instanced dungeons

i like the fact that the dungeons in ashes of creation are open world, however i think they should have a cap of players that can enter each dungeon, a good example is anarchy online, they had a player cap of about 16-24 players per dungeon before a new ID was formed, or a new Layer

the problem with open world dungeons is, on paper it sounds fun, you can pvp for the chance of loot, etc etc, but in reality it will be chaos, with servers holding anywhere between 10-20,000 players at a given time people will just skip dungeons all together as competing against 500 other players for a chance of loot is just not worth it,

once the game matures and there becomes twink items dropping from certain bosses in certain dungeons this will be even worse, and i feel that a large part of the game will be just un obtainable by a vast majority of players,

i dont think dungeons instance locked like wow to a 5 man team is the way to go but maybe they should have a player cap, whats everyones thoughts

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Depraved

Dygz wrote: »

Depraved wrote: »

not at all. this depends on how you design the game. there are games where you start farming dungeons at low levels, and you do these dungeons everyday as part of your progression until you hit max level.

Pretty sure that's what "typically" means.

Depraved wrote: »

no no and no. you have a very biased notion on what is an rpg or how an rpg should be or must be. what makes an rpg an rpg is the ability to control the progression of your character (stats, skills or both) or the ability to act and pretend you are your character and the effects it has in the game.

LMFAO
No. That is not what makes an RPG an RPG.
That's like saying what makes Ashes of Creation Ashes of Creation is: Engaging and Immersive Story.

Depraved wrote: »

questing, farming, turn based combat, dice rolls, action combat, etc are just obstacles in progression or extra elements of what already is the core of an rpg, which is the 2 things that i mentioned above.

LMFAO
That is coming from the biased perspective of a gamer who loves progression from combat.
It's defintitely not the perspective of an RPG designer.

lets say i play a game and i rpg as a tavern owner. all im doing is stay in my tavern offering people drinks and making sure there are no unsavory individuals in the tavern. there is no story, no questing and no progression, but im still roleplaying, arent i?

Fantmx

To be clear I am referencing vanilla eq2, a very different experience than the past 15 or more years. It was 90% group-based play. I can remember spending hours in the dungeon Stormhold for example. It was a shared large dungeon and there were numerous places where player groups would set up camps either for named mobs to spawn or just for experience and money grinds.

Dygz

Raven016 wrote: »

Instances create an environment easier to control and balance.
Sieges will / might be instanced too.
It takes away from the sandbox nature of the game.
But because are instances, does not mean they are safe space.
The way OP describe them, they are accessible to multiple teams. Like 3 teams of 8 players. Could be more,
So the 4th team might be alone in the instance until a 5th and a 6th enter.

Ashes is a Themebox - not a Sandbox.
80% Open World dungeons; 20% Instanced dungeons. Instanced dungeons are primarily associated with dev curated story, rather than emergent story from PvP.

"If Design has a specific reason for which they want you to only be able to encounter this area with 8 players, or to only do this boss with 8 players, either from a story perspective, a class progression perspective or racial storyline, whatever... that's where we delegate a majority of the Instance use to. Not necessarily for places you can grind or farm repeatedly. So, these are specific story-arcs we want to give containment to the encounter."
---Steven The Big Cheeked Giant Episode 100

Dygz

Depraved wrote: »

lets say i play a game and i rpg as a tavern owner.

I think you mean you RP as a tavern owner. You could try to do that in just about any game.
You could do that while playing chess if you wanted to. That would not make chess an RPG.

Depraved wrote: »

all im doing is stay in my tavern offering people drinks and making sure there are no unsavory individuals in the tavern. there is no story, no questing and no progression, but im still roleplaying, arent i?

You would be RPing. That doesn't tell me whether the game is an RPG.
If it's an RPG, I would expect there to be quests associated with running the tavern. And some of those quests would probably involve killing some Rats.

If you said, "I like staying in a tavern and playing chess."
I would also say - "that sounds like a chess sim". Hopefully, the other features of the MMORPG are engaging enough that it's not common for people to want to spend the bulk of their time playing chess in a tavern.
And, yeah, in an RPG, I would hope it's designed that people would want to stay in a spot farming mobs about as often as people would want to stay in a tavern playing chess.

Raven016

Dygz wrote: »

Raven016 wrote: »

Instances create an environment easier to control and balance.
Sieges will / might be instanced too.
It takes away from the sandbox nature of the game.
But because are instances, does not mean they are safe space.
The way OP describe them, they are accessible to multiple teams. Like 3 teams of 8 players. Could be more,
So the 4th team might be alone in the instance until a 5th and a 6th enter.

Ashes is a Themebox - not a Sandbox.
80% Open World dungeons; 20% Instanced dungeons. Instanced dungeons are primarily associated with dev curated story, rather than emergent story from PvP.

"If Design has a specific reason for which they want you to only be able to encounter this area with 8 players, or to only do this boss with 8 players, either from a story perspective, a class progression perspective or racial storyline, whatever... that's where we delegate a majority of the Instance use to. Not necessarily for places you can grind or farm repeatedly. So, these are specific story-arcs we want to give containment to the encounter."
---Steven The Big Cheeked Giant Episode 100

I don't know what those words mean anyway

With or without sand, there might be chaos. If you shake the box and is the theme instead of sand which gets mixed up, it's fine. Maybe even better.

Dygz

If you don't know what the words mean... maybe the Instanced content is OK?

Balrog21

NO, only for story content. This has already been said multiple times by Steven.

Raven016

Dygz wrote: »

If you don't know what the words mean... maybe the Instanced content is OK?

I have no idea.
I do not oppose instances as long as they do not end up dominating the game.
Instance for me is a space which has a loading screen.
That space can be only one or can be created more times.
Some players may want one such instance only for themselves (to be safe). That would be against Steven's risk vs fun vision. A few instances would not hurt. They have to see how many players would go there, why, how often, how long they stay, what they get there. Only knowing such information I could think what impact it would have onto the server. Because if most players are in instances, then they are not outside them. In the end, moving the balance you get a more mixed or a more specific player base.
I can addapt to both extremes.

Also depending on what the objective of the game is, instances can be adjusted and we could see some kind which we never seen before in other games, because they were not needed.

Chicago

Raven016 wrote: »

Ravicus wrote: »

I would not have instanced dungeons at all. If it is PvX then there needs to be pvp, at least in the open world. If the dungeon drops pvp type gear (not sure if there will be a seperation from pvp/pve gear in this game) then it needs to be able to be fought over. The whole foundation of the game is open world, why give safe space in dungeons?

Instances create an environment easier to control and balance.
Sieges will / might be instanced too.
It takes away from the sandbox nature of the game.
But because are instances, does not mean they are safe space.
The way OP describe them, they are accessible to multiple teams. Like 3 teams of 8 players. Could be more,
So the 4th team might be alone in the instance until a 5th and a 6th enter.

Definitley, i dont think that the dungeons need to be instanced to a degree where it is basically solo content, or one team enters and cleans the entire instance, but i think it needs to be managed vs the size of the dungeon, if there are to many people to compete against i feel as though this is ruining content and not the best design, so yes i would say that dungeon caps at maybe 60 ish players before a new layer is formed could be a good work around, they could code it that there are more players per dungeon than bosses/mobs so it will still be contested without it looking like a cross walk in tokyo having to compete for regular trash mobs because there are pushing 500 players per instance

we will see in time

Ludullu

In other words yall do not want open world dungeons. Simple as that.

Ludullu

Here's what L2 dungeon are.

A dungeon that you TP into ("instanced" in other words). No limit on people inside. lvl40-55 (out of potential 85) content.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwYSPH7uGEw

A purely open world dungeon for lvl20-40 content, with a very important boss at the very bottom.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLrccSBRG_w

A fight right outside of a top lvl dungeon, with the goal of preventing the enemy to farm said dungeon (and the very important boss inside).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYNbR-mvfU

You see how massive all of those are? That's what "open world dungeon" means to Steven, me and some others. That's the content we want to see.

Chicago

Dygz wrote: »

Depraved wrote: »

lets say i play a game and i rpg as a tavern owner.

I think you mean you RP as a tavern owner. You could try to do that in just about any game.
You could do that while playing chess if you wanted to. That would not make chess an RPG.

actually by definition it would make chess an RPG

Chicago

NiKr wrote: »

Here's what L2 dungeon are.

A dungeon that you TP into ("instanced" in other words). No limit on people inside. lvl40-55 (out of potential 85) content.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwYSPH7uGEw

A purely open world dungeon for lvl20-40 content, with a very important boss at the very bottom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLrccSBRG_w

A fight right outside of a top lvl dungeon, with the goal of preventing the enemy to farm said dungeon (and the very important boss inside).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYNbR-mvfU

You see how massive all of those are? That's what "open world dungeon" means to Steven, me and some others. That's the content we want to see.

this looks terrible lol

Ludullu

Chicago wrote: »

this looks terrible lol

So in the words of a classic game developer: "This game is not for you"

Chicago

NiKr wrote: »

Chicago wrote: »

this looks terrible lol

So in the words of a classic game developer: "This game is not for you"

i mean are we making an MMO here or trying to bring back life to an old game that a couple of people miss, there are always ways for games to improve and just because i dont like one aspect of it does not mean the game is not for me, maybe it means some of the dungeon content is not for me, but please tell me how that is good game play

firstly there are literally hundreds of people in the dungeon, witch totally removes the risk vs reward aspect of it, no mobs will be up more than a few seconds including bosses, if pvp breaks out its going to just be an aoe fest, no real combat no real skill, no outplays, just a big aoe fest of 500 people, and most likely who ever has the biggest raid group will win, every single player wanting to go in and test their skills as a 5 man or 8 man party will have next to no chance competing

secondly, i cant even appreciate the dungeon with this many people, now imagine this with the flashy spell animations ashes has, most peoples computers will probably just shut down at this point,

like i said i dont think dungeons should be instanced to one group but 500 players in one dungeon seems like it will cause more issues than it will fix, and with corruption it will be almost impossible to even pvp your way into a farm spot because as soon as your group flags you are just an easy target for the other 500 players already standing ontop of you that can kill you with no downside, obviously we need to test this but like i said, is ashes of creation a new MMO or is it just L2 being brought back to life because steven misses the game, they can have their own systems

Ludullu

Chicago wrote: »

i mean are we making an MMO here or trying to bring back life to an old game that a couple of people miss, there are always ways for games to improve and just because i dont like one aspect of it does not mean the game is not for me, maybe it means some of the dungeon content is not for me, but please tell me how that is good game play

It's a game that Steven decided to make exactly because he dislikes the current form of the genre. And his favorite dungeon experience is pretty much what I posted. So yes, Intrepid are making an mmo. And Steven's vision for an mmo is exactly what I posted. Otherwise his design would've been different from the very start.

Chicago wrote: »

firstly there are literally hundreds of people in the dungeon, witch totally removes the risk vs reward aspect of it, no mobs will be up more than a few seconds including bosses, if pvp breaks out its going to just be an aoe fest, no real combat no real skill, no outplays, just a big aoe fest of 500 people, and most likely who ever has the biggest raid group will win, every single player wanting to go in and test their skills as a 5 man or 8 man party will have next to no chance competing

The 3rd video is literally a solo group against over a hundred people. They distract that whole zerg, kite them and pick off quite a few enemies. With just a few more groups you could outplay that whole zerg easily (as that guild has done in the past btw).

As for the few seconds for mobs/bosses. Mobs don't matter during the pvp itself, because you're fighting for the right to kill the mobs. And bosses are tuned to take that kind of dmg w/o dying in seconds. Also, loot is not given to every participant, so just bringing a huge zerg to a dungeon is a waste of time, because you're spending way more manhours on getting smth that's worth a fraction of that effort.

Chicago wrote: »

fecondly, i cant even appreciate the dungeon with this many people, now imagine this with the flashy spell animations ashes has, most peoples computers will probably just shut down at this point,

Intrepid want sieges to be 500vs500. With node sieges potentially having even more people, if they somehow stay non-instanced. If the game can't handle just a few hundred people in one place - it will have failed at its core goal.

As for people's PCs - Intrepid have already said that we'll have extensive graphics settings and they'll try optimizing the game to the best of their ability. If your PC can't meet the minimum requirements - bad for you (I'm quite likely in this camp btw).

Chicago wrote: »

like i said i dont think dungeons should be instanced to one group but 500 players in one dungeon seems like it will cause more issues than it will fix, and with corruption it will be almost impossible to even pvp your way into a farm spot because as soon as your group flags you are just an easy target for the other 500 players already standing ontop of you that can kill you with no downside, obviously we need to test this but like i said, is ashes of creation a new MMO or is it just L2 being brought back to life because steven misses the game, they can have their own systems

Corruption has nothing to do with being flagged. It does have smth to do with you just running through a crowd of flagged zerg though. Mainly in the way of that zerg being scared to kill you, because they'll suffer huge penalties and you'll be able to kill them for free in return.

Also, as I wrote here before, AoC's dungeons will be huge. Having just a few parties in them would be an absolute waste of dev time and game space. And making all those dungeons instanced would just create a participation trophy mechanic, because guilds would just immediately fill up those dungeons and would farm them for absolutely free.

Vyril

Stepping on each others toes will be a common occurrence in open world dungeons.

You'll either choose to let them be stepped on, be the ones stepping on toes, or shove them off your feet.

Can't wait!

LeRebelle

Well, it's important to notice that there is not everytime so much players in those dungeons in the videos posted by NiKr.

It's crowded because they know approximatively the respawn of the boss. (Or already spawn)

Ludullu

LeRebelle wrote: »

Well, it's important to notice that there is not everytime so much players in those dungeons in the videos posted by NiKr.

It's crowded because they know approximatively the respawn of the boss. (Or already spawn)

Or at the very least they're just spread over all the rooms of the dungeon instead of being in one place due to pvp fights over boss/access to the dungeon.

Mag7spy

It will be interesting to see the direction they actually will choose to do. I am for open dungeons, but the issue will always be there needs to be enough content for people, else if no content people won't play the game.

So the world needs to be large enough to handle all those people, which I'm sure their developers are working on that and expectations so it will be in line with modern standard when it comes to content.

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