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Feedback Thread - August 20 Play Test

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Comments

  • I had a good amount of fun with Ashes of Creation: Apocalypse! I won two rounds, got a kill streak of 7, made comebacks from a few tough situations. Now that the test is over, here's my feedback.

    Weapon & ability balance
    I'll do this with a 5 star rating system, starting with melee weapons.

    5/5:
    -Bonecrusher: Hits hard with a deadly ability. I got 2 kills from beyond the grave with it.
    -Thundering Mace: Low stamina cost paired with it's ability gives the most sustained DPS for melee.

    4/5:
    -Lifebringer: Nice wide strikes make it pretty deadly. Life steal is nice, but didn't seem to do much.
    -Greatsword of Haste: Increased mobility means less stamina spent rolling.

    3/5:
    -The Silencer: May hit hard, but it's ability means little after they used their ability. Could it cancel abilities?
    -Spiritpierce: Not sure it it's ability did much, but it was another wide reaching weapon.
    -Archmage's Companion: I never used it, but its ability seems cool.

    2/5:
    -Stillblade: Seemed pretty generic and it always got swapped out for something else. Never tried the ability.

    1/5:
    -Paladin's Might: Heard it was garbage so I never used it. If you could block with it without having a block cooldown and/or reduced stamina cost for blocking, then it might be good.

    0/5 (if not worse):
    Bronze (starting) Axe: Having to fight with this against anything else meant you basically weren't fighting and you were given a death sentence. If it had a really fast attack speed and being highly skilled with melee could make up for its low damage to be on par with a blue weapon, that would have been fair.


    Now for ranged weapons (but I'm a bad shot, so take my comments on the bows with a grain of salt):

    6/5:
    -Firefrost: Yup, it's that good. a red potion launcher and a bit of distance against any melee is an auto win if you get direct hits with the projectiles. I never used (or needed) the ability, but I imagine slower targets die even faster. I'd have to suggest making the potions explode sooner rather than instantly upon hitting an enemy to make it more balanced.

    5/5:
    -The Drifter: I haven't seen the projectiles track targets like I heard, but it's still pretty deadly at short range.

    4/5:
    -Wand of Light: even though it's accuracy was nerfed, it's still pretty solid at short range. I never used its ability, but I got hit with it once and it REALLY should be toned down and have a reduced duration.

    3/5:
    -Longbow of Miasma/Nightfall: Abilities are fairly similar and DPS is comparable. Both are solid if you have good aim.

    2/5:
    -Grimoire of the Fallen Sky: I found it hard to use, but it seems to inflict good damage. Seems most practical if you're on the high ground, but not nearly as much at ground level.

    1/5:
    -Crossbow of Revealing: Zooms in WAY too much for a rolling hills type map. Its ability, I think, should have a really short (like, 5-10 second) cooldown to be really practical.


    Other ability feedback:
    -Horses: Having a mount is great. You can escape danger or charge into battle with a horse. It's too bad there were so few, but becoming much more visible to other players balanced out this issue a bit.
    -Gap Close Attacks: Amazing for mobility since they could also act as a double jump if aimed at an upwards angle mid-jump. It might be a bit much though, since the bigger weapons could send you pretty far upwards. I'd have to recommend considering making it usable on the ground only.
    -Heroic Leap: I almost never used it since Gap Close attacking upwards or a horse was plenty of mobility in most cases. One exception would be if you had to go up a steep cliff to escape the storm. Also, it's kinda funny that the heroic leap charge up looks kind of like your character's trying really hard to go to the bathroom.


    User interface
    In a word, it was adequate. It would have been nice if the sub menus had a "go back" or "close" button and really nice if the abilities had a seconds countdown on their icons to show their exact cooldown durations. It also would have been nice if the "hold this button to interact" icon on chests and horses could be animated during interaction instead of on the character status bars, where it was easily missable. Having a progress bar at the lower middle of the screen is another option.

    Another suggestion is to have status effect popups that say/suggest things like "you're bleeding from a bonecrusher attack, stand still to avoid damage!" Finally, as a side note, Apex Legends has a "players in queue" tracker and having one for the next public AoC beta test would be sweet to give players an idea of when the next match will start.

    Client & server performance
    You probably already know there was a number of crashes/freezes for people and that fixing said issue is a good top priority. I went through 3 or 4 freezes personally during the 8-10 hours I played. Other than that, I only had a few hiccups during stable gameplay overall, so performance should be pretty solid once the crashes get fixed. I only played on low graphics with my GTX 970, so I couldn't say how good high graphics are handled with the recommended specs.
  • RLTygurrRLTygurr Member
    edited August 2019
    As a suggestion here,

    Dodging and blocking seemed a little off. This partially comes from the stamina issues people are mentioning quite often, but both of these mechanics add a HUGE layer of depth to melee combat if they're executed properly.

    Blocking:
    - It felt good to block, but the short duration and the huge stamina consumption to hold it made it a bit awkward to use in a real fight. Additionally, you had to be angled perfectly at an attacker to block their attack. With how quickly people move around, it made it difficult to use.
    - It felt like there wasn't much 'oomph' when you blocked an attack though. There was no special sound effects or noticeable visual effects, and if it weren't for the floating text, I would have no idea an attack landed as opposed to being blocked. Maybe a heavier, more metallic 'clang' sound would be good for blocking an enemy weapon? The parry sound effect from Sekiro was a little exaggerated, but it felt meaningful and powerful to do it. Could be a good inspiration to work from.
    - if there is an animation for when an attack is blocked, it wasn't noticeable enough in my opinion. This could also translate well for boss monsters (big stuff that it doesn't make sense to be able to block) since blocking one of their attacks could fling you backwards and stagger you for a few moments. That would really make combat against monsters or bosses feel more immersive.
    - I think the lunge distance being greatly reduced would fix this somewhat. I noticed that 2h weapons had a farther lunge distance, but you just fly so far forward that it makes it really difficult to control where you're going or to predict where an opponent will go. Also, basic attacks would lunge slightly forward to strike a fleeing opponent. Making movement as a whole a little more consistent and predictable between actions would inevitably make the block feature much more useful
    - I think block should not have such a long cool down, and should drain half as much stamina per tick. HOWEVER, blocking an attack drains a certain amount of stamina. Additionally, I believe a having an attack blocked should drain some stamina (making blocking a more critical mechanic for surviving in melee as opposed to a wet noodle slapping fight). These changes would make it important to time your blocks well to protect yourself, but holding it for too long can drain your stamina somewhat quickly

    Dodging:
    -It does not provide any sort of protection from attacks, and drains a lot of stamina. Although I understand why it shouldn't give you complete immunity to damage for the duration (Guild wars 2 has this and it made PvP unbearable for me personally), it feels like a lackluster use of stamina as opposed to simply lunge attacking for more distance.
    -I would suggest slightly lowering the stamina cost as well as the dodge distance (thus keeping melee combat a little more tight and less floaty). In exchange, I would recommend having dodge reduce damage taken by 65% for the duration. This means you're still taking damage from something that hits you, but it makes it worthwhile to use dodge as your preferred method of escaping a bad situation.

    I'd love to hear what other people think about these, as they felt underused and mildly underwhelming in their current state. Translating these updates mechanics over to the MMO will make the combat feel much more than just slapping a monster and blocking whenever it attacks. Since we don't know exactly how many abilities/skills we will have during the MMO, we need to make sure that the combat fundamentals are interesting and fun.
  • Fuppo HeadhunterFuppo Headhunter Moderator, Member, Alpha One
    One thing I noticed on test yesterday was things look a little to washed out in distance..... also gryphons when flying in interact with ground shadow shaders to far out from their body. Makes ground shadows disappear when wings are flapping and can see it real easy. Need to tighten occlusion around gryph body closer as well as the animations.

    Combat seems better than December build... arrow combat ect....

    need to loosen the lock on melee combat animation a little. Only had one disconnect from a game and played around six hours...

    One last thing is that when loading into the starting area I could see the base model character and everything was frozen for like 2 seconds then everything would load in and it would be fine... possibly just add a loading screen like 3 seconds longer to cover up loading assets into the game?

    The Ui needs improvement though am guessing alot is place holder at this point...

    Would like to see larger inventory as well and maybe objects in game that are used to repair armor like a potion instead of the F1 button.---

    Good improvements from December ... adding in some little critters ect was good to see... overall graphical fidelity and improvement to textures, water and general environment was very positive... I downloaded from the website as well as am on west coast with a really good connection so possibly why i did not have any connection issues to west coast server.


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  • ilisfetilisfet Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    The combat felt a little worse than the previous APOC test and I think the best adjective to describe the negative feeling is "jerky." Not quite choppy, but not smooth either. I can hazard a few guesses as to why combat felt jerky:
    1. Concast grade packet loss. 'Tis a horrible company well known for shit service at extortionist prices.
    2. Low server tick rate. It felt like the server was working at 20Hz or less at points, leading to micro-stutters in movement and faulty hit registration. This would definitely create a feeling of jerkiness.
    3. Root animations. There may be some sliding in the animations or perhaps they're too snappy in movement -- these can also lead to it feeling like the PC is jerking about.
    Beyond the jerkiness I also felt the first LMB attack of one-handers was far too short in forward movement. When I swing my weapon, I expect the Longsword R1 of Dark Souls: a lunging step forward followed by a half step for the followup swing. What APOC has is the inverse, the big movement is on the second swing while the first is almost stationary. In combat, it leads to me overestimating my reach on initiation and wasting stamina.

    Weapon abilities could stand to be activatable mid-swing, as they have no animations of their own. It feels unresponsive to only be able to activate them from idle. Else, give them activation animations so it feels right to need to activate them from idle.

    Your changes to the Wand of Light are interesting. It's definitely hitscan now, which I said I detested in earlier tests on ranged weapons, but the Wand has significant firing delay and even more significant damage drop off, so I'm actually glad it's hitscan. The fire delay makes it incredibly difficult to hit enemies at range, and even if you do, the Wand deals a measly 6 damage. Meanwhile it shines up close with rapid fire and 20-30 damage per hit. May want to change the ADS function to a charged shot, one which consumes more ammo but has less drop off and maybe a projectile? Something to make the Wand viable at long range.

    The Stillblade is underpowered and the Spirit Pierce is overpowered. Stillblade's slow on hit is mismatched with a short weapon, as it makes the debuff difficult to apply and also capitalize on. It would be ideal to slow the opponent and then use your weapon's superior reach and now superior mobility to stay out of harm's way. But it's a relatively short one-hander. Spirit Pierce's stamina drain is overpowering in melee combat. Stamina is used both to attack and defend, so if a Spirit Pierce user gets the initiative, the weapon ability ensures their opponent has 0 stamina while the user always has enough to attack. It's essentially a stunlock to death.

    The Greatsword of Haste's ability was nerfed by the switch to root animations. You can't dance in and out of range as effectively anymore. I won't comment whether this is good or bad for the health of the game, but I can say I enjoyed dancing in and out of reach with free animations more than trading blows with root animations.

    Without a hitstun animation, the root animations feel lacking. They are nice in isolation, but when colliding with another player, it becomes even more weightless than previous because the rooting forces rapid trading. I think I prefer the free animation over root because of the control it affords players and the empowerment I feel from sidestepping and slicing in the same motion.

    Blocking is a bit too restrictive. A 6 second cap on activation, 10 stamina drain per second, and lengthy cooldown that comes into full effect regardless of actual block activation time is too much restriction on it. I like the idea of restricting block, especially since it fully negated damage, but the cooldown should at least be adjusted according to how long block was held. ...and shown. There's no indicator on how long is left on block's cooldown. Or the horse's cooldown, for that matter. Or heroic leap.

    You could go the Mordhau route on animations: the have free movement on windup, but force a forward step and restrict movement afterwards. It's a middle ground between free and root animation.
  • zer0dotzer0dot Member
    edited August 2019
    Let's talk about clunkiness.

    Guys, the game looks great and all, I'm sure you've got lots of work done behind the scenes for stuff like the interface and visuals, but man... man the animations need work.

    Let's start with the obvious:

    Mobility

    Both dodges and right+left click attacks that move you feel absurdly unnatural. This is the kind of thing that destroys a game's longevity. It's as if you momentarily turn into a rocket, instead of using your own momentum. It's unrealistic and immersion-breaking.

    To fix this problem, I'd recommend drastically toning down the pace of mobility. Look at rolls in games like Dark Souls, the range is MUCH lower, and the laws of conservation of momentum are NOT broken!

    Combat

    Oh boy, I've never played AoC before, but this was kind of shocking. I expected something smooth and natural, but instead I got absolute clunkiness. It NEEDS to feel smooth. Now it doesn't have to be BDO, but it can and should at least feel natural.

    Take for instance swinging the axe; It throws you forward slightly and locks you into that animation. I have no issue with animation lock, but it makes no sense on a small axe. Again, momentum seems completely ignored. If I swing with a greatmace, I would accept a slight animation lock, but at least make the animation feel like it has to do with momentum. Instead I feel like my character freezes and creates a hitbox... And that's not very immersive.

    Immersion is KEY HERE GUYS! The best advice I could give would be to try and shift more towards a Guild Wars 2 action camera style of action combat. Where you can still move (although probably not as much) but your attacks feel like they carry momentum.

    Player Models

    I don't think more needs to be said. Player models are really odd. They seem abnormally weak, even disproportionate at times.

    Also, the running animation... Can we talk about this? I feel like a robot! Nobody (I MEAN NOBODY runs like this. This is one of the top things I dislike about ESO too. The running animations feel like you're a machine. No good!

    Despite all this and server issues here and there, I have faith in you guys, don't let the community down!

    Edit: Typo!
  • amezuhkamezuhk Member
    edited August 2019
    Weapon & ability balance
    Two handed weapons with a big wind up like the 2h Great Axe, 2h Mace, and the 2h Great Sword are really weak now. The big wind up combined with the new block and the increased smoothness of the 1h weapons means that using them is just not viable. 1 single hit blocked means that they just lose the fight.
    Two handed weapons without the big wind up like spiritpierce, and the quarterstaff are really strong. They have the attack speed similar to a 1h the big damage of heavier 2hs and the active abilities are really strong with the flame and the stam drain.
    The ranged weapons seem more balanced now.

    User interface
    It looks a lot better but maybe a bit too dark

    Client & server performance
    I had a lot of frame drops at the start of a match and stuttering through out the game especially during fights while averaging 60-80 fps on low - medium settings. The game over all feels more unstable since the last test. Could just be my potato though XD

    Sound
    your foot steps sound like they are coming from behind you and it is realllllly annoying.

    Looking forward to the next test!
  • jointjoint Member, Intrepid Pack
    Hey everyone,

    First of all, I am truly impressed by the progress made since the beginning of the year. The entire experience already feels almost like a complete game and I had lots of fun playing yesterday!

    Talking about the feedback:

    * Weapon & ability balance

    I feel that in current version it’s much more beneficial to have any two-handed weapon rather than to use anything else. With huge both attack range and damage, you can just jump closer to an opponent and after two swings they will be dead. You don’t really need to aim or maneuver much.

    For me, It was not really easy to measure efficiency of abilities. Firstly, I didn’t really know what many of them suppose to do. And secondly, the fights are so dynamic that you can’t really see how they affect your opponent (especially in a melee battle). But visually they all look amazing :D

    * User interface

    It’s neat and quite convenient. I would probably change visualize for the armor bar when your armor is damaged. Make it different color (not simple black) or highlight it somehow. So, it will become obvious when you should fix it.

    * Client & server performance

    Client - I played on “epic” graphics settings and didn’t have any issues with performance (on GTX 1080 though). At all. It ran super smooth and looked just stunningly beautiful.

    Server - I played probably 30 rounds, and except few server “freezing” bugs (that everyone had), didn’t experience problems. Not even during a clash with several players when everyone was shooting fireballs and other spells.

    Overall, I think the Intrepid team did a great job in last several months.

    Thank you very much for it. You are definitely on the right way!

    Cheers!
  • It was my first experience with the AoC, I saw some guys who played on January, but I'm really waiting and anxious to the MMO in fact. I wasn't able to play more than 4 games, so...

    User interface
    I don't know if it was because the graphics but when we start the game we can't saw where the players are dropping from the portal, and would be great if we could see that because in this way you know where people are going and if your style is killing at the beginning you drop with the most of players otherwise drop far away from them.

    About the game controls, maybe some tutorial or even let players see how the abilities of the items work before the game starts would be nice, so this way you can test and start knowing what do you want.
    And the moviment with the horse is strange when you need to do curves, something need to be adjusted.

    This is it, I hope I helped in some way, battle royale isn't my favorite game style, so I'm waiting for the MMO and I belive it will be a great game.
  • Blackfr0stBlackfr0st Member
    edited August 2019
    I didn't get a chance to play for long, since it only lasted for one day, but here's my feedback:
    1) The game feels more like an FPS (such as Counter-Strike) rather than an RPG in the sense that you die too fast, so there isn't much room for the kind of skill required for an RPG, it's more like just initial aiming skill. Even Apex Legends has a "longer" combat. One game I think does it right is Battlerite when it comes to length of battle (requires skill but does not have one-shots).
    2) Maybe it's because I didn't try every weapon, but as for the wand, the attack also seems like an FPS game, not a proper spell cast. I'm not sure if it's due to not having flashy effects or the animation itself being too fast, but something just doesn't feel right.
    3) When it comes to attacks I'd also recommend keep attacking when you hold the mouse button. As it stands, I have to click multiple times for multiple attacks.
    4) The camera in relation to my character seems too low. Again, I'm not sure if it's because the aim is not above my head (but rather at the same height), or if it's because the character itself is too centered (when it maybe should be positioned in the bottom half of the screen).
    5) I'd like to see more complex skills for each weapon. The melee weapons are almost all the same, just two types of attacks and their skills are mostly buffs. Would be interesting to see different skills such as a jump to the air and stomp on the ground or a whirlwind spin. For caster type weapons, maybe a freeze spell, root, life steal, fear, projectile slow bubble, etc.
    6) I'd also recommend for each weapon to have more skills (like more than 20). One of the reasons I like RPGs is the level of complexity and different mechanics. I still remember the days of vanilla WoW when you had to know in which situation you should use each skill.

    Finally, I'd like to thank the Ashes of Creation team for attempting this huge project. The MMORPG genre has been stale for a while (since after the second WoW expansion IMHO) with none requiring too much skill (Tera does, but pvp is dead over there, maybe BDO, but too much gear dependent rather than more skill based and maybe ESO, but combat feels a little clunky and there is a soft target rather than true action combat).
  • I think the Battle Royal genre is played out... We've had enough, the west is so desperate for a good MMO, so much that WoW is making a comeback, which doesn't even make sense. Why would anyone pay for a 2006 version of a game and pay a subscription? When I sat in on the panel for this game at PAX 2018 I was genuinely excited for a fresh then I saw Battle Royal, and in 2018 I was excited but is late 2019 almost 2020 still making a Battle Royal game? ReallY? This game isn't even a shooter. Focus on building a good MMO subscription-based with no PAY 2 WIN components and also limit the cosmetics( cosmetics make grinding good gear pointless). -- That my rant ... Now about the game, If you play Spellbreak, then this is the same thing.

    Come on guys be original...
  • 1.I'm not sure I like the root animations, they make the gameplay feel less skillful and kiting more difficult.

    2.The weapon skills' active time's are way too long and It would be cool if missing while a skill is active would affect the skill being used for example spiritpierce's skill only lasting for 3 hits instead of a time period, it would add more diversity while making it again feel more skillful.
    -Even if the alacrity buff lasted for 2-3 seconds it would be a great skill, with the dodge and the charges(plus it is the of the longer charges anyway) it so easily outruns anything and dodges projectiles much easier. Similarly, the slow debuffs are really powerful too, almost immobilizing. Movement speed makes too much of a difference to be this easy to control.

    3.I love the mounts and the superjump and the gryphon redeploy, the map definitely needed a way to go around quicker.

    4.The sound cues are still confusing. Also once I didn't start hearing someone far away's shot until I turned to face them randomly which I don't know if it was a bug or not.
  • So my opinions are: first connection...character was frozen for the session, subsequently other connections after the initial was choppy and not fluid in motion. The pet gryphon graphics were nice when flying. World graphics were faded out and I have to be honest that I expected better but that may be secondary as to what you were testing :) saying that the graphics seemed improved when entering buildings/houses. Overall I didn't last long enough to test much as I was killed constantly lol; the character movements were good and weapon movement appeared comparable to what I expected. Thanks so much for a good test, I look forward to a more complete test soon. Good day to you.
  • CaelronCaelron Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    Okay, here's the pseudo-novel:

    User Interface
    • Action bar for opening chests / mounting a horse / etc - This wasn't intuitive and wasn't obvious... but not sure I have a real complaint. Perhaps an animation for the action that makes more sense? Petting the horse, or kneeling to unlock the chest.
    • Health bar / Mana bar / Stamina Bar / Armor bar - This visually looked better than the previous Apoc testing, but the colors and the placement actually made it more difficult to see.
    • Damage numbers / Mana / Other numbers - I liked how they seemed to be scaled based on the distance from you they were. Hitting an opponent far away with a bow shot had smaller numbers next to your target. That part I loved! On the other side, it was very difficult to tell whether I was doing damage vs. getting hit vs. collecting mana or spending it, and where the source was coming from. Could potentially be a color adjustment, could be more.
    • Kill streak statements from other players - nice to know, but I don't need this directly in my face unless that person's nearby.
    • Action bars - There were a few glitches with them randomly, but couldn't recreate it or capture it; though, it did happen multiple times, typically with the last 2 or 3 slots. The colors for rarity on the items wasn't obvious or intuitive (except 'maybe' red for the best). Picking up the items, though, I LOVED that you added a 3-star system to tell us the rarity. This helped tremendously when trying to figure out things.

    Client & Server Performance
    • Initial log in / loading is very clunky, but improved pretty quickly (went away after a minute-ish until the launch, then repeated the clunkiness until after landing.).
    • Patching system - Still had it's "bubble" phases where nothing happens for a period of time and you were forced to cancel or restart. Possibly a connection issue with myself, but no indicator to tell otherwise.
    • Initial download and install seemed to go pretty quick until launching - this created many errors for me (unreal engine failure or some-such others mentioned). After deleting "almost" everything, then running it again - I was given a "repair" option, which fixed it! Much much nicer than having to do a fresh install every time like last time.
    • Combat still had its server lag and lag bubbles. The initial attacks seem to be slow/clunky, then everything catches up normally. Might be tied to attack and/or spell/action ability animations.
    • Attack animations and sounds - All attacks that connected had a very delayed striking animation and sound in the Lobby. The adrenaline was going to much with the visuals to notice in the match, but the sounds were very muted, quiet, and couldn't tell what direction they were coming from.

    Weapon and ability balance
    • Stillblade - LOVED the increase speed for one-handed swords from last time. I don't think the damage was improved, but the increased speed and decreased stamina cost made it useable! If you were fast enough and coordinated enough to stay on your target, this weapon was one of the best there is, despite all the complaints. This was my favorite weapon to use. I don't even know if I used its ability, and still have no idea what the ability does, 'cause I didn't see a difference when it was turned on. That being said, the polearms towards the end of the matches were always (seemingly) in the hands of people who could use them well, which meant there was really no match against them in full armor. I think I killed someone once with one, but only because they missed one of their swings and I didn't.
    • Mage tome / Grimoire - I didn't get to use it to compare, but had it used against me. I was SUPER excited at the camera impact shake. It might be slightly too much, unless the damage went way up for the size of the fireball/comet strike. Loved the change to this.
    • Polearm - I actually like the risk/reward for using these. I think the high stamina cost per swing off-sets the high damage. Of course, I didn't like being on the receiving end, since it basically didn't matter if you were wearing armor at some point. But, if you were able to dodge without wasting your own stamina, it was almost a free kill.
    • Spear thingy with stamina drain - I think this was a fair adjustment. High stamina cost to use, not as much damage, but drains the opponents stamina. I actually think this was the best weapon, all things considered. Blink boots were a great counter to this, too.
    • Wand of revealing - Something seemed off with this. I know the damage went up, but it seemed like the animation and action was delayed from when you fired compared to last time. I couldn't use it in combat against a single opponent without putting myself at risk of dying.
    • Scepter with warp space - I love this thing! Most people seemed to miss the point of it, which was to close the gap with your opponent, essentially bringing them to you (which is very disorienting for anybody) so you can swap weapons immediately and shank 'em! I was only able to catch a couple of people with this, since the delay on the projectiles is far too long from casting (clicking attack button). The delay in the projectiles and lack of damage basically make this useless in close combat. This is also the best building destroyer in the game so far, at least from my perspective. I can blow away walls that other weapons can't even dent. Would be really funny if this also worked on rocks, so people couldn't hide behind them anymore! (Even though this thing has like no damage, I think destroying rocks would be overpowered... and I'd use it all the time.)
    • Longbow - This basically became the silent killer. I could barely hear it when attacking, and it barely made a clicking sound when getting hit from it. The abilities attached were snazzy, but didn't get much experience with them. I think the sounds from this, especially when getting hit, need to be a little more. Perhaps a slightly stronger "whip" sound when it goes near you, and gives a direction-based sound (doesn't have to be super accurate... getting shot at by anything only gives you a general direction on the first shot). I'd also have the projectiles stick around a little bit longer when it hits something - could be the ground, the wall, or the character. One time, I was getting hit from really far away (love the reduced damage, they were way overpowered before), but I couldn't figure out where it was coming from for the life of me... If that's by design, then great job!
    • Potion Launcher - Huge improvement on the explosion damage, range, area, (including the ability to self-inflict damage, which I find super funny AND fun - this is risk vs. reward done right!) and effects. I actually found this useful this time around, especially with the frost ability active. I really hope the potential to cause self-harm stays!

    All of the other weapons I didn't get a chance to really use. I was more focused on finite testing to see improvements due to my limited time to test.

    Armor and abilities
    • Boots of Arcanic Power - I honestly still have no idea what this ability does. It seems to add a little extra damage to your abilities and attacks, but still not quite as impactful as I would have hoped. It doesn't quite compete with the increased mobility boots (blink boots), but better than the icy steps (slightly) due to action vs. reaction damage.
    • Blink boots - I thought these were a big improvement from before based on the animation and the direction. Pretty sure I blinked through a crate and got stuck, though... Let me blink to a hiding spot for about 20 seconds before getting killed. Longer than I expected. Also helps you get out of melee and recover stamina for that brief moment. I do think the blink distance needs to be increased slightly. Seems like it was reduced from last time, so it doesn't remove you from immediate danger long enough to recover against a persistent opponent.
    • Polymorph Chest piece - Despite all the complaints, I loved this one. I turned in to something city related most of the time (crates and boxes, or the cart), and the crystal once. Inside the street area, this was amazing! Even the crystal made sense, because I saw some quillboar right next to me! (Were they actually there, or did they appear there because I turned in to a crystal?) I thought this chestpiece was best this time around because if you transformed in to something that fit the environment you were in - it was perfect! The complaint: Your visibility when transformed reduced to almost nothing. It was impossible to see around yourself if you were the peddler's cart, and still difficult if you were some crates, making it hard to observe. It also doesn't make sense to turn in to a large cart on the top of a hill... but I guess I could rationalize it in some way.
    • Invisibility chest piece - This was a disappointment this time around. I felt like it made me stand out WAY more due to the light refraction. If I was fully clothed without invisibility, there was a possibility I'd blend in to the environment (a couple darker clothed people got the jump on me in the city by blending in with the buildings). "Sneaking" wasn't even possible the way the light bounced off of you while moving this time around. Stationary wasn't horrible, but not the best, either. I'm glad there was an attempt to improve on invisibility this time around, but I think it made it worse. Perhaps it's just because I have an RTX graphics card, and I was experiencing some awesomeness... but the people I tried to sneak up on noticed me instantly while "invisible", whereas they didn't notice me instantly when not.
    • Horse mount - I loved the animations and the movement. The left/right movements with the keys and mouse seemed a little redundant. I liked most of the movement, even if it wasn't quite perfect, yet - mostly related to turning, though I understand the challenge of sharper turns when using a mouse and turning mid-jump. I actually would prefer more realism by increasing the restrictions: don't let me sharply turn without a couple extra steps, or slowing down the horse to adjust ; and, don't let anybody turn or change direction after jumping in a direction. It was also super sad to see that the horse dies (and does the dying animation) like I just killed it, just by dismounting. It was almost like the horse died of a heart-attack from separation anxiety because you're a meany for dismounting it!
    • Griffon ride down - I loved the improved animations and movement, but this seemed much more like a controlled fall instead of a glide. I also liked how you couldn't partially land on buildings anymore. Prevented you from doing the glitch/bounce.
    • Corruption wall - It was almost impossible to see if you got stuck in it this time around. Probably by design. I liked how it did much more damage this time around, increasing as it got closer to the center. Both, hopefully, in an effort to prevent people from dipping in and out of the corruption wall the whole time to last until the end.

    I wish I could give more feedback and more details, but I'm afraid I'm too busy at the moment! Hopefully I'm not too late in giving the feedback.
  • The only things I really have feedback on our hit detection (which is probably due to the server stutters) and the horse feeling bad and not being able to strafe on it. ie looking at my sides as I run straight. Beyond that it felt good when no server stutter was going. Could use a gfource optimized patch but that will come way later I know. I had a lot of fun beyond these points and all around it felt much better this time around. I had a few bugs like once floors were destroyed getting stuck in teh air or sliding across nothing.
  • AwaceAwace Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    It was mentioned multiple times that the Azerty keyboard layout wasn't supported back in the end of 2018 during tests & got an answer from steven on discord that it is being worked on.

    Which made me confident it would be fixed after 7 months of downtime.
    And it concerns me that nothing has been done to keybinding page at all, only how the page exactly looks.

    What i would like to see changed regarding keybinding;

    1. Support for different keyboard layouts from different countries/languages.
    2. Being able to bind scrollwheel up & down but also being able to click the mousewheel.




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    Awacegg l Awace l Awacegg l Awace#3904
  • Hi all - thank you SO MUCH for taking the time to help us play test during our August 20 session, as well as provide your feedback in this thread and detailed bug reports in our Bug Reporting category!

    I'm writing up a summary for the team now, but I'm going to go ahead and leave this thread open for a bit longer if there's any additional feedback on the posted topics that you'd like to provide <3

    Thank you again for all your support of Ashes of Creation!
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  • PharazonPharazon Member, Intrepid Pack
    Ultra wide monitor had UI issues on the main lobby area. In the store the shopping cart was displaying mostly off the right side of the screen a few pieces of text here and there were not aligned with where they should have been, instead they were out of the box and in some cases partially off the left side of the screen.

    Biggest issue mechanically for me is block and dodge. Having them tied to the stamina system makes them virtually useless. Blocking should create a combat advantage since I am out maneuvering my opponent. Because it drains stamina I can actually end up with less resources than my opponent. This is similarly true for dodge as I could just as easily use a weapon lunge and burn stamina as well and have more maneuverability. I believe these two abilities should have a separate resource where they share two charges. Each charge would take about 15 seconds to come back and block could be held for up to 3 seconds on a charge. I think these abilities are meant to have melee v melee feel more chess like with counter-play but as they are right now, they border on unusable. I go into more detail in the video I posted to youtube if this is an area you decide to look at more, but I think this covers the core.

    As a side note, melee combat hit detection, root animation movement, and targeting reticle all felt mostly right but I consistently got the feeling that things I should have landed missed instead. I have been going back over my stream looking for examples trying to narrow down exactly what it was that felt off but so far haven't been able to quantify it. The spirit pierce felt mostly right but the wide arc swinging weapons in particular had this "janky" feel to them that I wish I could explain better. I don't know if you have a hitbox path diagram that could be shown for those attacks, but maybe that would help with understanding what was feeling off about them. I know this part probably isn't super helpful but I wanted to make note of it, because it kept coming up during the night and after talking about it, some others have expressed similar.

    Anyway, great test overall, can't wait for the next one.
  • akabearakabear Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    USER INTERFACE

    Personal take was that is was a little eclectic setting out+
    Main screen

    - missed a sense of coordinated alignment between elements,
    - a collection of elements in different/unlinked / unrelated styles,
    - scale between elements not consistent or related,
    - no hierarchy of information,
    - and high priority visually in keyboard shortcuts which once learned are a low priority not needed to be reminded on every action. No need to repeated explain in full

    I would like very much for this to be moddable end game as this is a very personal preference for me and I imagine, most people. Might I suggest a community competition for ideas. May not generate the right one, but might provide some alternatives and directional assistance.
  • Not my feedback but this video goes quite in-depth on the melee combat for APOC. I totally agree with it on melee.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EClvk_AD0wg
  • CaelronCaelron Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    Reading a few of the comments about the block mechanic - I really hope some type of block stays, even though I never found a good enough time to use it (best defense is offense, right?)

    I might be in the minority, but I do think that block should be tied to stamina - however, I don't think it should drain any stamina unless you're actually blocking something. Otherwise it's just a different weapon stance.

    Maybe it's a more awkward weapon stance, like holding the sword above your head, so maybe it has the same penalties as if holding down the run button to stamina?
  • T ElfT Elf Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    I feel compelled to add that on the Map, having your cursor white like all the marked areas made it very difficult to locate your position on the map. Please make the cursor stand out.
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    Formerly T-Elf

  • ZeidoZeido Member, Alpha One, Adventurer
    I had limited game play time due to a corrupted patch during the 12hrs, so first things first move to an external game launcher that includes all of your patching and troubleshooting tools(verify files, roll back, etc). With these in the game client, if the client doesn't launch, you are stuck.

    I was playing on a gaming laptop and surprisingly didn't have my issues. During match map loading, my fps did drop but after I launched, it was fine. I left the graphics at the default settings.

    As for combat i was able to participate in, pole-arm weapon alt attack seemed to be op, 1 hit kill in most instances. Bows seemed to never register a hit, not sure if there is a hit display or not or Im just that terrible with them XD.

    For the time I was able to play, that's about all the feed back I can provide.
  • Thank you all again for providing your feedback & bug reports from our August 20 test! I'm going to go ahead and close this thread out now, but please feel free to message me directly if you have any additional feedback to share regarding this test <3

    Be sure to keep an eye on our Announcements here or on our other social media channels to see when you can join us for upcoming tests!

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This discussion has been closed.