What am I missing?


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Goblin Squad Member

Would it possible if one day a week there was a time when EVERY POI PvP window was open? Might provide some interesting content?

Goblin Squad Member

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I think a reminder is a good thing given the OP Q:-

Dissenting voices are more valuable than those of yes-men. Better to identify issues than to stay silent and hope it all works out for the best. :)
My major issue with the "game" part is that if we are to be expected to pay for early enrollment, it needs to be exceptionally good for a pre-release game . . . and I'm not seeing that right now. I don't see the path by which PFO will be worth paying as much as WoW, Rift, or EVE, even with the carrot of supposedly being MORE interactive with players than other teams have been. (And I have seen some pretty substantial interactions in the past, so that's a high bar.)

They have nine employees and an entire, fully functional base sandbox which is stable to complete. In 25 months.

That's not an easy deadline to meet. If they make a million, we see some more people get hired, and the dev timeline drop by six months. Again, we have no measure of how "likely" that is to happen. Even GW says it's a projection. Having worked in and played in the MMO space I can say that MORE OFTEN THAN NOT in my experience, deadlines slip. (As in, I can say it is unlikely they will actually hit Jun/Dec 2014.)

Well, there's no end to an MMO's story, and unfortunately the success of that beta/early release/pay us to test period will have a pretty sizable impact. Particularly if they're trying to count on money supposedly expected to roll in when people start to pay, and the impact of the loss of "think tank" capital when people choose to drop out of the process because they're being asked to pay to test.

I remember this conversation from 2012. I think the points raised by this poster are still highly pertinent. I don't remember them posting again after making these useful points.

Atm, we're in a critical stage before the game reaches that Tipping Point, if it's ever to make that point. The Design gives the potential to do so, which I don't think other mmorpg designs have been able to achieve, so that differentiates in theory PFO. But it still has to reach that point.

We're assessing now the above in 2015:-

  • The Testing Phase Retention success rate
  • If PFO is on time/on budget
  • How much of a boon or not "Crowdforging" really has been
  • How much the value proposition of subbing during this stage is matched to the pricing ie the quality of gameplay to cost tolerance.

The only observation I've been making reviewing here is:-

1. Ryan and GW have been very successful with their Design Document and Kickstarter campaign in order to raise required Money and convince people the design will create a great game.
2. Ryan and GW have been much less successful with the Graphics and Gameplay Implementation as components of the above full vision so far. This is partly a factor of time but also it pertains to the above factors listed above; it's not isolated from those conditions that will impact the future growth of the game.

My point is simply that the game design needs to be pushed faster and implemented more simply than trying to wrestle with the graphics/animation and combat depth per individual character. That's going to (I worry) get everything bogged down at this critical stage.

What PFO NEEDS is what such as different players WANT asap:-

  • Bludd wants real bandits
  • Avena wants a cooperative with a werewolf monthly player-run event
  • Guild Leaders want their settlements from the Land Rush to be viable and drawing in the players with lots of buildings and functions to perform in game
  • TT PF fans want some adventure in a digital information-rich world, don't want to have to work out an arcane and opaque control and combat system and get ganked

IE PFO's design needs to try to match as many of it's customers WANTS sooner via a faster development delivery ability.

If the plan is to grow the PFO tree from various seeds ie a small sapling is the combat system to grow huge, I worry that sapling is going to need too many resources when you have about 100 other different saplings to attend to too. To use an analogy.

What's going to draw outside players is seeing players playing/paying getting what they want and things like armies and diverse settlements with loads of building functions in a huge huge world. Flags/Symbols/Names also really help as per GoT's as people are drawn by the social group thing and immediately start thinking: "Gotta choose my group carefully" even before buying the game!

Edit: Much vexing on my mind is the likes of Kingdom Come eg: Kingdom Come: Deliverance - introducing the Alchemy quest in Early Alpha

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mk2nHG9XsLQ

The graphics they can deliver much stronger on due to single-player game and the current graphics of PFO by implication has to compete with this as well as MMOs.

CEO, Goblinworks

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I wanted to address the OP's original issue with crashing a lot.

If you are not on a Mac, you should not be crashing a lot. Those problems have mostly been addressed.

If you wish you can run DXDIAG.EXE and paste the output text (not an attachment) and email it to customer.support@goblinworks.com and I'd be happy to take a look and make any suggestions that seem useful.

Goblin Squad Member

Some want dungeons and more advanced PvE.
Not now
Some want completed full PvV
Not now

What do these not understand about Minimal Viable Product.

There are concepts of agile development. I do not know if that is in use here, but I suspect it is.

The foundation needs to be laid before more advanced features are there.

Besides complaining, what are they doing to define use cases which the design can address.

There is a year before release. this does not support easter eggs either.

Must be a flop. Anyone can do easter eggs. We coloured them today. How could they fail to support Easter Eggs.

Goblin Squad Member

Sure the foundations need to be laid. But what are those?

What I think they are is the foundations to a budget MMO that looks not dissimilar to a Themepark MMO built during the EE phase. I think this must be the case due to:-

1. The graphics choice matching the market expectation of GW finance plan
2. The draw of these graphics and a bit more freedom and polish over the next x months before OE will likely attract the target figure of 10,000 if GW are financed for the foreseeable months.
3. Added benefit of money invested in xp by a core of players when the game really begins in OE and hence will stick around.
4. More feedback during this extended testing/adding phase.

However, there is a danger in 2 areas:-

1. This is not worth subbing to; I'd prefer to let others sub at this time.
2. This emphasis on matching a market expectation via graphics emphasis I fear is going to heavily restrict and reduce the simulation potential of this game. I wonder how long it will hence take to get to Armies?

And it's point 2. that concerns me more, tbh. What worries me is we're getting just another mmo that feels the same with some incremental quality and freedom improvements but the same mmorpg mores apply as ever.

Here's Total War: Arena Wars showing that they're working on Armies and Battles already:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/12/15/hands-on-total-war-arena/

http://wiki.totalwar.com/images/d/db/Arena_Screenshot_06.png

I think with a simpler graphical approach, this sort of result could have been achieved faster and differentiated PFO sooner from the mmorpg market. Instead the above approach may end up being financially sound & safe, but it seems to me it's going to be very very slow and the end result will not be the full scope as per the visionary but hugely ambitious design document; because the graphics expectations for market penetration have been dictated. I think a lot of stuff will not only be slower in delivery, but shaved off or if implemented in restricted form.

For example, with a simpler graphics seasons and their gameplay effects could have been implemented I believe with less challenge/overhead on development resources? This is the multiple stuff that makes the sandbox tick as per:-

http://gamasutra.com/view/news/200149/Do_you_want_your_game_to_do_everythin g_or_do_one_thing_very_well.php

Quote:

By contrast, broad games have a broad player base as well, and all of them want more and more interesting things to do when they consume their favorite kind of gameplay. In Ultima Online, crafters and tamers demanded as much design attention as combatants, and I'm sure the same can be said in Free Realms for fans of the soccer and mail delivery games. It is harder to improve the game on multiple tracks, and keep all fan bases happy while still maintaining the game's core balance integrity. Adding new features and game systems to increase the breadth of the game is always an option, and is typically popular, but it also risks increasing the complexity of the game -- increasing the number of unexpected interactions that need to be considered, balanced for, and tested.

3. Accept that your features will be simpler. Complexity in multiple systems is hard to support, hard to test, hard to balance, hard to expand, but perhaps most of all, hard for most players to actually follow and understand. In a broad game, the game systems need to be simple -- the complexity will come from how those systems interact.

I'm thinking that's what Ryan means when said: "PFO is to WOW what EVE is to UO."

I'm not sure I'm that audience that wishes to do tab-target with these graphics; the complexity of systems interacting and generating story on a large scale is more interesting to me. You can see some of this in various games that involve single-player or multiplayer and often strategy or simulation; I'm hoping mmo can combine these things.

You know another great concept from this would be to be able to pause the live-server-game, roll back a year or two "to the past" as it were and let players (re-)play (this saved game-state for a short period) to a particular narrative in the past as some sort of magical time-reversal to then use results from that to implement changes when you re-open the server of the "present".

Stuff like this is kinda more realization of fantasy and magic - and it just needs simpler graphics but more interesting interacting systems.

Again the graphics and combat are not so interesting to me. The other area that I never took to: The idea of individual characters never dying and increasing in power as per EVE. I think the dynasty system of family Name => Account and size of family = Payment Sub Price (with Plex of course) is the way to go at this scale of gameplay. Also meaning each family member is limited to a few class specialization ie you distribute your skill-training across numerous avatars to log in/out and manage and play their stories - of course they're all mortal! You'd need to extra thinking on the rules of new born generations timings, marriage alliances and fielty to lords systems of families as well as if Family decimated what/who is the refuge ie a part of the game map for refugees to grow up their family in safety for a time again to then migrate back into the world.

=

Anyway I think I "get" where GW is going and their solid reasons (it's a lot of money and their experience of the market is superior). I just have to question the implications of that decision on the simulation of the game systems and the time it takes to work on these and the elastic potential for these in the future.

In a nutshell, "a mmorpg dwarf fortress" with 3d graphics is the sort of vision that I think is more conducive to the concept of "maximizing meaningful human interaction".

Goblin Squad Member

Bluddwolf wrote:
But to be clear, what I want and have always wanted is EvE with Swords. All aspects of EvE, including the fact that it is a game "Made by wolves, for wolves". Now I expected that some compromises would be made and PFO would be "Made by Sheepdogs for Wolves". But, I believe it is more so "Made by Sheepdogs for Sheep" and the wolves are left with nothing but to become sheepdogs themselves. Eventually, even the sheepdogs will have nothing to do and we all become sheep in the FarmVille Kingdoms.

I <3 this post.

Goblinworks Executive Founder

<Tavernhold> Locke wrote:

Some want dungeons and more advanced PvE.

Not now
Some want completed full PvV
Not now

What do these not understand about Minimal Viable Product.

There are concepts of agile development. I do not know if that is in use here, but I suspect it is.

The foundation needs to be laid before more advanced features are there.

Besides complaining, what are they doing to define use cases which the design can address.

There is a year before release. this does not support easter eggs either.

Must be a flop. Anyone can do easter eggs. We coloured them today. How could they fail to support Easter Eggs.

A set of foundations does not make a minimum viable house.


Audoucet wrote:
A set of foundations does not make a minimum viable house.

Standing on the front porch refusing to join the party inside while throwing up your hands declaring, "This minimumally viable house before me doesn't exist!" doesn't mean much either.

Goblin Squad Member

Summersnow wrote:
Bluddwolf wrote:
But to be clear, what I want and have always wanted is EvE with Swords. All aspects of EvE, including the fact that it is a game "Made by wolves, for wolves". Now I expected that some compromises would be made and PFO would be "Made by Sheepdogs for Wolves". But, I believe it is more so "Made by Sheepdogs for Sheep" and the wolves are left with nothing but to become sheepdogs themselves. Eventually, even the sheepdogs will have nothing to do and we all become sheep in the FarmVille Kingdoms.
I <3 this post.

You may not like this post, but at least it is consistent and honest. Besides, I thought you rage quit a year and a half ago? Did you actually give the game a try?

Goblin Squad Member

Quote:
Quote:
I <3 this post.
You may not like this post, but at least it is consistent and honest. Besides, I thought you rage quit a year and a half ago? Did you actually give the game a try?

Umm.. Bludd.. I think that's a heart, not a 'less-than-three'

Goblinworks Executive Founder

Rynnik wrote:
Standing on the front porch refusing to join the party inside while throwing up your hands declaring, "This minimumally viable house before me doesn't exist!" doesn't mean much either.

I don't call a house something without walls, without roof, and without door.

Goblin Squad Member

Lahasha wrote:
Quote:
Quote:
I <3 this post.
You may not like this post, but at least it is consistent and honest. Besides, I thought you rage quit a year and a half ago? Did you actually give the game a try?
Umm.. Bludd.. I think that's a heart, not a 'less-than-three'

I checked to see if he liked the original post, didn't. So the "heart" was less likely than the "ball sack" meaning. Also, Summersnow has always been against PFO being even close to EvE, so again.... I doubt the "heart" was the meaning.

Goblin Squad Member

serioustiger wrote:

1) The graphics - on the highest settings on a top-end machine - remind me exactly of Everquest (the first one). Which was a great game. In 1999. Character animations look like Thunderbirds puppets.

2)I had really high hopes for this game because it has the best IP in the world to build on. But I guess Blizzard really has hired everyone who knows anything about MMO design.

3) I'm sure I'll get slated for bringing up WoW but it really is the elephant in the room here...I didn't expect PO to be as good at launch as WoW is today, but it's nowhere near even the quality of WoW when it launched in 2005.

1) That's appropriate considering they have about the same amount of money. EverQuest initially cost only $3 million to develop, Pathfinder Online has raised a similarly low figure for its development. It can't afford fancy graphics.

2) Blizzard had the success of their RTS franchise to bankroll their MMO designs with, along with a history of making high graphical fidelity games according to their unique art style.

3) World of Warcraft had a budget of about $100 million which allowed them to go for those 2005 graphics. Modern MMOs cost even more that, with some hitting $500 million developments.

Just saying you really can't expect fancy graphics unless you're willing to give them the money to do it. The kickstarter didn't raise nearly enough money for it.

Goblin Squad Member

Coming back to graphics... we're going to see jaw-dropping graphics from Star Citizen. It will look great, it will play viscerally (the FPS-shooter component will I think take on a growth of it's own and feed the star ships side).

The are fortunate that the engines are all good for this and it seems suitable the FPS physics, the Space just rendering the spaceship etc all help I am guessing.

PFO would have to do tremendous heavy lifting to compare - ie the Themepark budgets spiralling higher every year >250m$.

If we look at SC, it's possible it will merge Space Sim + FPS in space/planets + MMO modules eg persistence, economy etc.

They've got tons of money from their payment for ships scheme so even if it's not great it can keep on improving I'd guess again.

But I think the hybrid of genres is what is going to make this game pull away.

TL;DRThe observation I have for PFO or any other fantasy mmorpg is to do likewise: Hybrid Strategy/Sim RTS with MMO-RPG. It works with the graphics and it works with the scale necessary to abstract so many working parts that go with creating a world (instead of space + physical instance islands as it were ie planetside).


Audoucet wrote:
Rynnik wrote:
Standing on the front porch refusing to join the party inside while throwing up your hands declaring, "This minimumally viable house before me doesn't exist!" doesn't mean much either.
I don't call a house something without walls, without roof, and without door.

That's fine and as much a valid choice as those of us content with full plumbing, their own bedroom, and a broom closet so we can sweep the floor with folks.

Your definition doesn't dictate fact.

Goblin Squad Member

AvenaOats wrote:
If we look at SC, it's possible it will merge Space Sim + FPS in space/planets + MMO modules eg persistence, economy etc.

Anything's possible I suppose. But I have a longstanding history of accurately predicting MMO success and I've done so by boiling down gameplay and promises into their least viable components.

Currently Star Citizen promises much and fans are taking those dreams and expanding them infinitely as far as their imagination lets them. That's great if you're MAKING a game, not looking forward to one. I've done the reverse, compressing the promises into the smallest, cheapest module one can possibly imagine while still having all those promises effectively fulfilled.

The end result is that I firmly believe Star Citizen will merely be an arena dogfighter lobby game as it currently is. Players will launch into "open world" or battle arenas, do their gathering/fighting, then return with resources to continue the process. Star Trek Online already works similarly to this, as does Neverwinter, and to a lesser extent EVE because it actually can make good on its promises due to a low requirement client exchange service.

The developers even support this claim with their discussion on how battle instancing will work. There is no need to have players fight in an open world setting when you can shift them into a pocket dimension until another player approaches their battleground and "Joins the server". The game is being built to work as an old fashioned CounterStrike, Call of Duty, or Battlefield server hosting platform with interconnected transitions, a resource-based economy, and a lobby chat room shaped like a space station.

To like this type of model, you'd have to REALLY enjoy the current version of Arena Commander.

Goblin Squad Member

Kyutaru wrote:
AvenaOats wrote:
If we look at SC, it's possible it will merge Space Sim + FPS in space/planets + MMO modules eg persistence, economy etc.

Anything's possible I suppose. But I have a longstanding history of accurately predicting MMO success and I've done so by boiling down gameplay and promises into their least viable components.

Currently Star Citizen promises much and fans are taking those dreams and expanding them infinitely as far as their imagination lets them. That's great if you're MAKING a game, not looking forward to one. I've done the reverse, compressing the promises into the smallest, cheapest module one can possibly imagine while still having all those promises effectively fulfilled.

The end result is that I firmly believe Star Citizen will merely be an arena dogfighter lobby game as it currently is. Players will launch into "open world" or battle arenas, do their gathering/fighting, then return with resources to continue the process. Star Trek Online already works similarly to this, as does Neverwinter, and to a lesser extent EVE because it actually can make good on its promises due to a low requirement client exchange service.

The developers even support this claim with their discussion on how battle instancing will work. There is no need to have players fight in an open world setting when you can shift them into a pocket dimension until another player approaches their battleground and "Joins the server". The game is being built to work as an old fashioned CounterStrike, Call of Duty, or Battlefield server hosting platform with interconnected transitions, a resource-based economy, and a lobby chat room shaped like a space station.

To like this type of model, you'd have to REALLY enjoy the current version of Arena Commander.

That's what I surmise of SC: But you're getting those different modules in the same game community, the same overall story space and I think it only get better too.

So as said, it's not a "Open World vs Instance" problem at all: The different pockets of game-play are intended to be more visceral and high quality and that will sell, doubly so linked up with components from mmo eg persistence, levelling, and economy and community factions and so forth.

Goblinworks Executive Founder

Rynnik wrote:

That's fine and as much a valid choice as those of us content with full plumbing, their own bedroom, and a broom closet so we can sweep the floor with folks.

Your definition doesn't dictate fact.

Since I was answering to a guy calling a set of foundations "A minimum viable product", yes, my definition does dictate fact.

Goblin Squad Member

Rynnik wrote:
Your definition doesn't dictate fact.

The consumer dictates what is "minimally viable", not Goblin Works or Ryan Dancey. Every individual consumer will judge what that means for themselves.

Goblin Works will dictate what is "Financially Viable", because only they can know what it takes to keep the doors open.

I believe that in its current state, PFO is "minimally playable", but that is only due to the fact that I had 25 months of pre paid time. If I had to make the decision to resub or not come April 30, I most likely would not.

Maybe in 6 months the development of the game will be there, but I doubt that population will be. Goblin Works is going to have to launch a major advertising campaign and perhaps alter some of their vision to meet gaming community expectations, to either win back old subscribers or attract new ones.

Goblin Work's major challenge in that 6 months is not going to be internal, or community based, it is going to be competing with the games that are due to be launched or enter FREE Alpha a beta in that same time period.

PFO will have to be better in some aspect, than any one of those releases.


Bluddwolf wrote:
The consumer dictates what is "minimally viable", not Goblin Works or Ryan Dancey. Every individual consumer will judge what that means for themselves.

Yup, exactly right. And what the old salt seems to be ignoring or flat out unable to see is the way, from a player perspective, the game is growing nicely. New recruits every day, turn around in new player organizations and new names in general chat every log in.

Slow steady growth is what is going to keep PFO in there for the long haul and by every actual metric they are achieving that right now.

Goblinworks Executive Founder

Rynnik wrote:
Bluddwolf wrote:
The consumer dictates what is "minimally viable", not Goblin Works or Ryan Dancey. Every individual consumer will judge what that means for themselves.

Yup, exactly right. And what the old salt seems to be ignoring or flat out unable to see is the way, from a player perspective, the game is growing nicely. New recruits every day, turn around in new player organizations and new names in general chat every log in.

Slow steady growth is what is going to keep PFO in there for the long haul and by every actual metric they are achieving that right now.

Keep telling yourself that, enjoy KS backers' money while it lasts.

Goblin Squad Member

Rynnik wrote:
Bluddwolf wrote:
The consumer dictates what is "minimally viable", not Goblin Works or Ryan Dancey. Every individual consumer will judge what that means for themselves.
Slow steady growth is what is going to keep PFO in there for the long haul and by every actual metric they are achieving that right now.

GW's refusal to discuss or disclose subscription numbers, trial account to subscriber numbers, the number of unused KS's, etc makes me wonder what evidence there is to support your argument.

"actual metrics?" From thin air and based on very fallible data. I can create a new, untrainable alt every other day, just to grind the easily attainable company influence. This character will appear as a "new player" in your "actual metric", and you would be none the wiser.

Bottom line, if their numbers were so healthy and showing that slow growth, they would advertise it. My conjecture, which is as valid as anyone's, is that there are fewer than 1000 unique subscribers (not including multiple account holders, or alternate characters). This is before the big drop off at the end of this month.

Goblin Squad Member

Well, I happen to be enjoying the game quite a bit thanks.

Goblin Squad Member

@ AvenaOats

You keep on bringing up Tab-targeting as a major negative, but perhaps I have missed your alternative.

To be specific, my only gripe with Tab-Targeting is that resource nodes fall within the tabbing cycle for an unexplained reason (By the Devs). I find that this interferes more with combat targeting than it enhances targeting for gatherers.

I can see an argument made for point-and-click targeting only. I write "only" because it already exists, but it is not as finely tuned as it needs to be. I think that mouse cursor clicking in general is not working very well, including clicking on abilities in the action tray.

But, what is your solution?

Goblin Squad Member

Bluddwolf wrote:

@ AvenaOats

You keep on bringing up Tab-targeting as a major negative, but perhaps I have missed your alternative.

To be specific, my only gripe with Tab-Targeting is that resource nodes fall within the tabbing cycle for an unexplained reason (By the Devs). I find that this interferes more with combat targeting than it enhances targeting for gatherers.

I can see an argument made for point-and-click targeting only. I write "only" because it already exists, but it is not as finely tuned as it needs to be. I think that mouse cursor clicking in general is not working very well, including clicking on abilities in the action tray.

But, what is your solution?

Thanks for taking the time to read and posing a question. I'm really sorry if I have not been clear in my posts; partly it's thoughts that are forming more solidly as typed and partly banging out a post to then get on with other things, ie posting actually helps the thinking process (hence the verbiage - sorry!). :-0

Ok, I agree it was not clear.

PFO with the EQ/WOW 3rd person over the shoulder view effectively that aesthetic informs the game experience of the player and hence the gamplay. That game play is Tab-Target (for network reasons). However at this scale: The combat must be really intricate and complex to actually be much fun - I think. One of the major design decisions is as per the devs that combat must last a certain time or else the player who runs in and gets killed quickly does not like it; or else they are stunned to oblivion and again that is a killer for player retention. So the combat involves the DANCE you always end up seeing in these games of tab-target. Eg kiting, tanking and all the rest of it...

This seems to require exquisite level of animation as people always say about WOW's animations being amazing and so on.

So here's the problem in a nut-shell: This aesthetic it seems to me (I could be wrong) necessitates a huge FOCUS on high quality design, programming logic and art assets for this gameplay to be any good; as well as match the high demands of the players who are used to this gameplay.

It's an intrinsic problem that I don't think for GW is winnable ie they're falling to exactly the trap of the themepark mmorpgs or sandbox mmorpgs before: That is the themepark mmorpgs spend millions to be polished but could not afford to then make the game sandboxy sytems, the sandbox games could not afford to get the polish of the systems.

And it's related imho to The graphics aesthetic dictating the gameplay.

So, finally setting the scene to address your question: "If not tab-target are you suggesting point-and-click"; I'm not, keep tab-target, but as with the other systems keep it simple but keep working on the breadth and range of systems.

The combat should be at a different graphical SCALE be very simplified (eg the 0AD scale or RTS characters) but more based on players forming formations when engaging in combat together in numbers. There could be ways to develop "set-piece battles" here or otherwise but the general idea is that the cooperation of the players playing together is the REAL FUN which accords with the aesthetic scale choice of say a board game. Here the characters are simply a cadre of soldiers of each of the players family (perhaps have as many as 10< at the smallest sub level). Each one has small margins to improve their survivability and some optional skills but flanking and 2:1 units is more the gameplay of combat in battles. For skirmish adventurers and archers of course simple tab-target really straightforward chipping the health meter down and picking targets for a killing field (focus fire) etc.

The reason for this is the scale, the alt proposition of the family structure and hence survivability in combats and battle experience -> boost to xp-skill training integrating all these systems. But also it reduces the scope of developing combat complexity: What you always see in tab-target is the MESS of characters all over the screen with effects going off like fireworks. Look at 0AD and emulate that but in MMO form each character a player.

Also again, combat/battle should be one part of the sandbox simulation, the combat taking up too much gameplay ie the actual mechanics, the context and decisions should be the fun of battle (and strategy external ie drama and tactics ie units and commmunication during).

Here's an old post from Ryan about sandboxes:-

I don't believe that to be true. I have played a lot of them (at least the ones that are still playable) and for the most part I found one of three things:

They are either

1: Hardcore PvP games where the real "game" is just PvP combat. These games will not succeed because FPS games are a better play experience for this kind of style and it's almost impossible to become successful unless you were an early adopter or have friends willing to help you power level and gear up via metagaming.

2: Life Simulators where the emphasis is on "living" in a "realistic" world. Instead of being a place where there is an emphasis on being a hero, the emphasis is on being a farmer, or a woodsman, or some other lifestyle choice while your character develops skills via repetition and tedium until they can kill a wolf or two, and dare to go into the wilderness beyond the range of the firelight. These games do not succeed because most people want to be heroes to begin with, not "work up" to it by leading a mundane life in a simulated world first.

I think you square this circle with the Family concept of avatars instead where the player manages lots of alts as their family. One real key to this is the generation vs full life to senescence and mortality rate via homicide which analytics of in game of players could modify via play testing to reach equilibrium: Not too long but not too short with violence reducing a family's size until another generation grows up... etc.

IE with the above the violent players in 1. get killed more often ie their xp spent on soldier characters with the cream rising to the top as vet soldiers alive and very valuable. 2. it means having to manage your family members xp-training in the "life simulator" skill-training eg builders, merchants, administrators, politicians etc etc...

You see, combat needs to be important for territory as it was in feudal times and today even (sadly) but also a part of the rest of the simulation as some comments on reddit attest to concerning EVE:-

Q: Are they the same game? If not, is one better than the other and why?

^A1: EVE Online. It is like a tabletop rpg session. Everything is there just as an excuse to drink beer and have a good time with friends.

^^A2-A1: Agreed. The best in-game lore is what happens between player groups and all the history of the various organisations. A lot of the better parts of the game is inaccessible if you're not part of a corporation.

Now this also imho allows players to actually RP different characters in their families more too ie each character has a finite life and finite time with which to skill-train also. This I think opens opportunity for some family members to not only do different PAR (Playing A Role) ie actually needed but also RP eg one family member the player sends to the local tavern to become the belligerent drunk beating people up or some other "fallibility of free will" drama! etc.

So it goes way beyond just combat development. Of course at this scale I've already mentioned my own intentions for "deviant drama" eg lycanthropes per month. This goes way off on a tangent so to boomerang back:-

The current problem is very precisely summed up by Rob Lashley at mmorpg.com in his review of EE atm:-

Initially I was very excited about the prospects of Pathfinder Online. To an extent I’m still excited about what the game can be. I’m just not excited about what it currently is or what I expect it to be in 2015. I also don’t see that changing much for 2016. The game is just now entering year 2 of Goblinworks’ 5 year plan. Maybe in year 3 or 4 I’ll be turned back on by what the game has become but for now it is too crude for me to get excited about (or pay for). Let me know what you think in the comments below.

He goes on about the movement/jumping animations feeling not right too. In the other feature, plenty of the comments also hover on the problems of the combat and the animation also.

Now I don't see how GW is able to attract players during the next 2 years and at the end of those 2 years also have an amazing combat system and solid graphics and have lots of systems working together satisfactory.

It comes back to what do customers want?

I'd argue they want the social community network thing as per the above quote about EVE, you want to provide open world pvp but contain it as a subset within the larger simulation PAR/RP picture which provides more stories for more players.

I think the 2 biggest innovations are:-

* Avatar => Family of Alts ie player ownership on The Name/Clan and hence physical assets they own eg land, money, influence (ie connections marriages etc) and mortality ie soldiers die in battles cycles of investment (Crusader Kings II and Dwarf Fortress inspiration here)
* SCALE = Epic for graphics to remove the problem of complex combat of avatars EQ/WOW scale ie small characters as per 0AD and faster development of the larger world and it's systems ie trending back towards MUDs emphasis of simulation and not being hampered by graphics. (The RTS god-sim inspiration here as well as comparing SC hybrid direction of FPS/Space Sim -> Visceral direction of combat in instances)

You see the SCALE I think we can bifurcate the market between the 2 away from the EQ/WOW idea where the fantasy has to go more epic scale due to the demands of the land and the sheer number of things you have to show eg terrain - settlements - buildings - characters doing jobs compared to space.

So, to reiterate on the combat, I think little characters biffing each other in formations as per 0AD working together would be the MMO innovation that suits the Kingmaker PFO concept of PFO. The EQ/WOW concept is I fear a dead-end road to travel down once again (either themepark or sandbox as per previous attempts). I think you can still have interesting small group skirmishes too, it might be a case of locking an area as a combat area so that it can be seen but those combatants are effectively locked in unless they hold up a white flag or are slaughtered/routed! Again some MORE degree of abstraction would be required.

Unfortunately with 4m$ spent I do not think GW are able to move in this direction and nor do I understand the financial/marketing rationale - PFO may suck up a large part of the market but from the DESIGN pov I think I'm right about the SCALE being the way to innovate using dwarf fortress in the same way as infiniminer was inspiration for Minecraft.

TL;DR It's very challenging trying to convey what seems like a simple switch in concept in writing, I hope the above cumulatively helps.

Another key idea is that with the WOW/EQ combat many players I suspect feel very bad at this. With the simpler battle system of the epic scale, they can send soldiers to be commanded by captain characters in formations ie cannon-fodder or partake more directly in these with simpler actual mechanics but coordinating with their own side being the actual gameplay and again having other characters if those die. It takes both the sting and stress out of combat I hope, you see a little character die and think "dang my investment fell short of returns on the battle field!"

I think what a lot of players would enjoy: The grand simulation of the settlements, living the sim life brought to life with other players and stories running a family and the annals of their chronicles being recorded and shared. Then this social interaction I think is going to sell a game much more than complex combat (see previous posts on this). That's the market to go for imho. In fact there's an idea on this from Ramin Shokrizade and his break-down of the problem as reward chemicals, it's useful even if it's perhaps additional rather than definitive evidence (though I think he's definitely another one in the mmo space to listen to, another sharp cookie so to speak!) eg think of what makes board-games so fun (the bonding aspect of the social sharing of story):-

So how can this technology be used to help consumers? By making products give them the rewards they are seeking. Remove all of the painful/boring parts of games that we keep repeating decade after decade. Make video games less predictable and more social. Any company that does this honestly and transparently with their customers is going to quickly build a loyal following, and their products will render today's games non-competitive.

You know I fear the combat tab-target complexity is too complex and too boring and too painful for most customers. Now the sim stuff and helping the hawks via the sim life and social sharing of groups... there I think we have huge market potential. I mean ppl want to log in look after and find out next the story of their characters lives and help them along as well as cause mischief.

But you have to change the graphics as per Bartle has said to get the rule-systems and simulations for story generation going, another gamasutra article or at least schema on this:-

Story within System

What's going to get people lingering when they log in is looking at this teeeming drama of small lives being led and the grand sweep of narratives taking place before their eyes (seasons come and go, markets rise and fall, and wars rage across continents when politics breaks down and monsters team in the wildernesses).

My problem to contrast is PFO's combat is supposed to be the hook for me atm in EE. Also the character is immortal and bloats in power is not very RP/PFO'y, the decision making is subbing to grow value and power, whereas the family way is to grow stories and rp and power and stored value in the assets owned/conquered/influenced into control against other scheming families (players).

Length was unintentional. Enough of my theory-crafting. I think Pathfinder and Game Of Thrones are good IP's for this vision. Drawing in the RTS/Strategy/Sim/RPG markets and some from MMO market I think could work.

Visceral combat leave that to other genres eg BF, SC, Chivalry etc. And also simplify tab-target to the correct scale.

At this new scale, RTS, the economy is also emphasized too, that needs the most work: It's the beating heart of the story, not the combat complexity. You could add some complex combat with assassin characters eg Arya water dance stance and so on... easy at this graphic scale (!!).

Goblin Squad Member

I'm in the process of downloading Mortal Online. From the brief reading I did of its features, it appears its combat system is very different. Also, it seems to be a true, open world PvP sandbox, but I'll withold judgement until I have a chance to play it.

The Exchange

I was reading some pre release stuff about the next Everquest that's coming out. It sounds very much like PFO, but with the backing of a major company that isn't charging you to test their game.

Might be worth checking for some of you who are disgruntled. If my impression of the next Everquest is right, it also means "the race of one" concept just became the race of the one legged blind man vs the Ferrari.

It would be a very tough gig for an indi company like GW to go up against SOE.

I actually hope I'm wrong. I have no interest in PvP games like this, but I wouldn't want to see people's time, effort and money destroyed by big game competition.

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