Do you think you are a part of the "Target Audience"? Why or Why not?

I was going to ask this in the related thread, but I feel this question is specific enough to need a separate thread.

I'll start:

I think I am a part of the target audience. Here is why.

I value the emergent storytelling that comes from a persistent open world competitive environment as the apex of modern gaming. Games like Eve, Darkfall Online, Lineage 2, and Mortal Online have been among my favorite examples. Games where the world is not an instanced theme park, but a theater of war for real-world people to not have to role-play, but to actually be a part of a real war. To me, the drama and betrayal that comes from these environments is better than any book I can read or movie I can watch.

This is what Ashes is trying to do with the node and corruption systems. The node system turns the traditional MMORPG world into a living, breathing theater of war. No longer will zones, be static areas for developers to tell their stories, but instead they will be dynamic areas for players to live their stories.

What also appeals to me about Ashes is that, unlike the four games listed above. Ashes has what those games have, and the features of a modern MMORPG. Mounts, cosmetics, housing, and good graphics. I have always said that I love Sci-fi, but if there was a fantasy game that was like EVE with modern third-person combat. That would be the game for me. Ashes is not exactly that, but it is a close enough cousin to get me excited and accept some of the things I feel are flaws.

If you think I am not a part of the "Target Audience", based on anything I have just said. I invite you to tell me why as well.

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Dygz

Then you will probably love killing Corrupted player characters.

Azherae

Dygz wrote: »

Everyone in the forums believe they are a part of the target audience.

Almost everyone. I'm here.

I don't believe I'm part of the Target Audience of Ashes of Creation as it is currently shown.

I believe that the systems used for managing PvP and aggression are outside of the scope of my enjoyment, and that the design schema have the potential to be simplistic and restrictive relative to my preferences. I believe that the rewards will go to groups that have power through methods that I don't have any way to access, and it will rapidly degrade my enjoyment of the game.

I believe that the tendency to be able to keep one's 'hard' power, i.e. gear, wealth, levels, will completely dominate over people who focus on roleplaying and 'soft' power in most forms (social things, effort building up Nodes, effort following and learning 'story' things or making Alliances) because the player who puts work into those things gets what appears to be a 'group benefit' which by the nature of the game, is supposed to be easily destroyed for 'freshness' and 'rotation'.

I believe that players who do this in smaller groups will eventually be subjected to, or subsumed into, larger guilds whether they like it or not, and will still be 'underpowered' except in the cases where they somehow draw favor with the big guilds. The impermanence of 'results' from the time commitment to soft power probably shouldn't be changed, but I don't think it is likely that the degradation rate of powerful equipment could, or should, be set to anything approximating it.

I believe that in order for a game to be successful, a certain type of player cannot be allowed to translate over specific RL tendencies, skills, or resources, whereas another type does, and this type of game is therefore, in the long term, less enjoyable to them.

I don't believe that anyone whose success (defined as 'being able to continue doing the thing they enjoy doing, rather than spending 50% or more of their time doing something they don't actually want to do') is controlled by a large group of non-like minded individuals, is within the Target Audience. That's definitional, and perfectly fine. It might be hard to communicate to some, but so it is.

I don't believe I'm in the Target Audience for Ashes because I've seen other people talk about what they believe Ashes is, and what they want it to be, and I know that those people's wishes are backed up with data, indicators, and the Creative Director's design models, making it more likely that those things will shift in that direction.

People tell you who they are, and if you give them a place to freely be that, and a big enough 'tribe' of people who are okay with them being that, they'll do it, because at that point, there is no social pressure to not, only tribal pressure. And you defeat tribal pressure by changing tribe, or gaining enough power to kill the other tribe.

I don't believe I'm the Target Audience for Ashes in the long term because 20 years of watching MMOs has taught me that my tribe is too small or too unrewarded in games like Ashes, to have any chance of standing up to the other tribes, and therefore will be wiped out within a few months if the design follows the requests of the vocal players giving feedback now.

I intend to do absolutely nothing about this. It's a no box cost sub based game. If my tribe is wiped out, or fighting to defend it takes more time than my life grants me to play Ashes, I'll just leave.

Dygz

You are definitely in the target audience.
You might choose not to play.
What other people want Ashes to be is not the same thing as who the devs are targeting.

But, sure, you might not believe you are in the target audience.
Whether you believe you will enjoy the game is different than whether you are the target audience.

Azherae

Dygz wrote: »

You are definitely in the target audience.
You might choose not to play.
What other people want Ashes to be is not the same thing as who the devs are targeting.

Oh, I thought we were talking about what the development decisions were targeting, not the devs themselves.

The devs can target whatever and whoever they want. Their designs, though, have constraints. This isn't a 'one size fits all' pants (get it?).

So sure, they can 'want everyone to wear the pants', make it stretchy, put clips on the bottom of it to let you roll up the leg parts if they're too long, try to make the fabric both somehow super-breathable and also heat-retentive, and make all the excess space around the waist fit neatly into a pocket dimension for really skinny folk.

I'm not going to make some sarcastic closing point because I genuinely believe this is actually what you are saying and fully believe. That the Devs are marketing their Magic Pants to everyone.

Dygz

The dev decisions are to design for all MMORPG fans (except P2W).
Whether they actually meet the needs of all MMORPG fans is different.

For instance, the devs are targeting Action Combat fans... whether they implement Action Combat well enough for Action Combat fans to be willing to play is different.
The devs are targeting all RPG Dwarf fans...whether they implement Dwarves well enough to entice most of the Ashes players who love playing Dwarves to actually play Ashes Dwarves is different.

Percimes

To be completely honest, I don't know yet. I probably wont know until I've played the game for a month or two.

I like many aspects of what's been announced for the game, but also some that make me doubt a long time commitment.

Being more gameplay oriented than goal oriented I'll need to experience the playing itself, what you actually do when you log in. How different classes play. Fighting dynamics. Buttons pushing. Abilities interaction. Mob behaviours. The world of Verra itself.

Once that step is passed it will be a question of how much I can do, and what I can do, without being forced to group all the time. More than simple personal preference, the time of the day I can usually play is during non-peak hours, so I need a certain level of independence.

wherediditrun

Dygz wrote: »

Everyone in the forums believe they are a part of the target audience.

*raises hand* I'm not sure.
What's more likely, I'll like some aspects of the game a lot, and some other aspects will gonna make me annoyed. Like.. the most games do.

I think game going for this specific type of audience alone is not a good idea and won't work. Naturally, I hope many people of many interests will find something in the game they like. And the things they like and people they enjoy playing with will matter enough to outweight the things they don't.

Also, I think that's the best everyone can hope. A lot of high hopes imo are related to grass is greener type of thing in current state of affairs.

CriminalCupcake

Dygz wrote: »

Everyone in the forums believe they are a part of the target audience.

I don't believe I'm part of the target audience, yet I still backed alpha 1. I'm a solo player after countless years of failed mmo and other game groups. Kinda hoping my interests shift, as I truly love the ideals that AOC is.

Dygz

How does PvE work in Ashes of Creation?
One of the main philosophical pillars behind our design was that PvE must be impactful and inclusive. We want solo players, small groups and large groups to all have a home within our system. With monsters throughout the world, challenging raid bosses, new dungeons spawning as your world develops, and scalable challenges, we know that each player will have a complete PvE experience. Our Node system allows the constant generation of new PvE content such as questlines, monsters, dungeons and even raid bosses as well!

Solo players are part of the target audience, though, so why do you believe you're not?

JustVine

Not trying to explain things for people but it sounds like to me that you aren't listening. Cupcake didn't explicitly say they /want/ to play solo. Much like Azherae they explained that because of the way mmos tend to go they tend to be forced to either go along with a certain set of things, or play solo. I think they were hoping things improve relative to the design of that, that makes them feel less targeted.

CriminalCupcake

I feel that the major systems such as guilds, town mayor, sieges, etc are against solo play. I feel that the intense loot drop from PvP is against solo play. Even running your materials from one node to another in a caravan, if you are solo, you defend solo.

Everything boasted about this game has been group play, Guild association, and being banded together. We already have people complaining in forums about *the game being too hard*. I'm not exactly saying that because I know what i signed up for lol, but I think others here also feel they aren't the target audience, and I think i see that in their posts. Call me asinine or pretentious, that's ok im cool with it. Its all about the feeling that 'I' get.

Also does anyone else feel like the forums are dying? I know it's a lull time between tests but... I see the same names only in recent discussions. There's only a dedicated few.

Azherae

CriminalCupcake wrote: »

Also does anyone else feel like the forums are dying? I know it's a lull time between tests but... I see the same names only in recent discussions. There's only a dedicated few.

Well, Alpha-1 didn't quite deliver everything people were expecting (whether those expectations were correct or not), so there isn't as much to talk about other than philosophical stuff.

So much of what one would discuss for this game is already covered, there won't really be anything to say until the next Dev stream.

But from my data scraping, the posters that post now are the ones that always post, they just started to segregate into their 'tribes' while waiting. Only a few actually drifted away for the time being. Most others are still here, just posting much much less. (this is anecdotal, I am going by memory, but if it matters, my memory type is semi-photographic with symbol-color synesthesia to boost it significantly, point is that I didn't actually 'check all recent posters against my collected data', I just remember them all)

Expect a huge burst of activity, either positive or negative, Friday afternoon.

Dygz

JustVine wrote: »

Not trying to explain things for people but it sounds like to me that you aren't listening. Cupcake didn't explicitly say they /want/ to play solo. Much like Azherae they explained that because of the way mmos tend to go they tend to be forced to either go along with a certain set of things, or play solo. I think they were hoping things improve relative to the design of that, that makes them feel less targeted.

"I'm a solo player, but I don't want to play solo." ??? That makes no sense.
Solo players are part of the target audience. CriminalCupcake can clarify for themselves why they think they aren't part of the target audience despite the devs stating they want solo players to have a home.

Thanks for trying...??

CROW3

To underscore @Dygz's point, I'm generally a solo player, and still feel like I'm square in the targeted player base for Ashes. Mainly because I accept (and look forward to) that the world is going to be a risky, dangerous place. Which is exactly why I want to explore & map it.

Ravel

It is good to hear that even when Intrepid misses the target completely when releasing AoC, I will still be part of the target audience.
But that is of little importance. What is important, for me, is, not whether I am in the target audience for AoC, but whether I will like the game, and that is not entirely in the hands of Intrepid.

So, am I in the target audience?

If, AoC is able to attract the more social players and less the competitive players of games that are constantly e-peening, then I am the target audience.

Azherae

CROW3 wrote: »

To underscore @Dygz's point, I'm generally a solo player, and still feel like I'm square in the targeted player base for Ashes. Mainly because I accept (and look forward to) that the world is going to be a risky, dangerous place. Which is exactly why I want to explore & map it.

Other people's capacity to tell themselves that the game will turn out to be something they enjoy has nothing to do with the development or the marketing.

Dygz started this with the assertion that everyone on the forums believes they are part of the target audience, was told 'no' by at least two people, and then as usual 'decided that those people were wrong'.

Some of us are more self-aware than others.

Your perspective is in no way what I'm challenging with this response, I'm just pointing out that it doesn't even remotely underscore Dygz's point, because Dygz's point started from the usual position of 'whatever someone says a thing is meant to be, is what it is'. Starfish.

CROW3

Dygz wrote: »

"I'm a solo player, but I don't want to play solo." ??? That makes no sense.
Solo players are part of the target audience. CriminalCupcake can clarify for themselves why they think they aren't part of the target audience despite the devs stating they want solo players to have a home.

@Azherae - Ok. @dygz's quote above is what I was speaking to.

Azherae

CROW3 wrote: »

Dygz wrote: »

"I'm a solo player, but I don't want to play solo." ??? That makes no sense.
Solo players are part of the target audience. CriminalCupcake can clarify for themselves why they think they aren't part of the target audience despite the devs stating they want solo players to have a home.

@Azherae - Ok. @dygz's quote above is what I was speaking to.

That's what I figured.

Except that Dygz' quote inexplicably treats 'solo players' as a monolith.

Is that what you're going with? "Ashes says it will appeal to solo players" and since you are a Solo player and it appeals to you, they have done as they said? They have met the bare minimum requirement of at least some percentage of solo players?

That's literally the only way in which your personal opinion has any connection to Dygz's point. A logical stretch, but if that's the way you want to assert it, then at least it's clear.

"Some subset, including myself, of the total varied concept of 'solo players', has been convinced that they are part of the target audience."

Unfalsifiable by your existence and as of your statement. Great.

CROW3

Azherae wrote: »

Is that what you're going with? "Ashes says it will appeal to solo players" and since you are a Solo player and it appeals to you, they have done as they said? They have met the bare minimum requirement of at least some percentage of solo players?

That's literally the only way in which your personal opinion has any connection to Dygz's point. A logical stretch, but if that's the way you want to assert it, then at least it's clear.

"Some subset, including myself, of the total varied concept of 'solo players', has been convinced that they are part of the target audience."

Unfalsifiable by your existence and as of your statement. Great.

No. Being a solo player doesn't meet the criteria for being in the targeted audience for Ashes. Understanding the world that Intrepid is creating, accepting the dangers and risks for what they are, accepting that there are some aspects of the world that may be MORE dangerous for me - or inaccessible without a group - and being excited to enter and navigate that world as a mostly solo player (with occasional grouping for whatever content / needs) - THAT is what brings me into the target audience.

Azherae

CROW3 wrote: »

Azherae wrote: »

Is that what you're going with? "Ashes says it will appeal to solo players" and since you are a Solo player and it appeals to you, they have done as they said? They have met the bare minimum requirement of at least some percentage of solo players?

That's literally the only way in which your personal opinion has any connection to Dygz's point. A logical stretch, but if that's the way you want to assert it, then at least it's clear.

"Some subset, including myself, of the total varied concept of 'solo players', has been convinced that they are part of the target audience."

Unfalsifiable by your existence and as of your statement. Great.

No. Being a solo player doesn't meet the criteria for being in the targeted audience for Ashes. Understanding the world that Intrepid is creating, accepting the dangers and risks for what they are, accepting that there are some aspects of the world that may be MORE dangerous for me - or inaccessible without a group - and being excited to enter and navigate that world as a mostly solo player (with occasional grouping for whatever content / needs) - THAT is what brings me into the target audience.

Absolutely. I'm 'fussing' over the way Dygz deals with this, not the way you do, my only wish was to point out that the two don't have any connection, before this became another of those

If Cupcake had left the words 'solo player' out of their post altogether, Dygz wouldn't have been able to latch onto them. There are multiple issues with being a solo player in Ashes that do not currently have any presented solutions, so those players are left hoping.

Some of the issues literally cannot be solved without diminishing some of the benefits of grouping. That's a known part of design (or at least I HOPE so or there will be some unpleasant awakenings later), and Ashes has explicitly stated multiple times that they will prioritize the grouping aspect.

It doesn't matter if Intrepid 'hopes' to fulfill the wishes of two diametrically opposed groups within the same design space, because the possibility of doing so may be beyond their reach.

You are a solo player who wants them, or (I doubt this) does not yet realize the parts of it that will make your experience lesser. Cupcake might just not want them, or just 'already can see the parts that will diminish their experience'.

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