Keep the notion that an MMO is online social experience first and a game second, that is important.

Well... To start with, I've been playing mmos for over 20 years and in the meantime with so many games that you end up playing you notice what ends up ruining a mmo and in my experience in these 20 years the answer is: when a mmo stops being a social experience.

Not in the big mechanics, but in the little things that make a mmo game incredible. The small details tell the experience.

Having said that, I have two suggestions for the team, as an example. From there the team can think of ideas to add to the game world social functions that aggregate to why the mmo is a collective social experience.

1. Using WoW guild creation system as example, you need to buy a contract item from a vendor, get 5 unique players signatures. And then the guild creation process is concluded. ( Handing the item to each individual player to sign, creating a social interaction via the playable avatar).

Something similiar could happen here on guild creations.

- Using guild creations as a concept, i hope the developers get the general picture of what i'm trying to say about making an mmo a social experience and implement similar concepts in different mechanics of the game, for example the loot mechanic that i will use as an example as follows:

2.Looting: one thing wow did wrong, both in the original version and the modern game, is the looting system. Classic wow suffered from loot robbers and modern wow, sadly, chose personal loot to fix the problem¹, which in my opinion made everything worse because it deviated from the core principle of an mmo being a social game. (Alongside activity finder, unlimited and abundant fast travel - which diminished the portal skill functionality - and other things, things that destroyed the social components of world of warcraft)

The solution, imho, to this problem: an integrated voting system for each item on the loot table of the monster or boss killed. The party or raid would vote on each important unique item, to what player it should belong to. Obviously, generic and repeatable items would be excluded from this voting system and could be distributed via existant means ( master loot, round-robin, need before greed, group loot, ffa, etc)

¹I know legacy loot mode exist, however, it's mechanics are not changed, and the solution presented fix the social issue.

The why: Most people here played mmos in their lives, more than one mmo actually, and they know that the most memorable moments for them were not created via game mechanics or gameplay but interaction with other players, interactions created through meaningful tools inside the game.

I hope the devs read this,

From a loving fan of the genre to another,

Thank you!

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Lazyactor

we facebook now boys!

Yuyukoyay

I do like the Playstation achievements though. They are fun to collect. Do they count as social? xD

vhbenin

nidriks wrote: »

From the moment I first heard of Ashes I saw in it a return to the social MMOs, such as Everquest.

I still believe that will be true. I echo the Op.

i had the same feelings.

What i see, as of now, is that the team behind aoc wants to bring the good things from oldschools mmo back with a modernized combat system.

And the fact that they are listening to the community keeps me hopeful...

it can't get better than this honestly.

Elistriell

I echo the OP as well. Let's be honest: Lord of the Rings Online has not aged spectacularly, it costs a lot of money, and back-end issues in recent years have been annoying as hell. But people still play--and they play like their lives depend on it--because of the community. Almost every day in World chat or on Reddit there are posts from new players that are shocked by how kind and patiently they've been treated as they blundered through mistakes, expecting the toxic environment they came from in other games. Veteran players echo that the mature community is what keeps them there. The game wouldn't still be afloat if not for that.

That game is my wheelhouse, so that's where I pull my experience from, but my point (I hope) still stands. Community can make or break a game. There's no reason why, even in a game with a considerable PvP focus, we can't give each other the benefit of the doubt and seek to educate rather than insult. To forgive rather than hold a grudge. To pay it forward. Call me a "carebear" or whatever the term is these days. I just mean that positive experiences bring people back again and again. This can *be* a game that people will one day look back on with nostalgia if we, as a community, focus on friendship more than stats.

nidriks

Elistriell wrote: »

I echo the OP as well. Let's be honest: Lord of the Rings Online has not aged spectacularly, it costs a lot of money, and back-end issues in recent years have been annoying as hell. But people still play--and they play like their lives depend on it--because of the community. Almost every day in World chat or on Reddit there are posts from new players that are shocked by how kind and patiently they've been treated as they blundered through mistakes, expecting the toxic environment they came from in other games. Veteran players echo that the mature community is what keeps them there. The game wouldn't still be afloat if not for that.

Sadly, I joined LotRO too late and it was more a solo experience by then. But what I do recall is that it was indeed very friendly.

Beautiful game at the time, too.

Warhog53

I agree with the sentiment here, though I'm not sure what the recipe is. Community creates memories. Content aimed at the entire audience creates community. Content created for the elite creates negativity toward new players though it is necessary as well

Yuyukoyay

People are going to find their fun in something in the game. The social aspect is how they stay. That said there are examples of meaningful social systems and plain annoyances.

nidriks

I do worry that the game will change to suit the influx. Since the influx of people and the hype associated with Peon's video and Asmongold's interview I have started to follow Ashes much more closely again.

I do worry that there is a much more vocalised section of the community now that don't want so strong a sense of community, or at least don't care about it as much. At least not to the level that was so prevalent in games like EQ and SWG.

I started listening to the Pathfinder podcast at work and was really shocked by the latest episode. They were talking about buying a bow and the worry that they would end up taking hours to buy a bow they wanted.

Call me mad, but that doesn't scare me, even if I don't think it will happen. I remember SWG well, and even though the game didn't have an auction house I found buying stuff to be enjoyable, even when I had to travel from city to city trying to find a merchant I needed (it happened - I remember the day).

SWG didn't have an auction house, but it did have terminals that allowed you to find people who sold the things you wanted.

EQ2 was similar, but simplified up a little. In that game you could search for what you wanted on a database but then went to the seller's house to purchase it. I loved that because I could wander people's houses and see what they had done with them.

I'm hoping for Ashes to be a mix of both. I see city message boards taking the place of the SWG terminals, allowing artisans to advertise their services. I then hope we get to travel to an artisan's business to buy what we want, so inputting the EQ2 bit.

I personally have no objection to some sort of marketplace that allows players to search for items, but I don't think it should be as simple as collecting what you buy through the mail. Make travelling the world mean something, or making it as real as possible is wasted.

I am actually hoping the nature of the nodes results in a world where people know crafters and will go to certain people to get what they need. Make reputation mean something and have crafters need to do good business to earn that reputation.

It still worried me to hear the lead guy on a podcast team so worried about a system that I believe will make the game a more engrossing. Is that the attitude that will become prevalent with the numbers influx? Will the nature of this game, as I saw it from day one, slowly be eroded, or will Intrepid stick to their guns?

The Pathfinder guys are still very passionate about this game, and I enjoy their podcast, so hopefully this was a small thing. They were right about one thing being bad. Some guy that wanted toilet mechanics. That may just be too far.

Daiska

Social is pretty important to me. One thing I haven't seen any indication of, is if there will be chat channels in world.. Like a map chat? A node chat? Local chat? Anything besides the most likely guild chat and whisper/IM? I'm sort of a peanut gallery person, and shy away from large guilds. Map chat type communication has always been an entertaining thing for me, and I never feel alone.

nidriks

Daiska wrote: »

Social is pretty important to me. One thing I haven't seen any indication of, is if there will be chat channels in world.. Like a map chat? A node chat? Local chat? Anything besides the most likely guild chat and whisper/IM? I'm sort of a peanut gallery person, and shy away from large guilds. Map chat type communication has always been an entertaining thing for me, and I never feel alone.

I can't imagine why there wouldn't be those sorts of channels for nodes. Whether there will be a universal world channel is a different matter.

The fact that Steven has said he doesn't want universal auction houses or fast travel, in an effort to make the world larger, makes me think we won't see world chat.

World chat just makes it easier for people to know what is going on anywhere and cuts the need to socialise in settlements.

Don't quote me though.

vhbenin

nidriks wrote: »

I do worry that the game will change to suit the influx. Since the influx of people and the hype associated with Peon's video and Asmongold's interview I have started to follow Ashes much more closely again.

I do worry that there is a much more vocalised section of the community now that don't want so strong a sense of community, or at least don't care about it as much. At least not to the level that was so prevalent in games like EQ and SWG.

I started listening to the Pathfinder podcast at work and was really shocked by the latest episode. They were talking about buying a bow and the worry that they would end up taking hours to buy a bow they wanted.

Call me mad, but that doesn't scare me, even if I don't think it will happen. I remember SWG well, and even though the game didn't have an auction house I found buying stuff to be enjoyable, even when I had to travel from city to city trying to find a merchant I needed (it happened - I remember the day).

SWG didn't have an auction house, but it did have terminals that allowed you to find people who sold the things you wanted.

EQ2 was similar, but simplified up a little. In that game you could search for what you wanted on a database but then went to the seller's house to purchase it. I loved that because I could wander people's houses and see what they had done with them.

I'm hoping for Ashes to be a mix of both. I see city message boards taking the place of the SWG terminals, allowing artisans to advertise their services. I then hope we get to travel to an artisan's business to buy what we want, so inputting the EQ2 bit.

I personally have no objection to some sort of marketplace that allows players to search for items, but I don't think it should be as simple as collecting what you buy through the mail. Make travelling the world mean something, or making it as real as possible is wasted.

I am actually hoping the nature of the nodes results in a world where people know crafters and will go to certain people to get what they need. Make reputation mean something and have crafters need to do good business to earn that reputation.

It still worried me to hear the lead guy on a podcast team so worried about a system that I believe will make the game a more engrossing. Is that the attitude that will become prevalent with the numbers influx? Will the nature of this game, as I saw it from day one, slowly be eroded, or will Intrepid stick to their guns?

The Pathfinder guys are still very passionate about this game, and I enjoy their podcast, so hopefully this was a small thing. They were right about one thing being bad. Some guy that wanted toilet mechanics. That may just be too far.

Well, idk if it would work, but i envision an mmo that monsters only drop materials and the equipments are crafted by the players.

the way i see it is that the auction house would be a place to buy materials and the crafting would be done by players, either online, as any normal mmo... or..

offline via a display shop.

Imagine if each blacksmith could build their own tent in the game.... or in case of economic nodes a building, like a mall.

and the itens in display (like a real shop where you browse for items, for example a sword hanged on a wall or a axe in a table).... would be the itens that the blacksmith player could craft, you give the materials ( either by monster hunting or buying materials in the auction house) and for a fee decided by the blacksmith player you see an npc in the shop with the appearance of the player in question craft the weapon for you.

same could be done for any other profession.

a fisher? selling his fish in a shop. You choose the fish you want.

A cook? making food buffs? cooking in front of you?

Monster hunters and people not interested in professions would profit via material gathering from monster hunts... or through billboards of hunting jobs created by the professions ( a blacksmith that needs x amount of material from y monster, a fisherman that needs meat from a specific monster to use as bait for that rare fish... etc)

( as i'm thinking about this maybe i will make a topic for this suggestion alone on how looting and hunting would work and if this can be implemented in aoc, how you guys like this idea? )

vhbenin

ALSO: to keep old content relevant... a new sword created from the boss of the latests content update would need some materials from older content to keep that content relevant.... for example. And the same could be applied to other professions.

vhbenin

In this scenario of monsters only dropping matterials, crafting done by the players and so on... gold would be given only by npcs, for completing story-driven quests or missions, killing monsters, discovering a new location and creating settlement there, etc.

so npcs -> gold

monsters -> materials

items -> professions

idk how much of this type of system is or will be implemented in aoc, thoughts?

ps: i always hated the idea of bosses dropping a legendary weapon, monsters dropping equipment and gold does not seem like the ideal away for a mmo world to work. And if you think about it, it's the way it's been done for the past 16 years since wow launch.
I think for an mmo to be truly, truly refreshing we need to think outside the box in every way possible.
Ragnarok had a system similar like this, but flawed in my opinion in some aspects. You were forced to create a merchant in that game.

( maybe i need to create a topic for this hahaha)

(STEVEN READ THIS FOR THE LOVE OF JESUS)

edit: making only npcs give gold would make harder to acquire money, fighting inflation and making professions more interesting because it's a guaranteed way to make money via player to player trading.
Since the auction house would be exclusive to materials, those that want to trade their items would need to communicate.

maybe an old low lvl sword from a player, let's say a knight that became stronger, could be sold to a player blacksmith because that profession is the only one able to dismantle it to salvage part of the sword's materials and would pay for that because he needs those materials for his bussiness, same goes for alchemy via potion ingredients, cooking and so on...

nidriks

@vhbenin - whilst it would be great to have individual stalls for every trader, complete with goods for sale being visible, I wonder if it is feasible.

Dont get me wrong, because I would love this. This is what you see in the likes of Divinity Original Sin, but there is only a few merchants there.

My idea was a compromise to this, as well as what worked well in EQ2. There is nothing to say that people can't decorate their appartments as a shop.

What was possible in SWG was that crafters could place mining machinery that you could post tags to, such as "Nidrik's Animal Husbanders - Get the best pets at Nidrik's". For example.

It'll be harder to implement in Ashes, I guess, but maybe crafters can place adverts somewhere other. Maybe we can rent store space in cosmetic stalls in the settlements and have NPC traders that will sell our gear. That was an idea I saw in another game.

I have so many ideas, but not the time to write them at the moment.

vhbenin

nidriks wrote: »

@vhbenin - whilst it would be great to have individual stalls for every trader, complete with goods for sale being visible, I wonder if it is feasible.

Dont get me wrong, because I would love this. This is what you see in the likes of Divinity Original Sin, but there is only a few merchants there.

My idea was a compromise to this, as well as what worked well in EQ2. There is nothing to say that people can't decorate their appartments as a shop.

What was possible in SWG was that crafters could place mining machinery that you could post tags to, such as "Nidrik's Animal Husbanders - Get the best pets at Nidrik's". For example.

It'll be harder to implement in Ashes, I guess, but maybe crafters can place adverts somewhere other. Maybe we can rent store space in cosmetic stalls in the settlements and have NPC traders that will sell our gear. That was an idea I saw in another game.

I have so many ideas, but not the time to write them at the moment.

my only concern is that a lot of good ideias are hidden because of the massive influx of people giving ideas... i'm hoping the devs can read all of it, there are some really good concepts out there!

nidriks

vhbenin wrote: »

nidriks wrote: »

@vhbenin - whilst it would be great to have individual stalls for every trader, complete with goods for sale being visible, I wonder if it is feasible.

Dont get me wrong, because I would love this. This is what you see in the likes of Divinity Original Sin, but there is only a few merchants there.

My idea was a compromise to this, as well as what worked well in EQ2. There is nothing to say that people can't decorate their appartments as a shop.

What was possible in SWG was that crafters could place mining machinery that you could post tags to, such as "Nidrik's Animal Husbanders - Get the best pets at Nidrik's". For example.

It'll be harder to implement in Ashes, I guess, but maybe crafters can place adverts somewhere other. Maybe we can rent store space in cosmetic stalls in the settlements and have NPC traders that will sell our gear. That was an idea I saw in another game.

I have so many ideas, but not the time to write them at the moment.

my only concern is that a lot of good ideias are hidden because of the massive influx of people giving ideas... i'm hoping the devs can read all of it, there are some really good concepts out there!

Steven has often said he falls asleep with his phone on his face. I think he reads as much as is humanly possible without feeling sick through sleep deprivation.

I had a few more thoughts. SWG had a system whereby resources were graded by quality. I can't think of the exact way they did it, but it was something like a numerical scale where, for example 1.000 was the highest quality resource and 0.500 the median. Crafters could scan an area for resources and try to find the best concentration of high quality resources.

From then on your crafting was decided by the quality of your resource, but not only. I can't speak too much for weaponsmithing, for example, but with bio-engineering or the small amount of droid engineering that I dabbled with, each stage of production would give the crafter further chance to improve their product via a risk and reward system.

In this way the really serious crafters can work hard to produce the best product they possibly can.

In addition, maybe the crafter doesn't want to devote time to having to find the resource. In this case they hire a gatherer. The question is, do you pay a high cost for the best resource and hope to succeed the best you can with your crafting, or do you go midway and get a reasonable return for less effort? At each stage not only can there be chances to improve, but there can be chances to get no result, or even a failure that will damage or even break your build.

This process all goes to creating a strong social experience because it let's crafters build a reputation for themselves. Combine that with the possibility of being able to advertise your wares around settlements, and the lack of a universal AH, and we have a system whereby people need to meet and talk to find the best crafters and obtain the best wares.

For me all AHs do is suffocate a social side of a game. You go to an AH and search for the item you want. You get a list ordered by price and you pick the cheapest. Does anyone even note, and remember, the name of the person who made that item? That is lost. If you have to make the effort to travel, or even find, that person you get a more realistic economy and a social side to the game.

In this way a strong crafting system can go hand in hand with a fantastic social structure to the game. It even introduces the prospect for bartering to the game. Person A wants iron and person B wants a new pick axe. "Why don't we trade? ", they realise. A new relationship is formed. Player A finds the resource and player B furnishes him with nice new tools to improve the resource. Did I mention that better tools and higher skill can produce both better and more resource? In comes a carpenter to trade work benches for saws...and we let our mind wander from there.

Yes, it's my favourite idea for an incredible MMO socially structured economy. Maybe one day someone will make it. Though, to be honest, they almost did in SWG. It has been a while, but I do remember it being an incredible game to be a part of.

I just want to see something this detailed in a fantasy MMO. We had the Commons tunnel in EQ, where traders would gather and call such things as "selling a bag of quality wares at T1", and you could and ask to view his wares. T1 being torch one of a number of torches along the wall of the tunnel. I have so many fond memories of that tunnel. It moved on with the creation of the Bazaar in EQ.

I'll stop rambling now.

Titillater

CaptnChuck wrote: »

Yuyukoyay wrote: »

I think it matters a lot more that the game is fun than anything else in the game. WoW ruled the MMO market for so long solely because it had the best combat for a long time.

And their extremely well designed raids. That along with their combat fluidity, is why it is the most popular MMO to date. FF14's combat is not even close to as good as WoW's, even if its PvE content is equally challenging.

What makes a game fun changes over time, too. The raiding and combat standards have been set by WoW and all games have to reach it to have a shot. It was a 100% a game changer.

Now I think we're going to find that rich lore, exceptional environment, and deeply connected player base is what will attract and keep players, provided you still meet the combat standards. Most games are fun, but what makes them last beyond that next dose of content release and expansion?

Titillater

nidriks wrote: »

Call me mad, but that doesn't scare me, even if I don't think it will happen. I remember SWG well, and even though the game didn't have an auction house I found buying stuff to be enjoyable, even when I had to travel from city to city trying to find a merchant I needed (it happened - I remember the day).

100% agree. And then you often found yourself frequenting that city for other supplies, hitting up the cantina there and doing a few missions.

I just found out about this project and I could feel the inspiration coming from games like SWG/DAoC that really had a deep social aspect which I have not found since.

vhbenin

nidriks wrote: »

vhbenin wrote: »

nidriks wrote: »

@vhbenin - whilst it would be great to have individual stalls for every trader, complete with goods for sale being visible, I wonder if it is feasible.

Dont get me wrong, because I would love this. This is what you see in the likes of Divinity Original Sin, but there is only a few merchants there.

My idea was a compromise to this, as well as what worked well in EQ2. There is nothing to say that people can't decorate their appartments as a shop.

What was possible in SWG was that crafters could place mining machinery that you could post tags to, such as "Nidrik's Animal Husbanders - Get the best pets at Nidrik's". For example.

It'll be harder to implement in Ashes, I guess, but maybe crafters can place adverts somewhere other. Maybe we can rent store space in cosmetic stalls in the settlements and have NPC traders that will sell our gear. That was an idea I saw in another game.

I have so many ideas, but not the time to write them at the moment.

my only concern is that a lot of good ideias are hidden because of the massive influx of people giving ideas... i'm hoping the devs can read all of it, there are some really good concepts out there!

Steven has often said he falls asleep with his phone on his face. I think he reads as much as is humanly possible without feeling sick through sleep deprivation.

I had a few more thoughts. SWG had a system whereby resources were graded by quality. I can't think of the exact way they did it, but it was something like a numerical scale where, for example 1.000 was the highest quality resource and 0.500 the median. Crafters could scan an area for resources and try to find the best concentration of high quality resources.

From then on your crafting was decided by the quality of your resource, but not only. I can't speak too much for weaponsmithing, for example, but with bio-engineering or the small amount of droid engineering that I dabbled with, each stage of production would give the crafter further chance to improve their product via a risk and reward system.

In this way the really serious crafters can work hard to produce the best product they possibly can.

In addition, maybe the crafter doesn't want to devote time to having to find the resource. In this case they hire a gatherer. The question is, do you pay a high cost for the best resource and hope to succeed the best you can with your crafting, or do you go midway and get a reasonable return for less effort? At each stage not only can there be chances to improve, but there can be chances to get no result, or even a failure that will damage or even break your build.

This process all goes to creating a strong social experience because it let's crafters build a reputation for themselves. Combine that with the possibility of being able to advertise your wares around settlements, and the lack of a universal AH, and we have a system whereby people need to meet and talk to find the best crafters and obtain the best wares.

For me all AHs do is suffocate a social side of a game. You go to an AH and search for the item you want. You get a list ordered by price and you pick the cheapest. Does anyone even note, and remember, the name of the person who made that item? That is lost. If you have to make the effort to travel, or even find, that person you get a more realistic economy and a social side to the game.

In this way a strong crafting system can go hand in hand with a fantastic social structure to the game. It even introduces the prospect for bartering to the game. Person A wants iron and person B wants a new pick axe. "Why don't we trade? ", they realise. A new relationship is formed. Player A finds the resource and player B furnishes him with nice new tools to improve the resource. Did I mention that better tools and higher skill can produce both better and more resource? In comes a carpenter to trade work benches for saws...and we let our mind wander from there.

Yes, it's my favourite idea for an incredible MMO socially structured economy. Maybe one day someone will make it. Though, to be honest, they almost did in SWG. It has been a while, but I do remember it being an incredible game to be a part of.

I just want to see something this detailed in a fantasy MMO. We had the Commons tunnel in EQ, where traders would gather and call such things as "selling a bag of quality wares at T1", and you could and ask to view his wares. T1 being torch one of a number of torches along the wall of the tunnel. I have so many fond memories of that tunnel. It moved on with the creation of the Bazaar in EQ.

I'll stop rambling now.

I agree 100% with you.

That's why i think the solution is that the auction house would be 100% for materials only. ( like in real life japan where sushi-men go to find the best fish they can bid. To use in their restaurants )

and all the items and equipment should be strictly sold by professions and players.

edit: expanding on this system in the economic node would be a given blessing.

IllusionTokomi

My two cents: social (to include raids, guilds, etc...) is not even on the list of important things to me.

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