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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.
In-game Tutorials
Wandering Mist
Member, Founder, Kickstarter, Alpha One, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
I'm sure we've talked about this before but I'm curious to know what you would like to see in the tutorial section for Ashes. What do you think should be included? (feel free to reference other games that you thought had good tutorials).
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Comments
1. Have the tutorials offline like Elite Dangerous. (Nothing is brought into the game world from this.)
2. Have a just a detailed guild book in game as part of the menu, and no quests.
3. Don't have tutorials, and let the community figure it out. (People are just going to watch Youtube anyways)
My closing points against tutorial quests is that they take away from the open world nature of this game. Not much, but a little. I also just hate the idea of players getting rewards for tutorials, knowledge is its own reward.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
But if were going to be more in-depth, then it might be good also to have abilities to turn on/off specific tutorials.
This should also be 100% optional, though I'd personally be ok with it being required once.
It shouldn't be a curated experience like most tutorials are, as this is too far removed from what the game will be. Rather, it should be an area in which there are options that the player can take.
This tutorial could have optional aspects that cover different professions, augments, caravans and what ever other aspects are needed.
Nothing from it needs to be taken over in to the game - and probably shouldn't. Players should also be able to run this tutorial any time they wish, without needing to create a new character (there is no need for the tutorial character to be tied at all to the players characters).
I would be all for this tutorial being completely offline, as there is no specific need for it to not be. It could perhaps even being shipped with the character creator.
For the tutorials themselves, I like them stripped back - When would I use this system? What are the basic controls/terminology? Do a simple but full run through the system once, then leave me to discover/explore/research the deeper hidden mechanics of the system on my own.
One thing I appreciated from FFIV were the icons that let you know who was proficient in what, and the game encouraged you to ask these people questions. Maybe AoC could have an achievement/title for players who repeatedly complete low-level dungeons like "Dungeon Tour Guide" that lets new players know who they can ask questions.
Not this
or this
I want to use this as a springboard and say that the tutorials should be easily accessible through some sort of interface. However, this should never be forced on the player. If they have an interest in a craft or type of content they should be able to open up a tutorial for it.
I don't think the game needs a forced in-depth tutorial past basic combat training, the rest of the tutorials can be searched for by the player. If you add on little tip popups when a player first encounters a new type of content, such as entering a caravan defense/attack scenario, they can then check out the more indepth tutorial on the interface at their discretion.
Going back to the NPC it would be pretty good if the tutorials were implemented into the game rather than being a foregin pop up on the screen, 9 out of 10 I will skip those and end up looking things through reddit and the wiki since it tends to be presented in much easier to understand manner.
Yes we need a Hall of the Novice and Hall of the Intermediate to teach people not to stand in aoes. Not even joking. Some people in FFXIV are doing normal raids and still don't understand the stack markers or aoe indicators.
Plus it provides you with a good lesson on your role and it awarded you a set of gear that was really decent for that level range. (Usually around 15 was when you did your first dungeon and thus Hall of the Novice)
It should start APOC style, everything is on fire, corrupted monsters are invading the city, you are a high level player and get ready to fight, but a voice in your head tells you to rush to the divine gate, you follow the path until you encounter a few weaker monsters and corrupted humans so you get a feel on how to fight and how your skills will look like. You fight your way trough the collapsing city to the divine gate, and when you arrive a blinding light takes over and your body vanishes....then you wake up XXX years later, and the voice in your head present herself as the Goddess of Y, and explains what happened during the apocalypse and how she saved your body but being so long in stasis drained your strength, and so she commands you go back and retake the old world and are dropped to the divine gate of your choice.Now with the artisan system, you should be forced to experience a little bit of each branch trough early game quests, and then if you feel like diving deeper you can do that by yourslef.
If i recall currently(LOL i was mentor) this wasn't in the base game but came in the second expansion.
It was truly a nice idea to do this before entering the first dungeon.
What a tutorial SHOULD BE is giving a player little steps to conquer as they're already playing. You want to get to step 2? Learn to use WASD movement. Step 3? Use an ability. The tutorial should flow so well that an experienced player will already go through the steps naturally, because they're the most natural way to approach the game.
The Cuphead tutorial (known for the infamous footage) is actually an excellent tutorial. If you're a pro, you can speedrun it in seconds, while a complete beginner can concentrate on mastering each of the steps that will help them play the game successfully later on.
I was dropped right into the city of Bastok. Annnnnnnd, that was that.
Haha!
I didn't even know how to MOVE! It was confusing. But eventually I figured out how to type in chat and asked someone how to move. Shortly after, 2 friendly players showed up and coached me along. Giving me tips and hints and lead me around the city to various useful locations. And after about 30-40 minutes, they bid me farewell, releasing me into the wild world of Vana'diel.
As discombobulating as that experience was, it was also very memorable and fun. And felt warming that other's would stop what they are doing to help a newbie out.
I prefer no tutorials.
We are arriving on Verra as newborn-pups...and must figure out how to survive on our own, or alongside our fellow friends that have exited the Gates alongside us.
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Steven Sharif is my James Halliday (Anorak)
“That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.”
-HPL
When it comes to artisan paths, this should be something taught through a quest chain. This should be an EPIC quest chain that includes lore, helping/working with others, and send you on missions to kill specific lvl threats.
A game with as many systems as Ashes definitely needs a tutorial of sorts. Imagine trying to figure out the hybrid combat system with zero explanation. It doesn't need to be super extensive, just a couple sentences to get the player started. There should also be an in-game "glossary" of sorts to look up terms, systems, abilities, classes, lore... Anybody that's played games like Crusader Kings III or Civilization will know how great these things can be. A glossary would allow people to quickly look up in game what the difference is between a scientific node and an economic node. This way people can easily learn in-game if they want to, without a super extensive tutorial to cover every detail.
While you are offline, a very brief Verra lore will be told to you, and you will be taught only basic operations, including combat.
And if I want to know about efficient crafting, for example, I prefer to be able to get non-meta information in the form of specialized books. 👀
I've never played an MMO before, but I've played a few hundred hours of Kenshi, and I've been knocked down by goats and scavenged the belongings of criminals killed by guards, so I know how fun it can be to live in a world of exploration!
And in an MMO, you can ask other players for help.
Maybe that's why players communicate so well with each other, and maybe that's how you find your future best friend!
Tutorials: None or minimal.
They can easily become a waste of dev resource as many players will ignore them.
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Ask your official content creators to do videos on various orientation subjects and launch an Intrepid copy of those videos (permissions vs. referral money) when the player clicks on them in the HELP menu.
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If you get the players used to asking content creators then you farm out front line support to the content creators (they get referrals!), which takes some workload off Intrepid staff.
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You might even get players to read the wiki for help. Imagine that.
You are right about that. No other MMO I have ever played required the players to teach each other so much. The lack of hand holding really helped with both the sense of accomplishment when actually doing something, and the socialization. I met a lot of people just asking them basic things like: "why are you in this area at your level? Ohh there is a job quest here? cool. Sure i'll help." boom, just like that you are making a new friend.
Tutorials shift the game slightly toward being a solo experience, and I will never be in favor of that. If I wanted to play a solo game I would.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
I see where you're coming from, but at the same time if you have absolutely no tutorial at all, you can potentially create a barrier to entry that relies on the community to fix.
Yes, and as I stated in my video on this (thanks to everyone for your replies by the way), the absolute minimum I would include in the beginning is:
character movement
camera control
accepting and completing quests
basic combat
Everything else can be left to the player to learn or given in an offline information codex (ala ffxiv).
So, I do believe there should be the capacity to redo a tutorial at a later date and even turn on particular areas too if you want a refresher.
I think that can be good for the community though. In my experience the more obtuse the new player experience is the more helpful veteran players are.
I thought about it more. I think the fairest compromise would be a in game manual. That way there is always an official explanation of how things are expected to work that can be referred to at anytime, but new players would still be likely to just ask questions about how do things in world or local chat.
Most people are going to just click though those quests any way then ask questions later.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
I would initially assume that it is all intuitive enough for me not to need hand holding and skip the tutorial. Later you might find me asking guild mates or googling what I need, when I need it.
I respect that others may prefer to play through the tutorial.
Maybe a poll would give a better idea of how many would use the tutorial?
1) I will play through the tutorial fully
2) I will skip to play through only the more complex functions in the tutorial
3) I will skip the tutorial and find out what I need to know elsewhere