Goblinworks Blog: Where the Wild Things Are


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Goblin Squad Member

Buri wrote:
A big potential downfall to locking instances is that if the player dies IRL, quits the game, doesn't go through the instance because it's too hard or something they don't enjoy (a thief type dungeon versus a hack and slash maybe??) then that's a wasted instance, for intents and purposes. Either of those is likely to happen as we're all human and have our own quirks.

I have my own apprehentions about the topic, though we do also need to shake some ideas from WoW and other theme parks. It isn't like there is going to be 1 level 15-20 dungeon in existance and once that is locked that is it. In addition dungeons themselves de-spawn and new ones respawn.

Now as far as multiple locking. Now as far as locking etc... it widely depends on how many there are, how hard to find they are etc... The rarer + harder to find they are, the more obnoxious and unfair locking can be, and the more likely that groups will start massive undertakings to keep others from getting to them, to have a solid monopoly on dungeon exclusive materials and drive the prices to the moon, anyone familliar with goonswarms antics in eve can picture something like this occouring.

Now when we move the slider the other direction, and make dungeons common and easy to find... Well now what's the justification for the locking system at all. If a team of 5 by splitting up can find 3 dungeons in an hour, what motive is there for ensuring that they can reserve more then 1 dungeon each There is little reason they can't, but there is also almost no reason for them to do so.

Goblin Squad Member

Buri wrote:
big potential downfall to locking instances is that if the player dies IRL, quits the game, doesn't go through the instance because it's too hard or something they don't enjoy (a thief type dungeon versus a hack and slash maybe??) then that's a wasted instance, for intents and purposes.

It won't stay locked forever.

From the blog:

Quote:
If nobody finds the entrance, or none of the people who find it enter it, the entrance will be removed from the game world after a fairly short period of time, and it will respawn elsewhere. If the dungeon is entered, it will remain in the game world a longer period of time.

It'll stick around longer if you lock it, but not forever.

Also:

Quote:
As you find and explore theme park content you should have the sense that you're accomplishing something meaningful. And there should be enough of it that everyone who wants to can engage with it.

Goblin Squad Member

@Nihimon

To be clear, my grievance is with the profiteering of Quest-associated dungeons. Type 2 in the blog, which from what I read is the only player-associated lockable dungeon.

Directly related to dungeons is loot.

This is an area that needs some TLC. I don't want a flaming bastard sword +3 with 2d6 fire damage. Nor do I want the really good / great armor to be so accessable 1 in 5 players of a given class have it. Really good equipment should have a history. Aegis Fang, Icingdeath, Creshinboon, Twinkle, Charion's Claw. These are all unique items that have history attached to them and they don't come off an assembly line.

Can I see two flaming longswords? Sure. Can a see a Castle's Royal Guard all having them? Sure. Can I see every fighter of a given level running around with it because not only does it look cool, it's the best, most accessable weapon? No.

Paizo has created a huge world with lots of potential. Giving the backstory to a truely unique weapon is something that is deserved.

With that, you shouldn't be looking for a new weapon every 3 to 4 levels or whatever the equivilant will be. Equipment should stick with you for a while. Swapping out most of your equipment more than three times in the life of a character without good reason, ie lost, broken, or significant improvement, shouldn't be necessary. Your skills should be what improves your combat proficientcy, not swapping breastplates every 3 levels.

Of course there could be certain exceptions... robes, bracers, rings, things that it makes sense to have multiple small interchangable items that are swapped depending on the situation. Bruenor had the same broken helm until he died... the only time he wore something else was when he was King. That helm had seen him through battles and probably took a blow that was meant for his head. Unique equipment should be unique enough to stick with a character. I don't think this is an impossible task.

Goblin Squad Member

Obakararuir wrote:


This is an area that needs some TLC. I don't want a flaming bastard sword +3 with 2d6 fire damage. Nor do I want the really good / great armor to be so accessable 1 in 5 players of a given class have it. Really good equipment should have a history. Aegis Fang, Icingdeath, Creshinboon, Twinkle, Charion's Claw. These are all unique items that have history attached to them and they don't come off an assembly line.

IMO this is half way covered anyway. Dungeons themselves aren't consistant, IE there can't be a guide saying "OK run dungeon X to get item Y" will never exist, because every dungeon is a huge variant.

Now on the other hand I do point out, overall I am against fully completed items dropping at all. Having everything in assembely required form, eliminates all of the mess that non-defined classes creates. IE the same items being able to make dozens of different things, keeps everyone on an even playing field, and eliminates the issue of "well Jim is a generalist paladin rogue, wizard and monk, so he gets the sword, the shield, the dagger and the gloves, and Joe the cleric specialist only gets the healing wand". When instead of dropping a flaming sword, it drops a crystal of flame that can be mixed into a crafting recepie that can make a flaming sword, or a flaming dagger, or fire guard armor, or robes etc... Now everything is equally fair game for every character, and generalists do not have a huge looting advantage over specialists.

Goblin Squad Member

Obakararuir wrote:
... my grievance is with the profiteering of Quest-associated dungeons. Type 2 in the blog, which from what I read is the only player-associated lockable dungeon.

I was referring to Type 1 Dungeons when I expressed a desire that players would be able to discover them, and then "sell" them by leading others to them. I actually think this is inevitable, based on the blog.

But I don't really expect Dungeons to be such a source of high-end gear.

Obakararuir wrote:
Your skills should be what improves your combat proficientcy, not swapping breastplates every 3 levels.

I couldn't agree more. I feel exactly the same way.

Goblin Squad Member

I like what Obakarruir is saying.

If you want to make money leading people to instances, ok. It's not the profiteering, but the artificial calling dibs that seems off. If you discover a dungeon, you should also have to successfully be the first to lead a client there to earn your bread.

From there, of course locking makes sense to avoid griefing. But before that, it's too akin for my tastes to bribing government officials for unfair advantages in what is supposed to be a fair marketplace.

Goblin Squad Member

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Here's what will happen if there's no control over who has access to a dungeon.

At midnight GMT, a team of highly trained Rangers will spread out in a hex. They'll be coordinated via voice comms, and will have been exploring this hex for months so they know exactly how to move through it to cover the entire space in the minimum amount of time.

They will find every dungeon in the hex.

Shortly afterwards, teams of highly skilled adventurers will be dispatched to each dungeon. They will proceed through the dungeons quickly, having done so many of them that it has become virtually rote to clear them. They'll leave just enough content in the dungeon to keep it from despawning. When they finish one, they'll move to the next.

They'll clear every dungeon in the hex.

Now it's eight hours later, the rest of the world starts to wake up. As the day progresses, more and more people log in. By the time work/school ends and dinner is finished, the game starts to reach peak concurrency.

Everyone else in that hex finds mostly empty dungeons. Many of them discover bands of assassins waiting near the dungeon entrances, ready to gank anyone who comes exploring.

Swiftly, the players decide "dungeons are pointless", and they cease playing characters who do dungeons for fun. So a very small number of players, maybe less than 100 per hex, have ruined an entire type of content, and a huge amount of gameplay potential, for everyone else.

What's fun about that?

RyanD


Wow...MMOpocalypse. That situation sounds like every casual gamer's worst nightmare, and I have to admit that you just switched my opinion on this issue. What you described sounds like no fun at all.

Silver Crusade Goblin Squad Member

Ryan Dancey wrote:

Here's what will happen if there's no control over who has access to a dungeon.

At midnight GMT, a team of highly trained Rangers will spread out in a hex. They'll be coordinated via voice comms, and will have been exploring this hex for months so they know exactly how to move through it to cover the entire space in the minimum amount of time.

They will find every dungeon in the hex.

Shortly afterwards, teams of highly skilled adventurers will be dispatched to each dungeon. They will proceed through the dungeons quickly, having done so many of them that it has become virtually rote to clear them. They'll leave just enough content in the dungeon to keep it from despawning. When they finish one, they'll move to the next.

They'll clear every dungeon in the hex.

Now it's eight hours later, the rest of the world starts to wake up. As the day progresses, more and more people log in. By the time work/school ends and dinner is finished, the game starts to reach peak concurrency.

Everyone else in that hex finds mostly empty dungeons. Many of them discover bands of assassins waiting near the dungeon entrances, ready to gank anyone who comes exploring.

Swiftly, the players decide "dungeons are pointless", and they cease playing characters who do dungeons for fun. So a very small number of players, maybe less than 100 per hex, have ruined an entire type of content, and a huge amount of gameplay potential, for everyone else.

What's fun about that?

RyanD

That sounds like a problem. But how does locking a dungeon stop that from happening? In this case, they could spread out, lock it, and then have their friends clear em out in the evening. It seems that locking a dungeon would make the situation *worse*, requiring only a dedicated team of "lockers" to be up in the wee hours of the morning.

I'm not trying to be combative, but I just don't see how Dungeon Locking solves that problem.

Goblin Squad Member

Alexander_Damocles wrote:


That sounds like a problem. But how does locking a dungeon stop that from happening? In this case, they could spread out, lock it, and then have their friends clear em out in the evening. It seems that locking a dungeon would make the situation *worse*, requiring only a dedicated team of "lockers" to be up in the wee hours of the morning.

I'm not trying to be combative, but I just don't see how Dungeon Locking solves that problem.

Well I'm thinking in this case, They could be implying that dungeon locking may not be a particularly long term process? Potentially a despawn time that is fairly short? Dungeon spawning times that are intentionally scattered throughout the day? IE even if the dungeons were all cleared simultaniously, say 1 to spawn every half hour in a hex, and perhaps a shorter despawn time for anything other then a 100% cleared dungeon? Say 3 hours (1 hour to get a group and reach, 2 to clear). Uninitiated dungeons despawn every 3 hours.

These are just guesses on my part, any better clues on your plans to prevent the issues you mentioned Ryan?

Goblin Squad Member

Alexander_Damocles wrote:
But how does locking a dungeon stop that from happening?

For one thing, all the dungeons will be locked to the groups that cleared them, so that their entrances won't even be visible to other players.

Goblin Squad Member

Alexander_Damocles wrote:


That sounds like a problem. But how does locking a dungeon stop that from happening?

There has to be a lot of randomness in the timers as well.

The respawn times have to be random. The lock times have to be random. That way, its nearly impossible to get all the dungeons coming active at the same time every day - even if you try to "groom" them as a team.

The lock times have to be fairly short (at least the "sneak & peek" lock where you just stick your head in a dungeon and then leave). That will make it hard for one team to find AND clear all the dungeons without a huge number of participants. I have no idea how many dungeons would be in a hex, but if it is a small enough number that one organized group of a couple of dozen people can control, they will.

I am imagining a system where the longer you spend clearing a dungeon, the longer it stays locked to you. That rewards people who are actually playing through the content, not just trying to farm bookmarks and become gatekeepers of information. Then there would be a narrow "waist" where as you get close to completion, the respawn timer gets shorter, so you can't clear almost the whole thing, and then leave it so that it doesn't respawn for a long time. Finally, once you clear the dungeon (however that is determined) you get a series of locks based on the last time you visited, so that if it takes you a long time to haul out all the resources and treasure you'll be able to do so without fear that the dungeon will despawn - but you'll have to be actively visiting to keep that lock in place; you can't just leave it to be looted and go away for a week.

The actual timers have to be randomized, and the length concealed from the players. That introduces enough variance and uncertainty to keep people from gaming the timers.

Ideally you want dungeons to be appearing and disappearing all over the place constantly so that it's almost impossible for any one team to cover the hex with a blanket of control. Of course some of them will be more "permanent" in the sense that they'll persist across days of time and will become increasingly more dangerous to visit (because of PvP) as time goes on. Nothing attracts killers like a crowd. :)

RyanD


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This sounds pretty amazing, the best of both worlds of theme park and sand box content. Sounds like exploration is going to be a lot of fun.

Really looking forward to seeing all of this in action, although we're obviously far off that point. My main worry for this game isn't related to the design blogs, as all of the plans sound great, but rather the game itself failing to deliver what is being discussed, or even not making it to release at all.

Hoping we get a developer blog on middleware and technology in not too long. (And on that note, that HeroEngine isn't being used)

Goblin Squad Member

Ryan Dancey wrote:

There has to be a lot of randomness in the timers as well.

The respawn times have to be random. The lock times have to be random. That way, its nearly impossible to get all the dungeons coming active at the same time every day - even if you try to "groom" them as a team.

Ryan, that's an interesting dynamic will thier be some sort of "Meta-effect" on the type & scale of content spawned in dungeons (or perhaps the amount/frequency of dungeons with spawn) over time if players are consistantly being successfull in clearing out dungeons in a hex, or vice versa...if they are consistantly failing to do so...to represent the hex is getting "cleared/tamed" or conversely "growing wilder and more dangerous"?

It strikes me as it would be a cool dynamic to try to push players further and further away from civilization to find more advanced (and potentialy rewarding) dungeons....while those that were getting cleared on a regular basis got less challanging in terms of content (and less rewarding) and essentialy became places that were only worthwhile for lower level adventuring parties to visit with any frequency... functioning to sorta "maintain" the threat level in a hex and keep it from backsliding... while higher level teams were continualy being pushed to "explore the frontier" so to speak, in search of rewarding dungeons?

Goblin Squad Member

I like that system, though the idea of not knowing how long one can wait could be frustrating. I think implying the time remaining in a description of the dungeon would be useful without allowing abuse.

"The ruin is pristine, almost as if no time has passed." (Two to five days)

"The cave is highly unstable. There is rubble near the entrance." (Less than an hour)

"The lair shows signs of recent use, but there are tracks that show creatures coming and going. In time they may move on again." (Two or three hours)

...something like that.

Goblin Squad Member

At any rate, I hope the sneak&peek timer is long enough to get to town and gather some people to explore it. It would be frustrating to have to have a group before you head out to look for dungeons since they'll be so random.

Goblin Squad Member

Ryan Dancey wrote:

Here's what will happen if there's no control over who has access to a dungeon.

At midnight GMT, a team of highly trained Rangers will spread out in a hex. They'll be coordinated via voice comms, and will have been exploring this hex for months so they know exactly how to move through it to cover the entire space in the minimum amount of time.

They will find every dungeon in the hex.

Shortly afterwards, teams of highly skilled adventurers will be dispatched to each dungeon. They will proceed through the dungeons quickly, having done so many of them that it has become virtually rote to clear them. They'll leave just enough content in the dungeon to keep it from despawning. When they finish one, they'll move to the next.

They'll clear every dungeon in the hex.

Now it's eight hours later, the rest of the world starts to wake up. As the day progresses, more and more people log in. By the time work/school ends and dinner is finished, the game starts to reach peak concurrency.

Everyone else in that hex finds mostly empty dungeons. Many of them discover bands of assassins waiting near the dungeon entrances, ready to gank anyone who comes exploring.

Swiftly, the players decide "dungeons are pointless", and they cease playing characters who do dungeons for fun. So a very small number of players, maybe less than 100 per hex, have ruined an entire type of content, and a huge amount of gameplay potential, for everyone else.

What's fun about that?

RyanD

Psh, assassins wont be waiting at the dungeon - they'll follow the explorers there. Unless of course you're using the word "assassin" as someone who just kills whoever for fun, but that would be a misnomer in that case. With or without a dungeon, assassins are opportunists. They'll rely on whatever form of stealth is available to them to pick the worst possible time for you and the best possible time for them to begin fighting. No matter what system, or rules you introduce, they will find the optimum way to do their job.

Goblin Squad Member

I cannot wait for this game. PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEASE!

Also, I do like the idea of random instances.

Something that irritates the hell out of me with most MMOs is that, by making the fights 'rote', with every mob in the instances being able to have their abilities mapped out and players fighting almost by rote with each 'dungeon run', the game actually becomes either a chore or ridiculously easy.

I know, as a Warrior Tank, I run in, hit rend, hit thunderclap, hit shockwave, hit cleave, then start spamming devastate and Revenge every time it pops up, swapping targets to keep the aggro up and hitting thunderclap often to keep Rend up and keep the damage ticking over.

And yes, I am an Orc X-P.

What I see, when I read the Blog, is 'Dungeons' that fit with the local terrain and the current 'crop' of monsters spawning there. AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, it will never be running the same damn Instance/Dungeon with the same damn mobs and the same damn drops over and over and over again.

May I just slip in, please, no badges. Please. Player Made or Looted Items, possibly with an 'Item Modifier' thrown in somewhere so Players can tailor their appearance.

Throwing another bit of WoW in here, do people honestly think Blizzard is not watching the Transmogrification system to see what sets people are using the most? Which 'season' or 'expansion' or 'patch' of gear the majority of their players are using?
I expect to see that turn around into 1) Blizzard just doesn't care anymore, let players use older gear to look cool, they don't have to do the hard work anymore or 2) Blizzard will use that data to produce gear that has the latest Expansion's 'theme' but also appeals to the aesthetics of the largest number of Players, leaving the Transmog system open for those who prefer something different.

A Hex mostly dominated by wild animals? Cave full of mostly animals, maybe Druids (whom you may or may not have to fight) and possibly a few animal-themed monsters.

A Hex dominated by Goblinoids? Abandoned Dwarven ruin brimming with ancient-but-still-dangerous traps, Goblins, Worgs and a small cadre of Hobgoblins in charge of it all.

A Hex dominated by Players? A mine, loaded with Bandits and Thieves, or a sinister Cult, or Were-Rats!

That's something that I don't think people have twigged to yet. Even if a Hex becomes 'colonised', there is no reason why the Instances will stop spawning, they will simply change their tune and adapt to the current environment.

Actually, Mr Dancey, question:

Assuming my Character finds an area that will often spawn a Dungeon or 'Dungeon Cluster', would my Character be permitted to build a Tavern there to provide a safe haven and/or place to sell treasure for adventurers?

Would I also be facing 'invasions' from the inhabitants if the Players don't come and clear out the instance every week or so?

Or does the presence of a Building nearby or 'Hideout' cause a buffer zone where Instance 'Gates' will not spawn?

Goblin Squad Member

HalfOrcHeavyMetal wrote:


Assuming my Character finds an area that will often spawn a Dungeon or 'Dungeon Cluster', would my Character be permitted to build a Tavern there to provide a safe haven and/or place to sell treasure for adventurers?

The locations where Inns will be buildable will be plentiful, but they're not going to be so dense that you'll find an Inn every 10 feet. The "wilder" a Hex is, the fewer Inn construction spots you'll find. The details are to be left to future design work.

Quote:
Would I also be facing 'invasions' from the inhabitants if the Players don't come and clear out the instance every week or so?

If you have a structure built in a Hex that's not keeping Encampments under control, or letting big Dungeons spawn wandering monsters, the chances are excellent that your Inn will get attacked. What you do about that is up to you.

RyanD

Goblin Squad Member

Ryan Dancey wrote:

If you have a structure built in a Hex that's not keeping Encampments under control, or letting big Dungeons spawn wandering monsters, the chances are excellent that your Inn will get attacked. What you do about that is up to you.

RyanD

So it's pretty much a matter of finding the right balance of distance from known cluster to get optimal safety and benefit for potential explorers.

Or else...Blaeringr introduces a new concept: public hideouts! Yes, you heard me, hideouts built smack in the middle of dungeon clusters and upgraded to support optimal stealth, and manned by a merchant to meet all your short range supply needs. Of course by "public" I don't mean completely public. The general location will be told to prospective clients, and after negotiations are final, the exact location will be given and revealed. Not just a place for supplies, but a safe place to log out between adventures!

Goblin Squad Member

A point that I don't think has been discussed, yet that I find very important, is immersion. Will these dungeon entrances be just popping in and out of existence? That is one of the biggest immersion breakers for me in games like WoW or Rift when enemies respawn, appearing out of thin air. I have a suggestion to handle such a thing for the dungeon entrances as well as monster spawns.

Let's use a dungeon that is, say, a cave in the side of a mountain for example. It could appear in the game world with a few rocks being rolled out of the way, tumbling away from the opening and being quickly followed by a handful of the dungeon's vicious denizens that spill out into the world around the entrance. At the end of the dungeon, after killing the last "boss" creature of the dungeon, the tunnel begins to shake. The party makes a mad dash for the entrance, avoiding falling stalactites and rocks. They jump out into the open world just as the tunnel behind them collapses, kicking up a blinding cloud of dust. As the cloud clears, the opening has disappeared, and only the rocky mountainside remains.

Obviously, this would be far superior to having things just fading in and out, and the same thing can be applied to monster spawns. Perhaps have them spawn in some bush and walk casually out much to the surprise of the harvester foraging for berries and hunting for game. Or in a camp, have a bandit crawl out from a tent, stretching as he begins his patrol around the area. Tiny things like that can make or break a game for immersion, the small details that you don't quite notice until they are missing, or are very much noticed and praised when they are present.

Just some ideas. Very excited about what has been described so far, hoping it can be everything you are planning. :)

Goblin Squad Member

Dalan Breos wrote:


Let's use a dungeon that is, say, a cave in the side of a mountain for example. It could appear in the game world with a few rocks being rolled out of the way, tumbling away from the opening and being quickly followed by a handful of the dungeon's vicious denizens that spill out into the world around the entrance. At the end of the dungeon, after killing the last "boss" creature of the dungeon, the tunnel begins to shake. The party makes a mad dash for the entrance, avoiding falling stalactites and rocks. They jump out into the open world just as the tunnel behind them collapses, kicking up a blinding cloud of dust. As the cloud clears, the opening has disappeared, and only the rocky mountainside remains.

The collapse after the boss I find highly unlikely to happen due to one major detail in the description of dungeons from the blog

"blog wrote:
If the final challenge is overcome, the dungeon will be removed after a short interval (giving you time to make several trips to and from the dungeon to haul out the loot within).

It becomes a bit tricky to do the dramatic run out, then a run back in with wagons to pick up the piles of goods within.

At least from several descriptions of dungeons

blog wrote:
Ruins, lairs and caverns: These are the classic set-piece adventuring experiences of many tabletop games. Call them "dungeons" for the sake of discussion. You will find these areas using abilities; once located they'll spawn on the map and be findable by anyone who travels to the correct location

Now ignoring the clear contradiction that has come from the 2nd quote being a far earlier blog, (I am guessing some internal discussions between that blog and the more recent one that lead to the locking system), It sounds to me like they will be abilities that find the dungeons. IE when the dungeon is added, it is completely invisible, but a character with the skills to find it, will likely dig a small hole into the rocks or something along those lines to uncover a previously non existant enterence. With this system there is also no chance of a player actually being present to see a dungeon spawn, as you have no idea if you just missed it on your last pass, or it spawned 2 seconds ago.

Either way though, the odds of a player being at the scene when a dungeon spawns, is extremely minute. The planned size of PFO's world is extremely large and vast (by current plans we are looking at roughly double the area that WoW's world is for when the game has only 4500 players, they intend to increase the size of the world as the number of players grows), and the majority of dungeons will be spawning far from civilization.

Goblin Squad Member

Ok, fair enough. It is unlikely that the player will be around for a dungeon spawn, but not impossible. The same applies to the creature camps. I simply do not want to see things spawning on my head as I am out adventuring. I am sure there is a simple and effective way around that though. Likely, that solution will be just as you said, the decreased chance of it happening due to the size of the world and the lower number of people in it.

Onishi said wrote:

It becomes a bit tricky to do the dramatic run out, then a run back in with wagons to pick up the piles of goods within.

At least from several descriptions of dungeons

That can still use my idea, though not after killing the final boss, or maybe have it delayed longer. As you are hauling out loot on many trips, the tunnel begins to shake. The more it shakes, the less time you have to finish looting. Finally, when the dungeon is ready to be removed, the tunnel collapses. It would give a sense of urgency to the looting, making the party prioritize on what they need to get out first, and maybe even giving a fun event at the end after the fighting is all done.

As I said, these are all just ideas. They are meant to be taken or left as the designers see fit. I would just like to see a reason of why we can't just return a week later to finish looting other than game mechanics. Give a reason why the dungeon is gone that makes sense for the setting.

Goblinworks Executive Founder

I can just see the mountains after a few weeks: All of the collapsing tunnels have leveled the once-mighty peaks, and the spoil from digging out all those tunnels chokes out the forest.


Skwiziks wrote:
Ryan Dancey wrote:
There's a third kind of dungeon, the largest and most challenging type. These are often designed to have several different entrances, each of which could be discovered by a different character, and shared by several parties. While exploring this kind of dungeon, you may very well encounter other characters! Fight, parlay, flee, or join forces—the results are up to you. Challenges in these dungeons may even require coordination between groups to complete—one party might have to fight through a room of undead to lower a magical barrier so that another party can access a different part of the dungeon.

It's at this point that I jump for joy.

In other news, it seems like everyone will need to be somewhat proficient at combat, as danger can find you anywhere. I'm okay with this.

I agree with everything you just said. I love the idea of bumping into other adventurers.

Goblin Squad Member

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I very much agree with what Ryan has been saying in this thread.

To offer an example from my own experience, I spent a good amount of time playing Neverwinter Nights on quite a hardcore Persistent World server. Dungeons there spawned somewhat randomly and took a few hours to respawn, this included chests etc and generally made dungeons appear like one would expect in maybe Diablo following completion; ransacked. Despite the obvious casual gamer response of 'why am I waiting to play the game?', this occurrence really seemed to supplement gameplay as it gave a natural period of hiatus in which I could focus on other things, that or simply spend the time finding an 'active' dungeon. Such irregularity also hindered the 'villains' of the server from attempting to grief players as dungeons were occupied by players so irregularly.

In my own personal opinion, this gave the world a true organic feeling in that the world did not simply contain spawn points to which could be farmed. Experience was something you did not take for granted and upon stumbling across a natural spawn or build up of monsters, you would jump at the opportunity to get your friends together and face any risk in getting that experience. Experience was in essence no different than any other resource and was not readily available; you mine when resources are abundant, you trade when prices are high, you slay when monsters are abound. I generally did not go looking for adventure in Neverwinter Nights as it was dangerous to do so alone and I was not guaranteed ever finding one. Instead, a player would perhaps come by and shout that goblins had come to occupy a cavern north of town and a band of us would join together to go sort it out; guaranteed both safeties in numbers and the opportunity to get our experience up.

I can only hope that this vision remains true and that 'looking' for a fight is more the order of the day that 'deciding' to go farm something for a few hours. That's how people get bored and move on. Organic and random spawning of monsters plays heavily into the social interaction and quality of social interaction and shouldn't be simply painted over with static, permanent spawns. Encounters ultimately become more sparse but the rewards and experience far more rewarding than your typical MMORPG, and unique instead of the monotony of hitting a static dungeon. Each location and enemy became a mini story and combat and risk ultimately felt more meaningful.

I'm rambling...get what I mean? lol

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