now it sounds like you're just complaining about the summon system just because you personally wouldn't use it.
If it makes it in to the game, I'll abuse the absolute shit out of it, make no mistake.
A game and its systems should all be simple to follow, and should be intuitive. Placing arbitrary restrictions on some activities after using a summons is not intuitive - even if those restrictions are for a good reason.
If there is a restriction after using the summons, that restriction should be for all forms of combat, not for selected, arbitrary aspects of combat.
The thing is, even with that arbitrary restriction, you aren't actually stopping the issue at hand.
If you are sporting from one side of the world to the other to kill a top end encou ter, you are saving yourself and your raid an hour or more of travel time. 5 minutes wait before you can engage is still a massive time saving.
Same with caravans. It isn't an issue to summon your friends and then follow that caravan for a few minutes before attacking.
The suggestion is stupid and arbitrary from a game design perspective (not from a suggestion perspective), and is completely ineffective at doing what it would need to do.
Alright this discussion seems to be just going in a circular motion because either you can't seem to keep straight exactly what your issues are or I'm really not understanding, so I'll try to summarize so maybe we can stop and leave room for some other voices to contribute:
Your opinion: You're not attacking the summon system on premise alone, you are attacking the potential for abuse. You don't believe these abuses can be prevented and any attempt at preventing them is "arbitrary and stupid". Also, even if the abuses could be prevented it's not really fair to implement the system because somehow it only benefits casual players, not hardcore players, and hardcore players deserve love too. So ultimately you dislike the summon system for both it's premise/original intention and for the potential for abuse.
My opinion:
1.) The premise/original intention of the system (to add a little more convenience to a small group of friends/family to group up and play the game) is a great feature that I would love to have access to, but only provided that it can be limited in a way that does not result in abuses in other parts.
2..) The teleport system could be limited in a way to prevent pretty much any abuse you can think of, the question is not really can it be prevented, but will you still have a usable system with the proper limitations put in place.
3.) games are full of arbitrary limitations, it is a core part of balancing all sorts of systems from combat to crafting to travel. Not really sure why any attempt to balance this particular system is suddenly "stupid".
Is that an accurate assessment of your opinion so we can just leave it here for intrepid to take note of or is there something else you would like to add?
Also, even if the abuses could be prevented it's not really fair to implement the system because somehow it only benefits casual players, not hardcore players, and hardcore players deserve love too.
This is neither something I have said, nor implied. If anything, I have said it is unfair on casual players.
Lets assume that your suggestion of preventing players from the kinds of activities that would be abused actually goes ahead. The next question is - how long does that prevention need to last in order to stop the abuse of the summons.
The answer to that is no less than 30 minutes.
If it is going to save me and my guild an hour of travel time to go from one world boss to the next, anything less than this will obviously not be an issue. With caravans,it is very likely that they will move somewhat slower than characters on foot, and so 30 minutes is probably about how long a medium length caravan run would take.
So even then, 30 minutes isn't likely to stop people using this system in order to facilitate the two most obvious (though by absolutely no means *only*) abuses of this system. All it will do is add in a small delay - in both cases, the abusers are still able to perform the task they want earlier (in the case of world bosses) or perform the task at all (in the case of caravans).
So, a 30 minute prevention on these activities is ineffective - and that is far longer than Intrepid would ever consider implementing.
Lets look at what a 30 minute block on these activities does to a casual player.
Lets say your friends are in a dungeon, and want to summon you to them. You get summoned, fight for a bit and then come across a boss. You have the remainder of that 30 minute timer before you are able to take it on - giving other groups in the area plenty of time to come around and take the kill from you.
Maybe your group gets annoyed with that and so leaves the dungeon. While running to the next thing you all decide to do, you come across an undefended caravan. Since casual players can PvP too, you consider attacking it - but once again, you can't.
Then we have to look at all of the other activities that players would abuse the summons to facilitate. Assuming you want to put a prevention on all of them, that list would include no killing bosses, no PvP at all, no harvesting, no using the marketplace, no quest advancement, no joining groups that someone has just been booted out of, and likely a few other things related specifically to unique mechanics in Ashes.
That is a big chunk of the game you are saying people shouldn't be able to do, and 30 minutes is a big chunk of time to a casual player (and still not long enough to prevent abuse). That is not a good system, and is considerably worse than just telling casual players that if they want to play together, they should organize themselves because they are better off doing that and would probably end up doing that anyway, due to frustration with the limitations that would be necessary on the summons - if a block on all abused activities were put on it as you are suggesting.
Also, even if the abuses could be prevented it's not really fair to implement the system because somehow it only benefits casual players, not hardcore players, and hardcore players deserve love too.
This is neither something I have said, nor implied. If anything, I have said it is unfair on casual players.
Ya I'm sorry I must've really misunderstood when you said:
What the family teleport system is saying is that casual players simply don't need to be organized. They are excused from that.
Since being organized is not a factor of casual/not-casual, that is obviously a bullshit position to take. If the game is going to ask a level of organization from one group of players in order to be successful, it should ask for that same level of organization from all groups of players in order to be successful.
Thank you for clarifying, because this whole time I thought you were arguing against family teleport because it would benefit casual players more, among the other abuse reasons listed. Anyway, with regards to:
Lets assume that your suggestion of preventing players from the kinds of activities that would be abused actually goes ahead. The next question is - how long does that prevention need to last in order to stop the abuse of the summons.
The answer to that is no less than 30 minutes.
If it is going to save me and my guild an hour of travel time to go from one world boss to the next, anything less than this will obviously not be an issue. With caravans,it is very likely that they will move somewhat slower than characters on foot, and so 30 minutes is probably about how long a medium length caravan run would take.
So even then, 30 minutes isn't likely to stop people using this system in order to facilitate the two most obvious (though by absolutely no means *only*) abuses of this system. All it will do is add in a small delay - in both cases, the abusers are still able to perform the task they want earlier (in the case of world bosses) or perform the task at all (in the case of caravans).
So, a 30 minute prevention on these activities is ineffective - and that is far longer than Intrepid would ever consider implementing.
Lets look at what a 30 minute block on these activities does to a casual player.
Lets say your friends are in a dungeon, and want to summon you to them. You get summoned, fight for a bit and then come across a boss. You have the remainder of that 30 minute timer before you are able to take it on - giving other groups in the area plenty of time to come around and take the kill from you.
Maybe your group gets annoyed with that and so leaves the dungeon. While running to the next thing you all decide to do, you come across an undefended caravan. Since casual players can PvP too, you consider attacking it - but once again, you can't.
Then we have to look at all of the other activities that players would abuse the summons to facilitate. Assuming you want to put a prevention on all of them, that list would include no killing bosses, no PvP at all, no harvesting, no using the marketplace, no quest advancement, no joining groups that someone has just been booted out of, and likely a few other things related specifically to unique mechanics in Ashes.
That is a big chunk of the game you are saying people shouldn't be able to do, and 30 minutes is a big chunk of time to a casual player (and still not long enough to prevent abuse). That is not a good system, and is considerably worse than just telling casual players that if they want to play together, they should organize themselves because they are better off doing that and would probably end up doing that anyway, due to frustration with the limitations that would be necessary on the summons - if a block on all abused activities were put on it as you are suggesting.
I don't really understand why it's so hard to grasp that if you don't like the limitations, then don't use the system. No one is trying to force you to use it, and everyone has different interests in the game. Not everyone wants to participate in caravan attacks or world bosses, especially not 24/7, and if at that time you do want to participate in that stuff then don't use the summon system plain and simple. This is also just one potential way to limit the system. There are plenty more that people have mentioned before each with varying pros and cons.
As for specific times on any sort of cooldown/debuff, the potential range for that stuff is immense, not sure why you're making the assumption of 30 minutes, 5 minutes, 1 hour whatever. It's whatever the hell intrepid wants it to be to prevent abuse, and if that ends up being too large for your liking, then don't use the summon. The debuff time could even be made proportional to the distance traveled via summon, meaning it could be designed so that if you want to attack X caravan that your friend spots, you would literally always be able to get there faster on foot than you would by using the summon system and then waiting for the debuff timer, no matter where you are in the world.
I don't really understand why it's so hard to grasp that if you don't like the limitations, then don't use the system.
@Irohnic the issue with this is that it goes against the games philosophy and it gives organized use of the summoning system an unfair advantage. It being exploited by other players makes the game worse and choosing to not use it yourself does not change that fact. If a guild wants to maximize slaying bosses they send 1 of each 8 man family in groups of 5 out to scout the world, if anyone gets a hit they summon everyone else. This is not good for the game and is clearly going against the idea behind family summoning.
Currently the one suggestion I thought was worth trying was the once a day summon limitation. This makes it rare enough that maybe it wouldn't be that big of an issue but still needs testing.
I don't really understand why it's so hard to grasp that if you don't like the limitations, then don't use the system.
But then what is the point of developing a system like this?
The 30 minutes I talk about is a minimum. There will still be many things in the game that are easily abused with this timer, even with all of the activities I listed being prevented.
So what we have now is a system taht people like me can STILL abuse, and people like you won't use because it means you can't do anything. Sure, you may be able to get to your friends, but you won't be able to actually join them in anything while you are there.
Since that would last half an hour (at least), you are probably better off just running to where they are in that time. If the time was dependent on how far the summons was (and that time was designed to make abuse of the system not possible), it would always be benefitial to casual players to run to their friends.
I mean, there is no point being summoned to your friends if you are unable to do anything once there. Since one very obvious abuse for a system like this is to form a group knowing a friend is to log in later on, and then when they do log in, booting a player from the group to give your friend space, if we are trying to design away all abuses by preventing activity that could be abused, then joining a group post summons would be in that list of activities that can't be done.
One easy abuse for this system I can see that literally can never be designed around is for me to set up my crafting and supply network in a part of the world that has the resources I want (which will shift, as per game design). I then make finished products to sell, where all materials, processing and crafting are done in a somewhat condensed area, limiting the number and length of caravans needed, thus lowering the overall risk and over all time spent to get the finished items.
Then, I can place all of those finished items on an alt and have them summoned to a metropolis node far away, in an area that doesn't have access to those resources in the same proximity. This trip should take me hours each direction, but with the summons, I can be there instantly, and I can return instantly (even if I have to wait for the next day).
This allows me to compete with crafters in all metropolis nodes, but with significantly less overall time investment on my part.
Because this is an activity that only needs to happen a few times a week to save me, as a player, many hours of travel time, there is literally nothing at all that can be done to prevent this from taking place short of preventing all players that ever use this summons system from ever using the marketplace.
I'm really curious, if all potentially abused activities (which is virtually all activities) were prevented for an amount of time after being summoned, what actual use do you see as being left for the summons?
I mean, the idea of the summons is to get players to an area faster in order to do things - and the abuse that people will use it for is to get to an area faster in order to do things. Preventing the abuse is preventing the use, if the use is left in tact, then the abuse is left in tact. You can't have one without the other, because they are the same thing - the only difference, as I said earlier, is the intent.
I have nothing to add to what's already been said. I just want to show my position TOTALLY AGAINST the teleport system.
Even if people don't exploit it (and they will, ofc) it just makes the world as small as any other themepark game out there.
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akabearMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
In a past MMO I used a summoner for the basic purpose to provide increased play time and provide convenience. I had 3 accounts and have 1-2 summoners on each account.
Whilst I could have used the summoners for pvp, I rarely did find the need.
My summoners were primarily used to save time, I placed them at strategic locations around the map in sets in order to firstly scout if the pve area was vacant and then to summon my set of characters to the xp spot to play. And later if I played for longer periods to summon in clan members that were looking for a party.
When solo, by doing this saved me 10-20min play time. And when only wishing to play for 30min at a time, then this was ideal. I could then be at the places I wanted, knowing they were free within 2min and get productive play time in for 28min.
Where as without this, I would spend 10-20min travelling to a spot to find it may not be empty and then walk away disheartened for the day that I would have to wait until tomorrow to have a quick round.
So prior, to finding the utility of the summoner, I nearly gave up on the game as it was just not geared for casuals.
If summoning is to be limited, I hope the casual player is catered for.
In a past MMO I used a summoner for the basic purpose to provide increased play time and provide convenience. I had 3 accounts and have 1-2 summoners on each account.
Whilst I could have used the summoners for pvp, I rarely did find the need.
My summoners were primarily used to save time, I placed them at strategic locations around the map in sets in order to firstly scout if the pve area was vacant and then to summon my set of characters to the xp spot to play. And later if I played for longer periods to summon in clan members that were looking for a party.
When solo, by doing this saved me 10-20min play time. And when only wishing to play for 30min at a time, then this was ideal. I could then be at the places I wanted, knowing they were free within 2min and get productive play time in for 28min.
Where as without this, I would spend 10-20min travelling to a spot to find it may not be empty and then walk away disheartened for the day that I would have to wait until tomorrow to have a quick round.
So prior, to finding the utility of the summoner, I nearly gave up on the game as it was just not geared for casuals.
If summoning is to be limited, I hope the casual player is catered for.
Seems to me, the easy fix to this is to have worthwhile casual content closer at hand.
Needing a summons to get to worthwhile content is the issue here. The summons is a band aid, not a fix.
I don't really understand why it's so hard to grasp that if you don't like the limitations, then don't use the system.
@Irohnic the issue with this is that it goes against the games philosophy and it gives organized use of the summoning system an unfair advantage. It being exploited by other players makes the game worse and choosing to not use it yourself does not change that fact. If a guild wants to maximize slaying bosses they send 1 of each 8 man family in groups of 5 out to scout the world, if anyone gets a hit they summon everyone else. This is not good for the game and is clearly going against the idea behind family summoning.
Currently the one suggestion I thought was worth trying was the once a day summon limitation. This makes it rare enough that maybe it wouldn't be that big of an issue but still needs testing.
Appreciate the input, and agree 100%. I do think a cooldown is 1 aspect of limitation that should be implemented. I think it's pretty universal that the vast majority of us don't want this system to be exploited in a way that would make the game worse, but this comment of mine was actually in reference to Noaani's critique of a proposed debuff system that would lock players out of participating in world bosses, caravans or any other event that would be a common exploit target. Noaani pointed out that with such a debuff someone using the system without intentions to exploit would then find themselves locked out of a caravan attack that they might stumble upon after summoning, hence why I suggested under such a system, you simply don't use the summon system if you are looking to do caravan content. Once again, meta-changing exploitation=bad, adding additional limitations to prevent significant exploitation while still maintaining a usable system=good (IMO), but is also the hardest path to take from a development/balancing standpoint. it will never please everyone, it's about balance and compromise, but if some people can get some use out of it and enjoy having that access, and it doesn't result in widespread exploitation due to the limitations placed, then in my opinion it would be great to have. If that's simply not possible then by all means remove the system. QoL features aren't worth it if they significantly and negatively impact gameplay experience.
Just based on the reactions when the summon system was first announced as well as the various commenters in this thread there is definitely a good mix of people who don't believe such a balance is possible, people who think the premise alone is against the design philosophy of the game regardless of potential abuse, and people that would love to have a usable family summon system provided it doesn't result in abuse. they are all reasonable opinions.
I don't really understand why it's so hard to grasp that if you don't like the limitations, then don't use the system.
But then what is the point of developing a system like this?
The 30 minutes I talk about is a minimum. There will still be many things in the game that are easily abused with this timer, even with all of the activities I listed being prevented.
So what we have now is a system taht people like me can STILL abuse, and people like you won't use because it means you can't do anything. Sure, you may be able to get to your friends, but you won't be able to actually join them in anything while you are there.
Since that would last half an hour (at least), you are probably better off just running to where they are in that time. If the time was dependent on how far the summons was (and that time was designed to make abuse of the system not possible), it would always be benefitial to casual players to run to their friends.
I'm really curious, if all potentially abused activities (which is virtually all activities) were prevented for an amount of time after being summoned, what actual use do you see as being left for the summons?
The proposal with the debuff was never to lock you out of all potential activities, it was to block the activities that have been considered readily exploitative and with large negative impact on the game by the people commenting in these threads: the majority being guilds using the system to mobilize for world bosses or groups using them to mobilize to attack (or defend) caravans. If there were a debuff lockout from those activities proportional to distance traveled from the summon it would prevent the summon system from being used by guilds to zerg those objectives while at the same time leave plenty of other stuff you can still do with the debuff such as your standard leveling quests that myself and many other people would still find good, benign uses for it.
Are there other ways that people can gain advantages from using it, absolutely, and those should be considered as well, but there is never a black and white, this is exploitative/abuse and that isn't, this shouldn't be in the game but this should, no matter what player behavior you are talking about in whichever game system, there will always be varying opinions on what is exploitative and what is not. And even if something is considered exploitative by the majority, but has little negative impact on overall gameplay and removing would cause negative impact on gameplay, then guess what: people are okay with it! Ultimately game design always comes down to balance and compromise, as I've stated many times. Most people don't seem to be concerned with eliminating every single potential advantage one can gain from the summon system, after all the system itself used as intended is a small advantage of saving some time that a few players get for being in a family together. The same way being in a guild gives you certain advantages over not being in a guild. What most people seem to be worried about are meta-defining advantages which they deem exploitations, such as guilds using summons to quickly control world bosses, and therefore integration into a guild's family system being a requirement for joining. There have been plenty of recommendations to limit the summon system in this thread that would stop that specific exploit. you will never be able to completely eliminate every player use of the system that you're not happy with, but if you can decentivize and limit abuse to a small number of players , with little to no impact on general gameplay/metas, while still allowing intended use from a decent proportion of the population, that is a good system IMO.
I mean, there is no point being summoned to your friends if you are unable to do anything once there. Since one very obvious abuse for a system like this is to form a group knowing a friend is to log in later on, and then when they do log in, booting a player from the group to give your friend space, if we are trying to design away all abuses by preventing activity that could be abused, then joining a group post summons would be in that list of activities that can't be done.
I don't see this as an abuse of the summon system at all. This is just someone being a jerk and kicking someone from a pre-formed group just to give a spot to a friend--that could happen with our without a summon system. People who do that face repercussions of not being able to find groups later or even becoming targets for ganking due to their poor game etiquette. It's not fast travel or summons that enables this type of behavior, it is an automated LFG system which AFAIK AoC will not have. An great example of this is WoW's progression through it's first 3 expansions. From the beginning WoW has always had a summon ability given to one class. You could literally have a 5 person group ready to go to do a dungeon and then kick 1 or 2 people, fill the group with your friends, and then instantly summon the friends to the dungeon to get going. In the 2nd expansion this summon ability was given to every class via summoning stones outside of the instances. Nevertheless, this kind of behavior rarely happened because if you were a jerk like that you would quickly build a reputation on the server and no one would group with you. Yes that's right imagine that absurdity: they had a system way less limited than the proposed 8 person family summon system and it did not result in people regularly being kicked from groups. It wasn't until the 3rd expansion that kicking people from groups became a regular occurrence BECAUSE they implemented an automated cross-server LFG system, meaning there was no negative consequence for kicking people from groups. In summary that type of behavior is a function of group finding and repercussions, NOT of summoning.
One easy abuse for this system I can see that literally can never be designed around is for me to set up my crafting and supply network in a part of the world that has the resources I want (which will shift, as per game design). I then make finished products to sell, where all materials, processing and crafting are done in a somewhat condensed area, limiting the number and length of caravans needed, thus lowering the overall risk and over all time spent to get the finished items.
Then, I can place all of those finished items on an alt and have them summoned to a metropolis node far away, in an area that doesn't have access to those resources in the same proximity. This trip should take me hours each direction, but with the summons, I can be there instantly, and I can return instantly (even if I have to wait for the next day).
This allows me to compete with crafters in all metropolis nodes, but with significantly less overall time investment on my part.
Because this is an activity that only needs to happen a few times a week to save me, as a player, many hours of travel time, there is literally nothing at all that can be done to prevent this from taking place short of preventing all players that ever use this summons system from ever using the marketplace.
This can be heavily decentivized and has been discussed already in this thread. For starters, you will need multiple accounts for what you've proposed as you can't log into 2 characters at once to summon one of them, so already we are getting into the terrirory of the inevitable "pay-to-win" advantages that comes with owning multiple accounts that can be applied across virtually all areas of the game, but fortunately it's also a relatively small portion of the population meaning this limitation alone makes such exploitation a relatively uncommon occurence. Additionally summon cooldowns could be linked to playtime or experience gain, meaning you would actually need to spend time playing whichever characters are used to shuttle items. Thirdly, I believe it is already the case that basic and processed materials can not be taken with you through a summon, and it has been proposed in this thread that crafted goods also be limited in certain ways. They can be limited in number (ie. what you have equipped +5), and/or limited in level (can only take a summon with weapons/armor that you are actually able to equip). Couple this with summon skill level limitations (ie. a level 1 can't summon a level 50), and this means if you wanted to set up a system like that to shuttle high level goods you would need to have multiple accounts, level mutliple alts to max or close to max, and use up spots in your family, all to be able to shuttle a limited number of items every X amount of time based on cooldown, when those items aren't even at risk of being stolen in the open world anyways since they are crafted goods. I know this is kind of an extreme example with all the limitations but the point is that you don't have to completely eliminate every possible case of using the system in a way that people consider unsavory, you just have to decentivize to the point that it's not commonplace enough to create a negative impact on the general gameplay.
The proposal with the debuff was never to lock you out of all potential activities, it was to block the activities that have been considered readily exploitative and with large negative impact on the game by the people commenting in these threads: the majority being guilds using the system to mobilize for world bosses or groups using them to mobilize to attack (or defend) caravans.
So, what you are saying is that you are ok with the summons if only some areas of the game are able to be easily exploited with it.
You are ok with people teleporting directly to get quest updates, to get to harvesting locations (even if not to get back), to participate in sieges on the other side of the game world without needing to travel or to sell products in significantly higher risk markets without that risk, and also without travel time.
You also seem to be ok with this system essentially allowing players to treat each other as disposable, much as WoW's LFG does. With this system in place, you can form a group up, head in to a dungeon and if a member of your group isn't up to standard you can then just boot them out of the group and port in another player.
The examples of world bosses and caravans were given as mere examples, with the assumption that anyone reading would be able to extrapolate those examples to literally every other activity in the game, and realize that literally every activity in the game can be exploited in exactly the same way. They were not the biggest exploits, nor the most impactful - they were simply two that were pulled from the list of all possible exploits in order to prevent the need to discuss literally every activity in the game - as literally every activity in the game is equally exploitable.
Also, there is never a need to have two accounts for any of the exploits mentioned - a friend on the same server is literally all that is needed.
They can be limited in number (ie. what you have equipped +5), and/or limited in level (can only take a summon with weapons/armor that you are actually able to equip). Couple this with summon skill level limitations (ie. a level 1 can't summon a level 50)
I don't think these "limitations" are quite what you think they are.
First of all, non-casual players absolutely will level their characters up to the cap, regardless of if they are summon bots or not. Requiring that in order for a world spanning summons for the purposes of marketplace listings to be effective isn't a problem.
Second, if there is a limit on how many items a player can carry on them in order to be summoned, all that is doing is limiting the use of this to the intended players again.
All of a sudden, not only does the player wanting to be summoned need to find space to dump any raw materials they have on them, but they also need to dump all items they have. This means they are going to need to spend time finding storage (storage in Ashes is not a given). Essentially, what you are doing is saying that instead of players needing to be organized in a way where they are not too far from each other when their friends all log in, you are saying that they need to be organized enough to be able to stow away literally everything they are carrying away in order to be summoned. I mean, if players can be that organized, surely they can be organized enough to stay in the same area while waiting for their friends.
Further to that, what you are also now saying is that people that are summoned to their friends don't have the option of taking situational gear, nor of taking a backup set of gear for if/when their equipped gear breaks.
This is obviously not a good idea.
What I don't think you are quite getting is that I am not coming up with potential abuses, I am telling you the abuses that I personally will use if this system goes live, and pointing out to you that the only way you will be able to stop me from abusing this summons is to make it so that it is not effective for the intended use. As long as there is a system that allows players to be summoned to a different area to take on content, it will be abused by people that summon others to different areas to take on content.
You're threatening to exploit the family summon system let's see how many people are concerned about you abusing it. I'm not planning on raising my hand, do what you gotta do champ.
Tyrantor
Master Assassin
(Yes same Tyrantor from Shadowbane)
Book suggestions:
Galaxy Outlaws books 1-16.5, Metagamer Chronicles, The Land litrpg series, Ready Player One, Zen in the Martial Arts
You're threatening to exploit the family summon system let's see how many people are concerned about you abusing it. I'm not planning on raising my hand, do what you gotta do champ.
I am not at all the only person that would abuse a system like this if it is in the game.
And to be clear, abusing a system is not the same as exploiting. Abusing a system is using it in ways that are not specifically intended, but are predictable both in terms of people using it, and in the result. An exploit is using a system for an unpredicted result.
I am not coming up with potential exploits, I am telling you the exploits that I personally will use if this system goes live.
I mean you said exploits....
Tyrantor
Master Assassin
(Yes same Tyrantor from Shadowbane)
Book suggestions:
Galaxy Outlaws books 1-16.5, Metagamer Chronicles, The Land litrpg series, Ready Player One, Zen in the Martial Arts
I am not coming up with potential exploits, I am telling you the exploits that I personally will use if this system goes live.
I mean you said exploits....
Yeah, in my last post I did. My bad. The post I was replying to used the term exploit rather than abuse, and as people are sometimes want to do, I just carried on the vernacular, even if incorrect.
Point is, it is not an exploit, it is an abuse of a system. As I said earlier, if this goes live, I will abuse the absolute shit out of it (as I would expect you to do, as well).
No I think the point is what ever version of the summon makes live is the system. Let's at least see what the game looks like before disowning something that may be much needed. The need for the system may out weigh the endless list of reasons you don't want it.
Tyrantor
Master Assassin
(Yes same Tyrantor from Shadowbane)
Book suggestions:
Galaxy Outlaws books 1-16.5, Metagamer Chronicles, The Land litrpg series, Ready Player One, Zen in the Martial Arts
No I think the point is what ever version of the summon makes live is the system. Let's at least see what the game looks like before disowning something that may be much needed. The need for the system may out weigh the endless list of reasons you don't want it.
How about instead of launching the game with a system that can't be removed later if it turns out to be a net negative, they develop the game in a way where the system isn't needed, launch the game, and then if they got it wrong and people do want a summons, they instead attempt to fix the root cause of that issue.
The proposal with the debuff was never to lock you out of all potential activities, it was to block the activities that have been considered readily exploitative and with large negative impact on the game by the people commenting in these threads: the majority being guilds using the system to mobilize for world bosses or groups using them to mobilize to attack (or defend) caravans.
So, what you are saying is that you are ok with the summons if only some areas of the game are able to be easily exploited with it.
You are ok with people teleporting directly to get quest updates, to get to harvesting locations (even if not to get back), to participate in sieges on the other side of the game world without needing to travel or to sell products in significantly higher risk markets without that risk, and also without travel time.
Yes I am, as stated, within the context of the family summon system because the ability to do those things is already extremely limited with only 8 people per farmily, and would be even more limited by some of the proposed additions such as longer cooldowns and level requirements. As I said, the issue is not that someone finds a way to gain an advantage through a "misuse", "abuse", "exploit" or whatever subjective term you want to call it, it's if that abuse has a large-scale negative impact on the game that it is a problem. As previously stated, every single area of any game has mechanics which can and will be used in unintended ways. For example, the other day I was chatting with my brother while he was playing WoW and he told me someone stealthed used some sort of crowd control on him to troll him and prevent him from catching his boat on time. There was virtually nothing he could do because the dude was invisible so that was pretty frustrating and many would consider a misuse of the skill, (others like myself might find it funny but that's off-topic hehe), but he also said that's the first time that has ever happened to him despite playing the game for over a year; hardly sounds like an abuse worth worrying about limiting.
The caravans and world bosses are not just some random example equal to every other misuse of the system, they represent very real meta-defining issues that the summon system could create if not implemented with proper limitations, that cannot be said for all areas of misuse. If you want to go ahead and spend your time leveling alts to use up your 7 other family spots and just sit there at specific farming spots for you so you can get there quicker when you want to go farm, I don't care really. In fact I'm a firm believer that small incentives for hardcore players to level more alts actually contribute to the health of a game by maintaining player numbers and diversity in lower level content. So level away, it makes the game better, not worse. I'd maybe feel a little sorry for you that that's how you choose to play the game, but I'm not going to sit here butthurt about that little advantage that you have, because it's pretty hard to believe that a few people doing that will have any sort of significant negative impact on my gameplay experience, definitely not moreso than the positive impact that having the summon system would bring to me being able to more easily play with my friends and family. sounds like a net gain to me.
I will repeat myself because apparently it's not clear, enjoyable games, games that last, they are not written in black and white, there is no perfect game that everyone plays in an acceptable manner; they are made of compromises and balances. Good devs watch player trends and listen to player complaints and player desires, and then they work to balance the diverse opinions that they hear and the vision they have for the game. They don't try to nitpick every potential way that a player can use their systems outside of their original intentions because plain and simple that is just not possible.
You also seem to be ok with this system essentially allowing players to treat each other as disposable, much as WoW's LFG does. With this system in place, you can form a group up, head in to a dungeon and if a member of your group isn't up to standard you can then just boot them out of the group and port in another player.
nope, I never said this and the example I gave was evidence contrary to what you are claiming. I guess I will repeat myself again, but I'm not really sure how to be any more clear. WoW's first 2 expansions had a summon system with much fewer restrictions than what is currently proposed in AoC, yet kicking players from groups was extremely rare. The culture of "treating players as disposable" did not start until the 3rd expansion with the implementation of an automated, cross-server LFG system. This system removed the social repercussions that come with bad player etiquette such as group kicking, enabling such toxicity. It's a common misconception that it is fast travel that enables such toxicity, but in reality the summon system which had been in the game since day 1 had absolutely nothing to do with it. My experiences with CLASSIC WoW today (albeit limited), have shown that the "anti-kicking" trend still stands today despite an overall more toxic playerbase: people kicking from groups is rare because there is no automated LFG system, this is despite the game having even more fast travel options than its original version back in 2005 due to mass player-made organization of portals and summon alts. Thankfully AoC has no LFG system that I am aware of, so we should not have to worry about the proliferation of such toxicity.
Also, there is never a need to have two accounts for any of the exploits mentioned - a friend on the same server is literally all that is needed.
correct, I was simply responding to the idea you had proposed of using alts. For sure, you can have a friend's account function in the same way instead of buying your own 2nd account, but once again if you're talking about leveling an alt (and trading said service with a friend) and sitting them at a certain farming location or city or wherever so you can always have them available for a quick summon, you're talking about using up your family spots for that, investing time in leveling a character to not use it or use it on a limited basis, and now adding a third factor of finding another player willing to do the same for you on their account. I'm not saying you will be able to remove all possiblity of people using the system in such a way but I think you're severely overestimating how commonplace such practices would be, how impactful they would be on the game's economy/gameplay/etc., and/or the inability of devs to adjust and put limitations on such practices if they were to become a widespread issue.
They can be limited in number (ie. what you have equipped +5), and/or limited in level (can only take a summon with weapons/armor that you are actually able to equip). Couple this with summon skill level limitations (ie. a level 1 can't summon a level 50)
I don't think these "limitations" are quite what you think they are.
First of all, non-casual players absolutely will level their characters up to the cap, regardless of if they are summon bots or not. Requiring that in order for a world spanning summons for the purposes of marketplace listings to be effective isn't a problem.
Second, if there is a limit on how many items a player can carry on them in order to be summoned, all that is doing is limiting the use of this to the intended players again.
All of a sudden, not only does the player wanting to be summoned need to find space to dump any raw materials they have on them, but they also need to dump all items they have. This means they are going to need to spend time finding storage (storage in Ashes is not a given). Essentially, what you are doing is saying that instead of players needing to be organized in a way where they are not too far from each other when their friends all log in, you are saying that they need to be organized enough to be able to stow away literally everything they are carrying away in order to be summoned. I mean, if players can be that organized, surely they can be organized enough to stay in the same area while waiting for their friends.
Further to that, what you are also now saying is that people that are summoned to their friends don't have the option of taking situational gear, nor of taking a backup set of gear for if/when their equipped gear breaks.
This is obviously not a good idea.
What I don't think you are quite getting is that I am not coming up with potential abuses, I am telling you the abuses that I personally will use if this system goes live, and pointing out to you that the only way you will be able to stop me from abusing this summons is to make it so that it is not effective for the intended use. As long as there is a system that allows players to be summoned to a different area to take on content, it will be abused by people that summon others to different areas to take on content.
I don't really care, you're welcome to try to "abuse" away all you want. MMORPG's will always have some sweaty nerds pouring over spreadsheets to try to optimize and min/max every aspect of the game from economy to dps to travel. I'm not saying that's you, I'm just saying in general there will always be people looking to optimize their playstyle to "abuse" game mechanics to give them an edge on whatever they deem to be success in the game. I have confidence in what I've seen from Intrepid so far that they will do a good job of being vigilant of such behavior, putting in the proper limitations to prevent it from causing widespread negative impacts on the game, and if it really comes down to it, removing systems such as family summons all together if such prevention is not possible in any other way. I think it's pretty clear you don't have the same sort of confidence in them, but that's okay, I think that's just something we're going to have to agree to disagree on.
Yes I am, as stated, within the context of the family summon system because the ability to do those things is already extremely limited with only 8 people per farmily, and would be even more limited by some of the proposed additions such as longer cooldowns and level requirements.
These things are not limitations.
I've already pointed out that the level restriction you suggest isn't an issue, but neither is the 8 players per family. Thing is, I can have characters on my account that belong to more than one family, and my friends can all have characters in those families as well.
Now, you may want to say that families should then only be account wide, not character. This would be a natural reaction to this notion that I can have multiple families that I am able to abuse. The thing is, Ashes is a game that intends to have espionage and intrigue - and these things can not really be done if characters on an account are tied to others in this way. Requiring one family per account would be a massive detriment to this aspect of the game.
On top of that, if it is account wide, then the 8 character limit would obviousy need to be dropped for an 8 account system. This would obviously open up more potential summons locations, making the whole system even more useful to me.
As to the suggestion that this system wouldn't be widely abused if implemented - I challenge you to name one system in one MMO that provides players with financial and progression benefits that is not abused to it's fullest. Sure, abuses of systems that are just kind of funny (as per your post) don't happen all that often, and are perhaps not always worth working to prevent.
Systems that allow players access to five markets instead of one market though? That will be widely abused. If the only way to get a top end PvE kill is to beat other guilds that are abusing this system, you had better bet every guild wanting to kill such encounters will be abusing this. If you are on the lookout for somewhat rare resource spawns, you will abuse this.
Unlike WoW, Ashes is a game where if you are not the first there, you miss out most of the time. If someone harvests a resource before you, you can be assured that it will respawn indefinately in that same general location. In Ashes, once the resources in a location are gone, you do not know where they will respawn. In WoW, you have all of your boss encounters in an instance that is specific and unique to you, your group or your raid. No one can take those kills from you. In Ashes, the encounters spawn, and the first guild to get the kill, gets the kill (DPS checks and all notwithstanding).
Basically, WoW is not an openly competitive environment, Ashes is. This means people in Ashes have far more reason to abuse any system they can, as long as the abuse of that system won't result in action taken on their account.
What I am saying is - in a game like Ashes, you have to assume that all players will take what ever steps they can to be as competitive as they can, and so abuses to systems like this will be frequent.
I have confidence in what I've seen from Intrepid so far that they will do a good job of being vigilant of such behavior, putting in the proper limitations to prevent it from causing widespread negative impacts on the game, and if it really comes down to it, removing systems such as family summons all together if such prevention is not possible in any other way.
See, I agree completely.
What I am trying to tell you, that again, seems to have missed the mark, is that the family summons is a system that will need to be removed for exactly these reasons.
I am not trying to say Intrepid don't know what they are doing (Steven doesn't, but his team do, and he is learning). I am saying Intrepid know what they are doing, will see the obvious abuses this system will open up, and will not let it go live.
I am trying to explain to you the reasoning behind this thing that you already know.
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FuryBladeborneMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Yes I am, as stated, within the context of the family summon system because the ability to do those things is already extremely limited with only 8 people per farmily, and would be even more limited by some of the proposed additions such as longer cooldowns and level requirements.
These things are not limitations.
I can't resist being a pain in the arse here. Limitations are restrictions and those are restrictions regardless of whether they can be worked around with extra effort.
I've already pointed out that the level restriction you suggest isn't an issue, but neither is the 8 players per family...
Now, you may want to say that families should then only be account wide, not character.... This would obviously open up more potential summons locations...
I'm pretty sure that restricting family summon to once per day per account per server would block any abuses that you are referring to.
Systems that allow players access to five markets instead of one market though?
It appears that players will be able to create a new character, join to the family of the main, travel to one of the 5 markets (probably metropolis?), sit there and summon family in as needed. However, if you have a character there do you really need to summon? In fact, do you even need to use the family system?
That will be widely abused. If the only way to get a top end PvE kill is to beat other guilds that are abusing this system, you had better bet every guild wanting to kill such encounters will be abusing this.
I am not sure about the actual impact on the game. If these are something like regularly scheduled regional bosses or open world dungeons for large groups to justify full guild participation, it seems like something that a guild could walk to. I mean, if its a scheduled event then planning is effective without summoning being required.
I think the problem with your argument is the statement that "the only way to get a top end PvE kill is to beat other guilds that are abusing this system". I think that you are referring to a required race to the top end PvE kill. However, we haven't been told if these encounters will be on timers or not yet. It is common for such bosses to be on timers in other games. Of course, with the various event systems involving monsters attacking cities and such, we currently don't even know if bosses will spawn at a specific location so that we can park an alt there for summoning. Event locations may be much more random than we have seen in other games.
If you are on the lookout for somewhat rare resource spawns, you will abuse this.
Ok. I am also not sure if it is a problem. Group content will tend to yield more valuable rewards (possibly similar or equal to rare resource spawns). The summoning system is intended to bring players together for group content and thus, larger rewards. The difference in the value of what is obtained by the apparent abuse that you suggested may really be any different than rewards intended by use of the summoning system.
I am not saying your points are necessarily wrong, I just not certain that they turn into that much of a gameplay advantage or have much of an impact on the economy provided that the summons are limited enough such as once per day. The currently intended system to be tested is a 30 minute cooldown that is far to often as a character could potentially be summoned over 40 times per day by hardcore players.
I'm pretty sure that restricting family summon to once per day per account per server would block any abuses that you are referring to.
Not really.
The need to fast travel to get to a top end PvE encounter won't happen more than once a day, so the people using it for this will never be limited by that.
As to the type of raid spawn mechanics, there are likely to be a number of different systems employed, for different purposes. Encounters designed for all to participate will likely be the kind of thing that spawns in the open - so that all can participate easily. Raid encounters that spawn in dungeons (which we know will be a thing) are more for individual guild participation (and guild competition). Obviously, it is the latter ones here that I am referring to.
This is also why abusing a summons (if it were in game) would be the only way to kill this content. My expectation of these encounters is that Intrepid will have them spawn at specific and set times during each servers prime time. There is also likely to be a server announcement when they spawn.
However, even if they are based on a spawn window (the mechanic that has the most variation) with no notification, top end guilds will figure out their window, and have a spotter. I have yet to play a game with contested encounters that are actually worth fighting over where top end guilds haven't always known they were up with 2 minutes of them spawning - so this aspect of it is already established.
From there, it is simply a matter of who gets there in force first. Obviously, the way to do that is to use the summons, if it is in the game.
As to the market aspect, the reason the family summons is useful is that it will allow you to transport finished items and coin in either direction, without the requisite time investment in traveling. It is the ability to avoid having to transport products from one market to the other that is the abuse here. The very least this does is give players access to markets that should require a significant time investment and risk (via PvP) to be able to access.
If a player wanted access to all five metropolis markets, that would likely take a major portion of their play time to accomplish without the summons (the idea of seperate markets would suggest that they don't expect players to sell in all markets). With a summons, it is something they can dedicate the last 10 minutes of their play time to.
With this one, there is also the likely need for citizenship in the node you want to sell in - which means this exploit is likely to be a collaberation between multiple players with different products to sell. This also totally negates all potential restrictions like character level, family size, cooldowns etc.
Thing is, Ashes is designed around the notion of space and location being important. As long as players are able to negate distance, there will be ways to abuse it that go against the idea and spirit of the game.
limiting the summon to once a day would make abuse rare but it would still work well enough for guilds looking to snipe resources/dungeons. The only thing I can think of to stop this is to ban the organized use of family summoning as a written rule considering it an exploit... And good luck enforcing that.
The only thing I can think of to stop this is to ban the organized use of family summoning as a written rule considering it an exploit... And good luck enforcing that.
But wouldn't that include if you have planned to summon your friend when he gets home from work?
Do we know yet if we can decline the Family Summon? If they're doing a dungeon and I don't want to, and they Summon us all, do I have to get summoned, too?
Do we know yet if we can decline the Family Summon? If they're doing a dungeon and I don't want to, and they Summon us all, do I have to get summoned, too?
Other than assuming that this won't make it to the game, I would have to assume you would have the choice - or perhaps you even summon yourself to your family members (would make more sense to do it that way - not that it makes any sense at all).
The only thing I can think of to stop this is to ban the organized use of family summoning as a written rule considering it an exploit... And good luck enforcing that.
But wouldn't that include if you have planned to summon your friend when he gets home from work?
I mean, that is organization, of sorts.
What I mean is the intent and use in a guild setting for the purposes of fast traveling your entire guild or large parts of it to a single point.
The rule is more of a joke than a suggestion this would make things needlessly difficult for the moderation team.
or perhaps you even summon yourself to your family members (would make more sense to do it that way - not that it makes any sense at all).
Yeah, that's the way we did it in ESO. Meant you could just port to a guildie to help them out. Also meant that you could unlock all the high-end zones on a brand new character just by picking someone that happened to be there at the time. ESO wasn't so bothered about the whole "distances" thing.
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Alright this discussion seems to be just going in a circular motion because either you can't seem to keep straight exactly what your issues are or I'm really not understanding, so I'll try to summarize so maybe we can stop and leave room for some other voices to contribute:
Your opinion: You're not attacking the summon system on premise alone, you are attacking the potential for abuse. You don't believe these abuses can be prevented and any attempt at preventing them is "arbitrary and stupid". Also, even if the abuses could be prevented it's not really fair to implement the system because somehow it only benefits casual players, not hardcore players, and hardcore players deserve love too. So ultimately you dislike the summon system for both it's premise/original intention and for the potential for abuse.
My opinion:
1.) The premise/original intention of the system (to add a little more convenience to a small group of friends/family to group up and play the game) is a great feature that I would love to have access to, but only provided that it can be limited in a way that does not result in abuses in other parts.
2..) The teleport system could be limited in a way to prevent pretty much any abuse you can think of, the question is not really can it be prevented, but will you still have a usable system with the proper limitations put in place.
3.) games are full of arbitrary limitations, it is a core part of balancing all sorts of systems from combat to crafting to travel. Not really sure why any attempt to balance this particular system is suddenly "stupid".
Is that an accurate assessment of your opinion so we can just leave it here for intrepid to take note of or is there something else you would like to add?
Lets assume that your suggestion of preventing players from the kinds of activities that would be abused actually goes ahead. The next question is - how long does that prevention need to last in order to stop the abuse of the summons.
The answer to that is no less than 30 minutes.
If it is going to save me and my guild an hour of travel time to go from one world boss to the next, anything less than this will obviously not be an issue. With caravans,it is very likely that they will move somewhat slower than characters on foot, and so 30 minutes is probably about how long a medium length caravan run would take.
So even then, 30 minutes isn't likely to stop people using this system in order to facilitate the two most obvious (though by absolutely no means *only*) abuses of this system. All it will do is add in a small delay - in both cases, the abusers are still able to perform the task they want earlier (in the case of world bosses) or perform the task at all (in the case of caravans).
So, a 30 minute prevention on these activities is ineffective - and that is far longer than Intrepid would ever consider implementing.
Lets look at what a 30 minute block on these activities does to a casual player.
Lets say your friends are in a dungeon, and want to summon you to them. You get summoned, fight for a bit and then come across a boss. You have the remainder of that 30 minute timer before you are able to take it on - giving other groups in the area plenty of time to come around and take the kill from you.
Maybe your group gets annoyed with that and so leaves the dungeon. While running to the next thing you all decide to do, you come across an undefended caravan. Since casual players can PvP too, you consider attacking it - but once again, you can't.
Then we have to look at all of the other activities that players would abuse the summons to facilitate. Assuming you want to put a prevention on all of them, that list would include no killing bosses, no PvP at all, no harvesting, no using the marketplace, no quest advancement, no joining groups that someone has just been booted out of, and likely a few other things related specifically to unique mechanics in Ashes.
That is a big chunk of the game you are saying people shouldn't be able to do, and 30 minutes is a big chunk of time to a casual player (and still not long enough to prevent abuse). That is not a good system, and is considerably worse than just telling casual players that if they want to play together, they should organize themselves because they are better off doing that and would probably end up doing that anyway, due to frustration with the limitations that would be necessary on the summons - if a block on all abused activities were put on it as you are suggesting.
Ya I'm sorry I must've really misunderstood when you said:
Thank you for clarifying, because this whole time I thought you were arguing against family teleport because it would benefit casual players more, among the other abuse reasons listed. Anyway, with regards to:
I don't really understand why it's so hard to grasp that if you don't like the limitations, then don't use the system. No one is trying to force you to use it, and everyone has different interests in the game. Not everyone wants to participate in caravan attacks or world bosses, especially not 24/7, and if at that time you do want to participate in that stuff then don't use the summon system plain and simple. This is also just one potential way to limit the system. There are plenty more that people have mentioned before each with varying pros and cons.
As for specific times on any sort of cooldown/debuff, the potential range for that stuff is immense, not sure why you're making the assumption of 30 minutes, 5 minutes, 1 hour whatever. It's whatever the hell intrepid wants it to be to prevent abuse, and if that ends up being too large for your liking, then don't use the summon. The debuff time could even be made proportional to the distance traveled via summon, meaning it could be designed so that if you want to attack X caravan that your friend spots, you would literally always be able to get there faster on foot than you would by using the summon system and then waiting for the debuff timer, no matter where you are in the world.
Currently the one suggestion I thought was worth trying was the once a day summon limitation. This makes it rare enough that maybe it wouldn't be that big of an issue but still needs testing.
The 30 minutes I talk about is a minimum. There will still be many things in the game that are easily abused with this timer, even with all of the activities I listed being prevented.
So what we have now is a system taht people like me can STILL abuse, and people like you won't use because it means you can't do anything. Sure, you may be able to get to your friends, but you won't be able to actually join them in anything while you are there.
Since that would last half an hour (at least), you are probably better off just running to where they are in that time. If the time was dependent on how far the summons was (and that time was designed to make abuse of the system not possible), it would always be benefitial to casual players to run to their friends.
I mean, there is no point being summoned to your friends if you are unable to do anything once there. Since one very obvious abuse for a system like this is to form a group knowing a friend is to log in later on, and then when they do log in, booting a player from the group to give your friend space, if we are trying to design away all abuses by preventing activity that could be abused, then joining a group post summons would be in that list of activities that can't be done.
One easy abuse for this system I can see that literally can never be designed around is for me to set up my crafting and supply network in a part of the world that has the resources I want (which will shift, as per game design). I then make finished products to sell, where all materials, processing and crafting are done in a somewhat condensed area, limiting the number and length of caravans needed, thus lowering the overall risk and over all time spent to get the finished items.
Then, I can place all of those finished items on an alt and have them summoned to a metropolis node far away, in an area that doesn't have access to those resources in the same proximity. This trip should take me hours each direction, but with the summons, I can be there instantly, and I can return instantly (even if I have to wait for the next day).
This allows me to compete with crafters in all metropolis nodes, but with significantly less overall time investment on my part.
Because this is an activity that only needs to happen a few times a week to save me, as a player, many hours of travel time, there is literally nothing at all that can be done to prevent this from taking place short of preventing all players that ever use this summons system from ever using the marketplace.
I'm really curious, if all potentially abused activities (which is virtually all activities) were prevented for an amount of time after being summoned, what actual use do you see as being left for the summons?
I mean, the idea of the summons is to get players to an area faster in order to do things - and the abuse that people will use it for is to get to an area faster in order to do things. Preventing the abuse is preventing the use, if the use is left in tact, then the abuse is left in tact. You can't have one without the other, because they are the same thing - the only difference, as I said earlier, is the intent.
Even if people don't exploit it (and they will, ofc) it just makes the world as small as any other themepark game out there.
Whilst I could have used the summoners for pvp, I rarely did find the need.
My summoners were primarily used to save time, I placed them at strategic locations around the map in sets in order to firstly scout if the pve area was vacant and then to summon my set of characters to the xp spot to play. And later if I played for longer periods to summon in clan members that were looking for a party.
When solo, by doing this saved me 10-20min play time. And when only wishing to play for 30min at a time, then this was ideal. I could then be at the places I wanted, knowing they were free within 2min and get productive play time in for 28min.
Where as without this, I would spend 10-20min travelling to a spot to find it may not be empty and then walk away disheartened for the day that I would have to wait until tomorrow to have a quick round.
So prior, to finding the utility of the summoner, I nearly gave up on the game as it was just not geared for casuals.
If summoning is to be limited, I hope the casual player is catered for.
Seems to me, the easy fix to this is to have worthwhile casual content closer at hand.
Needing a summons to get to worthwhile content is the issue here. The summons is a band aid, not a fix.
Appreciate the input, and agree 100%. I do think a cooldown is 1 aspect of limitation that should be implemented. I think it's pretty universal that the vast majority of us don't want this system to be exploited in a way that would make the game worse, but this comment of mine was actually in reference to Noaani's critique of a proposed debuff system that would lock players out of participating in world bosses, caravans or any other event that would be a common exploit target. Noaani pointed out that with such a debuff someone using the system without intentions to exploit would then find themselves locked out of a caravan attack that they might stumble upon after summoning, hence why I suggested under such a system, you simply don't use the summon system if you are looking to do caravan content. Once again, meta-changing exploitation=bad, adding additional limitations to prevent significant exploitation while still maintaining a usable system=good (IMO), but is also the hardest path to take from a development/balancing standpoint. it will never please everyone, it's about balance and compromise, but if some people can get some use out of it and enjoy having that access, and it doesn't result in widespread exploitation due to the limitations placed, then in my opinion it would be great to have. If that's simply not possible then by all means remove the system. QoL features aren't worth it if they significantly and negatively impact gameplay experience.
Just based on the reactions when the summon system was first announced as well as the various commenters in this thread there is definitely a good mix of people who don't believe such a balance is possible, people who think the premise alone is against the design philosophy of the game regardless of potential abuse, and people that would love to have a usable family summon system provided it doesn't result in abuse. they are all reasonable opinions.
Are there other ways that people can gain advantages from using it, absolutely, and those should be considered as well, but there is never a black and white, this is exploitative/abuse and that isn't, this shouldn't be in the game but this should, no matter what player behavior you are talking about in whichever game system, there will always be varying opinions on what is exploitative and what is not. And even if something is considered exploitative by the majority, but has little negative impact on overall gameplay and removing would cause negative impact on gameplay, then guess what: people are okay with it! Ultimately game design always comes down to balance and compromise, as I've stated many times. Most people don't seem to be concerned with eliminating every single potential advantage one can gain from the summon system, after all the system itself used as intended is a small advantage of saving some time that a few players get for being in a family together. The same way being in a guild gives you certain advantages over not being in a guild. What most people seem to be worried about are meta-defining advantages which they deem exploitations, such as guilds using summons to quickly control world bosses, and therefore integration into a guild's family system being a requirement for joining. There have been plenty of recommendations to limit the summon system in this thread that would stop that specific exploit. you will never be able to completely eliminate every player use of the system that you're not happy with, but if you can decentivize and limit abuse to a small number of players , with little to no impact on general gameplay/metas, while still allowing intended use from a decent proportion of the population, that is a good system IMO.
I don't see this as an abuse of the summon system at all. This is just someone being a jerk and kicking someone from a pre-formed group just to give a spot to a friend--that could happen with our without a summon system. People who do that face repercussions of not being able to find groups later or even becoming targets for ganking due to their poor game etiquette. It's not fast travel or summons that enables this type of behavior, it is an automated LFG system which AFAIK AoC will not have. An great example of this is WoW's progression through it's first 3 expansions. From the beginning WoW has always had a summon ability given to one class. You could literally have a 5 person group ready to go to do a dungeon and then kick 1 or 2 people, fill the group with your friends, and then instantly summon the friends to the dungeon to get going. In the 2nd expansion this summon ability was given to every class via summoning stones outside of the instances. Nevertheless, this kind of behavior rarely happened because if you were a jerk like that you would quickly build a reputation on the server and no one would group with you. Yes that's right imagine that absurdity: they had a system way less limited than the proposed 8 person family summon system and it did not result in people regularly being kicked from groups. It wasn't until the 3rd expansion that kicking people from groups became a regular occurrence BECAUSE they implemented an automated cross-server LFG system, meaning there was no negative consequence for kicking people from groups. In summary that type of behavior is a function of group finding and repercussions, NOT of summoning.
This can be heavily decentivized and has been discussed already in this thread. For starters, you will need multiple accounts for what you've proposed as you can't log into 2 characters at once to summon one of them, so already we are getting into the terrirory of the inevitable "pay-to-win" advantages that comes with owning multiple accounts that can be applied across virtually all areas of the game, but fortunately it's also a relatively small portion of the population meaning this limitation alone makes such exploitation a relatively uncommon occurence. Additionally summon cooldowns could be linked to playtime or experience gain, meaning you would actually need to spend time playing whichever characters are used to shuttle items. Thirdly, I believe it is already the case that basic and processed materials can not be taken with you through a summon, and it has been proposed in this thread that crafted goods also be limited in certain ways. They can be limited in number (ie. what you have equipped +5), and/or limited in level (can only take a summon with weapons/armor that you are actually able to equip). Couple this with summon skill level limitations (ie. a level 1 can't summon a level 50), and this means if you wanted to set up a system like that to shuttle high level goods you would need to have multiple accounts, level mutliple alts to max or close to max, and use up spots in your family, all to be able to shuttle a limited number of items every X amount of time based on cooldown, when those items aren't even at risk of being stolen in the open world anyways since they are crafted goods. I know this is kind of an extreme example with all the limitations but the point is that you don't have to completely eliminate every possible case of using the system in a way that people consider unsavory, you just have to decentivize to the point that it's not commonplace enough to create a negative impact on the general gameplay.
edit: fixed missing quote bracket
You are ok with people teleporting directly to get quest updates, to get to harvesting locations (even if not to get back), to participate in sieges on the other side of the game world without needing to travel or to sell products in significantly higher risk markets without that risk, and also without travel time.
You also seem to be ok with this system essentially allowing players to treat each other as disposable, much as WoW's LFG does. With this system in place, you can form a group up, head in to a dungeon and if a member of your group isn't up to standard you can then just boot them out of the group and port in another player.
The examples of world bosses and caravans were given as mere examples, with the assumption that anyone reading would be able to extrapolate those examples to literally every other activity in the game, and realize that literally every activity in the game can be exploited in exactly the same way. They were not the biggest exploits, nor the most impactful - they were simply two that were pulled from the list of all possible exploits in order to prevent the need to discuss literally every activity in the game - as literally every activity in the game is equally exploitable.
Also, there is never a need to have two accounts for any of the exploits mentioned - a friend on the same server is literally all that is needed. I don't think these "limitations" are quite what you think they are.
First of all, non-casual players absolutely will level their characters up to the cap, regardless of if they are summon bots or not. Requiring that in order for a world spanning summons for the purposes of marketplace listings to be effective isn't a problem.
Second, if there is a limit on how many items a player can carry on them in order to be summoned, all that is doing is limiting the use of this to the intended players again.
All of a sudden, not only does the player wanting to be summoned need to find space to dump any raw materials they have on them, but they also need to dump all items they have. This means they are going to need to spend time finding storage (storage in Ashes is not a given). Essentially, what you are doing is saying that instead of players needing to be organized in a way where they are not too far from each other when their friends all log in, you are saying that they need to be organized enough to be able to stow away literally everything they are carrying away in order to be summoned. I mean, if players can be that organized, surely they can be organized enough to stay in the same area while waiting for their friends.
Further to that, what you are also now saying is that people that are summoned to their friends don't have the option of taking situational gear, nor of taking a backup set of gear for if/when their equipped gear breaks.
This is obviously not a good idea.
What I don't think you are quite getting is that I am not coming up with potential abuses, I am telling you the abuses that I personally will use if this system goes live, and pointing out to you that the only way you will be able to stop me from abusing this summons is to make it so that it is not effective for the intended use. As long as there is a system that allows players to be summoned to a different area to take on content, it will be abused by people that summon others to different areas to take on content.
Master Assassin
(Yes same Tyrantor from Shadowbane)
Book suggestions:
Galaxy Outlaws books 1-16.5, Metagamer Chronicles, The Land litrpg series, Ready Player One, Zen in the Martial Arts
I am not at all the only person that would abuse a system like this if it is in the game.
And to be clear, abusing a system is not the same as exploiting. Abusing a system is using it in ways that are not specifically intended, but are predictable both in terms of people using it, and in the result. An exploit is using a system for an unpredicted result.
I mean you said exploits....
Master Assassin
(Yes same Tyrantor from Shadowbane)
Book suggestions:
Galaxy Outlaws books 1-16.5, Metagamer Chronicles, The Land litrpg series, Ready Player One, Zen in the Martial Arts
Yeah, in my last post I did. My bad. The post I was replying to used the term exploit rather than abuse, and as people are sometimes want to do, I just carried on the vernacular, even if incorrect.
Point is, it is not an exploit, it is an abuse of a system. As I said earlier, if this goes live, I will abuse the absolute shit out of it (as I would expect you to do, as well).
Master Assassin
(Yes same Tyrantor from Shadowbane)
Book suggestions:
Galaxy Outlaws books 1-16.5, Metagamer Chronicles, The Land litrpg series, Ready Player One, Zen in the Martial Arts
How about instead of launching the game with a system that can't be removed later if it turns out to be a net negative, they develop the game in a way where the system isn't needed, launch the game, and then if they got it wrong and people do want a summons, they instead attempt to fix the root cause of that issue.
Yes I am, as stated, within the context of the family summon system because the ability to do those things is already extremely limited with only 8 people per farmily, and would be even more limited by some of the proposed additions such as longer cooldowns and level requirements. As I said, the issue is not that someone finds a way to gain an advantage through a "misuse", "abuse", "exploit" or whatever subjective term you want to call it, it's if that abuse has a large-scale negative impact on the game that it is a problem. As previously stated, every single area of any game has mechanics which can and will be used in unintended ways. For example, the other day I was chatting with my brother while he was playing WoW and he told me someone stealthed used some sort of crowd control on him to troll him and prevent him from catching his boat on time. There was virtually nothing he could do because the dude was invisible so that was pretty frustrating and many would consider a misuse of the skill, (others like myself might find it funny but that's off-topic hehe), but he also said that's the first time that has ever happened to him despite playing the game for over a year; hardly sounds like an abuse worth worrying about limiting.
The caravans and world bosses are not just some random example equal to every other misuse of the system, they represent very real meta-defining issues that the summon system could create if not implemented with proper limitations, that cannot be said for all areas of misuse. If you want to go ahead and spend your time leveling alts to use up your 7 other family spots and just sit there at specific farming spots for you so you can get there quicker when you want to go farm, I don't care really. In fact I'm a firm believer that small incentives for hardcore players to level more alts actually contribute to the health of a game by maintaining player numbers and diversity in lower level content. So level away, it makes the game better, not worse. I'd maybe feel a little sorry for you that that's how you choose to play the game, but I'm not going to sit here butthurt about that little advantage that you have, because it's pretty hard to believe that a few people doing that will have any sort of significant negative impact on my gameplay experience, definitely not moreso than the positive impact that having the summon system would bring to me being able to more easily play with my friends and family. sounds like a net gain to me.
I will repeat myself because apparently it's not clear, enjoyable games, games that last, they are not written in black and white, there is no perfect game that everyone plays in an acceptable manner; they are made of compromises and balances. Good devs watch player trends and listen to player complaints and player desires, and then they work to balance the diverse opinions that they hear and the vision they have for the game. They don't try to nitpick every potential way that a player can use their systems outside of their original intentions because plain and simple that is just not possible.
nope, I never said this and the example I gave was evidence contrary to what you are claiming. I guess I will repeat myself again, but I'm not really sure how to be any more clear. WoW's first 2 expansions had a summon system with much fewer restrictions than what is currently proposed in AoC, yet kicking players from groups was extremely rare. The culture of "treating players as disposable" did not start until the 3rd expansion with the implementation of an automated, cross-server LFG system. This system removed the social repercussions that come with bad player etiquette such as group kicking, enabling such toxicity. It's a common misconception that it is fast travel that enables such toxicity, but in reality the summon system which had been in the game since day 1 had absolutely nothing to do with it. My experiences with CLASSIC WoW today (albeit limited), have shown that the "anti-kicking" trend still stands today despite an overall more toxic playerbase: people kicking from groups is rare because there is no automated LFG system, this is despite the game having even more fast travel options than its original version back in 2005 due to mass player-made organization of portals and summon alts. Thankfully AoC has no LFG system that I am aware of, so we should not have to worry about the proliferation of such toxicity.
correct, I was simply responding to the idea you had proposed of using alts. For sure, you can have a friend's account function in the same way instead of buying your own 2nd account, but once again if you're talking about leveling an alt (and trading said service with a friend) and sitting them at a certain farming location or city or wherever so you can always have them available for a quick summon, you're talking about using up your family spots for that, investing time in leveling a character to not use it or use it on a limited basis, and now adding a third factor of finding another player willing to do the same for you on their account. I'm not saying you will be able to remove all possiblity of people using the system in such a way but I think you're severely overestimating how commonplace such practices would be, how impactful they would be on the game's economy/gameplay/etc., and/or the inability of devs to adjust and put limitations on such practices if they were to become a widespread issue.
I don't really care, you're welcome to try to "abuse" away all you want. MMORPG's will always have some sweaty nerds pouring over spreadsheets to try to optimize and min/max every aspect of the game from economy to dps to travel. I'm not saying that's you, I'm just saying in general there will always be people looking to optimize their playstyle to "abuse" game mechanics to give them an edge on whatever they deem to be success in the game. I have confidence in what I've seen from Intrepid so far that they will do a good job of being vigilant of such behavior, putting in the proper limitations to prevent it from causing widespread negative impacts on the game, and if it really comes down to it, removing systems such as family summons all together if such prevention is not possible in any other way. I think it's pretty clear you don't have the same sort of confidence in them, but that's okay, I think that's just something we're going to have to agree to disagree on.
I've already pointed out that the level restriction you suggest isn't an issue, but neither is the 8 players per family. Thing is, I can have characters on my account that belong to more than one family, and my friends can all have characters in those families as well.
Now, you may want to say that families should then only be account wide, not character. This would be a natural reaction to this notion that I can have multiple families that I am able to abuse. The thing is, Ashes is a game that intends to have espionage and intrigue - and these things can not really be done if characters on an account are tied to others in this way. Requiring one family per account would be a massive detriment to this aspect of the game.
On top of that, if it is account wide, then the 8 character limit would obviousy need to be dropped for an 8 account system. This would obviously open up more potential summons locations, making the whole system even more useful to me.
As to the suggestion that this system wouldn't be widely abused if implemented - I challenge you to name one system in one MMO that provides players with financial and progression benefits that is not abused to it's fullest. Sure, abuses of systems that are just kind of funny (as per your post) don't happen all that often, and are perhaps not always worth working to prevent.
Systems that allow players access to five markets instead of one market though? That will be widely abused. If the only way to get a top end PvE kill is to beat other guilds that are abusing this system, you had better bet every guild wanting to kill such encounters will be abusing this. If you are on the lookout for somewhat rare resource spawns, you will abuse this.
Unlike WoW, Ashes is a game where if you are not the first there, you miss out most of the time. If someone harvests a resource before you, you can be assured that it will respawn indefinately in that same general location. In Ashes, once the resources in a location are gone, you do not know where they will respawn. In WoW, you have all of your boss encounters in an instance that is specific and unique to you, your group or your raid. No one can take those kills from you. In Ashes, the encounters spawn, and the first guild to get the kill, gets the kill (DPS checks and all notwithstanding).
Basically, WoW is not an openly competitive environment, Ashes is. This means people in Ashes have far more reason to abuse any system they can, as long as the abuse of that system won't result in action taken on their account.
What I am saying is - in a game like Ashes, you have to assume that all players will take what ever steps they can to be as competitive as they can, and so abuses to systems like this will be frequent. See, I agree completely.
What I am trying to tell you, that again, seems to have missed the mark, is that the family summons is a system that will need to be removed for exactly these reasons.
I am not trying to say Intrepid don't know what they are doing (Steven doesn't, but his team do, and he is learning). I am saying Intrepid know what they are doing, will see the obvious abuses this system will open up, and will not let it go live.
I am trying to explain to you the reasoning behind this thing that you already know.
There will be a "comfortable" number of character slots on launch.[3]
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Alts#Character_slots
It's hard to tell if it will be easy to spare 5 character slots, but it seems like we have a good chance.
I am not sure about the actual impact on the game. If these are something like regularly scheduled regional bosses or open world dungeons for large groups to justify full guild participation, it seems like something that a guild could walk to. I mean, if its a scheduled event then planning is effective without summoning being required.
I think the problem with your argument is the statement that "the only way to get a top end PvE kill is to beat other guilds that are abusing this system". I think that you are referring to a required race to the top end PvE kill. However, we haven't been told if these encounters will be on timers or not yet. It is common for such bosses to be on timers in other games. Of course, with the various event systems involving monsters attacking cities and such, we currently don't even know if bosses will spawn at a specific location so that we can park an alt there for summoning. Event locations may be much more random than we have seen in other games. Ok. I am also not sure if it is a problem. Group content will tend to yield more valuable rewards (possibly similar or equal to rare resource spawns). The summoning system is intended to bring players together for group content and thus, larger rewards. The difference in the value of what is obtained by the apparent abuse that you suggested may really be any different than rewards intended by use of the summoning system.
I am not saying your points are necessarily wrong, I just not certain that they turn into that much of a gameplay advantage or have much of an impact on the economy provided that the summons are limited enough such as once per day. The currently intended system to be tested is a 30 minute cooldown that is far to often as a character could potentially be summoned over 40 times per day by hardcore players.
The need to fast travel to get to a top end PvE encounter won't happen more than once a day, so the people using it for this will never be limited by that.
As to the type of raid spawn mechanics, there are likely to be a number of different systems employed, for different purposes. Encounters designed for all to participate will likely be the kind of thing that spawns in the open - so that all can participate easily. Raid encounters that spawn in dungeons (which we know will be a thing) are more for individual guild participation (and guild competition). Obviously, it is the latter ones here that I am referring to.
This is also why abusing a summons (if it were in game) would be the only way to kill this content. My expectation of these encounters is that Intrepid will have them spawn at specific and set times during each servers prime time. There is also likely to be a server announcement when they spawn.
However, even if they are based on a spawn window (the mechanic that has the most variation) with no notification, top end guilds will figure out their window, and have a spotter. I have yet to play a game with contested encounters that are actually worth fighting over where top end guilds haven't always known they were up with 2 minutes of them spawning - so this aspect of it is already established.
From there, it is simply a matter of who gets there in force first. Obviously, the way to do that is to use the summons, if it is in the game.
As to the market aspect, the reason the family summons is useful is that it will allow you to transport finished items and coin in either direction, without the requisite time investment in traveling. It is the ability to avoid having to transport products from one market to the other that is the abuse here. The very least this does is give players access to markets that should require a significant time investment and risk (via PvP) to be able to access.
If a player wanted access to all five metropolis markets, that would likely take a major portion of their play time to accomplish without the summons (the idea of seperate markets would suggest that they don't expect players to sell in all markets). With a summons, it is something they can dedicate the last 10 minutes of their play time to.
With this one, there is also the likely need for citizenship in the node you want to sell in - which means this exploit is likely to be a collaberation between multiple players with different products to sell. This also totally negates all potential restrictions like character level, family size, cooldowns etc.
Thing is, Ashes is designed around the notion of space and location being important. As long as players are able to negate distance, there will be ways to abuse it that go against the idea and spirit of the game.
But wouldn't that include if you have planned to summon your friend when he gets home from work?
I mean, that is organization, of sorts.
Other than assuming that this won't make it to the game, I would have to assume you would have the choice - or perhaps you even summon yourself to your family members (would make more sense to do it that way - not that it makes any sense at all).
What I mean is the intent and use in a guild setting for the purposes of fast traveling your entire guild or large parts of it to a single point.
The rule is more of a joke than a suggestion this would make things needlessly difficult for the moderation team.
Yeah, that's the way we did it in ESO. Meant you could just port to a guildie to help them out. Also meant that you could unlock all the high-end zones on a brand new character just by picking someone that happened to be there at the time. ESO wasn't so bothered about the whole "distances" thing.
Indeed.
And in a game like that, it makes perfect sense to have a summons like that.
My suggestion to people that need a feature like this in a game is to play a game where a feature like this makes sense - which is clearly not Ashes.
This is no different to suggesting to people that refuse PvP in all forms that maybe Ashes isn't the game for them.