Valandur's page

Well it seems that GW decision to adopt the Crowdforging system of making a MMO is being picked up by several developers to use in making their games.

In a Dev hangout (chat) done Wed, Richard Garriot, who is creating Shroud of the Avatar came right out and said that they were definitely going to have the same level of community involvement as GW in creating SotA.

Mark Jacobs has been saying for some time how he plans to bring the community into the creation of Camelot Unchained, the successor to DAOC.

I'm really excited to see these companies take this approach. Both companies are also using Kickstarter so they won't be as "under the thumb" of a publisher as usual. Honestly I'm unsure if a studio could use Crowdforging to create a game while a big name publisher like EA is involved.

I thought it was interesting that we now have 3 games being made with input from the players.

I've seen this mentioned in threads but not really detailed or discussed. There may be additional effects or events then the three I listed, but they should operate on the same core principal.

The concept of a character being put under the control of another player,being or entity shouldn't be taken lightly. Like the imprisonment debate, no one wants to lose control of their character. But sometimes the risk is considered worth the possibility.

A prime example is Michael Moorecock's Stormbringer, the black sword possessed by a demon that grants great power and extracts an equally great price from its holder. In the books the sword would, at times, move of its own violation and suck the soul of someone standing nearby. Often the victim would be someone Elric considered a friend, it seemed to favor slaying any female Elric was involved with. But the power granted by the sword was awesome.

An example in a game is the Barbarian class's Berserk ability in the 2D graphical MUD Drakkar. In that game a Barb could activate his Berserk ability while in combat, the ability had levels which were accessed with repeated key presses of the ability button. As the Barb increased their "rage" their damage, number of attacks in a round, ability to dodge would all fluctuate randomly within a round while the Barb would often let out wild, incoherent screams. But there was also the chance that the Barbarian would lose control, leap huge distances and strike (usually with massive damage) friendlies, party members pretty much anyone. The way a Barb usually "calmed down" was to go off where they alone until they naturally calmed down, think of it like some games handle recovering from having drank too much.

Demon possession would be putting a character under the control of an NPC demonic (or Devilish?) entity.

Cursed items, perhaps even cursed locations might result in a character becoming possessed.

Mind control would be putting a character under the control of another player, or NPC entity.

Now my thought would be to have these things be pretty much short term events. No one wants to spend 30 mins watching someone else kill your alignment after all! But I do think this sort of thing would provide a lot of RP potential as well as being something memorable to all parties! :D methods to rid characters of these effects shouldn't be too difficult to find nor perform unless its some sort of special situation.

Spells in the form of Dominate Person, items or the effect of some action by the player might lead to their becoming possessed or some sort of divine interaction may result in a player being possessed (perhaps not all possession need result in bad things happening? That would be more of a GM event though) . In terms of the Barbarian, the skill Berserk. Perhaps there are other things that can cause these effects or even other similar effects.

It goes without saying that this would be something far back on any priority list if it even makes a list!

So, what do you think?

Ok, many MMOs have taken on cooking. Some have even tried to add flavor to it :p. I would love to see a complex cooking system with a huge variety of materials, meats, herbs, spices, vegetables as well as recipes that must be discovered ie. no recipe books at start!

To give an idea of how I was thinking it might work, I considered breaking the recipes down into stages or levels. Beginning with say a potato, tossing it into a fire would be an example of a level 1 recipe. As would taking chicken and putting that in a fire. A level 2 recipe would be taking. Potato and combining it with say butter and bay leaves and a pan on a fire or in an oven, or chicken combined with wine and herbs in a pan over a fire or in an oven. Level 3 could be a pan, with potatoes, chicken, butter and some herbs and wine in an oven. Each level could provide increasing bonuses. It could even be further broken down into each food type providing bonuses in specific areas and when combined could increase to give greater or longer lasting benefits.

It would be very easy to generate recipes. The herbs, even though it would require extra coding, could also be used in alchemy.

Obviously this isn't something that needs to be a priority above, we'll above much of anything. But I think it would add richness to PFO that has been missing from MMOs recently.

So, what do you all think? Good, bad, ugly?

I wanted to throw this idea out there and see if its something that people have an interest in. It's a combination of a couple of ideas I've been kicking around in my head, and in a few threads.

There's a lot we still don't know about things like advanced item creation, spell research and recipes, so I'm doing some guessing that might be totally off base to what the Dev team has planned so far.

Accepting a few things, like spell creation, experimentation (to some degree) will be possible, and accepting that some concepts can be learned by finding ancient writings.

What if it were possible to transcribe things like certain rare components could be used to create variations of spells, or certain crafted items could be created/enhanced by using specific rare materials into books or scrolls that can be traded or sold? Say your Mage discovered that using Dragonwood instead of live oak in a staff recipe resulted in a new type of staff with nice properties. Or a crafter finding an ancient scroll with a previously unknown recipe for an item being able to transfer that knowledge into a book that could be sold or given to others?

I'm also thinking that some combat unit formations, or specific tactics that work well against specific enemies could be unlocked by finding ancient writings in dungeons, or within a Dragons treasure horde. These could be 'learned' and later written down and passed on to others.

There should be a limit to the amount or number of things that could be transcribed onto a scroll and into books. But it would be a way of transferring knowledge, perhaps even creating a scribe trade that would be sought after to transfer those things into written form?

If these things, spells that enchant, recipes that can be used and new formations for unit combat, once read we're then "learned" by that character as opposed to be just taken from a wiki, they would become commodities and sources for many types of RP, player interaction, all sorts of fun stuff.

Say you learn that a reclusive Wizard possesses a tome (that he created) with a rare method that results in a powerful item being created. He plans to meet with another Wizard and sell the tome. But you hire the services of a thief to break into his tower and steal the tome, or employ a mercenary band to assail the tower and secure the tome before the transaction can take place? Seems like a way to spark lots of player interaction.

I know this is full of holes, but maybe it's something that would be interesting?