A Plea To The Game Devs

ArchivedUser

This is a tricky thing. If the places you need to be are too far apart, things get a little silly having to horse it back and forth. I experienced this in BDO, when I'm all the way at pirates and Dim Tree spawns. It feels kind of like arbitrary tedium at times. I'm all for incentivizing normal travel and putting restrictions on fast travel, but I think it'd be foolish to put a blanket "no" on it.

The hard part comes when you want to balance it. I'd want them to follow their own logic like they did with PvP, incentivize the behavior they want players to have. They want conflict between players, so staying yellow is more rewarding. They don't want random murderers, so staying red is risky. If there were limited teleports (say a Hearthstone), you could easily give it a long cooldown and prohibit carrying of things marked as "Caravan Only". You could even slap a debuff on players for a while and call it summoning sickness so people only use it when they really need to.

Either way, there's lots of good reasons to not outright exclude functionality.

ArchivedUser

Yep. I really don't think anything will get excluded, it will be a compromise in the hope of keeping as many players happy as possible. I just hope that I will not be able to press 'm' and then port to anywhere I want. Please no.

ArchivedUser

lmao
I wouldn't be following the game if I thought Ashes is trying to be like other MMORGPs.

Hearthstone isn't a crutch.
Hearthstones won't prevent tattered inns along the roadside from feeling like sanctuaries. Medieval Earth also didn't have high fantasy magic.
So, I'll argue that you're the one who thinks that Ashes is like other MMORPGs.
Your entire premise is absurd.

Especially since we already know that Ashes will have fast travel.

ArchivedUser

Leipuri said:

How about summoning? if it requires like 4 people to perform this summon?

/e: Like if summoner could summon another player to his location but this requires help of few other players and this had cooldown of 60min?

   We can't let this  happen in  pvp and a siege world even with a 60 min. timer.   It could make or break the siege or action that is happening.  For example someone being ported in with extra firepower or healing or powerful potions or epic armor and high level to over balance the odds.  It offers unfair advantages.

ArchivedUser

lexmax said:
No fast travel to me means that every faintly heard footstep or twig break would carry some fear. Tattered inns along the roadside encountered in the dead of night would feel like hallowed sanctuaries. Zapping to and from a remote capital city with no peril and no effort is about as exciting to me as playing a FPS game in godmode.

OMG, I want twig snapping to be a feature in the game.  Wouldn't it be a great rogue skill to use "sneak" to avoid such sounds?

Me, a Dwarf tromping around in heavy plate armor, you'll here me clanking a mile away.  

But I love the idea of environmental soundscapes playing into the strategy. 

ArchivedUser

Dygz said:

lmao
I wouldn't be following the game if I thought Ashes is trying to be like other MMORGPs.

Hearthstone isn't a crutch.
Hearthstones won't prevent tattered inns along the roadside from feeling like sanctuaries. Medieval Earth also didn't have high fantasy magic.
So, I'll argue that you're the one who thinks that Ashes is like other MMORPGs.
Your entire premise is absurd.

Especially since we already know that Ashes will have fast travel.

I think you are back on the troll juice there @Dygz.

The Devs have stated that fast travel will be very limited.

Scientific Metropolis will offer fast travel to Nodes within its zone of influence, this is big because there is very little fast travel in the game.

You are welcome to take this to mean you'll be given a hearthstone or magic carpet or whatever you want it to mean.

ArchivedUser

Whether or not I would like to see some type of teleport would depend on how long it takes to get somewhere. There is a world of difference between 10 to 20 minutes to get somewhere and having to make an ingame 4 hour epic journey. I want to have to travel but not so much that it is all I'm doing. I would like to see world specific teleport spots. Something like weak points in the universe. These points would be limited to beginning and ending at specific points not necessarily located in a city. 

ArchivedUser

OOOH boy do i here you Krojak , and i stand on your side just travel  and enjoy the game porting around kills the game experience and takes away the value.... of the game 

ArchivedUser

lexmax said:

Dygz said:

lmao
I wouldn't be following the game if I thought Ashes is trying to be like other MMORGPs.

Hearthstone isn't a crutch.
Hearthstones won't prevent tattered inns along the roadside from feeling like sanctuaries. Medieval Earth also didn't have high fantasy magic.
So, I'll argue that you're the one who thinks that Ashes is like other MMORPGs.
Your entire premise is absurd.

Especially since we already know that Ashes will have fast travel.

I think you are back on the troll juice there @Dygz.

The Devs have stated that fast travel will be very limited.

Scientific Metropolis will offer fast travel to Nodes within its zone of influence, this is big because there is very little fast travel in the game.

You are welcome to take this to mean you'll be given a hearthstone or magic carpet or whatever you want it to mean.

I will take it to mean that we know the game will certainly have fast travel, rather than no fast travel - as you claimed.

And, yes, I take limited fast travel to include some form of hearth stone.

ArchivedUser

I spoke of fast travel in the context of global fast travel from anywhere in the game, which is how hearthstone's work in other MMOs. From what has been officially defined so far, it appears that fast travel will be limited to scientific nodes within a single metropolis' zone of influence; so if there are going to be hearthstones, then it would be reasonable to conclude that these will also be so limited. 

ArchivedUser

Krojak said:

tugowar said:

You should be able to summon mates to you in the world.  Some convenience trumps absolute, total immersion.  There's no point in being totally archaic in transportation style. 

This isn't a matter of some perception of archaism, but a true desire to improve upon the mistakes of the MMOs that came before. I can see a world where the mage class can do this, much like how Mages were paid by players to provide portals to the major cities in WoW. This has a feeling of community to it. However, to simply tele a friend to you through a built in UI option with no cost ruins the game.

Perhaps a portal altar after the node reaches a certain threshold? I think that would be a fair compromise. 
IE: Node A reaches level 3 after 4 months, an altar is constructed through government approval, Node B and C are also level 3 around the same time, however the government in node B refuses the proposition of the portal altar, whereas Node C has one. After synchronizing the altars at Node A and C, the player can then take a portal from A to C and vice versa but there is no way to port in to B since the altar doesnt exist and is probably owned by a PK guild. 
This way you can still coordinate a large number of people in a timely manner, but not quite at the blink of an eye. We still dont quite know how large the map will be. Having no means to travel a far distance in a short amount of time may be a big problem if it takes 35 minutes to get back to your home node that's being burnt to a crisp by a 2 headed dragon, or overrun by a multi guild powerhouse siege. 

ArchivedUser

Goonsquad said:
Having no means to travel a far distance in a short amount of time may be a big problem if it takes 35 minutes to get back to your home node that's being burnt to a crisp by a 2 headed dragon, or overrun by a multi guild powerhouse siege. 

That's why Steven spoke of travel in AoC being "meaningful". When you decide to travel you have to be prepared for the trip. Maybe ensuring someone nearby (PC or NPC) is going to keep an eye on your freehold for you while you are gone?

The pillar of design that I like the most is that every action in the game has consequences. I can't speak for anyone else, but having risk associated with the decisions I make will make AoC exciting and immersive to me.

ArchivedUser

No

ArchivedUser

Lets remember what distance is, what different communities are like. 
Let's build somewhere no one finds unless they have a reason to go there!

ArchivedUser

Megs said:

Lets remember what distance is, what different communities are like. 
Let's build somewhere no one finds unless they have a reason to go there!

Will we also remember what it's like to miss a boat /shuttle just as it pulls away from the docks knowing that it'll be another 10 or so minutes before it arrives. 

Stand around, dance, interact with strangers... 

ArchivedUser

Summoners should be able to summon their party member imo, similar to warlocks in another game

ArchivedUser

Well most of the team are old EverQuest players, and in that world we had to run from A to B. Dodge guards if they hated our race or just big mobs.  I realy hope they don't bring and form of fast travel in the game, to force all to get out in the world and explore.

ArchivedUser

Windwaker said:

Summoners should be able to summon their party member imo, similar to warlocks in another game

I wouldn't hate this. This would give this class a unique purpose outside of combat.

ArchivedUser

The pillar of design that I like the most is that every action in the game has consequences. I can't speak for anyone else, but having risk associated with the decisions I make will make AoC exciting and immersive to me.

I most heartedly agree with you on this!