Sabatour's page

Sup guys - I have only made a few posts and I will confess that I have not used the search button as much as I probably should have but I wanted to toss out what I am looking for in a new MMO to see what you all think and what the general theme of this community is. Also I will admit I am not a fan of the layout of this site as far as a forum goes so there is that as well :). I did back this project on kick starter so I have some skin in this game and this is by no means a troll of any sort.

First a little background.
I have been active in PnP games from AD&D 1st to 3.5 to 4 (bad idea) across to Pathfinder. Messed around with CoC, Car Wars, Top Secret, Boot Hill, Twilight 2000, Shadowrun and even Traveller. I would put my rp gaming at about 3 decades give or take. Spent a TON of time in EQ1, EQ2, Vanguard, Shadowrun etc etc... With EQ1 pre Kunark by far being above and beyond the best MMO to date IMO.

Raids: Really hoping they bring back the large group format encounters. Current games seem to alienate large guilds by forcing them into making hard decisions on raid groups as the size is limited to a small number of people so there is no room for those nice to have classes etc. I am not looking to remove any content from solo or single group play but IMO if a game wants to last and stick around this is a serious point that needs to be addressed. I do understand that most if not all people sit at a table with 4-8 players when they are playing Pathfinder in RL but some concession should be made for this I would think.

Characters: I was messing around with a new game coming out from an IP that is very similar to Pathfinder and was seriously disappointed in how they are handling the classes. PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD give us the ability to roll how we want and be viable. If say.. I want to make a ranger and focus on two handed sword - there is no reason what so ever I should not be able to do that. I don't think forcing players right into arch-types / prestige class or whatever (great sword fighter) is a good way to garner character investment. I understand that game balance could be a bit easier if it is done that way but that would be a mistake IMO.

Instances: No - no place for this in a modern MMO - IMO if you want to play something like that go play Neverwinter or another multi player hosted game. This is an MMO - you want people to interact, compete, make new friends, meet new people to despise etc etc. Sanctioning off content so people can stay in their own little bubble will not help this game stick around. There is a large portion of players that like to compete with one another over content and this ruins that aspect of the game sandbox or not. There is a place for instances I suppose but please don't make that the norm and do NOT do that with guild/player houses.

Finally I wanted to cover my thoughts on risk vs reward. Let me start by saying that I was a big fan of leaving a corpse behind when you get smoked in EQ and I was a big fan of some classes helping you recover that like Necros could do with summon corpse, which in turn forced some to reach out and be a good member of the community and maybe step outside of their group of friends and meet new people. Also promoting class need. I really think that when you die the penalty should be severe. Just taking a armor hit on durability and costing some cash is not enough. Real penalty causes fear which causes excitement and MMO's today do not have that. At some point - and I would guess it was WoW (sorry if you are a fan this isn't a bash)developers got it into their heads that what is easy for the players and what the players THINK they want is the right choice. Things that are easy are never appreciated nor held onto for very long and I think there has been a constant stream of MMOs after to prove this. Another good example would be DayZ. I know this is an FPS and vastly different from an MMO but the fact that a dev made MOD got over a million people to download a game that flat out scared the s%@! out of people which in turn is keeping those same players and morphing into its own game is a tribute to what is fun(rewarding) when you play and what is fun on paper(board room).

Ok that is all I have right now. Sorry for the big wall of text and I look forward to being more active here.

Erik