Waste of time idea because to keep it real would mean very little degradation therefore WHY have it at all? How long would a composite last without repair?It would last a long time and what are you going to wax the bow string?
It is just silly imo,i am all for realism but sometimes in a game situation it doesn't make much sense. I mean if we are going down that path of realism,why would a player take ANY damage at all when wearing metal plate? Since we are doing the FAKE death scenario in these games,what i could go for is when a player dies their armor is broken because how else did they die unless hit in the head lol but games are not doing much aiming for the head unless a shooter game "headshot !!".
I want to see better MMO aspects of grouping so this means i do not want to see any idea that is disruptive to the grouping gameplay other than the risk of dying,well fake dying.
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If it is a game where crafting is important, like Eve, there must be item destruction, else each player would only ever need one of a given item and there would be no demand for crafters and resource harvesters, and huge parts of the game would be unattractive.
If crafting is not important, then the game does not need item destruction.
It is sad that so many games have crafting systems where the primary goal of crafting is simply to level up the crafting skill, either because crafted items are inferior to looted, or because items are indestructible and there is almost zero demand for crafted goods.
If you're going to have crafting, do it right instead of making it just one more mindless grind.
No. Not at all. It's an incredibly outdated, antiquated/archaic idea that does nothing but blatantly hinder a player. It would bring nothing of use or benefit to games.
And it completely boggles me how some people think this would be a good thing to bring in.
Not a fan of managing things like this. I'd rather have equipment maintenance abstracted and out of the game.
But then I have also never been a fan of the crafting/economy simulation in MMOs. I participate in it if I have to but it's not something I want or see as a necessity for good game play.
I play MMOs to explore, fight, improve my character and chat with friends I don't need item decay or in-game bathroom breaks for more "realism" and I can immerse in the world just fine without them.
I find the immersion argument kind of silly really when you have such things for mundane realism but at the same time you have skills with little timers that control when you're allowed to use that skill again. I'd rather have resource-based realism in the fighting than any of the other trivial immersion mechanics.
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I don't remember a game where it really worked very well...i know alot of people cite UO and its crafting community as proof that this works, but I just didnt see many MMOs today where this works.
It depends on whether there is any emphasis on a crafting/market aspect to the game. Item decay definitely helps support a game with an economic aspect. If it's just a mash'em bash'em game without a crafting/market mechanism, the who cares.
Build in a tradeskill for repairing items where blacksmiths repair swords, armour etc Leather workers leather gear etc. At low levels you can only repair a small amount but at higher levels you can repair most or all the damage. Also the more an item degrades the more resources it needs to repair. If you let a high level item degrade too far you may need to harvest/buy rarer items to be able to repair it. It could make crafting more meaningful in some games.
Item decay went away when raids became the main focus of game design. Right along with crafting actually being a "thing".
In Ultima Online I found crafting and stocking my shop to just about be a full time job. Prices were low so it was easy enough to be able to buy gear. Yet I was making a lot of money due to volume of sales. *edit* I should also mention Star Wars Galaxies in here. Although prices were often much higher this was when being a resource mall owner was very lucrative. Also if you knew how to make money (it wasn't hard) then the prices weren't really that high compared to say the rip off fest of todays AH's.
Of course you could get repairs from a Blacksmith or ripped off until the invention of repair deeds...
To have item decay you would have to not have raids as your end all be all. Or you would have to change gear compared to now. The only time modern games made crafting overly useful the resources dropped in raids which just goes back to raids. Yet the vast majority of the larger MMO base only knows that kind of end game. Simply because prior to raid fest the subscription base was much smaller.
Raids and cash shops are about all there is now. New raid comes out.. follow the other lemmings that all watched youtube videos on how to beat the raid... after a week or so complain there is nothing to do... not that "end game" was overly elaborate before. Yet somehow I managed to stay subscribed to games for years as opposed to two or three months at most.
in my opinion its done all wrong. You should be able to break a weapon when using the wrong weapon vs the wrong armor. You should also be able to break armor. The idea is that it becomes useless during that encounter but can be repaired later to function again.
so there would be attacks specially designed for breaking armor and armor for breaking weapons. This whole degradation thing is worthless as it doesn't really have much gameplay attached to it.
there has to be some strategy and gameplay to it. Currently there is not. The mechanism is used mostly as a gold sink.
This is just a popular myth that if the game has gear decay it will have "healthy economy" and motivate crafting.
Seen this system in "Legends of Aria" at work and it busts this popular myth.
In reality this system makes most of the people avoid rare and difficult to craft items at all and almost all are spending most of their time in game with easy to replace trash items that can be easily disposed and replaced (from frequent drops or self crafted with low crafting skill) while having something rare just "for show" on rare ocations, or for very rare and specific fights... There is simply no point of spending time and energy for gathering resources and/or looking for master crafter to only loose all these resources few hours later... therefore crafters not only don't have more work, with decay system but even loose any of it as most are not looking for any high tier or rare crafts at all. And as opposed to that when you know that rare item will serve you long and good and you'll be able to repair and continue using it, you are likely to put effort in gathering resources and paying skilled crafter to get hands on that peace of gear as you know that it will take you far afterwards and all the efforts you've put into if will eventually pay off.
This is just a popular myth that if the game has gear decay it will have "healthy economy" and motivate crafting.
Seen this system in "Legends of Aria" at work and it busts this popular myth.
In reality this system makes most of the people avoid rare and difficult to craft items at all and almost all are spending most of their time in game with easy to replace trash items that can be easily disposed and replaced (from frequent drops or self crafted with low crafting skill) while having something rare just "for show" on rare ocations, or for very rare and specific fights... There is simply no point of spending time and energy for gathering resources and/or looking for master crafter to only loose all these resources few hours later... therefore crafters not only don't have more work, with decay system but even loose any of it as most are not looking for any high tier or rare crafts at all. And as opposed to that when you know that rare item will serve you long and good and you'll be able to repair and continue using it, you are likely to put effort in gathering resources and paying skilled crafter to get hands on that peace of gear as you know that it will take you far afterwards and all the efforts you've put into if will eventually pay off.
And what game would that be that they are avoiding higher-end items for trash items?
Regardless of whether it's decay or some other system, removing items from players does help the player economy.
If there is nothing to remove items then there is no reason to really have an economy now is there?
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it's complicated for sure. I personally like the idea that use wears out mechanical parts for realism. However, I think there should be some sort of mechanism for repairing/refurbishing gear even if it takes a lot of time and resources for higher-end stuff.
it's complicated for sure. I personally like the idea that use wears out mechanical parts for realism. However, I think there should be some sort of mechanism for repairing/refurbishing gear even if it takes a lot of time and resources for higher-end stuff.
I think that works too.
Just something that takes money out of players' hands and gives business to players who create items. That is if the game is "that type of game." Not every game will be that type of game.
In Lineage 2 there wasn't item decay but there was a chance to destroy items after a certain enchantment level and that kept crafters working, it kept money flowing and it essentially created an economy.
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Not surprisingly, there is a lot of support for this idea, mostly from the perspective of crafting. From a realistic representation of weapons, then no. Real world weapons like swords break and are abandoned. Iron and steel are incredibly durable, but components like leather will wear. The blade of a sword will probably never actually be unusable due to wear (pitting the metal, needing sharpening, etc) -- it's far more likely to bend or break. Grips need to be replaced (friction), and wooden shafts break (impact). Resetting the grip and honing the edge are considered routine maintenance, if someone uses a sword, they are responsible for the upkeep of that sword. Most component pieces there is no 'repair', only 'replace'.
A far more realistic approach to living in a fantasy world with medieval weapons would be to carry a backup weapon. Something goes wrong, drop what you've got and get another. Break the backup? Run (something not done enough in MMORPGs). Real world weapons are commodities; tools that don't have special properties, prestigious histories, or somehow improve the user's physical strength.
So, it all depends on what the game is trying to accomplish. Commodity level gear, replace. Unique +2 Sword of Niftyness, repair. (Yes, it's a money sink, but do you realize how tedious and boring repairing a sword is? Just pay the damn repair bill).
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
However, I do like it when there is a risk of gear being destroyed during an upgrading / enchanting process.
Over the years there have been so many F2P mmos that exploit this feature by selling higher success rates up to 100% on the cash shop, effectively making the game P2W. It's not even funny.
Like many others have already said, it totally depends on the design of the rest of the game.
If you want a really strong player economy (which i do, despite not being a crafter), then item decay / breakage combined with all the best gear being crafted is the way to go. Just gotta balance the decay rate properly - if everything breaks too often, you'll just piss off your players.
If you make your game loot-focused (i.e. 99% of MMOs) then you'll never have a strong player economy and so item decay really doesn't make much sense, except as a gold-sink.
If you want the worst of both worlds, do it like Zelda. Ridiculous item decay combined with an inability to get replacements. Just a nightmare, definitely one of the main things that made me stop playing.
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I'm trying to think of an iteration this could work in.
The problem with degrading gear is you'll feel like your time was wasted getting the gear you got. So for this to work it has to feel like it was an investment to reach the next stage of gear.
I think Monster Hunter did the latter very well. It felt rewarding and it made me want to fight harder enemies to make bigger and better gear. But the game's core gameplay loop may have been the reason that worked well, whereas other MMOs feel just like a grind fest.
To implement the former I think you could do something similar. Instead of getting gear drops: you center all gear generation around crafting (I'd wager vendor and player crafting would be the ideal combination). So by proxy, it centers around material drops. I also think implementing a way to prevent players from crafting their own gear should be introduced.
Where I like the idea of being self-sufficient, I don't think it's conducive to an MMORPG that, by its nature, promotes player interaction.
Additionally, scale the rate of degradation based on the, for the lack of a better word, "Level" of the gear. You should, hopefully, feel a sense of progression whilst not feeling like you're being utterly cucked out of your time.
SWG had it, but it was really slow so you hardly noticed it. Plus it kept crafters busy. We had repair kits but those never worked the entire time the game was live and if you clicked repair of something that was say 20/1500 it would bug out and make it 1/1.
1. Crafters need to be able to craft the best gear. If a player loses a gear piece due to decay, it needs to be replaceable.
2. Crafters need to be able to survive and thrive on their own. Not simple be a minor system in the game (i.e. WoW).
3. This one is up for debate, but I don't think traditional leveling works for this type of environment. I would like to see a version where it does, but games like SWG / UO had skill leveling progression and that worked. Crafters were required in these games.
Equipment decayed in SWG, you could fix it, but the mechanic was broken so it most likely would result in gear being 1/1 (broken). Most times when your favorite piece of uber gear broke it became a trophy to hang on your wall in your house. Later they added recyclers which was handy.
Honestly I didn't mind it in that game much; it gave me something to do (shopping). When my gear was almost broken, I would head out and either search for new better gear, or hit up my favorite crafter for a replacement of the same thing.
SWG was a player driven economy type game, even some of the rarest gear was crafted with only parts that dropped from encounters, so you still had to find a crafter to make it. If it broke you start over buy or make a new one. Everyone excepted it as how things were back then. I think people would have too short of an attention spans and would become too frustrated these days for it to work as a mainstream mechanic.
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How long would a composite last without repair?It would last a long time and what are you going to wax the bow string?
It is just silly imo,i am all for realism but sometimes in a game situation it doesn't make much sense.
I mean if we are going down that path of realism,why would a player take ANY damage at all when wearing metal plate?
Since we are doing the FAKE death scenario in these games,what i could go for is when a player dies their armor is broken because how else did they die unless hit in the head lol but games are not doing much aiming for the head unless a shooter game "headshot !!".
I want to see better MMO aspects of grouping so this means i do not want to see any idea that is disruptive to the grouping gameplay other than the risk of dying,well fake dying.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
If crafting is not important, then the game does not need item destruction.
It is sad that so many games have crafting systems where the primary goal of crafting is simply to level up the crafting skill, either because crafted items are inferior to looted, or because items are indestructible and there is almost zero demand for crafted goods.
If you're going to have crafting, do it right instead of making it just one more mindless grind.
And it completely boggles me how some people think this would be a good thing to bring in.
But then I have also never been a fan of the crafting/economy simulation in MMOs. I participate in it if I have to but it's not something I want or see as a necessity for good game play.
I play MMOs to explore, fight, improve my character and chat with friends I don't need item decay or in-game bathroom breaks for more "realism" and I can immerse in the world just fine without them.
I find the immersion argument kind of silly really when you have such things for mundane realism but at the same time you have skills with little timers that control when you're allowed to use that skill again. I'd rather have resource-based realism in the fighting than any of the other trivial immersion mechanics.
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In Ultima Online I found crafting and stocking my shop to just about be a full time job. Prices were low so it was easy enough to be able to buy gear. Yet I was making a lot of money due to volume of sales. *edit* I should also mention Star Wars Galaxies in here. Although prices were often much higher this was when being a resource mall owner was very lucrative. Also if you knew how to make money (it wasn't hard) then the prices weren't really that high compared to say the rip off fest of todays AH's.
Of course you could get repairs from a Blacksmith or ripped off until the invention of repair deeds...
To have item decay you would have to not have raids as your end all be all. Or you would have to change gear compared to now. The only time modern games made crafting overly useful the resources dropped in raids which just goes back to raids. Yet the vast majority of the larger MMO base only knows that kind of end game. Simply because prior to raid fest the subscription base was much smaller.
Raids and cash shops are about all there is now. New raid comes out.. follow the other lemmings that all watched youtube videos on how to beat the raid... after a week or so complain there is nothing to do... not that "end game" was overly elaborate before. Yet somehow I managed to stay subscribed to games for years as opposed to two or three months at most.
so there would be attacks specially designed for breaking armor and armor for breaking weapons. This whole degradation thing is worthless as it doesn't really have much gameplay attached to it.
there has to be some strategy and gameplay to it. Currently there is not. The mechanism is used mostly as a gold sink.
Seen this system in "Legends of Aria" at work and it busts this popular myth.
In reality this system makes most of the people avoid rare and difficult to craft items at all and almost all are spending most of their time in game with easy to replace trash items that can be easily disposed and replaced (from frequent drops or self crafted with low crafting skill) while having something rare just "for show" on rare ocations, or for very rare and specific fights... There is simply no point of spending time and energy for gathering resources and/or looking for master crafter to only loose all these resources few hours later... therefore crafters not only don't have more work, with decay system but even loose any of it as most are not looking for any high tier or rare crafts at all. And as opposed to that when you know that rare item will serve you long and good and you'll be able to repair and continue using it, you are likely to put effort in gathering resources and paying skilled crafter to get hands on that peace of gear as you know that it will take you far afterwards and all the efforts you've put into if will eventually pay off.
Regardless of whether it's decay or some other system, removing items from players does help the player economy.
If there is nothing to remove items then there is no reason to really have an economy now is there?
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Just something that takes money out of players' hands and gives business to players who create items. That is if the game is "that type of game." Not every game will be that type of game.
In Lineage 2 there wasn't item decay but there was a chance to destroy items after a certain enchantment level and that kept crafters working, it kept money flowing and it essentially created an economy.
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
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
Over the years there have been so many F2P mmos that exploit this feature by selling higher success rates up to 100% on the cash shop, effectively making the game P2W. It's not even funny.
If you want a really strong player economy (which i do, despite not being a crafter), then item decay / breakage combined with all the best gear being crafted is the way to go. Just gotta balance the decay rate properly - if everything breaks too often, you'll just piss off your players.
If you make your game loot-focused (i.e. 99% of MMOs) then you'll never have a strong player economy and so item decay really doesn't make much sense, except as a gold-sink.
If you want the worst of both worlds, do it like Zelda. Ridiculous item decay combined with an inability to get replacements. Just a nightmare, definitely one of the main things that made me stop playing.
Is the game designed around crafting and require equipment decay?
A functional game design trumps all. You don't throw random systems in for no reason.
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The problem with degrading gear is you'll feel like your time was wasted getting the gear you got. So for this to work it has to feel like it was an investment to reach the next stage of gear.
I think Monster Hunter did the latter very well. It felt rewarding and it made me want to fight harder enemies to make bigger and better gear. But the game's core gameplay loop may have been the reason that worked well, whereas other MMOs feel just like a grind fest.
To implement the former I think you could do something similar. Instead of getting gear drops: you center all gear generation around crafting (I'd wager vendor and player crafting would be the ideal combination). So by proxy, it centers around material drops. I also think implementing a way to prevent players from crafting their own gear should be introduced.
Where I like the idea of being self-sufficient, I don't think it's conducive to an MMORPG that, by its nature, promotes player interaction.
Additionally, scale the rate of degradation based on the, for the lack of a better word, "Level" of the gear. You should, hopefully, feel a sense of progression whilst not feeling like you're being utterly cucked out of your time.
(Naturally, I'm just spitballing)
1. Crafters need to be able to craft the best gear. If a player loses a gear piece due to decay, it needs to be replaceable.
2. Crafters need to be able to survive and thrive on their own. Not simple be a minor system in the game (i.e. WoW).
3. This one is up for debate, but I don't think traditional leveling works for this type of environment. I would like to see a version where it does, but games like SWG / UO had skill leveling progression and that worked. Crafters were required in these games.
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