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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
Honestly, i don't really care about streamers. As many people support them, just as many will try to do the opposite. They are an extra bit of content created by people.
As for encouraging them to go on a streamer server - i don't know how you would do that. If i was a streamer i definitely would play wherever i wanted.
I like the idea about streamer mode, but at some point their character names will become public knowledge anyway and people will be able to troll them regardless.
If streamers are on their own server, it will be a low population server by necessity - at least in comparison to other servers.
This means those watching the stream would be watching a far less interesting game than those subscribers on regular servers would be experiencing. Basically, streamers would be showing the game to their audience at it's worst.
This isn't good for anyone. It won't leave the streamer with good things to say about the gam, it won't leave their audience with good impressions of the game, and it won't even make for good stream content.
If streamers want to show this game off, they should show the game off as the bulk of the population experience it. This is far more important a con pet (to streamers, viewers, players of the game and developers of the game) than being concerned with a streamer being sniped ever could be, and the notion that an MMO (as opposed to other game genres) should not only allow - but actively enable - their game to be shown in such a poor light that is the inevitable result of a streamer only server is just asinine.
There is no point in putting any work in to making things easier for streamers unless those streamers are going to bring subscribers to the game in a long term capacity - and that won't happen if the streamers are showing a shit version of the game
If they can gather, train and equip an army and square off against another streamer's army - that's a game changer.
You're right though, if the population isn't large enough then it's not sustainable.
Don't get me wrong, I don't want streamers playing on my server either.
Thing is, if they are going to stream the game, it should be the actual game.
Since any given server will hold 10k players concurrently, meaning each server will likely be home to twice that many players, I don't see how streamers could populate that. I could see some of them getting that many people to by a cheap game and play it for 30 minutes, but I cant see them getting people to subscribe to an MMO, level up a character that will likely require months of time from the average player, and then gear that character up to be able to function in a battle like you are describing.
Most streamers in MMO's that I have played only have a few dozen (at most) players that follow them in game, even if they have a much larger stream audience.
Essentially, with that number of players, they are functioning as just a regular guild that just happens to be giving away their location to anyone that wants to know.
Having to put 100% of my brain into an MMO that's supposed to be as grindy as AoC would instantly kill any excitement I have for it. MMOs inherently have a ton of downtime such as when crafting or gathering, let alone anytime spent managing inventory, skills, housing, etc.
There's plenty of time to watch a stream, movie, show, porn...anything really when you're grinding your fishing.
https://knightsofember.com/forums/members/winner909098.54
A lot of times it's more relaxing. Get home from a long work day and don't have the time to invest in playing, throw on a stream and enjoy!
Additionally, sometimes watching other players can give you insights into strategy or playstyle. If you're not always on the grind on certain games, getting a quick update on the Meta can help.
I plan on streaming at least when I'm soloing....Obviously would deconflict with Guild before streaming any group content. But, no one really watches me stream anyway, I just do it so talking to myself for a few hours at a time doesn't seem as weird
As to the topic of streamer only servers I am a hard No. It is a terrible idea and only helps to further the divide between the actual players. If you want to stream while playing a game then go right ahead, but you need to deal with the consequences. Setting up streamer only servers sets a wildly unrealistic expectation for normal people that jump into these games, they will never have the type of game experience that these coddled streamers get. I understand the marketing aspect, it can be good publicity for a game. But again, the normal day to day people playing will Never have a similar experience and it only causes more trouble in the end.
Even so it does seem like a bad a idea to split the community from the start i mean the point of MMO is to have the community work together or against each other. MMO today you can play without ever needing to interact to another person, which kind of take away the MMO-part.
Sadly as long as there is no penalty then people will continue to streamsnipe and griefing, its juvenile but there is some who gets a kick out of it.
you mean the limited fast travel of Family Summoning your entire family every 30 min?
That is pretty limited compared to any other MMO I can think of.
It is still limited, but if it makes it to the game, that small amount of fast travel means there may as well be more, as that amount is enough to remove the advantages that not having it would have on the game - which is making place matter.
The family summons is absolutely more than enough fast travel to be able to successfully snipe a stream.
I agree, I’d rather do without family summoning. One of the selling points of the game is the lack of fast travel, and the family summoning undercuts that. But you also can’t say that because of it you no longer have limited fast travel.
Pick whatever MMO you are playing and imagine that you cut out every mode of fast travel in it (by this I mean quick automated travel, either by some kind of train/blimp/griffin or an instant teleport somewhere). Replace it with the ability to pull a small group of people (and only ever those people) to the location you are at once every 30 minutes. Then tell me that your fast travel options are the same or better.
Again, I’d rather not have family summoning, but it doesn’t suddenly give us a robust fast travel method comparable to other MMOs.
You are running a caravan, you have enough friends with you to protect against 5 or 6 other players.
A group of three or four players sees you, which is not nearly enough to be successful against you, but they all call in a friend off doing their own thing to come and attack you. All of a sudden, in a matter of seconds, they are a force that absolutely will take over your caravan.
Do you much care if those friends came to attack your caravan by a mass transit means of teleportation, or by using that once every 30 minute teleport?
The difference is totally unimportant when the outcome is the same.
In a specific niche case, yes. Also don’t forget the multiple conditions involved in when a person can be summoned. They might not be able to summon people in a moment’s notice. And if you attack them before they can summon they’re stuck because you can’t summon in combat.
In all honesty, I’m not sure the scenario you describe is really possible. I don’t think that group is going to have a chance to summon people. It would only happen if they spot you and remain unnoticed by you long enough to coordinate and then bring in their group. Which still makes the family summoning powerful in that situation, of course, but still situational.
You’re preaching to the choir if you are trying to convince me that it’s not a good thing to have in Ashes. I think it has no place in the game, and I’m still confused as to why it’s being added. It doesn’t fit in any way with the way the game is supposed to work.
I would also expect caravans to move slower than standard character run speed - let alone mount speed.
This means that group you see could simply appear to carry on about their way, stop when it of sight to summon friends, then jump on mountain in order to catch up in a matter of a minute or so.
While it is a niche case here (sort of), the summons opens up the ability for people to organize caravan ambushes covering a far larger area than they would be able to without it. This means that the scenario above absolutely will happen all the time, the only thing being the attackers planned on attacking a caravan, rather than just lucked upon one.
Yeah, developing a node with your followers would be awesome for streamers! If streamers can purchase keys to the streamer server, that they hand out to their followers (and reassign keys that get abused) - I think it's possible.
Helluva necro, but what are you reference when you say it's not over?
If it's about streamers getting sniped...that's just a risk of streaming, if you're on a public server there's no real way to fully avoid it.
Raids and dungeons would probably only be streamed while indoors so that it's more difficult to discern the location on the map.
Interesting ....