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.
Comments
I think you are misunderstanding my question, so maybe I did make it too confusing. I have no problem with info being hidden as long as info that is necessary for making informed decisions can be acquired in some manner (otherwise your decisions have too much rng); my question is in regards to ensuring the act of uncovering info or drawing conclusion with said info is fun and interesting.
If the act of discovering essential information is tedious and boring (like grinding repetitively to get data that could have just been told to you, such as finding out the effect of an ability you unlocked) then I am distinguishing that from maybe a different system where discovering info is interesting and fun (like finding clues/making deductions using known information, such as noticing a mob has a certain ability that could be used to open a hidden path if you can train it over to an obstacle and trick it into hitting it, or something like that where the act of acquiring the information was interesting).
Will the Bard archetype in Alpha Two have unique mechanics or abilities that allow it to significantly influence large-scale battles, such as sieges or node wars, and if so, can you provide an example of how this might work in gameplay?
Of course either way I agree that there should be cool hidden information to uncover, like the mob mechanics you're talking about, or advanced PvP strategies you can learn. Which is part of the reason why I think it's so important that players learn to prioritise their time on the aspects of the game that matter to them, instead of going on the quest to define the perfect meta.
But if you want to be able to calculate the damage difference between any potentially viable ten-ability-combos, including itemisation differences, so you can calculate the correct "best in slot", most efficient, build, or confirm the mathematical superiority of your personal version of your preferred streamer's build recommendation, while afk-ing at your skill trainer...
Then no, I understood all of that, and like I said, I think that should be tedious, for the reasons I stated. Because hyperoptimisation and min-maxing should not just be "the norm," just because players *want* to be the best.
I think I said it very clearly before: Players should make very deliberate decisions about whether "being part of the best" itself is fun enough for them to be worth the time investment, and otherwise be okay with just being "good enough" and finding their personal effective playstyle.
And by making those ideals as difficult to research as possible through obscure information, you incentivise players to think twice about defining, or following, "the meta." Because then the time investment for correct answers is so large that players have to make a deliberate choice whether they want to sacrifice their time, or just be okay with any playstyle that makes sense in theory, and that's "good enough," and achieves measurable *results* in the game, rather than on paper.
It's both more fun if players have to go out into the world to test their builds and confirm their decisions than if they can figure out the "correct" answer in a reliable spreadsheet, and it leaves more room for interpretation and thus encourages more different personalised meta varieties.
Essentially, obscure information is the only tool we have to defend ourselves against WoW metaslaves dictating the game's culture at the cost of variety and personal preference.
If you want to discuss this further, we should probably make a thread about it or do it in private messages, at this point.
Can you explain it in details?
Ill put my response here in case it helps clarify the question for anyone else confused.
I think I understand how you are interpreting it now, im not talking about data mining exact values or anything relating to obtaining an unhealthy amount of information that could ruin the gameplay. I am talking about intended knowledge/data that the players are meant to have, which is at the designer's discretion to uphold the intergrity of the gameplay for a given system (such as the whole dps meter discussion). For the purposes of my question I am not giving a direct opinion either way on how much info the player should have available to them other than "whatever allows them to best make informed decisions that mimimizes rng and maximizes skill/fun gameplay".
My question is more in regards to the knowledge player's are intended to discover, and maximizing the fun ways of discovering that knowledge/info and minimizing the need to use tedious methods for discovering that knowledge/info.
Are there internal discussions on anti-zerg mechanics such as uncapped AoE abilities or abilities that scale in damage the more targets they hit within a certain radius to punish excessive or uncoordinated zerging and force large guilds/groups to think more carefully about committing overwhelming forces into a fight?
Any chance bards can use that oratory skill this way. The intrigue
would keep things active.