Goblin Squad Member
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From what I have read there will not be a variable dungeon in every Hex. The 'variable' descriptor is talking about the location. When a character comes across one he or she gains an opportunity to 'lock' it somehow, and gather a party to adventure there. Once locked, player characters not in group with the discoverer won't be able to see it. And I believe once his party leaves that dungeon it vanishes to reappear somewhere else for someone else to find.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Hunting creatures for pelt and other products (maybe bones, teeth, venon etc) will be an important part of the game and vital to economy. Hunting is basically PVE activity.
Any gathering opperation is going to attract npc attackers, so we have more PVE content. Even farms could attract creatures as, for example, a chicken farm attractibg foxes, a honney farm attracting bears or a sheep farm attracting wolves.
I see lots of PVE opportunities in the way GW is designing PFO, and still think even who hates PvP can have fun and play PvE content most of time, as we can do in other sandbox MMOs such as EVE.
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Goblin Squad Member
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... and it needs more epic quest lines culminating in a RAID.
I believe this is likely to be how the Escalations play out in their final stages.
I love dungeon runs. I usually play a tank (Paladin) because my wife always needs a tank. There's something very fulfilling about pulling too much and realizing that everyone was focused and on their game and the whole group survives - it's a fantastic feeling.
Raids are okay. I tend to think they too often boil down to "gear checks". Or even worse, they require you to fail at them repeatedly until you discover some minor trick the devs expect you to execute, after which the raid is "easy". In a way, this exposes the scaffolding too much and, for me anyway, is too immersion-breaking to be really fun.
One thing I think could alleviate this a lot is to leave bread crumbs outside of the dungeon in the form of quests that reveal the raid boss's weaknesses. I expect there are a lot of "lone wolf" players who don't really enjoy raids, or even dungeons, who would jump at the chance to help their guild by discovering key pieces of information to help in the raids.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Raids generally suck. They are harder "dungeons" with a one-shot kill mechanic included because most often by the time players get around to the "raid" type adventure they are powerful enough to survive and heal through most all battle damage. That usually leaves the NPC mobs and monsters to have a one-shot mechanic to kill players. Which in turn means the players have to learn a specific trick (stand in a certain spot, have a certain counter spell ready, go thru a secret door, activate a mysterious portal or escape to a separate level, etc...) to avoid the one-shot. These are poorly generated battles between a group of players versus the programmer, not versus the monster.
It would be much more interesting to have an intellectual "raid mechanic" rather than fighting a one-shot monster. The lack of developer originality is pervasive in raids. Instead have really intricate puzzles requiring the group to split up to achieve a goal (splitting the group is a great way to create tension in a large party....always fun); have the monsters attack using guerrilla tactics (fire wands, anti-magic traps, missile weapons); require a skilled lockpicker to enter a door with a puzzlelock the whole group can see but only the lockpicker can disarm; a battle of attrition. Get creative.
Nihimon mentioned dungeons...this may be where PFO can pull off the raid type adventure without them having a large suck factor. If the players' equivalent level stays between 6-10 as Ryan has mentioned in a few interviews, that is the player character "sweet spot", where the adventures are dangerous but still survivable. Not the "Hercules versus the World", or "Odysseus versus the Kraken". Those are silly.
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Goblin Squad Member
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One thing I think would go a long way to making Raids seem more natural is to put Diminishing Returns on heals during combat. Instead of having a Tank that needs to be healed for 70-80% of his total hit points every few seconds, make it impossible to heal any character for more than their total hit points without resting first.
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Raids generally suck. They are harder "dungeons" with a one-shot kill mechanic included because most often by the time players get around to the "raid" type adventure they are powerful enough to survive and heal through most all battle damage. That usually leaves the NPC mobs and monsters to have a one-shot mechanic to kill players. Which in turn means the players have to learn a specific trick (stand in a certain spot, have a certain counter spell ready, go thru a secret door, activate a mysterious portal or escape to a separate level, etc...) to avoid the one-shot. These are poorly generated battles between a group of players versus the programmer, not versus the monster.
It would be much more interesting to have an intellectual "raid mechanic" rather than fighting a one-shot monster. The lack of developer originality is pervasive in raids. Instead have really intricate puzzles requiring the group to split up to achieve a goal (splitting the group is a great way to create tension in a large party....always fun); have the monsters attack using guerrilla tactics (fire wands, anti-magic traps, missile weapons); require a skilled lockpicker to enter a door with a puzzlelock the whole group can see but only the lockpicker can disarm; a battle of attrition. Get creative.
Nihimon mentioned dungeons...this may be where PFO can pull off the raid type adventure without them having a large suck factor. If the players' equivalent level stays between 6-10 as Ryan has mentioned in a few interviews, that is the player character "sweet spot", where the adventures are dangerous but still survivable. Not the "Hercules versus the World", or "Odysseus versus the Kraken". Those are silly.
The boredom factor inherent in most MMOs Raids is what drove me away from all the theme park games. Going into a huge hall that's got knots of mobs standing grouped throughout the hall. Then the players move 2 paces north and 3 west and engage 1 group. Then move 4 paces east and 3 north to take on another group etc.... Thats like watching paint dry. And your reward? The chance to roll on a piece of armor you need to complete yet another set of gear, big woohoo.
I hope the Superdungeon is able to avoid this type of situation. If nothing else hopefully they can randomize the rewards so that its not so predictable.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Pathfinder PnP often finds ways to restrict characters from performing the 'room, rest' cycle of NWN. Why can't PFO put arbitrary restrictions on "You cannot regain refreshes in this area."
There's a lot of details to work out, but making some resources very scarce is an important part of making them valuable. If the cleric has to sit for a few seconds to regain mana and cast Mass Heal again, it has a different meaning than if the cleric cannot use Mass Heal sustainably.
They said that more experienced characters will have access to far less refreshes than beginning characters. They've also said there will be ways to purchase more of them. I'm sure a large part of balancing the game will be deciding how many times people can rest and recuperate their daily abilities.
We just have to trust(and provide feedback when the time comes) GW to get it right.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Balancing PVE content (quests, dungeons) is hard in a themepark but also less important.
Motivation to go into dungeons is different: Gear is crafted by players, not dropped by mobs. You don't need quests to level up. Dungeon bosses may unlock achievements that escalation bosses don't, but there should be little need to re-grind dungeons to get the reward you really wanted.
PVE content that is 'too hard' is not a problem, unless GW enforce instancing magic where the 6th or 21st player to enter the dungeon finds himself alone in a parallel dimension. If a escalation cycle spawns a dragon powerful enough to wipe out a settlement, then you gather the whole kingdom to fight it.
If PVE content is too easy it may be a problem. But then you have the other players.
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Goblin Squad Member
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... and it needs more epic quest lines culminating in a RAID.
My understanding from everything Ryan and the Devs have posted related to such things is that Raids will not be a part of PfO, due to their theme-park gear grabbing connotation. There will be content for large group combat (wars and escalations) but raids are out.
Look at it this way, if WoW did it, PfO won't be, so think sandbox, not theme-park. This game, per Ryan, is targeted at a small niche audience, so most of what is in other MMO's won't be here or heavily modified. Hell, raids would be just to kill things as little loot is dropped by MOBS, other than crafting items and some coins. All gear will be strictly player created except for starter items, at least at first; once crafters are established, even starting gear will likely be crafter made exclusively except for whatever you have stepping out of the character generator. Players will be doing a good 90-95% of all content here, with the rest being Dev created such as dungeons that can randomly pop up in any given hex if it is coded for it (less likely to happen in settled hexes and more likely in wild ones is my guess). Everything you know about MMO's is almost 100% theme-park, and that is not PfO.
So no MOBA, no raids like anything seen in other MMO's, no major theme-park stuff other than the super-dungeon, and that is likely to be coded so that the experience is different for every group that enters it (MOBS likely change rooms and numbers for each group, making encounters truly random) and aside from some coin and crafting items chests, not that much in terms of treasure/loot. So no "gearing up" by running the dungeon over and over again though the coins received could buy better player made gear.
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Goblin Squad Member
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...and it needs more epic quest lines culminating in a RAID.
If you provide raid-Dungeons that is a lot of work and you need to add a new one every few months or else the raiding crowd gets bored.
All classic fantasy MMO games since WoW have tried to establish such a cycle AND FAILED.
So your suggestion is that PFO should do like all these games - fail?
Pathfinder PnP often finds ways to restrict characters from performing the 'room, rest' cycle of NWN. Why can't PFO put arbitrary restrictions on "You cannot regain refreshes in this area."
There's a lot of details to work out, but making some resources very scarce is an important part of making them valuable. If the cleric has to sit for a few seconds to regain mana and cast Mass Heal again, it has a different meaning than if the cleric cannot use Mass Heal sustainably.
Personally, I've always liked the "Recharge Magic" proposal found in Unearthed Arcana.
Removes the necessity of the 15-minute workday, allows spellcasters to always be able to do what they created the character to do (cast spells), and yet provides an even higher resolution of control on spells (so that GMs can limit the use of a specific spell if they wish without limiting anything else)!
Essentially, cooldowns. Which almost all modern MMOs use (including MOBAs...).
I am opposed to the "rest" system seen in DDO because it unfairly limits spellcasters. If there was a Fatigue system implemented in DDO, that would be fair -- but as it is, when spellcasters are the only ones with limited ammo... it makes me not want to play the game at all.
Find a solution that allows players to do the thing they designed their character to do without punishing them for it with boring downtime, disproportionate expenses or tedious mechanics I have to keep track of. I would hope the rest of the party doesn't appreciate having to stand around tapping their foot waiting for the casters to regain spells just because of the decades-old legacy folly of blankety blank blanking Vancian Magic.
Motivation to go into dungeons is different: Gear is crafted by players, not dropped by mobs. You don't need quests to level up. Dungeon bosses may unlock achievements that escalation bosses don't, but there should be little need to re-grind dungeons to get the reward you really wanted.
Can someone clarify for me what my motivation is to enter a dungeon if it isn't loot or xp?
Is that the "achievement" you mentioned? If so, what is that exactly?
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Goblin Squad Member
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To stop the drow from expanding and potentially become so powerful they threaten the local settlements.
To lead the faithful on a religious crusade to crush the tribe of dark gnomes that stole an artifact from your deities temple.
To put an end to the heinous necromancer and his horde of fresh meat.
To clear out the trash and take the dungeon as your own so you can raise your horde of undead minions in peace.
In other words, I hope there could be some roleplaying reasons to enter a dungeon other than loot.
We really have little information on how dungeons will work. I assume that players will want to run through a dungeon for the loot. But what form this loot will take is still unknown.
Personally I would love to see dungeon loot include non-gear based magic items. Not weapons and armor, but misc. magic items like we used to get playing D&D amulets, rings, figurines of wonderous power!
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Goblin Squad Member
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I am an advocate of developers putting things into games and not talking about them, not publishing "How to" manuals, but dropping little hints here and there to keep a little, burning seed of interest in the player base. The solution should be there all along, but it should be very mysterious and obscure so there is a reason to explore new lands, seek new clues in a new area or an ancient dungeon. Have a system that allows, even encourages, creativity (like new recipes in crafting that are totally undiscovered, but attemptable, and with the correct skills sets, achieveable).
Say a dungeon boss drops a little wooden figurine. Earlier you found an adventurer's journal on a corpse, but it didn't mean much at the time. Now the little wooden figurine makes sense, as it was mentioned in the journal. It seems to be some sort of a token, or a good luck charm, but has been written about in some tomes in the library in your dieties temple. Hmmmm. Maybe it has some hidden power.
I love the mysteries. Solving these puzzles is fun, and creates a stir in the public forums as players begin to share data (or even to spread false rumors...hey, YOU want to solve the mystery. Why share your hard earned discoveries with competitors?).
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Goblin Squad Member
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...Can someone clarify for me what my motivation is to enter a dungeon if it isn't loot or xp?...
We asked our audience what they thought, and now, live from our New York (well, Philly) offices we proudly present:
TOP TEN REASONS AUNT TONY SHOULD ENTER THE DUNGEON
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Goblin Squad Member
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...Can someone clarify for me what my motivation is to enter a dungeon if it isn't loot or xp?...We asked our audience what they thought, and now, live from our New York (well, Philly) offices we proudly present:
TOP TEN REASONS AUNT TONY SHOULD ENTER THE DUNGEON
Fun!
Adventure!
Exploration!
The companionship of friends!
Lost spellbook pages!
Hilt of the Sword of Damocles!
Rescuing the Ensorcelled Princess!
To clear that entry in your quest log!
To gather fresh mushrooms!
Because it is THERE!
And Finally... its D&D
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Goblin Squad Member
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Motivation to go into dungeons is different: Gear is crafted by players, not dropped by mobs. You don't need quests to level up. Dungeon bosses may unlock achievements that escalation bosses don't, but there should be little need to re-grind dungeons to get the reward you really wanted.Can someone clarify for me what my motivation is to enter a dungeon if it isn't loot or xp?
Is that the "achievement" you mentioned? If so, what is that exactly?
Riches, power, save the world!!! Fun!!!!! Excitement!!!! Adventure!!!!!
Edit: I forgot: Fame!!!!
To find your €/&£|%@ keys! They must be around here somewhere!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Motivation to go into dungeons is different: Gear is crafted by players, not dropped by mobs. You don't need quests to level up. Dungeon bosses may unlock achievements that escalation bosses don't, but there should be little need to re-grind dungeons to get the reward you really wanted.Can someone clarify for me what my motivation is to enter a dungeon if it isn't loot or xp?
Is that the "achievement" you mentioned? If so, what is that exactly?
My understanding was that gear is crafted by players AND found in dungeons.
From Where the Wild Things Are:
If the final challenge is overcome, the dungeon will be removed after a short interval (giving you time to make several trips to and from the dungeon to haul out the loot within).
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Goblin Squad Member
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My understanding was that gear is crafted by players AND found in dungeons.
From Where the Wild Things Are:
If the final challenge is overcome, the dungeon will be removed after a short interval (giving you time to make several trips to and from the dungeon to haul out the loot within).
my understanding from what ryan's said, is that for the most part gear from monsters etc... is all salvagable and used for parts, most likely not equipable by players or used for that purpose. The need for significant time to carry things out further implies that too me. Dungeon delving reward wise I think, is another form of harvesting, and now with new information it may take propor knowledge skills to know how or what to harvest from the corpses of the creatures you've slain.
...Pallid grey skin and crimson eyes,
How could my dough help but rise?
Alas. I've changed my avatar. Probably more of a hairdo thing than anything.
Riches, power,
Isn't that "loot" and "XP", respectively?
save the world!!!
I'd sincerely hope PFO will continue if I don't raid some dungeons...
Fun!!!!! Excitement!!!! Adventure!!!!!
Is it still "fun" if it's unrewarding? What exactly is "fun"? Excitement and adventure involves risk -- why risk my things if I don't get anything for it? If I do risk my things and then lose them, if dungeons aren't where I must go to replace them... then...?
Edit: I forgot: Fame!!!!
In a game with bounty hunters where you're guaranteed to never be "the biggest fish", fame is something to be avoided...
TOP TEN REASONS AUNT TONY SHOULD ENTER THE DUNGEON
Fun!
Adventure!
Exploration!
The companionship of friends!
Lost spellbook pages!
Hilt of the Sword of Damocles!
Rescuing the Ensorcelled Princess!
To clear that entry in your quest log!
To gather fresh mushrooms!
Because it is THERE!
In order:
1. What's fun without reward?
2. Why risk adventure without possible reward?
3. As an artist, new experiences can be nice. But aren't guaranteed to be.
4. Friends only exist in dungeons?
5. Magic is ++good, but probably falls under the category of "loot"
6. Sword chunks are also loot.
7. Make her a prince and I might consider it.
8. Quest Logs are burned upon acquisition.
9. I like a good soup, but ... is it "loot"?
10. So is North Korea...
My understanding was that gear is crafted by players AND found in dungeons.
From Where the Wild Things Are:
If the final challenge is overcome, the dungeon will be removed after a short interval (giving you time to make several trips to and from the dungeon to haul out the loot within).
Hmmmm... What did randomwalker mean?
To find your €/&£|%@ keys! They must be around here somewhere!
So help me, if that $&*%^@$ halfling took them again, I'll stuff him so far up his mama, he won't know which way is down!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Group Oriented Content.... Why limit it (ourselves) to dungeons and raids?
Game World Altering Public Works Projects:
1. Community construction projects (bridges, tunnels, damns, etc)
Not something that is owned by any one settlement, but somehting that is useful to all on the server (if there are servers) as a whole.
2. Massive Monuments to the Gods; to the Devs; or to Nihimon and / or Being for being (no pun intended) the forum sages.
Later on these could become points of contention, and fought to have them within a settlement's controlled hexes (Kind of like NY and NJ fighting over the Staute of Liberty).
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Goblin Squad Member
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Is it still "fun" if it's unrewarding? What exactly is "fun"? Excitement and adventure involves risk -- why risk my things if I don't get anything for it? If I do risk my things and then lose them, if dungeons aren't where I must go to replace them... then...?
I take it you are in the game strictly for the loot, and not for roleplay. At least that is what you are telling us from your response. That's okay, but having fun is....well, a lot like having a good time. Loot isn't everything. If you have a good conversation with someone that is a form of loot. If you go into a "dungeon" and overcome some challenges, that is fun, even if there isn't any decent loot.
Get out of the house once in a while and experience the world. You won't get much loot, but you might have some fun!
Is it still "fun" if it's unrewarding? What exactly is "fun"? Excitement and adventure involves risk -- why risk my things if I don't get anything for it? If I do risk my things and then lose them, if dungeons aren't where I must go to replace them... then...?
I take it you are in the game strictly for the loot, and not for roleplay. At least that is what you are telling us from your response. That's okay, but having fun is....well, a lot like having a good time. Loot isn't everything. If you have a good conversation with someone that is a form of loot. If you go into a "dungeon" and overcome some challenges, that is fun, even if there isn't any decent loot.
Get out of the house once in a while and experience the world. You won't get much loot, but you might have some fun!
Why bother with PFO when Skype has been around since forever?
Getting out and experiencing the world is seldom conducive to playing MMOs. Like PFO. I'm not sure you're doing them any favors. =P
Eyes like charcoal, hair like snakes,
Really warms my butter cakes
Tiny eyes, sweaty face,
Build of a brick fireplace.|
Goblin Squad Member
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1. What's fun without reward?
I fear your inner child is wandering lost on a barren, windswept plain in the dark, weeping. Fun is not mercenary avarice. Play is not work-like business.
2. Why risk adventure without possible reward?
For the adventure and not for the 'reward', of course. Monomaniacle subservience to the god of acquisition is similar to the myth of Tantalus. The journey is different from the destination. If most of your time is spent on the journey, why not allow yourself to enjoy travelling instead of merely ignoring it's own merits?
3. As an artist, new experiences can be nice. But aren't guaranteed to be.
If you need a guarantee to venture a gamble you forego surprises, including the nice ones.
4. Friends only exist in dungeons?
Friends -in-need are friends indeed, but found only where there is need. Dungeons teach constructive interdependence.
5. Magic is ++good, but probably falls under the category of "loot"
They are spellbook components wizards can craft.
6. Sword chunks are also loot.
Sword chunks are swordcrafting components.
7. Make her a prince and I might consider it.
Okay, she is a handsome, sensitive, and articulate prince.
8. Quest Logs are burned upon acquisition.
Those involving dungeons may be of superior timbre.
9. I like a good soup, but ... is it "loot"?
Mushrooms may be components for make-believe beneficial potions.
10. So is North Korea...
Perhaps Dennis Rodman was on a quest? At least he appears to have found a boss mob.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Dungeoneering shouldn't be obligatory, but optional. If rare crafting components are the items of significant value in the game, how can it be that those components are not treasure? And if such rare crafting components spawn in the loot of a dungeon's most challenging inhabitents, then the reward of dungeoneering should obtain.
1. What's fun without reward?I fear your inner child is wandering lost on a barren, windswept plain in the dark, weeping. Fun is not mercenary avarice. Play is not work-like business.
Not all that glitters is gold. Not all rewards clink and jingle.
But my inner child finds play most satisfying when it's rewarding...
If you need a guarantee to venture a gamble you forego surprises, including the nice ones.
Provably untrue.
Friends -in-need are friends indeed, but found only where there is need. Dungeons teach constructive interdependence.
Or resilient independence.
Okay, she is a handsome, sensitive, and articulate prince.
Ha. "And look! You're here, too."
Mushrooms may be components for make-believe beneficial potions.
Surely it's guaranteed there will Potion crafting...
Perhaps Dennis Rodman was on a quest? At least he appears to have found a boss mob.
More of a mob boss.
You don't have to go into the dungeon yourself; that's what coin and friends are for.
I like the way you think. I wonder where I can buy some quality disposable friends?
Please, don't encourage him.
Hood like Night,
What a fright!Now I've lost
My Appetite.
Those butter cakes
And rising dough
Sure are pretty tempting, though...
It would be REALLY clever if you switched to a limerick form... for the holiday, you know?
What holiday? And limerick could get dirty fast.
Uncle Tony is fat and sweaty.
When we get into bed he's ready
To turn out the light
And bed down for the night,
So I go see my friend Uncle Freddy.
But seriously, it's been shown that when you pay people to do things, their enjoyment and desire to do them when not paid goes away. When tasks can only be enjoyed by the reward at the end then they really aren't enjoyed at all. If I'm doing a task only for virtual dollars it soon makes me think 'why not do something I else that gives me real dollars instead? or something that I actually like doing?'.
The theory is that you should enjoy "doing" PFO. I think what I'm really getting at is: without the reward, what proof have you that you've even done anything in the first place?
There's something philosophical in there about life and finding meaning in it...
Aunt Tony went to a dungeon and all I got was this lousy t-shirt!
Yeah, me too. Shoulda got something more useful.
Like a coffee mug.
Strike that, I meant to say "Ring of Invisibility"...
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The theory is that you should enjoy "doing" PFO. I think what I'm really getting at is: without the reward, what proof have you that you've even done anything in the first place?
There's something philosophical in there about life and finding meaning in it...
In PFO many actions leave a real mark on the game world. Like say you gathered the material and initiated the upgrade to your settlements metalworking facility from level 2 to level 3. That's a physical change you effected in the game world.
Where as in games like Wow, you could spend 10 hours raiding some instance, and unless you won the roll for those clunky bird cage shoulder pieces, you may as well have spent those 10 hours standing around IF with all the other superLeet players for all the impact on the game world you had.
The theory is that you should enjoy "doing" PFO. I think what I'm really getting at is: without the reward, what proof have you that you've even done anything in the first place?
There's something philosophical in there about life and finding meaning in it...
In PFO many actions leave a real mark on the game world. Like say you gathered the material and initiated the upgrade to your settlements metalworking facility from level 2 to level 3. That's a physical change you effected in the game world.
Where as in games like Wow, you could spend 10 hours raiding some instance, and unless you won the roll for those clunky bird cage shoulder pieces, you may as well have spent those 10 hours standing around IF with all the other superLeet players for all the impact on the game world you had.
There's a gradient.
At one end of the scale, I can advance my character indefinitely, gaining power, designing and fortifying my abode/lair/fortress, then attaining lichdom and finally apotheosis... Vecna transformed a world fairly utterly and completely.
At the other is WoW.
What if the spot on the scale PFO occupies is too far toward WoW and actually very little you do leaves a mark on the world? I can't carve my face into the cliff/moon, surely. I can't dig a hole just any ole place. I can't build a house/dungeon/stronghold/metalworking facility just any old place either. I suppose in this respect, it's a matter of freedom. If you're gonna have such open 24/7 PvP, it seems a little arbitrary to worry about how to best implement a nannybot to restrict players' options.
Can I be the architect of my blacksmithy? Can I decide what color, pattern and type of shingle is on my cottage? Can I paint with all the colors of the wind.
Can I design and wear my own costume, jewelry, shoes... What if I want to just model and texture a willow to droop romantically over a pond in my front yard? I think PFO's playerbase is too-easily impressed. No matter what GW does with PFO, it won't even be a toe in the water of a truly malleable world.
So until I can engage in the sorts of non-power-gamey activities I want, then I'm gonna be playing PFO for the loot and xp. There will be precious little else, no matter how many time you rank up your pre-fab blacksmith or garrison walls.
Well until we know for sure what our limitations will and won't be, we can't, or shouldn't, make arbitrary judgements on what is and isn't possible.
I do however share many of your concerns and wonder if PFO will be as sandboxy as its billed. PFO isn't Populous, so digging holes and shaping trees, I'm fairly sure, won't be possible. But the rest of what you mention are things you would expect to see in a sandbox world. I wonder if we will see them?
I'm willing to remain hopeful until release and the announcements of their long term goals and plans. We've got a long time between now and then, a lot can happen.
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Goblin Squad Member
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My understanding was that gear is crafted by players AND found in dungeons.
I don't think so.
From Goblinworks Blog: If I Had a Hammer:
We don't intend for usable items to be dropped by anything as loot from the system. You get them by crafting them, buying them, or looting dead PCs.
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Goblin Squad Member
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About the "nannybot":
EvE is a prime example why such a system is needed.
When EvE launched in Europe it initially captured few players, which was good! These players struggled with the game because it ws deep and complex and no walkthrough were available. The PvP aspect of the game was played down.
After that the community grew steadily and EvE became a success.
When the same EvE launched in Asia it was a horrible "everyone for himself" PvP gankfest galore and thus failed.
It was the same game, why did it succeed and fail at the same time?
Well, EvE hat no nannybot at all and no Dungeons. It was totally up to the players and EvE profited in Europe from being pretty much unknown with a small but dedicated community at first. PFO will have a greater community at start but witht his comes also a greater risk.
To be honest EvEs success is true in part of they being "lucky" to have attracted a fine community at the start - if they had launched like in Asia the game would probably be dead and forgotten by now!