Thoughts on inventory management in mmorpgs

I'm curious to get your thoughts on this, as a lot of games like ESO and GW2 offer vast amounts of storage space for materials and items, as well as quick ways of accessing these items whenever you want. I personally dislike having too much storage space as I feel it detracts from the sense of adventure that is important in any RPG.

Do you think having lots of inventory space and quick ways to access it away from town enhances or detracts from the gameplay experience?

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phdmonster

I don't like having too much inventory or stash space, let alone infinite amount of it. ESO offers infinite amount of crafting inventory if you sub, which basically makes the game playable. It was basically a Bag of Holding (for the classic rpg people) and you could access those materials from anywhere.

Probably an item system that i liked the most is Lineage 2 - it was weight based i think and how much you could carry i think depended on things like race and class. It has unlimited space in terms of slots (i think), but once you exceeded the weight limit you slow down and at one point you would be unable to move. Each item or stack of materials takes 1 slot as well and i don't recall having stack limits for items. You could literally stack thousands of Bones (a material) on a single slot if you wanted. Quest items and drops were separated in different tabs and quest items didn't count towards space or weight limits. in L2 you had to go to town to do everything. There was no way to chest mails, put or buy items from the AH (I don't even remember there being an AH), you went back, stashed your gold or materials to reduce weight and went to the central square in Dion/Giran to shop around for items and consumables.

I don't like what WoW did with their inventory management - well, buy a bigger backpack and have more space. Carry a submarine in it if you want to cuz there is literally no limit to how much or what you can put in there.

I do not want to be able to access my stashes, bank or anything like that unless i am next to an NPC that provides that service. If I can do that, just give us a raid finder, a global AH and the ability to put items on the AH from anywhere and call the game 'WoW: But Better'.

Kreed

Gear storage, resource storage and crafting storage is always an issue in every game, for all the earlier years of MMO's it was restrictive, work around's like alts holding extra storage was a painful and wasteful experience. Constantly flipping back and forth through the multiple alts mailing the ingredient back and forth was just wasteful. Character slots of alts that were used only for storage were wasted.

Games who opened up storage by increasing stack amounts and bank space made things less of a struggle and offered more convenience. I prefer the ability to summon a banker to me, a merchant to sell crap to and a bag to stack all the resources into that are gathered. But if I have to go back to town to unload that's fine to as long as I can store and save the crap up.

Noaani

I wouldn't personally mind having a whole lot of storage space available to me, as long as the items in storage were where they were.

Basically, if I put items in storage in one city, I shouldn't be able to use them in another.

If I am crafting in my house, I am ok with having access to materials stored in that house or on my character, but I shouldn't have access to materials in other houses, or in other forms of storage.

So, I am all for lots of storage, but not for quick and easy ways to access it.

What I would say is that if there are multiple areas that a player could store items, it would be great if there was a master inventory list somewhere.

Caeryl

I hate it so much, but I know it’s necessary to limit inventory size.

ESO’s Buy-to-Play, Play-to-Pay system is godawful. The sub is “optional” but there’s almost more material types than there is storage space so you have to sub to have any space at all. If you’re gonna apply storage limits, they should have the same potential cap for everyone.

Some basic QoL things that make inventory management less painful are high quantity stack limits, having designated slots for gear so they don’t take parts of your inventory space when equipped, and storage logs so you know where you stored something even if you have to travel to its specific location to get it.

Jubilum

I'm all about keeping my personal inventory as empty as possible. A decent size bank vault that can be expanded for a nominal fee to store rarely used and rare items. I need my big storage in my house for resources, potions, extra gear and weapons, buffs, spare mounts, event costumes, and all the other crap you tend to accumulate.

Kohl

I hope they add mount storage space. That's all.

CaptnChuck

I doubt there will be a lot of space for resources as if you did have a lot of space, why would you have mules and caravans in the game?

I'd assume that only high level gatherers will be able to expand their inventory slots for resources.

Aeri

Edit: Just read through the 'Storage' section of the wiki, which basically made my entire post irrelevant.

noaani wrote: »

I wouldn't personally mind having a whole lot of storage space available to me, as long as the items in storage were where they were.

Basically, if I put items in storage in one city, I shouldn't be able to use them in another.

Based on the wiki, storage should mostly be like this. If I'm reading things correctly, anything deposited in a warehouse in one node will only be available in that node.

Kohl wrote: »

I hope they add mount storage space. That's all.

The wiki says that some mounts will be considered mules, and will have ~10x the storage space of a player's inventory.

CaptnChuck wrote: »

I doubt there will be a lot of space for resources as if you did have a lot of space, why would you have mules and caravans in the game?

I'd assume that only high level gatherers will be able to expand their inventory slots for resources.

Per the wiki, there will likely be some forms of player backpacks that will be better for carrying resources/gatherables.

Roko

As we know there are 2 limiters planned to be applied to inventory in ashes. Some things like gatherables, processed goods and really anything that has to do with the caravan system is going to be limited by weight while the rest of the stuff is weightless.

If I understand correctly we are talking about backpack space which limits the carry capacity of weightless things only and is expanded by purchasing bigger backpacks from crafters.

If that’s the case I am all for having a backpack capacity to be as large as possible. I want to be able to take many different mounts, costumes, and completed items like backup gear sets with me when I go out wandering.

I think we will need separate tools to perform different things, not to mention backups for those tools if they break in the middle of the adventure, or in the middle of gathering a rare gatherable. We might even want to carry gear with different kinds of resistances or abilities for a single dungeon that has some requirements for cold resistances against one boss or fire resistances against another.
We will need to carry utility things to find where we are going, consumables for buffs like food, scrolls, potions, and many many things.

So ashes being a game with hardly any fast travel, many threats out there in the world, and ever changing situations that call for different equipment. Means when you head out. If you want to be prepared. You need to take with you loads of things to be ready for what you may encounter out there.

So in conclusion my opinion is that the “weightless things grid space” (backpack capacity) should start somewhere between 50 and 100 slots and be upgradeable to like 300 slots by purchasing more advanced backpacks from crafters with later expansions pushing that to numbers like 600 slots.

McShave

I like WoW's bags that held specific crafting materials. I didn't like that it took up a whole bag slot, but it would be good if it was a inventory item that held some amount of ore, or wood, or fur. Also limit it to a specific progression level of profession (gathering item bag for gatherers, processing item bag for processors, crafting item bag for crafters).

Taipan

phdmonster wrote: »

I don't like having too much inventory or stash space, let alone infinite amount of it. ESO offers infinite amount of crafting inventory if you sub, which basically makes the game playable. It was basically a Bag of Holding (for the classic rpg people) and you could access those materials from anywhere.

Probably an item system that i liked the most is Lineage 2 - it was weight based i think and how much you could carry i think depended on things like race and class. It has unlimited space in terms of slots (i think), but once you exceeded the weight limit you slow down and at one point you would be unable to move. Each item or stack of materials takes 1 slot as well and i don't recall having stack limits for items. You could literally stack thousands of Bones (a material) on a single slot if you wanted. Quest items and drops were separated in different tabs and quest items didn't count towards space or weight limits. in L2 you had to go to town to do everything. There was no way to chest mails, put or buy items from the AH (I don't even remember there being an AH), you went back, stashed your gold or materials to reduce weight and went to the central square in Dion/Giran to shop around for items and consumables.

I don't like what WoW did with their inventory management - well, buy a bigger backpack and have more space. Carry a submarine in it if you want to cuz there is literally no limit to how much or what you can put in there.

I do not want to be able to access my stashes, bank or anything like that unless i am next to an NPC that provides that service. If I can do that, just give us a raid finder, a global AH and the ability to put items on the AH from anywhere and call the game 'WoW: But Better'.

Agreed

I dont think actual space should be as much of a limiting factor as it is in most games. However weight makes a whole lot of sense, particularly if it affects your ability to move just as it would irl. I dont say that because I want a game to replicate real world conditions but in some areas it actually goes some way to enhancing immersion because it instinctively makes sense.

I started MMO's with Shadowbane almost 20 years ago. There was no simple access to banks when you were literally a 30 minute run on foot to a "safe" bank. If you looted something of genuine value or were carrying a lot of semi valuable mats you actually had to make real choices about who you needed to help you get back to bank it and how long youd risk being out in the world before doing a bank run.

Gannito

phdmonster wrote: »

I don't like having too much inventory or stash space, let alone infinite amount of it. ESO offers infinite amount of crafting inventory if you sub, which basically makes the game playable. It was basically a Bag of Holding (for the classic rpg people) and you could access those materials from anywhere.

Probably an item system that i liked the most is Lineage 2 - it was weight based i think and how much you could carry i think depended on things like race and class. It has unlimited space in terms of slots (i think), but once you exceeded the weight limit you slow down and at one point you would be unable to move. Each item or stack of materials takes 1 slot as well and i don't recall having stack limits for items. You could literally stack thousands of Bones (a material) on a single slot if you wanted. Quest items and drops were separated in different tabs and quest items didn't count towards space or weight limits. in L2 you had to go to town to do everything. There was no way to chest mails, put or buy items from the AH (I don't even remember there being an AH), you went back, stashed your gold or materials to reduce weight and went to the central square in Dion/Giran to shop around for items and consumables.

I don't like what WoW did with their inventory management - well, buy a bigger backpack and have more space. Carry a submarine in it if you want to cuz there is literally no limit to how much or what you can put in there.

I do not want to be able to access my stashes, bank or anything like that unless i am next to an NPC that provides that service. If I can do that, just give us a raid finder, a global AH and the ability to put items on the AH from anywhere and call the game 'WoW: But Better'.

L2 has the best storage system, it is not infinite, but it is enough, and it forced you to organize all your materials very well and think about your next crafting move. you also had a place in every city to access the warehouse.

Leonerdo

There should be limits to space, but I shouldn't have to fight with that limit every single day. I think it's healthy to ask the players to organize their inventory/bank every once in a while and force them to Do Something with all the crap they collect, or risk running out of space.

You should be able to go off and adventure all day and pick up lots of cool stuff, without worrying about space or running back to town to deposit it every hour. But you shouldn't be able to carry Everything You Own with you at all times. You should be able to store all kinds of crap "just in case", but if you do that a lot, you might have to clean out your bank once a month or so.

I think those are reasonable middle-grounds that encourage players to keep their shit somewhat organized, rather than piling up stuff up forever, and forgetting that 90% of it even exists.
___________________

In terms of convenience: We already know that in Ashes, storage will be local, and you actually have to go a node or freehold to store or retrieve stuff. So when you're in the field, all you have access to is your backpack and mount. This is just a sensible structure to keep gameplay simple and intentional. You take only what you need with you when adventuring. And inventory management/commerce happens only in towns/freeholds.

The cost of moving materials around is a core part of the economy and PvP gameplay, so obviously that can't be compromised. So materials cannot by any means "teleport". You have to move it all manually. But paying to mail finished items around is probably acceptable, since they aren't a part of the caravan system.

I would personally like some inventory management shortcuts. One of my favorite things about GW2 is that little button to "deposit all materials", without having to click each one individually. Anything to minimize the amount of clicking-and-dragging icons around, since I don't consider that to be valuable gameplay. (But again, these functions should only be available in-town.)
___________________

Weight limits for materials are fine. They just exist so that carrying a lot of materials requires a mule/caravan. Which makes those materials more visible and vulnerable for open-world PvP. I don't have much experience with that, so I can't guess what a good tuning balance would be. But some kind of weight system makes sense.

Allowing people to buy expansions to their inventory is not that important to me. I guess it has value as a progression system for new players. As you get deeper into the MMO, and participate in more systems, you're going to need more space. Inventory space should attempt to follow that curve, so there's always a sensible limit (again, to encourage people to actually care about all the crap they're hoarding). So I think inventory expansion should be limited but free -- unlocked as you progress from newbie to veteran. Every 10 levels perhaps.

Jxshuwu

I believe there's two main things mmo's use to cap out how many items one can carry.

1: Weight limit
2: Inventory space limit

They both follow a similar principle, at a certain amount of items you can't carry anymore because either you'll be overweight or you don't have space anymore.

In my opinion, both should be able to be countered by the use of items/mounts. Like specific gear or mounts to increase the Weight limit or being able to store items in a mount's inventory.

One big issue i have with both of these, is that they can easily be implemented to be frustrating as hell.
You shouldn't give an mmo a small inventory, and throw 1000 items at the player. That's just annoying.
You also shouldn't give a player alot of inventory spots, but you get overweight so quickly you barely even get to use 10% of it.

Also, hard-caps on weight limit is shit. Make players progressively walk slower, don't just hit em heavy when they hit a certain point.

George_Black

I don't like "Inventory is full", nor do I like inventory expansion systems, no matter how it's implemented. Inventory should be infinate. Chest since we housing is another story..

I like infinate space but weight restrictions, except for currency.
You shouldn't run around with 1000 healing potions.
You shouldn't run around with 500 roasted chickens.
You shouldn't run around with 5 gear sets.
Arrange your bag before heading out.

You shouldnt run around with 5k iron ore.
You shouldnt run around with 5k animal skin etc etc.

I also like when some races -> dwarves can carry more stuff. In L2 we would unload all our consumables on our Scavenger (dwarf class that gets extra materials from dead mobs) and camp a zone for days.

TL;DR I dont like limited bag space. I like weight restrictions except for currency. Increasing bag space is tedious, weight restrictions enable you to get organized before heading out.

akabear

I got annoyed at first with New World`s inventory / storage that, for someone that enjoys crafting, was quite limited. But what I took away from it was for the player it made you conscious of what to keep and what to discard and for the economy created a material sink that I guess would keep the economy active and gathering relevant.

I think ESO`s most popular addons was a good indicator of what the community would like to see for that game..

For the inventory, I would like to see a number of ways to filter and arrange the contents and perhaps even sub-folder/bag/containers.

Such filters that could be related to the nodal alliance as weight, quantity, value, grade, level.

I really like the idea that for an individual carrying goods will be somewhat reflected in what they wear.

And I really do like to see encumbrance impact speed and some variance between classes.

Gubiak

Personally not a fan of weightbased inventories. I like how FFXIV dealt with inventory by giving limited backpack space for misc items, armoury inventory for weapons and armour and separate slots for quest/important items. One of my biggest gripes with inventory is when keys/quest items are given to the player in their normal inventory so you have to weigh pros and cons of keeping like 20 potions or a small damn key for a quest.

JamesSunderland

phdmonster wrote: »

Probably an item system that i liked the most is Lineage 2 - it was weight based i think and how much you could carry i think depended on things like race and class. It has unlimited space in terms of slots (i think), but once you exceeded the weight limit you slow down and at one point you would be unable to move. Each item or stack of materials takes 1 slot as well and i don't recall having stack limits for items. You could literally stack thousands of Bones (a material) on a single slot if you wanted. Quest items and drops were separated in different tabs and quest items didn't count towards space or weight limits. in L2 you had to go to town to do everything. There was no way to chest mails, put or buy items from the AH (I don't even remember there being an AH), you went back, stashed your gold or materials to reduce weight and went to the central square in Dion/Giran to shop around for items and consumables.

L2 didn't had unlimited slots(had 80 for all classes other than dwarfs that had 120 i think and there was methods to increase the slot limit through fishing) but 80 slots was enough for you to hardly care about while farming other than late game spots that had alot of material drop variance, it was mostly the weight system that would say when was the time to back, the only criticism i have for it was because the weight limited was based on the CON base stat and not equalized like the slots. And yes quest items having its own separate bag and holding no weight was excellent.

Vhaeyne

Here comes a opinion no one will like, but it is my true opinion on the matter.

I always wanted a MMO to simulate both encumbrance with the diablo/poe larger items take up more slots, and account for weight.

You would do this with a bag system like darkfall or uo.

I know people don't like having to manage their inventory, but things like being able to craft tiered bags of holding for you and your mount would make it so that a larger inventory is eventually possible, but must be worked for.

I am the type of D&D character that keeps good track of their inventory, and actually puts things in bags in a way that they would realistically fit correctly. I feel like I am cheating if I just assume I have enough arrows.

In short I think inventory management doesn't go far enough in MMOS. It is always some lame single slot system.

zammwich

I prefer lower storage spaces, When a personal inventory is essentially endless It seems to lead to staying in one spot and grinding forever. It also diminishes the value of harvested goods which doesn't feel as satisfying when you are the one gathering things. On that note I like when the depletion of resources in an area (probably not permanently in an mmo) is a thing as it encourages exploration and discovery.

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