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.
A2 Feedback & Suggestions - November
HellsGeneral
Member, Alpha Two
Hello all,
I wanted to provide feedback and suggestions on behalf of my friends and myself. We have been following AoC since the Kickstarter, and we are avid MMO fans that have been around the Genre since the days of the original EQ. We are very exited and invested in the success of this game, so we wanted to leave feedback.
We fully understand this is an Alpha, so I will not state the obvious in each section. We are late to actually entering the Alpha, so I apologize in advance if a feature is already planned.
Guilds/Nodes -
The Node citizenship and guild system are very intriguing in their current form and I am excited to see how they flush out. I believe adding another layer to this system in the form of Minor Factions, Banners or a Fellowship system would enhance the current player experience. Adding a layer that allows a group of friends to have a House or Faction independent of the Guild & Citizenship systems would add a layer of complexity to the political system and enrich the community in AoC. Factions will allow a smaller group of friends to create something that is not in direct conflict with the bigger guild system, which they can feel invested in. The smaller and more cohesive Faction should have something like their own bank and group ownership layers to create a feudal type system. While I see the intent of this in the form of the nodes and guilds, the additional Faction system gives players more control and would allow them to pledge their group and holdings to certain guilds. In contrast, the Faction could decide to be more of a secret society and it could be completely independent of the guild system, allowing each member to join different guilds and spread their influence. Like account based housing, the Faction system would be account based, so players could not join more than one Faction per account.
Town Militia/Guards - One issue I noticed was the behavior of the guards. They should be able to attack hostile creatures entering a town to protect the inhabitants, as this appeared to be a griefing feature already. This could be a missing feature, but it is also an opportunity for an enhanced feature. The control of guard behavior could be under mayoral or system control, which would determine their aggressiveness or other actions. If under the control of a player, it could create unique situations like a Pirate Haven where PvP is prevalent and guards do not help. This could create another level of content through player management of the town guard and their area of control.
Banking/Professions -
Resource specific bank types do not offer increased stack sizes or any benefits, so it only benefits the player to choose general storage type. If there is a current benefit, it is not explained and should be explained to the player.
Auto deposit - There should be a feature to quickly deposit all items so they will stack and enter the banks for rapid drop-off.
Sorting - The Tetris like inventory management can add fun in the wild, but there should be an auto sort button with filters in at least the bank, especially with how many bank tabs there are.
Profession Crafting has a few dated systems. Having tangible items on your person to go crafting and make stuff has its applications, but in the current day and age, you should be able to craft from your bank if it is stored in the same node. Making players carry items around a Node to craft is toxic, which will lead to more toxic behavior than interesting content. Having to transfer resources from one node to another for processing, selling, etc is a different story, but if the storage and use are within the same node then crafting from the bank is a must.
I do not know the future plans for the professions, but here are a couple of suggestions:
For Hunting, a Field Dressing or Skinning option for hunting would be a great improvement. Being able to clean up the corpses instead of waiting for special spawns to pet would be a big improvement.
For Farming, the ability to farm plots for different yields and such as a minigame would add a great feature. You could keep the current crafting, but offer additional yields or quality for growing them yourself on land.
Misc
With not having any means of quick travel, the current player corpse timers seems very low. Yes, other players can loot them, but I have lost a couple of corpses due to travel time as my friends guarded them. Unfortunately, if they were to loot them for me they would be flagged.
Camera - The camera seems to hang up a lot on trees and adding an opacity to trees for the camera would help out a lot.
Looting - The dice rolling and looting system needs help. If you need to roll on an item, it should go directly to your bag if you win. This is really a basic QoL, which offers more benefits than negatives. If you are dead set on not letting loot go directly to the players bags, you need to increase the protection timer of the loot on the corpses. If the loot drops and is rolled at the beginning of a large pull, it is possible for the protections to fade by the end of the pull. Having healers or tanks panic looting is not a good mechanic and can lead to a lot of unnecessary deaths.
This is the summation of our experiences over two weekends and we are really looking forward to the 3rd! I hope this feedback was helpful.
Thank you,
HellsGeneral
I wanted to provide feedback and suggestions on behalf of my friends and myself. We have been following AoC since the Kickstarter, and we are avid MMO fans that have been around the Genre since the days of the original EQ. We are very exited and invested in the success of this game, so we wanted to leave feedback.
We fully understand this is an Alpha, so I will not state the obvious in each section. We are late to actually entering the Alpha, so I apologize in advance if a feature is already planned.
Guilds/Nodes -
The Node citizenship and guild system are very intriguing in their current form and I am excited to see how they flush out. I believe adding another layer to this system in the form of Minor Factions, Banners or a Fellowship system would enhance the current player experience. Adding a layer that allows a group of friends to have a House or Faction independent of the Guild & Citizenship systems would add a layer of complexity to the political system and enrich the community in AoC. Factions will allow a smaller group of friends to create something that is not in direct conflict with the bigger guild system, which they can feel invested in. The smaller and more cohesive Faction should have something like their own bank and group ownership layers to create a feudal type system. While I see the intent of this in the form of the nodes and guilds, the additional Faction system gives players more control and would allow them to pledge their group and holdings to certain guilds. In contrast, the Faction could decide to be more of a secret society and it could be completely independent of the guild system, allowing each member to join different guilds and spread their influence. Like account based housing, the Faction system would be account based, so players could not join more than one Faction per account.
Town Militia/Guards - One issue I noticed was the behavior of the guards. They should be able to attack hostile creatures entering a town to protect the inhabitants, as this appeared to be a griefing feature already. This could be a missing feature, but it is also an opportunity for an enhanced feature. The control of guard behavior could be under mayoral or system control, which would determine their aggressiveness or other actions. If under the control of a player, it could create unique situations like a Pirate Haven where PvP is prevalent and guards do not help. This could create another level of content through player management of the town guard and their area of control.
Banking/Professions -
Resource specific bank types do not offer increased stack sizes or any benefits, so it only benefits the player to choose general storage type. If there is a current benefit, it is not explained and should be explained to the player.
Auto deposit - There should be a feature to quickly deposit all items so they will stack and enter the banks for rapid drop-off.
Sorting - The Tetris like inventory management can add fun in the wild, but there should be an auto sort button with filters in at least the bank, especially with how many bank tabs there are.
Profession Crafting has a few dated systems. Having tangible items on your person to go crafting and make stuff has its applications, but in the current day and age, you should be able to craft from your bank if it is stored in the same node. Making players carry items around a Node to craft is toxic, which will lead to more toxic behavior than interesting content. Having to transfer resources from one node to another for processing, selling, etc is a different story, but if the storage and use are within the same node then crafting from the bank is a must.
I do not know the future plans for the professions, but here are a couple of suggestions:
For Hunting, a Field Dressing or Skinning option for hunting would be a great improvement. Being able to clean up the corpses instead of waiting for special spawns to pet would be a big improvement.
For Farming, the ability to farm plots for different yields and such as a minigame would add a great feature. You could keep the current crafting, but offer additional yields or quality for growing them yourself on land.
Misc
With not having any means of quick travel, the current player corpse timers seems very low. Yes, other players can loot them, but I have lost a couple of corpses due to travel time as my friends guarded them. Unfortunately, if they were to loot them for me they would be flagged.
Camera - The camera seems to hang up a lot on trees and adding an opacity to trees for the camera would help out a lot.
Looting - The dice rolling and looting system needs help. If you need to roll on an item, it should go directly to your bag if you win. This is really a basic QoL, which offers more benefits than negatives. If you are dead set on not letting loot go directly to the players bags, you need to increase the protection timer of the loot on the corpses. If the loot drops and is rolled at the beginning of a large pull, it is possible for the protections to fade by the end of the pull. Having healers or tanks panic looting is not a good mechanic and can lead to a lot of unnecessary deaths.
This is the summation of our experiences over two weekends and we are really looking forward to the 3rd! I hope this feedback was helpful.
Thank you,
HellsGeneral
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