You can't practically have a unique animation for every single skill. Subtle animations and audio are enough, no need for any flips or levitation. If I played for you the casting audio of a WoW mage frostbolt, you'd recognize it if you've played the game for a month. If you see a WoW mage cast a fireball, the visual alone narrows it down enough for you to appropriately respond. Not only can your teamates and opponents then recognize those spells, neither of them interfere with the mage's vision of the battlefield either because it doesn't have a lot of movement or fx.
I dunno why they can't have a unique animation for every ability. How many abilities will each Primary Archetype have? Each ability in the Cleric Preview already has a unique animation. Same for Mage and Tank.
I just played WoW with a Mage from Dec through April. I don't recognize the audio of a Frostbolt.
I don't think I recognize the audio of any WoW abilities as a telegraph. And, I think I recognize the effects when they are activated. I don't recognize a casting telegraph.
Ashes casting telegraphs in the Archetype Previews are obvious.
In the Alpha One Preview, I definitely recognized Javelin and Onslaught when I saw them.
I don't really even pay attention to the scrolling numbers. I know I'm doing some damage and I know I'm getting some healing, but I'm really looking at my opponents' health bar and my own health bar and mana bar.
You don't need to explicitly pay attention, your brain extracts information implicitly. Even if you think it doesn't though, numbers also play an important role on impact and feel of combat. The way a big crit # pops up at you when you hit something can be very satisfying.[/quote]
No. I recognize that red numbers are happening for damage and blue numbers are happening for health.
But, I don't need to pay attention to what those numbers are. The health bars give more useful info.
Crit is nice, but I also don't need to know what the Crit number is.
Again, the health bars and mana bar give more useful info.
And...I am not paying any attention at all to my own floaty damage numbers.
I can generally tell by the camera if I'm standing in fire or something is attacking me from behind.
Just chiming in really quick to say that if you're expecting a 100+ person battle to not be chaotic you might want to alter your expectations lol
This is only 3 Archetypes in the alpha test, each with ~10 abilities, so around 30 total.
In the finished product, you're going to have 250v250 battles with countless abilities firing off from the full 8 Archetypes with their full spell lists, most which will probably be augmented and look different.
You might have 30+ different spell effects in your vicinity instead of just the two types you saw in the footage (meteors and rainbow)
Definitely expect chaos.
In SWG we had huge battles but the chaos factor was minimal. Even when we had 50 Jedi and 50 Sith on each side, we could still marshal the momentum and fight with control and efficiency. The problem right now is even the physical classes have particle effects, which, if you are a Jedi I would expect, but if you are not a Jedi just adds into the chaos. The issue is prevalent in BDO too due to the particle effects but that is even in small scale let alone the sieges.
I dunno why they can't have a unique animation for every ability. How many abilities will each Primary Archetype have? Each ability in the Cleric Preview already has a unique animation. Same for Mage and Tank.
I just played WoW with a Mage from Dec through April. I don't recognize the audio of a Frostbolt.
I don't think I recognize the audio of any WoW abilities as a telegraph. And, I think I recognize the effects when they are activated. I don't recognize a casting telegraph.
Ashes casting telegraphs in the Archetype Previews are obvious.
In the Alpha One Preview, I definitely recognized Javelin and Onslaught when I saw them.
We will have god knows how many ability with god know how many augments. What use is it to have unique animations for each one? It goes directly against clarity. You won't be able to distinguish that many so it does not provide much extra information. I guess you could just want them to look cool but I personally think animators' times can be better spent. And if you can't distinguish any casting telegraph (really?), I would put you in a small minority of players. That makes me even more confused as to why you'd want unique casting animations if you can't even distinguish between any to begin with...
No. I recognize that red numbers are happening for damage and blue numbers are happening for health.
But, I don't need to pay attention to what those numbers are. The health bars give more useful info.
Crit is nice, but I also don't need to know what the Crit number is.
Again, the health bars and mana bar give more useful info.
And...I am not paying any attention at all to my own floaty damage numbers.
I can generally tell by the camera if I'm standing in fire or something is attacking me from behind.
Again, they don't just provide information and if you don't like them then turn them off. It's not an argument against improving how the numbers are presented since they will almost certainly be in the game (at least the damage you receive). In a chaotic large scale PvP battle, it may be hard to see all the ground effects or if you're getting hit by AoE or a direct targeted damage spell. And if you're not arguing against my proposed changes then cool, no comment then.
As always, I'm very confused about what point(s) you're trying to get across or if you're just conversing with no point in mind.
the rainbow-ability is the best-looking ability ingame so far...of course, there should be some diminishing return-optics or at least options to tone down such effects especially in large-scale combats. But overall it's still very impressive.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
We will have god knows how many ability with god know how many augments. What use is it to have unique animations for each one? It goes directly against clarity.
I don't think we will have unique casting animations for augments. Augments will provide unique sfx in any case. I don't expect the Hallowed Ground from a Shadow Disciple or Protector to have a rainbow effect.
You're saying we will have "god knows how many" abilities, but, since the devs don't want us to have "god knows how many" hotbars, I don't think we will have tons of abilities compared to previous MMORPGs.
And if you can't distinguish any casting telegraph (really?), I would put you in a small minority of players. That makes me even more confused as to why you'd want unique casting animations if you can't even distinguish between any to begin with...
Pretty sure I said that can already recognize the unique casting animations in Ashes.
I said I don't recognize WoW audio casting telegraphs.
Again, they don't just provide information and if you don't like them then turn them off.
You are the one who says you don't like the scrolling numbers.
I'm saying the scrolling numbers are mostly irrelevant in Ashes...so far.
It's not an argument against improving how the numbers are presented since they will almost certainly be in the game (at least the damage you receive). In a chaotic large scale PvP battle, it may be hard to see all the ground effects or if you're getting hit by AoE or a direct targeted damage spell. And if you're not arguing against my proposed changes then cool, no comment then.
I'm just saying that the speed of those scrolling numbers will be irrelevant. Especially in a chaotic large scale battle. The health bars give better info. And it's better to improve ability sfx than it is to improve scrolling damage number speed. Effects should always be better than numbers.
That is an observation. I am not always commenting as an argument against or support for a change.
Sometimes, I'm just sharing an observation.
This is why I suggested removing the rainbow. Focusing on using a single colour, as a friendly you would see your sides spell as a yellow/gold dome that is transparent. As an enemy the same dome would be red transparent.
Yellow/Gold being positive and red being negative. Heck even green could work.
Most games abide by blues, greens, golds as friendly and oranges, reds, browns as negative.
The shimmer does not help with clutter or help with seeing through the bubble, so I would have said remove that too. It's unnecessary. I think that someone else was talking about the pillar. But again unnecessary imo.
(It's more important to see whats going on through the spell than making the VFX look special).
By using one colour, it will be far easier to implement for colourblind mode. Which is very important for modern human computer interaction. When there will be potentially 50 of these on the screen in a 250v250.
It's important for colourblind accessibility to not just rely on colour. But to also use things like symbols, numbers or patterns to convey the information.
As for knowing that seeing a red spell is benefitting your enemy, well that can be achieved in other ways. Such as seeing their health numbers going up.
There is a lot to unpack here. So let's get right into it.
The primary thing I feel you seem to be missing is the 'why' of the current format. When critiquing a professional designers work you must start with 'why did they do it this way.' Without doing this it's harder to give proper feed back because you might be trying to solve a different problem than the designer in question or you may have a valid critique but won't be able to 'reach' them because they don't know they are trying to solve the 'wrong problem'.
In this case the why of the design for the cleric spell in question is fairly clear and I have already alluded the main points in my original post so I'll be brief. 1. it must convey that the effect is an aoe buff (and is therefore of vital strategic importance) to people gathering. 2. It must cut through the clutter of war while simultaneously 3. it must not disrupt close quarter and midrange combat 4. it must somehow indicate it is friendly or foe 5. it must feel cohesive with the clerics other spells.
These are the problems the current iteration are trying to solve all at once. It's current only short coming from that list is that it lacks a clear indicator of friendly or foe. I do think IS needs to consider accessibility and add it to the list above if it isn't already. Unless you are personally colorblind, let's not get into an argument about whether or not a rainbow would even need an accessibility shift from that direction as it's not something inside of our domain so to speak. If you are, I sincerely apologize if you have been trying to explain to me that 'yes rainbows are hard to see in a dynamic environment as a person with colorblindeness'. It wasn't clear to me and I hope IS hear's your opinion on the matter.
Your proposed solutions fail to answer at least one of these questions.
A solid transparent dome has a higher chance of obscuring from a distance for example(1 and 3). You would need to increase the width of the current dome to make it more obvious to see in a crowd (a game balance issue.) The current effect serves as an artificial outline allowing it to look bigger than it is. It could also make different gear color harder to balance in a way that allows for good twitch movement tracking if you want to make it visible enough in a clash from a distance. The shimmer was a compromise between visibility, not obscuring too much, and making it clear where the effect starts from at midrange.
Making the enemies sphere a singular color addresses quick judgement of if it benefits you or not but it fails to tell you at a glance if it benefits the enemy you may be thinking of approaching (4). Relying on seeing numbers or symbols also fails to answer (1) especially in a crowded environment.
Particle effect design is a complicated task, isn't it?
But for the most part I believe one can also argue that seeing an enemies spell that has a rainbow above it can be confused by your side for being a positive spell. The argument applies both ways.
The rainbow however confuses this for both sides. Hence why in my view it's problematic from a functional standpoint. Disregarding that I am not fond of rainbows being eveywhere lol.
I don't see how a rainbow is confusing as 'positive for your side' when there is a clear pillar of light that could easily be colored to indicate that it's not on your side. Is there another way you can think of that would clearly indicate both 'this is a buff area' at a distance as well as 'this is an enemies/friends'. I certainly can't. It doesn't have to be a rainbow, but a rainbow certainly fits in with a cleric's 'light based' thematic over all. A pale corona of whitish yellow maybe if statistics are really on the side of not liking the rainbow. That'd be a lot of asset rework given rainbows are used in a lot of cleric particle effects though.
Lastly obviously 5. is subjective. But so is you thinking of rainbows as girly. If you wanna be a cleric bandit that strikes the fear into others, that's on your play ability and sense of theatrics. For me it would not detract from your 'manly intimidation' if you are trying to rob my stuff. I'd be too busy thinking about some dastardly fiend trying to rob me of my stuff, not your particle effects.
I will say that I never called rainbows 'girly'. So don't put words in my mouth as the saying goes.
All I meant was that speaking from my perspective "as a guy that wants to play a Cleric" they do not appeal to me.
And that rainbows are not scary are they? (This was a joke hence the "haha").
This part is fully subjective - however I tend to focus more on the functionality of VFX anyway.
In one legend a rainbow was literally the sign of 'God feeling satisfied/slightly bad for smiting everyone but one dude's family in a boat'. I personally don't have a connotation for rainbows being scary or not so your joke was lost on me. Pale yellow light on the other hand, would definitely be way less scary to me yeah.
The fact that you feel the need to spell everything out as if I am uncapable of understanding the thought process that goes into designing the VFX for a spell is pretty obnoxious tbh. As this was the reason for the creation of the thread?
I will address your 5 points.
I would say that my last post fulfilled every point:
1. If it's a yellow/gold "bubble". It's clearly an AoE beneficial spell. Hence why simplifying the current iteration actually helps in this regard.
2. It would still cut through the clutter of war without the rainbow and the shimmer effect. It's a giant AoE bubble. Pretty visible I would say.
3. If it was made transparent without any distortion and a rainbow border it blocks less of the close quarter/midrange combat than it does currently. This point is literally ?? What? Again by simplifying it and keeping it transparent without the shimmer effect you should be able to see even more clearly through the VFX of the ability. All it needs is an outline and you're off.
4. What I suggested meaning that your allies see the bubble as yellow/gold (friendly) and your enemies see red. Perfectly addresses which is friendly and which is foe. Again ?? This would be up to the designers at Intrepid to decide if it needs further visual cues. The important part is that at one glance you can tell the difference. Which again we touched on in my previous post.
5. So a gold AoE bubble that is transparent and looks holy. Using the same asthetic design just without the rainbow and shimmer somehow will no longer fit the asthetic?
I don't see how a rainbow is confusing as 'positive for your side' when there is a clear pillar of light that could easily be colored to indicate that it's not on your side.
But both would have a rainbow above it. And since you are implying that a rainbow is a positive effect. That at a glance is confusing. As now you will have yellow/gold bubbles with rainbows above them alongside red bubbles with rainbows above them...
Imagine if you were a new player just starting out in PvP or not familiar with a Clerics spells if you don't play it. They are gonna be like ??
Now add in the point I made about colourblind players. Keeping in mind there are many different types of colourblind you need to be aware of. A few examples:
Red-Green
Blue-Yellow
Complete colourblindness
By using a rainbow which is using all the colours and in this case as a border makes it much harder to adapt it to colourblind mode setting. As you would have a bubble that has a really weird colour border confusing them.
Well if we went with my suggestion above, sticking to one colour and adding an outline means when the devs implement a mode for this purpose it's much simpler as it avoids this problem entirely.
My suggestion will save them future work unless you believe they won't be adding a colourblind mode?
I spotted a potential problem and raised concerns.
I personally don't have a connotation for rainbows being scary or not so your joke was lost on me. Pale yellow light on the other hand, would definitely be way less scary to me yeah.
Just shows that a comment tongue in cheek as a joke was taken seriously by you.
Just said that rainbows are not scary are they? Didn't say removing it made it any more scary smh.
I think the main issue here is that my suggestions and feedback have been deemed not good enough in your book. And by your response I can see that this has gone from a discussion into you making assumptions at my intelligence and you trying to "win" instead of a healthy chat.
That is not what I created the thread to accomplish.
Thus my feedback is declared as "not proper feedback". Why? Because you disagree?
Mmhm okay. Well if that's how you treat others feedback why should I not do the same with yours?
At this point all the feedback I wanted to provide is pointed out above. The game is in Alpha, and Intrepid in every stream each month keeps encouraging us to provide feedback. And after the siege stream I felt inclined to start this thread.
Hopefully someone finds it helpful.
But don't expect me to continue spending time replying to you JustVine if all you have to add is picking my post apart and telling me I don't understand things. Really exhausting talking on a forum in 2021.
<Insert too old for this **** meme>
Questioning what I expected when I had this bright idea.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
These devs seem to love lots of sparkles during combat.
I like the idea of having a visual difference between ally Hallowed Ground and opponent Hallowed Ground, but I'm not sure how well that will work once we add augments to that ability.
Could be enough if the ground effect has a different color ally v opponent, while the bubble reflects the School (Holy, Shadow, Nature, etc.).
The fact that you feel the need to spell everything out as if I am uncapable of understanding the thought process that goes into designing the VFX for a spell is pretty obnoxious tbh. As this was the reason for the creation of the thread?
...
I think the main issue here is that my suggestions and feedback have been deemed not good enough in your book. And by your response I can see that this has gone from a discussion into you making assumptions at my intelligence and you trying to "win" instead of a healthy chat.
That is not what I created the thread to accomplish.
I know what it's like to feel talked down to. I'll bow out for now.
These devs seem to love lots of sparkles during combat.
I like the idea of having a visual difference between ally Hallowed Ground and opponent Hallowed Ground, but I'm not sure how well that will work once we add augments to that ability.
Could be enough if the ground effect has a different color ally v opponent, while the bubble reflects the School (Holy, Shadow, Nature, etc.).
Yes this would also be one of my concerns.
But I am sure they have a plan for that
We will have to wait and see.
These devs seem to love lots of sparkles during combat.
...
Keep in mind that this is alpha, and it's the first pass.
It's very common to have quickly-made particle effects that are just there to serve the purpose of testing functionality.
I hate that this has to be repeated constantly due to people's ignorance of how development process works, but don't take any current animations or particle effects as the final product.
The fireball animation debacle should attest to this.
If you see spell effects with the "explosions of tiny colored squares" or as so many people in video comments and stream chats refer to them, "sparkles", it's because the tiny colored square is the simplest type of particle effect to make. A white square is usually the default particle effect, which can be easily recolored and given velocities and such.
That being said, the rainbow effect itself (just the rainbow) is more complex to implement and probably required some effort, so that part of the effect will probably remain in some fashion. Even if maybe it's alpha value is just lowered to a much more manageable amount.
As someone who's created hundreds of particle effects, I fully expect them to go back over every current spell and drastically change/tweak them.
Keep in mind that this is alpha, and it's the first pass.
It's very common to have quickly-made particle effects that are just there to serve the purpose of testing functionality.
I hate that this has to be repeated constantly due to people's ignorance of how development process works, but don't take any current animations or particle effects as the final product.
The fireball animation debacle should attest to this.
I think everyone knows that it's alpha as they are very particular of quoting this on every single stream AoC has done. Steven himself have never failed to put that fact across EVERYWHERE! Haha
The difference is we are providing feedback. This is alpha and it's the time for feedback. If people do not like the direction of a particular spell effect and have feedback to provide. I see no reason why they shouldn't voice them at this stage.
If they voice them at a later stage it's much harder to make changes.
You mentioned the fireball animation changes. Well they went through this same process.
I don't believe anyone is ignorant here, other than it seems you believing others are ignorant because they wish to voice concerns at this stage.
Have some faith in others dude.
I personally despise the fact that people can't voice something on a video game forum anymore without someone telling them they do not understand and need to be enlightened by another forum user.
Until someone actually says something that shows they are misinformed theres really no need for such assumptions to be made.
However having feedback threads derailed by other forum users who pick out on things to attack on other forum users write, means the entire thread becomes useless. Plus it's a waste of everyone's energy who participate.
These devs seem to love lots of sparkles during combat.
...
Keep in mind that this is alpha, and it's the first pass.
It's very common to have quickly-made particle effects that are just there to serve the purpose of testing functionality.
I hate that this has to be repeated constantly due to people's ignorance of how development process works, but don't take any current animations or particle effects as the final product.
The fireball animation debacle should attest to this.
If you see spell effects with the "explosions of tiny colored squares" or as so many people in video comments and stream chats refer to them, "sparkles", it's because the tiny colored square is the simplest type of particle effect to make. A white square is usually the default particle effect, which can be easily recolored and given velocities and such.
That being said, the rainbow effect itself (just the rainbow) is more complex to implement and probably required some effort, so that part of the effect will probably remain in some fashion. Even if maybe it's alpha value is just lowered to a much more manageable amount.
As someone who's created hundreds of particle effects, I fully expect them to go back over every current spell and drastically change/tweak them.
I think everyone knows that it's alpha as they are very particular of quoting this on every single stream AoC has done. Steven himself have never failed to put that fact across EVERYWHERE! Haha
The difference is we are providing feedback. This is alpha and it's the time for feedback. If people do not like the direction of a particular spell effect and have feedback to provide. I see no reason why they shouldn't voice them at this stage.
If they voice them at a later stage it's much harder to make changes.
You mentioned the fireball animation changes. Well they went through this same process.
I don't believe anyone is ignorant here, other than it seems you believing others are ignorant because they wish to voice concerns at this stage.
Have some faith in others dude.
I personally despise the fact that people can't voice something on a video game forum anymore without someone telling them they do not understand and need to be enlightened by another forum user.
Until someone actually says something that shows they are misinformed theres really no need for such assumptions to be made.
However having feedback threads derailed by other forum users who pick out on things to attack on other forum users write, means the entire thread becomes useless. Plus it's a waste of everyone's energy who participate.
Ok yes, everything you're saying is correct and things I agree with, but not at all what I was talking about in my response to Dygz saying "The developers love particle effects". This is definitely a case of you seeing one line of my comment that you decided to bounce off and go on about instead of seeing the whole context.
All I was saying is that Dygz's comment was unwarranted. That's all. That's it.
Definitely get the impression you didn't actually read my comment and just saw it as something you had to debate against?
About everyone knowing it's alpha and first pass, the reason why they have to constantly say it is because not everyone DOES realize this, or they hear the words but do not understand what "alpha" and "first pass" actually mean. People have become used to seeing "alpha" as "early access", and not "development alpha status".
It's why every other day you get people on this forum complaining about how combat looks and particle effects even though they state CONSTANTLY that none of this is final and will be redone.
In fact, they said in the livestream that the combat rework isn't in the video yet. However EVERYONE is complaining about the current state of combat even though it's a version of combat that's about to be completely replaced.
Edit: If anything you're the one who derailed the thread by jumping in to suddenly say my topic relevant and clarifying response is somehow derailing.
Ok yes, everything you're saying is correct and things I agree with, but not at all what I was talking about in my response to Dygz saying "The developers love particle effects". This is definitely a case of you seeing one line of my comment that you decided to bounce off and go on about instead of seeing the whole context.
All I was saying is that Dygz's comment was unwarranted. That's all. That's it.
About everyone knowing it's alpha and first pass, the reason why they have to constantly say it is because not everyone DOES realize this, or they hear the words but do not understand what "alpha" and "first pass" actually mean. People have become used to seeing "alpha" as "early access", and not "development alpha status".
It's why every other day you get people on this forum complaining about how combat looks and particle effects even though they state CONSTANTLY that none of this is final and will be redone.
In fact, they said in the livestream that the combat rework isn't in the video yet. However EVERYONE is complaining about the current state of combat even though it's a version of combat that's about to be completely replaced.
They discuss what they are shown, and provide feedback on it and make their voices heard.
I see nothing wrong with that. They can't discuss what it will look like based on future changes until they see them. But they can voice current concerns. It's completely relevant.
Besides the fact Steven himself took the time to remind everyone in the thread it's alpha and WIP. Why do you feel the need to do it a second time?
Unless his response was not enough for you in some way?
I think someone made a comment you didn't like and you just HAD to defend the game.
If you do not agree with someones feedback that is perfectly acceptable. But please do not derail the thread by tearing it apart and making assumptions at others level of involvement in the project.
This thread is not about the combat. It's about the visual effects.
And I think everyone in here would love to hear if you have anything to add on this topic?
Ok yes, everything you're saying is correct and things I agree with, but not at all what I was talking about in my response to Dygz saying "The developers love particle effects". This is definitely a case of you seeing one line of my comment that you decided to bounce off and go on about instead of seeing the whole context.
All I was saying is that Dygz's comment was unwarranted. That's all. That's it.
About everyone knowing it's alpha and first pass, the reason why they have to constantly say it is because not everyone DOES realize this, or they hear the words but do not understand what "alpha" and "first pass" actually mean. People have become used to seeing "alpha" as "early access", and not "development alpha status".
It's why every other day you get people on this forum complaining about how combat looks and particle effects even though they state CONSTANTLY that none of this is final and will be redone.
In fact, they said in the livestream that the combat rework isn't in the video yet. However EVERYONE is complaining about the current state of combat even though it's a version of combat that's about to be completely replaced.
They discuss what they are shown, and provide feedback on it and make their voices heard.
I see nothing wrong with that. They can't discuss what it will look like based on future changes until they see them. But they can voice current concerns. It's completely relevant.
Besides the fact Steven himself took the time to remind everyone in the thread it's alpha and WIP. Why do you feel the need to do it a second time?
Unless his response was not enough for you in some way?
I think someone made a comment you didn't like and you just HAD to defend the game.
If you do not agree with someones feedback that is perfectly acceptable. But please do not derail the thread by tearing it apart and making assumptions at others level of involvement in the project.
This thread is not about the combat. It's about the visual effects.
And I think everyone in here would love to hear if you have anything to add on this topic?
Why are you telling me to stop doing what you're doing lol
You're coming off very hypocritical right now.
My response to Dygz was topic relevant.
All I did was respond to him saying the "the devs love sparkles" by explaining why that may seem to be the case because I've done plenty of particle system creation and have relevant knowledge and experience.
Calm down, I honestly don't know why this triggered you so much.
All I can guess is you saw the first line of my original comment and ignored the rest.
I personally despise the fact that people can't voice something on a video game forum anymore without someone telling them they do not understand and need to be enlightened by another forum user.
You might telling the wrong person that as Dygz is the one doing such in multiple threads.
I had no issues with the rainbow effect, and I actually thought the multiple bubbles showed depth to the battle, which gives more of a perception there's a large fight going on. I think it could be simplified in larger fights or cut off at a certain distance, but I didn't find it distracting.
I had no issues with the rainbow effect, and I actually thought the multiple bubbles showed depth to the battle, which gives more of a perception there's a large fight going on. I think it could be simplified in larger fights or cut off at a certain distance, but I didn't find it distracting.
My issue mainly stems from the fact the battle size was only around 100 players. And now imagine scaling that up to 250v250.
I would be interested to see how this particular ability changes with future updates.
Hopefully we get some more voices in here. Maybe if anyone can think of anything from other MMORPG's that use similar abilities for inspiration. That would be great.
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I just played WoW with a Mage from Dec through April. I don't recognize the audio of a Frostbolt.
I don't think I recognize the audio of any WoW abilities as a telegraph. And, I think I recognize the effects when they are activated. I don't recognize a casting telegraph.
Ashes casting telegraphs in the Archetype Previews are obvious.
In the Alpha One Preview, I definitely recognized Javelin and Onslaught when I saw them.
You don't need to explicitly pay attention, your brain extracts information implicitly. Even if you think it doesn't though, numbers also play an important role on impact and feel of combat. The way a big crit # pops up at you when you hit something can be very satisfying.[/quote]
No. I recognize that red numbers are happening for damage and blue numbers are happening for health.
But, I don't need to pay attention to what those numbers are. The health bars give more useful info.
Crit is nice, but I also don't need to know what the Crit number is.
Again, the health bars and mana bar give more useful info.
And...I am not paying any attention at all to my own floaty damage numbers.
I can generally tell by the camera if I'm standing in fire or something is attacking me from behind.
In SWG we had huge battles but the chaos factor was minimal. Even when we had 50 Jedi and 50 Sith on each side, we could still marshal the momentum and fight with control and efficiency. The problem right now is even the physical classes have particle effects, which, if you are a Jedi I would expect, but if you are not a Jedi just adds into the chaos. The issue is prevalent in BDO too due to the particle effects but that is even in small scale let alone the sieges.
Again, they don't just provide information and if you don't like them then turn them off. It's not an argument against improving how the numbers are presented since they will almost certainly be in the game (at least the damage you receive). In a chaotic large scale PvP battle, it may be hard to see all the ground effects or if you're getting hit by AoE or a direct targeted damage spell. And if you're not arguing against my proposed changes then cool, no comment then.
As always, I'm very confused about what point(s) you're trying to get across or if you're just conversing with no point in mind.
You're saying we will have "god knows how many" abilities, but, since the devs don't want us to have "god knows how many" hotbars, I don't think we will have tons of abilities compared to previous MMORPGs.
Pretty sure I said that can already recognize the unique casting animations in Ashes.
I said I don't recognize WoW audio casting telegraphs.
You are the one who says you don't like the scrolling numbers.
I'm saying the scrolling numbers are mostly irrelevant in Ashes...so far.
I'm just saying that the speed of those scrolling numbers will be irrelevant. Especially in a chaotic large scale battle. The health bars give better info. And it's better to improve ability sfx than it is to improve scrolling damage number speed. Effects should always be better than numbers.
That is an observation. I am not always commenting as an argument against or support for a change.
Sometimes, I'm just sharing an observation.
The fact that you feel the need to spell everything out as if I am uncapable of understanding the thought process that goes into designing the VFX for a spell is pretty obnoxious tbh. As this was the reason for the creation of the thread?
I will address your 5 points.
I would say that my last post fulfilled every point:
1. If it's a yellow/gold "bubble". It's clearly an AoE beneficial spell. Hence why simplifying the current iteration actually helps in this regard.
2. It would still cut through the clutter of war without the rainbow and the shimmer effect. It's a giant AoE bubble. Pretty visible I would say.
3. If it was made transparent without any distortion and a rainbow border it blocks less of the close quarter/midrange combat than it does currently. This point is literally ?? What? Again by simplifying it and keeping it transparent without the shimmer effect you should be able to see even more clearly through the VFX of the ability. All it needs is an outline and you're off.
4. What I suggested meaning that your allies see the bubble as yellow/gold (friendly) and your enemies see red. Perfectly addresses which is friendly and which is foe. Again ?? This would be up to the designers at Intrepid to decide if it needs further visual cues. The important part is that at one glance you can tell the difference. Which again we touched on in my previous post.
5. So a gold AoE bubble that is transparent and looks holy. Using the same asthetic design just without the rainbow and shimmer somehow will no longer fit the asthetic?
But both would have a rainbow above it. And since you are implying that a rainbow is a positive effect. That at a glance is confusing. As now you will have yellow/gold bubbles with rainbows above them alongside red bubbles with rainbows above them...
Imagine if you were a new player just starting out in PvP or not familiar with a Clerics spells if you don't play it. They are gonna be like ??
Now add in the point I made about colourblind players. Keeping in mind there are many different types of colourblind you need to be aware of. A few examples:
Red-Green
Blue-Yellow
Complete colourblindness
By using a rainbow which is using all the colours and in this case as a border makes it much harder to adapt it to colourblind mode setting. As you would have a bubble that has a really weird colour border confusing them.
Well if we went with my suggestion above, sticking to one colour and adding an outline means when the devs implement a mode for this purpose it's much simpler as it avoids this problem entirely.
My suggestion will save them future work unless you believe they won't be adding a colourblind mode?
I spotted a potential problem and raised concerns.
Just shows that a comment tongue in cheek as a joke was taken seriously by you.
Just said that rainbows are not scary are they? Didn't say removing it made it any more scary smh.
I think the main issue here is that my suggestions and feedback have been deemed not good enough in your book. And by your response I can see that this has gone from a discussion into you making assumptions at my intelligence and you trying to "win" instead of a healthy chat.
That is not what I created the thread to accomplish.
Thus my feedback is declared as "not proper feedback". Why? Because you disagree?
Mmhm okay. Well if that's how you treat others feedback why should I not do the same with yours?
At this point all the feedback I wanted to provide is pointed out above. The game is in Alpha, and Intrepid in every stream each month keeps encouraging us to provide feedback. And after the siege stream I felt inclined to start this thread.
Hopefully someone finds it helpful.
But don't expect me to continue spending time replying to you JustVine if all you have to add is picking my post apart and telling me I don't understand things. Really exhausting talking on a forum in 2021.
<Insert too old for this **** meme>
Questioning what I expected when I had this bright idea.
I like the idea of having a visual difference between ally Hallowed Ground and opponent Hallowed Ground, but I'm not sure how well that will work once we add augments to that ability.
Could be enough if the ground effect has a different color ally v opponent, while the bubble reflects the School (Holy, Shadow, Nature, etc.).
I know what it's like to feel talked down to. I'll bow out for now.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Yhr9WpjaDzw
Yes this would also be one of my concerns.
But I am sure they have a plan for that
We will have to wait and see.
Keep in mind that this is alpha, and it's the first pass.
It's very common to have quickly-made particle effects that are just there to serve the purpose of testing functionality.
I hate that this has to be repeated constantly due to people's ignorance of how development process works, but don't take any current animations or particle effects as the final product.
The fireball animation debacle should attest to this.
If you see spell effects with the "explosions of tiny colored squares" or as so many people in video comments and stream chats refer to them, "sparkles", it's because the tiny colored square is the simplest type of particle effect to make. A white square is usually the default particle effect, which can be easily recolored and given velocities and such.
That being said, the rainbow effect itself (just the rainbow) is more complex to implement and probably required some effort, so that part of the effect will probably remain in some fashion. Even if maybe it's alpha value is just lowered to a much more manageable amount.
As someone who's created hundreds of particle effects, I fully expect them to go back over every current spell and drastically change/tweak them.
I think everyone knows that it's alpha as they are very particular of quoting this on every single stream AoC has done. Steven himself have never failed to put that fact across EVERYWHERE! Haha
The difference is we are providing feedback. This is alpha and it's the time for feedback. If people do not like the direction of a particular spell effect and have feedback to provide. I see no reason why they shouldn't voice them at this stage.
If they voice them at a later stage it's much harder to make changes.
You mentioned the fireball animation changes. Well they went through this same process.
I don't believe anyone is ignorant here, other than it seems you believing others are ignorant because they wish to voice concerns at this stage.
Have some faith in others dude.
I personally despise the fact that people can't voice something on a video game forum anymore without someone telling them they do not understand and need to be enlightened by another forum user.
Until someone actually says something that shows they are misinformed theres really no need for such assumptions to be made.
However having feedback threads derailed by other forum users who pick out on things to attack on other forum users write, means the entire thread becomes useless. Plus it's a waste of everyone's energy who participate.
Steven's words himself:
"Keep up the feedback."
Ok yes, everything you're saying is correct and things I agree with, but not at all what I was talking about in my response to Dygz saying "The developers love particle effects". This is definitely a case of you seeing one line of my comment that you decided to bounce off and go on about instead of seeing the whole context.
All I was saying is that Dygz's comment was unwarranted. That's all. That's it.
Definitely get the impression you didn't actually read my comment and just saw it as something you had to debate against?
About everyone knowing it's alpha and first pass, the reason why they have to constantly say it is because not everyone DOES realize this, or they hear the words but do not understand what "alpha" and "first pass" actually mean. People have become used to seeing "alpha" as "early access", and not "development alpha status".
It's why every other day you get people on this forum complaining about how combat looks and particle effects even though they state CONSTANTLY that none of this is final and will be redone.
In fact, they said in the livestream that the combat rework isn't in the video yet. However EVERYONE is complaining about the current state of combat even though it's a version of combat that's about to be completely replaced.
Edit: If anything you're the one who derailed the thread by jumping in to suddenly say my topic relevant and clarifying response is somehow derailing.
They discuss what they are shown, and provide feedback on it and make their voices heard.
I see nothing wrong with that. They can't discuss what it will look like based on future changes until they see them. But they can voice current concerns. It's completely relevant.
Besides the fact Steven himself took the time to remind everyone in the thread it's alpha and WIP. Why do you feel the need to do it a second time?
Unless his response was not enough for you in some way?
I think someone made a comment you didn't like and you just HAD to defend the game.
If you do not agree with someones feedback that is perfectly acceptable. But please do not derail the thread by tearing it apart and making assumptions at others level of involvement in the project.
This thread is not about the combat. It's about the visual effects.
And I think everyone in here would love to hear if you have anything to add on this topic?
Why are you telling me to stop doing what you're doing lol
You're coming off very hypocritical right now.
My response to Dygz was topic relevant.
All I did was respond to him saying the "the devs love sparkles" by explaining why that may seem to be the case because I've done plenty of particle system creation and have relevant knowledge and experience.
Calm down, I honestly don't know why this triggered you so much.
All I can guess is you saw the first line of my original comment and ignored the rest.
If you are not providing any feedback. Please stop with the personal statements aimed at others.
You might telling the wrong person that as Dygz is the one doing such in multiple threads.
Read the comic here!
But you're the one who derailed it lmao
If you're done trying to get in the final word I would appreciate focusing on the subject at hand. Thank you.
Back on topic:
My issue mainly stems from the fact the battle size was only around 100 players. And now imagine scaling that up to 250v250.
I would be interested to see how this particular ability changes with future updates.
Hopefully we get some more voices in here. Maybe if anyone can think of anything from other MMORPG's that use similar abilities for inspiration. That would be great.
I mean, yes?! If someone slanders you you'd defend yourself too