Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
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Alpha Two Phase II testing is currently taking place five days each week. More information about testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
And considering that we will most likely miss some content while leveling (due to how nodes will work) - having high lvl content together with lowbie stuff could lead to higher cross-lvl player engagement, with both sides benefiting.
And it would also mean that high lvl players would have a bigger reason to siege nodes (as I mentioned in my og comment here).
This would also resolve Noaani's problem of "I don't want to do the same shit for a long time", because you'd be doing new content.
AND this would not "waste" devtime, because all content would sooner or later be experienced by all players, regardless of player progress.
AND AND this would allow devs to make new lowbie content w/o fearing that old players won't experience it. Which would be a much better pull for new players, and would connect them with oldschoolers faster.
It wouldn't' really be engaging you just would be one shotting the dungeon and clearing it quickly as a over padded high level /stat character. Its important to mention the time frame i said after the fact which is like 1.5-2.5 years. A major expansion should see a lot more content added and changes to the game. Some of those changes could re reworking different areas reducing the amount of low end content and adding more high end content, and anything else you can imagine.
To be clear I'm like talking about whole new content added and such not just a few pieces of content added as the latter would just be a smaller update and not really like an expansion. It really shouldn't be added lowbie content it should be all max level + content. With the older content leveling process sped up and replaced with higher level content changing and introducing new dangers and such.
I'm simply, once again, asking Intrepid to be better than their predecessors and make a game that's better than the stuff others made. Raise the standards of the genre.
That said, other aspects can be largely done this way as well. Commissions absolutely can be (and almost definately will be) procedurally generated. I mean, the basic description we have of them is that they are system-generated. I don't see any world where these are hand crafted.
Quests with story lines are a little different. I don't see any quests being restricted to one specific node - that simply can't happen in a game like Ashes. With 85 nodes, in order for players to have just one quest per level, that would mean Intrepid need to create 4,250 quests. Simply not going to happen - that is as many quests as EverQUEST had 10 years after launch - and a good number of those quests were simple fetch quests.
So no, the notion of quests being unique to a node simply isn't viable.
What is viable, however, is creating a basic quest that has variables for NPC's and base population mobs, then have pre-set locations in the world for things like specific quest mob spawns. Then, when a node levels up, the game can select from a list of quests, fill in the blanks, and then have a quest that stays as is until the next node state change that affects it. It would even be possible to assign these quests a level, so the same quest could be assigned at level 20, or at level 45, and in both cases it asks the player to do level appropriate things, and rewards level appropriate rewards.
That way, instead of having to craft 4,250 quests in order for players to have one quest per level, they could craft 50 quests and players have one quest per level - and those quests would be different from different nodes.
It is worth keeping in mind that Intrepid don't plan on Ashes having the detailed storytelling that some other MMO's have - they want the story of Ashes to be the story of players. As such, the writing for quests can involve a lot less detail.
I expect them to hand edit afterwards - but it still needs to be procedurally generated (or some other form of automated generation).
Again, if they hand populate the world, that means they are doing it dozens of times, as node state (potentially including parent nodes) as well as racial influence all play a part in the local population.
You can not hand populate a game with that amount of variation - it just wouldn't be possible on a commercial product.
When a new player joins the game long enough after release that there has been a significant jump in the level cap, their primary goal is to get to that level cap where everyone is playing, so that they can join in.
They are not interested in playing through all the content that people played through at launch - it is the existing population that thinks this is what they should do.
So yes, content should become obsolete.
In a game where you level up to 50 and then run dungeons and raids, when the level cap is increase to level 60, new players shouldn't have to stop at 50 to run dungeons and raids. To them, level 50 is what level 40 was to players at release, 10 levels short of where they want to be.
That isn't to say that old content should be removed from the game - it shouldn't. It should be left in so that players can go back to it for fun if they like, or so that a guild can show players that missed it what it used to be like - but it should be obsolete in terms of it simply doesn't need to be run.
uhhh actually lost for words on this one. Sudden people have have maxed out kits and max knowledge on the game won't be one shotting lower level mobs and the game magically accounts for it in non instanced content?
Think we are drifting away from actual reality here. Its like saying I want people in life to do better and start using magic suddenly. I could go into detail on why this wouldn't work but I don't see much point in doing a page explaining all the issues + griefing + other things.
That is an oversimplified example, which most definitely has design holes in it, but it's there to explain my point. In a better design those high lvl mobs would be tied to lowbie quests, so lowbies might be required to get a high lvl player to join them in order to complete the quest, and the highbie gets their own reward (and new content) out of it. Etc etc
This makes it harder to abuse lowbies as a highbie, because there'll always be mobs around that aggro onto you. This promotes cross-lvl interactions, so that newbies don't feel like the world is dead at low lvls and also so that the game doesn't turn into a solo player mmo all the way up to max lvl, simply because there's no other newbies around.
This is, supposedly, already kinda planned, because every dungeon in the game should, in theory, have the potential to be max lvl and have max lvl content. I'm just asking that the game has cross-lvl quest hooks that temporarily spawn high lvl content. This would also not be completely against the game rules, cause low lvl nodes will always be in a metro's zoi, so spawning a high lvl mob (while not always having it there) is not out of the question.
Obviously there's the buffer zone nodes, but not having high lvl content there could be its own feature. The lawless lands in-between that push people towards metro ZOIs and citizenships. Hell, have a whole trigger setup where, if the nope is in the buffer zone - it has some special quests/content.
Again, Nodes are the biggest and most unique system in Ashes (or is at least presented as such), so I want Intrepid to use it to the fullest extent. And I believe there's already some groundwork done towards that goal.
I see it as a time gate. In most games it is a way to slow progression so that content lasts a little longer. I think character levels are an archaic system that made sense in the beginning of mmorpgs but should give way to better systems today. I would like to see an actual skill based progression. Characters advance based on what they actually do.
WoW as an example, in my opinion, should not have level based progression system and instead have a story based progression system that introduced new skills and items that then lead to "end game" as they know it there.
Not really a fan of this and I prefer what they are actually doing where deeper parts of a dungeon has higher level mobs. At this point you may as well advertise that mobs scale and there is no levels. If a lvl 30 a lvl 40 a lvl50 all walk in you are suddenly making the whole encounter messy with all these random level mobs. All with different mechanics meant for players with different tools. And sudden for some reason they don't attack now yet places int he dungeon is being taken up causing less loot to encounter. I'm not going to base it off empty dungeons because that be a sign of a dead game.
Again they plan to have nodes be hubs and dungeons have higher level mobs deep[er within them not mixing up within mobs for a low level player to aoe aggro and create a bad pve experience.
I don't feel this is really making nodes better but the overall experience worse.
This is also getting away from my original point and becoming a node conversation over content expansion.
Which expansion should be building upon what people have done and giving them more content so they have reasons to keep playing. Not creating a bunch of content they gain nothing from with a big context expansion. Which effectively would be a lowbie context expansion is as backwards as you can get.
Push the bar forward and give everyone a reason to progress equally and not gear check content. While elevating the weaker people or people that were not level 50 more quickly towards that point. A bunch of new content added, but also the older content updated with less lower end stuff and the land mass used to create more higher level content.
Here's a question for you. If after a year you finally get a friend to play with you. You're max lvl, they're obviously lvl1. Would you prefer to play with them on your main char or would you prefer having a requirement to make an alt?
Because I'd personally prefer a game where I can play my main, get new content AND play with my newbie friend - all at the same time. Again, that example was the most basic representation of my idea, and I'd prefer a much better implementation, but that implementation would take way longer to properly explain.
And this directly relates to expansion and lvl growth. If the game gets lvl growth in expansions - much more content needs to be added at the top, while all the lower lvl content will have to be cleared way faster (as others pointed out and explained already). And for any newcomers that don't come in right on the expansion release - the game will be a solo experience (and the design would have to account for that as well), which makes the overall game shit imo.
It depends on this player that is a friend if they are casual Ill use a alt, if they are like me ill use my main and power level them.
So you are talking about a general issue with mmorpgs when you are a new player and most people are a higher level. That to me is another separate issue to talk about. Creating more low end dungeons also does not solve that issue but makes it more difficult and people are even more spread out. You want to have less stuff around and condense them so they more easily find groups and such. Based on how they plan to do nodes towns won' be empty either so plenty of people will be around.
If there is less dungeons around people condense where they need to be to do those types of content. On top of what i said about the expansion you don't just add new content you change current content as well giving high levels a reason to go back to older content with new challenges / levels with mobs in deeper parts of those dungeons or whole dungeons.
And to me proper expansion design plans address this, which is why for me this is not a separate issue. Especially when talking about raising max lvl with those expansions.
Changing what mobs in the dungeon is not the same as different sections of the dungeon having higher level mobs. You are also suggesting lower levels should need to get a high level which also doesn't make a lot of sense as general content. At that point its just finding a high level dps and that dps on shots all the weak mobs. Not exactly challenging / engaging content to me that just sounds like a power level.
Seeing as WoW handled most Issues in either the wrong or the worst Way, (no Hate),
i too hope Ashes will tackle certain Issues more flexible. I mean, it totally "has" the better Developers. Those who actually care immensely for their ingame World and Game - and not just Money.
✓ Occasional Roleplayer
✓ Maybe i look after a Guild sometime soon
And if those quests are tied to guilds (or maybe even guild-based by default), then we have an even better way of streamlining the process.
This is not the leveling speed thread?
And yes people should level faster to catch up with the new point being lvl 50-55 or 50-60 or whatever it would be. I've already made points on concentering lower end content and opening older areas to be new high end areas.
Again we are talking about a major expansion where people have cleared most the content not a small update and not months after release..
They can only have my ideas if Steven allows me to name my Goblin pet skin "Martin Looter"
But I am glad to see you like the idea. Seeing how Intrepid would want to keep the world changing, the principle of rewarding players with different buffs they can collect from "expansion territories" would greatly support that by incentivizing new players & characters to move around and collect those buffs. Heck, if we end up with too many of them it might even make sense to limit the number of buffs you can slot to three at a time so that new players or characters don't feel like they have to make a giant world tour to match older players strength.
what is?
Since Ashes has a design style that can pivot to Level Sync and Level Capped content fairly easily, I've changed my perspective to 'Total Support'.
"For what...?"
"Just about everything, really."
Those require new map areas where such skills can be applied.
And other skills blur the line between classes or gear. They end up having long swords which act as ranged weapons and classes not having a clear role.
A one time level cap increase in an expansion is not so bad. We will have it anyway during Alpha 2.
Leveling is for those who want progression. In AoC character leveling is the least important aspect because power will come also from nodes, guilds, (repaired) gear, consumables... Crafting progression will depend on what the metropolises will build and if each metropolis will make the same choices, players on that map will have no way to become masters in certain professions. Nodes will fall to make room for new nodes with new content.
Expansions can bring story and transform the terrain without need to add more space to the world.
But 10 levels in one expansion will not cause a big problem.
I believe only when I see it.
This is kind of my point.
If ever there was a game designed to be able to easily add new character levels, it's Ashes.
I understand that people who have never tried alternate ways to progress like outlined in the OP might be hesitant. And people also like to see numbers go up. But all that is still possible with a mastery/master level/champion/prestige system. You still get the long-term progress and numbers going up and ability to work up towards more challenging content. What you avoid is that almost complete progress reset we normally see with a level cap increase, because all your nice gear is still relevant. At least if the alternate progress system is implemented well.
As for level scaling and level sync, it seems like they don't want to do it like we know from other games. But they are going to implement a mentor program: https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Mentor_program
I am a little unsure exactly how that will work, just from the description we have now.
IMO the Node system is managing content access and therefore creates "a new meta" (although it is not the only factor influencing that) as the Nodes change. It does not enterly reset character power.
And while there was an interview where Steven mentioned increasing the level cap, it wasn't a certain thing at the time nor has it become confirmed or denied ever since. Furthermore in the same interview it has been said that Ashes will receive content updates, I personally cannot remember them ever saying that there won't be expansions either.
And to expand the game makes sense as content is finite and might at some point be fully explored. Sure you may cycle through it slower as Nodes falling and rising takes time, but at some point you have seen "everything", so expanding makes sense for Ashes as much as any other MMORPG. Why would Ashes not expand the content at some point, add new realms or add new quest lines in the story arc systems or make new events? Expansion does not necessarily mean "whole new region" it can just as much be new variety in "old" regions, e.g. an expansion of the Node system at some point could be implemented, that allowed for Tier 7 Nodes and/or for independent Nodes, for new armor sets or a new encounters for the same dungeon depending on new factors.
Suffice to say: Ashes having expansions makes sense, as much as in any other game.
That is the point you will be at the same power, meaning the new content will be equal for both players to experience.
You fear reeks of not wanting to worry about needing to progress anymore in a mmorpg or thinking you should be able to grind infinite power without cap or loss ever...
Not a fan of any kind of suggestion where one tries to say infinite play time can mean infinite strength and that is how one can beat someone.
That's not how those other systems work. You've clearly never tried them so it's fair that you don't know, but it's not about infinite power given infinite time. That's obviously silly and bad design. It's about not shitting on the players that have put in the time, and providing a better and more gradual progression over time. New players can still catch up, but it won't leave older players with that feeling of it all being worthless every time the level cap increases.