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
As a self proclaimed former game tester, are you that positively absolutely sure that the corruption system wont be powerful enough (combined with all the no penalty ways to PVP) to mitigate ganking and not scare away the pvp averse?
I mean, I get being super skeptical, but that is not what you are saying.
Whatever other types of competition there might be, I can, and have, completely ignored it.
I think I don't disagree, but it's a moot point.
I think this is also irrelevant. You seem to still be describing people who like to play EvE Online, ArcheAge and Lineage II.
I consider EvE Online, ArcheAge and Lineage II to be niche and also fairly successful. Especially EvE Online.
I think if Ashes has the same population numbers as EvE Online, that would have significant value.
If by old school, you mean UO...OK, I guess.
If by old schoool, you include EQ and WoW - I expect Ashes to be more niche than those games.
I think "scare" is the wrong word. I'm not scared of PvP. I just don't enjoy it very much - primarily because I'm a cooperative carebear who is non-competitive.
I'm not scared to eat jerky. I've eaten jerky before. I even like the taste of jerky. But I find the concept of it to be reprehensible enough that I might have eaten jerky twice in the last 10 years. It's just not something I enjoy doing. Regardless of how good it might taste.
I expect MMORPG fans who don't like PvP much will be playing Pax Dei rather than Ashes.
Because, while there will be probably auto-flag PvP zones in Pax Dei...
At least in Pax Dei there are also large PvE-Only zones where casual PvEers can build villages and do some crafting stuff with 0% chance of being forced into unwanted PvP.
Of course... if Pax Dei becomes vaporware....
Do you believe EvE, AA and L2 players to be the only type of MMORPG players that will be attracted to Ashes?
Even tho i believe people who played those will most likely be very fond of Ashes aspects, i believe people from many other MMORPGs will be attracted by those aspects and features the game provides.
Do you believe the mere dislike for PvP aspects to be the ultimate factor for an average MMORPG fan decision in playing a MMORPG with more features they may like over one with less features that they may like?
In my mind, only someone who finds PvP absolutely repulsive and a complete deal-breaker would forego this.
Aren't we all sinners?
Yeah. We have a Lead Designer now, though, so let's see if he can straighten things out again.
0%.
If you remember, that was the thread where EVERYBODY was in full agreement.
Yeah, fairly sure this is the one topic that has most of us agreeing.
Daily quests and tasks are shit.
Oldschool is UO, Asherons Call, Shadowbane, and Dark Age of Camelot.
Out of those games you listed I've only played AA which had the greatest contributions to naval content for the genre as far as I'm concerned. Are they niche? No. I'm the particular one, not the game.
Ashes appeals to me as an oldschooler, it'll appeal more to me if they do the combat justice.
Hardcore classic WoW has PvP disabled.
Extraction shooters are great, but mostly played seasonally and there aren't really any losses that would impact you long term.
AoC is going to be niche as long as there is unconditional PvP. That's just how it goes. Actually, I think AoC will be more niche than people expect.
Steven confirmed the 100k for A2.
I am not going to concern myself with the success of Ashes, because I think for the most part its too early too tell.
I do not think Ashes will need advertising at all, I think if it's good enough it'll stand on its own laurels and grow in popularity. Sometimes the best way to advertise isn't to Raid Shadow Legends the hell out of everything.
I think the younger generation is really no different than generations that raised them, some will enjoy it some will be obnoxious know it all karens or kens and they'll bitch and moan on the forums till they realize they should just spend their money elsewhere.
People have preconceived notions of PVP. That's fine, people have preconceived notions of PVE too, that's also fine. I do not typically concern myself with that, if people do not like a free flow game and they try to kick and scream into the night that Ashes forces them to PvP, we can simply look at it as it is, that person would have no integrity as they chose to press play. It's not like Ashes like every other game won't have multiple steps into the game that assumes consent.
Anything that goes for PvP, also goes for PvE too. Anyone who cannot handle any form of PvE well then lobby games with their versions of PvP exist and are probably better suited for them.
I find lobby PvP inferior to a good mmorpg with an oldschool feel and good combat.
im just pointing out that there are more "pvp" players that people might think, since most people usually say there are more pve players since there are more pve servers.
you are one of those few who prefer solo or solo cooperative gameplay and thats ok.
Agree with both of you. However, the majority of player consumers will not be members of these forums, and won’t have followed the game as closely as we have.
So, I’m expecting this % attrition will be higher as those uninformed expectations aren’t met (thankfully).
I don't really think it got 'bent', so I'm not sure I'd want this.
The design goals of Ashes aren't necessarily inconsistent, maybe not even inconsistent with 'what we were told originally' and even if they are, it did go through a shakeup when Jeffrey Bard left, so it's somewhat understandable.
I just want Steven to make the game he actually wants, but that game might just be more niche than might have been implied even with his original measured expectations.
But that's also partially my bias, since I tend to build games/systems according to what the creator or initial audience desires first and 'what I know works or is popular' second. We'll have to wait to see if Bill is similar (or if somehow it turns out that Steven doesn't want things this way, but the 'level 50 to start Freehold Quest' thing feels like something Steven himself could have easily vetoed if he didn't want it).
I like PvP sometimes, but not enough to play Ashes due to the changes to the design made after Jeffery Bard left. And, I hear other casuals say, "Yes, that is not the game that I signed on to play at Kickstarter." That's a fairly small sample size, but... the current changes are similar to suggestions that caused PvE-Only and PvP sometimes players in the EQNext forums to rage.
Also, at least 30 of the players who typically play on EQ and WoW on PvE-only servers like PvP sometimes but feel better playing on PvE-Only servers. And then a significant portion of people playing on PvE-Optional servers flag for PvP less than 2% of their play time.
Many other MMORPGs?? - those people would most likely already be playing EvE.
And I think Ashes is no releasing too late. It would have attracted a bunch of people from other MMORPGs, at least for a while, if it had released before 2020.
But, I think a significant number of those people will be playing other games besides Ashes.
Between 2012 and 2021, I thought I was done playing WoW until they made a WoW 2.0. I didn't think they could make an expansion that could win me back. They didn't have stuff that I enjoyed doing after the story ends at endgame. Especially with Dragonflight, there now is plenty of stuff I enjoy doing after the initial story ends - and Seasons extends that even more.
So... I would be playing WoW before Ashes.
And I expect to be playing Pax Dei before I choose to play Ashes. Even though I have some similar reservations about Pax Dei - Pax Dei allows me to choose when I flag for PvP better than Ashes does. It has a considerable amount of PvE-Only space.
I also expect to be playing Palia.
I think I would be playing Throne and Liberty before Ashes - because the Lineage II designers working on the game seem to have decided to tone down the PvP mechanics compared to Lineage II - and also offers Siege features similar to Ashes.
And that does not exhaust the list of preferable MMOs on my radar - those are just the MMORPGs I expect to release before Ashes and still be available to play whenever Ashes releases.
In 2017, with a release date of "Before 2020", Ashes seemed to be the next best answer to the problems with WoW endgame for players who don't want to be stuck just repeating dungeons and raids over and over and over again for 2+ years... and then get content we exhaust in a month... and then have to wait around again for 2+ years to get new content.
Lots of MMORPGs currently in development will have something similar to Nodes - build up a village/town from scratch, rather than occupy already existing cities. Lots of MMORPGs have Seasons as part of their design. WoW no includes this already. Even Diablo IV has Seasons. So I think MMORPG devs have solved the "stuck in endgame for 2+ years problem" without relying on PvP Sieges.
Back in 2017, I agreed with you that it's likely that only the players who find PvP combat absolutely repulsive wil be turned off by the Ashes design. I no longer agree with that.
Quite a bit has changed - both in the Ashes design and in the features of competing MMORPGs.
PvE Only servers have the highest populations.
Then PvP-Optional servers.
Then PvP servers.
So that link wasn't particularly meaningful.
All of it is "OK".
This isn't really a discussion about what is OK and what isn't OK.
It's also not really an issue of solo play. It's an issue of casual play.
And... casual MMORPG players are not few.
Most MMORPG players are some form of casual:
Casual Time/Casual Challenge
Casual Time/Hardcore Challenge
Hardcore Challenge/Casual Time
and then...
Hardcore Challenge/Hardcore Time.
Lots of MMORPG fans who used to be Hardcore Time/Hardcore Challenge are too old to support that they way they could 20 years ago. They now only have Casual Time. And that also impacts what they are available to do for Hardcore Challenge.
Of course, I refused to play UO.
ShadowBane was sooo niche, it might as well have been vaporware. That is a failed MMORPG.
How many years did AC and DAoC last before they were sunset?
I have a feeling Steven hopes that Ashes will survive longer than those games, but...
I don't know that they had numbers significantly higher than EvE or ArcheAge.
Maybe you know?
I think people stopped playing those games for a reason.
Ton of people are going to play this on release that is just going to be a fact with content creators hyping it up when it gets to that point. There will be a large audience fort his game without a voice to currently fill it.
With how successful it will be long term we will see can't predict it one way or another until we have a full game to see and try.
Except that the debate shifted somewhat.
Now Dygz is 'main speaker' and Dygz' point is closer to:
"There will be other games that handle those things better than Ashes."
If you remove the 'PvE only' games that Dygz plays and remember that Dygz enjoys PvP too then you could look at it and compare something simple.
"Is ArcheAge 2 more inclusive to that playstyle than Ashes is while offering most or all of the same features?"
(As an example).
Ashes doesn't offer anything particularly unique anymore and whatever it does offer that is unique is the thing you have to look at when deciding if it is niche or not. I'm sure you can draw parallels to your experience. SC6 is among the few Weapons Based 3D fighters, you could say 'there are people out there who want that gameplay' and you'd be right (I'd like one) but it's still basically dead.
(I pray that this doesn't turn in the usual direction today, but if it does I apologize to everyone for trying to use a relation to personal experience again)
So your point, is that 'some people who complain on the forums are actually casuals who want to get advantage by dual boxing, but they will come on the forums and complain about something else instead in order to... make Intrepid change their policy on that?
Better to go by cluster https://us.battle.net/support/en/article/14296
I am of the opinion WoW only beat out EQ2 due to soloability. In my humble opinion EQ2 was in every way the superior game a launch. 🙂
Not directly no. But you do know that many people want to multi box right? I have seen it in many games in the past. Maybe it would include more than casuals that want to do this, but It is more prominent for solo players to do this as they do not need a guild.
*edit
This would make the solo player that is used to multi/boxing min/maxing to want to make the game easier being that they could not do this.
Yes, multiboxing is a strong strategy in games with certain flaws such as 'time gated resource gains', 'low limit economies' and 'easy healing or buffing for PvE'.
I don't necessarily think that people prefer games with those flaws, though, so I think it's possible to make a game where most people don't want to multi-box, but still want to play, even 'casuals' and solo players.
It is my experience that solo players multi-box when they realize that the game has decided to 'reward' large groups with 'time gated resource gains' or a low limit economy, because then the game is designed to reward 'numbers for the sake of numbers', and therefore '2 heads is better than one'.