Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Animations & Class Fantasy
Vzael
Member, Alpha Two
Hey guys!
This is a long post so I apologise in advance but after some discussion on the Discord regarding this topic, I realised I had to elaborate and justify my thoughts before formally providing feedback on the forums. This post contains nothing more than my opinion based on livestream footage and I would appreciate others thoughts on my take. There will be some mention of WoW as a widely relatable basis for comparison, but to clarify, I do not want Ashes to become WoW.
The Old Trinity
Classes in fantasy RPGs (Tabletop / Single player / Online) can be plotted within a triangle, with classes that specialize purely in Melee, Ranged or Magic at each point, and classes that are hybrids of these styles placed between them. I will refer to this triangle as the "Old Trinity" as it's presence in games precedes the Holy Trinity's role of providing structure to group content in MMORPGs. My opinion is that non-magic based classes have become poorly represented in modern RPGs, tainted by either a magic chosen-one trope (eg. Skyrim - Dragonborn shouts) or animations that imply the presence of magic with colourful particle effects (basically every eastern RPG / MMO). It is my opinion that Ashes has the perfect opportunity to rectify this with both the realistic art style and the detailed class system to be inclusive of all class fantasy decisions. I have made a crude diagram representing Ashes' classes and where I believe they fall roughly within the old trinity.
Ok... but why do you think this is important?
Ashes appears to provide a very immersive experience, with a wide range of classes, races, in-depth character creation, player owned property, player driven conflict and politics, etc. Immersion is obviously a heavily considered part of Intrepid's development on Ashes of Creation. Personally if I create a Fighter, I want it to feel and appear as a traditional old school Fighter and to not have animations that either imply the presence of magic, or that can be mistaken as magic. It is my opinion that players should have access to characters that have their strength represented solely by their martial prowess, such as true Fighters and Rogues. With class choice being so varied, if a Fighter archetype wants to incorporate magic, they have the option to do so by picking a magic using secondary class. By repurposing any animations that imply magic from non magic users to others, you create space for power gains to have rewarding visuals that fit class fantasy as their character progresses. Here are two possible examples:
1 - Player A wants to play the equivalent of a Retribution Paladin in Ashes and decides on the Highsword (Fighter / Cleric). At level 10 his Fighter obtains the Hammer Smash AOE ability (I don't know it's name, it is in the Basic Weapon Attack video) but as he is still just a Fighter, the golden hammer part of the animation is absent. Player A reaches level 25 and selects Cleric as his second class and the animation now has the golden hammer when cast, befitting of the class fantasy and visually rewarding his character progression.
2 - Player B is a Weapon Master (Fighter / Fighter). His weapon swings have colourless trails and his abilities depict no use of magic. Player B receives a weapon that lore states is enchanted with fire. His weapon swings now have a fiery trail, visually representing his equipment progression and justifying the presence of magic in the animation as it is the weapon that is magical.
So do you hate the animations that Intrepid have showcased so far?
I think the quality and execution of animations so far is exceptional, especially considering the current state of development. My problems do not lie with the animations themselves but more with what they could imply to me as a melee player and how it will affect my immersion in an otherwise incredibly immersive experience. We do not know exactly what classes have been played in the showcases so far. If the fighter in the Melee Weapon Attack Update video is actually a Highsword, then I think the animations are wonderful. But if the class in the video is a Weapons Master for example, then I think the hammer smash animation does not fit the class fantasy for me at all.
Can you provide some examples of animation repurposing?
- Basic swings for all weapons to use the colourless trail (This was shown in the Basic Melee Weapon Attack livestream when using daggers).
- Weapon swing animations for all non magic users abilities to use the colourless trail. Exceptions could include green or red trails for classes incorporating Rogue or Fighter to depict poison or blood, providing it fits with the ability (applying bleed dots) or buffs (weapons coated with poison).
- Current melee weapon swing trail (Golden) to be repurposed as the weapon swing trail whilst buffed by the Cleric's "Bless Weapon" ability. Golden trail fits with the Cleric's theme.
- Repurpose current Hammer Smash ability animation to Highsword and remove the golden hammer part of the animation for Fighter, Weapon Master, Shadowblade & Dreadnought.
How does this fit the Lore? Isn't Verra a world of latent Essence? Mana is the resource for all of the classes!
According to Lore on the Wiki, the playable races (excluding Tulnar) have been on Sanctus - a plane entirely void of magic - for thousands of years since the fall. Our character's journeys begin as we return to Verra via Divine Gateway for the first time. It would be plausible that during these thousands of years some classes have lost the ability to freely wield the Essence. Regardless of time away from Verra, we have witnessed NPC races on Verra be able or unable to wield magic based on their class, such as the Minotaurs. Looking at the old trinity diagram above, the group of non-magic users is a minority (1/4), albeit an important one. Magic is only magical when it is exclusive.
I don't think having Mana as a resource for a non magic using class is as immersion breaking as not being able to play a non magic using class at all. There are several easy solutions though if Intrepid deemed it necessary. One potential solution is to rename Mana across the board to Essence to remove the historical connection players have between Mana and magic user. Another alternative is to reskin mana for non magic classes with a different name (Energy or something, idk) and make it fundamentally identical to Mana outside of name and perhaps bar colour. I do not personally think either is necessary though.
Does this mean you expect Intrepid to develop 8 animations for each ability?
No not at all, in fact I believe you can treat the non magic classes as equals to a certain degree in terms of animations. An example of this would be the Tank's Aegis ability. For the Knight (Tank / Fighter), Nightshield (Tank / Rogue) and Guardian (Tank / Tank) you could use the current animation recoloured from blue to grey / white to emulate the "colourless" affect from the daggers weapon swings. Then for the Tank / Magic classes have recolours to fit class fantasy, eg. Golden for the Paladin (Tank / Cleric) or the current blue for the Spellshield (Tank / Mage), etc. This is just one animation recoloured to represent class flavour to all magic users and also reduce the presence of "magic" for the non magic using classes, whilst still serving to telegraph that an ability has been used to other players.
You have listed the Ranger archetype as a non magic user, but have not suggested any animation changes, why?
I do think that the Ranger's animations so far have been great, but some of them do imply magic use. Public opinion on the Ranger's animations shown so far appear to be overwhelmingly positive and if the majority of the community are happy with the Ranger appearing to be a magic user that is fine. As a predominantly melee player this post is mainly to speak up for those of us who play melee and want no affiliation with magic use.
The purpose of this post was to suggest Ashes deviate from the modern norm of "more colour more better" in animations and that I believe it can be done in a way that is truly non-destructive to the assets that have been shown so far. I am incredibly excited for the game and if none of my feedback is taken to account I will still be testing Alpha 2 and playing the game at launch. Thanks for reading this long post, please voice your opinion on whether you agree with me or not!
This is a long post so I apologise in advance but after some discussion on the Discord regarding this topic, I realised I had to elaborate and justify my thoughts before formally providing feedback on the forums. This post contains nothing more than my opinion based on livestream footage and I would appreciate others thoughts on my take. There will be some mention of WoW as a widely relatable basis for comparison, but to clarify, I do not want Ashes to become WoW.
The Old Trinity
Classes in fantasy RPGs (Tabletop / Single player / Online) can be plotted within a triangle, with classes that specialize purely in Melee, Ranged or Magic at each point, and classes that are hybrids of these styles placed between them. I will refer to this triangle as the "Old Trinity" as it's presence in games precedes the Holy Trinity's role of providing structure to group content in MMORPGs. My opinion is that non-magic based classes have become poorly represented in modern RPGs, tainted by either a magic chosen-one trope (eg. Skyrim - Dragonborn shouts) or animations that imply the presence of magic with colourful particle effects (basically every eastern RPG / MMO). It is my opinion that Ashes has the perfect opportunity to rectify this with both the realistic art style and the detailed class system to be inclusive of all class fantasy decisions. I have made a crude diagram representing Ashes' classes and where I believe they fall roughly within the old trinity.
Ok... but why do you think this is important?
Ashes appears to provide a very immersive experience, with a wide range of classes, races, in-depth character creation, player owned property, player driven conflict and politics, etc. Immersion is obviously a heavily considered part of Intrepid's development on Ashes of Creation. Personally if I create a Fighter, I want it to feel and appear as a traditional old school Fighter and to not have animations that either imply the presence of magic, or that can be mistaken as magic. It is my opinion that players should have access to characters that have their strength represented solely by their martial prowess, such as true Fighters and Rogues. With class choice being so varied, if a Fighter archetype wants to incorporate magic, they have the option to do so by picking a magic using secondary class. By repurposing any animations that imply magic from non magic users to others, you create space for power gains to have rewarding visuals that fit class fantasy as their character progresses. Here are two possible examples:
1 - Player A wants to play the equivalent of a Retribution Paladin in Ashes and decides on the Highsword (Fighter / Cleric). At level 10 his Fighter obtains the Hammer Smash AOE ability (I don't know it's name, it is in the Basic Weapon Attack video) but as he is still just a Fighter, the golden hammer part of the animation is absent. Player A reaches level 25 and selects Cleric as his second class and the animation now has the golden hammer when cast, befitting of the class fantasy and visually rewarding his character progression.
2 - Player B is a Weapon Master (Fighter / Fighter). His weapon swings have colourless trails and his abilities depict no use of magic. Player B receives a weapon that lore states is enchanted with fire. His weapon swings now have a fiery trail, visually representing his equipment progression and justifying the presence of magic in the animation as it is the weapon that is magical.
So do you hate the animations that Intrepid have showcased so far?
I think the quality and execution of animations so far is exceptional, especially considering the current state of development. My problems do not lie with the animations themselves but more with what they could imply to me as a melee player and how it will affect my immersion in an otherwise incredibly immersive experience. We do not know exactly what classes have been played in the showcases so far. If the fighter in the Melee Weapon Attack Update video is actually a Highsword, then I think the animations are wonderful. But if the class in the video is a Weapons Master for example, then I think the hammer smash animation does not fit the class fantasy for me at all.
Can you provide some examples of animation repurposing?
- Basic swings for all weapons to use the colourless trail (This was shown in the Basic Melee Weapon Attack livestream when using daggers).
- Weapon swing animations for all non magic users abilities to use the colourless trail. Exceptions could include green or red trails for classes incorporating Rogue or Fighter to depict poison or blood, providing it fits with the ability (applying bleed dots) or buffs (weapons coated with poison).
- Current melee weapon swing trail (Golden) to be repurposed as the weapon swing trail whilst buffed by the Cleric's "Bless Weapon" ability. Golden trail fits with the Cleric's theme.
- Repurpose current Hammer Smash ability animation to Highsword and remove the golden hammer part of the animation for Fighter, Weapon Master, Shadowblade & Dreadnought.
How does this fit the Lore? Isn't Verra a world of latent Essence? Mana is the resource for all of the classes!
According to Lore on the Wiki, the playable races (excluding Tulnar) have been on Sanctus - a plane entirely void of magic - for thousands of years since the fall. Our character's journeys begin as we return to Verra via Divine Gateway for the first time. It would be plausible that during these thousands of years some classes have lost the ability to freely wield the Essence. Regardless of time away from Verra, we have witnessed NPC races on Verra be able or unable to wield magic based on their class, such as the Minotaurs. Looking at the old trinity diagram above, the group of non-magic users is a minority (1/4), albeit an important one. Magic is only magical when it is exclusive.
I don't think having Mana as a resource for a non magic using class is as immersion breaking as not being able to play a non magic using class at all. There are several easy solutions though if Intrepid deemed it necessary. One potential solution is to rename Mana across the board to Essence to remove the historical connection players have between Mana and magic user. Another alternative is to reskin mana for non magic classes with a different name (Energy or something, idk) and make it fundamentally identical to Mana outside of name and perhaps bar colour. I do not personally think either is necessary though.
Does this mean you expect Intrepid to develop 8 animations for each ability?
No not at all, in fact I believe you can treat the non magic classes as equals to a certain degree in terms of animations. An example of this would be the Tank's Aegis ability. For the Knight (Tank / Fighter), Nightshield (Tank / Rogue) and Guardian (Tank / Tank) you could use the current animation recoloured from blue to grey / white to emulate the "colourless" affect from the daggers weapon swings. Then for the Tank / Magic classes have recolours to fit class fantasy, eg. Golden for the Paladin (Tank / Cleric) or the current blue for the Spellshield (Tank / Mage), etc. This is just one animation recoloured to represent class flavour to all magic users and also reduce the presence of "magic" for the non magic using classes, whilst still serving to telegraph that an ability has been used to other players.
You have listed the Ranger archetype as a non magic user, but have not suggested any animation changes, why?
I do think that the Ranger's animations so far have been great, but some of them do imply magic use. Public opinion on the Ranger's animations shown so far appear to be overwhelmingly positive and if the majority of the community are happy with the Ranger appearing to be a magic user that is fine. As a predominantly melee player this post is mainly to speak up for those of us who play melee and want no affiliation with magic use.
The purpose of this post was to suggest Ashes deviate from the modern norm of "more colour more better" in animations and that I believe it can be done in a way that is truly non-destructive to the assets that have been shown so far. I am incredibly excited for the game and if none of my feedback is taken to account I will still be testing Alpha 2 and playing the game at launch. Thanks for reading this long post, please voice your opinion on whether you agree with me or not!
4
Comments
agreed T_T
we need castigation back T_T
How do you come to such conclusions?
What cant of mind leaps do you do?
They didn't remove anything yet.
Two suggestions: dont waste peoples time refering back to tabletops.
It's been a looooooong time since classes have been a part of video games, there is no need for such "education".
Not having a go at you. I just want to inform you that people might start skipping your post and the juicy parts in them. Mods and perhaps devs too.
Second, dont open a can of warms with pointless stuff like "mana is used..."
It's simple with video games. Red bar keeps you alive, Blue bar enables you to use skills. Dont invite pointless conversations. Everybody knows that mana is used for skills and some games have additional power sources. Nobody serious would discuss MP and the hidden meaning of life.
Again, good post. You put in the effort and I hope to get proper conversations instead of people derailing it with USELESS stuff and "I was right, you werw wrong, here is my quote" from the usual delvers here, whose primary function is ro seek validation from on another about things the said which are irrelevant to the development.
I didn't see Castigation used in the demo.
I also didn't see Hallowed Ground on the hotbar.
I also didn't see Hallowed Ground used in the demo.
I make leaps of logic, sure.... and we will see if my conclusion is correct.
People here have not seen PvE raids or the castigation skill in a Dev Update and they will take up pages upon pages with their versions of facts and logic.
Which is OK. Bless your heart.
https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/56029/feedback-request-alpha-two-cleric-archetype-updates-shown-in-july-livestream/p1
Why not post it into the pinned thread too?
Definatly not a place for people to go off topic and agree or disagree.
This thread is open ended
Yeah, as much as I’d like the mods and/or devs to acknowledge my feedback I’d rather let it happen naturally if the community like my suggestions. I’d prefer to not derail a thread that is asking for specific feedback.
More specifically, it should go to Fighter + Cleric combo, as the OP has suggested.
I do agree with the post definitely.
Pure melee characters that incorporate magic, definitely shouldn't look all yellow like in the showcase (though with the Cleric augmentation, it should definitely look like that). I think it could be done in many different ways, with particles, blood, etc. rather than having bright colors. The issue is that it could look boring, especially compared to other classes.
Generally, it could be done by using mostly neutral colors (gray-ish), with either added blood splatter, or some yellow/red particle effects added (or both at the same time). I think the daggers looked really good as well, and it should be the overall theme for pure melee non magic classes.
I definitely think they should recolor the abilities based on the augment picked, rather than creating a whole new look, for most abilities. Some abilities definitely should feel a bit more unique, but those should be reserved only for some specific things.
Thanks for the response Iccer, we are definitely on the same page!
I definitely feel like the “less is more” ethos can apply to most animations for purely melee characters.
Or you might get something like summoned weapon from GW2 where picking them up give you new skills like the firey greatdsword summon gave you melee attacks and whirlwinds and things. So summoner clkasses could go any direction from melee/range or magic they might not all be pet classes
In the original post I suggested that Summoner archetypes with secondary classes of Bard, Cleric, Mage or Summoner were “purely” magic classes. Summoners with secondary classes of Fighter, Rogue or Tank were Melee/Magic hybrids and the Summoner/Ranger mix was a Ranged/Magic hybrid.
I think it’s important to note at this point that we know that any class can use any weapon so my scale of “Pure Magic” classes to “Pure Melee or Ranged” class is mainly to predetermine how elaborate their animations should be (representing the use of magic or not) and not of how they will actually play.
I agree that a purely melee class using mana is fine and not an immersive breaking aspect, despite it being the only “traditional” RPG rule that I (once again this is all just my stinky opinion) am happy to compromise. I also appreciate the comparison you provide with Anime although I am hesitant for Intrepid to take any eastern influence. I think the East’s flashy art style is massively to blame for the rainbow puke that RPG combat has become in modern games.
I hear that Steven’s vision for Ashes takes a lot of influence in from Archeage as he apparently enjoyed that game. With AAC launching soon I figured I would check out some old content to fill the gap whilst waiting for ashes and because I didn’t play it before. The gameplay looks pretty fun, the systems are player driven and the combat looks mechanically sound. The combat animations though look absolutely horrendous and it has nothing to do with the games age. There are no identifiable class silhouettes and as most of the combat I saw was large skirmishes and it’s just a big blob of colours and particle effects. I’d like to think that Steven’s fondness of the game stems from the player driven experiences he had and not from the visuals.
For all the things that World of Warcraft did terribly over the years, I guarantee that if you sat a DnD player down in front of some footage of Vanilla, they could tell you what class was being played within seconds. I appreciate this is not entirely fair with Archeage due to how much more complicated the class system is, but nearly all eastern RPGs are guilty of this to a degree.
The last point I’d like to make is that the most immersive MMORPGs have the world as the main character and the player as one of many supporting characters. If I am a human fighter fighting an equal level human fighter NPC and he is swinging at me with clean, basic animations whilst I retaliate with flashy, colourful weapon swings, there is a disconnect. My character feels like a chosen-one because my visuals do not reflect what I am supposed to be.
Sorry for another long message! I am passionate about this subject, possibly much more so than the average player. 😅
Exactly! Thanks for your input!