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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Different borders to show how powerful an enemy is
Spurius
Member
What do you people think about different portrait-borders to show how elite is the mob you are looking at? Right now it shows "+" near the level of the mob, but I doubt this is how it's going to end up looking at the end. Archeage did it quite well, they had different borders with stars, but stars is something you need to count. How strong is that drake? Wait, let me count the stars... The best way it was ever done was in LOTRO, where the moment you targeted the enemy you knew immediately how strong it was, and you didn't have to count anything or memorize anything, it was very apparent. If it has a bunch of flames coming out of it's portrait, don't touch it!
Like this post if you think something like that should be added into the game.
Like this post if you think something like that should be added into the game.
12
Comments
That said, the LOTRO ones are tacky AF.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
Those borders are ghastly unimmersive and distracting. Bloody awful, but I can see it's merits for people who are less in tune with color ratings.
If they make a check function I would target just be able to use it on monster and it give a vague strength reading and it's strongest/weakest stat relative to me.
So you have borders that are more or less ornate, depending on how many players the mob is intended for. Not as intrusive as those in the OP, and I also don't see a need for more than three or four different borders (mobs intended for solo players, small groups, full groups, raids).
Then have a color to delineate mob level in relation to your character. An example of this (pulled directly from another game), is that if the mob is 10 levels or more below you, it's nameplate text is grey. If it is 5 - 9 levels below you, it is green, 1 - 4 levels below you it is blue, the same level as you and it is white, 1 - 4 levels above you and it is yellow, 5 - 9 levels above you and it is orange, 10+ levels above you and it is red.
In terms of quick target identification of PvE mobs, imo this is all the information that is needed.
No elite.
No “+”
No dragons or flames.
Just level 15 beach troll or level 700 Elder Dragon of the Tundra.
Jaded by overworked art in 2021. Cybertruck anyone?
I prefer different colours for the letters naming the mob, inside the target box.
Blue, lightblue, green, white, yellow, faded red, red.
How do you propose using just color to convey two different pieces of information?
At a glance, players should be able to see roughly how many players the mob is intended for (solo, group, raid), and what the mobs level is in relation to your character.
This is why I personally think nameplate borders (simplified compared to what is posted above) and text color. Each aspect of the design is used to convey a different piece of information.
I was actually thinking it would be for players too. It would look at the gear score and relative stats and give you a difference in power at a glance.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
I think people can go a little overboard with saying that players just need to figure it out on their own. And many that tend to argue for this are the ones that say, "But my immersion...
Immersion is important but it can definitely be taken too far where the game suffers from the removal of certain UI info and game mechanics. If you would like to figure out if a mob will kill you in one hit or not without any visual indication, you can just play the game with the UI toggled off and see what happens.
My initial thought was that I don't like this, but after thinking about it for a few minutes, I actually kind of do.
It partially makes up for not being able to see the gear players have on.
So, a system where we have a system where level gap is denoted by color, for both PvE and PvP, and then a border indication to delineate solo/group/raid for PvE, and gear differentiation for PvP.
You are still needing to look at the specific buff the player has to get an indication of the specific type of armor the player is wearing (which would likely be something along the lines of a buff to magic damage for cloth, a buff to melee damage for leather and a buff to defense for plate - as an example).
To me, this creates an acceptable over all paradigm, even if I am not super stoked about the individual components of it.
I don't think corruption-themed borders would break anyone's immersion. You can say that they represent a feeling you get looking at an enemy.
Too many number-indicators kind of do break an immersion though. Begins to feel like a game wants you to solve a math-problem.
I think that is the difference between "one star, two stars... let me check the star-manual now, I have it opened somewhere..." and "HOLY MOTHER OF JESUS THAT'S A LOT OF FLAMES".
Different borders for the players is something LOTRO never did, but I always thought would be cool. For the mobs borders should not represent the difference in power, but rather represent how deep does the evil go here. So they are not personalized - this mob just always has that border, does not matter who is looking at him. And if we make them for players, it should go along the same lines.
names, levels and titles of the NPCs are necessary info, but when you notice that some mob looks bigger
and more menacing than anything else around you, you instinctively know that mob is strong, but how strong?will you need teammates to defeat it or you can do it alone?
problem with strength indication is that it depends on individual players, you and your friend might defeat some subset of 4-star bosses easily but others might have hard time defeating them even as full party. Hence strength indication is irrelevant in that sense.
No UI info is just as bad as having UI info on everything. You have to identify which UI infos are necessary. In this case fancy enemy name borders are not necessary because they dont apply to everyone.
It's not necessary, but it is cool.
Hence any strength indication is "irrelevant". In that sense.
I like this take.
Let the difficulty of a mob be experienced, instead of indicated - keep players on their toes when trying new stuff.
There are so many stories of people accidentally wandering into areas way beyond their depth, and you basically kill all that sense of adventure by putting up guard-rails for players.
PvP in Ashes provides that sense of adventure.
Let PvE be known.