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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Dailies/Weeklies
Let's discuss dailies and weeklies, one thing I personally dislike about MMOs. I feel like daily quests are a kind of a "bait" to force players to login to the game on a daily basis. For example I just started playing Revelation Online as a time filler, nothing serious, even though I'm not serious about the game I already hate the fact that I have to spend 2 hours / day to do dailies and extra hours for weeklies. If I don't do them I basically fall behind and have low gear compared to the rest of the server. I know that game isn't the only one with "forced" daily (questing) system.
I don't mind weeklies. I believe that every player should be committed enough to spend at least few hours a week on the game they want to play. But not logging in for 2 days and missing out on a tiny bit of content and falling behind doesn't sound fair to me.
Dailies and weeklies should be optional in my opinion. They shouldn't be the main reason why you login to the game.
So what kind of daily/weekly questing system would you guys prefer?
I don't mind weeklies. I believe that every player should be committed enough to spend at least few hours a week on the game they want to play. But not logging in for 2 days and missing out on a tiny bit of content and falling behind doesn't sound fair to me.
Dailies and weeklies should be optional in my opinion. They shouldn't be the main reason why you login to the game.
So what kind of daily/weekly questing system would you guys prefer?
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I do lean more toward no dailies at all, and what you mentioned seems good: weeklies. Of course, these should take longer than a couple of hours in one day to complete, maybe something like 3-5 hours of total play time to get them done. Just kind of throwing numbers out from the top of my head, but it should be a reasonable amount of playing, while not being hardcore.
It should require effort in the sense of play time and maybe a little focusing on certain content to get done quicker, but not feel like a chore to do. It should <em>never</em> feel like a chore. None of the content should, really. Grinding to get what you want is quite a difference, to me, than doing a chore to that the game wants you to do.
Revelation's dailies quests are way to over the top, there should be a choice whether to do them or not and not cripple those who dont complete them and reward those who do with small rewards that are handy and nice but you can live without.
Weekly Quests should be more impactfull should take time over that week to complete.
Monthly rewards should be if you complete all the weekly quests, and reward the player with something that is amazing.
From the<a href="http://www.mmogames.com/gamearticles/interview-ashes-of-creation-wants-bring-virtual-world-life/"> this interview</a>:
<em>Tasks are hyper-local to individual Nodes, and will be centered around developing the Node that they belong to. If you want to go kill five wolves, this is where you’d do it. You can kill five wolves on your own, and that will count toward Node progression, but if a Task is offered to kill five wolves, then both the Node and your character will get bonus XP when that task is completed. Tasks will be numerous and varied, and will reflect the different gameplay styles that players can engage in within Ashes – there will be crafting, exploration, combat, and gathering oriented tasks (among many others).</em>
^Probably whats gonna be like dailies, or the "burn time quests".
I liked them in GW2 - 15 mins max and be done with it - pvp / pve / gathering, great. Small benefits - Could've been a bit more imo. But yeah - positive experience.
In BDO. You also have dailies and weeklies. When I had less time, I only did dailies and weeklies each day (up to 2h-day - just for dailies) , I couldn't level up or anything because I didn't have more time. The dailies and weeklies had so much benefit to them that it was logical to do those, and just those if you hadn't had the time for more. Negative experience.
Hope they get it balanced.
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oooo i like this, winter the nodes need wood, summer they need water, another you have to gather crops etc etc
Where you rather fast done with everything.
It might also be good if you have just weeklys where you can split everything over the week so you dont need to do it every day and can for exemple do all stuff on Saturday and Sunday.
The idea of having different weeklys/dailys for each season is in my opinion very good.
So the stuff dosen't get to fast repetetive.
I believe the gorgeous seasonal environments,as seen in "immersive world-environments" video,adds possibilities for more variety in tasks.
For once it would actually be exciting to revisit areas as new season related tasks open up..Really like the direction they are taking this.
Maybe dailies/weeklies in other games are there in an attempt to keep areas that are otherwise rather static and dull relevant?
Most of the time it can encourage players to continue playing for a few weeks or months ,but eventually it becomes a repetitive chore,unless dailies/weeklies would only exist for a limited time ingame,perhaps?
And if they happen sporadically;once in a while,not every day/week.
They might even be triggered by how players impact the world;like if you manage to destroy the mage academy in one town,it will trigger a weekly for them
where they get the chance to get a golem companion if they manage to find all the parts(torso,head,legs,arms,..) that were stolen by looters during the destruction of the mage academy.
After the period ends the temporary quest vanishes for good & others are created in different areas.
Like if a town takes care of some magical seeds ,they get golden apples by the end of the week if they have taken good care of that tree & if it isn't destroyed in a node war.
This way we can still get a form of weekly quests while keeping them fresh at the same time
Sometimes they could offer you a piece of furniture,other times a companion ,a weapon skin or special plant for in your garden,...
[quote quote=2294]It really depends on how it’s done. For me, dailies in a game like Guild Wars 2 are fine — if you miss out, it’s not a big deal whatsoever, and if you do them, it can take as little as 5-10 minutes. The reward for it is good enough to justify doing them, but at the same time, you don’t feel bad if you miss out on a few days here and there. At least, I don’t.
I do lean more toward no dailies at all, and what you mentioned seems good: weeklies. Of course, these should take longer than a couple of hours in one day to complete, maybe something like 3-5 hours of total play time to get them done. Just kind of throwing numbers out from the top of my head, but it should be a reasonable amount of playing, while not being hardcore.
It should require effort in the sense of play time and maybe a little focusing on certain content to get done quicker, but not feel like a chore to do. It should <em>never</em> feel like a chore. None of the content should, really. Grinding to get what you want is quite a difference, to me, than doing a chore to that the game wants you to do.
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As far as I know sometimes winter will last for 1 week, sometimes for longer. Which would create the idea of "I should finish my winter weekly because It's already spring in 6 days!" so people have to hurry on killing X amount of polar bears in a PvP zone, which could automatically create a competition if the polar bears can only be found in PvP-free zones and spawn rarely :P
On the next winter notation let's say it's gonna last for 16 days, so it can be considered as a chill winter in terms of slaying evil polar bears.
When you mentioned weekly quest I couldn’t resist but to remember that in-game seasons are supposed to last week if I’m correct. That gives me the idea that this “weeklies” could be done so that each week they’re different depending on the season. What do you guys think?
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As far as I know sometimes winter will last for 1 week, sometimes for longer. Which would create the idea of “I should finish my winter weekly because It’s already spring in 6 days!” so people have to hurry on killing X amount of polar bears in a PvP zone, which could automatically create a competition if the polar bears can only be found in PvP-free zones and spawn rarely <img alt="?" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/2/svg/1f61b.svg" />
On the next winter notation let’s say it’s gonna last for 16 days, so it can be considered as a chill winter in terms of slaying evil polar bears.
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I don't think you get told how long the seasons are, its more like you can guess/hope for a certain length. Which I only find makes it even more interesting :) You can gamble and wait a few days before you start the weekly, or just doing as fast as possible.
But I gotta say, I will have no polarbear killing on my watch! I'll get the highest corruptscore in the game, if polar bears become a weekly...
<blockquote><div class="d4p-bbt-quote-title"><a href="https://www.ashesofcreation.com/forums/topic/dailiesweeklies/#post-2348" rel="nofollow">Syadnom wrote:</a></div>
When you mentioned weekly quest I couldn’t resist but to remember that in-game seasons are supposed to last week if I’m correct. That gives me the idea that this “weeklies” could be done so that each week they’re different depending on the season. What do you guys think?
</blockquote>
As far as I know sometimes winter will last for 1 week, sometimes for longer. Which would create the idea of “I should finish my winter weekly because It’s already spring in 6 days!” so people have to hurry on killing X amount of polar bears in a PvP zone, which could automatically create a competition if the polar bears can only be found in PvP-free zones and spawn rarely <img alt="?" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/2/svg/1f61b.svg" />
On the next winter notation let’s say it’s gonna last for 16 days, so it can be considered as a chill winter in terms of slaying evil polar bears.
</blockquote>
I don’t think you get told how long the seasons are, its more like you can guess/hope for a certain length. Which I only find makes it even more interesting <img alt="?" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/2/svg/1f642.svg" /> You can gamble and wait a few days before you start the weekly, or just doing as fast as possible.
But I gotta say, I will have no polarbear killing on my watch! I’ll get the highest corruptscore in the game, if polar bears become a weekly…
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I totally agree, we shall protect the Polar Bears!
And although I dont personally like it when dailies are a huge benefit to players and leveling I do think they need to have some impact and players who do them get a decent reward. I work 40 hours a week also so cant sit at home all day grinding but for people who can, hey they should get rewarded for the time spent.
Honestly I dislike the concept as a whole.
If game devs feel like they have to force you to login through things like: Dailies, weekly lockouts, loot lockouts, etc, the game must not be very interesting in the first place. It's just pseudo-content to keep you subbed and logging in...
While on the subject, loot/weekly lockouts suck... I'd rather have boss loot tables have insanely low chances of dropping rare loot.
Also... even though it works in something like FFXIV... please... no dungeon currency... Poetics, Scripture, Esoterics, etc... please don't do anything like this. Bringing this up because it, too, is an artificial cap to keep you subbed and coming back...
If they can innovate <em>heavily</em> on this kind of thing and make it feel more alive/dynamic, maybe I wouldn't be opposed...
but if it's like:
"Go kill 100 of X" every day
"Fish 10 of X" every day
"Oh, you got a piece of loot, soz m8, that's it for this week. But hey, you can still grind a capped currency for gear that is kinda the same"
I want rare gear to be rare because it is <em>actually</em> rare... not because it is locked behind a created time sink / waiting game, and in reality would be very easy to obtain if not for the lockouts.
Edit: Daily log in rewards on the other hand aren't too bad, like the loyalty system in BDO for example. If this game isn't going to have a cash shop, though, that might not work. I guess you could maybe give some kind of XP bonus reward for logging in daily, or drop rate increase for X hours if the devs feel they need some sort of incentive/loyalty system.
Edit 2: In a similar fashion, if the game has some kind of arena system... please, no queues for it. No currency. Go back to how old games used to do it: Have a physical location in the game, have a GM moderate the whole thing, and have an actual prize like gold, a rare weapon, rare armor, titles, etc. Make it weekly, monthly, or quarterly.
If you feel you need to have a queue/instanced arena, fine, but again, currency grinding and the like is just another time sink. If you go this route, maybe give out decent amounts of gold to the winners or something. I would strongly prefer to not have a WoW like arena system though... old school PVP events (keyword: event) on EQ1 and on UO free shards were amazing. I actually respected the winners, and it was much more intense/fun to watch. Having the whole server go to the arena(s) on EQ1 for PVP tournaments is something I will never forget. It felt so much more real and alive. Even just journeying to the arena to watch was quite an experience.
Another possibility would be having a queue based system, but have an actual arena physically in the world. This way, players could visit the location to watch, bet gold or items on the team or player they think would win, etc. Have it on a schedule, 1v1 @ 6:00, 3v3 @ 6:15, 5v5 @ 6:30, or some such. Make arena PVP a social experience. If a game did a system like this, I could probably just sit at the arena all day gambling. It would also let the PVPers have more than just titles or gear, they'd actually gain a reputation on the server. Like I could see "Player X" is going up against "Player Y", and know Player X has won 7 out of 10, and bet on him. It could truly be exciting.
It would also be interesting if guilds could build their own arenas and host tournies themselves. I still like the idea of tournaments run by GMs though, as the rewards could be truly unique.
/endrant, sorry for getting a bit off topic.
As for the daily part, I agree that if its made so you feel like you need to play then its done the wrong way. It has to be in the sense that you wanna do them, and not so you feel you need to do them (except if you need to do it to help guild, world, node etc. Then its okay to be called upon). From what has been released so far about quests and such, it would seem theres gonna be some really local node/city quests, that kinda act as the dailies. Things like "get me 10 logs" or "we are starving, get us 10 fish", fit under those "dailies" but I think it will feel more like you're helping the community than doing actual dailies ;)
So for example dailys shouldn't be bound to something important like node development or bound to a specific area.
That should be an area for weeklies and maybe even monthly tasks if at all introduced. (A city isn't built in a day)
At the biggest scale I believe daily quests should be for personal development only.
"Go out and train yourself against wild animals"
"There is a rumour that some rare plants started to grow around XYZ, see if you can confirm it"
Something along those lines, with xp rewards, a little currency or something.
Daily quest/weekly quests are quest implemented into the MMO genre to reinforce replayability, conversely the way to do this is by rewarding the players with incentives to do their dailies.
In current MMOs such as BnS, FFXIV and WoW dailies serve the function of encouraging daily play. This could be seen as a fair mechanic as one is awarded for daily playtime. One would get more reputation, gold, crafting reagents, currency that serves different functions.
Conversely this reward system can also impose a paradigm of forced play as it did for hardcore raiders in both the new FFXIV expansion and in WoW, where players that did not meet their weekly quota of daily quests/dungeons would miss out of large amounts of character progression.
This then leads us to the divides of personal preferences. Where the beliefs of people will differ, and create a divide in what one sees as a good solution to daily quests and whether they are necessary. As we have discussed the preferential factors of daily quests so far have been of economic value, however our inherent preferences of how we want our gameplay experience to be is made out of a mirage of factors; material, economical, religious morales, moral precepts, ideological disposition, altruistic impulses, and a sense of common destiny with family, clan, tribe, ethnic group or community.
In essence person A might be a die-hard believer in his guild and will play every day to do his dailies to be the best one can be to further the progress of the guild. Whilst the person B is a strongly religious father, that enjoys the game, but has a limited amount of time to play. Henceforth a daily model might be of the design that caters to person A, whilst a weekly model might cater to person B. However, doing both is also possible.
With the dichotomy of the preferences of daily quests to weekly quest underway, one might want to discuss how to deal with these quest. The only daily quests that really made sense to me in the MMO world was not really a daily quest, but a repeatable quest. The Gates of Ahn’qiraj. Here guilds band together in trade hierarchies and farming networks in order to meet a common, goal a large incentive to open the gates.
The goal does however not need to be as grand a scheme as the gates of Ahn’qiraj the essence of this event is to band together around the incentive of unity and community. In essence the model where the quests further a common goal, rather than a singular goal might be more preferable to this style of MMO, as nodes will need to be reinforced and furthered.
In the end; there are pros and cons to dailies, world repeatables and weeklies. They do however cater to different kinds of audiences with different sets of preferences where our person A might have a preference table as such World Repatables, Dailies and, Weeklies>World Repeatables > Dailies > Weeklies. Whilst person B might have preference table of Weeklies > Dailies > World repeatables > World repeatables, Dailies and, weeklies. The biggest issue and divide here is when the reward for partaking in this mechanic becomes so significant that you cannot not play a day, as it will halt personal and collective progression.
Off-topic: Please don't make us kill 200 polar bears so that we get to build a tower, make the quests make sense. Like chop wood in order to get the saw-mill to procude planks for the tower.