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Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest news on Alpha Two.
Check out general Announcements here to see the latest news on Ashes of Creation & Intrepid Studios.
To get the quickest updates regarding Alpha Two, connect your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Best Of
Re: Is there a problem for solo players
Ashes isn't made for everyone.So, that's why, again, for me it's neither impressive nor special or important, that it is Steven (or Kevin, or Donald, or...), but only that a huge next MMO is coming out attracting (with this current marketing on website and showcases) all types of players in a high-fantasy setting with 3rd person characters with different races and classes, solid gameplay/combat mechanics (action combat + targeting), pvp AND pve content and thus choices what to play depending on the particual situation with or without guildies/friends. That's why I'm watching, that's what I'm hopeing, but it's no personal cult for me following a person or whatever - it's just one promising MMO combining pvp and pve as I don't want to only have one content type of it.
It's going to be relatively niche.
And... it will release when it's ready. Or become vaporware.
Dygz
1
Re: Is there a problem for solo players
It remains strange to count on hope to designs based on a dead game.Ludullu_(NiKr) wrote: »I believe Ashes could greatly benefit from a similar system, especially if they expand on L2's design.
I don't consider that strange at all.
Most games have good and bad aspects to their design. Picking good aspects of games that didn't do well is perfectly fine.
Noaani
2
Re: Is there a problem for solo players
And I've played none of those because they don't interest me. Different people have different tastes. I'm glad that all of those games are successful and a ton of people love them - I'm still not interested in spending my time in them.There are also players that never played Mass Effect, or The Witcher, or Red Dead Redemption, or Baldurs Gate - that's just fine, but missing milestones sometimes is unlucky if talking about broad experience.
The exact same applies to Ashes and other mmos. I'm not interested in spending ungodly amounts of time just to "not just launch them". I'd rather play a game that I like and am interested in. And I want Ashes to be that game.
Yes, and as you said, there's already a ton of games with those exact mechanics. I'm not interested in them. I want a competitive mmo where I gotta fight and compete for my rewards. Ashes promised to be such an mmo, which is why I got interested in it.Such games got easy solutions for that when it comes to respawn time, location or also like "resource is not gone just because someone else gathered it before". There is a huge field of meaningful options that gets fun into the game and not limits, disappointments and waste of time.
Yes, metal has not been a successful genre of music. Which is definitely why it has survived for over 50 years.Niche games are not successful, not popular and all of them die a slower or faster death.
No serious human would accept that and still would be, like a child, insist of not listening and learning.
And stuff like EVE definitely hasn't survived for more than 2 decades being a hardcore owpvp mmo.
Also, if your only measurement of success is WoW and FF14, then that means that literally every other mmo is dead, because none of them came even close to either of those games. And considering that there's been way more pve mmos out there, I guess pve mmos have died way more than the pvp ones.
Ludullu
2
Re: Player enemy visual Health Bar update on hit.
I am against anything convoluted that doesn't serve an actual purpose - and also often convoluted things that do serve a purpose.I don't get it, what's the problem that you have with a suggestions that HP bars are not visible for non-compabatants, but visible for purple and red players?[/b]
SInce health information is proven to not be the root cause of the issue you are talking about (as per Archeage), I see no reason to do anything other than display it.
My suggestion wouldn't prevent players attacking others - it would prevent players attacking without the intent to follow through. While you can argue that this is part of gameplay - that means the specific action you are trying to stop via not displaying health bars would have to be considered a part of gameplay (that action can specifically be defined as attacking a player without the intent to follow through).
So, you and I are indeed looking at trying to prevent the same behavior. The difference is, you are looking at it in a way that isn't going to stop it. Again, it happened in L2 with no health information, it didn't happen in Archeage with perfect health information, thus health information is of no importance at all as to whether this happens in a given game or not.
Noaani
1
Re: Player enemy visual Health Bar update on hit.
I highly doubt that Intrepid would seriously consider doing this and here is why.As a thought - and I am asking you specifically because your experience probably provides a perspective that mine does not - what about changing kill count to "green attack" count?
So, you can attack a green with no immediate penalty, but you don't want to make that a standard part of your gameplay, otherwise you will gain a massive amount of corruption at what ever point you do eventually kill a green.
The original system in Lineage 2 (in which health bars were not visible, at least in the most popular patches) provided a relatively optimal amount of risk and reward for both sides. In vast majority of cases it achieved it's goal of preventing random PKing and griefing (not by modern definition of griefing, where gatekeeping or contesting certain areas/resources/POIs is counted as such, but by the old-school definition, let's put it that way), despite having certain leaks that allowed to somewhat exploit it in some cases.
Intrepid did a decent job by addressing those leaks, thanks to Steven's L2 experience. If Ashes didn't have visible health bars, I'd bet it would be perfectly fine or very close to that state. However, the original conditions are not the same for Ashes and Lineage 2, because in one of them you can see the health bar and in the other one - you can't. Visible health bars significantly reduce the risk for the attacking side and the whole balance of both sides may end up collapsing. The system itself would still achieve it's goal and work in majority of cases, but in all other cases you will be able to hear people screaming even from Mars. So basically:
Lineage 2 system:
Attacker - had certain ways to circumvent the system (mostly hardcore players)
Victim - had certain tricks to provoke the attacker go corrupt and face the consequences of that
Overall - worked well in majority of cases, but there were issues. Risk vs Reward balance was relatively fine
Ashes of Creation system under the same conditions (hidden HP bars for non-combatants):
Attacker - the issues of Lineage 2 system are neutralized and punishment is more serious
Victim - feels much better as there are less potential ways to circumvent the system
Overall - more risks to the attacker, less risks for victim, no room for already known ways to exploit the system. Risk vs Reward balance is either perfect or favors the defender a little bit due to more serious punishments for the attacker. In general, potentially a 10/10 outcome.
Ashes of Creation system at it's current state (visible HP bars for non-combatants):
Attacker - the issues of Lineage 2 system are neutralized and punishment is more serious, but who cares when you can safely harass players with little to no risk of going corrupt
Victim - still feels very happy about eliminating flaws of L2 system. Feels extremely unhappy, because even those flaws were not that serious as being harassed with no risk by attacker
Overall - the balance shifts significantly in favor of attacker as they take little to no risk, unless they make a serious mistake. Even more serious consequences of going corrupt do not compensate that.
Hope this comparison provides a better explanation. Once again, please keep in mind that Lineage 2 players (at least from what I see) are on YOUR side and we want YOU to have a pleasant gameplay experience. Because the majority of us wouldn't care about the outcome of this discussion as we are mostly used to tougher conditions, unfair fights and all kinds of dirty tricks used against us (such as PK alts; fighting for a spot/boss for many hours; having certain parts of gameplay gatekept by other players; straightforward griefing; losing valuable gear due to PK etc.). The average modern MMO player is apparently not. Not trying to sound arrogant, but I assume that you understand very well what I'm talking about.
Flanker
1
Re: Player enemy visual Health Bar update on hit.
There will always be a risk of going corrupt.Ashes of Creation system at it's current state (visible HP bars for non-combatants):
Attacker - the issues of Lineage 2 system are neutralized and punishment is more serious, but who cares when you can safely harass players with little to no risk of going corrupt
If the suggestion above is set in place, so that attacking a green increases what is currently your PK score, that means people won't attack greens as a means of harassment.
If you do, and you gain a large amount of what is currently a PK score, and since this score acts as a multiplier to corruption gain, a single kill of a green player could incapacitate your character to the point where it may not even be worth trying to play any longer.
Since there is always a risk of corruption, most people will not be willing to then attack a green just to harass them - which is what the goal of any system around this should be.
At that point, health bars are irrelevent.
Again, keep in mind that Archeage had visible health bars showing perfect information and didn't have the issues you are talking about - so the issues you are talking about are not an inherent result of showing health information. It is possible and proven that you can show perfect health information of rival players and still not have this kind of behavior.
It is worth pointing out that since Archeage was a faction game, you could see the health of people you were able to attack without any penalty at all, and still there wasn't any of this issue.
Noaani
3
Re: Well requested a refund on my Alpha 2 package
I never said, I would not play the game, just don’t want to put any money in until I see it out.
Guess I was never comfortable with a lot of things said by Steven etc, and went down the rabbit hole a bit on Reddit, while a lot of it is the normal rubbish, there were quite a few factual things, that moved me a bit to far down the uncomfortable road.
One thing, that I’ve thought, for 8 years, this game should be almost ready, if not ready, it just smacks of no vision, no clear leadership.
Guess I was never comfortable with a lot of things said by Steven etc, and went down the rabbit hole a bit on Reddit, while a lot of it is the normal rubbish, there were quite a few factual things, that moved me a bit to far down the uncomfortable road.
One thing, that I’ve thought, for 8 years, this game should be almost ready, if not ready, it just smacks of no vision, no clear leadership.
Nemeses
1
Re: My theory to balancing AOC
Most of this would work for a different game (Ashes has some breakpoints that cause two of your 'assumptions' to falter, before we even start to think about the actual mechanics of their combat).
idk if you value my experience much, but at the very least, you can bounce stuff off me.
If you want to 'consider balance for Ashes' though, as we understand it to be, you would have to drop the concept of assigning a balance-able value to CDR because of the way that works in group play, and start from the 'outcomes desired' side for that one.
Similarly, remember that even if you turned their Augments system into a pure skill-point thing (which at the moment, it actually is explicitly NOT), you would have to account for Social Orgs and similar Augment rewards, which doesn't work as cleanly. Right now, being able to think of it more like 'slots' is the 'safer' method for the 'Augment'/'subclass' part of the spec.
Finally, there would need to be a diminishing return or rising cost on the concept of assigning the same debuff type to every ability in your kit, even if it didn't stack for this to work as an MMO balance scalar. This isn't usually obvious because MMOs are actually the ONLY competitive game type that usually seem to require this due to their high number of available abilities.
Overall, (in all arrogance) you have a solid understanding of the starting points you'd need to get good balance on something, but you're lacking some fundamentals that take a while to learn without getting to actually test your concepts on a live 'audience'.
idk if you value my experience much, but at the very least, you can bounce stuff off me.
If you want to 'consider balance for Ashes' though, as we understand it to be, you would have to drop the concept of assigning a balance-able value to CDR because of the way that works in group play, and start from the 'outcomes desired' side for that one.
Similarly, remember that even if you turned their Augments system into a pure skill-point thing (which at the moment, it actually is explicitly NOT), you would have to account for Social Orgs and similar Augment rewards, which doesn't work as cleanly. Right now, being able to think of it more like 'slots' is the 'safer' method for the 'Augment'/'subclass' part of the spec.
Finally, there would need to be a diminishing return or rising cost on the concept of assigning the same debuff type to every ability in your kit, even if it didn't stack for this to work as an MMO balance scalar. This isn't usually obvious because MMOs are actually the ONLY competitive game type that usually seem to require this due to their high number of available abilities.
Overall, (in all arrogance) you have a solid understanding of the starting points you'd need to get good balance on something, but you're lacking some fundamentals that take a while to learn without getting to actually test your concepts on a live 'audience'.
Azherae
1
Re: Player enemy visual Health Bar update on hit.
The same is valid for WoW, and even more. Ofc, this 9vp deathmatch is something different to smaller 3v3 WoW Arena. You are now comparing a 9v9 vs. 3v3. You have to listen to a 2v2 or 3v3 arena game in WoW in which speed/pace the game is done, and all the calls and all the actions/reactions you need. It's not that slow paced.Ludullu_(NiKr) wrote: »But the videos are the same. Players are making plays, reacting to enemy's plays and calling those out when needed. In both videos players react to different effects/buffs/debuffs on their enemies, which then dictates who they hit. Except in L2 players need to know animations, instead of just seeing all the buffs and effects right on the enemy nameplate.
If you want to compare this size, you have to do it with an rated battleground in WoW. That's larger scale with deathmatch and map goals, which adds complexitiy. All sizes are provided (https://www.wowhead.com/zones/battlegrounds), 6v6, 10v10, 15v15 up to 40v40.
It's the same in WoW and you need to anticipate enemys actions. There is a move called "blind vanish", but probably that would lead to an in depth discussion which is quite pointless to explain for a non-wow player (no offense meant, just a fact).To me, that requirement of knowledge makes the pvp harder and also creates a higher requirement for teamplay, because if your partymates don't know an animation - they can't call it out, which can then lead to a loss, or at the very least a disadvantageous situation.
Quite same in WoW + there are debuffs that can't be cleanses or harm the cleaner, so it shouldn't be done. You have to see and know this as a player to act correctly.The only true difference between the two games is simply the fact that L2 was built for bigger scale pvp even at a party scale, so the debuffs have different designs. WoW seems to be the "debuffs work 100% of the time and counterbalanced by cleanses and CDs" while L2 is "debuffs have a chance-based success rate, which is balanced through buffs and gear".
But, back to the discussion in general:
All MMOs, expect one (which is dead), features visible health points bars. All of them. PvP MMOs, PvE MMOs, PvX MMOs.
So, as several guys in this thread already mentioned: Because some minority of L2 players say "it's fine" the majority of the rest should adapt and got the wrong view on it? You know by yourself that it's the other way round. There is absolutely no problem to see hp bars but it add depth and increases pvp quality.
So, I just can repeat. Hopefully the remain with the current decision, that HP bars are visible and you get all the information or at least an indication (25%). All other workarounds are not needed and not worth the effort, only to argue around copying a dead game for a minority of players.
Let's just wait for the testphases. I foresee, that there is no real chance in any way that the majority of players doesnt want to have HP bars. I'm convinced about that. This real issue remains: Non-Combatant players can be attacked against their will.
Chaliux
1