Vaporware was the ability to full loot however some item's could be bound. they had it set at 3 specific items, and only 3. There are alot of ways to do this, honestly full loot does not mean I need to loot every piece of gear on them but Coin, general items and non magical gear or low magic gear should be able to be looted. I do not think you will find too many Pvpers completely against some item binding, so long as its not rediculous.
Hello, first off i'd like to say good luck with the game, and i like the idea that your actually finding out what the gaming community really wants..
Im quite young still, but have played many RPG's online and offline. Over time i have built up a picture in my head using bits of different games to create the perfect MMORPG, i will now list the main points which i would really like to see in one game;
* Lots of PvP, make the whole game PvP (apart from starting place/town for newbies), if people dont want to be killed- dont carry expensive items, and keep out of peoples way.
* Lots of Items- make them UNIQUE as possible.
* Fighting PvP/PvE, needs to be Real-time, not turn based.
* 'The Elder Scrolls: Morrowwind' has a very nice combat system, you actualy have to AIM with magic, nearly all MMORPG lack this! i think its V important that you bring aiming and dodging skill into the game- NOT JUST BASE IT ON PLAYER STATS.
* Characters classes.. i have two main ideas for this
+ Make a character, choose whichever skills you like- make your character unique to you.
+ System used in old FF game for SNES- you choose a class(e.g. Mage.. Fighter) and spend your skill points, BUT you can change class (at a specific building maybe?) and respend your skill points, meaning classes will have a use, but if u get bored, you can try something new - i really liked this is Final Fantasy, and think it could do very well in a modern MMORPG.
Hope this helps