Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
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.
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.
Comments
L2
L2 death penalty was harsh, from memory, a single pve or pvp death might be anywhere from 20min - 1 hr to recover pve`ing. And a round of pvp that may only last 10-20min might end up with 2-5 deaths before done. So frequent pvp was limited to those skilled, or high powered and those willing to put in an awful amount of time to level.
I would say from my own experience, I pvp`ed probably 2% of the time, yet was in a warring clan. The main focus in that game was to level up and gear up and you needed to pvp and you couldn`t level your toon by pvp`ing.
When one wanted a peaceful time, it was common to de-tag from clan for a while or just switch clans.
I rarely got griefed once into the game and if griefed later in the game it was when the benefits of being a clan shone over being solo. The clan as a whole would team together to do something about it; be that diplomacy or war or retribution or maybe even payoff.
Did I feel griefed in that game, very, very rarely.. Perhaps for a few min once every 3-6 months or so.
In the beginning, a few deaths were hard to suffer.. then later it was just part of a day`s fun and sometimes I even let some take me out when I felt they had pvp`ed so well they deserved a kill.
New World
Not the recent round but last year, when there were overpowered players just camping outside the city gate, for the sole purpose of killing low levels and I could not venture past the gate as I had died enough times for the day already and lost too much gear such that I couldn't economically support replacement anymore, then I felt griefed.
Could I fight back, maybe but highly unlikely to win 1 lowbie vs a group.. Was I a member of a clan, no. Would being a member of a clan helped, probably but the time investment for a short test run was not sufficient to get that far.
ESO
There is no real griefing in that one.
BDO
A few times got dropped for no apparent reason or rationalle, just someone being an ass.
Did it annoy me at the time, yes. Did I feel griefed, no.
Time investment nowadays in a game is dramatically different from 15 years ago.
So for me, how to play smarter will be more critical to do if the ratio of pvp to pve is out of line with the my needs to enjoy the game.
To me, the best thing about the game from a PvP perspective are sieges. It is PvP having an actual immediate and obvious effect on the actual game world - something no game has managed (not even EVE).
What we will find though, once we get in to the game, is that sieging a metropolis with any reasonable chance of success is going to take a mammoth amount of raw resources. I wouldn't be surprised if this was counted in the millions (quite honestly). This is just of the common raw materials - I would also expect there to be materials required (or at least very useful) that come from PvE aspects of the game, likely requiring a skilled PvE raid to acquire.
You may disagree, but I don't see a PvP centric player wanting to be a part of a massive harvesting session like that which will take a month or more, only to participate in a few hours worth of sieging, to then start that harvesting again. Nor do most PvP players want to spend days raiding PvE content.
Again, I may be mistaken here, but this is how I see the game going.
I see three major player groups in Ashes - the PvE, the PvP and the crafter/harvester. Obviously these aren't strict groups, there is always going to be cross over, but I am sure you get the point here and probably know people that fit in to each group.
To me, the PvP player that will get the most out of the game is the one that doesn't need to spend massive amounts of time harvesting, crafting or PvE'ing. They are in a situation where they have others doing that for them.
To me, the PvE player that will get the most out of the game is the one that doesn't need to spend massive amounts of time harvesting, crafting or PvP'ing. They are in a situation where they have others doing that for them.
To me, the crafter/harvester that will get the most out of the game is the one that doesn't need to spend massive amounts of time PvP'ing or PvE'ing. They are in a situation where they have others doing that for them.
To me, this is what will make Ashes great. Rather than chasing away all the solo players around their node, the smart PvP player will realize that this solo harvester is actually getting the resources that said PvP player will need for their next siege, and so will leave them to it. The more that solo harvester gathers, the less that PvP player and his PvP friends need to get - which means they have more time to do the things they enjoy.
Ashes has things that are on a scale too large for a single guild - too large even for a single node. What will make Ashes great is when clusters of nodes all work together to defeat other clusters of nodes.
It is this working together in order to tear down what others have that is what will make Ashes great, not attacking some guy harvesting iron.
Needless to say, if Ashes doesn't maintain that balance that I have been talking about, all of the above will come crashing down. What the game will then be is a PvP game that is either going to be like L2 with a drastic dropoff of players, followed by over a decade of a slow, ignominious tail of decline, or a drastic dropoff of players followed by a desperate attempt to generate as much revenue as possible as per Archeage.
My guess is it would be the latter - since if that happens, Ashes will have the same bad name in the MMO community that Bless has, and for generally the same reason (not being what was promised).
Either way, the game will be insignificant as an MMO without that balance.
With it though, it could well be the best sandbox.
The sandpark will be the best sandbox and the PvX game will be the best PvP game.
I'm not really talking about how much PvP there will be. I think it's very likely that Corruption will not deter PvP enough to my satisfaction and I won't play Ashes.
That's assuming Ashes even launches...
Do you realize you said you don't think you are opposed, and then followed that up with a statement that directly suggests you are?
While I wouldn't want to speak for Tyrantor, I think it is safe to say that if the corruption system limits how much PvP the game has, he will leave.
In terms of the spectrum of PvP vs PvE, the two of you are as far apart as any regular posters I have come across on these forums.
Even though agreeing with Noaani makes me feel a little sick inside (
There it is.....!
The game design includes activities specifically designed for solo play, so... "literally every aspect of the game is designed around group play" is false.
Ashes game design includes solo questlines.
Yep. it has mechanics and systems that can be done alone. BUUUUUUUUUT... The combat is designed around groups, the materials required for crafting past basic bitch armor require grouping, and the entire economy revolves around selling and buying with other players to get most things done. Let's also not forget that you can pvp literally anywhere, and having more players in your party reduces the chance that you will get merced by random groups of strangers.
Sure you can go gather solo, but the materials are not going to be for high end gear. Sure, you can go solo mobs, but your efficiency is lower than a groups and you increase the chance of being attacked like I stated previously.
Just because the game allows you to do solo content does not mean it is designed around it.
Yeah. In Bless Online, the couple of times I got ganked, I didn't feel griefed because there was no real disruption of my game session. I respawned not too far away from my corpse and was able to reach my corpse and re-equip without being corpse camped. And then went back to whatever I was doing.
I think the whole encounter took less than five minutes and no time was added trying recoup material losses.
Another nice thing about Ashes is that looting PC corpses is percentage resource drop, rather than the attacker(s) choosing what they loot. So, it's not a guarantee that the best resources(s) will be lost upon death.
Strong disagree from me. Although solo leveling is the norm now, any endgame stuff usually requires groups if not raids. I've mostly soloed in all the mmorpgs I've played, never had access to the high level content, and that is fine. Guilds and groups are always more effective, so I don't know what you're complaining about.
Honestly, I don't understand the hate for the people with a different play style. MMOs have many aspects drawing different kind of players. Socializing is one of them, but never the only one. These games are simply too big.
Now, if you go about persecuting players with another play style preference until they stop playing: that is griefing, or close to it.
I don't like being force fed a story where. I could go on and on about how great the sandbox genre is.
This is a bias sure, but when Steven describes AoC, all I think is "finally, someone has the balls to make a real deal Sandbox MMO."
It depends on the player. Some pure PvP types only want to crack heads in a equal environment. MOBAs are popular now. You can always que into a match and get your fix. I sure do from time to time. The thing is that the gravity of the situation in a match based game is lost. What do I lose? 45-60mins of my time in a lose?
In a sandbox MMO a lost can be more real. I have told this story here on the forums I think, but one of the best experiences of my MMO career was looking a small ship that took weeks to build in a four hour shit to ship PvP skirmish in Darkfall. You can't script that, and have it carry the same weight.
All possible. I am thinking that in ashes just being a well rounded player might be the ticket. We never called ourselves PvP or PvE players in the old days of MMOs. You were just a noob or not.
I think there will be a drastic drop off of players no matter what. The age of no life-ing one game for months to years on end is lost to the general population. The game that I hear described in interviews and read about on the wiki looks like it is going to be plenty balanced. Lets hope we get a game we both like.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
I think more clearly delineating things like this in places like our Terms/Community Guidelines as we get deeper into testing will hopefully help set those expectations better! That way players know what can be actioned, and the proper way to go about reporting it if it occurs.
I've seen a few folks mention in this thread that "intent of the alleged griefer" should be the barometer by which griefing definitions were set - in a world where intent can be difficult to determine, how might you go about this? For example, some mentioned that if there was no "gain" involved with repeatedly killing someone, then that would count as griefing - but what if the griefer considers their own personal enjoyment of your repeated demise a form of "gain"?
Also seeing a lot of interesting notes here on whether or not spawn camping might constitute as griefing - perhaps overall this is something we can bring up a wider Dev Discussion on
Endgame is such a minuscule part of an MMO, it isn’t even close to justify calling a game “social”. The whole game has to promote grouping of it expects anyone to be effective team players.
The reason so many MMOs have such a small endgame scene is because the rest of the game enables going it alone, so people enter the environment where they have to perform for the good of the group, and suddenly they’re being held to expectations and they can’t stand it.
From the very start, players should be reliant on and have expectations as part of the community.
Yes risk verses reward is a core theme of AOC however with some people there is no thought of reward. The reason some people kill other players is to purely get a reaction the thought that hey might be upsetting the plans of another random player is what gives them their kicks. Its who they are and we will have to wait and see if the corruption system will be enough to deter such behaviour.
I think a good start for determining griefing is to draw a line in the sand on what is griefing, and where it can take place. EVE has it's rookie griefing rules, that basically state that you can't attack, scam, or exploit a player in these "X" starting zones. Ashes could easily say: While you are within "X" distance of a divine gateway it is expected to be on your best behavior to allow new players to get acclimated to the world.
Knowing up front that some repetitive killing of another player is acceptable "bad behavior" because the bounty system and the corruption system are in place to not only deter griefing, but to help bring griefers to justice. Specifically in any case where resources are to be gained or territory is being fought over. I personally like all of the steps Intrpid has taken so far to make the game not a "Gank box". I worry that without permissions for some "bad behavior", people will use griefing as a blanket term for any social interaction they don't like. FFXIV is an example of a game where people just report each other for harassment/griefing anytime a social interaction goes south.
I do agree that when someone is killing another player repeatedly for no gain. Just for the sick enjoyment of it, that might be considered griefing. I am not sure what the solution is for that would be. I know it will be a major issue for streamers because their might not be any prior social interactions to provoke these repeat killings. Just some twitch viewer stream sniping. Maybe make it so that if the same person kills you 10 times in 24 hours you can report them for suspected griefing if you feel like their is a strong case to be made, but if the report is found to be made in bad faith their could be a corresponding punishment for reporting fair play as griefing. Spawn camping could fall under this behavior as well, as there would not be anything to be gained from it.
I just really don't want to see what is considered griefing spiral out of control. It's subjective at best already. So some firm ideas from intrepid could really help bring some unity to the topic.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
I am very surprised to see Steven saying "no dps meters" some time ago.
But the shitstorm that followed was an example of why statements shouldnt be made yet from officials.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
This is why any action considered to be griefing needs to be repeated, as that repetition is what signifies intent.
This distinction is only needing to be considered in discussions around punishment though, which is not what this thread is. That said, I am all for the notion of not having rules that can't be enforced, which is why this reply is here.
If you look at a body of behavioral interactions between two players - rather than a single act - you can usually fairly easily determine the intent of each player.
Sometimes in L2, there were highly imbalanced wars between clans, which led to imbalanced pvp and/or pk`ing as a strategy.
A way less powered clan (numbers, strength and/or pvp experience) might fight back is to focus on the weaker players within the warring clan to whittle away the numbers or to bring a voice to the plight from within that clan from the weakest players. For the poor player that got that focus, probably not fair.. but in the larger game proved to be a solution in some instances.
There were plenty of players that jumped clans to either go to the strongest or hide in numbers, sometimes worked but did not always bode well for them as joining the strongest also got you the most attention, and being passive in a warring clan is often a conflict of interest.
So for every argument to constrict pvp, there is a similar argument to lessen restriction
Personally I do think that the corruption system will be a deterrent for the worst of behaviour. I have a guild full of people who will delight in nothing more than hunting down griefers, well anyone who is red for that matter.
Making a bad name for yourself will stick with you and I do remember Steven saying there will be no name changes which I personally think is a good thing. Will be either reroll or live with the consequences of what you have done.
I am honestly really looking forward to seeing just how the corruption system will work and the effects it will have on the world as a whole. If Intrepid can deliver on the systems they have outlined there will be some fun times ahead in AOC.
Obviously, I'm going to attempt to focus as much of my play time on PvE as possible, but I am also not going to shy away from PvP at all, and any characters I adventure on will be maxed out in a harvesting skill of some form.
However, I look at this in the same way I would look at a raid setup. In a raid, you have people that are dedicated to tanking, others dedicated to healing and still others dedicated to dealing damage. If you specalize each of these three jobs, your raid will be far more successful than if you try to spread each task out over all participants.
Likewise, if I am in a guild of players that generally prefer PvE, and we have a guild that we are friends with that generally prefer PvP, and yet another guild we are friends with that generally prefer harvesting, crafting and such, then it makes perfect sense to try and optimize everyones play to the benefit of all.
Without a setup like this, a PvP guild wanting to siege a metropolis will likely find they have to put in months worth of work in just getting materials. Since they attack all the harvesters in the nodes around where they are from, there won't be much in the way of materials in those nodes - definately not enough to organize a siege. This means those PvP players have to spend the bulk of their time online trying to find raw materials - either harvesting them or going to other nodes to buy them (which then requires them to be transported).
Their rivals though, the players in the setup outlined above, those PvP players are instead able to focus their time on PvP, knowing that their friends that enjoy harvesting are performing that task for them. Clearly, the players in this node are also going to get more enjoyment out of the game as well, as the PvP players don't need to spend weeks (or months) scrounging to find materials for a siege, and the harvesters can harvest without too much trouble.
This is why I have been saying for well over a year now that it is not in a PvP players best interest to attack players that are from their node cluster, and are harvesting in their node cluster. That PvP player may well be making a small personal gain, and may find a minute or two worth of enjoyment, but when it comes to trying to get involved in major sieges, you want that harvester there working behind you and the best way to ensure you have that is to make sure those harvesters in your node cluster can go about their business.
People really need to read @Noaani above post because it shows how AOC will go beyond just a PvX game people off on a happy little gank have the possibility to do so much more harm than good to the settlements they consider themselves to be part of or citizens of. It is not just the ability to raise a banner to call a siege but the resources needed to build the very nodes that will provide the building and services they desire to progress their own characters in many cases. Not to mention taking care not to attack friendly caravans trying to bring needed resources in to help with node progression.
Your average Pker will become known and if they are just indiscriminate their own nodes will just disown them and life will become pretty tough when crafter and gatherers refuse to provide services to them. Really just need to see how it all shakes out.
When the first alpha 1 testers got in to test many of them went off on a murder spree and later after the novelty of killing each other had worn off they wondered why they were not levelling up, experience debit numb skulls experience debit.
I give you a scenario for thoughts. Say, you are happily gathering solo in a key area and there really isn't somewhere else as valuable to you at that point in time. You want to be there. Then another player comes along and starts gathering over you in the same space. It kills all your efforts of traversing the land for 20min to get to a vacant spot and you really want to stay, but the player has just depleted the areas value to you.
The area is small and gathering with the rate of respawn will only generate reasonable returns for one player.
Now do you:
a) accept that you must now play at half speed or less
b) leave and stop playing for a few hours
c) ask the player to leave as you had first dibs, and they say, "no".
d) kill them yourself and quickly generate a bit more xp to clean your red status
e) call in the pvp clan that wont get there in force for another 40min
f) something else?
For me personally: a)
They've just as much right to be there as I do.
Disappointing, for sure, but they're not MY resources until I've picked them up. I just didn't get to them fast enough.
Always makes me curious how people's brains work, when I see someone talking about "Guarding their resource spawns". They're not yours just cos you were there first...! lol