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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.
Fast Travel & Mounts
A game mechanic that has ruined not only most open world games but MMORPGs in general is click-map-fast-travel, (ex. Guild Wars 2, Elder Scrolls Online) developers should NEVER give the option to open your map and click a location and suddenly teleport there no matter what the cost of gold or whatever resource it requires, make players run to a boat, carriage, or griffin, or use a taxi mount at the very least (ex. World of Warcraft, Everquest, Final Fantasy XI & XIV) or ask another player for a teleport for instant travel which also helps with player interaction, click-map-fast-travel not only ruins the shrinks the size of the world but prevents people from coming in contact with other players for help or direction in the world like in woodsy trails or vast deserts, it will make the world seem a lot less active and empty with map fast travel. I also feel that every open world game must have mounts but using them should come with some sort of drawback for example you will be required to feed and take care of your mounts health and stats if you want to ride it, if you get attacked while on a mount the mount should throw you off onto your back and run off for a short time for your enemy to get a few good hits on you as well as the mount hotkey having a cool down for several minutes before it can be called again (this is not much of an addition to challenge but, why make games so easy, mounts should be mandatory but it should be a privilege not a right) (I watched a developer documentaries on fast travel and they confirmed there will be very little fast travel except through allied nodes which is understandable and please i beg you to keep it this way very good decision making), one of the prime reasons I'm backing this game is because of the lack of click-map-fast-travel and is a blight to open world games.
What are your thoughts on these mechanics?
What are your thoughts on these mechanics?
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Comments
What I think is so compelling about Ashes of Creation is that gameplay and immersion are not being pitted against one another - but are rather interconnected in a really exciting way.
It seems so far that fast travel will be a liability for anyone interested in protecting the interests of their node throughout the region of influence.
Personally, as much as I enjoy flying in WoW, I'm glad it's not happening in Ashes. I'm also glad we won't have the same sort of instant travel as GW2. I'd much rather explore the environment.
1.The world will look and be more populated as people move around.
2. Going places will be meaningful. No more just hopping around the world. People will be established and invested in their homes.
Why then is it such a big issue with people? IMO, this is like saying "I hate seeing people RP, therefore no one should be allowed to RP, in case and I see it and it makes me sad." Like, come on...grow up? I won't enjoy the game one ounce more just by being forced to walk/ride around to get where I want to go, or even seeing other people around. I can interact with who I want, when I want. Again, why should anyone be forced into doing it?
Don't get me wrong, I love seeing the different environments and beauty that the devs have created. But I also have limited time, and some (most) days I'd rather just be efficient, and that requires getting around quickly.
Ashes is changing that design, such that we don't outlevel zones. And so that we have incentive to frequently return to adventure near the nodes were have citizenship - regardless of our level.
Devil's Advocate: If most people are using fast travel, I'll see less people on the roads and more people just standing in larger cities. Thus making the world feel less alive.
I do get that the people who enjoy immersion...walking to dungeons... finding a group in a city etc
Will probably love this game
Those who love fast travel may find that the whole thing is just too slow and may all leave.....
But given that the team are planning the game from the pov of no fast travel, I'd expect the team to make sure that everything you could possibly need, dungeons, quests, roleplay, crafting, politics and jumping puzzles....everything you need, would be in easy travel distance from the node heart.
Why do you normally need fast travel?
To get somewhere else.
It may be that some of you are overestimating the need to go somewhere else.
Just an idea.
Like @Megs said, they've decided already and I'll be happy either way.
I have played plenty of MMOs that have used fast travel and I'm not opposed to a very limited couple of waypoints (like from one continent to another) but overall I want my exploration and willingness to travel far into the wilderness to mean something.
DAoC had this. "fast" travel was taking established fast horse travel routes but after that you were on your own to get to anything more remote. Needless to say if you run for 20 mins to get somewhere you were serious about exploring. this also meant if you died you would spawn 20 mins away! This was also the case out in realm deep in the enemies territory which made death and rezzing MUCH more meaningful. People in your group all die? Time to look for a Cleric before the death timer runs out!
Another unlikely game that had similar exploration was Wizardry Online. To get to the deepest and best dungeons meant you would have to run a gauntlet for 10-20 mins just to get there. If you screwed up you died and had to start over. Again it made arriving at that remote spot feel like you had accomplished something just doing that.
Cyreph's Guild Wars 2 Adventure
PS: I don't get to where I want to go very often.
This is plainly evident in scenarios, such as caravan missions, and sieges. Caravans would be next to impossible to protect (unless guarded by a sizeable party), due to would-be attackers being able to quickly intercept the caravan once notified of it's departure. This would mightily hinder node to node economics in a bad way.
Also, it would devalue the goods of local markets, as players would be able to take goods that would normally be consigned to a specific area, and quickly transport it to a far off location, thus destabilizing node to node trading.
I'm sure there are other factors that fast travel would negatively impact.
Though I commiserate with your quandary, Intrepid has a specific design they're going for. And, that means that convenient modes of transportation must be severely limited, for the sake of game balance.
We need caravans because the weight that can carry on our persons is woefully limited.
Which is why we need pack animals.
I hope we at least have a hearthstone. And the hearthstone can be on a long timer.
MMORPGs are about community. Part of community is being able to reach soical events in a reasonable time frame.
When the devs are making appearances in the game after livestreams, we should all be able to attend. And, really, the same is true for casual gamers logging in to join social events after several days of being offline.
Easy enough to have a long timer on the hearthstone - even if it's 2 or 4 or 8 hour cooldowns.
Reminder that Ashes does have limited fast travel as the ultimate for the Scientific nodes. We'll have to see what a world is like with multiple fast travel networks due to having multiple Scientific nodes.
Also, we know that Mages have a flight spell.
A liitle bit more than hover and land.
I don't think everyone gets a similar ability.
Rogue's have Climb, but I wouldn't consider that similar.
Mage Flight isn't going to get you home fast. But, it will probably take you higher than a Dawnbreaker.
Personal travel from city to city could also allow for this, prompting guild members to teleport to a specific city and blockade a caravan. I know this will be partially implemented by scientific nodes. I can also see where a hearthstone would not necessarily allow for this.
Another reason I think fast travel is limited falls into the "I made it, it's my game, you have to see it" category. IS has/will spent/spend a lot of time making the land travel friendly full of all sorts of wonders and they want you to see it.
As a GM there is not much more disheartening than spending a year detailing an entire campaign kingdom just to have your players spell casters teleport the party everywhere. This forces your hand into doing all exploration quest before a certain level is reached and then using a variety of methods to deter the group later. At one point in time most GM's I have played with have stated something along the lines of "I wish said teleportation spell was a higher level. Now I can't do cool thing that I wanted to do for my players."
Maybe what he meant was every class will have a method of traversing a different type of difficult terrain.
I am hoping that all the classes not "do the same thing but in a different manner". I played games where in an effort to balance the classes, all the classes ended up being quite homogeneous in abilities. Strength in diversity would be cool.
I'm perfectly aware that fast travel won't be a thing in Ashes. I've watched all the live streams and soaked up as much info as possible. It doesn't really bother me if an MMO chooses not to make fast travel available, especially if there's a reason behind it, which as you and other have pointed out...there is. But would I personally prefer to have it? Yes. And is it a bad mechanic to have in any MMO, as the OP claims? Absolutely not. That's really all I was trying to say.
The caravan PVP is what I'm looking forward to most at the moment, after all.
lets say I can play 10 hours week. 2 days a week I can play 3hours. That leaves me 4 hours remaining split over 5 days. This takes into account my work week. On the days I work, I would be limited in what I could do without some sort of fast travel. If i need to farm something that takes me 15min to get there and 15 min to get back, I will end up spending half my time walking around, and not accomplishing my current Task.
I do understand that GW2 style fast travel is too much, but there must be some sort compromise we can find. If real life forces me to stop playing, not being able to teleport back to my node and log off would be a pain.
lets hope that a compromise can be found