Hi everyone!
What I'd like to say first and foremost is that I'm actually pretty happy with what I've seen so far. I have absolutely no idea what most of the abilities I've picked up do, but that's fine, the NPCs standing completely still until they attack something is both unnerving and amusing, but that's alphas for you. But most importantly, I logged in, I started doing things, mostly just to see what I could do, where I could go, what was around, that sort of thing, and unlike a lot of games that claim to be a bit sandboxy, I didn't feel like I HAD to go out and do anything in particular, but could just try things. I cam across a few quests... a few brigand camps with markers and descriptions over them on the map that explained the scenario, and I really love that feature. To go out into the world and just DO stuff without it having to be a particular thing if you want to get anywhere. If this is the way the game is going to continue developing, then, for me at least, it's a winner!
I think there can be plenty of sexy items that don't need to be skimpy too.male and female. Yes. Both. And I still think heavy armor should come with penalties anyway, so all armor is a compromise between defence, speed and endurance. So skimpy has its place as much as full platemail.
Fair enough but I think the "I look like a human but I'm actually a half-elf" is a) immersion-breaking and b) problematic for PVP when trying to accurately sum up exactly who your opponent is and what they can do.I'm not really satisfied with a "free race change" option. I want to be a half elf. I know there are half elves being added. Let me be one from day one, models or not. The basic characteristics should be able to be included straight away, that shouldn't be anything technically difficult, then those races can be tested and tweaked as needed along with all the others. and having a midlife race change isn't?
I came to similar conclusions. I disagree on the first few though. Quests are in the form of objectives. "We found a dungeon! Hurry! Come here before someone else clears it or it despawns!!"
Apart from the gist of those, I agree, and voted for pets.
This may not seem very important to many people, and maybe it's not, but given the dynamic nature of spawns in this game, I'm assuming animals are equally dynamic in where they spawn. I'd like to take that concept to a little more depth.
Wolves would do a similar thing with rabbits, birds, deer etc, driving them from hexes through predation when there's lots of them, driving them away from civilized hexes.
But you get the general idea, a sort of dynamic animal spawn where the pedator/prey/plantlife and settlements all influence the rate and distribution of animal spawn. Want deer? Head out into the deeper forests. Want pigeons and foxes? Go closer to towns. Are deer getting to scare? Kill off some wolves. That's the broad brushstrokes anyway.
No one here is advocating a skill based targeting system. Just a system that we that are advocating it find less tedious and uninteresting. Something more dynamic and fluid. Like attacking what's in front of you rather than whatever has a magic box around it. It's actually becoming more common this sort of "smart targeting" system. It takes no extra skill. What do you need all those buttons on a mouse for? I use 3. Left click, right click and scroll wheel. That's it. Everything else is on the keyboard.
I propose, therefore, that rpers band together to found some towns in an area as a sort of "rp strongly encouraged (sometimes with blunt instruments) area", with an overall support network, so we can have people who rp bandits and work out of some wayside tavern, some good and evil towns connected by roads, and MAKE a strong rp presence in a section of the world.
Alignment penalties is the COST of an act of murder, not the RISK.
Bandits have bounties on them in just about every medieval/fantasy fiction I know. If you don't want to be a target, don't go round killing people, unless you have a good reason. People will be after you ANYWAY.
I wouldn't bother for a 1 gp bounty, would you? Why take that one when I can take one offering 3000?
I don't see the problem. Not everyone has the capability to get back at someone who killed them themselves, a bounty allows them to do that, particularly wealthy, non combat characters. It also adds to the meaningfulness. If you're going to attack someone in the wilderness, you better have a good reason and be willing to deal with the possible consequences. That IS risk vs reward.
I suppose we have the potential for some micro transactions, recipes for reskins of armor that crafters can purchase to give their armor a distinctive look, others could be loot items. After all, if we're talking extra resources to make it, micro transactions would cover it ;) As to the whole inappropriate statement thing, I think it is important just to be mindful that there are groups out there that have to deal with those kinds of loaded jokes every day, whether it's racial, gender or orientation, or disability. On the Internet, you may come across one of these people, in fact, it's guaranteed. It's not a freedom of speech issue, it's a "appropriate conduct in the context" issue. We all slip up sometimes, it happens, but conscious awareness of the issue is all it takes to stop a joke becoming an unpleasant situation. It's like making a dead grandma joke and discovering the person you told it to just lost their grandmother. It makes an awkward situation. The Australian Prime Minister recently trampled all over the opposition leader for misogyny. He's doesnt actually hate women, but he does use loaded wording, with very uncomfortable results for him. I don't think anyone here intends to be offending anyone else or attacking them, it's about raising awareness of what you're saying. I think it's all been said though.
*sigh* as I have said several times today, I am fine with the system as it is. I am sticking up for the pve'ers not because I agree that the system should be changed, but I'm trying to explain to other people where they are coming from. Stop thinking about the mechanics. It's not about those, it is about the actions of the people involved. There is a group, they are doing something together, enjoying themselves, having a good time. Someone else comes along and does something that interrupts their enjoyment. In rl such a thing would be considered impolite or rude. Perhaps at some other point in time they would have enjoyed the activity that has intruded in on what they are doing, but at this time they were dling something else, and someone has ruined that for them. I realise that to you this interruption adds a new dimension of excitement, for them it is the opposite. For them the whole experience was just ruined. If you can understand their point of view, THEN you can start discussing the mechanics of situations, but until you understand that point of view solutions like "but you can get your revenge any of these ways or "they will suffer for it" will only cause more agitation. I'm not trying to pick on anyone in particular here, in just frustrated that I apparently suck so bad at getting a point across and end up repeating myself all day. There is a proportion of the population that really dislike aspects of pvp THAT much that it totally ruins their enjoyment, for some it's looting, for some it's just an aggressive competitiveness they find distasteful. But to say they want a theme park is simply not true and is another frustrating point. They want a sandbox where human interaction is not based around what they consider antisocial behavior. For some, PFO will not be right for them. This, in itself can be frustrating because it has a great deal of potential. For others it's just a case of presenting to them the system in a way that mollifies their anxiety. Many of these are pledged and willing to try, others are not at the point where they are convinced it will deliver on it's promises, I'm expecting many more of these over the next 12 months leading up to beta. Many people could potentially be driven away and give the game a bad reputation like darkfall's community if this perception as a pvp centric game is not shifted. I think the key to that is for the people who understand the system as it has been described so far that are exited about the potential of the game to understand the perspective of people that aren't particularly interested in open pvp so that this perceived antagonism between the two groups can be overcome. Everyone here wants the game to live up to its potential, it is a very exciting project, but to communicate, we have to understand eachother's perspectives. Wow. That was long.
Monsters won't remember you and kill you whenever they sill you, they won't come back with friends, they won't target your group for special attention, they won't come after you in unexpected places (usually), they won't move around in fast moving, well organised squads specifically looking for easy prey. Shall we flip it again? Why do you need pvp at all if there's pve? Since apparently there's no difference?
Which is social. You can do many many social things back to the 'griefer' to get revenge or make sure they don't do it again. A mob is just some programmed sprites that respawn and attack you again regardless.How is dying to a PvE monster and losing your gear different then dying to a PvP'er and then losing your gear They don't want to do something back, they don't get enjoyment from revenge, they don't want it to happen. This is the single most important point that causes this exasperation, and the increasing irritation, this is the part that you have to understand. They don't like fighting people because they don't enjoy it.
I played uo since 98. I played darkfall, so yes, I have experience in sandboxes. I have also played minecraft and Salem and swg all of these are sandboxes. Only 3 of those have strong pvp, one of them even has permadeath. The point you are trying to get across is irrelevant. "Yes you will be killed by players" there is no acceptable "but" after that. Or yes they can loot you. No "buts" will change that that is the thing that is unacceptable, Most of them have listed reasons why it's different when a player does It too You can have a sandbox with absolutely no pvp, you can have one with consensual pvp only. You can't say that because someone doesn't want pvp or some specific aspect that they want to play a theme park. TERA is a theme park with open world pvp. Because you want open world pvp does not mean YOU want to play a theme park either. I'm saying you can't persuade someone that some other feature will make up for a feature if they refuse to take part in that feature AT ALL.
Assuming that you want to be a weapon smith, not an adventurer and that it's about money. That is a MASSIVE assumption. Just for perspective, lets flip the argument. Lets remove non consensual pvp altogether. You can be an adventurer, you can be a soldier in a town army, you can still be a weapon smith, there's just no bandits or gankers that you HAVE to deal with. Is it boggling to you that anyone would enjoy that less? If your whole goal was to be an anti pk and spend your time killing the nefarious element, your entire playstyle has just been severely changed in a way you don't like.
Let's have some fun with this game of yours though: can you now try to answer the question as though it were asked by a purple giraffe with a killer handlebar mustache who intends for their character to be a caravan guard? Best ImageEver
I would like to know what disadvantages they would get from training first THEN going chaotic evil. From the information provided it seems that since they would already have all the skills and abilities necessary, they wouldn't have any disadvsntages, and since they couldn't do much with new abilities, they'd play for free.Well considering it takes like 2.5 years to "max out" that is an awful long waiting period to be a ganker. That player can go ahead and be the "black knight" if they want to they earned it lol. I'm more concerned with groups of well established bored veterans after years who've seen and done it all and decide to take on that sort of behavior. It happens in most games eventually. Maybe because they'll see it as a "hard mode"
You're right. There are people that want no risk and all reward. Pvpers who gank for loot. Not pve'ers who spend hours acquiring a resource only to be set upon by someone fully refreshed and equipped to fight them, rather than whatever is needed to harvest the resource. Killing the pvper provides no benefit, if they're sensible, they have nothing of value to loot.
Lets flip it on its head. What if during pvp, the lower the health you had, the higher the chance of spawning a revenant, an npc monster that hits harder and faster and targets vulnerable players. Would that add you your enjoyment to have your fights greenfly interrupted by something designed to kill you when you're at your weakest and engaged in something else? It would be exciting in its unpredictability, but in the end just lead to most people bring quickly killed by monsters during pvp.
I think Robb has a very good point. If pvp looting doesn't add anything valuable, what IS the point of it? How does "random item of loot, not a major piece of equipment" achieve any of those things?
It would mean my red head would tan when not supposed to, and my albino would miraculously be cured of albinism :P But if scars and things were determined by the environment, eventually EVERYONE would accumulate all the scars. I have the same issue with muscle mass, either all fighters/barbarians/monks would look the same because of their stats or skills or the difference would be so subtle that they're essentially the same. It's like when some games give you several preset face options that all look almost identical no matter how much you fiddle with the sliders. In which case you may as well just implement class based armor models and be done with it.
But it would still be a linear process leading to sameness. All the veterans looking nearly identical. And just HOW cumulative is it? If it's stats we have a limit, if it's skills, how are you going to look in 5 years? Are people going to see you coming and mistake you for an ogre? Are you going to have skin with a luminosity higher than the clearest crystal lantern?
I am with Psyblade, I could see the outcome being pretty fun either way. Fun for all except the merchant moving their goods. Here we come to the point that has come up several times "I'm not paying to be someone else's content" For me personally, yeah, it adds something, a problem to overcome. Do you hire a company to escort you and attract attention? Or do you go it alone and try for the fast and secretive? Stay off the main roads and take a winding, less travelled road? Or take the main way and hope for the best? Put bounties out on the brigands and try again? So that there's even more incentive to kill them? Or try subterfuge and hire an escort for a not so valuable cargo while secretly transferring something valuable by other means? It all has possibilities. But for other people, none of that holds any appeal at all, and I think it's important to recognise that not everyone enjoys the same scenarios.
Mobs don't loot you when they kill you. Actually in UO they did xD It could be especially tough for mages, as often it was your reagent bag they took. That or gold. As for no looting having an impact on PvP, not really. Look at all those games like WoW and SWTOR. There's no looting and lots of killing. But again it is generally the no risk stuff where they're just killing people much weaker than them, which is something PFO seems to be trying to counter, making it more of a disadvantage to do that sort of thing to you than it is to the person you're killing.
I'm in australia. I don't GET high population. I get "hello? guild? is anyone here?" I also get a ping of about 300ms to the US. I was in the largest guild on the Australian UO server. It was in the top 100 guilds in UO. We took part in a pvp battle for a town. There were about 30 of us. We were against 8 PvPers. They wiped us out. Every single one. We had the home ground, we had prepared in advance, we have even barricaded many of the entrances to bottleneck the approaches. Before you say "get better at PvP and that won't happen" Remember you are talking to people with NO INTEREST in PvP. Practicing PvP is taking time away from "gameplay" to do a chore. It's like asking a PVPer to grind killing paralyzed rabbits for 12 days to unlock PvP. Nothing about it is fun.
dable in the occasional PvP and learn that yes, it sucks to lose your items, but damn it was a rush to defend our land. Because this is the point- for people who don't enjoy it, it ISN'T a rush, it's just frustrating. The same way some people enjoy WoW. There's nothing I find enjoyable about it. They're not wrong, for them it IS enjoyable, but for me it's not. The same thing applies here. For some people PVP holds NO appeal. As for the risk vs reward thing, part of the point is that for the people doing the attacking, there IS no risk. They're geared for it, experienced in it, and generally have enough success in looting that even when they do lose, they've gained more than they've lost over all, however if you travelled for an hour to get to a spot for a rare resource, spend and hour trying to gather it and finally do, then someone comes along and attacks you. You're geared up for harvesting, if it's harvesting off a creature that might mean specialised weapons and armor, a certain set of preprepared abilities (such as the spells a wizard chose to prepare) etc vs someone who came equipped and prepared to kill other people. Immediately the PvE'er is at a disadvantage EVEN if they're good at PvP. Even if they're equal in latency and skill, the PvPer STILL has the edge. Look at it this way: Time invested in the resource by PvE'er: 2 hours
All the risk goes to the PvE'er, all the reward goes to the PvPer. THIS is why PvEers find no enjoyment in it.
The main reason I brought the topic up was for training purposes, not duels for sport. Actually it was reading the Empyrean Order thread that brought it to my mind, thinking about them training their new recruits in military orders. That's going to be very painful if you're constantly breaking eachother's equipment and killing eahcother. In a REAL fight, if you're opponent is good, you won't get much of an opportunity to learn much, you'll be too busy trying to survive and reacting. So I like Andius's idea just as much, I think it would require a lot of training weapons to cover different styles of weaponry. If you're workign with an internal logic to combat, a sword isn't used like a halberd or a staff, and a bladed or double bladed staff is used differently to all of them. I know that eventually I'll be taking part in SOME PVP, but it'll never be my focus (at least not the combat side of it) so I'm going to need to do some sparring with people who know what they're doing. The last thing we need is alignment/reputation hits and constant replacement of equipment for PRACTICING with. As for the first point in the post of why no dueling. I can think of PLENTY of reasons why you'd want a non lethal fireball. Most of them involve not wanting to KILL your target, funnily enough. I've also read plenty of stories where duels are used for training purposes, even in magic. Sometimes it's not the spell that's non lethal, sometimes it's a layer of shields, break all the shields of your opponent and you win. That sort of thing, but it's still a duelling system. I do see the point with rage though, that one's a bit awkward.
Is there going to be a dueling system in game?
So I was thinking something like when you duel, if your hp hits 0 it just flags as "*name* yields" and they get 1hp back, so then they can heal up and you don't get those situations where people randomly invite you to duel and kill you because you accidentally accepted or flag you as a murderer/put a bounty on you when then invited you to spar with them in the first place.
I wouldn't worry too much about the community, forum debates everywhere tend to get heated, but in the end everyone is just looking to see the game succeed. Disagreements happen, and I've seen far worse than this, and at this early stage there's a great deal more debate, because so little is set in stone.
I'm slightly confused by alignment use for pvp. For example, necromancy is an evil act, but if you're in a nation of necromancers, necromancy could easily make you lawful evil- and you don't ever have to murder someone. But I can't help thinking of it like the uo karma system. I suppose I just think criminal acts and good/evil are not necessarily related. If we're talking about "unlawful killing" ie killing an innocent, or murder, yes it is an evil act, but in my opinion that's not relevant - it is a criminal act and that is what it should be flagged for. But I suppose the real discussion is actually how do you deal with griefing, murder and the abuse of in game mechanics. My suggestions are as follows;
Perhaps there should be a timer on this of a week or so that will turn it off again in a week if the war does not become mutual. Just a suggestion. For individuals committing murder, the only system I can think of is the uo murder count system where the victim gives them a murder count and they are worked of by time and penalties like tithes or some such, a murderer is therefore flagged as such and becomes "kill on sight" to all. I also like uo's fame/karma reputation system for an indicator. Perhaps with a "murderer" title in there too. It's not perfect, but I can't think of a better way. If someone else can, good! Perhaps it could be refined so that dependent on your actions the hostility and rapidity of response to your criminal acts varies. If you regularly murder people, even if you work them off, you're a serial offender and perhaps npc guards will keep a closer eye on you in their territory, responding more rapidly the more trouble you cause in their territory, to the point where they practically drop out of the sky on you if you so much as take a swing at someone. Player controlled factional towns should also be able to hire npc guards for the same purpose for similar effect. Their rules could be tweaked according to the desires of the owners. That should for the most part deal with random murderers, as long as things like aggressor timers don't drop out during combat and don't switch! Perhaps even pursue them beyond their territory, or perhaps the hiring of nps that hunt form players who committed crimes in a territory which will chase them within a certain range of a guild territory
My question remains will the currently planned mechanisms actually work?But that's a rhetorical question, right? I mean, of course a lot of us think they'll work, and we trust Ryan and the rest of the folks at Goblinworks when they say they're going to adapt to new situations as they arise to stamp out "griefing". But no one can answer that question until we're actually in-game. Which is why I'm bringing up the things I consider to be issues now, so that they can be taken into account in the design of the system and don't need to be added later. The more that is resolved before the mechanics are finalized, the easier it will be to make work.
That's all well and good to say we'll have good stats as newbies, but how will a new character's weapons do against top tier armor nod how will newbie gear do against top tier weapons? It doesn't make much difference if a gank squad's equipment is good enough. And if the equipment won't make much difference, then what's the point of it? Go to all the work of mastering weaponcraft only to find your weapons are hardly better than when you started out making them? That would be even worse. The other thing with the "risk vs reward" is that someone/ a group out adventuring and hunting say... Dragons, will be equipped for dragon hunting, they'll have selected abilities to take for this purpose. Your gank squad will be equipped for killing other players, and they'll have selected abilities for this purpose. People tend to say things like "well you shouldn't go out alone" which is fine if you're playing in peak time, but what about us players who aren't in American or European time zones? Not only will we have less people to ask for help, we also have lower pings. Yes, it means less killers will be around, but they'll pick the places they're most likely to find their preferred prey.
I start getting annoyed when people start throwing around "carebear" to describe anyone who doesn't want to pvp. There is already a full pvp player driven sandbox game. It's called Darkfall I quite enjoyed it until I started getting "accidentally" killed and looted at the bank, or when I stepped out of town by people so far above me in stats that I was dead before I even had a chance to react. They also had some anti griefing in place, it just didn't work. People have legitimate concerns. It's all well and good to say "we'll have systems in place" everywhere has systems in place. The question is DO THEY WORK? Generally, in my experience, the answer has been no. Personally I prefer to be in control of when I'm pvping, as most of my experiences have ended up being just someone much more powerful killing me for sport. As I've said before on these systems, the philosophy of "risk vs reward" doesn't apply because the person attacking random people has no risk and all the reward. Even if they sometimes get killed, most of the time they don't.
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