Goblin Squad Member
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A lot of votes have been cast without people clearly understanding what they are voting for. Many people don't know that ranger companions and familiars are considered pets, or that major dieties such as Sarenrae and Torag will be left out.
I have seen a lot of "I'm changing my vote" posts after people understand that. But the current crowdforger already contains nearly a thousand votes. A large portion of which don't understand that we aren't talking about cosmetic fluff like WoW's pet system, and dieties will have a meaningful mechanical effect on this game.
Personally I believe you need to re-open the poll with an OP stating the features included in each category for sure. People need to know:
• Which gods will be included on release?
• What building, items, cleric powers etc. are currently being left out?
• What is considered a pet? Companion? Familiars? Henchman? Pack-mules?
• How does fast travel work?
• What kind of mounts will there be? Horses? Dogs? Wagons? Griffons???
• Do mounts include mounted combat?
Any vote people cast without some understanding of the issue is meaningless. So lets go back to square one and give them some understanding.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So what you're saying is that the needs of one class, outweigh the convenience of all?
As you said, we don't have all the details of what they mean by "mounts" or "pets", but you objection is solely based on your narrow view point.
I personally couldn't care less which one is put in first or second. I doubt I would have a pet, nor would I travel (fast travel) very often. But, a horse might be nice, and does not prohibit exploration.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I can't for the life of me figure out, where Andius said this.So what you're saying is that the needs of one class, outweigh the convenience of all?
Neither can I. I think my comment about pack mules (As well as guard dogs and henchman) establish a pure non-class based use for a pet system.
And between companions and familiars aren't there at least four core classes that can use pets?
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Goblin Squad Member
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As you said, we don't have all the details of what they mean by "mounts" or "pets", but you objection is solely based on your narrow view point.
Actually... You're wrong. I do know the answers to most of the questions given in my OP. Lee Hammock has answered most of them. It was just buried on the 2nd page of the crowd-forger instead of in the original post where it should have been.
So a lot of people like you never knew it was there to read it.
Creating an area for Crowdforging questions would give people a single place to debate the question without having to go through the forums finding individual posts like was happening after this last poll went up. I think that's one benefit that will come from them redoing the format the polls were using.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I have a lot of sympathy for the deity cause, especially given my own deity (Sarenrae) is not on the list.
I am planning to go mechanically agnostic and RP my devotion to Sarenrae until her inclusion in game but still I don't want to be stuck doing that very long.
If dieties pull very far past mounts in the new poll I'll probably vote for them instead. I'd rather have pets but either are more important to me than mounts early on.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Could you be so kind as to link the discussion you've mentioned? I'm curious as to the list of gods.
I would love to grab a quote/link for you but this happened on the 2nd page of the currently hidden "Crowdforger #2" topic so that isn't possible atm. Unless someone has that quote saved somewhere.
I know there were 9 god, and I think it was one per alignment. The one I remember are Ioemedae, Desna, Abadar, and Asmodeous.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'd definitely put Pharasma in the TN slot. Druids don't have to name a patron, anyway.
I think 'mounts' and 'fast travel' are two separate issues from a game design perspective, though they share animations. Mounts are a subset of the pet system, one that could be a class feature to some and a mundane horse to others.
Anyway, I voted 'pets' because I'm very skeptical of the utility of an automated fast-travel system. If it's just a path-scripted horse like in LotRO, except that you can be attacked while on it, then you're just setting people up to be ambushed at predictable points. How is that a convenience? It's not even an opportunity to run to the bathroom while your character rides; it's too dangerous.
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I basically want them to swap half the deity choices they've made. :P
Edit: Here's a better Crowdforging poll: List the deities you want included first (one per alignment). The ones listed most win.
+1
This is in line with the first crowdforging vote on races, as it keeps all choices to the same type of feature.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The more fundemental issue, as Andius pointed out, is that Crowdforging becomes meaningless when there isn't a clear and explicit outlay of what people are voting on and what each selection actualy means. Not to get too political but it's kinda like being asked to vote on a bill without being given the opportunity to read what's actualy in the bill.
I would suggest that, in future, all crowd-forging polls start out with a very clear and detailed Dev explanation of what is actualy being voted on and what each selection specificaly means as the first post, pinned to the top of the thread.
I would also suggest that if there are any further clarifications provided by Dev's later on in the thread, that the initial post be edited to include that clarification along with the date on which it was made.
That way people fully understand what the ramifications are of their vote.
I understand that this does entail a bit of extra leg-work for the Dev's, however since Crowd-Forging poll's directly effect the priority of Development items, they are more serious items then other threads and therefore deserving of the extra leg-work. YMMV.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I basically want them to swap half the deity choices they've made. :P
Edit: Here's a better Crowdforging poll: List the deities you want included first (one per alignment). The ones listed most win.
+1
This is in line with the first crowdforging vote on races, as it keeps all choices to the same type of feature.
I was actually thinking about how they should do this instead of just implement the 9 they chose. They could pick the most popular of each of the nine alignments from the poll (staying sensitive to the clerics who should have the option of choosing all 9 alignments)
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Goblin Squad Member
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I was actually thinking about how they should do this instead of just implement the 9 they chose. They could pick the most popular of each of the nine alignments from the poll (staying sensitive to the clerics who should have the option of choosing all 9 alignments)
Since they'll have a new subforum dedicated to crowdforging, they could just have 9 polls (one per alignment) stickied.
I agree, there was barely any info included in the poll. How will fast travel/mounts work? What gods are they referring to? What kind of pets? If these can be answered then it would make voting a lot easier. I realize that GW are still in the pre-alpha stage but I would hope they have already covered these things in their meetings at least.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I was actually thinking about how they should do this instead of just implement the 9 they chose. They could pick the most popular of each of the nine alignments from the poll (staying sensitive to the clerics who should have the option of choosing all 9 alignments)Since they'll have a new subforum dedicated to crowdforging, they could just have 9 polls (one per alignment) stickied.
Ooo very true. I like this better!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Frankly, I think these polls should be dismissed and forgotten entirely. These are major game features, their inclusion or exclusion from the game should be decided by the consistent vision of a competent game designer, not by the vote of random fans. I know Goblinworks promised inclusion in the game design process for backers of the kickstarter, but this is going too far. These are not the decisions that us ignorant masses should be making. Especially when coupled with vaguely defined and poorly grouped together subjects of vote.
Personally, I don't think any of these features should be excluded, with the exception of maybe fast travel, too bad it's mindlessly grouped together with mounts. These are all features that are part of the core Pathfinder game and setting. I would rather wait an extra year for the game to come out then to see it come out trimmed down to another muddled indistinct fantasy MMO.
The same thing goes for the races in the first poll, excluding any of the core races is pretty much unacceptable. Were they seriously initially planning on only having humans, elves, and dwarves at launch? You know what else has humans, elves, and dwarves? Every fantasy MMO ever made. That poll shouldn't have been to decide on an extra core race, those should all be a given. If anything it should have been to decide an extra uncommon race to add, like, say, goblins.
So, yeah, these polls leave a sour taste in my mouth. I think Goblinworks needs to put a lot more thought into it before posting any more polls about the game. We collectively gave Goblinworks over a million dollars to help them make this game the best it can be. Yet, almost in the same instant that they take our money from us, they reveal that they're planning to leave huge chunks of the game we paid for out. Not cool.
(Wow, that was quite a rant. Might be I should have put this in a different thread...)
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Elorebaen, I'm aware that that's the plan, however, it's not that simple. Adding entirely new features post-launch that were not build into the core of the game is very difficult. It could take years just to get all the core races, let alone a decent animal companion system. Not to mention that in a player-driven world with a virtual economy any changes made will have a huge impact on the world and probably make a lot of people upset. This will in turn probably cause Goblinworks to approach major changes cautiously, and try to make them as low-impact as possible, which means watered down and incomplete.
This has all been seen time and time again in MMOs. DDO for example, in some ways this game's predecessor, took some 5 years just to implement monks, and longer still to implement unsatisfying watered down druids. EVE, similarly, has barely changed since launch, aside from just adding more of the same and a unsatisfying character creation update transparently designed to make money through micro transactions. To add the major features that people were asking for they're having to create a whole other game. Which, to be fair, is a neat idea, but still reinforces my point.
Obviously, I'm assuming that these non-prioritized features will be added post-launch, and if I'm wrong then good, I'm happy. However, I've seen little evidence that I'm wrong, and the very idea of having polls to prioritize features if they'll all be in at launch is kind of silly. Although, it would affect things for beta testers and early enrollments I suppose.
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Goblin Squad Member
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As Elorebaen mentioned, I think alot of people are forgetting that all the items up for vote in Poll #2 WILL be in the game come release.
And another point to keep in mind as well for anyone participating in further votes on Crowdforger topics is that when early enrollment starts it is effectively still a "Beta Test", meaning no matter what even though those in on that will be TESTING the game more then playing it for the sake of fun.
Yes, Crowdforging theoretically allows me a chance to see what I want in Pathfinder Online, but I think we have to think of the collective whole of the game first before ourselves, otherwise we run the risk of having a sandbox with far little sand in one part of the box. And I think we can all agree that'd be a pretty lame box of sand.