Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
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.
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.
Fight Against "Streamlined" Systems
I want to make sure AOC doesn't cater to lazy ('casual') players. This ultimately ruins a majority of MMOs with otherwise great potential. See video on what made Vanilla WoW so great: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OBK8k_B3Lc
Thoughts?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OBK8k_B3LcThoughts?
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Comments
So yes i also hope normal mobs are not just there to get farmed in hordes by one not even strong player but casual and not so much skilled players should be able to play through the normal content if they use their brain a little. Dungeons, raids and world bosses are another thing to talk about. Of course there should be rly difficult content like this that just can be made with a lot of skill and coordination. And i also hope that i dont play this kind of content and im very proud that i made it and some weeks later they nerf it cause some of the crybabies where to loud.
Challenge needs to be there in what we seek to do in the world of Verra, a sense of wonder and danger really do need to find their way back into MMO's.
I do however think it is beneficial for pvp content when it comes to arenas and instanced battlegrounds.
If you are just referring to general difficulty in content, then I absolutely agree. I've leveled a couple toons in WoW this last month and leveling is just a joke. The only time I died out in the world was when I accidentally pulled 3 mobs, and got aggro from two patrolling mobs too, which ended up with like 15 enemies beating on me, and even that was probably beatable if I wasn't just literally "smashing buttons and drinking coffee"
Im very hopeful that this game will bring back a need to CC, interrupt, and position well in every day questing, and definitely in dungeons/raids. Having to do these things in solo content, makes you better at group content.
With the way Steven has said mobs will be I think we may slightly get away from the standard with the absence of actual level gated areas(this area is for 1-10, next is 11-20 etc etc). Having mobs of varying levels occupy an area will certainly help. Also with how he said primary class will be a more vertical progression and secondary more horizontal, we have an opportunity for a better feeling there as well in the leveling experience.
As as soon as you involve systems where you unlock things as you go in his example (skills, talents, etc) you're still including a leveling system, just getting rid of the character levels and putting it else where.
Idk if we need to totally tear down the leveling system we are all familiar with, we just need to find better ways to implement it. Horizontal AND vertical progression is a nice start. Making the world feel more dynamic with varying mob levels is a nice start. Weapon proficiency progression is a nice start, and most importantly making all content at all points of the game rewarding, and with a semblance of difficulty will help lessen the need to just grind levels and rush to max.
I'm interested to see how Intrepid handles that claim of making this game about the entirety of the game and not just about max level. I hope this isn't another game where I dread making an alt because max level is all that matters and the grind to get there is long and boring.
I think there needs to be a sense of danger, a sense of importance. Dragons Dogma on hard mode did this well.
There is a fine line between punishing decisions and adding importance. I think the difference is games that don't allow skill changes, costing you potentially months of decisions vs doing a quest wrong and costing you minutes. I prefer challenging systems that I come close to failing regularly but games some games you can invest so much into a character and never be able to customize play further, leading to boredom because restarting is so punishing.
Its hard, because you need the game to be fresh and customizable but still rewarding and punishing.
That said... no matter what we are dealing with AI when talking about PvE anything. With enough practice, they will become easy. Going back to my GW2 example, when Silverwaste first came out, it was insane to hold a fort by yourself or with too few people. You'd get knocked down by the dog things, rooted by the tree things, and swarmed by the bee summoning things... all before you could stand up from that first knockdown...
Then people got used to it. They got used to the animations, patterns... learned where to stand and what kinds of skills / weapons fit you best for wrecking face in that area. It was no longer dangerous, it felt easy and became mindless farming.
The real challenge in this game is going to be the events where you face other players. Either the monster coin events where players can be monsters, or just the PvP sieges, etc. That is where your skill is going to matter the most because there's always someone better.
That doen't mean I want the game to be easy. Most MMOs these days are way too easy. I miss games where you had to think to beat your opponent. You had to lose a few times before you learned what worked and what didn't. I even miss having to retrieve my stuff from my corpse\tombstone after getting killed. No matter how good the story is if I can face roll the keyboard and win I'm not interested. I do not want an I win button. Does that mean I want Dark\Demon Souls level of difficulty? No, let's be real. Those games are brutal. Soul crushing even.
Tough mobs and fear of dying lead to excitement when levelling. Suddenly, gaining a level and a new skill point matters, your build matters, and you actually become happy when you find better items.
Also making the game too difficult for 'casual' players will make some people discouraged from playing the game.
I don't see many people having a problem with some casual gameplay I think there should be casual aspects to the game where you can log on for an hour and accomplish something but that should not be the focus of a sub based game.
I can't speak for everyone but I've seen a large group of people looking for difficulty and longevity. If you can accomplish everything you need to do in a single play session and you can easily breeze through it all something is wrong.
A truly successful game will have something for almost everyone; maybe not the Whiners......
On a side note i can already see myself spending a lot of time gambling as long as there are a couple of different types of games you can play.
There has to be some time investment, but this required time investment shouldn't be to harsh. Instead part of the time investment requirement should be replaced with skill requirement.
Formula for game progression should be something along the lines of:
40 x your success (attained by your skill) + 20 x your time investment + 20 x social factor + 20 x easy attainment (anyone can get just by logging in)
Just my 2 cents.
To be frank, an MMO needs the casuals. They pay a sub just like everyone else. It also needs the hardcore crowd. There's a spectrum of game play devs need to cover and it's hard. Most solutions are to just keep kicking the can down the road.
The "good" games figure out a way to reward players based not on just achievement but meaningful game play. Skill vs time played, I chose skill Everytime.
If you mean feature pruning, I would tend to agree; a company should be careful about pruning too many features, unless they're exceptionally vestigial.
If you mean streamlining UI, I would disagree; complexity is not often a good enough excuse to keep something looking/feeling janky.
A balance is necessary, of course, but I think your remark is a touch silly. What matters is that the developers keep their vision in mind and that they routinely check that what they're doing accomplishes that vision.
However, I consider myself a casual now. I used to be the GM of a high end raiding guild and we demanded up to 6 hours a night at least 3 nights a week... that's something I simply can't do anymore and looking back I'm glad I got out of it. I want to play a game to have fun doing it, not to take it on as a second job. Content should be challenging but not to the point where I have to sacrifice my ability to see the sun to do it.
Give me a game where I have to think - bring strategy back to gaming.
I'm a casual but I prefer challenging content and I'm not a fan of the "pay for convenience" or "p2w" as well.
I get your point and I agree but again they don't play 10 hours a day not because they're lazy, it's because one job is enough, I don't need a second one.
Seen a lot of toxicity towards the term "Casual Player" in the MMO scene in the last few years and it's unwarranted and bad. This could turn potential new people away from a game for absolutely no reason.
The term "casual player" has been used in a very specific way by game reviewers and thus has gained some negative connotation, we need to remember it can mean many things.
I like my games to be challenging and I dislike games that are too easy.
There are times I am Hardcore and there are times I am Casual depending on my real life commitments.
People may need to play casually due to school or family. That doesn't mean that they necessarily want the game to be easy or are "lazy"
It's better just to state how you want a game to be than to being toxic to a term that could have a broad meaning.
Could say:
I hope this game provides a challenge and does not cater to people who want and easy game or want to purchase advantages over other players.
Something like that where it doesn't really insult anyone and still gets the idea across.
Even if someone differs from what you want you can still be respectful and discuss it your point in a diplomatic way which builds a community.
I've made some great friends in my gaming life and some of them where we were on the opposite sides of a discussion but we always respected each other. Sometimes with a good argument we have swayed in out opinion.
Good community is all about respect and holding a conversation not dictating, please leave toxic comments at the door.
Let's be mindful of how we talk to each other.
Casuals do not kill the game, hell casuals help keep the population up. What AoC needs to do is plan ahead and I do not mean just a story. The need to sit down and think "what happens at level 130? will we have to cut the classes up with a knife and what effect will that have on the game." "what can we add to the game to with each new xpac that wont break the game" "how can we reward hard work without creating a disparity between the 24/7 no lifer and the 3/5 working stiff and the 6/7 student"
A pretty game with stuff to do can last for years but what will truly be the games death will be those little decisions that add up to the hot mess that wow and other games are today.