Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Best Of
Re: 📝 Dev Discussion #77 - Let’s Talk Quests! ❗
Ok this might be a long write up...
Questing in MMO's can take very different formats:
- Mob kill
- Area Discovery
- Storyline Progression
- Aspirational
- Class Specific
- Daily/Weekly
- Attunement
- Escort ( Please god no)
- Jumping Puzzle
- Riddle based
- Gear based ( Transmog / Weapon/ Armor)
The most sought after of these options in ranking differ for each type of player depending on the MMO. Ashes is meant to be a PvX based MMO where GEAR matters as well as being a part of a GUILD. So we can slot out some of these quest designs that don't fit that narrative.
Gear based Quests as I can see are the most appealing in terms right now as the game plays. "Arlogian Collar".
The Issue surrounding this style of quest in a node progression system like Ashes is the outdated systems every MMO player has become accustomed to: "If im in a level 5 area then there are only level 5 quests."
Because these areas might be destined to change and with the area increasing the mob levels how do you promote a "static" gear progression quest line up? Or are there so many hidden underneath the progression systems that there are enough to fill the world with enough variety to keep players engaged with questing.
Combining elements that fit toward a non static level up progression system is something that would have to be developed.
Static POI quests could also have a base level of difficulty at standard node levels and then increase in difficulty for the quest as that nodes monsters difficulty progresses. Systems would have to communicate that to each other.
Questing in MMO's can take very different formats:
- Mob kill
- Area Discovery
- Storyline Progression
- Aspirational
- Class Specific
- Daily/Weekly
- Attunement
- Escort ( Please god no)
- Jumping Puzzle
- Riddle based
- Gear based ( Transmog / Weapon/ Armor)
The most sought after of these options in ranking differ for each type of player depending on the MMO. Ashes is meant to be a PvX based MMO where GEAR matters as well as being a part of a GUILD. So we can slot out some of these quest designs that don't fit that narrative.
Gear based Quests as I can see are the most appealing in terms right now as the game plays. "Arlogian Collar".
The Issue surrounding this style of quest in a node progression system like Ashes is the outdated systems every MMO player has become accustomed to: "If im in a level 5 area then there are only level 5 quests."
Because these areas might be destined to change and with the area increasing the mob levels how do you promote a "static" gear progression quest line up? Or are there so many hidden underneath the progression systems that there are enough to fill the world with enough variety to keep players engaged with questing.
Combining elements that fit toward a non static level up progression system is something that would have to be developed.
Static POI quests could also have a base level of difficulty at standard node levels and then increase in difficulty for the quest as that nodes monsters difficulty progresses. Systems would have to communicate that to each other.
MojoVojo
1
Why implement useless gear?
This is something I honestly never understood in any game so far.
While I think it makes perfect sense to have more and less powerful gear for the same level range, having gear that absolutely nobody wants to use has never made any sense in any game.
I thought AoCs goal was to offer a variety of builds being played, players being able to choose between different playstyles, different stats they're going for etc, I might have gotten this wrong.
But rn it just feels like any other MMO where there is just an illusion of choice with no actual variety of gear and stats
I think replacing absolutely useless gear with gear that is just weaker or has different stats would be much better and would really take some weight off of just one piece of gear being bis for most classes etc. resulting in absolutely overfarmed spots and skyrocketing prices
I mean - with more stat variety in the endgame (lvl 50), stuff like max mana might make sense at some point (maybe?) but like right now, there's so many things that are just not worth equipping even if that slot is empty still at level 10.
And even if the gear is not completely useless, the gap between the "bis" gear vs the other stuff is so huge, you can't really not go for certain gear pieces
TLDR
Having so much useless gear that nobody can make use of just makes Ashes feel like any other game that wants to give you the illusion of choice and variety without actually having any
While I think it makes perfect sense to have more and less powerful gear for the same level range, having gear that absolutely nobody wants to use has never made any sense in any game.
I thought AoCs goal was to offer a variety of builds being played, players being able to choose between different playstyles, different stats they're going for etc, I might have gotten this wrong.
But rn it just feels like any other MMO where there is just an illusion of choice with no actual variety of gear and stats
I think replacing absolutely useless gear with gear that is just weaker or has different stats would be much better and would really take some weight off of just one piece of gear being bis for most classes etc. resulting in absolutely overfarmed spots and skyrocketing prices
I mean - with more stat variety in the endgame (lvl 50), stuff like max mana might make sense at some point (maybe?) but like right now, there's so many things that are just not worth equipping even if that slot is empty still at level 10.
And even if the gear is not completely useless, the gap between the "bis" gear vs the other stuff is so huge, you can't really not go for certain gear pieces
TLDR
Having so much useless gear that nobody can make use of just makes Ashes feel like any other game that wants to give you the illusion of choice and variety without actually having any
Kiwi_
2
Re: Game Balance
I hope u realize aoc is still in development and many features/systems are missing or are not finalized? Alpha is a place to test not game. I suggest wait until later in phase 3 when more systems will come online and try again
Re: Steven, Please Rethink “Not for Everyone”
That mindset is great, but it doesn’t pay the salaries of 100+ employees for years to come. And to my earlier point about hiring, top talent isn’t lining up to join a studio working on a title that might not make it past a year or two. Longevity and financial stability matter, not just for players, but for the people building the game.I don't know what success is to Steven, but he's not worried about the money as far I can tell. I assume success to him is going to be a couple healthy realms mostly full of players exploring the game and fighting it out over resources.
Re: Steven, Please Rethink “Not for Everyone”
I see we are " STILL " in the tough-for-everyone's-Mind -kind of Phase. I personally hope DarkSorcerer and me will get a middle-thing.
Ashes won't change in it's Core-Mechanic at all. But "WILL" have additional Contents for Players not that suited for the Core-Mechanics.
Ashes won't change in it's Core-Mechanic at all. But "WILL" have additional Contents for Players not that suited for the Core-Mechanics.
Aszkalon
1
Re: Linux Tips, Tweaks and Troubleshooting Thread
It seems Proton EasyAntiCheat Runtime is unnecessary.
Follow the previous instructions for running the launcher with Bottles/Lutris and AOCClient.exe with Steam using Proton Experimental.
I'm just using the old launch options for AOCClient.exe:
eval $(%command% LauncherTetherPort=$(ss -ulpn | grep wineserv | awk '{split($4, a , ":"); print a[2]}' ) -NOSPLASH -USEEOS=0)
zopsi
1
Re: Splinter Topic: 'RP-Frames' (mostly about quests/oneshots)
I'd expect Ashes, given Steven's style, to make some 'black sun cult' if that happened and they wanted to do this type of thing.
@Ludullu - obviously the answer is different for each situation, but in this case the Black Sun RP-frame is most fun for us because it isn't deep narrative, and it can therefore incorporate a lot of theories.
Since Throne and Liberty already has their equivalent of a 'Black Sun cult', as well as at least 4 other groups that could theoretically be at least tangentially involved, it is a situation where adding a 'canon solution' from the Developer side is not necessary or strong positive for us.
It wouldn't hurt too much though, especially if it 'adds a whole new group or something'. That comes down to RP style though. There are RP-ers who would 'take the reins' and absolutely canon-ize their 'ending/conclusion' and then be thrown off by a Dev-provided one (e.g. Armored Core 6 ending), and others who just 'allow the world to keep mystery' (think moreso Elden Ring lore).
I'd say the good thing for a really fleshed out MMORPG is that it can split those things into 'Quests and Main Story' and 'Environmental Storytelling' for the most part, because I believe personally that Roleplayers tend to roughly split themselves across those lines. I don't have enough data though, because I don't spend a lot of time with 'Quest Driven' type Roleplayers outside of TTRPGs and Neverwinter.
tl;dr for me personally, I prefer that, and TL therefore works for me because I can skip the 'very directed' quests they give me until I encounter them entirely naturally as part of my own RP, which massively increases my appreciation for them.
On the other side they put in at least FF11-tier effort on the world dynamics (and they've reassured us that we've only seen maybe half of what they have planned, TL has more than FF11 had at the equivalent stage of development).
I did the same thing in FF11, and yet I think I did most of the quests in that game eventually, with only the 'huge epics meant to make a different style of player feel good' sometimes being missed or 'just done to unlock the thing required and sorta-excluded from the RP-frame'. I think most Narrative Designers know this though, i.e. that their big epics are their stories and we player characters are moreso supporting characters (even if we often do all the heavy lifting and face-smashing).
Azherae
1
Re: Drops, quest rewards
Noblotavious wrote: »Also, drops/rewards in the game should be mostly (around 80%-90%) "bind on acquire" so they can't be sold or given to an alt. Some proportion of crafted gear should also be BOA to keep the economy moving.
Ludullu
3
