Some players are just not explorers, don't force them to explore because it is your main thing to do
I can't imagine "exploring" being my main activity in games. I would soon just take up recreational naps as my main hobby and quit playing games all together.
Just to chime in what the majority says - but I agree that making the levelling process as long as reasonably possible would be the best outcome. This game definitely will not focus on end game, however there are some things you absolutely have to note:
Every game will have people who brute-force their way through to max level; it's unavoidable. Do not change the core of the game to target them - it will not stop them.
Ashes hopes to be a different game, in that they will not have too many worries of a shortage of content, as the game is planning to take as long as it needs to reach the end of development. I don't think Steven will release anything that isn't up to standard, whereas New World as a comparison clearly made a huge sprint in the last year whereby there was hardly any content and all of a sudden they pushed out cookie cutter mmo elements like dungeons etc.
People will hit max level, and that's fine. As long as the game follows its course then I am sure that regardless of how fast people level, content drought shouldn't be a complaint.
Adventure is a subjective perception of the experience that the player has when playing the game. What you consider an adventure is unfun filler for someone else and vice versa what he considers an adventure is nothing to you
A true adventure is a journey.
Adventure is a journey towards a goal that the player set out for himself
A journey isn't rushed and it isn't easy. It's long and dangerous (full of obstacles and setbacks). The journey is what gives the success substance.
Indeed
If some players don't want a journey but a shortcut to what they assume is success then they don't really want an mmo-rpg.
MMO is a fictional place where a lot of people can find very different adventures so it all contributes towards a big realistic world.
Then this game is just not for them.
If they don't like it, they're free to go play other games.
Devs should stop trying to cater to people like them.
Catering to people like them is what lead to the decline of mmos we're witnessing today.
Just because your kid asks to be fed only sweets that doesn't mean you should only feed him sweets.
It's bad for him it's bad for you and it ironically destroys the joy of sweets as well generally.
Yes some people will ruin their fun no matter what you do. They're unrasonable and thats their problem.
The unreasonable should adapt to the reasonable, not the other way around.
Honestly it looks like you are mistaking mmo for a coop story game. Leveling is integral part of an mmo - there is no denying that, but leveling in mmo is always a kind of rite of passage to prove that you are ready to play with all sandbox and community tools the game has to offer. Many mmos do a big mistake to withdraw all of those tools until you hit max, but a great mmo introduces those during the leveling.
Honestly leveling isnt the whole game - if you are here for a leveling adventure - then welcome tourist! Play with others, contribute with others have fun and nobody will spare a tear when you quit because all that is left to do are sandbox elements and your leveling adventure is long over.
(Forum is bugging for me so I will show what statement I'm replying to using quoation marks as opposed to the Forum's internal quotation tool)
''Adventure is a subjective perception of the experience that the player has when playing the game. What you consider an adventure is unfun filler for someone else and vice versa what he considers an adventure is nothing to you ''
To some level, anything and everything is subjective but the fact is, adventure has an amount of objective everyone can agree on.
Adventure is born out of a challenge, out of a state of danger that gets you out of your zone of confort.
Which leads me back to my point and the point of the topic.
If it was a stroll in the park (fast, easy leveling) then it wasn't challenging, then it didnt' get anyone out of any zone of confort, it wasn't an adventure.
Either way, what is your point with the statement you just made, in regards to game development?
''Adventure is a journey towards a goal that the player set out for himself
''
Games have their own, pre-defined progression path.
Most people enter an mmo-rpg with no defined goal besides playing the game, assuming they will have fun playing it as it was deisgned, as its own progression path was designed.
Simply put, the design of the game will be what decides (in the case of most people if not virtually all) what the goal is and if the path to it is fun or not.
Either way, what is your point with the statement you just made, in regards to game development?
''MMO is a fictional place where a lot of people can find very different adventures so it all contributes towards a big realistic world.'' '
And, coming back to my point and the point of the topic, a game can be designed to facilitate, to encourage, go direct people towards having adventures, or, if badly designed it can hinder people having adventures.
Yes some people will find adventure in world pvp.
Some people will find adventure in group questing.
Some people will find advenure in dungeons and raids.
Some people will find adventure in the economy aspect.
Often in the context of finding friends and playing with them.
Most people will find adventure in the combination of all these.
And it is the duty of the game to be designed to cater to all these paths.
''Honestly it looks like you are mistaking mmo for a coop story game.
''
''and nobody will spare a tear when you quit because all that is left to do are sandbox elements and your leveling adventure is long over.''
Honestly it looks like you are here to get into a fight not discuss what would make this game better.
'' Leveling is integral part of an mmo - there is no denying that''
Modern mmos tend to disagree I feel.
Leveling has started to be seen more and more as an unpleasant obstacle. Many games even offer you the option to pay to skip it.
No longer is leveling seen as a source of fun, as an adventure. It's seen as a chore.
I hope AOC will change this.
''Honestly leveling isnt the whole game ''
Honestly max-lvl content isn't the whole game.
''- if you are here for a leveling adventure - then welcome tourist! ''
I'm here for a good mmo-rpg and a good-mmo rpg has great leveling.
The daddy of modern mmos, World of Warcraft had very good leveling in the time when it reached the legendary status Activision is leeching from its corpse even today.
Rushed lvling that feels like a chore isn't great leveling and a mmo-rpg with fast lvling that feels like a chore isnt a good mmo-rpg.
A good mmo-rpg also has great max level content, but this is not what this topic is about.
Either way, what is your point?
That the lvling in AOC should suck?
PS: The same toxic ''leave, you won't be missed'' was the ''main course'' among the WoW community as well and look what it lead to. I knew people like that would jump on this boat as well as WoW's is sinking, I just hoped to see you as late as possible.
ok, please learn to use [/quote] brackets so your quote posts are actually readable
also please read more than first sentence in my posts so you don't ask something that I answered a few posts above
Almost every other post in this thread I made is containing my opinion that leveling should not take longer than the leveling content that was created for it - leveling should be a supporting pillar for the game and not one of its primary goals
Making leveling longer for the sake of making it take longer without the content actually supporting it is truly horrendous
If the purpose of leveling is only as a timesink during which you are to learn your spells then the game has failed leveling and there should be ways for it to skip it
It literally helps nobody to set some arbitrary amount of time that is required for leveling, when we don't actually know how much leveling content is in the game
Either way, what is your point?
That the lvling in AOC should suck?
I wrote it in many times in this thread - leveling should not be set by some arbitrary amount of hours that forum posters think is accurate without any knowledge on how much leveling content is in the game
PS: The same toxic ''leave, you won't be missed'' was the ''main course'' among the WoW community as well and look what it lead to. I knew people like that would jump on this boat as well as WoW's is sinking, I just hoped to see you as late as possible.
This actually works here for this case, because I am only describing launch hype players that have no intention to play the game, but to enjoy the mass launch hype and new world to explore - the levelers are kinda part of it, because once they hit level cap they loose interest in the game, because they are out of leveling areas and levels
what you describe is applicable when the game is actually released and all that is left are players that play the game and the players that played because ashes became the "new game" left
Almost every other post in this thread I made is containing my opinion that leveling should not take longer than the leveling content that was created for it
- leveling should be a supporting pillar for the game and not one of its primary goals
It should absolutely be one of its primary goals.
Its the first thing the players come into contact with. If its not fun, hell in AOC's case simply if it wont be great, many will quit before ever reaching max level.
Its a very well proven source of great fun (The mmo-rpg that made mmo-rpgs great, Vanilla World of Warcraft, had great leveling, legendary to this day, re-proven to be great in Classic).
Its something people will do agian and again as they level ults, long after they reached max level.
Some people wont even ever reach max lvl but instead will twink. Its a very common sight in mmo-rpgs.
It literally helps nobody to set some arbitrary amount of time that is required for leveling, when we don't actually know how much leveling content is in the game
1. What does this have anything to do with what I was saying? Where did I say what you are now commenting? I feel like you invented your own ideas, attributed to me and now started attacking me for the ideas you invented.
2. So you're unilaterally and in the absence of any evidence to even indicate this, assuming that lvling in this game should be bad? How does this concern me and how is this constructive?
As a general rule the harder it is to lvl up, the better for the game and players, it feels more rewarding and the journey is longer at each stage.
As a general rule leveling is rewarding if it is created as part of the game and not as an afterthought.
If you artificially make leveling take super long time it will boil down to a list of places with level ranges with "Grind for X hours"
If you want to have leveling take 2000 hours - in essence I am not against it, but the game should contain 2000 hours of leveling content, not just purely "grind this mob" for 2k hours
Given that release is far into the future, and that we lack the corresponding experience and information, I can’t see how this topic can be discussed with any seriousness, as interesting and fun as it is
Indeed, advocating for longer or shorter leveling time at this moment is pretty meaningless, because the leveling time should match the leveling content and the pacing of the leveling
Leveling systems in other genres - like moba, br, fps are used primarily as a longterm reflection of the players time investment with various rewards to have a secondary tracking mechanism beyond the ranked system
However in MMOs the leveling system is more like a rite of passage that is supposed to benchmark you with competency for piloting your character at least at the minimal playable level. In other words, leveling is used as a roleplay tutorial with exams along the journey in order to make sure that the player capable to pilot the character at least on a level of a bot with 30 lines of code
If the purpose of leveling is only as a timesink during which you are to learn your spells then the game has failed leveling and there should be ways for it to skip it
literally cut out of context - read it again
Primary content in any mmo is only the repeatable content - which leveling isnt - you can "reset" your leveling by starting a new character, but that is the players choice.
Leveling is finite supporting content - does that mean it should be bad? Well tell me what happens to a building that has bad supporting pillars - Most people would say that the pillar would crumble and the building would fall or at least a big part of it
And about putting words into the others mouth - You clearly started with "the adventure should be long" which is automatically aligning you with people in this thread that are for making the leveling take longer than it is currently planned (because I assume that if they say they want leveling to take 45 days then they have enough content for it)
And quote me any instance where I say that Ashes leveling should be bad - the only thing you've done so far is to quote me out of context where I explain what happens if the leveling is bad
If you feel to be attacked, then I am sorry for that perception - I do not wish you any ill - I just want to debate based on the fact that your posts are tunneled on leveling disregarding the rest of the game
In some games leveling teaches you how to play your class. For example, if you want to learn how to tank in World of Warcraft, do dungeons and practice how to hold threat and learn your rotation. In other games leveling lets you enjoy the story like Final Fantasy 14. When I played that game, I didn't actually feel like I was leveling. The story was compelling enough that I just felt like I was helping the cause.
It would be awesome if this game could do the story telling of Final Fantasy 14, the raid bosses of World of Warcraft with challenging abilities that made you plan out the fight, the sieges of Guild Wars 2, and the crafting of Eve Online. If they could pull all of that off, this game would be a great MMO.
And quote me any instance where I say that Ashes leveling should be bad -
What else am I to understand by you attacking the point I've made, that leveling in ashes should be a focus of the game (so it should be done very well)?
In games that release the figures, 90% of the games play time is spent on characters at the level cap.
To be noted that modern games follow a toxic trend where lvling is seen as a chore and designed as such (as a bad experience that is very easy to get through, as something that is desired to be skipped, preferably by paying the game owners money).
This trend is one of the reasons which lead to the decline of mmos, a decline Intrepid wants to revert.
The norm in today's mmos (in this regard and many others) is the problem, something Intrepid should avoid, not something you can invoke as ''hey look, this is how things are done right'' in an argument.
To suggest otherwise is to take your own opinion and project it on to everyone else.
I don't suggest anything I state it as a fact, leveling will either be well done or many people won't even reach max level (people will come with sky-high expectation for ashes and if the game isn't very solid from the start, namely from the leveling part, large numbers of said players won't even reach the max level) and in classic mmo-s (including the one which made mmo-rpgs great, World of Warcraft Vanilla) it was a huge source of fun and good memories.
I asked you where you said that to me (you never did).
? don't tell me you're just trolling, because the quote where i say it is right above it - here lemme copy paste it again:
"If the purpose of leveling is only as a timesink during which you are to learn your spells then the game has failed leveling and there should be ways for it to skip it"
Primary content in any mmo is only the repeatable content
Making alts (leveling different characters) is very repeatable content in any mmo-rpg.
You totally misunderstand what repeatable content is - which is a certain type of content that you can do near endlessly without resetting your character - so leveling can NEVER be repeatable content since you can do it on any character only ONCE
in other words - if we take your definition of repeatable content then deleting your char is repeatable content as well, because you can endlessly create and delete characters and the deletion of a character can be a juicy content as some streamers showed us
And quote me any instance where I say that Ashes leveling should be bad -
What else am I to understand by you attacking the point I've made, that leveling in ashes should be a focus of the game (so it should be done very well)?
The only thing I stood against is that leveling should be long, because you didn't write anything about the leveling they actually might have - so the length of leveling is the primary criteria for you
Using a word "long" gives a clear message - that is why I only talked that the length of leveling should be reflective of the content
@Tragnar I'm here to contribute to the development of Ashes of Creation not pick fights with random frustrated people on the internet.
At this point it's beyond clear to me you're just looking for a fight and I don't have time or energy to waste with that.
If you have anything constructive to say regarding the development of the game or anything like that, I'll reply to that but otherwise please stop bothering me.
dude, you read first sentence of my every post, disagree and say I attack you while blaming me for not writing anything constructive without actually reading my posts
xD
dude, you read first sentence of my every post, disagree and say I attack you while blaming me for not writing anything constructive without actually reading my posts
I don't like what you said, so it's a destructive attack against me and my way of life!
I don't like what you said, so it's a destructive attack against me and my way of life!
Of course I dislike
- his abusive and insulting speech (example: ''don't tell me you're just trolling'')
- the fact he attacks me for things other people have said on this topic, with utterly no connection to me or other things I said
- the fact he blames me for not reading things he never wrote to me (but somewhere else, in a discussion with someone else)
Well damn, here we go again.... good work taking this whole thread off the tracks team.
because you cut a portion of that out of context as an argument that I am against good leveling
I said that's the only thing I could understand from what you said because that's the only thing that could be understood (how was I to know you were judging me and my claims based on what other random people I wasn't even aware of said).
Either way, can we agree to stop taking this off-topic further?
I said I want leveling to take adequate amount of time that fits the amount of leveling content the game actually has
stop playing the victim and do not pretend that you cannot understand my posts, because if you actually didn't understand you would have asked me to explain my position better, it is plain clear you chose to view my posts as personal attacks and thus this excuse allows you to completely ignore what I wrote in those
I said I want leveling to take adequate amount of time that fits the amount of leveling content the game actually has
Something with which I did not disagree.
But you felt I disagreed because of things other people with no connection to me said, in this thread.
Indeed there was a misunderstanding but I was not the one to blame for it and insulting and harrasing me because of said misunderstanding is even more unreasonable.
Right, take it easy everyone, no need to get heated for no reason.
The thread is more of a personal worry of mine and I am sure Ashes will be just fine without an XP nerf long term (short term, meh, I said my worries before)
That being said, I really, really hate the argument "just go play something else, its not for you". It comes off really childish.
We are fortunate that Ashes has an open development so we can give our input as players, trying to take that away is stupid, pure and simple.
There will be elements of the game that we won't agree with, there will be systems that we won't like. Calling them out is the best (and only) thing we can do.
And I don't mean just for launch. I am hoping Ashes becomes my daily game, for years hopefully. Currently, the devs have a solid player-friendly mentality. From all I have seen about the game so far, there is nothing I disagree with, all systems make me go "yes, i like that"
There were other games like this, think of WoW at its beginning, it was really good and players liked it. Right now though, it got to the point its a walking corpse of what it was. I don't think there was one massive change that was added, but a lot of small ones that the players overlooked. "Well, yea, they added a mount to the store, but its only one" "yea, they added yet another system to progress, but its just one". Then it got to whatever the fuck WoW is now.
Having a serious discussion about game mechanics should be not only allowed, but encouraged. Even if they are like this thread, a thread that makes no sense right now. We are what, 2-3 years away? We haven't seen the summoner yet (!!!), but I am asking about progression to max level.
And reading the posts here, there seem to be a lot of people "make leveling as hard and slow as possible" and a lot "no thank you, don;t want that"
Well guess, what, we are both right. Or wrong. Not being a game dev, I have no idea if it makes sense to slow people down. I liked the comment with "smell the roses", forcing people to stop during a race, even if they don't want to.
I liked it because it is so completely different to how I play MMOs. I know that for some players the game only starts at max level, but i don't understand that, not in an RPG. Its weird and interesting.
And hopefully, the devs find this post, take a look at the comments and see the 2 (maybe more) types of players that will play their game. (Let's be honest, we are lurking on the forums 2-3 years before launch, talking about random topics, we all are going to play this game.) And consider all players when designing the level curve, the xp gains, the loot drop, in such a way that no group feels abandoned.
If I can get to max level in a week, I will think that the devs have failed. Failed at making an MMORPG. Even worse, if I (with my play style) do get to max in a week, I'll probably stop playing. Harsh, but true. I personally don't like the idea of alts, have never made one, so I'll only have 1 character. Max level in a week, max profession level in a month, at that point the only thing that would keep me in is the social aspect. But is that good enough to keep me for months or years? I don't know.
Bit of an exaggeration, but I know there are a lot of other players that aren't in a hurry to get to max.
And 45 days of playing 4-6 hours a day is really fast leveling for max
In the end, the simple answer is to make levels less rewarding, honestly.
There are multiple ways to do this, without making everyone hate the system. Raiders and 'heavy endgamers' will just plow through it and complain a little, and everyone else has more fun.
Games are generally better when levels are less rewarding because more of the content has purpose. Nodes will already require this so I'm not too worried, but then again some decisions Intrepid (Steven?) makes about things confuse me.
If max level is a meaningful strong goal for effectiveness then people will find the 'fastest easiest to grind enemies' and 'do that infinitely' and then 'tell everyone else to do it too'. Different servers having different setups will be good, but that'd go the other way quick.
If leveling up is fastest when X node is high, and that information is known, there will be some people who try to raise that node even on servers that don't have it.
"Players will optimize the fun out of a game."
The speed of the leveling itself actually doesn't matter at all, only 'how rewarding higher levels are for doing things or achieving dominance'. Slow leveling has the benefit that 'people who have trouble being imaginative in certain ways' or 'seeing the point of activity' will get that dopamine hit triggered, the pattern matching part of their brains will go 'bigger numbers good must get bigger level number' even if it doesn't affect much, and keep playing.
I suspect Intrepid just used the psychological evaluation studies for the level numbers though, because those match up almost exactly with the 'required ones', and Ashes doesn't seem to have another item in the Fixed Interval Reward Schedule slot since Skill Points and gear are tied to levels, so Jeff and Steven probably did the research.
I think the exp given per quest should be quite small, but when you log in there should be a bonus lets say 300% but should drop to 0% bonus and if the actual exp is really small, in first few levels it might be worth to spend extra time but after a certain level doing a level day will automatically be the best solution.
In games that release the figures, 90% of the games play time is spent on characters at the level cap.
To be noted that modern games follow a toxic trend where lvling is seen as a chore and designed as such (as a bad experience that is very easy to get through, as something that is desired to be skipped, preferably by paying the game owners money).
I'm talking about games going back 15+ years. It is the norm in MMO's ever since they started being called MMO's.
I expect it to be even higher than 90% in more recent games. New World is likely to be at 98%+ by the end of it's first year (if it makes it that long).
Should the experience of leveling in an MMO be fun? Well, yes, obviously.
Should leveling in an MMO take long enough that it will turn people off the game? Well, no, obviously.
To illustrate that this isn't just a factor of modern games with faster leveling. lets look at it from the perspective of Ashes.
I'm going to assume you agree with the notion that there should not be a noticeable change to how you play the game when you reach the level cap in Ashes. You should not, for example, find that as soon as you hit the level cap, you are suddenly deprived of the same choices of content that you had while leveling.
If we make that assumption, and we also make the assumption that it will be 2 years before the level cap is raised, along with the assumption that 45 days to the initial level cap is retained, then it would stand to reason that about 6.5% of all content in Ashes should be leveling content, with the rest being content for those at max level.
This is because - based on the above assumptions - most players will spend about 6.5% of their time leveling.
Alts will add a little to that total amount of time leveling, but not all that much since many (most, in my experience) players don't bother with alts at all.
So, even with Ashes longer leveling time than most modern MMO's, it is still going to have 90%+ of all play time spent at the level cap.
I don't suggest anything I state it as a fact, leveling will either be well done or many people won't even reach max level
Leveling can be well done, and still many people won't even reach max level.
In fact, the longer it takes to level, the larger this number of people will be, regardless of how good it is.
Archeage had abysmal leveling. It was boring, repetitive and just not fun. But, it only took 5 hours or so to get to the cap. Not surprisingly, not all that many people dropped the game before reaching the level cap.
So it would then stand to reason that if the goal was to make a game where the fewest number of people stop playing before they reach the level cap - as you seem to suggest above - then the ideal way to do that would be to have the shortest possible leveling experience, regardless of quality.
This is something I disagree with, but if you are going to use the number of players that drop out of the game before reaching the level cap, shortening that time is the appropriate thing to do.
Comments
― Plato
I can't imagine "exploring" being my main activity in games. I would soon just take up recreational naps as my main hobby and quit playing games all together.
If I had more time, I would write a shorter post.
A great mmo-rpg is a true adventure.
A true adventure is a journey.
A journey isn't rushed and it isn't easy. It's long and dangerous (full of obstacles and setbacks). The journey is what gives the success substance.
If some players don't want a journey but a shortcut to what they assume is success then they don't really want an mmo-rpg.
Then this game is just not for them.
If they don't like it, they're free to go play other games.
Devs should stop trying to cater to people like them.
Catering to people like them is what lead to the decline of mmos we're witnessing today.
Just because your kid asks to be fed only sweets that doesn't mean you should only feed him sweets.
It's bad for him it's bad for you and it ironically destroys the joy of sweets as well generally.
Yes some people will ruin their fun no matter what you do. They're unrasonable and thats their problem.
The unreasonable should adapt to the reasonable, not the other way around.
Every game will have people who brute-force their way through to max level; it's unavoidable. Do not change the core of the game to target them - it will not stop them.
Ashes hopes to be a different game, in that they will not have too many worries of a shortage of content, as the game is planning to take as long as it needs to reach the end of development. I don't think Steven will release anything that isn't up to standard, whereas New World as a comparison clearly made a huge sprint in the last year whereby there was hardly any content and all of a sudden they pushed out cookie cutter mmo elements like dungeons etc.
People will hit max level, and that's fine. As long as the game follows its course then I am sure that regardless of how fast people level, content drought shouldn't be a complaint.
Honestly it looks like you are mistaking mmo for a coop story game. Leveling is integral part of an mmo - there is no denying that, but leveling in mmo is always a kind of rite of passage to prove that you are ready to play with all sandbox and community tools the game has to offer. Many mmos do a big mistake to withdraw all of those tools until you hit max, but a great mmo introduces those during the leveling.
Honestly leveling isnt the whole game - if you are here for a leveling adventure - then welcome tourist! Play with others, contribute with others have fun and nobody will spare a tear when you quit because all that is left to do are sandbox elements and your leveling adventure is long over.
― Plato
''Adventure is a subjective perception of the experience that the player has when playing the game. What you consider an adventure is unfun filler for someone else and vice versa what he considers an adventure is nothing to you ''
To some level, anything and everything is subjective but the fact is, adventure has an amount of objective everyone can agree on.
Adventure is born out of a challenge, out of a state of danger that gets you out of your zone of confort.
Which leads me back to my point and the point of the topic.
If it was a stroll in the park (fast, easy leveling) then it wasn't challenging, then it didnt' get anyone out of any zone of confort, it wasn't an adventure.
Either way, what is your point with the statement you just made, in regards to game development?
''Adventure is a journey towards a goal that the player set out for himself
''
Games have their own, pre-defined progression path.
Most people enter an mmo-rpg with no defined goal besides playing the game, assuming they will have fun playing it as it was deisgned, as its own progression path was designed.
Simply put, the design of the game will be what decides (in the case of most people if not virtually all) what the goal is and if the path to it is fun or not.
Either way, what is your point with the statement you just made, in regards to game development?
''MMO is a fictional place where a lot of people can find very different adventures so it all contributes towards a big realistic world.'' '
And, coming back to my point and the point of the topic, a game can be designed to facilitate, to encourage, go direct people towards having adventures, or, if badly designed it can hinder people having adventures.
Yes some people will find adventure in world pvp.
Some people will find adventure in group questing.
Some people will find advenure in dungeons and raids.
Some people will find adventure in the economy aspect.
Often in the context of finding friends and playing with them.
Most people will find adventure in the combination of all these.
And it is the duty of the game to be designed to cater to all these paths.
''Honestly it looks like you are mistaking mmo for a coop story game.
''
''and nobody will spare a tear when you quit because all that is left to do are sandbox elements and your leveling adventure is long over.''
Honestly it looks like you are here to get into a fight not discuss what would make this game better.
'' Leveling is integral part of an mmo - there is no denying that''
Modern mmos tend to disagree I feel.
Leveling has started to be seen more and more as an unpleasant obstacle. Many games even offer you the option to pay to skip it.
No longer is leveling seen as a source of fun, as an adventure. It's seen as a chore.
I hope AOC will change this.
''Honestly leveling isnt the whole game ''
Honestly max-lvl content isn't the whole game.
''- if you are here for a leveling adventure - then welcome tourist! ''
I'm here for a good mmo-rpg and a good-mmo rpg has great leveling.
The daddy of modern mmos, World of Warcraft had very good leveling in the time when it reached the legendary status Activision is leeching from its corpse even today.
Rushed lvling that feels like a chore isn't great leveling and a mmo-rpg with fast lvling that feels like a chore isnt a good mmo-rpg.
A good mmo-rpg also has great max level content, but this is not what this topic is about.
Either way, what is your point?
That the lvling in AOC should suck?
PS: The same toxic ''leave, you won't be missed'' was the ''main course'' among the WoW community as well and look what it lead to. I knew people like that would jump on this boat as well as WoW's is sinking, I just hoped to see you as late as possible.
also please read more than first sentence in my posts so you don't ask something that I answered a few posts above
Almost every other post in this thread I made is containing my opinion that leveling should not take longer than the leveling content that was created for it - leveling should be a supporting pillar for the game and not one of its primary goals
Making leveling longer for the sake of making it take longer without the content actually supporting it is truly horrendous
If the purpose of leveling is only as a timesink during which you are to learn your spells then the game has failed leveling and there should be ways for it to skip it
It literally helps nobody to set some arbitrary amount of time that is required for leveling, when we don't actually know how much leveling content is in the game
― Plato
This actually works here for this case, because I am only describing launch hype players that have no intention to play the game, but to enjoy the mass launch hype and new world to explore - the levelers are kinda part of it, because once they hit level cap they loose interest in the game, because they are out of leveling areas and levels
what you describe is applicable when the game is actually released and all that is left are players that play the game and the players that played because ashes became the "new game" left
― Plato
If you were to learn to check my account you would see I have tens of posts where I use it with no problem but this time it refused to work.
Considering I quoted and answered each of your claims individually I don't know why you're under the impression I did otherwise.
Please quote yourself saying that.
It should absolutely be one of its primary goals.
Its the first thing the players come into contact with. If its not fun, hell in AOC's case simply if it wont be great, many will quit before ever reaching max level.
Its a very well proven source of great fun (The mmo-rpg that made mmo-rpgs great, Vanilla World of Warcraft, had great leveling, legendary to this day, re-proven to be great in Classic).
Its something people will do agian and again as they level ults, long after they reached max level.
Some people wont even ever reach max lvl but instead will twink. Its a very common sight in mmo-rpgs.
Who said it should be?
1. What does this have anything to do with what I was saying? Where did I say what you are now commenting? I feel like you invented your own ideas, attributed to me and now started attacking me for the ideas you invented.
2. So you're unilaterally and in the absence of any evidence to even indicate this, assuming that lvling in this game should be bad? How does this concern me and how is this constructive?
literally cut out of context - read it again
Primary content in any mmo is only the repeatable content - which leveling isnt - you can "reset" your leveling by starting a new character, but that is the players choice.
Leveling is finite supporting content - does that mean it should be bad? Well tell me what happens to a building that has bad supporting pillars - Most people would say that the pillar would crumble and the building would fall or at least a big part of it
And about putting words into the others mouth - You clearly started with "the adventure should be long" which is automatically aligning you with people in this thread that are for making the leveling take longer than it is currently planned (because I assume that if they say they want leveling to take 45 days then they have enough content for it)
And quote me any instance where I say that Ashes leveling should be bad - the only thing you've done so far is to quote me out of context where I explain what happens if the leveling is bad
If you feel to be attacked, then I am sorry for that perception - I do not wish you any ill - I just want to debate based on the fact that your posts are tunneled on leveling disregarding the rest of the game
― Plato
It would be awesome if this game could do the story telling of Final Fantasy 14, the raid bosses of World of Warcraft with challenging abilities that made you plan out the fight, the sieges of Guild Wars 2, and the crafting of Eve Online. If they could pull all of that off, this game would be a great MMO.
I asked you where you said that to me (you never did).
Making alts (leveling different characters) is very repeatable content in any mmo-rpg.
It doesn't automatically align me with anything.
What I said is what I said and I never said what you just did.
Randomly associating me with other people in this forum with which you disagreed is irrational.
I explicitly said leveling should take long and be well done.
Per a contrario not having content for your leveling, in your game, is not well done leveling.
So I meant that leveling should take long and that it should be well supported by the game.
What else am I to understand by you attacking the point I've made, that leveling in ashes should be a focus of the game (so it should be done very well)?
As such, that is how leveling in MMO's should be treated - as 10% of the game.
This means that 90% of the game, the dungeons, the mobs, the quests - 90% of everything - should be aimed at the level cap.
To suggest otherwise is to take your own opinion and project it on to everyone else.
To be noted that modern games follow a toxic trend where lvling is seen as a chore and designed as such (as a bad experience that is very easy to get through, as something that is desired to be skipped, preferably by paying the game owners money).
This trend is one of the reasons which lead to the decline of mmos, a decline Intrepid wants to revert.
The norm in today's mmos (in this regard and many others) is the problem, something Intrepid should avoid, not something you can invoke as ''hey look, this is how things are done right'' in an argument.
I don't suggest anything I state it as a fact, leveling will either be well done or many people won't even reach max level (people will come with sky-high expectation for ashes and if the game isn't very solid from the start, namely from the leveling part, large numbers of said players won't even reach the max level) and in classic mmo-s (including the one which made mmo-rpgs great, World of Warcraft Vanilla) it was a huge source of fun and good memories.
"If the purpose of leveling is only as a timesink during which you are to learn your spells then the game has failed leveling and there should be ways for it to skip it"
You totally misunderstand what repeatable content is - which is a certain type of content that you can do near endlessly without resetting your character - so leveling can NEVER be repeatable content since you can do it on any character only ONCE
in other words - if we take your definition of repeatable content then deleting your char is repeatable content as well, because you can endlessly create and delete characters and the deletion of a character can be a juicy content as some streamers showed us
The only thing I stood against is that leveling should be long, because you didn't write anything about the leveling they actually might have - so the length of leveling is the primary criteria for you
Using a word "long" gives a clear message - that is why I only talked that the length of leveling should be reflective of the content
― Plato
At this point it's beyond clear to me you're just looking for a fight and I don't have time or energy to waste with that.
If you have anything constructive to say regarding the development of the game or anything like that, I'll reply to that but otherwise please stop bothering me.
dude, you read first sentence of my every post, disagree and say I attack you while blaming me for not writing anything constructive without actually reading my posts
― Plato
I don't like what you said, so it's a destructive attack against me and my way of life!
If I had more time, I would write a shorter post.
Of course I dislike
- his abusive and insulting speech (example: ''don't tell me you're just trolling'')
- the fact he attacks me for things other people have said on this topic, with utterly no connection to me or other things I said
- the fact he blames me for not reading things he never wrote to me (but somewhere else, in a discussion with someone else)
Well damn, here we go again.... good work taking this whole thread off the tracks team.
When you join already existing discussion topic and pretend only what you write from that point on belongs in the discussion
When I was pretty clear that you've not read posts that were specific replies towards you
― Plato
You repeated something you said to someone else after I asked you when you've said something like that to me.
Just like you disagreed with me because of things other people on this topic supposedly said.
from that point i've tried to post the full quote that clearly shows that it was literally cut out of context and portrayed as its opposite meaning
― Plato
I said that's the only thing I could understand from what you said because that's the only thing that could be understood (how was I to know you were judging me and my claims based on what other random people I wasn't even aware of said).
Either way, can we agree to stop taking this off-topic further?
you said you want long leveling
I said I want leveling to take adequate amount of time that fits the amount of leveling content the game actually has
stop playing the victim and do not pretend that you cannot understand my posts, because if you actually didn't understand you would have asked me to explain my position better, it is plain clear you chose to view my posts as personal attacks and thus this excuse allows you to completely ignore what I wrote in those
― Plato
Something with which I did not disagree.
But you felt I disagreed because of things other people with no connection to me said, in this thread.
Indeed there was a misunderstanding but I was not the one to blame for it and insulting and harrasing me because of said misunderstanding is even more unreasonable.
The thread is more of a personal worry of mine and I am sure Ashes will be just fine without an XP nerf long term (short term, meh, I said my worries before)
That being said, I really, really hate the argument "just go play something else, its not for you". It comes off really childish.
We are fortunate that Ashes has an open development so we can give our input as players, trying to take that away is stupid, pure and simple.
There will be elements of the game that we won't agree with, there will be systems that we won't like. Calling them out is the best (and only) thing we can do.
And I don't mean just for launch. I am hoping Ashes becomes my daily game, for years hopefully. Currently, the devs have a solid player-friendly mentality. From all I have seen about the game so far, there is nothing I disagree with, all systems make me go "yes, i like that"
There were other games like this, think of WoW at its beginning, it was really good and players liked it. Right now though, it got to the point its a walking corpse of what it was. I don't think there was one massive change that was added, but a lot of small ones that the players overlooked. "Well, yea, they added a mount to the store, but its only one" "yea, they added yet another system to progress, but its just one". Then it got to whatever the fuck WoW is now.
Having a serious discussion about game mechanics should be not only allowed, but encouraged. Even if they are like this thread, a thread that makes no sense right now. We are what, 2-3 years away? We haven't seen the summoner yet (!!!), but I am asking about progression to max level.
And reading the posts here, there seem to be a lot of people "make leveling as hard and slow as possible" and a lot "no thank you, don;t want that"
Well guess, what, we are both right. Or wrong. Not being a game dev, I have no idea if it makes sense to slow people down. I liked the comment with "smell the roses", forcing people to stop during a race, even if they don't want to.
I liked it because it is so completely different to how I play MMOs. I know that for some players the game only starts at max level, but i don't understand that, not in an RPG. Its weird and interesting.
And hopefully, the devs find this post, take a look at the comments and see the 2 (maybe more) types of players that will play their game. (Let's be honest, we are lurking on the forums 2-3 years before launch, talking about random topics, we all are going to play this game.) And consider all players when designing the level curve, the xp gains, the loot drop, in such a way that no group feels abandoned.
If I can get to max level in a week, I will think that the devs have failed. Failed at making an MMORPG. Even worse, if I (with my play style) do get to max in a week, I'll probably stop playing. Harsh, but true. I personally don't like the idea of alts, have never made one, so I'll only have 1 character. Max level in a week, max profession level in a month, at that point the only thing that would keep me in is the social aspect. But is that good enough to keep me for months or years? I don't know.
Bit of an exaggeration, but I know there are a lot of other players that aren't in a hurry to get to max.
And 45 days of playing 4-6 hours a day is really fast leveling for max
There are multiple ways to do this, without making everyone hate the system. Raiders and 'heavy endgamers' will just plow through it and complain a little, and everyone else has more fun.
Games are generally better when levels are less rewarding because more of the content has purpose. Nodes will already require this so I'm not too worried, but then again some decisions Intrepid (Steven?) makes about things confuse me.
If max level is a meaningful strong goal for effectiveness then people will find the 'fastest easiest to grind enemies' and 'do that infinitely' and then 'tell everyone else to do it too'. Different servers having different setups will be good, but that'd go the other way quick.
If leveling up is fastest when X node is high, and that information is known, there will be some people who try to raise that node even on servers that don't have it.
"Players will optimize the fun out of a game."
The speed of the leveling itself actually doesn't matter at all, only 'how rewarding higher levels are for doing things or achieving dominance'. Slow leveling has the benefit that 'people who have trouble being imaginative in certain ways' or 'seeing the point of activity' will get that dopamine hit triggered, the pattern matching part of their brains will go 'bigger numbers good must get bigger level number' even if it doesn't affect much, and keep playing.
I suspect Intrepid just used the psychological evaluation studies for the level numbers though, because those match up almost exactly with the 'required ones', and Ashes doesn't seem to have another item in the Fixed Interval Reward Schedule slot since Skill Points and gear are tied to levels, so Jeff and Steven probably did the research.
― Plato
I expect it to be even higher than 90% in more recent games. New World is likely to be at 98%+ by the end of it's first year (if it makes it that long).
Should the experience of leveling in an MMO be fun? Well, yes, obviously.
Should leveling in an MMO take long enough that it will turn people off the game? Well, no, obviously.
To illustrate that this isn't just a factor of modern games with faster leveling. lets look at it from the perspective of Ashes.
I'm going to assume you agree with the notion that there should not be a noticeable change to how you play the game when you reach the level cap in Ashes. You should not, for example, find that as soon as you hit the level cap, you are suddenly deprived of the same choices of content that you had while leveling.
If we make that assumption, and we also make the assumption that it will be 2 years before the level cap is raised, along with the assumption that 45 days to the initial level cap is retained, then it would stand to reason that about 6.5% of all content in Ashes should be leveling content, with the rest being content for those at max level.
This is because - based on the above assumptions - most players will spend about 6.5% of their time leveling.
Alts will add a little to that total amount of time leveling, but not all that much since many (most, in my experience) players don't bother with alts at all.
So, even with Ashes longer leveling time than most modern MMO's, it is still going to have 90%+ of all play time spent at the level cap. Leveling can be well done, and still many people won't even reach max level.
In fact, the longer it takes to level, the larger this number of people will be, regardless of how good it is.
Archeage had abysmal leveling. It was boring, repetitive and just not fun. But, it only took 5 hours or so to get to the cap. Not surprisingly, not all that many people dropped the game before reaching the level cap.
So it would then stand to reason that if the goal was to make a game where the fewest number of people stop playing before they reach the level cap - as you seem to suggest above - then the ideal way to do that would be to have the shortest possible leveling experience, regardless of quality.
This is something I disagree with, but if you are going to use the number of players that drop out of the game before reaching the level cap, shortening that time is the appropriate thing to do.