Reasons to have high TTK!
I know it's still "early" to give feedback on TTK, as we can't yet test how in-game combat currently is and we'll only be able to test it after A2 (which I'll be attending). But I want to highlight a few points that have become real concerns for me and for some people I talk to who, like me, have been following the project for years:
1) The TTK initially proposed was around 30 seconds to 1 minute.
As this proposal (said by Steven in an interview with Lazy Peon on April 20, 2019) has remained unchanged for years, it was exactly one of the things that struck me most about the game right from the start. Precisely because I was completely dissatisfied with the ridiculously low TTK of other MMORPGs, which is disheartening. The proposal of a high TTK was something that reminded me of the good old days of long PvPs where strategy, knowledge of your class and your individual skill defined the winner, rather than who attacked first, taking advantage of a few seconds and managing to cause enough damage to have no way of reversing the situation. However, we've gone from 30 seconds to 1 minute to a TTK that is "lower than usual for current MMOs" and this was said by Steven on January 31, 2024, in the monthly live... I know that "plans can change", but the moment a company proposes something that has become one of the most attractive points for part of the community and that idea has remained "fixed" for years in front of that community and the company not only goes back on it but plans a drastic change on that point, it's worrying and I would even say dangerous for the image of the company that has made an effort to listen to its community like very few companies do. "Dangerous" because the change is not taking place during A2 and with the feedback of the community that is actively testing the combat (as it should in theory), the change is taking place unilaterally without the community even having tested the combat in both PvP and PvE.
2) The level of penalty for each death in the Ashes is disproportionately high if we take into account a low TTK.
It has been mentioned that the amount of loss of collectibles upon death (which is subject to change) can vary between 20% and 30% (which was said by Steven on March 29, 2024 in the monthly live). With this figure in mind, if we consider the disputes for good collecting spots between the collectors themselves (the famous PvPs per spot), the ganks that the collectors will receive from those who will prefer to kill the collectors rather than collect properly, under these circumstances, having a low TTK, the chances of dying "a few times" a day become real and with that the losses of collectibles can be considerably high (not to mention the loss of XP involved as well, which will not be small). And don't get me wrong, I really like this premise of death in the Ashes not being trivialized and that it should be something that players should avoid as much as possible. I also know that the motto of the game is "Risk x Reward", but from the perspective of a low TTK, the risk can far outweigh the reward. Because gatherers (who are one of the pillars of the game's economy, since everything starts with gathering materials) will individually be the most constant gank targets of everyone in the game and without a TTK high enough for them to have time to react and reverse a gank situation or time to summon their mount and flee whenever necessary, they will suffer constant losses.
3) An "oldschool" style game needs oldschool combat.
Anyone who has been following the project for years in the community knows that Ashes is inspired by old-school MMORPGs such as Lineage 2, ArchAge, Eve Online and Star Wars Galaxies, which take us back to the good old days of this genre of games. And as I said in the first point, a high TTK (as it used to be in the old days) provides us with memorable moments of hotly contested PvPs, in which each player's strategy based on their own knowledge of their class and their individual skill defined the winner of the PvP, an experience that unfortunately I haven't had for many years due to the current wave of MMORPGs with low TTK. In fact, the last time I had this experience was playing old Lineage 2 servers, which has now also been "corrupted" by this "instant combat" fever and has lost much of what it once was. And I know that many ArchAge players were also frustrated by the combination of the game's low TTK and certain high damage classes that didn't even give them time to react and reverse the situation. I vividly remember the PvPs that lasted minutes in Lineage 2, yes, minutes, where each potion taken, each skill activated at the right time and the strategy behind the equipment used to deal with each type of class made the thrill of each combat become a "good reward" for the dozens of hours of grind and effort to create each piece of equipment and armament for the character. Ashes has given me and many others the "hope" of reliving that time of good battles, where P2W doesn't interfere. And for that, for all the effort put into creating the equipment, for all the strategy behind each skill chosen in the class, for even the mount chosen to deal with each situation, for all this to be valid, time is needed in combat to put it all into practice properly. That's why a high TTK is essentially necessary. A high TTK in Ashes will differentiate it from the vast majority of current games, in addition to what already makes it unique in the eyes of the community, which are the systems, the mechanics, the clear fight against RMT and P2W before it even launches.
I know that I don't speak for everyone and that there are people in favor of a low TTK merely because they prefer it that way, and I respect that. But I ask that, if possible, at least during A2, the TTK initially proposed (from 30 seconds to 1 minute) be tested by the community and that any changes in this context come after feedback with enough time for everyone to form a concrete opinion about it.
