Wandering Mist wrote: » Has anyone got any ideas on how to make levelling engaging for veteran players? Or is it just something we have to put up with?
leonerdo wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » ferryman wrote: » There could be different level quests available where the hard ones guides players to more dangerous areas and accomplish more difficult missions. Some quests could also be long, more like a juorneys rather than short tasks. These harder quests would of course offer better rewards and much more experience points than the basic ones. Now that I would certainly enjoy, as long as the increased difficulty had suitable rewards attached to it. Runescape does this very well with it's quests which are all rating in terms of length and difficulty and of course the longer and/or harder quests offer much more exp than the easier quests do. And I'd be willing to bet that the story and lore is absolutely garbage on launch. Intrepid is counting on the player-driven stories and all the different progression systems to push players through the leveling process. The dungeons/end-game raids/node events might have some decent plot behind them, but I predict that 90% of the leveling process won't have any narrative flourish worth mentioning. If Intrepid makes a point of hiring 20+ writers in the next year, I'll change my expectation. Otherwise, it's just logistically impossible to make good leveling stories for every region in the game, while also letting players choose their course.
Wandering Mist wrote: » ferryman wrote: » There could be different level quests available where the hard ones guides players to more dangerous areas and accomplish more difficult missions. Some quests could also be long, more like a juorneys rather than short tasks. These harder quests would of course offer better rewards and much more experience points than the basic ones. Now that I would certainly enjoy, as long as the increased difficulty had suitable rewards attached to it. Runescape does this very well with it's quests which are all rating in terms of length and difficulty and of course the longer and/or harder quests offer much more exp than the easier quests do.
ferryman wrote: » There could be different level quests available where the hard ones guides players to more dangerous areas and accomplish more difficult missions. Some quests could also be long, more like a juorneys rather than short tasks. These harder quests would of course offer better rewards and much more experience points than the basic ones.
Caeryl wrote: » I agree a game should make players use everything in their toolkit. Players should be required to use CC on all types of mobs, not just in dungeons or raids. They should be required to use interrupts, and they should be required to learn how to kite. A class without interrupts should be learning when to dodge an attack, a class without a dodge should be learning when to prep their defense. There’s no excuse for catering to the lowest common denominator in any game, it just makes for a less skilled community overall.
ferryman wrote: » I would say that IS needs to invest on leveling process or otherwise a lot of people will quit before they hit the max level. I am basing this argument on claim that leveling to max level will take averagely 45 days, and if the leveling is boring as hell then it is hard to see people e.g. just grind mobs or do basic kill/collect quests to achieve the max level milestone. If the leveling is taking a long time then it is also important make that experience as enjoyable as possible. I do not know how much they need writers to accomplish this mission but surely they have to take care of this aspect as well.
leonerdo wrote: » Caeryl wrote: » I agree a game should make players use everything in their toolkit. Players should be required to use CC on all types of mobs, not just in dungeons or raids. They should be required to use interrupts, and they should be required to learn how to kite. A class without interrupts should be learning when to dodge an attack, a class without a dodge should be learning when to prep their defense. There’s no excuse for catering to the lowest common denominator in any game, it just makes for a less skilled community overall. Unfortunately, if you make a challenging game, then you only get players who want a challenging game. So the options are to have a large, diverse community, or a skilled community that is much smaller. I would certainly enjoy a game that attempts to be challenging at every level. Something focused entirely on end-game, raid-like content. It's a neat concept. But AoC is not that kinda game. AoC needs plebs, for several reason.
Caeryl wrote: » See the thing is, none of what I describe is challenging. It requires a small amount of situational awareness and basic knowledge of your class’ skill set. I too often see MMOs not even require that. You should be teaching and testing players throughout the leveling process so they improve as they play. You should not be instilling bad habits by allowing players to ignore their class’ cc, not demanding they be aware of their surroundings, and showing them that the basics are optional. Even the plebs should know they have to interrupt enemies and stay out of red. That’s not exactly a tall order, and if that is “so hard” it’s dealbreaking for anyone, well then they wouldn’t be doing much of anything anyway.
leonerdo wrote: » Caeryl wrote: » See the thing is, none of what I describe is challenging. It requires a small amount of situational awareness and basic knowledge of your class’ skill set. I too often see MMOs not even require that. You should be teaching and testing players throughout the leveling process so they improve as they play. You should not be instilling bad habits by allowing players to ignore their class’ cc, not demanding they be aware of their surroundings, and showing them that the basics are optional. Even the plebs should know they have to interrupt enemies and stay out of red. That’s not exactly a tall order, and if that is “so hard” it’s dealbreaking for anyone, well then they wouldn’t be doing much of anything anyway. I agree, I want leveling to be somewhat challenging. And all players should be encouraged/taught to do intermediate-level mechanics throughout the leveling process. But some players are truly terrible. Maybe they're just playing because their friends/spouse dragged them into it. Maybe they're kids. As long as they're willing to pay the sub-fee though, they at least deserve to get to max level. So leveling has to be designed, at least in part, for the lowest-skilled players. I do think it's possible to support different skill-levels to some degree, and provide the appropriate challenge level for everyone, but that takes a lot of extra work. And the version of the leveling process that is braindead easy, is more important than the veteran challenges. The minimum viable product is one in which every player, even the complete newbies, can participate and make it max level. Everything else is extra. So veterans will probably have to put up with a little bit of tedium when they run out of bonus challenges, unless Intrepid manages to make two, entirely separate, complete difficulty modes for leveling,
leonerdo wrote: » Caeryl wrote: » See the thing is, none of what I describe is challenging. It requires a small amount of situational awareness and basic knowledge of your class’ skill set. I too often see MMOs not even require that. You should be teaching and testing players throughout the leveling process so they improve as they play. You should not be instilling bad habits by allowing players to ignore their class’ cc, not demanding they be aware of their surroundings, and showing them that the basics are optional. Even the plebs should know they have to interrupt enemies and stay out of red. That’s not exactly a tall order, and if that is “so hard” it’s dealbreaking for anyone, well then they wouldn’t be doing much of anything anyway. I agree, I want leveling to be somewhat challenging. And all players should be encouraged/taught to do intermediate-level mechanics throughout the leveling process. But some players are truly terrible. Maybe they're just playing because their friends/spouse dragged them into it. Maybe they're kids. As long as they're willing to pay the sub-fee though, they at least deserve to get to max level. So leveling has to be designed, at least in part, for the lowest-skilled players.
Wandering Mist wrote: » They way you get around that is with a smooth learning and difficulty curve. Teaching someone a new skill requires 2 key aspects - Gradual integration and practice. You start off with something really simple (e.g. moving your character and basic attacks) and from there you add on more and more elements. However, it's important to incorporate practice into the mix too. If you get a person to do a specific skill once and then they don't use that skill again for months, they will lose the ability to use that skill.
noaani wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » They way you get around that is with a smooth learning and difficulty curve. Teaching someone a new skill requires 2 key aspects - Gradual integration and practice. You start off with something really simple (e.g. moving your character and basic attacks) and from there you add on more and more elements. However, it's important to incorporate practice into the mix too. If you get a person to do a specific skill once and then they don't use that skill again for months, they will lose the ability to use that skill. I'm not sure it is possible to implement this in an open world game, let alone an open world sandbox. When you start looking at an open world sandbox game that has content that is constantly shifting and changing, I don't think it's even worth trying to do. The developers can plan out how they want players to take on content if - and only if - that content is linear. If players are free to jump in and out of an area as they see fit, then there is no way developers can set up this kind of teaching. This is, however, exactly what themepark MMO's do, and in those situations, it works perfectly well up to the point most players think they have the hang of the game/class, and start ignoring (or turning off) the teaching aides that are provided - whether they do have the hang of the class or not. Now, I personally would be all for gating character progression every 10 or so levels, telling players they need to complete a specific quest chain or task of some description to progress, but I don't think that fits in with the idea of what Ashes is.
Wandering Mist wrote: » noaani wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » They way you get around that is with a smooth learning and difficulty curve. Teaching someone a new skill requires 2 key aspects - Gradual integration and practice. You start off with something really simple (e.g. moving your character and basic attacks) and from there you add on more and more elements. However, it's important to incorporate practice into the mix too. If you get a person to do a specific skill once and then they don't use that skill again for months, they will lose the ability to use that skill. I'm not sure it is possible to implement this in an open world game, let alone an open world sandbox. When you start looking at an open world sandbox game that has content that is constantly shifting and changing, I don't think it's even worth trying to do. The developers can plan out how they want players to take on content if - and only if - that content is linear. If players are free to jump in and out of an area as they see fit, then there is no way developers can set up this kind of teaching. This is, however, exactly what themepark MMO's do, and in those situations, it works perfectly well up to the point most players think they have the hang of the game/class, and start ignoring (or turning off) the teaching aides that are provided - whether they do have the hang of the class or not. Now, I personally would be all for gating character progression every 10 or so levels, telling players they need to complete a specific quest chain or task of some description to progress, but I don't think that fits in with the idea of what Ashes is. It depends what you are trying to teach your players. If you want to teach them how to use spell interrupts, you give them an interrupt at level 10 and then give any mobs above level 10 an action that requires the player the use their interrupt on them. It doesn't have to be every single mob but it needs to be regular enough that the player can develop the muscle memory.
noaani wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » noaani wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » They way you get around that is with a smooth learning and difficulty curve. Teaching someone a new skill requires 2 key aspects - Gradual integration and practice. You start off with something really simple (e.g. moving your character and basic attacks) and from there you add on more and more elements. However, it's important to incorporate practice into the mix too. If you get a person to do a specific skill once and then they don't use that skill again for months, they will lose the ability to use that skill. I'm not sure it is possible to implement this in an open world game, let alone an open world sandbox. When you start looking at an open world sandbox game that has content that is constantly shifting and changing, I don't think it's even worth trying to do. The developers can plan out how they want players to take on content if - and only if - that content is linear. If players are free to jump in and out of an area as they see fit, then there is no way developers can set up this kind of teaching. This is, however, exactly what themepark MMO's do, and in those situations, it works perfectly well up to the point most players think they have the hang of the game/class, and start ignoring (or turning off) the teaching aides that are provided - whether they do have the hang of the class or not. Now, I personally would be all for gating character progression every 10 or so levels, telling players they need to complete a specific quest chain or task of some description to progress, but I don't think that fits in with the idea of what Ashes is. It depends what you are trying to teach your players. If you want to teach them how to use spell interrupts, you give them an interrupt at level 10 and then give any mobs above level 10 an action that requires the player the use their interrupt on them. It doesn't have to be every single mob but it needs to be regular enough that the player can develop the muscle memory. But then this means every single area that players of that level could possibly go to need to have that one mechanic. I mean, if I am level 10 and I just got an interrupt, that isn't going to do me a whole lot of good if I am fighting against level 10 bears. If they attempted to make all mobs of a given level range possess the same abilities or required the same counter, all the content in the game would feel somewhat the same. Suddenly, they don't have much of a sandbox MMO any more.
Caeryl wrote: » Uh... no, requiring more mechanics as mob levels increase doesn’t do anything to reduce the sandbox aspects. Wandering already said ex. interruptable abilities wouldn’t be on literally every mob, but it would show up enough that a player would have to know to use their interrupts when they start venturing into higher levels. Same as mobs at higher levels do more damage and have different attack patterns, requiring more thoughtful approaches than a lvl1 wolf that only basic attacks. If you are lvl10 fighting lvl10 bears that can use a charged ability that you can interrupt, and you now have an interrupt given at lvl10, then you start learning how to use that interrupt unless you go back to the lvl1-9 areas.
noaani wrote: » Caeryl wrote: » Uh... no, requiring more mechanics as mob levels increase doesn’t do anything to reduce the sandbox aspects. Wandering already said ex. interruptable abilities wouldn’t be on literally every mob, but it would show up enough that a player would have to know to use their interrupts when they start venturing into higher levels. Same as mobs at higher levels do more damage and have different attack patterns, requiring more thoughtful approaches than a lvl1 wolf that only basic attacks. If you are lvl10 fighting lvl10 bears that can use a charged ability that you can interrupt, and you now have an interrupt given at lvl10, then you start learning how to use that interrupt unless you go back to the lvl1-9 areas. The problem with this is that now you have the system that literally every game has, that we all seem to agree doesn't work. Play any MMO, there are no abilities on level 1 mobs to interrupt, but there are a handful at max level that can be. The mobs don't get interruptable abilities until players get interrupts, which is always at a different level in different games, but it still happens. The problem most games run in to is that unless all players get an interrupt, the developers can't require the use of interrupts to take on these mobs otherwise players without them will simply be unable to kill those mobs. Because of this, interrpts are not 100% needed, meaning even players with them can get by just fine without using them, meaning they don't learn to use them because they never actually had to use them. Some games get around this by putting in a progression block and forcing players to perform a specific task that they can only succeed at if they have managed to get their head around specific concepts and mechanics that pertain to their class, but this is not something that fits Ashes.
Caeryl wrote: » noaani wrote: » Caeryl wrote: » Uh... no, requiring more mechanics as mob levels increase doesn’t do anything to reduce the sandbox aspects. Wandering already said ex. interruptable abilities wouldn’t be on literally every mob, but it would show up enough that a player would have to know to use their interrupts when they start venturing into higher levels. Same as mobs at higher levels do more damage and have different attack patterns, requiring more thoughtful approaches than a lvl1 wolf that only basic attacks. If you are lvl10 fighting lvl10 bears that can use a charged ability that you can interrupt, and you now have an interrupt given at lvl10, then you start learning how to use that interrupt unless you go back to the lvl1-9 areas. The problem with this is that now you have the system that literally every game has, that we all seem to agree doesn't work. Play any MMO, there are no abilities on level 1 mobs to interrupt, but there are a handful at max level that can be. The mobs don't get interruptable abilities until players get interrupts, which is always at a different level in different games, but it still happens. The problem most games run in to is that unless all players get an interrupt, the developers can't require the use of interrupts to take on these mobs otherwise players without them will simply be unable to kill those mobs. Because of this, interrpts are not 100% needed, meaning even players with them can get by just fine without using them, meaning they don't learn to use them because they never actually had to use them. Some games get around this by putting in a progression block and forcing players to perform a specific task that they can only succeed at if they have managed to get their head around specific concepts and mechanics that pertain to their class, but this is not something that fits Ashes. You’re under the incorrect assumption that the only way to handle interruptable abilities it to interrupt them. I already gave examples of how multiple classes will approach that. To deal with an interruptable ability (a “charged ability” if thats simpler) you can: - Interrupt it - Buff up to survive it - Dodge it - Fight from outside the ability’s range But when you get an ability, especially one that is a very basic mechanic like a Fighter’s Parry or a Rogue’s Dodge, you should be having to use it. It’s is completely unreasonable to ever make those things optional once a players gets outside the starter areas.
Caeryl wrote: » You’re under the incorrect assumption that the only way to handle interruptable abilities it to interrupt them. I already gave examples of how multiple classes will approach that.
noaani wrote: » Because of this, interrpts are not 100% needed, meaning even players with them can get by just fine without using them, meaning they don't learn to use them because they never actually had to use them.
noaani wrote: » Caeryl wrote: » You’re under the incorrect assumption that the only way to handle interruptable abilities it to interrupt them. I already gave examples of how multiple classes will approach that. I specifically said the opposite of this in the post you just quoted. noaani wrote: » Because of this, interrpts are not 100% needed, meaning even players with them can get by just fine without using them, meaning they don't learn to use them because they never actually had to use them. But now, as I said, not only are we not at a system that teaches players how to play their class, we are back at the system most games actually already use, that doesn't do a good enough job. That system, by the way, is giving players an interrupt, then giving mobs an ability that can be interrupted, but not requiring the players with interrupts to actually use them in order to take on content, thus not teaching players how to use their interrupts. Obviously, interrupts can be extrapolated to any ability in a game.
