Saying the quiet part outloud

So this is not going to sit right with some and that's ok. I am simply attempting to give my feed back to help improve or possibly improve upon what is being created.

1. Steven should not be the one "showcasing" what ever it is that is being shown. He is more suited for a support/ environment showcase which suits the way he presents to the audience. The tank Showcase did not at all hit the mark of showing off the tank at all as Steven at times was more into Looting, looking around, or running to try and stay alive. I am not a Tank main at all by any means and this showcase would make me not interested at all in trying to look at branching off into something new. It did the opposite if I'm honest.
2. For the love of god stop making these showcase so dam long! Yes give us content but make it to the point, clear and concise. 30-45 mins should be the goal i lost interest in the video as it was getting repetitive and loopy feeling with nothing being shown that was informative, other than learning how to die.
3. The quality of the live streams has been suffering since Oct 2022 at least, imo. It seems like you are going for spit out stuff to stay relevant and on peoples mind rather than quality of what your showing. Being late is also something that should not be happening. You guys should have plenty of time to film, edit, and produce the content. If your not able to do that than maybe your going to fast.
4. Stick with actual mechanics of the game. GM cheats are fine if your showing off the world, assets etc. But for a "build" showcase you need to focus on the "tank" and show it off as its intended to be or at least intended to be at that time frame.
5. Start to think before acting. I say this just from the standpoint of the last lets say 4-5 live streams. They all seem rushed, lack content, lack quality, and are for me personally very off putting as a consumer.
6. Also going into areas that are not meant for the size of the group is also a fail as you have shed light on a possible flaw with how your building difficulty and such.

Steven can play his part for sure in live streams and be the center of the content, but there need to be a pass the touch talk/discussion had as its effecting how your product is being portrayed to the public.

You want feedback on the Tank and Looting seen but really can anyone really give you quality, insightful feedback if the stream didn't provide that the the viewer?

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Comments

Ludullu

Agree with most of these points, but mainly agree with the 6th one. The "this is an 8-man location, but we're a 4-man group clearing it" shouldn't be a thing in the showcases. Either don't say anything about the mob balancing, cause there's no real balance yet, or explicitly explain the direction that the balancing will take.

I'd personally be fine if the current mobs remained roughly the same, but I could definitely see how the location from the stream could be easily farmed by a dps-heavy 8-man group w/o even needing a tank, even though mobs did quite a few one-shots.

I come from a game where just pulling a ton of hard-hitting mobs and kiting them until the mages aoe them down was completely fine and right now it kinda seems like AoC could go down this path, but I'd definitely like more variety to the mobs. And if that variety will be present, it should be stated on stream and the location's mob design/distribution should be explained and put in proper context.

Sengarden

I would add that these videos should be recorded as a second take after the group has run through the content once to know what not to do. Most importantly, audio needs to be recorded as a voiceover, not in real time. The group trying to explain the game in detail to us while navigating terrain / healing / DPSing / tanking is obviously impacting their delivery of information, and vice versa.

Write a loose script of things you want to talk about and show. Get together, run through all that content twice, recording the second time so you have as few screw ups as possible. Make the visuals smooth and informative, get a good video, then sit down and record a voiceover while you’re watching it, following the bullet point script that you wrote to ensure a smooth delivery of verbal information. Voila! Marketing content that’s actually impactful and engaging to people who haven’t already been following the project.

Lastly, turn off mob respawns for these showcases. It’s completely irrelevant to our impression of almost any type of gameplay and only serves to complicate things.

bloodprophet

I get where your coming from.
I prefer the live version and reactions over a canned script. It's like listening to the recorded music vs going to the show. Sure the MP3 has better audio but it lacks the vibe and chaos of life.

novercalis

NiKr wrote: »

Agree with most of these points, but mainly agree with the 6th one. The "this is an 8-man location, but we're a 4-man group clearing it" shouldn't be a thing in the showcases. Either don't say anything about the mob balancing, cause there's no real balance yet, or explicitly explain the direction that the balancing will take.

I'd personally be fine if the current mobs remained roughly the same, but I could definitely see how the location from the stream could be easily farmed by a dps-heavy 8-man group w/o even needing a tank, even though mobs did quite a few one-shots.

I come from a game where just pulling a ton of hard-hitting mobs and kiting them until the mages aoe them down was completely fine and right now it kinda seems like AoC could go down this path, but I'd definitely like more variety to the mobs. And if that variety will be present, it should be stated on stream and the location's mob design/distribution should be explained and put in proper context.

100%

what was worse and offensive is, on the second video they uploaded on YT - he kinda encourage smaller groups to do it and brought up use of potions to make the content easier.

The entire run, they rarely had mana issue outside of the tank and ranger occasionally. After every fight, most of their HP was fine, when things went south - it was mainly due to HoT tick putting cleric in aggro when he was trying to top off Steven b4 he ran into make a pull w/o communicating to his team.

The first video they were forced to sit cause they tried to bum-rush the content, 2nd not so much, mostly on tank cause he kept pulling and finally ran low on mana.

The last boss fight was a joke, he tank the boss, someone else face tank the add and they were never in any danger both in terms of HP and MP.

I would be semi ok if the context was, this is a 4 man open world dungeon area & even then, it was super easy. 25 minutes upon ENTERING THE KEEP to complete the area and avoiding most of the mobs.

DeviLzFury_Gaming

I agree with everyone so far on all this input.

As was said the bigger issue than the showcase itself is the fact that they showed content that looks wayyyy to easy for the intended group size. Obviously they can change that but it just gives the audience the wrong impression of the game. Especially saying make it easier by doing "X".

As for pre recording/scripted vs live. They can do both but not both in the same video/showcase. If you wanna show "live" content and reactions then do it live on stream. For show cases around a build/class/Agriotype, a more formatted recorded approach would be easier as they can take the time to explain things better as is proof with the re recorded YT video they posted.

That also is a big fumble from this live stream as if the recording was not good enough to post after live stream then it should not have been shown during. there were 5k people watching the live stream and that is 5k to many who saw a very garbage showing. Now there is the new video that clearly is better, but still will come off negative due to all the above.

Bottom line they have to stop rushing things just to put stuff IN front of us, and remember to give us quality. IF that means a live stream every 2 months then so be it or they need to make time to make sure the livestreams are correct and presented the right way.

Gizban

This is good constructive criticism.

I would like to see the showcases more focused and cleaner as well. I do enjoy them generally but I was also disappointed in the Cleric showcase.

Gizban

bloodprophet wrote: »

I get where your coming from.
I prefer the live version and reactions over a canned script. It's like listening to the recorded music vs going to the show. Sure the MP3 has better audio but it lacks the vibe and chaos of life.

The live version is more laid back and I think that certainly has its place, however, to clearly convey information structure and planning is best.

Its the difference between a 'Sunday drive' and getting to the airport on time for your flight. Goals keep you focused and effective.

Sengarden

bloodprophet wrote: »

I get where your coming from.
I prefer the live version and reactions over a canned script. It's like listening to the recorded music vs going to the show. Sure the MP3 has better audio but it lacks the vibe and chaos of life.

I understand where you’re coming from, but this is supposed to be marketing material and informational first, fun and chaotic streamer material second, if at all. I don’t spend time watching streamers play video games, because the majority of it is “chaos”.

I’m glad Steven and the devs are having fun with the game, but that’s not what I think most people care to watch the videos for. I think a lot more people would prefer a clear delivery of gameplay information uninhibited by the stresses of gameplay, and gameplay uninhibited by the stresses of explaining the details of gameplay systems.

Austrinaut

How about a 50/50 approach of 50% of the time having the developers display the abilities and concepts in depth while playing, followed by the second half where they're commenters doing play by play on alpha testers or bug testers or a specialist team of presenters. There's a lot of options with dofferent tradeoffs here.

For instance, having Lazypeon, Asmongold, and whoever else take a fifteen minute chunk of time to fool around in-game and playtest these mechanics would go a long way for community immersion and excitement.

Likewise, having an E-Sports style commentary and play by play overlayed over skilled gameplay would be really good to show the current level of polish, as well as the mechanics functioning as intended.

I really love what's being done here with the dev updates and the recorded showcases. I feel more connected in a meaningful way to AoC than any other game I've ever played because of it. That said as we're seeing more complex content updates, I think that reconsidering the format to suit the situation is also a valuable endeavor.

Spif

I only ended up watching the re-recording, and it was fine. It's the only thing on YT, so many people will be in my situation.

As far as a 4-man clearing 8-man content, I think that's ok at L15. It might even be ok at L50, as long as it takes 4 good players significantly longer than 8 good players. Remember that they used GM rez 5+ times, and that 3 mob social pull was more than most 4's could handle.

Streamers are not a practical option IMO. Way too much loose cannon going that route. Polished demos should wait for the betas.

Ludullu

Spif wrote: »

As far as a 4-man clearing 8-man content, I think that's ok at L15. It might even be ok at L50, as long as it takes 4 good players significantly longer than 8 good players. Remember that they used GM rez 5+ times, and that 3 mob social pull was more than most 4's could handle.

This indicates a greater issue with design for some people. If 4 subpar players (devs were definitely nowhere close to high lvl skill) can farm an 8-man location with just a few deaths - it means that an 8-man of high skill lvl would fucking obliterate that location. Obliterate it to a point of a single party completely controlling the whole location.

And while some people might be ok with that kind of design, quite a lot of us would prefer a more difficult game where this would be, at least, highly improbable. Controlling a "room" or two in a location would be fine if players are skilled enough, but doing that to a whole location is going too far imo.

TyranthraxusEQ

I would hope it's just an easier area, and not indicative of the entire difficulty level. There should be a wide variety of difficulty levels at all levels of xp, so that there is challenging content for people of any gear score. More difficulty leads to better rewards, Risk/reward. I would expect heavily geared players to be able to mop up and solo area's tuned for less geared characters, while there are much more intense challenges that would take a full group of 8 well geared and skilled players to handle.

It's also possible they just have not tuned the difficulty, or even have it tuned down for their streaming purposes. Making their deaths even more amusing.

Azherae

TyranthraxusEQ wrote: »

I would hope it's just an easier area, and not indicative of the entire difficulty level. There should be a wide variety of difficulty levels at all levels of xp, so that there is challenging content for people of any gear score. More difficulty leads to better rewards, Risk/reward. I would expect heavily geared players to be able to mop up and solo area's tuned for less geared characters, while there are much more intense challenges that would take a full group of 8 well geared and skilled players to handle.

It's also possible they just have not tuned the difficulty, or even have it tuned down for their streaming purposes. Making their deaths even more amusing.

It's almost certainly tuned down a BIT since adding a Mage to that, as far as Mages generally go in games, will make it even simpler.

All four of the 'missing Archetypes' in this case contribute very directly to overall DPS on any mob, so presumably the health would have been toned down, at least?

I'm moreso concerned that the simplicity of the gameplay is right in that middle spot where you CAN and perhaps SHOULD just 'bring more DPS' to a place like that one. Things dying so relatively quickly (in terms of decisions made, not TTK) means that Bards and Summoners might not even be able to get properly positioned in time before the enemy is down, in which case 'bring more Rangers' is the obvious best answer.

That's probably just the enemy type though, since one wouldn't necessarily have wanted to do that against the Zombies.

novercalis

Spif wrote: »

I only ended up watching the re-recording, and it was fine. It's the only thing on YT, so many people will be in my situation.

As far as a 4-man clearing 8-man content, I think that's ok at L15. It might even be ok at L50, as long as it takes 4 good players significantly longer than 8 good players. Remember that they used GM rez 5+ times, and that 3 mob social pull was more than most 4's could handle.

Streamers are not a practical option IMO. Way too much loose cannon going that route. Polished demos should wait for the betas.

when you watch the second video - it was a breeze, They cleared everything in 20 mins the second they entered the KEEP.

The last fight, everyone has 75%+ HP/MP. We know they werent playing patiently, strategically or unfortunately, competently and it was far too ez once they allowed the tank to tank and having another role off-tank. DPS - Time to Kill for a 4 man was relatively fast, considering the context is suppose to be a 8man.

20-25 seconds TTK should be the default for 8 man, thus the 4 man should have taken much longer. But it wasn't. Meaning an 8 man would have killed a mob in 10-12 secs. The entire room for a 8 man would be 10 mins instead of 20. That is bad.

novercalis

TyranthraxusEQ wrote: »

I would hope it's just an easier area, and not indicative of the entire difficulty level. There should be a wide variety of difficulty levels at all levels of xp, so that there is challenging content for people of any gear score. More difficulty leads to better rewards, Risk/reward. I would expect heavily geared players to be able to mop up and solo area's tuned for less geared characters, while there are much more intense challenges that would take a full group of 8 well geared and skilled players to handle.

It's also possible they just have not tuned the difficulty, or even have it tuned down for their streaming purposes. Making their deaths even more amusing.

Beofre they entered - they were fighting minos which took then 5-8 seconds to kill. Those were also level 15 regular mobs. Then they began fighting the elite level 15-17 mobs.

Most of us DO NOT WANT SOLO AREAS or SOLO GAMEPLAY. Steven has touted L2 Influence which was heavily influenced by CO-OPERATIVE content. Can you solo some stuff? sure. But be fast and efficient with it? HELL NO.

Is it possible they just have not tuned it? I HOPE SO and we are trying to raise the flag to make sure that is the case and that they will tune it higher. Nothing wrong with that. We as players - in this genre that we call MMO have already lost hope in the genre. Steven has reignited it with his words 6-7 years ago. We are skeptical gamers after all the years of crap we have had. So we need to hold Intrepid Studio accountable and call out stuff that are potential red flags. Better now than when it's too late or falls on deaf ears.

DeviLzFury_Gaming

novercalis wrote: »

TyranthraxusEQ wrote: »

I would hope it's just an easier area, and not indicative of the entire difficulty level. There should be a wide variety of difficulty levels at all levels of xp, so that there is challenging content for people of any gear score. More difficulty leads to better rewards, Risk/reward. I would expect heavily geared players to be able to mop up and solo area's tuned for less geared characters, while there are much more intense challenges that would take a full group of 8 well geared and skilled players to handle.

It's also possible they just have not tuned the difficulty, or even have it tuned down for their streaming purposes. Making their deaths even more amusing.

Beofre they entered - they were fighting minos which took then 5-8 seconds to kill. Those were also level 15 regular mobs. Then they began fighting the elite level 15-17 mobs.

Most of us DO NOT WANT SOLO AREAS or SOLO GAMEPLAY. Steven has touted L2 Influence which was heavily influenced by CO-OPERATIVE content. Can you solo some stuff? sure. But be fast and efficient with it? HELL NO.

Is it possible they just have not tuned it? I HOPE SO and we are trying to raise the flag to make sure that is the case and that they will tune it higher. Nothing wrong with that. We as players - in this genre that we call MMO have already lost hope in the genre. Steven has reignited it with his words 6-7 years ago. We are skeptical gamers after all the years of crap we have had. So we need to hold Intrepid Studio accountable and call out stuff that are potential red flags. Better now than when it's too late or falls on deaf ears.

This right here is saying it best. We as a community need to hold their feet to the fire when there are some red flags, its part of this open Dev process in the end. They need the feedback to improve.

BobTheMagicalFish

Just commenting to say I totally agree with all your points, yes it may not sit right with some and might even seem harsh but I feel like it needed to be said. As much as I enjoy the showcases the length and repetitiveness puts me off and I end up watching a highlight later on instead.

Similarly I agree with the issue of saying they are a 4-man clearing an 8-man area, it doesn't feel like a suitable showcase if they are not showing off in a suitable area. It also brings up discussions about the difficulty direction of the game, which I am sure was not the intention but naturally people would bring it up in the forum to discuss.

I hope the team sees this and takes the feedback into account, they are doing a great job overall and I just want to see them produce slightly more well thought out streams.

Stalwart

I would say just aim to make future videos in this format come out like the second video they made. That one was perfectly fine to me.

Gui10

Either they are far from nailing the combat system yet, or Steven sucks. I think its a mix of both atm.

DeviLzFury_Gaming

Gui10 wrote: »

Either they are far from nailing the combat system yet, or Steven sucks. I think its a mix of both atm.

Steven also needs to stop "playing like a noob" during these showcases. There is a time and a place to "play as" but not during a showcase such as tank where you want feedback.

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