KnightErrantJR |
Disclaimer: I'm probably not the best person to be discussing this. I've kind of moved on from Pathfinder. If anyone cares about the reasons, or wishes to put things in context, I've called it out here, but I do still play in my friend's Pathfinder campaign:
Add to that the assumption that more books than the core are needed to run an adventure path, that high level adventures have encounters that seem like they will be really important, but the bad guy has some really bad flaw like a low will save that will sink the encounter in one round, and the fact that Pathfinder Society seemed like there were almost daily rules rewrites, and that rules questions were answered with “can't you figure that out, you are a GM,” and “We could answer, but we want to think really hard about the answer before we answer that question, and that could take a while because we are busy writing new rules,” as if the rules hadn't been playtested to begin with.
Killed my enthusiasm quite a bit.
Anyway, here is my take on MMORPG concept, and people wanting to have a world simulator. I've been in this boat a few times. I've even been on the side of making things super detailed and deliberate before to simulate living in a given world.
I wanted that in Star Wars Galaxies and I even wanted it, to a lesser degree, in DC Universe Online. Star Wars Galaxies probably did it more effectively than any other MMORPG I've played, and when I got what I asked for, I hated it. Turns that that, while I wanted to live the Star Wars universe, the reason I wanted to live in the Star Wars universe was that people jumped around having lightsaber battles and flying starships and getting into dogfights and fire fights.
Spending hours in a cantina watching dancers to rebuild some status bar that I'm sure why I need to rebuild, or working hours upon hours to build a halfway decent blaster or a hovel to live in oddly didn't quite match up with defending Echo base from AT-ATs or blowing up the Death Star.
Despite this lesson, I fell into this mindset again when I was playtesting DC Universe Online. I was very put out that my character had to have equipment to boost his stats. Sure some heroes need that kind of stuff, but I wanted to play a magical blasting sorcerer, and one that didn't need upgraded gauntlets or boots or belts or what have you.
I've recently gone back to playing DCUO now that its free to play, and honestly, it plays fast and combat is like comic book fights, which is what they should be like. It's appropriate for the genre, and the upgraded equipment tends to “run in the background” and give you a more immediate reward than just XP awards would grant. I'm not saying it's perfect, but it is a better handle on the superhero genre than I originally gave it credit for, because I wanted it, when I was playtesting, to be a DC Universe world simulator, except that isn't really what I wanted. I wanted to feel like my character was doing what I read characters in the comics doing.
What I'm saying is not that there should be no changes to the MMORPG paradigm, but what I am saying is that “make it more real” and “make really fiddly time consuming sub-systems” isn't really innovative. It's been done before, and while I know some people loved Star Wars Galxies, for example, it never really got the penetration that the property should have generated.
I think it's probably best to, instead of trying to imagine you are living in Golarion, try to picture how to capture the feel of what the inspiration material is. Look at Kingmaker, think about what works, and try to figure out how to capture that in a MMORPG. Once you get the feel of the game right, everything else is a matter of tweaks, bumping the investment to reward ratio.
I'll drop back into lurker mode now, but everyone have fun and play nice.
Scott Betts Goblin Squad Member |
Star Wars Galaxies probably did it more effectively than any other MMORPG I've played, and when I got what I asked for, I hated it. Turns that that, while I wanted to live the Star Wars universe, the reason I wanted to live in the Star Wars universe was that people jumped around having lightsaber battles and flying starships and getting into dogfights and fire fights.
Bingo.
Now if only people could come to this realization without having to get what they asked for first.
Sean Byram |
I'm on the side of gritty realism, and I've gotten what I wanted before. I liked it. Shores of Hazeron is an excellent game. My problem with it is that it puts you in charge of an empire to start with, and leaves much to be desired graphically. Wandering the countryside slaying monsters isn't much in it, but then again, it's sci-fi. It's basically 3d, MMO, first person, sci-fi Dwarf Fortress. And it's okay, for me. Which is saying a lot considering that I can't stand most MMOs.
On the other hand, I'm not a one-game guy. I don't require specific parameters to be met to necessarily enjoy a game. Everything I've heard about this game from the devs tells me I will love the game.
deinol Goblin Squad Member |
I would love to play a Dwarf Fortress MMO. Too bad me and the other 50 people who would love that aren't a big enough target market for a large studio to finance the development of that game.
For some reason I find the WoW style controls to be awkward, which is probably my biggest complaint about SWTOR. Which is a fine game otherwise. I found Diablo III's controls much more intuitive to start using though.
Coldman Goblin Squad Member |
There is a difference between realism for the sake of a time sink, and realism for the sake of authenticity.
SWG was a sandbox. You did not have to spend hours crafting a blaster. SWG had a very effective economy and functional craft system of any game, arguably still surpassing Eve Online. You had a large avenue of options in how you acquired your blaster.
You prefer blowing up death stars, that is your preference. Some never fired a blaster in their lives but enjoyed the same space that you did. You both relied upon eachother and fed eachothers experiences. Modern games have such an emphasis on playing to the action heroes that social aspects of MMORPGs and non combatant roles are obliterated. Such roles RELY on reliance(?). I never had any trouble using dancers in cantinas (that sounds rude), or acquiring gear from crafters and that stretches out into my other sandbox experiences too. I enjoy playing both instant thrill roles, and social roles; the latter requires a certain amount of difficulty in specific tasks, equal to what you'd expect to be made difficult in regards to 'killing things'. Your simply arguing that this aspect of sandbox games should be dumbed down for your own benefit. You can happily argue this point but it can never be accepted as a truth as we simply differ. I want nothing more than a game which allows such playstyles to co-exist.
If you need an example of an unorganic system where one playstyle is catered to and the other ignored: World of Warcraft. You rely on nobody. The world is not an organic system, the players do not function as the circulatory system. Perhaps they once might have when the game was difficult and required an able guild, but this was still a micro-organism than that of anything substantial to the game world.
Thriving communities are what have kept older games running to this day despite total neglect from their developers; they don't age the way content does. For this area of the game we need crafting, politics, roleplay, in depth trade skills such as fishing or alchemy. We need players to demand these commodities from us and we need it to be difficult, interesting and time consuming. Whether or not you like it being there is a null point; it shouldn't influence you. Kill things, make gold, give it to me and I'll give you what you need.
There are doubtless arguments on this topic within this forum and there will be many more. The point is that both playstyles should be catered for, but not at the expense of eachother. Skills regarded as specifically craft or social skills should be the emphasis, gameplay elements which appeal to one and not the other and not to dumb the game down for the socialites, or bore the eyeballs off of the action heroes.
KnightErrantJR |
There is a difference between realism for the sake of a time sink, and realism for the sake of authenticity.
SWG was a sandbox. You did not have to spend hours crafting a blaster. SWG had a very effective economy and functional craft system of any game, arguably still surpassing Eve Online. You had a large avenue of options in how you acquired your blaster.
You prefer blowing up death stars, that is your preference. Some never fired a blaster in their lives but enjoyed the same space that you did. You both relied upon eachother and fed eachothers experiences. Modern games have such an emphasis on playing to the action heroes that social aspects of MMORPGs and non combatant roles are obliterated. Such roles RELY on reliance(?). I never had any trouble using dancers in cantinas (that sounds rude), or acquiring gear from crafters and that stretches out into my other sandbox experiences too. I enjoy playing both instant thrill roles, and social roles; the latter requires a certain amount of difficulty in specific tasks, equal to what you'd expect to be made difficult in regards to 'killing things'. Your simply arguing that this aspect of sandbox games should be dumbed down for your own benefit. You can happily argue this point but it can never be accepted as a truth as we simply differ. I want nothing more than a game which allows such playstyles to co-exist.
If you need an example of an unorganic system where one playstyle is catered to and the other ignored: World of Warcraft. You rely on nobody. The world is not an organic system, the players do not function as the circulatory system. Perhaps they once might have when the game was difficult and required an able guild, but this was still a micro-organism than that of anything substantial to the game world.
Thriving communities are what have kept older games running to this day despite total neglect from their developers; they don't age the way content does. For this area of the game we need crafting, politics, roleplay, in depth trade skills such as...
My point, regarding Star Wars Galaxies, is that if someone comes to the game because they are a Star Wars fan, which seems to be the point, then they get to the game and find out that a large portion of the game is about playing Uncle Owen, it might be disappointing. Yes, you could choose your focus, but that didn't stop the first mission my Twi'lek scout was assigned from being to kill Corellian butterflies so that so guy could use them for something . . . and they still kicked my ass.
You may not go into a Star Wars game thinking you are going to be Luke, but you sure as hell at least want to be Wedge.
That doesn't mean that a certain percentage of players liked the persistent world elements of Star Wars Galaxies, but it never became the big guns MMO that it could have because a lot of Star Wars fans, when they saw the intensive complexity of the game, and didn't see a lot of swashbuckling space opera, didn't want to give it a whirl.
What I am saying, regarding Pathfinder Online is, if this is inspired by how well Kingmaker went over, look at how Kingmaker did it, and figure out how to translate that into a long term MMO instead of a pen and paper version of the campaign.
Kingmaker actually goes quite the opposite route than ultra-realism at times, because building phases and resource gathering/management is done fairly abstractly. I agree, cater to more than one playstyle, because Kingmaker allowed for players to roam around killing monsters, micromanaging the building of a Kingdom, and playing political games.
However, what I'm seeing in a lot of places is "don't make this like WoW because I don't like WoW," and "I've always wanted to live in Golarion, so make me a fantasy world simulator," and I don't think those goals are exactly what the game should be about. Heck, some people actually like Pathfinder and WoW, so perhaps the game shouldn't totally alienate them.
Doesn't mean the game should be a clone of WoW, just that having a guiding principle of "make is as un WoW like as possible" might be counter productive.
Coldman Goblin Squad Member |
You are right and this is a good post. The only thing I should say is that the polar opposition you hear about WoW from some, exists because WoW represents a whole new sub genre of MMORPGs which is popularly killing all others. The role of the non combatant or socialite has become obsolete. Look at WoW in its current carnation, look at SWTOR; the popular future of MMORPG games has become the natural progression of single player or multiplayer RPG games to the MMORPG platform. Great.
I don't play singleplayer or multiplayer RPGs :( I come to MMORPGs for the people and for every positive experience that we can create. If I wanted to kill monsters endlessly or slaughter bosses then I wouldn't do it in the poor fashion which MMORPG games deliver their content as opposed to Skyrim or offline RPGs. That's just my personal opinion.
Forgive me for getting my rant on but I hope you can see my point. There is not an MMORPG anymore which caters to the playstyles to which the original genre strongly encouraged. If I can't get a strong viability for a non combatant or social character from a MMORPG inspired by my favourite TTRPG then I'm going to...well keep playing Pathfinder (and probably cry).
LibraryRPGamer |
You are right and this is a good post. The only thing I should say is that the polar opposition you hear about WoW from some, exists because WoW represents a whole new sub genre of MMORPGs which is popularly killing all others. The role of the non combatant or socialite has become obsolete. Look at WoW in its current carnation, look at SWTOR; the popular future of MMORPG games has become the natural progression of single player or multiplayer RPG games to the MMORPG platform. Great.
I don't play singleplayer or multiplayer RPGs :( I come to MMORPGs for the people and for every positive experience that we can create. If I wanted to kill monsters endlessly or slaughter bosses then I wouldn't do it in the poor fashion which MMORPG games deliver their content as opposed to Skyrim or offline RPGs. That's just my personal opinion.
Forgive me for getting my rant on but I hope you can see my point. There is not an MMORPG anymore which caters to the playstyles to which the original genre strongly encouraged. If I can't get a strong viability for a non combatant or social character from a MMORPG inspired by my favourite TTRPG then I'm going to...well keep playing Pathfinder (and probably cry).
I completely agree with you Coldman. This may be corny, but my idea of an MMORPG is basically the "World" represented in the anime .Hack//Sign - where there are merchant guilds that and old smart dudes on bridges. But ALL of them are players! I have yet to see that in any MMO I have played. Does that kind of emersion in any MMO exist?
Mark Kalmes Goblin Squad Member |
Derek Vande Brake |
KnightErrantJR wrote:Spending hours in a cantina watching dancers to rebuild some status bar that I'm sure why I need to rebuild..Hahaha - I couldn't stand watching naked wookies to repair my psyche - seems like that should have the opposite effect.
Oh, God. The mental image just scarred me.