Playing Time & FOMO - Can we enjoy AoC as a Working Adult ?

Hi Glorious Ashes community!

I come before you today to ask questions and possibly some concerns about the typical playing time each player as to commit into the game to fully enjoy it, and possibly the fear of missing out content or important moments in AoC.

English is not my main language, so please forgive me if my English is a little approximative at times.

AoC is a massive in development game, with huge ambitions, I am really looking forward to play it, but when I see the world and all the possibilities I wonder if I will have the time to fully enjoy it.

I love MMO’s, but i love also video game as a medium in general too, I began MMO’s in the late 90’s and I grew up with MMO and video game as a hobby for as long as I remember. Fictive universe, fantasy, roleplaying are a part of my life which I allow time to enjoy. But I am also an individual with a work, chores, family and all the package of our busy nowadays lives.

AoC as a crossover between a Themepark and Sandbox MMO with vertical and horizontal progression are something I was eagerly anticipating for years. I think and feel that it can be; if the game is successful, a door step to a whole new era for MMORPG’s and Persistent worlds.

But will I have the ability and time to play it and enjoy it for a long period of time?

I fear that if I am not totally committed to playing the game nearly each day for months and months exclusively I can’t enjoy it in his full extent, that if I take a break, I could miss about the next big change in the world, in a really important world storyline quest, or that my home will be destroyed and all my efforts ruined just because I wanted to play for some time another game just released.

I have the feeling that it is “Try hard” or “Do not try at all” type of game.

And even for a game who would possibly be one of the milestone of the decade in the MMO Genra. I don’t want to make that type of commitment about a game, over my family and social life, and I suppose that I am not alone in this case. Core MMO players getting older day by day, with a job and a family.

My question(s) then is can I enjoy Ashes of Creation without it become a second job ? Can I take breaks without regretting to miss content ? Can I just play it for one hour and still have the feeling to progress and do something meaningful without the fear of missing out ? How much time should I dedicate to AoC a week to enjoy it to his fullest ?

Thanks a lot for your insight and answers about this,

KloWh

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Comments

Caww

Elri wrote: »

Tbh, I think everyone is overestimating the game. The PVE will probably be on par with New World, and the PVP will probably be worse than Warhammer Online.

Smack Down !!! only time will tell....

KloWh

Thanks a lot for all your comments, my intention was not really to emphatize on my own situation, but about the fact that i am surely not alone in this situation in the target audience of AoC.

I do not consider myself a casual player, i play video game about 15 to 20 hours a week. And i play mostly MMO's for the past 18 years more or less. But i like also play some other game when they release, and often take little break to clear those games then come back to my current MMO.

Anyway my point is, the game is made for players, and more precisely for a type of players who will represent the core audience.

Which is the main audience intended ? Is it adult players like myself, or is it younger / more free players with more time ?

I suppose a game of this caliber have a "Typical time spent" in the game by session and by players to caliber the time each activities / tasks take and how much time poeple must invest in it, the devs must have thought about this, right ?

The game is made to allow a large range of player to take part and enjoy, i understand that.

Who will be the typical player of AOC ? How much does he play each week ? Within this time which range of activities can be done In a game design and development perspective of course.

This post is not only to answer that question for myself. But i think that is a question worth to ask.

What do you think about that ?

tautau

The game will attract all kinds of players, young and older, casual and hard core, PvP and PvE, role players and literalists, honest and cheaters, and however you want to define the online world. You could say that the game is designed for all of them. But....

Stephen, the guy behind it all, has commented that he is designing a game like he would most like to play. So, if the game is designed for him, what kind of person is he?

Somewhat older, perhaps late 30's, dedicated gamer, smart, likes PvP, seems to enjoy technically complex fantasy worlds, hates cheaters, likes raiding, loves large and beautiful game worlds. He has a background in D&D, Lineage2, ArchAge (and other games, but those are mentioned as his favorites). He enjoys guilds. He likes being immersed in the game world. He has the ability to stick with projects for a long time (thank God!).

Other people who post here will probably have more (and better) insights than I do about his personality.

Dygz

I don't understand how these questions relate to FOMO.
The world of Ashes is a dynamic world. A player cannot do everything and will miss out on some stuff.
So...what is it that you think casual players will think they are missing out on?

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Game_difficulty
"I think our target demographic, obviously we have a very high graphic fidelity in the game that's attractive to younger players, but at the same time we have a very roleplay game orientation - a kind of a play back to that pen-and-paper Dungeons & Dragons feel that perhaps younger generations may not know but is very near and dear to the hearts of older gamers. So I think we have a broad appeal from a demographic standpoint."
---Steven Sharif

"There are events that are happening in the world in the game that you won't need to be a hardcore player to impact and join. For example, the triggered events from the PvE standpoint against the cities; the trades of the caravans; those natural battlegrounds that exist; the castle sieges you can login for. There is a lot of systems that are at play where a person can simply log in, participate, have fun, be impactful and then log out."
---Steven Sharif

"People who put more time and effort into it are definitely going to get more out of it but that doesn't mean that person who logs in once a week won't be able to have fun so it's just a matter of the scale of stuff that you're going after... Running a caravan is not gonna be the same thing every time you do it. You might be able to find like a super secret path that nobody knows about... and you exploit it for a while and nobody knows and then eventually somebody sees you and suddenly that route becomes a lot more difficult so you know that's kind of the way we really want that emergent gameplay to kind of come out of those options that we give you guys; and a lot of it is gonna come down to other players making it more or less difficult for you."
---Jeffrey Bard

"Traditionally in MMORPGs you're going to see a larger population of casual players than you do of hardcore players; and that's just the way the cookie crumbles from a population standpoint. And because of that and the way that nodes collect experience and advance as a result of player activity, those casual players will actually have more impact on node progression than the hardcore players will: at least as I predict, because of the sheer quantity disproportionate between the two different groups of people... You may see in Ashes the smaller hardcore group of players progress further into the late-game content, right. But they don't have the numbers to influence the nodes in those locations as quickly as the more casual... larger population has near the outskirts."
---Steven Sharif

Caeryl

I work full time and still have regular groups of online friends for dungeons/raids/arenas. It’s just a matter of finding players who will be on when you are, in my case, I’ve got a lot of Australian groupmates.

Besides that, straight up use your PTO for important events if you know dates far enough in advance.

Downfall89

Im in the same boat. I just hope i can do some dungeons, fish for some cool fish, impact the world bit, collect some mounts and cool items.
I just hope there are some elements of beeing lucky exploring the world, getting a slightly unique item. That not every single cool item is behind big raids and sieges.

But we are old, got less time. To enjoy it, we need to set other goals now, not like we were 20 and had all the freetime we wanted.

Lizuki

Honestly, I can't stress the fact enough that at least from what we know, at launch, you can take your time if you want. The world won't be developed enough for a bit. This means a large amount of content will be locked. Also, people like you who can spend minimal amounts of time playing the game, will almost 100% be present, I highly recommend seeking out those with similar time commitment to you. This game is far from released as well, so we don't know the full extent of how much time you'll have to spend to get geared, and compete in high tier content. I would keep an eye on the game, and decide later whether or not you think the game is worth it to play.

BlackBrony

It depends on what you like. For example I usually enjoy raiding, and it does require time up to a certain point. In Wow classic raiding is easy, but getting into raiding could take time if no one is helping.
Farming consumables and gold takes time, but only if you want the maximum efficiency, which I don't. In Ashes it will be the same. If you want the best in slot you will have to farm.
Caravans for example might take time, and you will only do them on the weekends. Maybe you won't get to explore as much because it takes time. The fact that node wars happen so sparingly it's a good sign, because you can time your free time.
If alts are hard to level, this also means that people won't be self sufficient, which help us people with more limited time because your professions will matter a lot more.

Dygz

(Well... someone will have to farm... might not be the person wearing the gear who did the farming.)

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