What I realy question is the ability of the games to interconnect the path of past quests to effect the course of future ones. Ive seen a few games with multiple choice quests. But never one which is effected by the past course of the adventurer. Well except maybe Ao. Ao did have a reputations system effect the instances. Hrmm I realy did like AO. Needs to be redone tho with modern tech. Guess that wont happen that Age of Conan is out. My real question is how the quest database interconnects your quest choices.
The best way to get rid of tedium is to get rid of levels. Play the game and your skill and attributes increase as you use them. However it is all in the background, never to be seen by a player. If you want to show how good you are, then you go do something to prove it.
Originally posted by Sylvado The best way to get rid of tedium is to get rid of levels. Play the game and your skill and attributes increase as you use them. However it is all in the background, never to be seen by a player. If you want to show how good you are, then you go do something to prove it.
Yep, too bad the class/level thing is like the beginning and end of MMO character development right now.
About the level issues this thread has gone in... has anyone played Fable? I really liked the way that game handled advancement. I usually can't stay interested in linear RPGs, but that game still has me hooked just making new characters and trying out the various different combat styles/approaches/builds. It's a good system. It doesn't use levels, you just spend experience points in the three realms of power (Strength, Skill, Will .. which is like, Warrior, Rogue/Archer, Mage).. and any combination is possible.
Although HJ is taking the classical approach to levels, keep in mind that it won't be level-based in the way a lot of RPGs are. Quest encounters and what not will scale accordingly to the power of the party, and are not always fixed, so you can play with people despite your level disparity.
>> Ok, what about combat exp? Am I going to be grinding away for months, ala EQ? ... <<
Hmm, if you've played any Simu games before, attaining level cap is quite an accomplishment. I can't say for certain at this point, but I would expect it to not be a worthless accomplishment like it is in World of Warcraft, but not years worth of work as it is in Gemstone. The idea is that you'll be entertained throughout so it won't feel like grinding. But that's a Quest Team thing... I just slav-- er, happily pluck away at code all the time...
Originally posted by Techleo What I realy question is the ability of the games to interconnect the path of past quests to effect the course of future ones. Ive seen a few games with multiple choice quests. But never one which is effected by the past course of the adventurer. Well except maybe Ao. Ao did have a reputations system effect the instances. Hrmm I realy did like AO. Needs to be redone tho with modern tech. Guess that wont happen that Age of Conan is out. My real question is how the quest database interconnects your quest choices.
Your quest line is determined by how you accomplished past quests. If you failed one, and yes you can fail a quest, the next quest you take will be different then if you had succeeded. How you succeed will also change your quest line. Nearly all of our quests are being built with a multiple path system to ensure that your chance of having the same questline, with every character you make, is next to improbable.
Originally posted by HJ-Sisca What we're hoping to accomplish, with quests and even world zones, is to have cool parts for your entire career. A party of level 50 hero's might be able to hold off the Ukar army outside of a large town but a party of level 5's could protect the wagons bringing supplies from a bunch of Ukar raiders and both encounters could be really cool.
The idea, and the challenge for us GM's, is to make the journey to 50 the cool part not what happens once you get there.
I just remembered about the huge town invasions in Gemstone. That was a pretty big reason why people wanted to be higher level. I like the idea of having something to that effect to do at a lower level as well.
Just thinking about being at the top of a large lookout station in front of town seeing GM-run generals and commanders ordering huge numbers of mobs at us strategically just puts a smile on my face (maybe not about the lag associated with that however).
My absolute favorate Gemstone invasion was the one where the invaders were listed under "also in the room:" like the other player characters, and you could only tell who they were by looking at them. They gloated on the thought-net that they had even come into town and been spelled up in town square before the battle, and taunted everybody that we left our dead out to rot and we couldn't get rid of them by simply killing their bodies that would decay moments after death and pop back somewhere else causing problems. Large groups of high leveled players would gather together as many clerics as they could so they would kill, raise, kill, raise, kill, raise, kill, raise, etc as quickly as possible before the GM controlling the invader could decay or even register what was happening. I still have a log of two parties doing that to a couple of invaders, they managed to kill and raise him about 20 times each before they ran out of clerics, I guess figuring that each invader had a certain number of deeds or something.
Another where animates would spring out of the ground and morph into a copy of somebody in the room. I remember being surprised out of my wits when one popped into my room pretty far away from the actual fighting and I ended up in a mad desperate struggle to kill myself. Thank god I wasn't spelled up at the time or my buddy with me wouldn't have been able to chop off its leg then finially behead it.
Both invasions lasted something like two or three weeks and ended up spreading to all the towns. One thing I didn't like tho is when you would attempt to get the lower levels involved by, for instance, making a large rat (common fodder for level 1s) turned into a speaking character and all the level 1s had to try to figure out what to do. They had gotten it nice and settled down when some dumb high level came along and zapped it to kingdom come. If you can keep high levels out of the area that a low level quest is going on, that would be really nice.
Originally posted by Valendros Both invasions lasted something like two or three weeks and ended up spreading to all the towns. One thing I didn't like tho is when you would attempt to get the lower levels involved by, for instance, making a large rat (common fodder for level 1s) turned into a speaking character and all the level 1s had to try to figure out what to do. They had gotten it nice and settled down when some dumb high level came along and zapped it to kingdom come. If you can keep high levels out of the area that a low level quest is going on, that would be really nice.
Taking a group that interacts with an NPC out to a certain location and porting them into an instance will be an easy thing to do. I've been toying with the idea of seeing if we can design special areas that will only be used for events, and can not be accessed except by will of a GM. Lag is always a thing that has to be taken into consideration with events, but after listening to how we're managing server loads. I think we'll be able to run decent events with a fair number of people attending. This will be one of the many things we will be testing during Beta I'm sure.
Yeah, that is one of the things that always worrry me about "events". I've played a couple games that have had events from time to time, but they end up being for maxed out players and the lag is so bad you cant even participate. As a result, I now tend to put "events" in the catagory of "fluff", stuff that is nice, but doesn't really affect my decision on whether I play the game or not, since I won;t deal with them much. Hopefully HJ will have events that incorperate all levels, and are actually playable to everyone that would like to participate.
Originally posted by HJ-Illuminat Originally posted by Valendros Both invasions lasted something like two or three weeks and ended up spreading to all the towns. One thing I didn't like tho is when you would attempt to get the lower levels involved by, for instance, making a large rat (common fodder for level 1s) turned into a speaking character and all the level 1s had to try to figure out what to do. They had gotten it nice and settled down when some dumb high level came along and zapped it to kingdom come. If you can keep high levels out of the area that a low level quest is going on, that would be really nice.
Taking a group that interacts with an NPC out to a certain location and porting them into an instance will be an easy thing to do. I've been toying with the idea of seeing if we can design special areas that will only be used for events, and can not be accessed except by will of a GM. Lag is always a thing that has to be taken into consideration with events, but after listening to how we're managing server loads. I think we'll be able to run decent events with a fair number of people attending. This will be one of the many things we will be testing during Beta I'm sure.
GM Illuminatis World Builder Hero's Journey
Here is one idea. Let's say you plan to do an event at 9 p.m. two days from now. In advance of that event, special scrolls could added to the loot table of mobs in the level range the event is geared towards. These scrolls, to use EQ parlance, would be no drop and bind, meaning you can't sell them, give them away, and once you have one you can't get another (this would be to prevent people from farming the scrolls and scalping admittance to events). When you read the scroll it asks you whether you would like to attend the event, and if you click yes, if you are online when the event occurs you get teleported to the zone to participate.
This may not work for all events, because it lacks spontonaity, but it could work for some.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Lol rushing to the ticket stand to get the tickets to the show? To funny. Of course if its a battle or something along those lines it could be fairly random. As simple as a name sql database where the gm just raffles from the active people and sends a invite on the fly. Pretty simple to achieve actualy. Actualy i guess thats what realy makes you wonder about most games. Most games dont even attempt new methods. Mind you simple=money in most cases hehehe
Originally posted by Techleo Lol rushing to the ticket stand to get the tickets to the show? To funny.
That's not what I said. I said that scrolls could be added to the loot table for the mobs in the level range for the event. That means if the event is aimed at levels 20-30, any level 20-30 mobs in the game, in any zone, would have the potential to drop scrolls for that event. So there would be no rushing to anywhere. You would hunt/adventure wherever you normally would and have a chance at a drop. In fact, the whole purpose of the suggestion was to avoid a mad dash across the game to a particular event.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
>> Ok, what about combat exp? Am I going to be grinding away for months, ala EQ? ... <<
Hmm, if you've played any Simu games before, attaining level cap is quite an accomplishment. I can't say for certain at this point, but I would expect it to not be a worthless accomplishment like it is in World of Warcraft, but not years worth of work as it is in Gemstone. The idea is that you'll be entertained throughout so it won't feel like grinding. But that's a Quest Team thing... I just slav-- er, happily pluck away at code all the time...
-Dez
Thanks for the answer on this. i havent played a Simu game before in the past, but I think I get the idea that it will be a long process. I'm pretty discouraged by that, because I don't have 90+hours a week to play. I do hope that HJ makes the journey worthwhile, but it's going to be a tough task I think. Keeping that part interesting might be the biggest challenge. I really loved alot of thing about CoH, but the grind at the top levels got to me. Guild Wars had a great storyline for awhile, but then after the Ascention it really lost momentum, and really didnt have much to stand on besides Arena PvP. The PvE aspect pretty much dried up and I was gone.
The point of the game should not be getting to the top level the quickest. The gameplay and role play should be the point. The game would be a lot better off with no levels at all.
Originally posted by HJ-Sisca The real reason for feeling like you have to grind to max level is that most games have all of the coolest stuff built for those levels. Even the original EQ1, before the expansions or even before the planes opened up there were the 2 dragons, Naggy & Vox, and they were only beatable by large numbers of level 50 characters.
Everyone that plays a fantasy based game wants a shot at killing the dragon, it's been a staple of fantasy since The Hobbit. So if only max level characters can do that then you feel that you have to just grind to get to max level so you can do the cool part.
What we're hoping to accomplish, with quests and even world zones, is to have cool parts for your entire career. A party of level 50 hero's might be able to hold off the Ukar army outside of a large town but a party of level 5's could protect the wagons bringing supplies from a bunch of Ukar raiders and both encounters could be really cool.
The idea, and the challenge for us GM's, is to make the journey to 50 the cool part not what happens once you get there.
Finally, a company that understands! Woooot!
I am looking forward to this game very much, however after many letdown from some other MMO's i am taking it in stride and will be anxious to see it when the game goes live.
Originally posted by Sylvado The point of the game should not be getting to the top level the quickest. The gameplay and role play should be the point. The game would be a lot better off with no levels at all.
I agree with all that you said. I for one HATE level/class bases systems, but once again (just like almost every single god damn MMO ever) that is what we are going to get. And in most of those games the "journy" tends to be pretty empty and doesn't have alot of really good stuff to do. MOst of hte dex focus is in the endgame, and that is where all the cool stuff is, most of the "events" are catered to, ect. That is why people feel the need to rush to the top, so they don't miss out on the actual fun. Unfortunatly MMO's have conditioned some people (like me) that we need to plow through the game to get to something worthwhile doing. Will HJ be able to have some really interesting and fun stuff for low/mid levels? I sure hope so, but it's going to be a "wait and see" process.
Originally posted by Morneblade I agree with all that you said. I for one HATE level/class bases systems, but once again (just like almost every single god damn MMO ever) that is what we are going to get. And in most of those games the "journy" tends to be pretty empty and doesn't have alot of really good stuff to do. MOst of hte dex focus is in the endgame, and that is where all the cool stuff is, most of the "events" are catered to, ect. That is why people feel the need to rush to the top, so they don't miss out on the actual fun. Unfortunatly MMO's have conditioned some people (like me) that we need to plow through the game to get to something worthwhile doing. Will HJ be able to have some really interesting and fun stuff for low/mid levels? I sure hope so, but it's going to be a "wait and see" process.
I've thought a lot about the "no level no class" system, and really you end up being one thing or another, depending on what you originally conceived for your character. And levels just scale power anyway. If you remove the "level" system you might just end up migrating to a "rank" system in which you're still measuring things in levels to get an idea of power scale.
So I played this old MacOS MMORPG called Clan Lord, and it had no levels. You talk to trainers, go out and "learn" their style, and get messages from time to time like "You now swing more accurately" and what not, which was a "rank" of "Atkus" (the name of the trainer). So you basically keep track of your ranks (since the game won't do it for you), and end up with a total score. Or, your level. 1200 ranks, 300 in Atkus, 200 in Detha... etc etc etc etc.
Even in Fable, you learn by using certain realms of power, strength, skill, will, and learn new spells or train in those realms to get stronger in the areas, thus shaping your character. But you end up maxing out strength and skill, and you're just "capped." So there is a measure of power.
And games with no limits are horribly bad because one guy finds an exploit and suddenly has 10290912909120924 hit points and is totally indestructible.
So yeah, we're getting levels and classes in HJ. But they're predictable, and balancable, and they work out well in the end, at the cost of total creativity, player freedom, and what not. I'd LOVE to see something more creative in a game, but, what works, works. And most attempts at alternatives end up just recreating the same system, but with different names or angles.
I guess the big difference is that the power difference between a maxed character and a entery level character is exponentially more than in a class based system than in a real skill based game, since you don't gain much in attributes and health/HP's. Players that have a low skill can play with players that have much higher skill, and several players that low skills could kill a highly skilled player. That kind of thing is not possible in a level based system. And of course, you're told what you can and can't do by your class, as opposed to having your character become what it is from how you wish to play.
Sure, powergamers will find the best set of skills and use them. but that happens just as often with a class based system. I don't think you can ever really "balance" either sytem, as there is always going to skilss and classes that are better.
Now, that fact that HJ has alot of classes and allows for you to take 2 professions gives alot of leeway, so while it's not as limited, but I find that in a class based system you tend to "grind alot more", since you can break it down to "how many mobs I need to kill to get to the next lvl". Much harder to do that in a pure skill based game, and you end up just "playing" more.
Originally posted by Morneblade I guess the big difference is that the power difference between a maxed character and a entery level character is exponentially more than in a class based system than in a real skill based game, since you don't gain much in attributes and health/HP's. Players that have a low skill can play with players that have much higher skill, and several players that low skills could kill a highly skilled player. That kind of thing is not possible in a level based system. And of course, you're told what you can and can't do by your class, as opposed to having your character become what it is from how you wish to play. Sure, powergamers will find the best set of skills and use them. but that happens just as often with a class based system. I don't think you can ever really "balance" either sytem, as there is always going to skilss and classes that are better. Now, that fact that HJ has alot of classes and allows for you to take 2 professions gives alot of leeway, so while it's not as limited, but I find that in a class based system you tend to "grind alot more", since you can break it down to "how many mobs I need to kill to get to the next lvl". Much harder to do that in a pure skill based game, and you end up just "playing" more. My 2 cp's anyways...
That assumes that your HP/Mana/Stats etc improve as you level, this doesn't have to be the case - look at Guild Wars. Your base HP and Power stays the same throughout the levels and the only way to increase it is by using the spells/skills you gain along the way. Every player goes into a fight with the same number of skills available to them, the difference between a level 1 and a level 20 is that the level 20 has more skills to choose from to fit into those slots.
So yeah in that game you'd want to get to level 20 as quickly as possible, especially if you wanted to participate in the PvP that's the main focus, so you'd have those extra skills to choose from. Of course if all you wanted to do with the character was play the PvP part of the game you can just create a level 20 character and have at it.
What I'm hoping to see with HJ is that you can rush to the level cap if that's your preference but you'll in actuallity be a "gimped" level XX when you get there. If you just sat somewhere and ground XP for levels then you haven't experienced the journey so you haven't gotten the cool Wyr or maybe you're missing some of the abilites that could only be gained by questing.
And yeah, a lot of players have learned a lot of "bad" habits from the MMO's that have come out to date and you're going to have to unlearn those habits and re-learn how to just have fun playing a game again
That's just my own personal opinion though and doesn't neccessarally reflect that of the onsite team or how the game will actually play.
What I'm hoping to see with HJ is that you can rush to the level cap if that's your preference but you'll in actuallity be a "gimped" level XX when you get there.
If HJ does this that would be great and I would give a standing ovation. All those quests we do for the benefit of all those cities and citizens and noblemen and damsels in distress should add up to something. But a lot of games have made that same claim and failed to deliver on it. There's one game (not HJ) that makes that claim now and it isn't true. The folks who powergame as fast as possible to the end game always end up ahead, at least in terms of their character's power. If you guys change that, it would be awesome.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Originally posted by HJ-Sisca That assumes that your HP/Mana/Stats etc improve as you level, this doesn't have to be the case - look at Guild Wars. Your base HP and Power stays the same throughout the levels and the only way to increase it is by using the spells/skills you gain along the way. Every player goes into a fight with the same number of skills available to them, the difference between a level 1 and a level 20 is that the level 20 has more skills to choose from to fit into those slots.
Umm - no - in Guild wars you do get more HP as you level. So a level 1 character has 80 or 100 HP and a level 20 character has 500 hp. You also get attribute points to spend each time you level, which allow you to increase the ranks in various attributes. This allows you to use more powerful weapons, do more damage, heal more etc.
By capping at level 20 and not having uber gear, and the 8 skill slots you mentioned they are keeping a more level playing field.
I have played both classless and class based p&p games - runequest and d&d. Classless is more realistic obviously, especially when the skills you use are the ones that improve.
However classes allow people to compare themselves to others, it provides a goal to improve yourself, it gives a sense of achievement. It can also provide a basis for role-playing. Especially for people who dont have much experience playing fantasy RPG's.
Guild wars system of letting you adjust your attributes and change your skills around when in a town/outpost means you could play your character many different ways, depending on what you expect to encounter, and who is in your party.
Originally posted by HJ-Sisca What I'm hoping to see with HJ is that you can rush to the level cap if that's your preference but you'll in actuallity be a "gimped" level XX when you get there.
If HJ does this that would be great and I would give a standing ovation. All those quests we do for the benefit of all those cities and citizens and noblemen and damsels in distress should add up to something. But a lot of games have made that same claim and failed to deliver on it. There's one game (not HJ) that makes that claim now and it isn't true. The folks who powergame as fast as possible to the end game always end up ahead, at least in terms of their character's power. If you guys change that, it would be awesome.
I SO agree with that. Right now I have a pretty limited amount of playtime, and when I do get to play I'm like Gen Patton, I grab my guildmates by the shorthairs and drag them kicking in screaming in some cases in my min/max effort to make every second that i have to play fully optimized. Hell, the last game I really did muchin (SWG) I was taking off even before the last mob in the camp was down and getting a new mission and heading off to it. I ran a tight ship. Wanna sell/train? Cool, meet us when you get done, cuz we aint waiting.
Hmm, doesn't really sound like much fun does it?
Now in my defence, AFTER I get myself maxed out, I tend to take it pretty easy. I do alot of the "smelling of the flowers" and general goofing off. I guess knowing that if something COOL comes up, I"ll be able to take part in it gives me the ability to relax. But that is how most games work. Grind through the filler content ASAP to get to the fun. Hell my brother is worse than I am. In most cases he doesn't even consider leveling up part of the game. It's just learning how to play your character when the (end)game starts.
I'd like to be able to smell the roses on the way up some (I'll probably push some at least, I dont think I can help it now.....) and not feel like I was missing out on the good stuff. I want the actual game to enthrall me enough so I don't focus on "how many of X mobs do I need to kill to get to the next level". I must admit, Guild Wars had me going for some time, they had a great storyline going. It pretty much died for me after the Assencion though. If HJ can do that for me, that would be pretty awesome.
I just remembered about the huge town invasions in Gemstone. That was a pretty big reason why people wanted to be higher level. I like the idea of having something to that effect to do at a lower level as well. <<snip>> Another where animates would spring out of the ground and morph into a copy of somebody in the room. I remember being surprised out of my wits when one popped into my room pretty far away from the actual fighting and I ended up in a mad desperate struggle to kill myself. Thank god I wasn't spelled up at the time or my buddy with me wouldn't have been able to chop off its leg then finially behead it.
I was actually the designer of the v'reen morphs that did the morphing into "Bizarro" copies of yourself or some other player in the room. One of the main reasons I built them when I was the creature guru in GS was so that all levels could participate in invasions. I'd been a GS player myself and early in my career I'd been unable to participate much for the same reasons mentioned. I'd get smooshed wandering out in an invasion and a high level doglord would come along and step on me. So once I became creature guru I set it as my personal task to create something that all players could fight with in an invasion. One of the fun things here was that it made people take notice of others in the community a bit more. Since you needed to understand what level of threat a morph of others were it made you sit up and notice people more. I hope to get back into GS at some point and update them for GSIV mechanics. The other thing I loved about them was it was a kick to watch players get waxed by themselves or even more fun watch someone wack the actual player instead of the creature. That never got old.
Overall I would like to see us able to do something similarly in HJ such that events along that line will scale to levels and everyone will have the ability to have fun their whole career rather than grinding to the end game. And I think our thoughts on the our friends system that allows you to scale up or down to adventure together will go a ways towards making this happen.
SGM Uska
Killing Players Isn't Just a Good Idea, It's the Law
We are hoping that the need to travel from place to place doesn't get voted into a "tedium" category; the screenshots do no justice to the visual beauty of this game. Yes, there'll be forests and mountains and glens. Yes, you'll have to see them more than once. But they are merely a backdrop to the adventures you'll make for yourself!
Repetitiveness is also not necessarily tedious. If your reason for having to stand there and craft "small metal rivets" has no meaning, then the exercise is boring.
So let me ask what you think of this: Imagine that those rivets are critical to the building of a mega war machine. Imagine that your guild, your clan, your neighborhood, is lost if you cannot deliver enough of them on time. You have two days...they need 10,000 widgets. Does this equate with tedium?
Yes, it equates to tedium, if I'm just going to cilck on the same 3 UI buttons over and over again 10,000 times in 48 hours.
Repetition of the same thing over and over again is most *definitely* tedious to many people, and I'm one of them. Now, if there is some variation in making each widget, that might get interesting. But if it's just the same clicks over and over again... I'm sorry but yes, that's boring, and tedious, and I'm not going to accept or do such a quest (and if it were forced on me a few times I'd cancel my account).
I play games with stunning visual graphics, large worlds, and high amounts of customization specifically because I like variety. Variety and mindless repetition do not mix. Sorry. If that's where you're going with "it won't be tedious" I'm not gonna be on board with it.
I agree with Chessack, that the example given is pretty much the definition of tedium. More like forced tedium. Unless, of course, there was something going on that made it different. For example you have make some in a special area while being attacked or something...that might make it interesting.
Otherwise...on to the next town !
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When you do something right people won't be sure you've done anything at all.
Comments
About the level issues this thread has gone in... has anyone played Fable? I really liked the way that game handled advancement. I usually can't stay interested in linear RPGs, but that game still has me hooked just making new characters and trying out the various different combat styles/approaches/builds. It's a good system. It doesn't use levels, you just spend experience points in the three realms of power (Strength, Skill, Will .. which is like, Warrior, Rogue/Archer, Mage).. and any combination is possible.
Although HJ is taking the classical approach to levels, keep in mind that it won't be level-based in the way a lot of RPGs are. Quest encounters and what not will scale accordingly to the power of the party, and are not always fixed, so you can play with people despite your level disparity.
>> Ok, what about combat exp? Am I going to be grinding away for months,
ala EQ? ... <<
Hmm, if you've played any Simu games before, attaining level cap is quite an accomplishment. I can't say for certain at this point, but I would expect it to not be a worthless accomplishment like it is in World of Warcraft, but not years worth of work as it is in Gemstone. The idea is that you'll be entertained throughout so it won't feel like grinding. But that's a Quest Team thing... I just slav-- er, happily pluck away at code all the time...
-Dez
Your quest line is determined by how you accomplished past quests. If you failed one, and yes you can fail a quest, the next quest you take will be different then if you had succeeded. How you succeed will also change your quest line. Nearly all of our quests are being built with a multiple path system to ensure that your chance of having the same questline, with every character you make, is next to improbable.
GM Illuminatis
World Builder
Hero's Journey
I just remembered about the huge town invasions in Gemstone. That was a pretty big reason why people wanted to be higher level. I like the idea of having something to that effect to do at a lower level as well.
Just thinking about being at the top of a large lookout station in front of town seeing GM-run generals and commanders ordering huge numbers of mobs at us strategically just puts a smile on my face (maybe not about the lag associated with that however).
My absolute favorate Gemstone invasion was the one where the invaders were listed under "also in the room:" like the other player characters, and you could only tell who they were by looking at them. They gloated on the thought-net that they had even come into town and been spelled up in town square before the battle, and taunted everybody that we left our dead out to rot and we couldn't get rid of them by simply killing their bodies that would decay moments after death and pop back somewhere else causing problems. Large groups of high leveled players would gather together as many clerics as they could so they would kill, raise, kill, raise, kill, raise, kill, raise, etc as quickly as possible before the GM controlling the invader could decay or even register what was happening. I still have a log of two parties doing that to a couple of invaders, they managed to kill and raise him about 20 times each before they ran out of clerics, I guess figuring that each invader had a certain number of deeds or something.
Another where animates would spring out of the ground and morph into a copy of somebody in the room. I remember being surprised out of my wits when one popped into my room pretty far away from the actual fighting and I ended up in a mad desperate struggle to kill myself. Thank god I wasn't spelled up at the time or my buddy with me wouldn't have been able to chop off its leg then finially behead it.
Both invasions lasted something like two or three weeks and ended up spreading to all the towns. One thing I didn't like tho is when you would attempt to get the lower levels involved by, for instance, making a large rat (common fodder for level 1s) turned into a speaking character and all the level 1s had to try to figure out what to do. They had gotten it nice and settled down when some dumb high level came along and zapped it to kingdom come. If you can keep high levels out of the area that a low level quest is going on, that would be really nice.
Taking a group that interacts with an NPC out to a certain location and porting them into an instance will be an easy thing to do. I've been toying with the idea of seeing if we can design special areas that will only be used for events, and can not be accessed except by will of a GM. Lag is always a thing that has to be taken into consideration with events, but after listening to how we're managing server loads. I think we'll be able to run decent events with a fair number of people attending. This will be one of the many things we will be testing during Beta I'm sure.
GM Illuminatis
World Builder
Hero's Journey
Taking a group that interacts with an NPC out to a certain location and porting them into an instance will be an easy thing to do. I've been toying with the idea of seeing if we can design special areas that will only be used for events, and can not be accessed except by will of a GM. Lag is always a thing that has to be taken into consideration with events, but after listening to how we're managing server loads. I think we'll be able to run decent events with a fair number of people attending. This will be one of the many things we will be testing during Beta I'm sure.
GM Illuminatis
World Builder
Hero's Journey
Here is one idea. Let's say you plan to do an event at 9 p.m. two days from now. In advance of that event, special scrolls could added to the loot table of mobs in the level range the event is geared towards. These scrolls, to use EQ parlance, would be no drop and bind, meaning you can't sell them, give them away, and once you have one you can't get another (this would be to prevent people from farming the scrolls and scalping admittance to events). When you read the scroll it asks you whether you would like to attend the event, and if you click yes, if you are online when the event occurs you get teleported to the zone to participate.
This may not work for all events, because it lacks spontonaity, but it could work for some.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Fun isn't in the destination, its in the "journey"
-- I need a nerf --
I am looking forward to this game very much, however after many letdown from some other MMO's i am taking it in stride and will be anxious to see it when the game goes live.
So I played this old MacOS MMORPG called Clan Lord, and it had no levels. You talk to trainers, go out and "learn" their style, and get messages from time to time like "You now swing more accurately" and what not, which was a "rank" of "Atkus" (the name of the trainer). So you basically keep track of your ranks (since the game won't do it for you), and end up with a total score. Or, your level. 1200 ranks, 300 in Atkus, 200 in Detha... etc etc etc etc.
Even in Fable, you learn by using certain realms of power, strength, skill, will, and learn new spells or train in those realms to get stronger in the areas, thus shaping your character. But you end up maxing out strength and skill, and you're just "capped." So there is a measure of power.
And games with no limits are horribly bad because one guy finds an exploit and suddenly has 10290912909120924 hit points and is totally indestructible.
So yeah, we're getting levels and classes in HJ. But they're predictable, and balancable, and they work out well in the end, at the cost of total creativity, player freedom, and what not. I'd LOVE to see something more creative in a game, but, what works, works. And most attempts at alternatives end up just recreating the same system, but with different names or angles.
I guess the big difference is that the power difference between a maxed character and a entery level character is exponentially more than in a class based system than in a real skill based game, since you don't gain much in attributes and health/HP's. Players that have a low skill can play with players that have much higher skill, and several players that low skills could kill a highly skilled player. That kind of thing is not possible in a level based system. And of course, you're told what you can and can't do by your class, as opposed to having your character become what it is from how you wish to play.
Sure, powergamers will find the best set of skills and use them. but that happens just as often with a class based system. I don't think you can ever really "balance" either sytem, as there is always going to skilss and classes that are better.
Now, that fact that HJ has alot of classes and allows for you to take 2 professions gives alot of leeway, so while it's not as limited, but I find that in a class based system you tend to "grind alot more", since you can break it down to "how many mobs I need to kill to get to the next lvl". Much harder to do that in a pure skill based game, and you end up just "playing" more.
My 2 cp's anyways...
So yeah in that game you'd want to get to level 20 as quickly as possible, especially if you wanted to participate in the PvP that's the main focus, so you'd have those extra skills to choose from. Of course if all you wanted to do with the character was play the PvP part of the game you can just create a level 20 character and have at it.
What I'm hoping to see with HJ is that you can rush to the level cap if that's your preference but you'll in actuallity be a "gimped" level XX when you get there. If you just sat somewhere and ground XP for levels then you haven't experienced the journey so you haven't gotten the cool Wyr or maybe you're missing some of the abilites that could only be gained by questing.
And yeah, a lot of players have learned a lot of "bad" habits from the MMO's that have come out to date and you're going to have to unlearn those habits and re-learn how to just have fun playing a game again
That's just my own personal opinion though and doesn't neccessarally reflect that of the onsite team or how the game will actually play.
If HJ does this that would be great and I would give a standing ovation. All those quests we do for the benefit of all those cities and citizens and noblemen and damsels in distress should add up to something. But a lot of games have made that same claim and failed to deliver on it. There's one game (not HJ) that makes that claim now and it isn't true. The folks who powergame as fast as possible to the end game always end up ahead, at least in terms of their character's power. If you guys change that, it would be awesome.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Umm - no - in Guild wars you do get more HP as you level. So a level 1 character has 80 or 100 HP and a level 20 character has 500 hp. You also get attribute points to spend each time you level, which allow you to increase the ranks in various attributes. This allows you to use more powerful weapons, do more damage, heal more etc.
By capping at level 20 and not having uber gear, and the 8 skill slots you mentioned they are keeping a more level playing field.
I have played both classless and class based p&p games - runequest and d&d. Classless is more realistic obviously, especially when the skills you use are the ones that improve.
However classes allow people to compare themselves to others, it provides a goal to improve yourself, it gives a sense of achievement. It can also provide a basis for role-playing. Especially for people who dont have much experience playing fantasy RPG's.
Guild wars system of letting you adjust your attributes and change your skills around when in a town/outpost means you could play your character many different ways, depending on what you expect to encounter, and who is in your party.
If HJ does this that would be great and I would give a standing ovation. All those quests we do for the benefit of all those cities and citizens and noblemen and damsels in distress should add up to something. But a lot of games have made that same claim and failed to deliver on it. There's one game (not HJ) that makes that claim now and it isn't true. The folks who powergame as fast as possible to the end game always end up ahead, at least in terms of their character's power. If you guys change that, it would be awesome.
I SO agree with that. Right now I have a pretty limited amount of playtime, and when I do get to play I'm like Gen Patton, I grab my guildmates by the shorthairs and drag them kicking in screaming in some cases in my min/max effort to make every second that i have to play fully optimized. Hell, the last game I really did muchin (SWG) I was taking off even before the last mob in the camp was down and getting a new mission and heading off to it. I ran a tight ship. Wanna sell/train? Cool, meet us when you get done, cuz we aint waiting.
Hmm, doesn't really sound like much fun does it?
Now in my defence, AFTER I get myself maxed out, I tend to take it pretty easy. I do alot of the "smelling of the flowers" and general goofing off. I guess knowing that if something COOL comes up, I"ll be able to take part in it gives me the ability to relax. But that is how most games work. Grind through the filler content ASAP to get to the fun. Hell my brother is worse than I am. In most cases he doesn't even consider leveling up part of the game. It's just learning how to play your character when the (end)game starts.
I'd like to be able to smell the roses on the way up some (I'll probably push some at least, I dont think I can help it now.....) and not feel like I was missing out on the good stuff. I want the actual game to enthrall me enough so I don't focus on "how many of X mobs do I need to kill to get to the next level". I must admit, Guild Wars had me going for some time, they had a great storyline going. It pretty much died for me after the Assencion though. If HJ can do that for me, that would be pretty awesome.
I was actually the designer of the v'reen morphs that did the morphing into "Bizarro" copies of yourself or some other player in the room. One of the main reasons I built them when I was the creature guru in GS was so that all levels could participate in invasions. I'd been a GS player myself and early in my career I'd been unable to participate much for the same reasons mentioned. I'd get smooshed wandering out in an invasion and a high level doglord would come along and step on me. So once I became creature guru I set it as my personal task to create something that all players could fight with in an invasion. One of the fun things here was that it made people take notice of others in the community a bit more. Since you needed to understand what level of threat a morph of others were it made you sit up and notice people more. I hope to get back into GS at some point and update them for GSIV mechanics. The other thing I loved about them was it was a kick to watch players get waxed by themselves or even more fun watch someone wack the actual player instead of the creature. That never got old.
Overall I would like to see us able to do something similarly in HJ such that events along that line will scale to levels and everyone will have the ability to have fun their whole career rather than grinding to the end game. And I think our thoughts on the our friends system that allows you to scale up or down to adventure together will go a ways towards making this happen.
SGM Uska
Killing Players Isn't Just a Good Idea, It's the Law
Critters Rule
Repetition of the same thing over and over again is most *definitely* tedious to many people, and I'm one of them. Now, if there is some variation in making each widget, that might get interesting. But if it's just the same clicks over and over again... I'm sorry but yes, that's boring, and tedious, and I'm not going to accept or do such a quest (and if it were forced on me a few times I'd cancel my account).
I play games with stunning visual graphics, large worlds, and high amounts of customization specifically because I like variety. Variety and mindless repetition do not mix. Sorry. If that's where you're going with "it won't be tedious" I'm not gonna be on board with it.
C
I agree with Chessack, that the example given is pretty much the definition of tedium. More like forced tedium. Unless, of course, there was something going on that made it different. For example you have make some in a special area while being attacked or something...that might make it interesting.
Otherwise...on to the next town !
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When you do something right people won't be sure you've done anything at all.