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Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest news on Alpha Two.
Check out general Announcements here to see the latest news on Ashes of Creation & Intrepid Studios.
To get the quickest updates regarding Alpha Two, connect your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
Playerbase stagnated in WoTLK then started dropping thereafter.
The majority began leaving lol and the majority began saying "no thanks" when people tried to get them interested in the game. During Vanilla/ TBC you could convince people to join the game. After TBC you couldn't. After WotLK they just started leaving.
Easy mode and making multiple versions of the dungeons/ raids is part of what killed it. Just make it hard and give something to do to everyone else. Make the threat real.
Trivializing content in a WORLD is what kills the World aspect of it. Don't gamify/ GIMMICK a World. People want the World not the gimmick of difficulty/ convenience.
Sure, there wont be a lot of people in the game that sont participate at all in crafting - but that isnt the point.
The point is thatDygz said the game will be designed around 100% participation - which Ashes will not, and no MMO ever has been.
Even then that wasnt the actual point, it was an illustration of the point. That original point being Dygz suggesting that Intrepid inplementing a combat tracker to the game would mean all content would be designed around 100% of people using that tracker.
Very few modern MMO's these days even assume 100% participation in their combat system (note; I am not talking about L2 here). Even back in 2004, EQ2 didnt expect everyone to participate in combat. The developers knew there would be people only interested in crafting, and people only interested in decorating houses (these people because some of the richest in the game).
We can go even further than this, many games have various consumables found within that game. If Dygz suggestion were to be true, the fact that developers add these consumables to the game would then mean that 100% of content needs to be designed around players using them.
My point was - and still is - that the comment of 100% content being designed with tracker use in mind if trackers are in the game is just outright incorrect.
Actually, it's always random people that push this thread to the top - usually people that were not signed up on these forums at the time of the post before the one they made.
I have personally never posted in this thread unless there is a post that I feel warrants a reply, and also have never posted to it if the thread is not on the front page (and rarely if it is not in the top half of the front page).
The reason the same arguments are being made is because those arguments have not been rebuffed.
People want to say trackers cause toxicity, yet no one can explain why some games with high tracker use have low toxicity, and some games with low tracker use have high toxicity.
The problem there isn't that we are making the same arguments, it is that no one has a response to the arguments made - yet people against trackers continue to post without making any actual reasoned arguments against this point.
Trackers favor reason.
Lack of trackers favor emotions (good and bad).
Trackers help to see things clearly, removing the false sense of superiority and possibility to blame others.
The word "toxic" is used by those who cannot adapt and cry. They leave and play other MMOs.
While I appreciate your reasoning here, this would then lead to toxicity in games like WoW not being possible.
If you look over all MMO's, there are games with low tracker use and high toxicity (Archeage), games with low tracker use and low toxicity (early FFXIV), games with high tracker use and high toxicity (WoW), and games with high tracker use and low toxicity (EQ2, among many others).
The only constant among all MMO's is that trackers have no objective impact on over all levels of toxicity in MMO's.
So are you hoping for 0 tracker?
Why not 'Inspect'?
The problem with this system is that it won't stop people using third party trackers.
While you may disagree, I am of the opinion that if Intrepid add anything to the game in this regard, it should be in an attempt to replace third party trackers - essentially make it so players do not feel the need to use them at all.
You inspect and you see clearly either immediately or over time their Health, Mana, "Aura" size and intensity which represents their Level, Rough Damge # to Stuff, Rough Healing # of Stuff, and whatever else I guess like Archetype, Sub-spec; All of it sort of Fading in or being rough estimates.
When in a Group with Someone or Family especially; the Inspect happens to all of them (up to 8) and those of similar Class/ Class Focus (magic or physical, melee or ranged) have their info of higher visibility but you can still focus on 1.
This would play out pretty interesting IMO.
When being Inspected you'd have an indication of this and the option to try and hide your info if you're a Rogue maybe Mage [click on the Eye indicator], or simply Line of Sight block them (including blocked by other players I guess).
Who digs it
While this may or may not be viable for Ashes, it isn't a replacement at all for a combat tracker. That is all I am trying to say.
This existing or not existing is not going to change anyone wanting to use or not wanting to use a combat tracker.
I think for the most part it would replace trackers but updates to other player/entity health/ mana don't necessarily need to reach the Client in the forum of precise numbers. After 2 hits to something you may be updated on a rough health change rather than 1; depending on your Inspecting for instance.
Most MMOs just don't give a shit lol not a programming issue
Now you're just being delusional; of course it would affect whether people wanted third party trackers or not. Having a good idea of what people are doing is plenty for most people.
Having a good idea of what people are doing is not the point of a tracker.
In fact, if you are using a tracker during combat, you are using the tracker wrong.
You just gonna leave that last line there without elaborating? How would Inspecting to see heal and damage output not be used to do stuff better; unless you think Trackers do something they don't?
The difference between a tracker and seeing people do damage/ heal is that one does the work of figuring out what they're doing over time, and the other doesn't.
No one has explained whether their position is to have no indication of other's damage/ healing so your positions have remained ambiguous.
Add up the numbers. No tracker for you.
I want - and will have - a combat tracker in Ashes that will allow me to analyze the games combat system, create builds for others players, find bugs and report them to Intrepid with objective data, and analyze and defeat content.
None of that involves having an indication of what other people are doing during combat - because that is a misuse of a combat tracker and I simply do not care at all about it. In fact, if you take my suggestion in full (guild based tracker), a part of it involves the tracker not giving players any data on a fight until that fight is over - regardless of who wins or loses. That is because that information isn't important at all at that point in time.
If you are paying any attention at all to a combat tracker during combat, you are using your tracker wrong.
I haven't gone through 150 pgs lol.
And turning the game into a data analyst's hobby is not good game design.
The presence or lack of information is a design choice; and playtesting is generally cheap and easy and doesn't require live entity/player ##s but placeholder values.
So I say no; it's a bad idea.
Saying it's a wrong use of information in combat is also BS.
If you don't know a target has high physical resistance then notice the low physical damage to them you can respond/ react. It requires decent Multi-tasking and multi-tasking can be rewarded in Live Combat; who is to say differently without being petty?
It's part of the premise of MMORPG Video Game rather than the premise of Data Analyst.
The thing is, this hasn't happened in any other MMO, despite every MMO having access to trackers. As such, it isn't really something that you would need to be concerned with.
As to your comment in relation to using a tracker to notice low physical damage - you shouldn't need a tracker to tell you that. The games combat feedback system should be able to tell you that just fine.
I can see the Inspect being a Cone of Vision as well; with those near closer to literal values and those far away something like "dying/not dying". Ranger might have better Range on this,
Cleric may see Health better,
Mage may see Mana better (please no mana on physical archetypes),
Figher may see Level better,
Tank may feel their Damage better (jk. . am I?),
Rogue may see. . . . uh. Rogue may be unseen and notice when inspected better than others.
Bard is whatever dunno he's playing a Rhythm Game. Is 'seen' better?
and Summoner gets to see if someone is recently summoned/ portaled.
That's just a rough outline but the important thing to note is that each Archetype may have access to different information about others; which can be the basis for many Designs.
MMO players using Trackers and your complete explanation of how you use them illustrated how Other MMOs are a Data Analyst's Hobby. Get real.
And yeah I said a tracker shouldn't be used for noticing different damage to targets but that information stay rough estimates and in-game for their intended purpose and no further, [further being data analyst territory].
Now on to your comment.
When you said that you would consider it bad game design to turn MMO's in to a data analysists hobby, my assumption was that you meant that it would be bad to require this of all players. This is a notion I agree with, absolutely.
However, if your comment is that those that enjoy data analysis simply shouldn't have the opportunity to do so at all in an MMO, I have to disagree with your stance here.
My assumption of what you were saying is that the game shouldn't force people in to doing something they may not enjoy. This is why I agreed with your comment based on what it was I thought you were saying.
Would it be accurate to state your opinion here as "not everyone likes data analysis, so it shouldn't be a factor in Ashes"?
AH I SEE THE BIG EXPAND YES YES
fixed it
Data analysis can happen it just shouldn't be given tools that remove all the work of it.
I'd also prefer that every NPC has variable health and resistances (in the micro sense if they're similar enough) that fits their visage. Buffalo are tanky, small spiders are not for example.
Comparing damage is easy. You have 3 mages use their firebolt on similar mobs till they die. You compare how many it takes to do so. You do this for multiple mobs till you get a sense of which is doing more damage on average. So 1 takes on average 4.5 bolts, another 3.9 bolts, another 5.1 bolts.
That's data anyone can analyze. It's data analysis anyone can engage with in the game. So my answer to the last line is NO.