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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.
Do not make 90% of the game obsolete
Marzzo
Member, Leader of Men, Kickstarter, Alpha One, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
Typicall MMO developers divide their game world and systems into hidden progression paths. For example:
Zone 1: New players
Zone 2: Mid level players
Zone 3: high level players
Zone 4: 1 out of 3 relevant high level dungeons
Zone 5: Endgame dungeon/raid location
Zone 6: Largest and most effective city
etc...etc...
This is not good. It makes many zones obsolete once you out-level them. It makes zones empty after a while. 90% of the game becomes a ghost town since there is no reason to go there.
To fight this, you developers sprinkle different resources all around the different zones and do the same with dungeons. The problem is, in the end, once our characters no longer need the stuff you sprinkle there, nobody will ever go there or use this zone or location anymore. It becomes obsolete.
To solve this, You must make every zone (or atleast most of the zones) relevant in some way or another. You must give max level players a reason to hang out in all parts of the game. It could be different clans and guilds. Or maybe important core farming locations that are a foundation to the economy.
Do not put every relevant piece of content in 10% of the game or just a few zones (like wow does) Do not offer every convenience in a single city. Give us a reason to travel the world. Give us a reason to keep coming back to low/mid level zones for relevant reasons.
You can also have "Lore events" connected to different zones and parts of the world.
It could be special celebrations, festivals, or historic feasts. Every culture and zone could have these, and in turn offer unique gameplay and rewards, be it valueble stuff or cosmetics.
Summary:
Please, do not make most of the zones non-relevant once you outlevel them. Give us reasons to go back. Gives us reasons to explore the world and find new adventures in old places. You make amazing looking zones, give us a reason to go there too.
Zone 1: New players
Zone 2: Mid level players
Zone 3: high level players
Zone 4: 1 out of 3 relevant high level dungeons
Zone 5: Endgame dungeon/raid location
Zone 6: Largest and most effective city
etc...etc...
This is not good. It makes many zones obsolete once you out-level them. It makes zones empty after a while. 90% of the game becomes a ghost town since there is no reason to go there.
To fight this, you developers sprinkle different resources all around the different zones and do the same with dungeons. The problem is, in the end, once our characters no longer need the stuff you sprinkle there, nobody will ever go there or use this zone or location anymore. It becomes obsolete.
To solve this, You must make every zone (or atleast most of the zones) relevant in some way or another. You must give max level players a reason to hang out in all parts of the game. It could be different clans and guilds. Or maybe important core farming locations that are a foundation to the economy.
Do not put every relevant piece of content in 10% of the game or just a few zones (like wow does) Do not offer every convenience in a single city. Give us a reason to travel the world. Give us a reason to keep coming back to low/mid level zones for relevant reasons.
You can also have "Lore events" connected to different zones and parts of the world.
It could be special celebrations, festivals, or historic feasts. Every culture and zone could have these, and in turn offer unique gameplay and rewards, be it valueble stuff or cosmetics.
Summary:
Please, do not make most of the zones non-relevant once you outlevel them. Give us reasons to go back. Gives us reasons to explore the world and find new adventures in old places. You make amazing looking zones, give us a reason to go there too.
3
Comments
Also the main problem I've seen in other mmorpgs for this "Dungeon finder" and such are not in this game (as far as I know). So players need to travel around the world instead of standing in one single hub zone that is the be all and end all.
I do like the final fantasy 14 roller duty finder where you can do any dungeon you have access to.
But it also destoys any resemblance of community as you can randomly draw players for your dungeon run (even worse across servers) without any need to communicate anymore. It makes things faster but it also makes every run a run with people you will never meet again and as such almost nobody talks and from the few that do the umber of jerks is much higher than normal.
In addition for this thread: it also removes the need to move around the world to visit different dungeons and as such leads to an emptier world.
Dungeon finder in my eyes is the prime example of a "quality of life improvement" that everyone wants even though it makes the game worse.
agreed nothing beets the old sitting around in a tavern talking about a raid
But as others have said, the node system should solve most of the issues presented.
If I am in a scientific node and I want to buy a large number of items, I would probably travel to an economic node.
There is also the notion of caravans making parts of the world important and full of life. Caravans mean that if a desired resource spawns in a specific location, not only will the location that the resource has spawned see more activity, but so to will the area between that location and where ever the best location is for that raw material to be worked in to useful items.
Also, don't get me started on FFXIV's duty finder roulette. That is a poor solution to a problem that shouldn't exist in the first place.
Nagash is 1000% correct, Areas are not tier based, they fluctuate with the node growth.
Mobs will be generally be weaker closer to civilization(roads/towns) while the further you go from there the stronger they will be but there is some variety there based on the node level itself.
You can find the direct quote in this Interview with Steven
As the game levels, the population in general slowly gains levels.
As the nodes in the game level up, the average level of the mobs in the game increase.
This means that as the game progresses, more players will be higher level, and additionally, more content will be a higher level.
There will still be lower level content for new players to level up on, but there will be more high level content.
Every MMO needs a small flow of new people to it to keep the population healthy - this is not something unique to Ashes. This kind of thing is usually a case of game marketing more than anything else. It is where promotions can come in.
Most games make the leveling curve slightly easier as the game ages, meaning newer players will have an easier time leveling up than the first wave of players did.
As long as there’s enough content in general that I don’t run out of things to do in the end game, not only do I not mind areas losing their challenge, I look forward to it. And maybe instead you can return to an area to more safely explore it for achievements in ways that you couldn’t effectively do before. Or you can return to farm crafting resources. You don’t need to have challenging enemies to make a place worth revisiting. Or maybe a quest that has you go to a beginner area and spawn something high level to fight (in an enclosed area so it doesn’t slaughter low level people nearby), that’s another reason to return.
I'm actually a big fan of games that put high level encounters in low level zones - as long as new players are able to clearly see that these encounters are for high level players.
EQ2 used to do this with contested avatar encounters. One of the hardest encounters in the game was in a level 10 area - when the level cap was 80. We'd often have an audience of low level characters - a mix of new players and alts - watching us take it on.
Good times.
I am also cautiously hopeful that the caravan system will always see large parts of the world being used, and I'm sure a lot of people would rather their freehold be near a low level area rather than a higher level one - even if mobs attacking you isn't an issue, it would probably still be preferred (unless those mobs are a source of materials).