KingDDD wrote: » Dolyem wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals. I love the fundamentals. Nodes are awesome, augemnts are great, open world sounds amazing, a variety of classes and unique customization should be great, graphics look astounding, and the lead dev has actually played an MMO in the past decade as a player with a team that has experience playing MMOs with a variety of skill levels versus someone who's been a lead developer in the industry for 20+ years beholden to turning a profit for shareholders. Awesome, heres another question. Will character levels stop you from playing the game? Depends on how it takes for it to be fun. If I'm playing a tank and my abilities and role are locked behind a timewall, it'll probably be pretty boring unless the starting zone has something to keep my interest. And that doesn't refer to saving a village from a graphically beautiful dragon. I've done that before and don't particularly care to do it again.
Dolyem wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals. I love the fundamentals. Nodes are awesome, augemnts are great, open world sounds amazing, a variety of classes and unique customization should be great, graphics look astounding, and the lead dev has actually played an MMO in the past decade as a player with a team that has experience playing MMOs with a variety of skill levels versus someone who's been a lead developer in the industry for 20+ years beholden to turning a profit for shareholders. Awesome, heres another question. Will character levels stop you from playing the game?
KingDDD wrote: » Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals. I love the fundamentals. Nodes are awesome, augemnts are great, open world sounds amazing, a variety of classes and unique customization should be great, graphics look astounding, and the lead dev has actually played an MMO in the past decade as a player with a team that has experience playing MMOs with a variety of skill levels versus someone who's been a lead developer in the industry for 20+ years beholden to turning a profit for shareholders.
Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals.
Wandering Mist wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it Pacing is very difficult in an MMO. Players have to be introduced to the overarching and unique game systems in addition to how their class plays in a solo, small group, large groupm and raids setting. Leveling doesn't teach any of that. A tutorial should act like a buffet hall, once completed individual players can choose what they want to do and how they want to do it. I see what you're saying, and you're right that it's hard to teach players how to work in a group or raid environment while levelling. That said, I feel a lot more could be done to teach players while levelling, mostly about their own class abilities. One of the biggest hurdles players encounter when they first reach max level is they are suddenly having to use abilities that they have never had to use while levelling. Taking WoW as an example, most classes get some kind of CC or spell interrupt, and all healers get buffs and debuff-cleansing spells, yet none of these are needed during the levelling (you can literally get to max level just by spamming a single button if you like). This means that once they get to max level, even IF the player remembers they have those abilities, they won't have developed the muscle memory to be able to use them effectively. That's partly why casual LFR dungeons and raids are such a coinflipping mess. Compare that to a game like Sekiro, where early on you are introduced to the counter mechanic. The difference between Sekiro and WoW (aside from the difficulty) is that once Sekiro has taught you the skill in a tutorial, it regularly gives you enemies that require you to use it. This is crucial in helping the player to develop the muscle memory needed to complete the later parts of the game. Unless you force players to use an ability by putting them in situations where it's needed, they won't use it and will forget about it. How long does it take a player to learn how combat abilities work? A more complex game like Devil May Cry doesn't start you with your entire kit at the beginning but slowly introduces new weapons, combos, unlocks, etc over the course of a 10ish hour campaign; 10 hours is significantly faster than 45 days. Is it necessary to have the additional time bloat? It's not just about learning how abilities work, but developing muscle memory for those skills. The last thing you want in the middle of an intense battle is to have to stop and remember which key your CC ability is on. By the time you reach max level you should have all your abilities committed to muscle memory, which is only possible if you use those abilities regularly while levelling.
KingDDD wrote: » Wandering Mist wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it Pacing is very difficult in an MMO. Players have to be introduced to the overarching and unique game systems in addition to how their class plays in a solo, small group, large groupm and raids setting. Leveling doesn't teach any of that. A tutorial should act like a buffet hall, once completed individual players can choose what they want to do and how they want to do it. I see what you're saying, and you're right that it's hard to teach players how to work in a group or raid environment while levelling. That said, I feel a lot more could be done to teach players while levelling, mostly about their own class abilities. One of the biggest hurdles players encounter when they first reach max level is they are suddenly having to use abilities that they have never had to use while levelling. Taking WoW as an example, most classes get some kind of CC or spell interrupt, and all healers get buffs and debuff-cleansing spells, yet none of these are needed during the levelling (you can literally get to max level just by spamming a single button if you like). This means that once they get to max level, even IF the player remembers they have those abilities, they won't have developed the muscle memory to be able to use them effectively. That's partly why casual LFR dungeons and raids are such a coinflipping mess. Compare that to a game like Sekiro, where early on you are introduced to the counter mechanic. The difference between Sekiro and WoW (aside from the difficulty) is that once Sekiro has taught you the skill in a tutorial, it regularly gives you enemies that require you to use it. This is crucial in helping the player to develop the muscle memory needed to complete the later parts of the game. Unless you force players to use an ability by putting them in situations where it's needed, they won't use it and will forget about it. How long does it take a player to learn how combat abilities work? A more complex game like Devil May Cry doesn't start you with your entire kit at the beginning but slowly introduces new weapons, combos, unlocks, etc over the course of a 10ish hour campaign; 10 hours is significantly faster than 45 days. Is it necessary to have the additional time bloat?
Wandering Mist wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it Pacing is very difficult in an MMO. Players have to be introduced to the overarching and unique game systems in addition to how their class plays in a solo, small group, large groupm and raids setting. Leveling doesn't teach any of that. A tutorial should act like a buffet hall, once completed individual players can choose what they want to do and how they want to do it. I see what you're saying, and you're right that it's hard to teach players how to work in a group or raid environment while levelling. That said, I feel a lot more could be done to teach players while levelling, mostly about their own class abilities. One of the biggest hurdles players encounter when they first reach max level is they are suddenly having to use abilities that they have never had to use while levelling. Taking WoW as an example, most classes get some kind of CC or spell interrupt, and all healers get buffs and debuff-cleansing spells, yet none of these are needed during the levelling (you can literally get to max level just by spamming a single button if you like). This means that once they get to max level, even IF the player remembers they have those abilities, they won't have developed the muscle memory to be able to use them effectively. That's partly why casual LFR dungeons and raids are such a coinflipping mess. Compare that to a game like Sekiro, where early on you are introduced to the counter mechanic. The difference between Sekiro and WoW (aside from the difficulty) is that once Sekiro has taught you the skill in a tutorial, it regularly gives you enemies that require you to use it. This is crucial in helping the player to develop the muscle memory needed to complete the later parts of the game. Unless you force players to use an ability by putting them in situations where it's needed, they won't use it and will forget about it.
KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it Pacing is very difficult in an MMO. Players have to be introduced to the overarching and unique game systems in addition to how their class plays in a solo, small group, large groupm and raids setting. Leveling doesn't teach any of that. A tutorial should act like a buffet hall, once completed individual players can choose what they want to do and how they want to do it.
Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it
KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops.
Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink
KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way.
KingDDD wrote: » Genshin Impact is P2W, but again if you like games designed around that have at it.
KingDDD wrote: » People bought New World because it's a new MMO and this genre is saturated with people looking for a new game.
KingDDD wrote: » So if WoW is a bad example, what is a game that is a good example? How long does it take and why is that relevant. DMC is 10 hours long and has a significantly more complex combat system than any MMO is going to have. Why must less complex game have a significantly inflated learning time?
KingDDD wrote: » That's great that you say you'll make a guild. However, saying something and doing it for a significant amount of time are two very different things. As someone whos tried playing a few MMOs in the past few months, its difficult to find a guild in a game due to verticle progression. Are there people always willing to play? Is it a positive experience for both the new player and the veteran to play together? In my experience, the answer to that is no.
KingDDD wrote: » Your SoT perspective is just conjecture and requires brand new bob with 0 gaming experience vs Chad the pro. In reality there will be more people around the 50 percentile of player skill and you will run into those players more often. So my invested time in other MMOs means i get to skip levels? Cool, where do I apply that to my account and do I have to verify my top 1 percentile ranking in other games?
KingDDD wrote: » Grinding gear is different than grinding levels as long as gear customization increases the ability to customize my character to the desired playstyle I want. It also means I'm not restricted in what gear I can grind because nothing is off limits to me because of an arbitrary mechanic like my level.
KingDDD wrote: » Hitting 6k took me roughly two years of playtime. The difference between that and leveling is there was nothing stopping me from achieving that besides my own abilities and understanding. Dota didn't gate me at 3k because other people who played for that same amount of time were there.
Strevi wrote: » Not true. Muscle memory is created by doing the same things again and again. Leveling is just a mechanic associated with this which mmorpg players need as reward because they like it. First time at least. But some players hate it so they play shooters.
Azherae wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Dolyem wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals. I love the fundamentals. Nodes are awesome, augemnts are great, open world sounds amazing, a variety of classes and unique customization should be great, graphics look astounding, and the lead dev has actually played an MMO in the past decade as a player with a team that has experience playing MMOs with a variety of skill levels versus someone who's been a lead developer in the industry for 20+ years beholden to turning a profit for shareholders. Awesome, heres another question. Will character levels stop you from playing the game? Depends on how it takes for it to be fun. If I'm playing a tank and my abilities and role are locked behind a timewall, it'll probably be pretty boring unless the starting zone has something to keep my interest. And that doesn't refer to saving a village from a graphically beautiful dragon. I've done that before and don't particularly care to do it again. Well then I finally have a question. Do games like Elder Scrolls where your character COULD theoretically do without 'real levels' but still need to do things like 'Speechcraft to level 100' also cause a negative response? Games of this type tend to have SOME form of progression, would you say that you're opposed to the 'power gap' part of it? For example, I play one where you start with a 'basic generic' Martial Arts kit, and you still have to 'level' by finding opponents to face who know other moves, but you could theoretically win fights with just the base kit, it's not 'weaker', it just possibly isn't 'what you prefer', and even that might not be true. Basically, is it 'having to kill mobs to raise a number' only or is 'having to work toward your customizations because you disprefer the default kit' also an offender in this?
KingDDD wrote: » Azherae wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Dolyem wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals. I love the fundamentals. Nodes are awesome, augemnts are great, open world sounds amazing, a variety of classes and unique customization should be great, graphics look astounding, and the lead dev has actually played an MMO in the past decade as a player with a team that has experience playing MMOs with a variety of skill levels versus someone who's been a lead developer in the industry for 20+ years beholden to turning a profit for shareholders. Awesome, heres another question. Will character levels stop you from playing the game? Depends on how it takes for it to be fun. If I'm playing a tank and my abilities and role are locked behind a timewall, it'll probably be pretty boring unless the starting zone has something to keep my interest. And that doesn't refer to saving a village from a graphically beautiful dragon. I've done that before and don't particularly care to do it again. Well then I finally have a question. Do games like Elder Scrolls where your character COULD theoretically do without 'real levels' but still need to do things like 'Speechcraft to level 100' also cause a negative response? Games of this type tend to have SOME form of progression, would you say that you're opposed to the 'power gap' part of it? For example, I play one where you start with a 'basic generic' Martial Arts kit, and you still have to 'level' by finding opponents to face who know other moves, but you could theoretically win fights with just the base kit, it's not 'weaker', it just possibly isn't 'what you prefer', and even that might not be true. Basically, is it 'having to kill mobs to raise a number' only or is 'having to work toward your customizations because you disprefer the default kit' also an offender in this? The Elder Scrolls (I assume you mean Skyrim, Oblivion, Morrowind etc) are single player games. The leveling aspect is part of the pacing for both design and story. Part of the fun for those games is beating them naked, or under leveled, or over leveled, or with specific classes, or with no heals, etc. The Elder Scrolls also got rid of leveling in the general sense or made things like speech craft unnecessary outside of a specific dialogue tree responses in the later releases. I don't remember if Skyrim had any particular quests locked behind 100 speech or not, it's been awhile since I played it. Obviously, there's mods to change that, but the majority of players don't use mods.
Azherae wrote: » "I like this Augment but I have to grind through this Social Organization's Questlines which I don't find appealing, I should just be able to have the Augment now because it would be more fun for me" would be a way someone could uncharitably interpret your position.
NiKr wrote: » Azherae wrote: » "I like this Augment but I have to grind through this Social Organization's Questlines which I don't find appealing, I should just be able to have the Augment now because it would be more fun for me" would be a way someone could uncharitably interpret your position. So far this has been roughly my interpretation. Dodges of direct answers of whether they are ok with a ton of grinding are not helping.
Azherae wrote: » There are even MMOs that approach this quite quickly, by moving the 'other advancement' to non-character systems, which Ashes theoretically could do. I personally don't like this for various reasons, but I still prefer to know what KingDDD actually has to say about it.
NiKr wrote: » Azherae wrote: » There are even MMOs that approach this quite quickly, by moving the 'other advancement' to non-character systems, which Ashes theoretically could do. I personally don't like this for various reasons, but I still prefer to know what KingDDD actually has to say about it. GW2 probably fits that. LA kinda does too with their super short leveling. Even FF14 could potentially fit this purely because their main story quests give insane amounts of XP. But afaik all of those games have some form of grind after you've reached "max lvl", which is why I've been saying that lvls are just a visual and have nothing to do with the underlying design of the game. The devs either backload all the content (pretty much any mmo that's older than a year) or they provide all the content in the game to all the vertical lvls (ff14). Out of all of those options I'd probably go with ff14's one if it was somehow designed in a better way than just "you're deleveled, your gear doesn't count, most of your abilities are gone". Though I'd assume it's really difficult to design that in a different matter while also making it a viable piece of content, WHILE not making it super OP to farm for all the high lvls.
NiKr wrote: » Strevi wrote: » Not true. Muscle memory is created by doing the same things again and again. Leveling is just a mechanic associated with this which mmorpg players need as reward because they like it. First time at least. But some players hate it so they play shooters. Shooters rely on the same muscle memory. Pvp ladder is literally the same "levels" as the mmo ones. You spend a shitton of time to create muscle memory for proper movement and aiming and you get to fight stronger enemies. It's all the same shit, but in a different package. And fps players are even more egocentric about their mmrs and ranks, because it took them THOUSANDS OF HOURS of work to get them. Except pretty much every mmo out there (outside of probably osrs) takes way less time to get to the top.
NiKr wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Genshin Impact is P2W, but again if you like games designed around that have at it. It's a single player game. You're not paying to "win" anything. Any content in the game can be completed w/o spending a single dime, it just takes time, just as any other rpg. KingDDD wrote: » People bought New World because it's a new MMO and this genre is saturated with people looking for a new game. Yes, indeed, the mmoRPG genre is saturated with people looking for a new mmoRPG, what a surprise. It's as if I said that rpgs sell well even though they have leveling in them. KingDDD wrote: » So if WoW is a bad example, what is a game that is a good example? How long does it take and why is that relevant. DMC is 10 hours long and has a significantly more complex combat system than any MMO is going to have. Why must less complex game have a significantly inflated learning time? DMC is a single player game where you only learn a single set of abilities. MMOs by default are multiplayer games where you learn more than one set of abilities. Doubly so in the case of Ashes, because you not only need to learn how to play well with others, but also need to know how to fight against other classes in pvp, so you ideally need to learn their class to, if you want to be the best at pvp. KingDDD wrote: » That's great that you say you'll make a guild. However, saying something and doing it for a significant amount of time are two very different things. As someone whos tried playing a few MMOs in the past few months, its difficult to find a guild in a game due to verticle progression. Are there people always willing to play? Is it a positive experience for both the new player and the veteran to play together? In my experience, the answer to that is no. What mmos were those? Did they have any mechanics that encouraged high lvl players to interact with lower lvl players?https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Mentor_program KingDDD wrote: » Your SoT perspective is just conjecture and requires brand new bob with 0 gaming experience vs Chad the pro. In reality there will be more people around the 50 percentile of player skill and you will run into those players more often. So my invested time in other MMOs means i get to skip levels? Cool, where do I apply that to my account and do I have to verify my top 1 percentile ranking in other games? As Ashes will have an action combat aspect in its design, you do in fact get to "skip" quite a bit of the game. Your innate knowledge will let you win pvp more often all throughout your way to higher lvls, because, as you said, most people will be around 50th% of player skill, while you're in a higher one. And all the people who don't just lvl up their characters to max immediately will be even more likely to be weaker at pvp, so you'll probably win even more. And Ashes will encourage them to not immediately lvl up, as have been stated in this thread a hundred times already. KingDDD wrote: » Grinding gear is different than grinding levels as long as gear customization increases the ability to customize my character to the desired playstyle I want. It also means I'm not restricted in what gear I can grind because nothing is off limits to me because of an arbitrary mechanic like my level. All that gear would most likely be gated by difficulty of content. And as a lot of gear in Ashes will come from bosses that would require 8-40 people, you'd need to know how to play with other people in order to acquire it. Learning how to play with people would take time. Lvls are just a representation of you spending that time in the game, nothing more. Though no, that's not true. There is more to lvls. They're also the representation of your character's progress. And in RPGs you're playing the character and not yourself, so your pure irl skill doesn't matter as much. The lvls show how "old" and experienced your character is. By doing quests, fighting mobs and bosses, exploring the world and all the other stuff your character will grow which will be shown through your lvl# KingDDD wrote: » Hitting 6k took me roughly two years of playtime. The difference between that and leveling is there was nothing stopping me from achieving that besides my own abilities and understanding. Dota didn't gate me at 3k because other people who played for that same amount of time were there. So you started at 3k and then were doing activities that led to you getting up to 6k? It's as if you'll start at lvl1 in Ashes, do activities in the game, and by a miraculous happenstance get to lvl50. And surprisingly enough people around you will most likely be of the roughly the same lvl, just as they were in dota. BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE! You'll be doing similar activities at all lvls, because Intrepid's aiming at making the leveling process fun from lvl1. So you're not in fact gated at any point. You're just moving upwards in the difficulty of the content, just as you are in dota when moving up the ladder. And just like with dota's different game modes, you'll be able to do a ton of other content in Ashes w/o needing to vertically level up.
Azherae wrote: » So if a game has 'At level 25 you get your preferred tools, before that you're Generic and must go kill 10,000 mobs with your Generic Kit', I can see the problem.
Strevi wrote: » KingDDD has an emotional reaction (burn out) to the trick that developers move this leveling onto the character.
Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it Pacing is very difficult in an MMO. Players have to be introduced to the overarching and unique game systems in addition to how their class plays in a solo, small group, large groupm and raids setting. Leveling doesn't teach any of that. A tutorial should act like a buffet hall, once completed individual players can choose what they want to do and how they want to do it. you are still not answering the question. if you have a character with 30 skills, plus all the combinations you can get from using 8 different subclasses and augments, plus racial and religious augments, how do you plan to introduce that without levels to the player so it doesn't become overwhelming?
NiKr wrote: » Strevi wrote: » KingDDD has an emotional reaction (burn out) to the trick that developers move this leveling onto the character. That's the point though. It's not a trick, it's the damn genre of the game. You're playing a role of your character. You have an avatar that fights for you, so instead of using your irl skills you're growing the avatar. And this is why we've been suggesting other genres of games in this thread, cause it definitely seems like the OP doesn't like how rpgs work.
KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Depraved wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Giving players a way to progress their character in a solo friendly manner isn't bad, but locking a combat/crafting role I want to play behind a significant timesink isn't good design or frankly fun. I hope the leveling timesink isn't required beyond a tutorial system to introduce players to the game world and systems in a meaningful way. why it isn't good design? care to elaborate? fun is subjective. killing mobs to level up or get gear is fun for me. progression implies a timesink If you're playing a dps role you need to have the necessary abilities to kill mobs. Jumping through artificial hoops doesn't add anything but jumping through artificial hoops. you cant kill mobs at low level? how do you plan to introduce abilities to players? so if your class has 30 abilities plus augments, should players start with everything unlocked? isn't that overwhelming? or maybe lets just give players 3 abilities max and that's it Pacing is very difficult in an MMO. Players have to be introduced to the overarching and unique game systems in addition to how their class plays in a solo, small group, large groupm and raids setting. Leveling doesn't teach any of that. A tutorial should act like a buffet hall, once completed individual players can choose what they want to do and how they want to do it. you are still not answering the question. if you have a character with 30 skills, plus all the combinations you can get from using 8 different subclasses and augments, plus racial and religious augments, how do you plan to introduce that without levels to the player so it doesn't become overwhelming? I've heard the pacing for level boosted characters in WoW during the WoD expansion was well done but its hard to find any quick info about that time. As of now the boosts starts you with everything instantly unlocked which is less than ideal for a new player. Within 5-10 hours I'd like to see players have: their core rotational abilities, the core utilities necessary to play the class, 1-3 world utility skills. The customized aspects of the augment system should be long term investments.
Azherae wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Azherae wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Dolyem wrote: » KingDDD wrote: » Neurath wrote: » It wasn't an insult. The point stands, do you want to play ashes? If so what drew you to ashes because so far you seem to dislike the basic fundamentals. I love the fundamentals. Nodes are awesome, augemnts are great, open world sounds amazing, a variety of classes and unique customization should be great, graphics look astounding, and the lead dev has actually played an MMO in the past decade as a player with a team that has experience playing MMOs with a variety of skill levels versus someone who's been a lead developer in the industry for 20+ years beholden to turning a profit for shareholders. Awesome, heres another question. Will character levels stop you from playing the game? Depends on how it takes for it to be fun. If I'm playing a tank and my abilities and role are locked behind a timewall, it'll probably be pretty boring unless the starting zone has something to keep my interest. And that doesn't refer to saving a village from a graphically beautiful dragon. I've done that before and don't particularly care to do it again. Well then I finally have a question. Do games like Elder Scrolls where your character COULD theoretically do without 'real levels' but still need to do things like 'Speechcraft to level 100' also cause a negative response? Games of this type tend to have SOME form of progression, would you say that you're opposed to the 'power gap' part of it? For example, I play one where you start with a 'basic generic' Martial Arts kit, and you still have to 'level' by finding opponents to face who know other moves, but you could theoretically win fights with just the base kit, it's not 'weaker', it just possibly isn't 'what you prefer', and even that might not be true. Basically, is it 'having to kill mobs to raise a number' only or is 'having to work toward your customizations because you disprefer the default kit' also an offender in this? The Elder Scrolls (I assume you mean Skyrim, Oblivion, Morrowind etc) are single player games. The leveling aspect is part of the pacing for both design and story. Part of the fun for those games is beating them naked, or under leveled, or over leveled, or with specific classes, or with no heals, etc. The Elder Scrolls also got rid of leveling in the general sense or made things like speech craft unnecessary outside of a specific dialogue tree responses in the later releases. I don't remember if Skyrim had any particular quests locked behind 100 speech or not, it's been awhile since I played it. Obviously, there's mods to change that, but the majority of players don't use mods. This is also true for MMORPGs though, or at least, in some better ones it can be. I'm trying to figure out if you have a design issue with leveling itself, or with 'a thing that comes along with it, which a game could simply choose not to do' (I am not claiming that Ashes has chosen not to do that something, so this probably isn't actually important). So, to repeat the part that might be relevant. I can play certain games where I need to put in time to get through the game's 'gates' to progress, such as 'gathering materials to make better gear' or 'encountering a situation in battle enough times for my character to unlock a related skill', but there are no gates based on initial level, and you could theoretically do all content without doing basically any of that through raw skill. Is this fine? Because it's hard to tell where you draw the line here. "I like this Augment but I have to grind through this Social Organization's Questlines which I don't find appealing, I should just be able to have the Augment now because it would be more fun for me" would be a way someone could uncharitably interpret your position.
