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A thing that would really make this game stand out for me, and turn it into a must play game, would be having the concept of ecosystems.
If herd animals were attacked by prey animals, if animals rather than having a set respawn population had rules like the simulation "Life" type programs. Running past the same 5 deer every time no matter on day/night/season/weather is dull in WoW/WAR/nearly every MMO game.
Are we at the level of computing power where the environment, and I'm thinking initially animals here, can have a life of their own? In a skill based game where blacksmith, and I guess skinner/tanner is a valid option, such game enhancements would really make PF Online stand out from the crowd.
Would anyone else be interested in the game not having a cardboard cutout for the environment?
Imagine a bad winter, and suddenly resource X or Y is in short supply - adds interest for me.
S.
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If you want to know if it is feasable check out Ryzom
"A UNIQUE MMORPG UNIVERSE
Planet Atys is not only an MMORPG but also a living, virtual world, with five rich and diverse ecosystems. A powerful AI technology makes flora and fauna interact dynamically with each other and the ever-changing environment. .
A Lush and unique RPG Living Ecosystem
Known as the Living Planet, Atys doesn't behave quite like any world you've experienced in any other MMORPG. To start with, Atys is growing, slowly sending tendrils out which can unveil new lands and cover up existing ones. Due to this constant growth, the climate and weather on the surface can vary greatly, even in a short time span.
The Behaviour of the Creatures is unique to our MMORPG
The creatures in our MMORPG behave intelligently. In our MMORPG each creature has its own set of behaviours, and natural enemies. Wild gingos travel in small packs, willing to attack anything they think they can kill for food. The more docile bodoc travels in herds, but fiercely come to each others defence should they be attacked. Some creatures will migrate naturally; others will prefer to remain in the same general area.
The Seasons & weather change in our MMORPG
The seasons in our MMORPG change naturally, altering not only the landscape of Atys but also the resources available to harvesters and the behaviour of the creatures that live there. In our MMORPG the changing weather can also alter these things, from raging snowstorms in the forest to thunderous storms in the jungle everything change perpetually." from http://www.ryzom.com/en/mmorpg-rpg-mmo-features.html
Goblinworks Founder
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If you want to know if it is feasable check out Ryzom
Ryzom looks like an amazing game, I just had a quick look over their features. I'm surprised I've never heard of the game before to be honest.
If PFO can offer an experience like this in Golarion it would definitely be worth exploring.
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Goblinworks Founder
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That's a good thing in my book Dudemeister :P (It also means the prey breed very rapidly, which can have interesting effects.)
Indeed. Clear an area of predators and watch the ecosystem become unstable as the prey over populates. Of course the prey over populating could be herded and butchered by the players as they top the food chain.
Goblin Squad Member
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That's a good thing in my book Dudemeister :P (It also means the prey breed very rapidly, which can have interesting effects.)Indeed. Clear an area of predators and watch the ecosystem become unstable as the prey over populates. Of course the prey over populating could be herded and butchered by the players as they top the food chain.
2 weeks into release the game will have been taken over by rabbits.
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Goblinworks Founder
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2 weeks into release the game will have been taken over by rabbits.That's a good thing in my book Dudemeister :P (It also means the prey breed very rapidly, which can have interesting effects.)Indeed. Clear an area of predators and watch the ecosystem become unstable as the prey over populates. Of course the prey over populating could be herded and butchered by the players as they top the food chain.
"That's ne ordinary rabbit"
"That's the most foul, cruel and bad tempered little rodent ye ever set eyes on.""He's got huge sharp...."
"He can leap about..."
"Look at the bones!" Tim the Enchanter
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Goblin Squad Member
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Ryzom was excellent back in the beta when I tested it. I had one of those fungusy tree-mage guys with the masks bolted on their heads. It was a terribly interesting game even then, and most of the people I ran into spoke korean! I should go back and check them now...
Still, you could handle 'roaming' spawns... with invisible areas that move along the map in predictable patterns so that you never really -destroy- the herd of deer, but you can certainly thin them out. Give rangers something to do.
Heck, make farming and hunting necessary for survival. Put meat and bread and fish up on the market and make people work for their leather and metal and you'll create a real player-driven economy.
Just don't let guys level up from swinging a pick-axe at the same spot on the wall all day.
The more 'non-combat' options that are available, the more "Pathfinder Life" the game is, the more people will enjoy the experience.
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Heck, make farming and hunting necessary for survival. Put meat and bread and fish up on the market and make people work for their leather and metal and you'll create a real player-driven economy.
Just don't let guys level up from swinging a pick-axe at the same spot on the wall all day.
The more 'non-combat' options that are available, the more "Pathfinder Life" the game is, the more people will enjoy the experience.
That's what I'm thinking. If they are serious about PF Online being a true sandbox, then I say they need to give us a believable world to interact with. With a static environments the most interesting thing is to go kill things and others - i.e. things will eventually de-volve into another combat feast MMORPG (like WoW/WAR/etc).
Any Goblin dev's around? What your take on this? Not saying we expect every fern to be exhibiting fractal growth patterns - but some 'life' in the world other than other players would make this game stand out in a crowded market.
As great as an ecosystem may sound, I think it's worth remembering what happened to Ultima Online. They took the time to make such a system... and they had to take it out before anyone could notice it.
Why? Because the players killed EVERYTHING in less then a week.
So unless there's a way for the critter population to resupply itself, you may end up with a very barren world...
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Goblinworks Founder
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As great as an ecosystem may sound, I think it's worth remembering what happened to Ultima Online. They took the time to make such a system... and they had to take it out before anyone could notice it.
Why? Because the players killed EVERYTHING in less then a week.
So unless there's a way for the critter population to resupply itself, you may end up with a very barren world...
I'm sure it could be easily avoided with a bunny injector tool.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Sounds like a good thing for a council of Druids to watch out for and try to prevent, peacefully or with the shillelagh
Imagine an MMORPG sandbox environment in which a council of Druids could physically play such an integral role in preserving local ecosystems.
Imaginations are dangerous.
♠ Join the Pathfinder Online community in IRC | Server: irc.stratics.com (6667) Channel: #pfo | We'll see you there! ♠
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Goblin Squad Member
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As a long time resident of Ryzom I concur this type of setup would be awesome, but Ryzom tech is over a decade old. I would like to see next-gen implementation of this...a large clan of players destroys a Orc stronghold...the Orcs have to move. Maybe attacking and moving into the hold of a less powerful guild. This would give every choice possible unintended consequences.
I would also love to see ecosystems that can be destroyed. A city is built in a region with plentiful game and forest...what happens after long term over hunting and logging? No more resources...expansion, exploitation...move? Welcome to end-game.
But of course, all of this requires a modicum of realism...
Interestingly, like the example of the Orc migration above, this would lead to events that are not player or dev implemented; they emerge from the symbiosis of the system and players themselves. And, if properly designed, the system could be seeded with the members of the ecosystem that find their own balance.
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Goblinworks Founder
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As a long time resident of Ryzom I concur this type of setup would be awesome, but Ryzom tech is over a decade old. I would like to see next-gen implementation of this...a large clan of players destroys a Orc stronghold...the Orcs have to move. Maybe attacking and moving into the hold of a less powerful guild. This would give every choice possible unintended consequences.
I would also love to see ecosystems that can be destroyed. A city is built in a region with plentiful game and forest...what happens after long term over hunting and logging? No more resources...expansion, exploitation...move? Welcome to end-game.
But of course, all of this requires a modicum of realism...
Interestingly, like the example of the Orc migration above, this would lead to events that are not player or dev implemented; they emerge from the symbiosis of the system and players themselves. And, if properly designed, the system could be seeded with the members of the ecosystem that find their own balance.
This is why I am actually in favour of non-renewable resources. Once a city has exhausted their resources they then must decide to relocate or become better traders and hope they have something worth trading on the market. Or maybe they just invade and absorb other countries.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It would be awesome if over-hunting caused populations to plummet, forcing people to turn to farming just to get enough food to eat, leather to turn into armor or other useful materials, so on and so forth.
I would also like to see players have to eat at least twice every 24 hours. If you are offline, the matter is taken care of (unless you toggle it off yourself!) and the appropriate amount of rations/raw ingredients/foraged items are deducted from your inventory.
Wouldn't that be horrific? Log out for a month in the wilderness, come back to a skeleton....
But yes, a world where the seasons determine how easy/hard it can be to find animals/monsters/bandits, winter might drive monsters to raid villages, farms and towns with renewed frenzy to stockpile supplies if the PCs have been hunting too much, killing off the deer, goat, hare and other animals required to survive, let alone people going after plants and herbs to make potions, poultices and poisons ....
Ignoring Mines and Quarries
I remember how painstaking finding food could be in the old "Dungeon Master" game, once one got to the later levels, but I always appreciated the nod toward realism. I think something more along those lines (a food slider rather than a 2/day requisite) that's based on exertion rather than time could be one option.
The only trick would be how the harvesting of food works. Would folks need to make Survival checks to properly clean a downed animal? Profession(Farmer)/Craft(Dinner) checks to make more nutritious meals than foraging?
If the game is starting in the River Kingdoms, what kind of wildlife would we be seeing?
I'd suspect that certain amounts of the ecosystem would be abstracted the way NPC Commoners would be - not rendered at all times, but somewhere on the backend where the players might not be able to see it (without being a druid, naturally) are the numbers and statistics that would keep track of such things. One prime reason to make the area appealing to would-be immigrants would be to increase the food supplies available outside of hunting.
I keep thinking at Golarion as a place like medieval times, Exhausting resources wasn't possible for the lack of manpower and technology. Been able to completely exploit the land means that Players are much more powerful that the Environment, and going around is no piece of cake, Characters can easily turn out dead.
I would rather see a land bigger and stronger than humanoids were resources are plentiful but hard to reach. I think it will also push for cooperation
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Goblin Squad Member
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The Romans had no problem deforesting the Mediterranean.
Going back even further: "The Neolithic period saw extensive deforestation for farming land...
Evidence of deforestation has been found in Minoan Crete; for example the environs of the Palace of Knossos were severely deforested in the Bronze Age"
And that is only deforestation...
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Goblin Squad Member
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If the system is set up such that characters have to be aware and careful of not adversely affecting their environment, then I wonder what would happen if people were not being careful.
Setting aside a dedicated band of griefers just destroying the game's environment just to ruin the game, what would it mean if a faction of fifty or so people decided the best way to destroy another faction was to destroy all their resources while they were in bed? The entire faction gets on at some time where the other side is not prepared to deal with this and just torch the entire forest around them.
From the indications here, people are thinking about druids with prentative powers and maybe restoration, but nothing that could undo the level of damage a dedicated band of people can do in the terrain. Especially outside the protection of the cities.
The Romans had no problem deforesting the Mediterranean.
Going back even further: "The Neolithic period saw extensive deforestation for farming land...
Evidence of deforestation has been found in Minoan Crete; for example the environs of the Palace of Knossos were severely deforested in the Bronze Age"
And that is only deforestation...
Don't know about the neolithic (seems interesting but wikipedia reference is broken).
The romans had been probably the most long lived and organized structure of ancient times. The Mediterranean also is not the most luxuriant place in the word, Italy is mostly mountains, Spain and Greece are very dry, Egypt and Libya are on the verge of the sahara: 600 years and other strong civilizations in the area (Pharaons and Ancient Greece) even older, took a strong toll. In places like modern France and Germany, where precipitation was stronger, things were different.Crete is right an example of small environment: dry rocky island with lot of people, not unlike Easter Island, were men were stronger than the environment.
For this reason I call for a big environment, if people can conquer the land too easily the fun for adventuring is spoilt in short time
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Blazej, you've touched on another issue with a PvP and RvR style games. Differing timezones. I'm in Australia, which means my playing times rarely gel with all you fine folk in America and Europe. This makes for difficulties in protecting areas, but more importantly in a single server society, means when I play, server population is generally low.
I suspect that kingdoms will develop with their own defenses which means that not being on doesnt mean not defended. I'm not sure how they'll deal with time zone differences and play style when the end game is meant to be PvP oriented. I'd be truly interested to hear some feedback on that one.
Also, have we heard anything about how the kingdoms will build. In kingmaker itself you are sent out to tame the land by an established kingdom. Will this be how the early game starts, running errands for established safe town until you can claim a piece of land.
Also, how viable will a kingdom be if only one person is building it? Will this be more an RTS game or more a traditional role play style game, or maybe a blend of both? Is running in a guild the only real way to gain success in kingdom building and managing?
If I'm a more casual gamer (which in my case the answer is yes) then will I be just a hireling to another players kingdoms (which could be great if they're able to generate quests etc).
Is there a plan to allow big enough kingdoms to generate their own content, as some mmo games have implemented.
Is ther a function planned to generate random dungeons in kingdoms for exploration?
Will PvP looting be in the form of take the dead players loot, or will it be like Rift where the loot is randomly generated gear of appropriate levels that doesn't actually take the players gear ( a much less grief worthy option in my opinion).
Maybe those questions need to be asked elsewhere, but I'd certainly like to hear from the guys planning this on many of those points.
Cheers
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Goblin Squad Member
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You raise some good points Blazej, and I agree that resources that don't recover independently would be problematic. By the same token though, I would really like to see some sense of long term effect you know? Have trees regrow and animals replenish themselves, but let it be slow enough to notice and perhaps work around through other areas.
Furthermore, doing such widescale damage should take a lot of effort from a lot of people over a lot of time. An army popping on for one IRL night shouldn't do it. Regretably, this is one of those areas where something sacrificed for playability [real darkness] could be handy. Maybe attempting to harvest/damage resources at night should have significantly reduced returns to simulate this? (Having mages around keeping light spells active would negate the effect of course.)
"Real darkness" isn't the real problem though (In fact just setting the forest on fire would likely solve some problems of speed and lighting). It is the fact that the characters vanish or become incredibly less active as soon as the player logs out.
In theory, that second faction has dozens of characters "sleeping" inside who can't be woken up (if characters are put on autopilot while logged off they will still be operating less effectively and intelligently than a player would). Compared to that, real darkness is a lot less meaningful.
Also, a reminder that real darkness isn't sacrificed for playability, but because people will be able to turn it off. In the foresting example, it would be worse because the few people on watch in the keep (assuming that they are not cheating as well) would be vastly limited in being able to see what any army is doing around their keep. (In addition, if we are defining "night" as the time most people are not able to play the game, then there will be people in the world that will be shut out of the bulk of the game play because of their time zone.)
Maybe there will be lots of rain? At least we know there are lots of rivers...
Not knowing much about realistic mining, would the geography need to include mountains, or just mineral rich hills? I'm thinking that if I want to build a stone house, I'd rather not have to travel across the country to get to sme good workable stone, then barge it back across.
Thanks for the geography/geology lesson that I'm sure will follow!
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm thinking that if I want to build a stone house, I'd rather not have to travel across the country to get to sme good workable stone, then barge it back across.
The fact that you do not want to do it shows there would be an in game demand. That players would be willing to pay caravaneers to transport their stone from the quarry to the build site. Sounds like opportunities for med-small sized mercantile guilds.
Many early empires where very protective of their resources...for the very reasons listed here. There are even theories that Royal Forests were early attempts at resource conservation; a place for the wildlife to breed and survive without the possibility of over hunting. Of course, it also insured the Royalty could go hunt in areas of plentiful game at their whim...but the conservation factors are there.
I also agree, "stealing" or "destroying" the resources of another kingdom would and should be considered at best vandalism, at worst an act of war; once again leading to end-game PvP politics/conflict.
Agreed, that does sound like a good way to haul it. Side question: what happens if a guild harvests boatloads of stone, and is halfway across the map to drop it off, and there are connection problems (with either server side or client side)?
Plus: agreed on vandalism point, so long as we leave some room for Robin Hooding!
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Goblin Squad Member
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One of the reasons I am hoping for respawning (albeit on an algorrhythm (spelling?) that dictates predator/prey/seasonal fluctuations) resources that diminish over time but are never completely 'gone'.
Given how players act, we'd end up turning the whole of the River Kingdom into a g!&!~*n open mine and living like those prisoners in the Chronicles of Riddick movie.
Trolls thinking of setting fire to the forest would A) piss off the NPC Druids/Dryads/Treants to the point of them leaving the charred remains of the forest to personally hunt the Trolls down, B) Enrage the players who make a living off harvesting the lumber, the animals of the forest and the herbs that grow there and earning themselves the deep-seated Ire and Loathing of the PC Community and C) probably earn themselves a Negative Karma score like nothing else that would hang over their head and punish them severely.
But Merchant/Consortium Guilds? Roll On~! Can you imagine Guilds making a profit hauling cargo from one end of the map to the other? Trading Convoys selling items and raw materials as they wind from village to town to logging camp to city?
Not only would it encourage PvP, but it is something players can do to stop from becoming bored with the daily grind of the game. A great chance to Roleplay, a great way to spend time with friends and the adventure is right around the corner.
{Wagon Master} "Alright! We know that there is a cave system up ahead, and it's probably crawling with Goblin-kin, so I want all you bastards to draw swords and prepare to earn your pay!"
Everyone draws weapons and readies themselves for a fight .... they round the corner .... and a Dryad is lying in the middle of the road with a broken leg.
{Wagon Master} " ...... Well! Okay, Priest, to the fore, everyone else, spread out, could be a trap!"
Dryad is healed, gratefully tells the PCs that there is an evil villain in the cave who is kidnapping pixies. PCs draw their wagons up into a circle, leave a handful of NPC guards to protect the Wagon and the Dryad, run up to the cave, kill some zombies, find another PC who is killing the local fey for their organs for an epic crafting recipe, 'Heroic' PCs 'kill' the 'Villain', collect the Pixies that are still alive and the remains of those that are not, loot the cave for what they can and go back out.
Dryad takes the remains, thanks them profusely and offers them a reward if they can find her at (Site X) later on. PCs go back to the Wagons, find a wolf has attacked and they are down an NPC Guard. Guard is revived (if possible) and the Wagon Convoy moves on again.
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Some great discussion. I hope the Devs are listening in. You want a real sandbox game, then providing the sort of environment being discussed seems almost impossible to ignore. I would love to play a hunter (not WOW hunter) but a trapper/skinner - living in the wilds mostly but coming into town to sell wears and restock.
S.
Speaking of ecosystems, what thoughts are out there re weather?
Yeah, or on combat: high winds and bows and all that.
Also, if weather were controlled in a particular way, would there be a way to track it? I'm seeing a PvP outcome where one faction consistently sends torrential rains at another faction, ruining their crops. What would that do to the ecosystem?
Probably thinking too big on that one, but that makes this dreaming up stuff stage so much fun...
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Goblinworks Founder
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Once you start talking about dynamic weather patterns you start questioning whether they will be possible to run on your average gamer PC.
Yes it is possible to create weather simulations, but is it possible when combined with acceptable graphical quality, crafting and building mechanics in addition to natural resources, flora and fauna, monsters and loot tables.
Yeah, dynamic weather is definitely lower on the totem pole than other game content, but weather that operates more along the lines of on and off is fine by me, too. Might be nice for rain or snow to come through now and then, but too bad that putting a layer of snow on the ground is probably a bit too much, especially if the passage of time means that a season comes and goes in a matter of RL weeks.
Help me out - do the river kingdoms count as a temperate zone or as a "cold" zone by Bestiary standards?
In response to the OP:
Artificial Life Engine
Starr Long, the game's associate producer, explained in 1996:
Nearly everything in the world, from grass to goblins, has a purpose, and not just as cannon fodder either. The 'virtual ecology' affects nearly every aspect of the game world, from the very small to the very large. If the rabbit population suddenly drops (because some gung-ho adventurer was trying out his new mace) then wolves may have to find different food sources (e.g., deer). When the deer population drops as a result, the local dragon, unable to find the food he’s accustomed to, may head into a local village and attack. Since all of this happens automatically, it generates numerous adventure possibilities.
However, this feature never made it beyond the game's beta stage. As Richard Garriott explained:
We thought it was fantastic. We'd spent an enormous amount of time and effort on it. But what happened was all the players went in and just killed everything; so fast that the game couldn't spawn them fast enough to make the simulation even begin. And so, this thing that we'd spent all this time on, literally no-one ever noticed – ever – and we eventually just ripped it out of the game, you know, with some sadness.[11]
It's been attempted before (way back in 1996, at that). The question is whether you can build an expansive enough world that it will work. Ultima Online is the original sandbox MMO, and they didn't.
It's also worth pointing out that World of Warcraft has a very primitive version of this, where wolves and other red-named predator mobs will attack and kill any yellow-named critter mob nearby.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It's been attempted before (way back in 1996, at that). The question is whether you can build an expansive enough world that it will work. Ultima Online is the original sandbox MMO, and they didn't.
It's also worth pointing out that World of Warcraft has a very primitive version of this, where wolves and other red-named predator mobs will attack and kill any yellow-named critter mob nearby.
WoW's version was all but pointless except for a very small amount of flavor involved, but it was something that was seen once and promptly ignored. As far as implementing something like UO's original idea, I wouldn't mind seeing it tried again. Maybe with a larger replenishing supply of rabbits. Maybe have the rabbits slowly dwindle down to nothing. And then start the chain from there.
I'm not any sort of programming wizard, but UO's failure for this system was 15 years ago. I'm willing to be there's some sort of solution possible now. Whether or not it would be easy to implement, or something that players would enjoy for that matter, is another thing entirely.