My concern - that these questions remind me a whole lot of discussions about Ultima Online during development. I see a lot of effort going into little things with the belief that they're going to make a huge difference.
For those who don't want to watch, it's about 7 mins long and is an ARS Technica interview with Richard Garriott explaining how months of work in creating and balancing an ecology was overrun by players seconds after launch. I'm pretty sure I've a similar one somewhere about how the closed player run economic system failed.
The community. Too many people are worried about things that we have years of testing to explore.
I think a lot of people might be worried about things that they have seen tried and tested for decades and that nobody has really gotten right yet. Very few of the things they want to do in the game are new ideas. The odds of this team magically hitting everything on mark is actually pretty small. The idea that the testing team is going to understand the nuances of the interactions of tens of thousands of individuals is pretty small too.
I think a part of the problem is that there are conflicting goals in some areas. You want to have meaningful PvP, but you don't want people just killing anyone? How do you allow people to kill and prevent them from killing? You want to have a closed economy, but you want everyone to feel like they're not getting cheated on loot? Doesn't every closed economy eventually wind up with haves and have-nots and a lot more have-nots? Does the world actually have room for tens of thousands of player made housing? Or does the wilderness just turn into a maze of house after house after house? Should every craftsman be special and be able to make the rare magic uber gear?
Large scale battles. May lag a lot, promote bullshit tactics, aoe class stacking.
Bullshit mega guilds controlling whole servers, murdering anyone with their 57th alt with 9999999 bounty but nobody cant touch them becuase they controll everything. unnecessary expensive gear, enchants and items because of free economy system and player dependence on crafter. Crafters will be able to overprice exactly everything which will promote gold buying, resulting in useless economy. This can only be solved with hard caps for prices.
Useless class balancing because there are too many combinations. This means either the classes will be almost the same, or some will be ridiculously overpowered. This probably can't be solved in any way since MMO creators usually have 0 knowledge about math. An example of this is designing an Archer to do a maximum of 1000 Damage per second if played perfectly. Then, designing a meele fighter to also deal 1000 Damage per second. This instantly makes the archer more overpowered because the Archer can attack from range. Designing abilities like Charge (fighter) Stun (Fighter) to compensate does not work since this forces rangers to get Vault back (Archer) or Evasion (Archer) and once again you get imbalance. If they decide to "Balance" everything the game will feel extremly stale.
Economy becoming more important than general gameplay. The game forcing you to grind materials for 7 hours a day to afford end game gear.
Not being able to earn currency by doing PVE/PVP (Getting paid for each arena, Battleground or siege etc. Getting paid to kill bosses. This is important because some people do not give a flying fuck about picking flowers in a game.
(Not really fair since they have not focused on it yet) the combat feels very sluggish and unnatural. Movements look like your ice skating. Combat feels extremly repetitive based on alpha. Extremly few abiltiies.
I can live with clunky combat and bugs. Heck, I can deal with lag when huge battles break out. What I cannot stand is crap like the teddy bear mount. But the fact that coming out of the gate we see this makes me pull back from giving them money and instead I am taking a wait and see position. Immersion breaking is game breaking. Just an opinion of course.
I know that no game is ever going to be everything I want it to be. My only concern is that AoC will not live up to its hype. Other games have promised new, innovative, everything-you've-always-wanted, never-been-done-before and failed to come close. AoC is promising a lot. I hope they can deliver.
I think that Ashes should have everything I require when it releases, even if it doesn't completely deliver on all the promises, so the content itself does not concern me. What does concern me, however, is server stability. I've played many different MMORPGs and if I was given a dollar everytime the sever crashed on me, i'd be purchasing the preorder of the highest tier without a second thought. Since the game is crowdfunded, they should have a better idea of how big their playerbase may end up, that should let them prepare the infrastructure accordingly. Ofc, they can never be completely ready and server will crash at some point, I just don't want to see server crashes on a daily basis when it launches.
I'm worried about the scale Steven envisioned. I know that most of them have plenty of expierience in MMO's. And i hope that's enough to blance it out. But there im still worried a bit. The tranparasy of the Team is awesome and i love how Steven is in love with this project. I want to play immedently and help to find bugs even thourgh i have no experience in it. Once again i'm excited over an MMO and wish it to be successfull.
Worrying about Ashes at this point in time is like chewing bubble gum to solve an algebra equation.
Lets just chillax about it and see what comes in a few more months development.
That pretty much nails it.
Right now I'm at the point where I am just coming in from time to time to see whats going on. Only time will tell.
***
My one big concern is Cash Shop and that will hold true for any game I play or don't play. I tend to avoid games with cash shops these days which is not easy cause seems like most games have them most of them are FTP tho. Not crazy about paying a subscription and having a cash shop in game even if it is just Cosmetics. But i'm still gonna wait and see how that unfolds as well if done right might not be so bad but I'm never gonna like the idea of it, just a matter of will I tolerate it or not if I love a game enough and if a company doesn't go overboard with it. Normally I would have been long gone at the mention of Cash Shops but Steve seems pretty genuine so for that and a lot of interesting new Ideas I will wait to see what happens. Make my decision at that time.
***
For those that are worried about what they are seeing in the Early footages need to look up what Pre Alpha and alpha means in aspect to development. It's to soon to judge how a game will be based on those footages.
For those that are worried the game is being released too soon if they stay on tract I would be lying if I said that shouldn't be a concern as games should never be rushed out and in terms of how long games like these take normally this game has a shorter time table than most but they also had a good budget to start in comparison as well as some very skilled people from the business on the team from start as well as well as sole focus on one game. So too many variables to say if it will be bad or not only time will tell on this as well as well as seeing how the game is in late beta stages. But I will agree if things are taking longer than anticipated I would rather have a later deadline than a game released too soon.
I read page 1& 6. I'm concerned.....my attention span isn't what it used to be.;)
Will there be a way to backtrack your skills if a class and 2nd class aren't quite what we expected? Also, government and politics!! I think a lot of us play and don't want have to deal with that topic in game. what next pvp = party vs party.
I have faith in Intrepid, but I've also built up a healthy dose of apathy toward gaming hype in general. I feel people build up games in their mind, hoping the next MMO they find is the "perfect" one that "checks all their boxes" and history had shown me perfection is the enemy of good.
An MMO is more about the community than gameplay for me. I really like this community, so already my greatest worry is quelled a bit. It's why I get so huffy over toxic people
I guess if the game has crap combat I'll be sad, but I've spent hours of fun playing with a stick, so as long as I'm having fun with fun people, I'm set.
Yooo this was so well said and I agree 1000% percent sir!
I want hidden content and unique stuff... hidden content seems like it may be in with the way the nodes work, but im worried about gatekeeping and player population... i want to be able to do things with a handfull of people and not have to rely on massive inclusion of a ton of people to get some things unlocked
I'm just worried content will be to easy, open world pvp will be limited/punished, and how well UE4 is gonna handle hundreds of characters at once.
@Argentdawn They just did a test on a lot of players and NPC looks like the system handled it pretty well especially for Pre-Alpha. As far as UE4 Intrepid does have access to source code and a team capable of custom tweaking UE4 to fit their needs. So you can see this in their live stream posted below.
Ashes of Creation - May 4th, 2018 LIVE STREAM demonstrates them testing raid mechanics:
@Dorje I forgot about this thread. Thanks for grabbing my attention I've been keeping up with the official releases and more recently the content creators as well since the main ashes website hasn't been updated in a long time. UE4 is a strong engine and it looks to be handling most of it well.
I have high hopes for ashes and every time I see an update and Steven or the crew talk Im Impressed.
@Dorje I forgot about this thread. Thanks for grabbing my attention I've been keeping up with the official releases and more recently the content creators as well since the main ashes website hasn't been updated in a long time. UE4 is a strong engine and it looks to be handling most of it well.
I have high hopes for ashes and every time I see an update and Steven or the crew talk Im Impressed.
Sure thing. I think what most people don't realise is that UE4 is a base system that allows for modification so while the base system may not be suited for certain things it can be changed if the people who use it have the talent and resources to the tweaks that are necessary to fit their needs.
Yeah they did a great job testing and showing what can be done with UE4 and explaining things a bit.
Yeah I think as they progress more and show the progress they make more people will start believing in it.
Yeah I been a away for a long time it's gruesome trying to keep daily tabs on a game you want that is far from completion. I plan to pop in on occasion catch up take a little active roll before I take a break in between. Makes it easier and rewarding when you see a few months of progress all at once.
hate to say this but i'm seeing a ton of stuff to buy verses actual backer rewards it is feeling like they are cash grabbing - and with BR getting tested by A1 backers that have been lucky to get in unlike myself only to find out that it will be opened to all seems a little like a punch to the face what i did by backing the project. I'm just seeing a lot of stuff for others and hardly anything for the backers. this is just how i seem like it feels to me not that i am upset with anything just a little worried - maybe I have missed info or something but just letting the steam off i'm still going to play the game and will always be a backer - This is my opinion and my Concern as of right now
hate to say this but i'm seeing a ton of stuff to buy verses actual backer rewards it is feeling like they are cash grabbing - and with BR getting tested by A1 backers that have been lucky to get in unlike myself only to find out that it will be opened to all seems a little like a punch to the face what i did by backing the project. I'm just seeing a lot of stuff for others and hardly anything for the backers. this is just how i seem like it feels to me not that i am upset with anything just a little worried - maybe I have missed info or something but just letting the steam off i'm still going to play the game and will always be a backer - This is my opinion and my Concern as of right now
In all honesty monthly skin sales without actually being able to see the final skin and actual in game image this early in the game yeah, it feels like a crash grab to me as well.
Still hope everything pans out but yeah I'm not as confident about everything like I was when I first started following. Time will tell one way or another.
hate to say this but i'm seeing a ton of stuff to buy verses actual backer rewards it is feeling like they are cash grabbing - and with BR getting tested by A1 backers that have been lucky to get in unlike myself only to find out that it will be opened to all seems a little like a punch to the face what i did by backing the project. I'm just seeing a lot of stuff for others and hardly anything for the backers. this is just how i seem like it feels to me not that i am upset with anything just a little worried - maybe I have missed info or something but just letting the steam off i'm still going to play the game and will always be a backer - This is my opinion and my Concern as of right now
If 500,000 people buy a $15 item per month in preproduction thats upto... $7,500,000/month with nothing to actually play or a place to use your purchases.
Steven could get his $30,000,000 back in 4 months. So with 24 months of cosmetics available before release, the game would be bought and paid for many times over.
I'm worried they will make a beautiful but empty and boring world like ESO. I'm worried they won't add past cosmetics into the cash shop or into the game as rare drops. I'm worried that they will focus mainly on PvP and every quest will be kill this and collect that. Among other worries.
hate to say this but i'm seeing a ton of stuff to buy verses actual backer rewards it is feeling like they are cash grabbing - and with BR getting tested by A1 backers that have been lucky to get in unlike myself only to find out that it will be opened to all seems a little like a punch to the face what i did by backing the project. I'm just seeing a lot of stuff for others and hardly anything for the backers. this is just how i seem like it feels to me not that i am upset with anything just a little worried - maybe I have missed info or something but just letting the steam off i'm still going to play the game and will always be a backer - This is my opinion and my Concern as of right now
If 500,000 people buy a $15 item per month in preproduction thats upto... $7,500,000/month with nothing to actually play or a place to use your purchases.
Steven could get his $30,000,000 back in 4 months. So with 24 months of cosmetics available before release, the game would be bought and paid for many times over.
that's the point seems like a cash grab with all these items but nothing to see
hate to say this but i'm seeing a ton of stuff to buy verses actual backer rewards it is feeling like they are cash grabbing - and with BR getting tested by A1 backers that have been lucky to get in unlike myself only to find out that it will be opened to all seems a little like a punch to the face what i did by backing the project. I'm just seeing a lot of stuff for others and hardly anything for the backers. this is just how i seem like it feels to me not that i am upset with anything just a little worried - maybe I have missed info or something but just letting the steam off i'm still going to play the game and will always be a backer - This is my opinion and my Concern as of right now
If 500,000 people buy a $15 item per month in preproduction thats upto... $7,500,000/month with nothing to actually play or a place to use your purchases.
Steven could get his $30,000,000 back in 4 months. So with 24 months of cosmetics available before release, the game would be bought and paid for many times over.
I'm worried their crafting system won't be fun and unique and that it'll be just like every other click and craft mmo. I hope IS can deliver on their promise to make the crafting system a main pillar of the game and not get lost in the pvp hype.
hate to say this but i'm seeing a ton of stuff to buy verses actual backer rewards it is feeling like they are cash grabbing - and with BR getting tested by A1 backers that have been lucky to get in unlike myself only to find out that it will be opened to all seems a little like a punch to the face what i did by backing the project. I'm just seeing a lot of stuff for others and hardly anything for the backers. this is just how i seem like it feels to me not that i am upset with anything just a little worried - maybe I have missed info or something but just letting the steam off i'm still going to play the game and will always be a backer - This is my opinion and my Concern as of right now
If 500,000 people buy a $15 item per month in preproduction thats upto... $7,500,000/month with nothing to actually play or a place to use your purchases.
Steven could get his $30,000,000 back in 4 months. So with 24 months of cosmetics available before release, the game would be bought and paid for many times over.
dont you think that qualifies as a cash grab
It's up to each individual to either pay for something in the store or not. If there are people who don't care how they spend their money then neither should you. If the items being offered help pay for this game to be developed then I, along with many others are all for it. Personally I am happy with my backers rewards for the tier I purchased. I purchased the backer pkg. knowing full well it was for a game IN development. That was my choice.
My biggest worry is that there will be silly cosmetics that shatter the atmosphere of the game. There’s already a teddy bear mount. This game isn’t an Asian MMO but I worry if it might turn into one.
Comments
What I fear is this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFNxJVTJleE
For those who don't want to watch, it's about 7 mins long and is an ARS Technica interview with Richard Garriott explaining how months of work in creating and balancing an ecology was overrun by players seconds after launch. I'm pretty sure I've a similar one somewhere about how the closed player run economic system failed.
Some people just want to watch the world burn ...or smash face ....same thing
I think a part of the problem is that there are conflicting goals in some areas. You want to have meaningful PvP, but you don't want people just killing anyone? How do you allow people to kill and prevent them from killing? You want to have a closed economy, but you want everyone to feel like they're not getting cheated on loot? Doesn't every closed economy eventually wind up with haves and have-nots and a lot more have-nots? Does the world actually have room for tens of thousands of player made housing? Or does the wilderness just turn into a maze of house after house after house? Should every craftsman be special and be able to make the rare magic uber gear?
Conflicting goals.
Bullshit mega guilds controlling whole servers, murdering anyone with their 57th alt with 9999999 bounty but nobody cant touch them becuase they controll everything.
unnecessary expensive gear, enchants and items because of free economy system and player dependence on crafter. Crafters will be able to overprice exactly everything which will promote gold buying, resulting in useless economy. This can only be solved with hard caps for prices.
Useless class balancing because there are too many combinations. This means either the classes will be almost the same, or some will be ridiculously overpowered. This probably can't be solved in any way since MMO creators usually have 0 knowledge about math. An example of this is designing an Archer to do a maximum of 1000 Damage per second if played perfectly. Then, designing a meele fighter to also deal 1000 Damage per second. This instantly makes the archer more overpowered because the Archer can attack from range. Designing abilities like Charge (fighter) Stun (Fighter) to compensate does not work since this forces rangers to get Vault back (Archer) or Evasion (Archer) and once again you get imbalance. If they decide to "Balance" everything the game will feel extremly stale.
Economy becoming more important than general gameplay. The game forcing you to grind materials for 7 hours a day to afford end game gear.
Not being able to earn currency by doing PVE/PVP (Getting paid for each arena, Battleground or siege etc. Getting paid to kill bosses. This is important because some people do not give a flying fuck about picking flowers in a game.
(Not really fair since they have not focused on it yet) the combat feels very sluggish and unnatural. Movements look like your ice skating. Combat feels extremly repetitive based on alpha. Extremly few abiltiies.
Right now I'm at the point where I am just coming in from time to time to see whats going on. Only time will tell.
***
My one big concern is Cash Shop and that will hold true for any game I play or don't play. I tend to avoid games with cash shops these days which is not easy cause seems like most games have them most of them are FTP tho. Not crazy about paying a subscription and having a cash shop in game even if it is just Cosmetics. But i'm still gonna wait and see how that unfolds as well if done right might not be so bad but I'm never gonna like the idea of it, just a matter of will I tolerate it or not if I love a game enough and if a company doesn't go overboard with it. Normally I would have been long gone at the mention of Cash Shops but Steve seems pretty genuine so for that and a lot of interesting new Ideas I will wait to see what happens. Make my decision at that time.
***
For those that are worried about what they are seeing in the Early footages need to look up what Pre Alpha and alpha means in aspect to development. It's to soon to judge how a game will be based on those footages.
For those that are worried the game is being released too soon if they stay on tract I would be lying if I said that shouldn't be a concern as games should never be rushed out and in terms of how long games like these take normally this game has a shorter time table than most but they also had a good budget to start in comparison as well as some very skilled people from the business on the team from start as well as well as sole focus on one game. So too many variables to say if it will be bad or not only time will tell on this as well as well as seeing how the game is in late beta stages. But I will agree if things are taking longer than anticipated I would rather have a later deadline than a game released too soon.
Will there be a way to backtrack your skills if a class and 2nd class aren't quite what we expected?
Also, government and politics!! I think a lot of us play and don't want have to deal with that topic in game. what next pvp = party vs party.
Ashes of Creation - May 4th, 2018 LIVE STREAM demonstrates them testing raid mechanics:
I have high hopes for ashes and every time I see an update and Steven or the crew talk Im Impressed.
Yeah they did a great job testing and showing what can be done with UE4 and explaining things a bit.
Yeah I think as they progress more and show the progress they make more people will start believing in it.
Yeah I been a away for a long time it's gruesome trying to keep daily tabs on a game you want that is far from completion. I plan to pop in on occasion catch up take a little active roll before I take a break in between. Makes it easier and rewarding when you see a few months of progress all at once.
Cheers.
Still hope everything pans out but yeah I'm not as confident about everything like I was when I first started following. Time will tell one way or another.
I'm worried they won't add past cosmetics into the cash shop or into the game as rare drops.
I'm worried that they will focus mainly on PvP and every quest will be kill this and collect that.
Among other worries.