Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
oh you are also watching fractured ^^
Yeah that one too. I am actually following several MMORPG projects which are still under early development. I guess that is quite common habbit nowadays and many people are just waiting for the next big thing. It would be nice to get hands at least in beta tests so there would be something reasonable to play with, now I am just playing WoW Classic as a filler, because there is nothing more interesting out there. This is quite sad actually.
In 2017 when I found Ashes, I was so hyped and excited. I really liked the ongoing athmosphere of IS, but this year has killed the hype and faded the most of the excitment. I have seen this same problem happening with other games too, they do not manage to keep up the hype after a good start, I guess there has been some problems with marketing strategy and with too optimistic development plans.
0dbea148-8cb8-4711-ba90-eb0864e93b5f
Sorry to ruin your day, but there will be a DPS/Combat meter one way or another. Either someone from the community will make one or IS will do it. I would prefer IS do that honestly though, because they could just make a personal DPS/Combat meter so it is only for self-improvement.
To be honest, I have ambivalent feeling about this. With an alt I definitely agree with you. But regarding the first character I find it OK to not open, if something has to happen in the questline what cause to open that content. For example the cliché: you help a crazy dwarf to make a big explosion in a mine what cause a mine collapse what open an ancient cave with an evil boss. Without your help, this explosion not happen so it is logical that you should not see that content. If the restriction is like: I see an open cave, but I can't enter it, just because I did not do something earlier, I would hate it as well.
So I would create an option that an alt can skip storyline, but the first character can have some logical restriction.
I would say, that you have to do story quests with one character once, and all other characters can skip the storyline. But hereis another thing: story quests will be dependend on the node level and other outside factors
But if there isn't a reason to do the story quests, why even have them?
I mean, I agree that there shouldn't just be a single questline that takes you from level 1 to max level like a lot of full on themepark MMO's do, but having multuple long questlines with an interweaving story (more what I'd expect fron Ashes a year or so after launch) needs to have sctual rewards behind it.
I wouldn't mind fast travel, but it make so it's exactly that: FAST TRAVEL. Fats travel in most MMO's is just an instant teleport. If AoC is going to have a massive map, we should at least have a some kind of transport at the largest cities. If anyone remember the Elder Scrolls III, Morrowind, you'll remember the boats, silt striders, and Mages' Guild teleporters. Making large cities more spread out and less common, that would give players just one more to travel to those large cities, as they are SUPPOSED to be anchors for commerce and travel. Fats travel isn't game-breaking at all if it's implemented well.
Hm, interesting idea. Another possiblity could be world bosses never showing up for you unless you have completed certain storyline objectives. I mean, if the main story has you accidentally blow open some ancient cave with a god boss inside, why would you be able to access that cave without ever opening it yourself? Even after beating any of these storyline bosses the first time, seeing them in the open world again would be normal just like any other world boss. It would also give a sense of curiosity when a bunch of people talk about how hard a world boss is, yet you are completely clueless to it, it can intrigue you to find out for yourself as long as you don't search the internet for spoilers.
There will be some kind of "fast travel". Notably though mostly for the scientific nodes: they have an instant teleport between the metropolis and their subservient nodes in their ZoI, as well as airship travel between two or more scientific nodes.
Auto-leveling PvE creatures. A sewer rat is a sewer rat, they may be a challenge for someone who doesn't know what end of the weapon to hold, but for a seasoned veteran the exact same sewer rat should not be much of a challenge. If an inexperienced adventurer wanders in to an area where there are some powerful monsters, they should use their common sense and make a hasty retreat until they become more confident in their abilities - the monsters should not suddenly become "de-leveled" to match the adventurers experience level.
Also, many quests will no longer be available for alts once they are first completed.
Ashes is a themebox, rather than a themepark.
Amen. This applies to less intelligent mobs as well: a field of rhino-like beasts all placidly grazing as I take them down one by one, all oblivious to the plight of their herd. Really kills immersion.
I don't expect the mobs to be as dynamic and unpredictable as in Diablo 3, but I hope to see some progress here. It seems the MMO genre has been largely stagnant in this regard.
Tying rewards to the amount of mobs kills and objectives completed would take care of that issue handily.
Of course, not having dungeon dailies/weeklies would also remove the incentive for such play anyway. If Intrepid Studios makes every part of a dungeon rewarding in some way, then dungeons should attract groups of people intent on completing the dungeons, rather than groups of people intent on getting it out of the way ASAP in order to turn in their daily.
Ashes seems to be doing something similar and i believe they have used the sandpark/themebox term before, I just think it's wrong to try to say ashes should have a story because AA has a story and it's a sandbox.
What I’m responding to is the notion of “doing the main storyline to unlock something” in a game where the primary focuses are Node progression, Religious progression, Social Org progression, Caravan runs and Sieges.
I’m not aware of ArcheAge having those features.
I've asked that question few months ago and this was Steven's answer:
@Dygz "in a game where the primary focuses are Node progression, Religious progression, Social Org progression, Caravan runs and Sieges."
First the progression can mean lot of things. Reputation farm like wow is also a kind of progression. Nobody said that the religious and social org progression is a primary focus. Node progression is OK, it is really a main focus, but you do not have to be citizen in any node. If they think about it as a enjoyable possibility they must provide something to them as well.
I do not see why these functions should exclude the main story possibility even the unlocking part of it. Just a fast thoughts: We start to repopulate the new world. But the main enemy is the corruption. Corruption can be lead by an entity. This entity can have leaders, solders. The quests can be elastic so the first lvl4 node trigger a main story-line continuity. For example somewhere a corruption lieutenant appeared, but only the most devoted warriors can resists him. So you have to do a quest to prove your devotion. Unless that, the NPCs do not let you in a place where this lieutenant can be find.
Other thing is that there will be instanced content. The main focus is the open world, but there will be instanced content as well. For instanced content you can do any personal restriction for any reason.
Hopefully they do not do these, but the node progression as main focus does not exclude the possibility.
This isn't the first time you've seen a game system and made an assumption to an unrelated system based on that first system.
I mean, just because Ashes has nodes, religion and social entities, doesn't mean it won't have major quest lines.
In fact, I'd happily wager that religions and social organisations will have their own major quest lines associated with them - and if the Intrepid team are even remotely good at story telling, there will be connecting threads between all of those stories.
Yes, that is true. However, not all the point. The question isn't the number of quest lines, it is how reliant players will be on them in order to progress. i.e how much of progress/content will be locked behind quests which will be my next Q&A question
Oh for sure. Somehow the discussion of you nit wanting content locked behind quests got turned in to someone thinking there wouldn't be any quest lines in Ashes - not a sentiment I can personally leave on the table without commenting.
I personally hope there is some content locked behind quests, but I wouldn't want to see too much of it.
If there is a large overland area or a whole dungeon that is behind an access quest, I would consider that to be really bad. On the other hand, a room in that dungeon or a small corner of an overland area could require an access quest if it made sense.
I haven’t made any assumptions.
I have spoken directly with the game devs several times.
In this case, I am questioning the player suggestion that Ashes is likely to have a main storyline that takes precedence of the numerous other forms of progression in the Ashes game design.
I expect all forms of progression will have stories that are tied together in some manner - and they will all create some larger narrative.
That is not the same thing as everyone being required to complete the quests in a main story line the likes of saving Mt. Hyjal from being complete razed by fire or completing Wrath Of The Lich King.
No one has stated that Ashes won’t have any quest lines. That notion is just another example of your poor reading comprehension. And another example of your penchant for straw man arguments.
When I played vanilla EQ, I mostly ignored quests. I found those quests to be too tedious and preferred to grind.
In the early days of EQ2 someone mentioned gathering up the quests in the local area and I realized that those quests gave me considerably more xp and more rewards for stuff I was already doing, like gathering resources and killing mobs. Plus, stories were attached that provided details about what was happening in the area and I could learn about the interests and concerns of individual NPCs - which helps with emersion.
What is your hope of what players will be doing and (might want to be doing) to progress that doesn’t rely on quests??
How do you hope we will progress without quests?
We do not have to be a citizen of a Node I order to participate in the progression of a Node. Everything we do in the vicinity of a Node adds to Node progression, regardless of whether we have picked up a quest associated with our activities. It’s just highly likely that we will get more xp and more rewards when we also have a quest for those activities. I don’t understand why that is a concern.
Instances are supposed to be rare.
They will likely open for major events, but that is not necessarily the same thing as a main storyline.
Corruption is a force that Ashes characters will have to combat, but it is a fundamental game mechanic that cannot be defeated as part of a main storyline.
I’m not sure what is meant by proving devotion to defeat a “Corruption Lieutenant”.
We do know that players will have to defeat the current masters of the Castles before we can take control of them. Steven and Jeffrey expect it will be very challenging to defeat those masters. I expect, from what they have said, that completing specific quests will be required to defeat them.
I don’t know that defeating those masters should be considered main storyline since we don’t have to defeat them if we don’t want to, AFAIK.
A clearer question for the devs to scope that out might be asking what how server progression would be affected if we left the NPC masters in control of the Castles.
Seems like Ashes has many story modules that come on line as we progress Nodes in various ways and as we move through the various other forms of progression.
Different servers could have very different “main storylines” in terms of overall narrative.
Some things will be locked behind quests for sure. We know some things will be locked behind which specific structures get built.
Seems likely that some things will be locked behind events regardless of whether they are completed as part of a quest - like depleting an area of a specific resource or specific mob population.
@Dygz I find most quests in MMORPGs tedious as well; they make it feel too 'artificial'. I like the idea of there being quests that reward me for what i plan to do in the first place and yes it is always good to know more about the place and its past etc as long as the story is told in a good way (people say FFXIV is great and all with story telling but i find it too brain dead and dunno how to feel when people say such things
As for my ideal progression in an MMO - I'd like to have a pure sandbox with quests that relate to lore and imo they should always remain optional for progression. i.e make everything a player does that ultimately help a node develop (which should be the main goal of all players) rewarding including PvP - it should be a good way to boost XP. This might be too far fetched for Ashes as they want to have quests for everything. You want a license - quest, want to remove your corruption - quest, want to obtain augments - quests, want to launch a mayoral caravan - quests.