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First off, this game does seem to have promise. Sort of an expanded Eve in fantasy, with "boots on the ground" too. I like good PvP and have been looking for meaningful play in that regard, which this game seems to have a good grasp of. But on to my questions.
One of the things I always consider is the power gaps in "levels" of characters, since I don't think you can have a real good Sandbox if they are extreme (which is subjective). What I worry about here is the special attacks a character learns. Is that the primary way power gaps occur? And how is it, compared to the typical Themepark design?
How do you zone between hexes? Does it feel like not "zoning", in a gamey way?
How extensive will the PvE and lore game play be? I know it's early, I'm looking for the concept more than what's in at this point. And related to that, is the plan to have antagonists of old lore come back to destroy the world and that sort of thing? Will there be mystery and discovery involved?
One of the things I would love to be a part of is a grand depository of knowledge. A library/research center with members that seek out such things and documents them, seeks artifacts, and the like. Is that viable in this game?
I've done some reading, have lots more to do. I was hoping I could get some insight at this point and thanks.
Goblin Squad Member
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- Ryan's said that the power-curve's going to be notably flatter than in other games. As examples, he wants a brand-new character to have a chance to escape from an experienced one, if the former has the presence of mind to start running right away; he wants there to be few or no one-hit-kills; he wants an experienced character to be in danger from only three or four new ones, rather than being able to shrug off a zerg.
- Zoning, in Alpha, has a momentary lag that several folks have commented on, but we have every reason to expect that to disappear; Ryan wants there to be no equivalent of EVE's gates, so zone-crossing should be un-noticeable.
- I admit up front this last point will look self-serving. Please consider checking out The Seventh Veil; we're focused on knowledge, lore, mysteries, and exploration of the game in- and out-of-character, and our goal is to build, in Phaeros, the game's first University Town.
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Goblin Squad Member
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1. It has been said that a maxed out player will be something like 4x as powerful as a newbie, which is a very small difference compared to many other mmorpgs.
2. I don't think there is a loading screen or anything like that between hexes.
3. It will definitely start out small and basic but it is possible for it to be expanded later on. There will be NPC factions, some sort of quests, a set of dungeons (Emerald Spire) with lore attached to it and Escalations (groups of mobs grow in strength, spread and evolve if left unchecked).
4. Not sure but some people are lobbying for the devs to implement player created books and scrolls and intend to focus their activities towards gathering information, writing lore and "the history" of the game as it evolves and so on. The Seventh Veil is the most prominent group doing so I think.
Welcome, hope you stick around!
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Goblin Squad Member
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First off, this game does seem to have promise. Sort of an expanded Eve in fantasy, with "boots on the ground" too. I like good PvP and have been looking for meaningful play in that regard, which this game seems to have a good grasp of. But on to my questions.
One of the things I always consider is the power gaps in "levels" of characters, since I don't think you can have a real good Sandbox if they are extreme (which is subjective). What I worry about here is the special attacks a character learns. Is that the primary way power gaps occur? And how is it, compared to the typical Themepark design?
It will take a month or two to be competative to older characters. But they aren't invincible to lowbies, you just need more new characters to take down old characters. It's not like themeparks where there is an exponential increase it power, it's the inverse.
How do you zone between hexes? Does it feel like not "zoning", in a gamey way?
Everything is seamlessly connected. Some dungeon areas may be instanced.
How extensive will the PvE and lore game play be? I know it's early, I'm looking for the concept more than what's in at this point. And related to that, is the plan to have antagonists of old lore come back to destroy the world and that sort of thing? Will there be mystery and discovery involved?
The lore is the Paizo lore. The game is based around player interactions, PvE instances are planned but far in the future. Don't expect some overarching story, that takes too much money to develop and is not in the game plan. We know there will be some "boss" type characters that some players (right now $1000+ backers) will be able to control for sort-of-pve events.
One of the things I would love to be a part of is a grand depository of knowledge. A library/research center with members that seek out such things and documents them, seeks artifacts, and the like. Is that viable in this game?
The Seventh Veil is planning this. Our settlement is Phaeros. While we know of nothing in-game to help with this, yet, we are hosting a wiki, and will probably help a little with the PFO section of the Galorapedia.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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One of the things I always consider is the power gaps in "levels" of characters, since I don't think you can have a real good Sandbox if they are extreme (which is subjective). What I worry about here is the special attacks a character learns. Is that the primary way power gaps occur? And how is it, compared to the typical Themepark design?
Hard to say how, but the plan is about four or five noobs CAN, kill an old character
How do you zone between hexes? Does it feel like not "zoning", in a gamey way?
Nop, not at all from my experience in alpha. there is a little freeze, for now, because of the hex loading, but it is an alpha.
How extensive will the PvE and lore game play be? I know it's early, I'm looking for the concept more than what's in at this point. And related to that, is the plan to have antagonists of old lore come back to destroy the world and that sort of thing? Will there be mystery and discovery involved?
I don't think that anything is planned on the subject, because this is a very low budget game. But random dungeons that you must find, are planned.
One of the things I would love to be a part of is a grand depository of knowledge. A library/research center with members that seek out such things and documents them, seeks artifacts, and the like. Is that viable in this game?
Phaeros, the city of the Seventh Veil community, is meant to be exactly that, you can look at the website : The Seventh Veil.
Edit : Beaten by Valk :)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Welcome!
From what we've been told, the spread in power between older and newer characters will never be as wide as a typical theme park MMO. Much like in EVE, older characters are projected to have more options, rather than overwhelmingly more health and damage output.
From what I've seen watching people play the Alpha, it looks like right now, hex boundaries can cause significant lag. I'm sure the transitions will smooth out quite a bit as development continues. Note: In case you haven't heard, this is a genuine alpha test, not the marketing ploy style "alpha" where the game is finished and people just pay for a sneak peak.
I'm not sure how much lore there will be. As a sandbox game, it will probably never have the Skyrim level of readable books in every bookcase. On the other hand, the Pathfinder world of Golarion has thousands of pages of lore in the form of tabletop game books, so Goblinworks can certainly draw from that.
As far as antagonists from tabletop lore, there are currently incursions from Razmiran into the River Kingdoms, and disaffected ex-soldiers from the Worldwound Crusade stirring up trouble. I doubt we'll ever see the Whispering Tyrant or the tarrasque in game, though.
I'm sure someone will be along shortly to entice you to join one of the library and collection oriented player companies.
Edit: Drat this slow phone keyboard! I was beaten to the punch multiple times over.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The game will definitely feature both PvE and PvP (including non-consensual PvP). The developers want a strong focus on interactions between player-created towns (even kingdoms, later on), but they've stated that a town that lets the local monster population (or bandit population) grow too strong will regret it.
To keep the PvP from spiraling out of control like the worst days of Ultima Online, there will be a reputation system. If someone spends all day outside the starter town jumping new players, there will be in-game consequences, such as difficulty finding trainers, and player-issued bounties Bounties can't be issued yet, but unsanctioned PVP inside the starter towns can already cramp a character's style.
I played Ultima Online for years. I loved the game, but the grief was too much and without proper persuasions against it. That was the first thing I looked for with PO, and I am very happy with their choices. I'm sure they will need to refine it, but it looks like a viable answer to grief, yet allows for play that should be allowed in a "world". The community penalty is big, as it makes a social outcast in action an outcast in-game.
So, the zoning is like UO then? You just walk across terrain? (UO had issues at first too, but smoothed it out nicely.)
UO brings up another question. I always loved that my mouse cursor was like my hands in-game, and my eyes to look at things (clicking on an item gave a description, double clicking caused any reaction is "using" the item. How is it in PO?
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Goblin Squad Member
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As far as lore goes, the escalations Bob Settles is working on are from the local story background...Razmiran cultists, Bonechewer Goblins (I think that's the clan) among others. As the game expands there should be more escalations that tie into Pathfinder the River Kingdoms lore (which is a really good thing, as Golarion is super rich with story, background and lore and it would be a real shame not to take advantage of it).
Settlement (player-run town) interactions will include trade, alliances, conquest, and destruction. Settlements aren't intended to be self-sufficient, so they'll have to deal with each other one way or another.
Yes! I've read some on that. This is one of the big things I've looked for in an MMO. How are these caravans done?
As far as lore goes, the escalations Bob Settles is working on are from the local story background...Razmiran cultists, Bonechewer Goblins (I think that's the clan) among others. As the game expands there should be more escalations that tie into Pathfinder the River Kingdoms lore (which is a really good thing, as Golarion is super rich with story, background and lore and it would be a real shame not to take advantage of it).
Is there any mystery involved that could make for game play in a research sort of way? Such as knowledge of artifacts that can be used for other purposes, weaknesses, resources hidden away or rarely found, anything like that? Secrets to discover?
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Goblin Squad Member
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We don't yet have much info about caravans; in fact, in fact, we're anticipating a blog-post on the topic sooner rather than later. We also don't yet know how mysteries and Golarion-specific lore will enter the game, it's just early days yet for things that detailed.
An excellent source for general info of many types is the resource we've nicknamed the Nihimonicon.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This is one of the big things I've looked for in an MMO. How are these caravans done?
The answer to almost any "how is X done" question in PFO is "we're going to start with the most basic viable version of the tech, and then iteratively improve it." The first version of caravans will be a bunch of guys stuffing their pockets as full as they can and jogging to the next town. The version two years from now will probably be very different.
- Ryan's said that the power-curve's going to be notably flatter than in other games. As examples, he wants a brand-new character to have a chance to escape from an experienced one, if the former has the presence of mind to start running right away; he wants there to be few or no one-hit-kills; he wants an experienced character to be in danger from only three or four new ones, rather than being able to shrug off a zerg.
- Zoning, in Alpha, has a momentary lag that several folks have commented on, but we have every reason to expect that to disappear; Ryan wants there to be no equivalent of EVE's gates, so zone-crossing should be un-noticeable.
- I admit up front this last point will look self-serving. Please consider checking out The Seventh Veil; we're focused on knowledge, lore, mysteries, and exploration of the game in- and out-of-character, and our goal is to build, in Phaeros, the game's first University Town.
This is of interest to me, I'll check out your site when I get some time. I like the idea of a university town a lot. I'd be equally interested in a university/library quarter in a larger city.
Can you pick up items of lore and place them in a museum? In UO there was a museum made by a player, and other players actually entrusted him with their rare collections of items from events, and UO's great "Rares" of one-off and "just a few" items for display. Of course, that player was well known and trusted in the first place.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Can you pick up items of lore and place them in a museum?
Ryan's starting with what he terms "Minimum Viable Product", or MVP. The first things in the game will be those required to actually *have* a game, and all else will follow.
Crowdforging is the next closely-associated concept. We, the players, will be instrumental in deciding what features appear when, and how they work. Not all decisions will be made by us, of course, but we're going to be "designing" Pathfinder Online to an extent not yet seen in a preceding game.
Can you pick up items of lore and place them in a museum?Ryan's starting with what he terms "Minimum Viable Product", or MVP. The first things in the game will be those required to actually *have* a game, and all else will follow.
Crowdforging is the next closely-associated concept. We, the players, will be instrumental in deciding what features appear when, and how they work. Not all decisions will be made by us, of course, but we're going to be "designing" Pathfinder Online to an extent not yet seen in a preceding game.
I'd need to come up with $1,000 to get in that, right? I'm retired and unfortunately fallen on hard times in my retirement portfolio so I have to get that set better first. I'm hopeful though (I did have a securities license in the past, it's not like I don't know what I'm doing.)
Edit to add: I understand that these guys have to build from the ground up. I'm really looking for their ultimate goals and concepts, so I have an idea of what they want to end up with.
To get into Alpha you would need $1000. To get into Early Enrollment, it is only $100. MVP will be what starts in EE which is expected to last 1.5 to 2 years with Crowdforging throughout.
Just to be clear, so I can be involved in the Crowdforging with the $100 EE?
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Goblin Squad Member
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To get into Alpha you would need $1000. To get into Early Enrollment, it is only $100. MVP will be what starts in EE which is expected to last 1.5 to 2 years with Crowdforging throughout.Just to be clear, so I can be involved in the Crowdforging with the $100 EE?
Yep. There's plenty of really helpful groups and strong community support as well.
Fantastic.
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Goblin Squad Member
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To get into Alpha you would need $1000. To get into Early Enrollment, it is only $100. MVP will be what starts in EE which is expected to last 1.5 to 2 years with Crowdforging throughout.Just to be clear, so I can be involved in the Crowdforging with the $100 EE?
That gets you in and maybe couple months. Expect something like $15 per month on going play and experience.
THERE WILL BE ON GOING COSTS TO PLAY.
There is electric to pay. There is internet to pay. There are developers (and testers and QA, and tech writers and ...) to pay. There is customer service people to pay. And there is business services (administrators, pay roll, business office, metrics office, advertisers/outreach) to pay. These are costs of running a business.
So after initial time (2 months?) there there will be be by month cost ( or by year).
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Goblin Squad Member
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Jump onto Goblinworks to read the blogs, to look at the purchase options, and to poke around the Land Rush information a bit. As you've already seen, lots of us are here when you have questions; this thread's essentially all yours :-).
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Goblin Squad Member
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For $100, you can get into the second month of Early Enrollment (essentially the beta test).
Later on, there may be more formal crowdforging systems that are only available to those who contribute money, or buy a game account. Right now, I suspect that all of us who post on this board have already crowdforged a lot of elements of PFO, and that's 100% Free.
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To get into Alpha you would need $1000. To get into Early Enrollment, it is only $100. MVP will be what starts in EE which is expected to last 1.5 to 2 years with Crowdforging throughout.Just to be clear, so I can be involved in the Crowdforging with the $100 EE?That gets you in and maybe couple months. Expect something like $15 per month on going play and experience.
THERE WILL BE ON GOING COSTS TO PLAY.
There is electric to pay. There is internet to pay. There are developers (and testers and QA, and tech writers and ...) to pay. There is customer service people to pay. And there is business services (administrators, pay roll, business office, metrics office, advertisers/outreach) to pay. These are costs of running a business.
So after initial time (2 months?) there there will be be by month cost ( or by year).
That's fine with me. I can handle a monthly sub, just not a big outlay at the moment.
And to be honest, I've often supported just this way of building a game for a small company. Pay to play as it's built from bare bones to a fleshed out world.|
Goblin Squad Member
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I believe, but I'm not certain, that an Early Enrollment purchase comes with three months' game-time. In PFO, we pay for the time in which we earn experience points (currently 100XP per hour in Alpha), not simply for playing; we can decide when to turn on and off the XP faucet, and our purchased-time runs only when we say.
(SNIP)
4. Not sure but some people are lobbying for the devs to implement player created books and scrolls and intend to focus their activities towards gathering information, writing lore and "the history" of the game as it evolves and so on. The Seventh Veil is the most prominent group doing so I think.
Welcome, hope you stick around!
I wanted to go back to this and give some ideas here.
I love the idea of player created books. That gives an in-game outlet of player supplied information. Another thing I'd like to see is information contained in carvings, reliefs, and painted things in dungeons and ruins. Items "locked" in place in the explorations of the world that can be referred to in such player made books and scrolls. Of course on web sites images can be displayed too. I just feel like having things in the world that mean something really fleshes out a world. Especially if there can be different interpretations and going to explore the area might lead to new thoughts, new discoveries.
Just another question. I know I can find this on my own as I look, but are there ancient lost languages or runes in Pathfinder?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I've no idea whether this is the best source, but there appear to be several dead languages, and a pile of un-dead ones :-).
I've no idea whether this is the best source, but there appear to be several dead languages, and a pile of un-dead ones :-).
Oh yeah. There's some real potential in that.
"Words and symbols in Ancient Osiriani can also have many more meanings than the modern language."
And
"Scholars remember it chiefly as the first language to develop three grammatical genders and for using a complex alphabet made up of three separate runic systems."
That's the sort of thing that can add mystery and investigation in to game play.
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Goblin Squad Member
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As far as lore goes, the escalations Bob Settles is working on are from the local story background...Razmiran cultists, Bonechewer Goblins (I think that's the clan) among others. As the game expands there should be more escalations that tie into Pathfinder the River Kingdoms lore (which is a really good thing, as Golarion is super rich with story, background and lore and it would be a real shame not to take advantage of it).Is there any mystery involved that could make for game play in a research sort of way? Such as knowledge of artifacts that can be used for other purposes, weaknesses, resources hidden away or rarely found, anything like that? Secrets to discover?
They are still working on tons of content. For example certain knowledge skills will allow a player to get better loot drops in the form of raw materials from creature kills, and the better your skill the better the loot drop.
There are what are being called "Artifacts" that are for killing off the big escalation bosses, which ends the escalation (don't think of them like the old 1 ed. D&D artifacts. But these will give a class structure or a settlement a boon perhaps (faster training, extra training slots, something good but not world breaking or so I understand).
Not certain what they are going to include, but Mosswater is on the map, as are Toad Hollow, the Emerald Spire, and most of the NPC areas and some creature should make it in as well, eventually.
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Goblin Squad Member
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No one's mentioned it yet: all gear, except some of the most basic that characters start with, will be made by players, from materials gathered in the world, from monsters and from the terrain. There'll be no item-drops from kills, but one may find, for example, a broken sword that can be melted down into one component of a new sword.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The Emerald Spire is rumored to have been built (or occupied, or conquered) by people from Azlant, one of the first known human civilizations. There could certainly be mysterious runes inscribed on the ruins around the spire, or in whatever dungeon levels might exist below it.
There are also rumors of pre-human Cyclops ruins in the darkest corners of the River Kingdoms. Remnants of their written language might linger here and there in the Echo Woods.
(I agree that it would be fun to find mysterious writings in PFO. We might have to wait a while, though.)
The Emerald Spire is rumored to have been built (or occupied, or conquered) by people from Azlant, one of the first known human civilizations. There could certainly be mysterious runes inscribed on the ruins around the spire, or in whatever dungeon levels might exist below it.
There are also rumors of pre-human Cyclops ruins in the darkest corners of the River Kingdoms. Remnants of their written language might linger here and there in the Echo Woods.
(I agree that it would be fun to find mysterious writings in PFO. We might have to wait a while, though.)
So then the next thought would be how to add this kind of thing to the game. Things like piles of rubble that shift away from walls revealing carved runes, or walls collapsing revealing a small room with such scribblings, or maybe concealing magics finally being defeated by newly discovered dispell magics? Earthquakes, world-wide quest discoveries, floods washing away banks of earth, etc.?
It was my understanding that this is the reason badlands hex existed. To add content later.
One hex? Has there been any statements about expanding the borders?
