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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.
Instanced Content Should Not Offer Power Gains
Solvryn
Member, Alpha One, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
In a recent Discord discussion, Steven confirmed that the plan for Ashes of Creation includes allowing rewards from 20% of instanced content. While this may seem like a balanced approach, it raises significant concerns about maintaining the integrity of the game’s open-world design.
Now that power gains will be present in all forms of instanced content, it'll inevitably disrupt the world.
1) Detracting from the Open-World Experience:
The true strength of Ashes of Creation lies in its commitment to an immersive, open-world environment where players interact dynamically and meaningfully. Introducing instanced content with power gains pulls players away from this shared world, reducing the richness of player interactions and the world itself.
2) The Domino Effect:
Once PvE instancing with rewards is established, there will be pressure to provide comparable PvP instancing with rewards. This further fragments the player base, drawing them into isolated scenarios rather than encouraging them to participate in the larger, open-world environment.
3) Learning from Other Games:
Many MMORPGs, like World of Warcraft, Guild Wars 2, and Elder Scrolls Online, have become "faux open-world" games where instanced content dominates the endgame. These games often favor PvE over PvP, leading to a lopsided experience where PvP is diminished and the open world feels less relevant. Ashes of Creation has the opportunity to avoid this pitfall and offer a truly unique experience.
4)The Potential of Open-World PvE:
There’s a strong argument that the best PvE experiences can and should be open-world. Intrepid Studios has the opportunity to implement creative and innovative solutions, such as multi-tiered open-world dungeons and environments. These could offer high skill ceiling PvE mechanics while maintaining the ever-present risk of PvP. Such content would be reserved for the best players, challenging them to master both the environment and their fellow players in a truly dynamic setting.
Addressing Steven Sharif's Quote:
Steven Sharif stated, "There is more than enough space to fill with regards to reward tables and the open vs instanced content. While the instanced content may not include the added risk of player vs player, it also means that the control setting is higher and capable of involving more rigid gameplay mechanics that can be quite tough and high on the skill ceiling."
While it is true that instanced content allows for more controlled settings and challenging gameplay, this approach risks undermining the core vision of Ashes of Creation. Instead of focusing on instanced content, the game should emphasize creating complex and challenging scenarios within the open world itself. This would keep players engaged with the environment and each other, preserving the risk and dynamic interactions that define the game’s unique appeal.
Conclusion:
To preserve the integrity and appeal of Ashes of Creation, instanced content should be carefully balanced. Power gains should remain tied to the open world, ensuring that players stay engaged with the core vision of the game—an immersive, interconnected world where player interactions and exploration are key. By implementing creative, open-world PvE content with high skill ceilings and maintaining the risk of PvP, Intrepid Studios can deliver a truly unique and dynamic MMORPG experience.
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Comments
Like when you make a sword, the materials for the hilt could come from instanced PvE but the blade would require always open world PvP.
This seems to be a foundational assumption of your post here - and it is demonstrably untrue.
Sure, some games by some developers listen to some bitching players.
However, all it takes from a developer when players complain that instanced PvE content has progression based rewards and instanced PvP doesn't, is for that developer to state outright that PvP players can - and historically do - cheese any form of instanced PvP content in order to maximize rewards.
Since these players simply can not be trusted (again, historical precedent), Intrepid simply can not in good faith add progression based instanced PvP be a thing in Ashes.
The moment Intrepid take this position, any potential notion of instanced PvP offering progression based rewards dies a well deserved death.
To then take the rest of y our points one by one;
1, having some instanced content does not detract at all from the open world aspect of the game. If you truely believed this, it wouldn't matter to you if that instanced content had rewards or not, as it simply existing would have this effect, if this effect was to ever happen.
2, see my initial point.
3, the games you listed are all PvE first games - of course the end game focuses on PvE.
The open world in WoW, as an example, was never supposed to matter. Blizzard do not consider travel to be content, they want people doing the parts of the game they enjoy most, and in an MMORPG the part people enjoy most (at least, the part 75% of all MMORPG players) is running PvE dungeons. This is *the* reason why WoW is still so popular after almost 20 years. The reason the open wprld and PvP in WoW feel like an afterthought is because they are essentially an afterthought.
4, PvE does not exist at all in an open world if PvP also exists. In every case where PvE and PvP supposedly so-exist, PvP is the only thing that matters. Thus, it is simply not possible for the best PvE in Ashes to be open world - there can be no good PvE in the open world at all.
Yes it should be carefully balanced. However, your notion of no progression based rewards is not careful balance, it is an absence of balance.
I have no idea at all why you think the existence of some instanced content would mean the open world matters less. As a general notion, it just doesn't make sense.
He dose not say "20% of Dungeons are instanced" he says "20% of CONTENT is instanced".
What he's described might better be called "locked room" stages in dungeons. Aka your party goes into some space that becomes cut off from the rest of the world for a time as you do a boss fight or face some other PvE challenge under a strict group size cap, which will either TPK you or that you finish and exit from. It has always been expressed as a sub-section of a larger challenge with the threat of PvP before and after.
It dose not implay an unlimited throughput capacity of players or a fully private pvp free dungeon. When some people are 'in' the instanced content others might be blocked from spawning a new instance. Instancing is not by definition a spigot of infinite loot output any more then the open dungeons already are.
I do not expect to see a single example of a classic WoW instanced dungeon in which you can walk up to the quest giver hit a button and be teleported to a whole private dungeon experience and then pop back into the world at the quest giver for the reward. If an instanced starting room exists then it will exits you into a public section that you then need to run through to get a reward and exit. Alternativly you might fight through a dungeon with a large group but the final 'boss' fight requires that you split into groups of 4 each of which must fight the boss alone and then exit, in such a senario parrelel instancing is used to prevent unreasonable waiting.
The goal is clearly to have 'gates' in the course of the PvE content which add group size variety to the expereince, so every bit of content is not plowed through in 40 man groups, because while thouse groups are a fun experience they should not be only experience, which WOULD be the optimized case (for safety and speed) if openworld dungeosn were just open to any groupsize. Instancing is a tool used in WoW for privitazation, removal of PvP threat and mass parrellizing players through the themepark 'rides', but it is not the ONLY way that tool can be used.
So having such specific events occur in instances might be due to: Simply not being possible in an open world (in a technical or an organisational way) or in case of a node siege because that would just ruin the idea of node siege in general with infinite players being able to join randomly... and primarily on the attacking side skewing the balance heavily in one direction disincentivizing defenders to show up.
I'll tend to the flame, you can worship the ashes.
I'm not against there being "ultra hard instanced PvE encounters" to satisfy people that want that thing, but they should never reward power. Have it reward cosmetics or titles or achievements and stuff like that. That way you can still show off that you beat this difficult instanced PvE encounter.
People shouldn't be rewarded with power in a Massively Multiplayer Online game by locking themselves in an instance away from 99.9% of the rest of the server. Where's the Massively in that?
The open world will be just fine
He's confirmed there will be power rewards in discord. Recently.
The quote was pointing out that most power comes from PvP systems, which is true. There’s nothing wrong with all content types providing rewards.
However I dont think you need to add BiS gear or anything to them.
I think transmogs and story arcs impacts would be enough.
I mean, other MMOs don't have any way to get BiS gear in the open-world, is it wrong to want one MMO where you need to actually participate in the "Massively" part of it to get good gear?
How do you get BiS in WoW through the open-world, or FF14?
Even if Gear can be obtained there, there's no reason it has to be BiS Gear.
Also, power gains don't always have to be vertical; they could also be horizontal.
Seems like we should hope that horizontal power gains derived from Instances fit thematically.
Here are some historical precedents and a timeline for a few titles:
In World of Warcraft, the best gear at launch was obtained through raid rewards. PvP-specific gear was introduced with the release of the game's first expansion, The Burning Crusade, on January 16, 2007. Before this expansion, players could earn gear through the Honor system and Battlegrounds, but it wasn't until The Burning Crusade that PvP gear became more specialized, featuring resilience as a key stat designed to reduce damage taken from other players.
Rated Battlegrounds were introduced in World of Warcraft during the Cataclysm expansion, which was released on December 7, 2010. This addition allowed players to engage in more competitive and structured PvP within the battleground system, offering rewards such as higher-level PvP gear and titles based on performance. However, these instanced battlegrounds took players out of the open world, removing them from the persistent world environment.
In Guild Wars 2, players can obtain gear throughout the world and also through instanced content, which similarly removes players from the open world. There’s no exploiting structured PvP or WvW; rewards are earned through participating in ranked reward tracks.
The Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) has historically offered its best gear through instanced PvE progression. Cyrodiil didn’t start receiving PvP-specific gear until later in its lifecycle, and Battlegrounds were introduced with the Morrowind expansion on June 6, 2017. This expansion introduced a new PvP mode that allows players to engage in fast-paced, small-scale battles. Battlegrounds are distinct from Cyrodiil's large-scale open-world PvP, offering structured 4v4v4 matches in various game modes. Like the other examples, these instanced battlegrounds take players out of the persistent world.
Still waiting on your demonstration, I have a feeling it'll never come.
Instanced content was originally for the story, some of us prefer it stays that way. With that being an unlikelihood, the point is to keep the power in the world and not in any form of instanced content.
The Elder Scrolls Online initially focused on Cyrodiil and ran quite well at launch, while the rest of the world experienced significant bugs and glitches. However, when the promise of large-scale PvP proved unachievable and raiders began complaining about the lack of raids (referred to as "trials" in ESO), the game started to shift away from Cyrodiil. To this day, Cyrodiil's performance remains problematic.
Guild Wars 2 has rated content, but I wouldn't classify it as a PvE-focused game. It is definitely instanced, and this very instancing removes players from the open world.
Seems like Raiders have plenty of content in the market where they can safely raid to their hearts content. It's just not Ashes of Creation.
You can perceive PvE how you like, for you the absence of PvPers means PvE. For PvXers like myself, both can occur organically at the same time -- because they do occur at the same time. There is very little reason why challenging content cannot be present.
Removing power from instancing entirely is balanced.
Keep the power in the open world where both pvp and pve occur simultaneously (PvX)
PvE (Player versus Environment) refers to gameplay where players face off against computer-controlled enemies, challenges, or scenarios rather than other players. It encompasses a variety of activities and features, including:
Yeah, asking for power gains to be kept in the open world by doing PvE, is really being a PvP elitist. /s
Disagreeing with the notion that the best PvE content can't be in the open world is really... elitist. /s
The vast majority of all types of power gain is in the open world. I'm still not understanding how you've come to the conclusion that 20% of all content being instanced would in any way tip the balance negatively when open world content is by and large the most important sort of power available in the game.
Some bits of gear and gold don't mean anything in the face of controlling a Castle or a Metro node
Avalanches start off as a single flake of snow. I don't want any power from PvE or PvP instancing. If I had my actual way, there would be no instancing at all.
Mostly because I prefer to preserve the integrity of the game instead of giving people an in to start demanding more instanced content.
The appeal of Ashes is that it's going to be seamless, open world with inherent risk. I am against anything that mars that integrity in the slightest. I prefer not to have instancing, but since it will be in the game, rewarding bragging rights and vanity seem like an apt reward; but keeping the power out of it.
Agree. Ashes doesn't generally feel like it would stay 'true to its character' while still supporting this.
But I'd be fine with specific implementations based on the usual 'Open World opens a path to Instance eventually'. I've mentioned things like FFXI's https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Kindred's_Seal and similar before, and now I have some experience with Throne and Liberty's Dimensional Circle (I can't get myself to not call these 'DCNMs' for short so forgive this reference in the future if I slip).
I definitely don't like the latter as much, it's the super standard 'here's some free stuff for logging in' timegate. Even in a game with a lot of 'technically bound' gear, it still feels like it couldn't lead to a good experience if translated over.
Even FFXI seals would falter because they'd basically end up like Glint, there's no real 'way to stop someone from gathering enough of them just by hitting things or worse, botting', and I really doubt the old 'well you got one try with your 30 Seals and you failed, better go get 30 more' would survive contact with most players in this era.
I like and support the part of both of these systems where the player who has earned enough can pull others (who have not earned/don't have enough) into the content, and then only they get the rewards (or can choose to share them). I don't hate the part where TL players can go into an instance and choose not to take any loot to retain their Dimensional Contract Tokens (only the part where you can just Instance repeatedly whenever).
I think that if Ashes has Instanced content rewards, it would need to have some mishmash of these concepts. It's fine with me if 'occasionally, after some hard work in the open world, even with no easy path for others to use to setback, a player can take some other players into an instance to get some gear, even gear that rewards power'. This isn't very different than just 'finding an abandoned spot' in my mind. Some competition is probably technically possible within such a flow.
But none of the three methods I am used to/like in other games (third not mentioned, basically stricter timegates though), feel like they fit Ashes in a way that I'd find compelling. If we want players to have the options for 'interesting PvE through instancing' to get around the PvX 'problem', it can't be earned by either 'just reaching and beating the boss' nor 'the equivalent of KSNM'. Maybe 'completing a long and meaningful quest where only one group can do this per Cycle' to control the gear influx, and allow for competition, but let's be real, the only thing that would stop that from being just as 'hard controlled' by the strong is some situation where the prerequisites are easier/more economically sensible when you're not 'strong' which makes little sense most of the time.
That said, Intrepid, if you're committing to this and this thread isn't going to sway your vision, please moreso KSNM style than 'Quest/ENM' or Dimensional Circle, because depopulating your world or changing incentives is the last thing I wanna see in this game right now, and no matter how much you make it possible for people to 'get a bit of a leg up through instanced gear', I don't think it would solve any problem other than content accessibility. I continue to hope that the target audience of Ashes would find the KSNM style to be sufficient/compelling enough.
Thanks Az, I appreciate you.
Arena PvP will be instanced and has rewards planned already, namely Mayoral control in military nodes.
PvE instances as they've been described are just locked rooms at the end of an otherwise open dungeon, which are necessary to implement fine-tuned mechanics during a fight, and also aren't risk-free.
There aren't going to be queue-in dungeons or fast travel, so even reaching the point of being able to initialize an instanced fight is by definition a PvX experience. You quite literally cannot have both free-for-all PvP and a precision-demanding combat encounter unless TTK is adjusted so that an enemy player could be focused down from 100-0 instantly on sight to prevent them from sabotaging a clear. It's very easy to ruin a run on accident, even easier to do it on purpose.
Instanced content should also give you meaningful rewards, including gear or materials that are necessary for crafting that gear.
I know your point was specifically against power gains, and not meaningful rewards in general.
In my opinion, instanced content should still provide some level of gear that won't make you useless. It doesn't have to be on the same level as the gear you get from open-world content, or crafted gear.
It could be your starting "endgame" set of gear, which you will replace in a few weeks with better gear you get from open world, or just the materials required for crafting some specific lower level gear (that maybe has no upgrade paths toward something better).
Your 2nd and 3rd points just don't make any sense. Third point especially, because those games are just not like what Ashes is aiming to be, because those games are heavily focused on instanced content, while Ashes will not be, even if it's 20% of all content in game. Open-world in Ashes will not be less meaningful, because all the events are going to happen there, from world bosses, to dungeons, caravans, naval content, OW events in general, etc.
Just because 20% of content is going to be instanced, doesn't mean all of that instanced content will provide power gains.
Just like in most instances, I'd just point out a certain game that a certain important person here has played.
Archeage.
Archeage had instanced dungeons, and they were somewhat of an important part of the game, whether that's for early end-game sets of gear, later for farming mats for gear upgrades, with library especially, or some unique weapons / pieces of gear that certain classes might want to go for.
I have never felt it took away anything from the open-world. It actually added something else to do, something different, which was just as fun.
So in my opinion, more content, and more different content is always welcome. I just do not see it being such a big deal as you are making it out to be, and if anything it can actually help the game attract more people, and give people more content to enjoy the game for longer, so they get bored of doing the same thing every day.
You need to make it worthwhile to do the instanced content though, because if the rewards are not there, or if they are not deemed important by players, then simply players won't do that content.
Unfortunately, it does exist, I don't like that either. However, there's very little direct player power involved in those systems.
That's the thing, you can have a precision demanding PvE encounter, an open world dungeon can be designed well enough to where that encounter can be defended from PvP incursions enough for the encounter to be completed. I'm sure most players cannot complete the content, that's actually perfectly acceptable to me, then it should create a drive for mastery.
I think the problem here is that maybe the average raiders aren't actually capable of defending their kill and would require PvPers in their guild to aid them, (which is how you will secure open world encounters already). But more so at this point, it seems like instancing is just for the sake of being inconvenienced - like it always has been.
Instances will dilute the open world experience and all that's interlinked to it
Instancing exists so that developers can craft highly demanding, high precision fights where the boss is meant to be the challenge. Those cannot exist alongside active ongoing PvP because then all that precision is worthless if one single person gets in to troll.
It just means there will be no actually high-end PvE encounters, because the devs would be stuck having to account for it being possible while other groups come in to sabotage the raid, and that’s just dull.
Your assumption that they can coexist in the same encounter is fundamentally flawed.
Its totally fine when you can obtain decent gear from instanced content, be it PvE or PvP, it just shouldnt be the best gear you can obtain and it should take some grinding to get it. Grinding that takes a considerable amount of time or luck.
I believe that this is actually needed especially as a "catchup mechanic" when newer players cant farm certain items to craft their gear or dont have access to worldbosses because of political/tyrannical structures on their server.
Sure, you can always argue that you just need to farm gold to buy the item from a crafter, but that is pretty dull for alot of people.
I think bragging rights and cosmetics are plenty meaningful when the end-game of MMORPGs is fashion, it becomes a cornerstone even. Without putting in any player power within said systems, those rewards are meaningful. Even then - it will still remove people from the open world.
Once you start adding in places where the instanced crowd can hide, they will hide. However if the power isn't in the instancing, they will hide less.
My second point is going to be what will happen when you start handing out power in PvE instancing, then the PvP crowd will demand power in their instancing and visa versa. I am against power in all instancing.
Once you put those things in the game, players who only partake in that content will demand more of it, they will demand balance be based off of it, it'll start an entire messy domino effect that is completely unnecessary.
Yes, instanced content pulls people out of the world. Which is why it precedes my second point. Instanced content should never provide power gains.
There have been over 200 MMORPG titled, there never has been a shortage of instanced content.
You know what there's been a shortage of? OW PvX MMORPG, we haven't seen a good one in years.