Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
Ok, I thought it would be more complex, since that can very easily be circumvented by the game developers.
Nagash do you know the scene from Penguins from Madagaskar, where the musician plays the background music in the alley while they fight?
Thats us.
Made it into a GIF:
The problem with this is that in the previous threads, the ones where myself and a number of other posters here got together and came up with a workable solution, the one Steven mentioned earlier in this thread, is that a part if that suggestion was that the data not be made available until the pull had finished. As such, it simply couldn't be used as a real time tool.
Sure, almost every tracker out there right now is able to be used in real time, but that is only because they are able to get information in real time.
I would label a PvE player that used a combat assistant as a cheater as well, which is why I am happy to point to WoW raids as being a poor example of the content type, and that games raiders as being a poor example of the player niche.
We are basically Statler and Waldorf
my dps was low for a while but was getting better and better If I would of known how much better I needed to get that would of saved me a lot of trouble.
Another thing is dps meters mostly only show dps so it becomes the metric for performance. But if there was a performance tracker or combat tracker and dps was just a part of that report then most likely not have such a toxic effect.
How are people that have low dps going to get better if they do not know their dps is low. And weather you have a dps meter or not low dps is still an issue.
Trial and error is the best way to figure out things out or live runs, but that can be very time consuming. And it is not peoples idea of fun.
The problem with this statement is that if you are somewhat competative, you will do your best to improve. I think what many people want is a good mmo where you don't rely on tools but rather play the game in it's "pure form" to figure out what works or not.
I won't say combat tracker, dmg meter or similar tools (implemented or not) has the same function as dbm in wow but it has the same result. It's so powerful that if you ignore it you and your guild will fall behind. In other words, if you want to be competative you can't afford not to use it.
Well said.
It is not the "somewhat competitive" people that this makes a difference to.
What I've been suggesting would see people play the game as per what you are calling it's "pure form", the difference is that after each encounter, should you chose to, you can then more easily go back and analyze how things went, and potentially make changes to your gear, your build, how you played the class, how you took on the encounter, what ever you think is needed.
Then, next time you come up against that mob, you will once again play the game int it's "pure form". This may or may not be true, but is only relevent in a discussion as to whether combat trackers will exist or not.
That isn't what this discussion is - they absolutely will exist.
This discussion is (or was) about trying to get the single best version of combat trackers possible, which could only be possible if they were implemented directly in to the games client.
I'm likely to be using a combat tracker while the game is still in alpha (potentially even while the game is still in alpha 1), based on progress that has taken place since the comments earlier in this thread.
- Only the leader/officers can see it.
- Guilds have to put points into certain perks to unlock it (give and take)
- Guilds can decide themselves to use or not.
- It will not affect the open world or random groups at all
- The perk only works within your guild so you cannot judge a 3th party member in your group.
I still think this is the middle way and best solution to please everyone.
As guilds can currently focus on passive buffs and growth and have to pick one of the two to focus on a 3th option like this wouldn't do any harm
+
Steven already confirmed combat logs, so I think the discussion is over
So I guess this discussion can be closed, one is a proposal and the other is already confirmed
The core question from the maker of this discussion is: Will/should combat tracker, dps meter or similar tools be allowed? This question is what I have tried to answer so far in all my posts here. Feel free to answer my statement again, please.
And to answer your quote about combat trackers: "They absolutely will exist." Allow me to quote StevenSharif:
If this doesn't directly contradict your statement, please elaborate. I don't wish to speculate wether he can enforce this or not. If he feel confident it's possible, I'll give him a chance to prove it.
We are talking about a game that has consequenses, and don't seek to please everyone. If you are in a 1v1, siege, public dungeon, world pvp or caravan fight you potentially stand to lose something. You are competing against other players, neighboring nodes, guilds and cities, whether you like it or not. And what do people do to prevent losing? Whatever they think is needed.
Because most people don't like the idea of losing. I suspect it might has to do with pride or not to be seen as less among their friends, guild members and enemies. Combat tracker makes a difference to everyone, even the casuals. Why? Because eventually someone they fight will have reaped the benefits from it. It will create a distinction between those who have used the tool and those who haven't. And those who haven't, have a greater chance of losing in the near or distant future. Making it more of a necessity than a choise.
Even in a casual friendly game like wow you see casuals taking the time to find, install and learn how to use addons. If combat tracker shows to be one of the best tools in AoC when it comes to improving your outcome, we see the possibility that most competative- and many casual players will make use of it. Even more true if it's incorporated and easy to use.
So, everyone will have to download it, no matter what you feel about them.
3rd party apps are banned
If there are combat logs, it's impossible to not have a Combat Tracker. You just upload the file to a server and the server does the calculation. Intrepid can't control that.
You won't see in game, but it will be there. I think that quote from Steven cleared things a lot.
It would seem he doesn't want to have an in game tracker constantly telling your DPS, but you will have the log to check after the fight.
On a side note. A game with a sub fee should have quite a lot less toxicity by default. People who are willing to pay money to play a game will naturally be more invested in playing rather than trolling. I've played pretty much every main stream MMO since the days of vanilla EQ and it just seems that sandbox MMOs have a much MUCH more adult player base. I really don't think a DPS meter is an issue and honestly think it adds a lot more to the game than people realize.
Edit: I should also mention that I think the game shouldn't necessarily include a DPS meter but rather allow some sort of 3rd party mod as an option
I actually like the idea of an 'after action report' implementation if a combat tracker was indeed to be implemented.
I dislike the idea of immediately knowing exactly how your performance is shifting from moment to moment, and being able to review a pull rather than measure in real time opens up avenues for more skillful analysis as opposed to relying on the meter to tell you how efficient you're being in a given moment.
All I will say is that obviously people will try to make them, we should all know this. This means it is essentially a battle of wits/ability between groups that will make them, and staff at Intrepid - as well as any firm they may contract this out to.
There are three groups that I know of that are working on a combat tracker for Ashes, two of which I am following closely.
Of the two that I am following closely, having seen the legitimate work they do, I wouldn't ever bet against then succeeding. The fact that they are able to implement a combat tracker without the constraints they face in the work they do daily means it's essentially like it's own game to them.
The third group, the one I no longer associate with, their tactics in previous games have left me not wanting to associate with them at all. These tactics have always proven successful, but I do not at all believe the ends justify the means.
Steven specifically said they expect to be able to prevent the majority of third party combat trackers, not all of them.
Does that mean we can't open the log file in Notepad?
Honestly, the comment that there will be combat logs seems to me like it will be a bait and switch. Combat logs in an MMO are an established thing, a specific thing, and I don't see Ashes having them at all.
My assumption is that by "combat log", Steven means a tree that will fight back after you cut it down.
Uh... Have you ever heard of World of Warcraft, upon which basically the entire conversation is predicated?
That is how the majority if combat trackers work, absolutely.
The people making the two I am following are assuming there will not be any logs, and so are taking other routes.
GW2 is an example of a game that didn't allow combat trackers at all on release, but players made one for it anyway, even without logs.
If encounters are designed primarily around exceeding mechanically per player then DPS shouldn’t have much of an exaggerated focus as it does in some other games. I know in WoW bosses have enrage timers and occasionally some additional monsters need to be bursted down in boss fights but these things are what the game is balanced around. If the game doesn’t have things which create major urgency on how quickly players are damaging down bosses and monsters then the need to focus so dramatically on DPS shouldn’t really be there either, not for only a singular player but the whole group.
In all of the actual good raiding guilds I’ve participated in, the only people holding us back were typically those too focused on their damage rather than avoiding standing in the fiery shit.
This conversation would be a lot more beneficial after we get a larger scope for the dynamics of boss and mob encounters.
The problem I have with this is that if encounters are *not* designed around the need for players to exceed mechanically - as you put it - then those players that do exceed mechanically will not find any challenge. Basically, the game can not reward good players in regards to PvE unless there is a need for players to actually be good.
On the other hand, if players are required to be good, then a combat tracker is needed in order to objectively assess what is and isn't good. That is straight up poor guild leadership. No other excuse.
Good guilds don't let players get away with this kind of behavior. If players are doing this, then you set up the parse to show the how much damage is taken from standing in that fiery shit, so you can show the whole raid how bad these players are at doing the thing that they need to get better at.
Most players only need to be embarrased in front of their friends like this once before they stop.
Even in games where combat trackers are not heavily used (Archeage), players still don't get out of that fiery shit just the same as they do in games with heavy combat tracker use.
You can blame the players involved here, you can blame the guild leadership, but you can't blame combat trackers for this when they are the best tool you could possibly ask for to get rid of this behavior - but only if you know how to use it properly.
That would be the worst result for all players involved - but seems to be the likely outcome.
Everything I could have come here to say, and more.
The problem is, there will still be combat trackers.
Well a good balance would be somewhere inbetween having good raid-wide DPS and having good mechanical skills, my point here was that it makes sense to create encounters that mostly focus on requiring players to have to match the difficulty of these mechanics to actually kill the boss rather than be in a DPS rush to down it. As far as I can recall also, Steven has said that the quality of the loot that you get from killing raid bosses or difficult monsters is dependent on how fast you actually kill these monsters which means that there is definitely incentive for players to keep getting better and not settle with just being able to eventually kill it after X minutes and get the worst quality gear possible but there's also not an absolute barrier to entry requirement which would deter the more casual playerbase and prevent them from completing this content.
You can say what you want but that behaviour to me is the worst form of leadership, why would you purposefully embarrass a guildmate infront of the rest of the team for getting too carried away with their damage. A healthy guild would mention this to them and let them know what they've done wrong in private, this is a game not military camp and I prefer the people I interact with in game to treat other players like people instead of a tool to advance themselves. You can have a competent raid team without resorting to that.
I'm not blaming anything in particular, combat trackers do facilitate toxicity and that's not something you can dispute. Obviously toxic players will be toxic players no matter what in my opinion and I'm completely impartial and uncaring whether there are ways to monitor encounters or not. I think the stance of 'Not allowing DPS meters because they are toxic' is inaccurate, it's a metric that isn't totally necessary to have which facilitates toxic people to continue to be toxic and taking away that ability as much as possible is fine by me.