Goblin Squad Member
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I've stolen that title from an expert (it references George RR Martin's titles style series from A Game Of Thrones).
I will try and fail to keep this short and pithy.
PaizoConPathfinderOnlinePresentation
In a recent EVE presentation the language is distilled succinctly:-
- USERS = players interact with game
- PARTICIPANTS = players interact with each other
When you design the former it costs a lot of Art Assets and Combat programming (EQ-Diku model).
When you design the latter it costs a lot less for broader systems
EVE is the model of this (see summary EVE vs WOD
Let's start with EVE. It has a huge advantage:-
1. Space (art overhead low)
2. Combat (overhead low due to spaceship pew-pew!)
3. Early 00's (market not saturated, stand out in space niche)
4. Sandbox dev = low cost and iterative with players etc
As Ryan says in the vid:-
EQ/WOW model:-
1. Won profits war (EQ vs UO, WOW vs EVE)
2. Spiralling cost due to graphics and assets and content (and combat!!!)
How have Sandbox mmorpgs faired? They've all been scratchy combat (bar DF which tried to be more actiony).
Expected trend of Fantasy combat => Has to outcompete the latest eg WOW tab-target. Expectation imho is for:-
1. More Visceral, more actiony eg Chivalry, Mount & Blade
2. Life Is Feudal or Gloria Victus try to go here and be sandbox.
So if you are not going FPS, you are going 3rdPP aka Over-The-Shoulder EQ/WOW Engine modelling of fantasy world.
(1) EQ/WOW Engine => Graphics demand ==> Complex Combat
EQ/WOW Engine => Graphics demand ==> Complex Combat demand for gameplay interaction/controls by the player.
INSIGHT Trend towards ACTION in-built into this engine away from DECISION.
(2) Decision-making vs Action Gameplay
EVE Space => graphics incidental to information => DECISION-MAKING gameplay expected by the player ie it markets this itself (expectation-setting/signaling)
INSIGHT This is a stronger fit for story generation in games
(3) Future Projections of Games Market
Star Citizen in space and using FPS perspective engine fits the action trend of MMO-ification of EQ/WOW engine trend. My young newphews are cock-a-hoop over spaceships and... Minecraft. Other kids like Clash of Clans. One involves major creativity and social space and the other is built on social dynamics to hook players into spending to keep up with peers. Both raised millions. SOCIAL + CREATIVITY (either assets or story or both).
(4) Simulation Space -> Story Generation -> Online Community
EVE/Game Of Thrones show strong egs of story creation. One is books the other is space. Parsimony is required eg Bartle and MUDs. WOD is an neg of converting from space to fantasy being challenging/expensive
[B](5) Evidence PFO is failing at this test: Action > Decision-Making
EE, youtube, comments in forums (see previous posts). Why? Imho, Ryan has taken the assumption that: EQ/WOW model built to bring that market in THEN add sandbox around that gameplay. However what's observable in EE is the bloat of graphics demand by mmorpg players and then the combat because of the graphics. THEN we might see the design doc (summary here). This has created a loss of focus and fallen into the Themepark Trap and loss of parsimony to create a system to create a story for a community online.
(6) Nature Of Solutions
if deducted rigorously have a habit of deriving natural products that synergize with the full vision - almost magically. The solution to extend Ryan's MMORPG Business Development Model imho is via Parsimony which derives graphics constraints in service of story. This leads to cheaper dev (as Ryan knows) and the way to re-do the Engine is SCALE change towards RTS which fits hundreds of agents interacting simultaneously on a screen better than the EQ/WOW model does think EVE and dots in combat of thousands. This aligns with philosophy of Bartle and Shokrizade
(7) Changing Direction: Decisions, Simulations, Story & Scale
From now on I'm going to assume (rightly or wrongly) PFO in present EE is going to fail due to the above reasoning, projection/expectation of trends and present evidence of the EQ/WOW engine demands. As said EE/alpha/beta has disproportionate bearing on future shape of game.
(8) We see with SC Hybridization trend will lead to innovation
of MMO via instances via FPS shooter + Space Flight Sim + MMO-ification (persistent economy, space = better graphics). Apply the same to Fantasy and RTS SCALE engine eg (0AD, Kingdoms 2, Total War Arenas etc). This fits PFO's design:-
* Exploration = HUGE WORLD (ie scale)
* Development = Settlements, buildings, territory, resource gathering, social simulation
* Domination = RTS Battles scale formations and tactics
The Scale is already intrinsic, and it would aid the networking as well as reduce the graphics overhead where staff salary is 80% and the combat overhead and apallingly high standards required for TT EQ/WOW combat. It means broader systems being built all at once even if shallow as per EVE's history of development. Avoiding the current EE trap PFO is experiencing.
(9) Capturing All The Markets That Fit This Focus
This aligns with what the customers who invested in PFO already have stated they want, there's a challenge of markets: The Once and Future Game: "Theatre of the Mind" or Crunchy System?. Ryan's identified another divide in the market: PvP vs Life Sim sandbox emphasis. The other market divide as per theatre vs crunchy explicitly = Pathfinder TT market vs MMO market. Here SCALE works to derive the solution naturally again:-
* Adventure module:-
It's important to get this right to merge the origins of PF with the digital incarnation for good publicity and good design. Here I suggest you keep the class system of PF TT and predominantly for this aspect of the game to build after the other 3 above. It needs to be on the RTS Scale and the combat can be elaborated for parties here in dungeons using Torchbearer style rules. Probably keep these chars immune from PvP in the Open World. It fits Ryan's vision of bringing these adventureres into a living world context. The other careers expanding eg merchant, soldier, diplomat they are part of the above pillars. I'm running out of space... but the design needs to create a system that is OGL inspired create your own dungeons/modules for the game world and adventurers. One day integrate this more with other pillars. You resolve the PF TT market in this. It also provides more dynamic dungeons than any MMORPG to date. The game within the game concept is powerful.
(10) Family Avatar Scale Derived (pricing, skill-training, story, gameplay, simulation)
The coupe de grace: Again deriving from this naturally at the heart of PFO's business model is the assumption of stored value in the game via skill-training x1 char as per EVE. The innovation that derives is FAMILY system of alt avatars of mortality cycles and births. Size of family is sub option with marginal plex economic discount system: It matches Players who spend more, need to play more, will influence the game world more, could open up higher levels of character development more. Value invested can be recycled via generation cycles, violent chars die sooner, eg wars, value is locked into family holdings and also via feudal loyalty systems between families and marriages to balance influence of connections. Limited skill-training per character, though as above any skill-training dependent on family size and opportunity. This I think simulates the social simulation of chars/sim life as well as political foundations for the meta-story of groups. It also naturally regulates ratio of male-female; cross-breeding perhaps, proportion of experienced vet chars in the game to newbies needing training up next cohorts, violent players as mentioned, allows players to manage their alts more naturally, not put all eggs in one basket of one char, end of stories allows players to write up their chars life stories - some supernatural stunts could be conceived, time travel too and so on... temples/religion has a stronger place and much more derived.
[B]TL;DR: But I think with all the above the sub price, the investing of players to influence the game world, the social systems focus, the creation of broad many systems interacting and visually available faster and away from gameplay components that are boring, stressful or alienate certain markets... SCALE I believe resolves these things and improves the business model, the game design implementation, focuses on the right market and avoids competition with the trend of the market.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Here's a glimmer of what players are actually wanting from mmorpgs:-
Tamriel Infinium: Elder Scrolls Online sucked me in with werewolves
A convenient example given I've realized that the Story > Action is what is so compelling and combining that with Social Systems it would be a huge selling point/talking point:-
Player Cooperative: The Shadow of the Beast (a lycanthrope initiative)
Now don't make the mistake of thinking this is blowing a personal vanity project trumpet. All it is is a worked through example of the sorts of stories players could be generating (with a little aid and stewardship from GW).
Werewolves merely happened to be a well known trope, an opportunity after WOD ceased ie market, and a solution that could be naturally deduced ie not forced through with inevitable incompatibility issues.
I know from reading the PFO forums that many have their own stories to imprint upon PFO. MMORPGs fail because they take too long to reach working on the fun product of the systems being built. That's the focus. It does not need Zenimax's budget to achieve it: Merely the imagination and social collaboration of the players with the devs.
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Goblin Squad Member
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There's the suggestion of an interesting story again from massivelyop:-
Wurm Online player deified, founds a religion
I think it's important to make a telling point (pun intended) here:-
When devs create in-game lore, the retcon or "a wizard did it!" type of fluff is really not good enough for players. What we can learn from Dwarf Fortresses' endless alpha is that the simulation must churn out a result to feed the story generation. It's why PvE is often so finite. I don't know much about PFO's pantheon of gods and goddesses, but it's far from challenging to think up using the above "mortality" system that a particular temple with enough worship manna could persuade whichever gods to free up a soul lost in war to come back again - with limited capacity to do so for a community. Or some other divine intervention system rarely relaying between planes of existence. One thing Bartle said is that anything unusual needs a full explanation, hence magic should be used economically to avoid having to come up with huge amount of explanations.
Magic Needs To Be Mysterious and Unpredictable In Games still a cashed copy.
Here's a genuine/bona fide spell of the most powerful magic from the author's lips, for reals...
The best games are those wherein the mechanics and the narrative (and all the various other elements) work together in harmony to construct a coherent and consistent whole.
We call this potent of spells "Unity of Aesthetic" and only a true master magician can hope to cast it.
You can I think still have "high" fantasy but you need to start reigning it in a bit if you are trying to simulate, as well as keep it magic! Either way souls could be a resource for blood magic/sacrifices to dark deities for simulation.
Another point about the Family system above and naturally deriving, there was an old topic of the problem of name conventions in mmorpgs. Well using the Family System, approved Surnames/Family/Proper Names could be enforced.
The first name, I think again could be randomly generated out of the players control. In some ways this is good, the characters have their own lives the players are guiding them and managing the family.
And this I think has a strong immersion factor: Tolkien was right about naming conventions and the power of language in these fantasy worlds. also said you have to be somewhat in some areas "fascist" in running these worlds, afterall.
A roleplay-mandated world is essentially going to have to be a fascist state. Whether or not this accords with your goals in making such a world is a decision you yourself will have to make.
I think another thing Bartle pointed out concerning breaking "The Golden Circle" with external payments into a game breaking immersion etc. The Family System it seems to me naturally helps provide variable sub options which are proportional to time investment in the game which in any case would lead to influence/power investment. It seems to me so long as smaller families have meaningful things to do at that level (stories to lead, fielty to their liege lord etc) it makes no difference?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm glad this is the more concise version. Bottom line is, Ryan will never get passed the part where you suggest that the focus or vision has been blurred or lost. There will be no acknowledgement of any missteps, regardless of the lack of interest or outcome for this project.
They could be forced to scrap this project due to lack of viable numbers to support it, and the blame will be placed on the general gamer population not being sophisticated enough to take that "next step" towards believing his vision will save MMOs.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I can't imagine being enamored by the Elder Scrolls werewolf meme. It is so overdone it is a total bore. Every single player was running around as a werewolf. Not interesting to me.
I can't see the loss of focus. This game is not targeting the WoWheads, or the F2P crowd. That is a totally different market and will not have an interest in PFO anyway, so not attracting them here is not unexpected.
Ryan and Lisa are targeting a small niche market (I am one of those players) that prefers interaction with other players, graphics are not the be-all-end-all of he game, depth is more important than sparkle. So far PFO has those things even if they have not made it into the game yet. The rollout of new content is on the schedule they have projected, and the design seems solid.
I do agree with the last part about the strict naming conventions. Having crazy numbers and x's in names is immersion breaking. It would be nice for players to have to have a certain name structure (personally I would prefer an area for a character backstory or biography like in LotRO), a home area, and some Golarion style connection in the character creation process to give players a nudge in that direction. The niche market Ryan and Lisa are looking might appreciate that layer of depth in the creation process.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm glad this is the more concise version. Bottom line is, Ryan will never get passed the part where you suggest that the focus or vision has been blurred or lost. There will be no acknowledgement of any missteps, regardless of the lack of interest or outcome for this project.
They could be forced to scrap this project due to lack of viable numbers to support it, and the blame will be placed on the general gamer population not being sophisticated enough to take that "next step" towards believing his vision will save MMOs.
I think the way Ryan/GW see the approach:-
* Market estimate of fantasy mmorpg. Remember ex-players > current-players and "pipe" themepark mmorpg fantasy -> sandbox mmorpg fantasy (done right) then EE adopters are some of sandbox mmorpg already.
* This means assuming the EQ/WOW Engine and TT combat are expected staple of this genre for this market.
* Finally with Middleware and leaner dev and crowdfunding, the cost to get to "decent" quality for the above staple before then adding in the gradual sandbox "pipes".
From this pov, it is boiled down to a gamble proposition on investment to expected returns and the risk according to the market numbers. If you abstract the case to this financial proposition, then it's far from a bad gamble.
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My concern is the basic assumption of taking EQ/WOW Engine. Looking at the data Ryan researched some time ago:-
Here are my estimates for the top* MMORPGs in the Western MMO market
Clearly there's people willing to splash the cash on mmorpgs of this type. And the real growth and opportunity for themepark->sandbox could be China, too. However, I wonder if the EQ/WOW engine is simply going to end up with a game that gamers first:-
1. Compare quality of graphics and combat to the bigger budget mmorpgs and dislike it?
2. Compare to the latest mmorpgs on the market and move onto those.
3. A mmorpg that manages to produce much better graphics and visceral FPS combat is going to suck a lot of the oxygen out of the above "EW/WOW Engine".
4. MMO-ification of other genres doing what they do better but with more online elements.
I think the player investment idea and a small uptake of new players is a good way to make the game more sticky for retention, but if the growth reaches a tiny point due to all the above, we're left with the familiar feeling from all the other indie mmorpg sandboxes of slow updates, lack of polish, small population.
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So the approach is a sound gamble, but what is the "mechanism" actually operating that makes players find a game addictive and replayable? I wonder if with WOW we saw the rise of the online phenomena for a lot of people who have aged and moved on or who's tastes have changed and with the younger generation, they're more into the latest demanding tech for combat or the latest online phenomena Minecraft?
In both WOW and Minecraft, the Social aspects of a "whole new world" and with Minecraft the creative aspects too of user input and finding servers that are interesting, these are the mechanisms it seems to me, broadly. I think for PFO, the board-gamer, the TT RPG gamer, the strategy sim and simulation and sandbox market is the way to go for sticky retention so long as the game PFO can generate story for them.
TL;DR
- The EQ/WOW Engine looks immediately attractive to the design and development of PFO, but as we're witnessing, it's going to lead to "bloat requirement" for graphics and combat to be able to compete and pull in more players beyond a certain point which then becomes a drain on the actual growth aspect of PFO's design document all those systems that will gradually grow the game over years.
- The RTS Engine (I'll call it in comparison) appears much less favorable as per graphics, much smaller market of players but I think using this would have gotten PFO to the growth part of the design document faster and possibly founded it's own niche in the market (First Mover Advantage) reconciling these markets and forging it's own online community in a shared story space. Once you get that story buy and investment...
Problems are a whole re-evaluation of the busines model if you don't adopt the EVE skill-training like-for-like^& and the EQ/WOW Engine - it's uncharted territory.
I'm personally a bit biased as I love "small characters" (god sim perspective) but you combine small elements and those turn into "big elements" = The holy grail of all mmorpg players I've ever heard on many forums and many many occasions repeatedly:-
A Living, breathing world
Which I think you see the visual/graphical vestiges of already in RTS games without the agency of MMO- players populating it/operating it.
&:The Family structure of accounts with multi-alts there's a lot of work to work out a lot of the functionality...
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Goblin Squad Member
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I can't imagine being enamored by the Elder Scrolls werewolf meme. It is so overdone it is a total bore. Every single player was running around as a werewolf. Not interesting to me.
That's why I said "glimmer". And even that tiny little sparkle had disproportionate "stickiness": That quality of enjoyment where players enjoy the activity for the sake of the activity ie the internal narrative they're actually playing in their brains by performing that action repeatedly for no necessarily external output reward.
The Werewolf is well known and well-liked. Why do you think that is? I think there's part of an answer in understanding the essence of the Werewolf is this:-
It inverts "a character" with "the monster" but it does it on a periodically predictable but preciously small duration of transformation.
There's even a successful board-game: "One Night Ultimate Werewolf". Now to connect the dots, a successful story is able to be adapted into the game systems and emerge from it via the players' actions ie the sandbox concept as PFO applies it (not terra-forming or rule-changing for example). In the implementation I suggested, that's exactly the intended result. ES has merely "bolted-on" the superficial aspects but at least int that restricted implementation quite successfully.
I can't see the loss of focus. This game is not targeting the WoWheads, or the F2P crowd. That is a totally different market and will not have an interest in PFO anyway, so not attracting them here is not unexpected.
Ryan and Lisa are targeting a small niche market (I am one of those players) that prefers interaction with other players, graphics are not the be-all-end-all of he game, depth is more important than sparkle. So far PFO has those things even if they have not made it into the game yet. The rollout of new content is on the schedule they have projected, and the design seems solid.
I hope so too, but I fear the EQ/WOW model as per countless other conceptions of mmorpgs is the problem; Bartle even points this problem out directly/explicitly as well. The reactions we're seeing from EE also appear to lean that way too. And even future mmorpgs CU/Crowfall, EQ all seem to erring this way too (that engine again).
PFO might end up being a profitable and serviceable game, I'm just estimating that the underlying mechanism of what players want from these online games is possibly in the long-run a better guide forwards?
I do agree with the last part about the strict naming conventions. Having crazy numbers and x's in names is immersion breaking. It would be nice for players to have to have a certain name structure (personally I would prefer an area for a character backstory or biography like in LotRO), a home area, and some Golarion style connection in the character creation process to give players a nudge in that direction. The niche market Ryan and Lisa are looking might appreciate that layer of depth in the creation process.
Yeah, as the Family Structure automatically derives:-
Family Surname Convention Rule-System per locality/area of origin: Players could try to input their own version of this and see if the progam accepts or it randomly churns out a suitable Surname for them to finally select.
Then the first name system could be randomly churned out with no player choice. IE the player gets to OWN the Family Name, but the character is more autonomous and randomly created from suitable elements as per further elaboration below:-
Name could be the beginning, with a bunch of other Family -identifier factors also created at Family Creation, these fields need to be function in some respect. The characters themselves could be "auto-rolled" with randomness for some of their stats too ie fittedness :-)
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CEO, Goblinworks
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@AvenaOats - sorry, still can't process that much stuff.
Is your core point "over-the-shoulder 3D worlds are dead"? Because if that's your core point, I just don't know what to tell you. You're wrong.
Are you wondering how big we think the market for a for a fantasy sandbox MMO is?
ArcheAge, which is a beautiful game that sells itself as a sandbox (but has only a very small bit of sandbox gameplay) generated two million signups in the west. It's Free to Play so that's a reasonable sizing function for "how big is the North American and European Market for a sandbox fantasy MMO" (the addressable part of that market for a Pay to Play game will be smaller, of course.)
Are you wondering why we don't have more players yet?
We have not turned on the marketing. We are spending effectively nothing on marketing yet. Awareness that this game exists within that 2 million person audience is close to 0%.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Are you wondering why we don't have more players yet?
We have not turned on the marketing. We are spending effectively nothing on marketing yet. Awareness that this game exists within that 2 million person audience is close to 0%.
Im wondering why you chose to begin charging a subscription at this stage, essentially discouraging the majority of the 8,000 - 10,000 players that were aware if it from playing?
I'm wondering why Goblin Works is running a forum that is not fully featured, when one would be available for free or at most $20.00 per month?
The first I can see, if you don't have the resources to run the servers with a revenue stream.
The second is inexcusable. Players are running better websites than you are, many of them for free. I don't even want to describe it as amateur hour, because many of us are amateurs and we are doing it better.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The answer they have given to the second are, at least from memory, security concerns. The Xeilias website is more functional than the Goblinworks forums, but that is primarily because we are using XenForo. XenForo is generally secure, but it isn't good and tight.
The developers could, obviously, very easily have a functional forum set up and running in a few hours. Most of the technically savvy forum users could have one set up in that time. But I doubt that I could write up a forum solution from scratch, with proper security controls, while also working on a game, with a particularly low budget.
They want to have control over their own source code.
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CEO, Goblinworks
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We are going to do an interation on the forums to mke them character, not player, centric. We have a lengthy list of enhancements we intend to make to provide a forum experience that is an extension of the game experience. To do that we need a platform we are comfortable we can modify in the ways we want to.
We are using a single sign-on system for authentication across all our tools. We need a forum that we can integrate with that system.
We need something small and simple enough that we can be reasonably certain there are no serious security leaks in, since we are using a single authentication system and we need to be able to inspect that system to ensure ourselves we think it is safe.
We want an off-the-shelf system that we don't have to write ourselves so we start with a common baseline used by other teams that we can learn from and troubleshoot with.
Our current forum meets these needs and is more than adequate for its current use case.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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I use lots of player-based solutions.
I take extra care to be security-aware while doing so, because any one of them might have a vulnerability that could compromise many things.
I would not take bets at the odds offered that eg XenForo does not have a vulnerability that might compromise a token that can be used to change the email address listed on the account, or otherwise compromise my characters.
Unified sign-in is the right long-term choice, and treating security of that login seriously at every point is far more critical than forum features.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@AvenaOats - sorry, still can't process that much stuff.
Is your core point "over-the-shoulder 3D worlds are dead"? Because if that's your core point, I just don't know what to tell you. You're wrong.
Are you wondering how big we think the market for a for a fantasy sandbox MMO is?
ArcheAge, which is a beautiful game that sells itself as a sandbox (but has only a very small bit of sandbox gameplay) generated two million signups in the west. It's Free to Play so that's a reasonable sizing function for "how big is the North American and European Market for a sandbox fantasy MMO" (the addressable part of that market for a Pay to Play game will be smaller, of course.)
Are you wondering why we don't have more players yet?
We have not turned on the marketing. We are spending effectively nothing on marketing yet. Awareness that this game exists within that 2 million person audience is close to 0%.
I can't obviously compete with your expertise and experience in making the strategic choices. It just seems to me that the market says "graphics" whereas the customer says "story" and this engine is a big hindrance to that?
With an RTS Engine, I feel the whole dev would be closer to the metal, family structure of accounts/alts per player would have their own management of estate and functions at this level as a by-product of the change in SCALE; mortality; seasons, the grandeur would pop-out as a natural product it seems to me for the EPIC story telling involving thousands+ interacting positively with each other ie willingly in the same story space. I think pushing this further, each player's chronology could have in-game functionality for recording their families many different characters rises and falls and so on. The idea of social capital between families and growing influence as a 3rd axis to power + money + social again seems to derive nicely too and of course fielty to the Lords declaring wars and their pitched battles.
I've reached the limits of my understanding I think finally. This is all, it's not a case to base big money decisions on! ^_^
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CEO, Goblinworks
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There's no functional difference between an "RTS engine" and an "over the shoulder" engine. They effectively use the same technology and the same art pipeline.
You save some money because you can make less detailed models, but you gain a lot of costs because you have to spend a lot of time trying to make small graphics look cool, and distinct enough to be understood by the player. The only place where this really applies (both savings and cost) is in character models. The models for structures, vegetation, etc. remain about the same level of cost & complexity regardless.
No money is saved on the environment because you have to make a huge world in either scenario.
A substantial cost is added in UI and visual effects (VFX). In an RTS environment you don't get the simple feedback loop of seeing your character act and being able to respond. Instead the game needs a lot of visual indications and audio indications that the user's input has been received and is being processed. Plus in the RTS world you need to be able to group and issue group commands, set waypoints, etc. all of which requires a lot of extremely complex programming, to say nothing of the level of graphic design required.
And then in the end you are taking the risk that the so-far nonexistent RTS "MMO" market is big enough to support a game that has to iterate from an MVP to some final state nobody has ever seen before, vs. the proven "over-the-shoulder" MMO market that is 2 million people in size (or larger) and where the evolutionary roadmap from MVP to something more sophisticated is intuitively understood by most of the players - they already know what the final destination looks like and they don't have to try and imagine it.
Summary: You don't save any money, you don't use less complex tools, you don't need less talented people, and you take a huge risk that nobody understands what you're trying to do and that the market you're addressing doesn't exist.
@ Avena - please make a game so we can all see it
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Goblin Squad Member
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That's very interesting information, thanks for the reply.
I was aware the UI would be a challenge. My guess though this scale you can simplify combat and the scale of the world fits the scope of the story attempted to be told. For example the Family structure: Land claimed by a family could convert to number of soldiers that can be raised for the armies ie direct correlation particularly fertile land and expense of and of course the size of the family itself (dependent on the account).
I was thinking AI might be deployed for soldiers sent to "muster arms" and then be controlled by captains (ie players of senior title in the fielty system) to form up as units. Of course players could have the option of directly controlling some soldiers in different formations eg as skirmishers or such...
The idea I quite like from this is that in a talk on the future of mmorpgs, Ryan said about AI that runs the characters more autonomously and players in part "manage these virtual characters". I think the Family system sort of matches that description albeit using players to manage and direct as opposed to put on the clothes, wield the sword of the characters so to speak! I think that happily evokes the right shift of scale I'm describing in the story-telling and it's relation to the graphics scale.
@GripGuiness -
Would that I could. I'm not criticizing PFO/GW, I'm just saying something very simple one of many voices:-
>"As a customer, what I would like to see is lots of other players' stories (thousands of different and individual and group) (as well as my own) in these virtual worlds. Whatever aids that result (I believe will) I support. Whatever detracts from that result - I should question."
What Ryan says is right, it's too big an unknown for what result? It just concerns me that many mmorpgs have believed they've found "next gen" with this "mmorpg standard". Koster goes on elsewhere about how facebook or other genres have innovated where WOW has defined what an MMORPG is with it's long shadow over the market.
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Just to cap this off, and sustain perspective atst as delivering this particular input:-
GW design doc for PFO is one of the best imo that I've seen: There's so much that's good about it.
I posit an alternative to the scale which I think fits the implementation of the above design as a more natural fit: More of a medieval sims model than a "learn to be a combat hero" model.
/popped out and saw a fox: I usually take that as a lucky sign!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Some interesting info on networking/rendering challenge + massive battles/numbers of participants from Mark Jacobs on Camelot Unchained:-
1) As you correctly point out, the problem with large-scale battles in MMORPG is definitely a hydra-headed monster. In our case, the two biggest issues are rendering time and networking. As to the former, Andrew is quite skilled in this area as his resume/experience shows. In most cases so far, the engine has handled hundreds of people on the screen without turning into a slideshow specifically due to rendering issues. Now, the landscape is pretty barren so far, there is no living/breathing sky, the effects are toned down, etc. so it is way too early to say "Mission Accomplished" but, OTOH, we have also put more than 1K Backers in Bots in so it's a pretty good start.
2) As to the networking, yep, that is one of the other heads. All I can say is that we have been focused on this as well and like building a renderer, you can't just take a game and then say you are going to add awesome networking code for a game like this, you have to design the networking code first and then add the gameplay elements/traffic/info/etc. in a way that won't degrade the code's performance to the point where you are screwed. That is one of the reasons we haven't gone all out in terms of building the world/gameplay until we knew we had a great working core. as per above, 1.1K is a good start.
One of the other things we are doing differently than WAR or many other games is that we are building the initial game not to be the first version of the game but in ways to build and test the core tech. So rather than focusing on getting class builds out as early as possible, we've been building tech and testing it. For example, our next evolution of our bots will be to act as projectile throwers. There's nothing like 1K bots all throwing fire, water and earth balls that can intersect/interact/stress a system like that will. Now, this has caused some people to worry (When are we going to see classes!!!!) but this is the right way to do things. Yeah, we could design and deploy some classes and then hope the tech can support it but that would be the wrong thing to do. We need to make sure the tech works first. I'd rather have to deal with the average upset Backer (or refund) now rather than to go back to our Backers in a year and say, "Sorry, I know we showed you this awesome class design, concept art, etc. but due to technical issues, it's now a bit of a pig. But don't worry, it has pretty lipstick!" It certainly would be easier just to trot out some fancies and look to garner more and more donations but we're not going down that path. Heck, even the upcoming Stretch Goal had to make sense and we had to be confident we could deploy it on time or we wouldn't even be talking about it now.
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Avena - some good stuff in there.
Why I never got into this game was the complete focus on PvP. Yet it was the part that got Bloodwulf interested in it. Seems it didn't work for him as well as me.
Things I want from a game like this -
1) to create my own stories or play in others. This requires a toolset to do it. Neverwinter online does this amazingly well. They also give regular content updates from the official producers. However, you can literally play the entire time using other peoples adventures or your own.
2) Co operative play that allows me and my friends to join up, have fun and do quests. Every story based MMO does this.
3) game world that changes based on what you do. The game that does this really well is Elderscrolls online. The world changes for you specifically . As you finish the quests, the bad guys disapear for you but not everyone else still doing that quest. NPCs comment on you and your efforts as you walk past.
4) PvP in an environment where I have a fair chance of winning based on level and skill. Not getting creamed by being hit by uber epic dude on a power trip. I realise this doesn't work in Sandbox model as it is the way to conquer more lands etc. the problem is time zones means that defending territory isn't always possible the way it would be in real life. Your avatar doesn't go to sleep in town and wake up when the attack happens, they're just not there for the fight. Games like Clash of Clans handle this well. Ranked players means you have similar skill range. You don't need to be there for your clan to defend itself. Downtime after attack to repair. People don't want to spend hours doing something only to have someone else destroy it completely with no recourse for repair.
The market is flooded with games that do what this one is trying to do. None of them do all of it, but many of them do these extremely well already.
In a discerning market, this is an issue.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Wrath -
0) Concerning PvP, I think the basis for it's focus is about right: Human interaction between players > content creation: All the pieces come together in this approach (ie player-content, replayability/longevity, depth of skill and if it can be hooked to a larger context then meaningful/purposeful and with integration to economy consequential change to world.
But I think the key is to provide this direct PvP but ensure it's a subset controlled within a wider set of human interactions that include more PAR/RP activities what we can categorize as "Sim Life" operations eg Diplomatic, Crafter, Adventurer, Builder, Farmer, Merchant and much much more.
1) I think then we move onto what you accurately hit the nail on the head with: "TO CREATE MY OWN STORIES OR PLAY IN OTHERS" . On the one hand you have the soldiers at war (PvP) and on the other you have in general the non-war many different roles engaged economically with each other bar exceptions:-
i) Adventurers - These need the party system of combat which TT fits very well but not so well perhaps with larger numbers of participants eg moba 5v5 seems to indicate the scale fit here. Also Adventurer characters could be a special category within families system I suggested above who are not part of the PvP system but go on PvE dungeon jaunts and some dungeons can be PvPvE also with several parties.
ii) Bandits and other "beyond the law characters" you'd have to chism them from Families as independent solo actors who may band together again with Adventurers you're allowing different rule sets for them but limiting their capacity but ensuring such roles exist.
One of the keys with above with the Family System is you have a suite of characters but proportionality rules limit how many of a type you can "house" and control per Family per living members!
2) Hence you get your cooperative play/scale and agree every mmo should have this.
3) Single Player RPGs can do a lot of simulation or at least appearance of via Open World. Dwarf Fortress shows the huge amount of sim behind the graphics needed. What I suggest is PFO is trying to do this - so great going - but I was thinking (perhaps it's still not possible) with simpler RTS graphics we could get there sooner with the world bits represented on smaller scale but looks more epic and then as per current plan iteratively add more and more. But base it on information collection in the world of things - the graphics are representing. It would coordinate lots of small size characters moving around a large world requiring numbers for safety and also for scale of collective action eg resource capture (pvp) then extraction (set up buildings) then transport (haulage eg caravans/beasts of burden perhaps ships on coast) and then processing at settlements. Around that economic ecosystem you build the simulation - PFO is trying this which is awesome awesome - I just think the macro- SCALE is better represented via RTS style presentation and possibly more do-able via dev? You probably want the pace of the game hence slower and the good thing about the RTS Scale implement different PvP rule-sets for armies in units to engage, to march and to declare war. Underneath have skirmish scale rule-set and numbers limits or something for PvP of scouts then armies soliders characters levied from families and potentially even delegated to PvP focused players :-)
4) PFO has some windows to help here, but as above I think putting our eggs into different character baskets of a Family helps avoid the problem. The Great PvP Generals and their Captains on the battlefield, the lonesome vulnerable but daring bandit solo chars and the party adventurers immune from the above.
It carves up characters to allow players to follow their own stories.
You'd have to have a clever system of carving up fielty between families and influence as a progression metric as important as power and money. So the map has to continually home Families with their fiefdoms but constant internal politics to climb socially higher and break up the blob effect. It might be that small areas prevent full scale invasions (and distance) eg water boundaries, mountain boundaries, forests/valleys etc...
I think the worry is valid for sandbox mmorpgs that your stuff will be taken/destroyed by the evil blob and then the other big fear, ppl believe they're not that skillful at the combat itself of controls and builds vs those who are highly motivated at such. Then finally those produce those group colony collapse syndrone which is lethal.
tl;dr: Warfare Ruleset could even up the mass combat pvp that then changes territory control. Under that you want small scale pvp easily controlled in settlement lands, but a thorn in the wilds/travels of caravans.
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Family Structure dividends:-
* Focus/pressure off combat - >2 eg 5:1 of chars non-combat to combat ratio raised per player ie focus on Sim Life - but heavy repercussions of battles/wars
* Managing chars operating different works in settlements own Families or as underlings to lords to rise up...
* adventurers ratios allows PvE party system
* Mortality cycle to regulate power both violence and inflation. Size of family modulated by territory, resources somewhat but also account pricing option
* Fits RTS scale and macro-economic scale and vision of PFO's 4 pillars.
3) game world that changes based on what you do. The game that does this really well is Elderscrolls online. The world changes for you specifically . As you finish the quests, the bad guys disapear for you but not everyone else still doing that quest. NPCs comment on you and your efforts as you walk past.
The gameworld doesnt really change though its basically what I believe Wow called phasing. The idea of a sandbox is the impact of your actions and your settlements actions impact on everyone either on a micro or macro scale.
I point you at this link for eve for example
http://updates.eve-volt.net/game-of-sov/counter-coup-15/
This page is updated often as you can see from the posts and following it gives you a broad idea of how the players are changing the universe. This is what PfO is aiming for
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Goblin Squad Member
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The map of eve reminds me of something:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observable_universe#/media/File:Large-scale_st ructure_of_light_distribution_in_the_universe.jpg
There's a similarity with the pattern between galaxies in the universe.
This is echoed/reflected (perhaps more accurately) in our night-time cities:-
http://spy-drones.com/files/2012/12/The-city-lights-of-Europe-North-Africa- and-the-Middle-East-at-night.-Photo-NASA.jpg
I think a map that might work might produce similar patterns. What is quite nice, the maps in Game Of Thrones seem to follow this pattern a little bit, in Westeros.
You'd want if it were more RTS Scale, real strongholds with some important holdfasts dotted around again then again smaller associations of lesser family's holdings. You'd want it around such features as produce the above pattern - with large gaps between clusters of shared assocation(s).
Obviously the water/mountain geographical boundaries are part of those gaps as river systems and fertile lands and near the sea are usually parts of the clusters of density. And of course at higher level continents between great seas for extreme distances.
This would moderate trade and war (armies marching/battlefields)
With RTS scale movement needs to be slower and distances longer. Roads would be useful to "automate" characters moving. Guards would be automated to escort but only if using roads.
I think the generation cycle of characters young->old needs to be of a decent length. Asymmetric in some sense to get some young'uns mixing with a few oldies but with population dip and rise a very important cycle in the game.
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@Steelwing. I understand its phasing, but for the player it feels like you are changing the world.
I realise that this game is not for me at all. There are other games out there that completely satisfy what I'm after. I merely pointed out what drives me to play and where this game doesn't meet those expectations.
Avena is talking about truly merging genres to get what you want.
RTS for kingdom building (age of empires style), linked with standard MMO style open world, linked with a toolkit allowing players to create dungeons and stories that others can play. This scratches the itch for multiple play styles and lets you play in a Sandbox that changes based on player activities.
His idea is like the ultimate game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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To make the connection (at least the vestiges) and of course adventurers being in short supply due to:-
1) Limits ratio per Family producing them.
2) Mortality rates of being an adventurer
3) Great experience/skills the greater testing the greater adventures!
But here's the connection aside from the rarity of adventurers:-
Such poor companies as Sweden and Denmark, for example, would probably have never sent a single ship to the East Indies, had not the trade been subjected to an exclusive company. The establishment of such a company necessarily encourages adventurers. Their monopoly secures them against all competitors in the home market, and they have the smae chance for foreign markets with traders of other nations... Without such extraordinary encouragement, the poor traders of such poor countries would probably never have thought of hazarding their small capitals in so very distant and uncertain an adventure as the trade to the East Indies must naturally have appeared to them.
The seafaring equivalent might have been privateers (sounds like pirates!). The actual "dungeons" could be anything "hell planes, golarion's moon, the emerald spire, distant continents..." Harnessing players to make 'em and then the actual Devs choosing the means of finding them (a whole adventure involving much capital!) and so... Fame and fortune to the few...
Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success
Tbh, PFO has the vision for this already albeit dungeons will "pop" in the well developed hexes - hence kinda rewards for well-run kingdoms for adventurers... I think the above is more interesting. Finding magical artefacts or such that might serve the Lord of the Realm wel etc. It's a part of Dwarf Fortress in a sense too. The "honors" system to grow Family influence would also tie in nicely with spending time and family characters on being adventurers too. Also the combat system party could be much more defined and more depth/detail too as per the TT.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I actually didn't realize but Crowfall's designer Ralph Koster seems to have realized the same thing here:-
"MMOs have been caught in the paradigm of leveling up and grinding for so long that I think it's going to be a real surprise to once again see an MMO based around this kind of freedom of action and conflict," says Koster. "Crowfall is a hybrid of strategy game and MMO. It also echoes back to the early days of MMOs with robust economies and rich player freedoms."
Personally, my view is that the "permanent character progression" is a false step in both PFO and Crowfall though both have it right about strategy but both don't seem to know what is the right scale to go for. Also knowing that the above is HYBRID they seem to be going for instanced campaigns that can be re-rolled when they end (with the world hopefully wreaked/trashed/smashed by the players ie full entropy.
This seems a safer bet if they're keeping the scale at the avatar level of combat actiony and more limited numbers. I'm not entirely sure it will work, but it's balance between the two.
Whereas the full sweep and scope of PFO's extraordinary design document... imho the SCALE needs to widen:-
* Map Scale
* Graphics representation Scale
* Time Scale/Movement Scale
* Numbers/Armies Scale
* Macro-Economics Scale
* Generations and mortality of characters via Family Scale
* Break up Settlements into Strongholds, Holdfasts, Holdings Scale per family
* Automate some of the characters work-loads eg merchant caravans AI along roads that take a long time to transport goods.
* Seasons and Cycles of harvest and war campaigns scale
* Using the above for proportionality of characters (sexes, generations and experience, careers and classes choices/investments
* Long time to build stuff - high investment in labour and materials and time ie slower pace of game.
All the above will help with boom-bust cycles and player investments in their characters and assets and war for property -> money -> power.
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Goblin Squad Member
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To recap:-
One of the key areas of evolution in game design has to be the merging of genres. Games like the Uncharted series combine shooting, puzzle, and adventure elements together.
Besides expanding the gameplay, this serves another purpose; it opens up the game to more people.
Two genres that have been working the hardest to do this would be action games and RPGs. The determining factor is the abstraction of skill and how each game handles it differently. This has lead to the term "skill abstraction." It's defined as:
The degree of which player skill (or input) has an effect on the gameplay.
In their infancy, both genres existed on complete opposite ends of the spectrum. Slowly, over the years, games designed for both genres have been moving inward. Action games have been adding more RPG elements; RPGs have become more action oriented.
On one hand, this has opened up the respective genres to more gamers. However, to quote Abraham Lincoln, "...you can't please all the people, all the time."
From what I can make out over the last few years listening to player conversations and reactions, is that there's some Fantasy Games that have led to positive reactions from players; notably:-
- Skyrim
- Darksouls
- Mount & Blade
- Chivalry
- The Witcher
- Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor
In these games you have visceral combat (ACTIONY) + RPG in fantasy genre.
This accords with the above observation. And it puts imho huge huge stress on the MMO-RPG genre as realized by EQ/WOW -> And all it's derivatives.
I think more actiony combat + sandbox is going to the "Middle Way" for future MMO-RPG that stick with the avatar perspective of EQ/WOW. AA (Archeage) may be doing well, but I think the engine and hobby features and lack of competition have helped it. As soon as a fantasy with more sandbox and better actiony-combat comes along... it might be a race of one.
Both EQN and CF are going for this stronger emphasis on action combat I think.
=
The other big issue is the lack of appetite for PFO from the PF TT market. I would guess they're more of the higher abstraction of skill of combat in a digital game and more interested in the strategy/sim genre as well as the RPG-PvE sub-set of the MMO-RPG?
I think simulating a lot of The River Kingdoms via the sim side would be attractive to these players (amongst others) within the kingdoms system of an RTS abstraction of formalities of issuing wars/battles/calling banners on a more lengthy cycle so it's proportionally large consequence rarer event - allowing sim life to carry out and again under that PvE of adventurers completely free of concern. That being small chars graphically, but individual character-focus much stronger here.
Anyway that would be my suggestion for HYBRID of genres to go in the other direction (higher abstraction = larger canvass).
@AvenaOats - sorry, still can't process that much stuff.
Is your core point "over-the-shoulder 3D worlds are dead"? Because if that's your core point, I just don't know what to tell you. You're wrong.
Are you wondering how big we think the market for a for a fantasy sandbox MMO is?
ArcheAge, which is a beautiful game that sells itself as a sandbox (but has only a very small bit of sandbox gameplay) generated two million signups in the west. It's Free to Play so that's a reasonable sizing function for "how big is the North American and European Market for a sandbox fantasy MMO" (the addressable part of that market for a Pay to Play game will be smaller, of course.)
Are you wondering why we don't have more players yet?
We have not turned on the marketing. We are spending effectively nothing on marketing yet. Awareness that this game exists within that 2 million person audience is close to 0%.
ArcheAge has questing, leveling, faction, instanced dungeons for set group sizes for gear grinding etc. On the sandbox side it has player housing but it's restricted to a few small/overcrowded zones, piracy of trade packs, and siegable castles that are built in set locations.
In other words it has everything that appeals to traditional theme-park players with a few sandbox features included. It's player base mainly comes from other ThemeParks.
The encouraging part about ArcheAge for a sandbox developer is that it means ThemePark games and players are now moving closer to sandboxes. Not that it's 2 million players are all eager for a true sandbox title.
Where a sandbox developer should be drawing their inspiration is the tens of millions of dollars raised by Star Citizen which is a clarion call to developers "We want something different, and we'll spend lots of money on it."
But the scary part is that because of Star Citizen there are some seriously talented developers coming out of the woodwork to create innovative titles and I personally believe it may only be a matter of time before companies like EA and Blizzard get in on the action.
The issue with Pathfinder Online is it looks, feels, and plays outdated. It's making improvements but what's considered to be an "up-to-date" game is a constantly moving goal line. While PFO makes its improvements so does every other MMO on the market. And newer, sleeker, more modern MMOs go into development, and get released.
So it's not an issue of "Is PFO getting better" but is it generating enough revenue to support a team capable of keeping up with the pace of the rapidly evolving MMO around it?
I believe the answer to that question is no. Why?
Here we are month 3 and they are already letting people with Open Enrollment accounts in. Open Enrollment accounts were supposed to be for... Open Enrollment. That combine with the state of the game when they went into EE and the fact it costs 15$ a month suggest one thing. This project is in serious need of cash and they are depending on the player base to provide it.
Yet despite that, as confirmed by Ryan, they have spent almost nothing on marketing. Why wouldn't they do that if they need sub money so bad? I'm sure most of you already realize this one. PFO isn't a marketable product. It will bring few subscribers given the state it's in right now, and turn many potential future subscribers away given how bad their first impression will likely be.
Desperately needing money to bring the project up to date but not having a very marketable product to bring in money is a terrible cycle a lot of indie MMOs are stuck in, which generally only ends if the MMO shuts down.
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On that note I believe there is one possible way for PFO to move beyond their current circumstances. Pick one or two features and make them so good people keep coming back for more.
Take Minecraft for instance. Bad graphics, boring combat, un-engaging item crafting, and absolutely no scripted content or goals. Just a bad to mediocre game in all aspects except two.
Limitless exploration potential and the ability to shape the terrain however you want to. (Within the limits of a block based system)
Result? Perhaps the most popular game of our time.
PFO needs to find it's reason for people to log in. That was originally PvP but if you're going to use PvP you really need to focus on it until it's amazing and if not pick something else. But right now your most unique aspect is that you are a sandbox (kind of) with a fantasy theme, and the number of "fantasy sandbox MMO" games that are out there is growing by the day.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The encouraging part about ArcheAge for a sandbox developer is that it means ThemePark games and players are now moving closer to sandboxes. Not that it's 2 million players are all eager for a true sandbox title.
Yes, the presumption is that Tab-Target + Sandbox features = a very decent market 2m of which 10,000 is needed to get cash positive for GW. This is the market approach and it's definitely correct according to the data/trends. I did some very rough investigation into the MMORTS market and it's tiny compared. People do seem to want Avatar-sized interaction with game worlds...
Where a sandbox developer should be drawing their inspiration is the tens of millions of dollars raised by Star Citizen which is a clarion call to developers "We want something different, and we'll spend lots of money on it."
And this is the above direction of travel: This is why SC has so much cash and fanfare from players: You get realistic scale of characters with huge powerful spaceships. The experience ie the DESIGN GOAL is very clear:-
>"You can only imagine what it's like to be a ""space-fighter"" as you imagine from films and sci-fi books and anime: Well now you can with the most vivid and physics feeling combination of avatar and spaceship and crew and planetside galaxy... ."
It's going to tap people's emotionally very strongly as evidenced. Tbh I was harping on about combination of space driver + team + ship some years ago as the vision that needed to be done. Didn't realize it could be done to such high graphical standards; I was more thinking Artemis space-Bridge simulator but inter-connected world of other daring firefly esque players to battle.
The issue with Pathfinder Online is it looks, feels, and plays outdated. It's making improvements but what's considered to be an "up-to-date" game is a constantly moving goal line. While PFO makes its improvements so does every other MMO on the market. And newer, sleeker, more modern MMOs go into development, and get released.
I think the big killer is going to be the fact the tech of eg EQ or Crowfall is going to out-do PFO and draw people away as per SC above it is a contest of raw power. IE more actiony combat, more voxel-changing "ooh!" impressions. PFO is more cerebral and more grand in it's scope. But the graphics have been chosen according to the above market data, as opposed to the best fit (I'd argue) of DESIGN GOAL which to my mind looking at the 4 pillars:-
* Exploration = Create a huge world that looks fantastical and immense/daunting
* Development = micro-macro systems of players teeeming around working together building infrastructure and developing system and opportunities
* Domination = Battle Armies and campaigns
* Adventure = the odd one out.
Here's some eg's of the scale vision:-
* DEVELOPMENT
0 A.D. Tutorial 4 - Territories and Buildings
This shows the concept at least of PFO's settlements -> buildings idea. It does not include the excellent extension of buildings -> skill-training but it does push the idea of services eg blacksmith for crafting weapons that players could resource collect, build, own finance etc. Here's Unity 5 using the same scale but imho updating the above with:-
* EXPLORATION
It's worth watching from t=0 to t=1m40 where "exploration" is actually even sub-titled. What they've got right here is the SCALE of the fantasy LANDSCAPE. It looks right. They've admittedly overblown the pace and army emphasis and the settlement building is too random ie it needs choice but it needs underlying city planning logic rules also. From these my conclusion is: PFO can be developed to the vision of the Design Documents in the blog... via the above implementation
Here we are month 3 and they are already letting people with Open Enrollment accounts in. Open Enrollment accounts were supposed to be for... Open Enrollment. That combine with the state of the game when they went into EE and the fact it costs 15$ a month suggest one thing.
Instead this is what we're seeing. I have an a/c with game time and other perks and it's value is related to the demand for the game of PFO.
I'm happy to sub and play if I'm playing the above design document. But I'm not. Now I'm very keen and well-read on PFO's objectives, other players in the market will look at the above and decide it's too poor polish and combat and visceral sense is too dull, I am guessing.On that note I believe there is one possible way for PFO to move beyond their current circumstances. Pick one or two features and make them so good people keep coming back for more.
Mandbo (hopefully spelt his name correctly) came up with a summary of the big problem for PFO (rhetorical challenge):-
1. PFO is seen as FFA PvP sandbox
2. PF TT crowd have been hostile to PFO from beginning (PvP, non-OGL combat, not NN's party emphasis of story)
3. Combat dev is going to have been super impressive to compete core game loop with other games
4. Graphics and Tech is out-muscled by SC, EQN etc ie budget
5. How successful has PFO drawn EVE crowd who want fantasy eve or avatars + big online strategy game?
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Goblin Squad Member
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PFO needs to find it's reason for people to log in. That was originally PvP but if you're going to use PvP you really need to focus on it until it's amazing and if not pick something else. But right now your most unique aspect is that you are a sandbox (kind of) with a fantasy theme, and the number of "fantasy sandbox MMO" games that are out there is growing by the day.
This is the money-quote.
I think PvP is simply too divisive as well as proportionally too small to make PFO both marketable against the grain and immediately attractive to wider market drawing from several different player bases.
What's the DESIGN GOAL? IE what experience is PFO trying to create for players?
Strangely enough I cannot help but notice that George RR Martin's Game Of Thrones is partly so interesting compared to many other fantasy novels because at it's heart he's changed the SCALE of the narrative so successfully.
When I read these books I was over-awed in several ways:-
1. Characters do realistic and interesting things - and die.
2. Major identity of characters is their Family and Family-Family relations
3. These all SCALE up to regions, kings and courts, battles and across time and even further - all from the time of death of Jon Arryn, and maybe even before.
So at this scale, combat and PvP are merely components. The simulation of systems via many players' agencies combining is the DESIGN GOAL.
And this goes on about the different types of emotional experience/relationship players may find for example in Magic: The Gathering:-
So, let's start with the obvious. What or who are Timmy, Johnny, and Spike? To answer this question, let me begin by flashing back ten years. When I was hired into R&D, I was a bit of an oddity. The way I put it back then was I was the one R&D guy that studied words in college. Everyone else majored in something that involved a lot of numbers, be in mathematics, engineering, or a number of different sciences. I, on the other hand, had majored in communications. I was a writer.
This meant that I approached card design the same way I approached writing a story. After all, to me, they were both forms of creative expression. So this begs the question of how I function as a writer. I write from the heart. I write to create an emotional response in my readers. This is the same way I design Magic cards.
Here's where it gets interesting. In order to create an emotional response, I had to understand what emotions I was trying to evoke. In short, I had to ask a number of questions: What does a Magic player want when they play Magic? What are their reasons for playing? What makes them happy?
[...]
The Play's The Thing
Timmy, Johnny and Spike are psychographic profiles for Magic players. That's what the test was all about. It lets you know which profile (including all the various hybrids) you fall into. So what makes the psychographic profile so valuable to a Magic designer (or developer)? The simplest answer is that our job is to make you happy. If we know what makes you happy, our job gets a lot easier.
It took me many years to piece these three psychographic profiles together and many years after that to really understand how each worked. (I should point out that this is an ongoing learning experience which is one of the reasons, by the way, that this column is so much more advanced than the one four years ago.) I had a lot of help from the rest of R&D fine-tuning the details, both in how to interpret what each profile liked and then figuring out how to make cards that satisfied that group's desires.
One of the biggest stumbling blocks is that each group had a clear stereotype that pulled focus. That is, when we talked about the psychographic profiles, we had a tendency to err in talking about one particular subset at the expense of the rest of the profile.
It's a good basis if the information can be obtained. I think Ryan was able to capture a lot of useful marketing data in his former roles. :-)
Looking at the above, in summary:-
1. SCALE
2. STORY
3. PLAYERS
4. INVESTMENT (money, community, time)
It strikes me that The Kingmaker Campaign as PRO/CON 'd here is better realized via this approach:-
Family Unit -> adventurers
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Buildings
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Settlements/Land
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Kingdoms
[LIST]Kingmaker allows many different characters to shine. The wilderness environment and wide range of challenges opens the door to many different character classes and concepts. Everyone from a beater to a skill monkey to a social butterfly will find interesting challenges and encounters.
The adventures hit many of the popular tropes of fantasy kingdoms – war, treachery, tournaments – missing from nearly every other D&D adventure.
The PCs actually increase in power and influence beyond their own collection of magic items: they all take leadership roles in a kingdom, projecting power on a much larger scale than most D&D adventures. If your players like to feel as though they make a difference in the wider world, Kingmaker may be ideal.
The “away party problem” leads to some major cognitive dissonance. The PCs rule a kingdom…but also adventure. By the rules, they can travel for three weeks out of each month without penalty, seeking their subjects’ lost children, eggs for dinner, and lost rings. It’s a little odd that the king and his most important advisors put themselves in danger for such trivial expeditions…but such is the nature of the game.
Kingdom-building can place stringent requirements on character types. This is not so much a mechanical problem as a conceptual one: the players must build characters with a reason to care about their nation and subjects. This is very different from many adventuring archetypes!
If you decide to tackle Kingmaker, there is one extremely important decision to make: should you use the kingdom-building and mass combat mini-games, or let that slide into the background? This is a difficult one, because the idea of ruling a kingdom is one of the two primary attractions of the campaign – but, at least in this reviewer’s eyes, the system itself is deeply flawed. Here are the problems we encountered.[/QUOTE I think the Family Concept of "avatar" resolves a lot of these problems as well as matching the PROS. It also aligns with Martin's method/scale of story telling. This aesthetically matches the visuals of RTS scale This requires slower pace, wider scope and more decision-making for more types of players to be happy to fit in. PvP should be ritualized at this scale to ensure different player types are enjoying the game as well as regulate the cycles of growth vs destruction skewed to growth in duration of execution. Some automation could be added via AI too over time with player created/sold scripts.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Avena,
I still don't understand the Family concept clearly:
Are you suggesting each player (or account) plays a family consisting of one/few adventurers and a cast of support characters? (Or do you mean players should form families and share resources/rep/etc?)
Are you suggesting this for PFO, or for "the ideal game" that may never be?
There's certainly interesting ideas around. The permadeath/heir system in the old Pendragon RPG (and still-in-dev Salem) comes to mind, as does of course Sims and Crusader Kings. But those are very different types of games, and I don't quite see your vision for how families would work in an MMO.
Shared banking, rep and last name across all alts I can understand and see some merit in. Having alt slots be something you earn in-game could be an interesting idea. Beyond that, I'm not sure what you are proposing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'd be best going for a quick cycle ride letting the answer spin in my head before replying... but. To begin with: PFO's design is awesome in the majority, why I backed, why I'm writing all this (apologies if anyone read it and felt wearied!). Eg the contract system instead of quests, single server economic system, player-run factions & settlements etc.
1. The EQ/WOW engine or "look" or indeed "scale" and TT combat is the standard in that.
2. The immortality of the characters - (1)"tis the way the mmorpg market went" as how Ryan put it once. Also the issue of connections over networks leading to loss of investment not good for players or business (2)
I think 9/10ths GW has got right. But I fear the 1/10th remaining from the old mmorpg above is going to sink the good ship Goblin Works. That's already many 10th's more than other mmorpgs were able to do.
Anyway to address 1. SCALE was suggested. What got me on this path was both feedback from EE and own impressions, also the fact it seems so much harder to get anything sandboxy that is a good idea to "breathe life into the world" implemented in these EQ/WOW Engine mmorpgs. There's many ideas to make it really compelling story experience that can't be done to due to cost of assets/art/graphics and complexity in the systems.
The design also smacks more of RTS...
2. The immortality trope of mmorpgs and skill-training works but the bloat of (3) "vets can never be caught" as well as the (4) flip-flopping of capstone vs multi-classing if you remember (squaring that circle)... it doesn't feel right. (5) It's also => Tab-Target Combat where like a deck of cards the players must evaluate what the other players have got etc to be tactical and fun... which again seems to me to be a helluva lot of work; I remember all the travails of WAR and GW2 over trying to get classes and combat right balance... oh dear.
However what got me onto families was the RTS SCALE naturally derives it. It fits. (6) Then it matches what George RR Martin's been doing and fits the scale of his stories... which reminds me also of (7) Crusader Kings II... here generation cycles come in, as well as marriages for connections between families, but also the subject of PvP and combat and serving what the types of players want; by having families it can de-emphasize this issue and introduce the (8) "Medieval Management Sim life" over the skill in competitive combat emphasis and appeal to more player types atst as allowing combat via: (9) RTS Armies for high status players (ie big and important families) and for (10) adventurers in the party system which can then have set context and hence complex puzzle combat added for these specialist classes from the PF TT game.
Finally we come back to the biggie (11) Mortality (it connects up lots of things: recycling of player power into economic assets and gameplay gains and hence choices and consequences of good and bad investments (Littlefinger!)) but also shedding the load on x1 toon and encouraging players during play sessions to experience different PAR/RP of different characters (12).
This can all be done via The Family System.
Start here!
I still don't understand the Family concept clearly:
Are you suggesting each player (or account) plays a family consisting of one/few adventurers and a cast of support characters? (Or do you mean players should form families and share resources/rep/etc?)
In RTS games they seem to go for a war game of armies. This scale is too specific and too pacey/large) for PFO per player it's too impersonal too. Whereas the EQ/WOW scale I feel is too demanding for fantasy (it seems FPS/Space can go in this direction but at cost): In between The Family System fits just about. You have personal connection/commitment and story (eg adventurers and more) but also spreading your class/career/ training into different characters to enjoy a wider gameplay experience and de-emphaze just combat. It also segues into Social Progression systems:-
* Fielty System of providing soldiers to Lords
* Marriage System in order to generate a new generation and hold "influence" in the family system itself "marrying up or among equals"
* Potentially some inherited Family attributes to the new chars generated (future dev)
* Fits a different Pricing model for GW small family to large (Time/Money) etc and potentially Family status changes access to different careers in the Realm/Kingdom system.
* Hopefully at this scale more players can experience running stuff for their family eg Holdings, Holdfasts, Strongholds (you could have the Strongholds with city below for those underling families not given titles and lands to squabble their way upwards from the city slums of ordinary merchants/farmers etc... at the lower sub level.
Answer Each Player runs a Family of a number of characters of the same Family Name (a suite of alts effectively). This allows players to play more rolls and specialize in skill-training to economically progress (leave cash for next gen and invest in assets) and social progression (see above) and ats Power Progression higher up (eg if Titles and Lands can produce Soldiers etc). Tbh the "how" is big to work out but according to the Sub system of pricing different levels of size of family and different access to skill-training going upwards ie cooler roles = bigger sub needed!! Basic roles all kingdoms need smaller families, lower sub price. The plex system could discount some of the above over time of course marginally but in the main a good pricing sytem).
The idea of different players running a family is cool, but if the Scale is RTS I think each player works at that foundation unit. If the Family Concept were taken for PFO as it presently stands... Idk... maybe it could work, the aesthetic unity is kinda wonky though^1 (see all the above connections eg combat)...
Are you suggesting this for PFO, or for "the ideal game" that may never be?
I would suggest as per spoiler above 9/10ths PFO is there, the remaining 1/10th I feel at least in design it's lacking in SCALE and hence in AVATAR representation ie Family unit instead of solo Character unit. But I fear it's too late to change this far into dev for PFO and indeed the market is so risky can well accept Ryan's response above.
There's certainly interesting ideas around. The permadeath/heir system in the old Pendragon RPG (and still-in-dev Salem) comes to mind, as does of course Sims and Crusader Kings. But those are very different types of games, and I don't quite see your vision for how families would work in an MMO.
Shared banking, rep and last name across all alts I can understand and see some merit in. Having alt slots be something you earn in-game could be an interesting idea.
Hopefully the above context (verbiage ahh, at least numbered) helps? It all derives and supports quite holistically I feel. One of things not listed above (13) automate some of the characters doing repetitive tasks via eg LUA scriping AI eg sending merchant caravans along long long roads could be automated - the distance is deliberately punishingly long and dangerous and vast. Or other such things - allowing players to manage atst as micro-manage ie sometimes actually play one character to high detail too. more stories and emotions and playstyles hopefully per player as well as variations eg bandit outlaw could be ostracized from Family and play solo or in other outlaw groups in the wilds with rules KOS (AI?) and so forth... well beyond the actual description here.
Yeah the conversion of player's spending skill-training on:-
* Characters (limited per lifetime and skills learn per char)
* Limited by social status
* limited by pricing model chosen (Time-Money investment balance)
* Converted into useful work done -> gains in game for the Family eg next and marriage and land/property got and bank balance(!) and heirlooms etc
* It ensures players can do teh social useful chars for their player communities and specialize chars for fun or personal profit (scheming) better than the solo char skill-training and buying heaps of alts.
I also hazard saying it breaks out of the shadow of WOW; read this earlier:-
What happens when a game accretes so much mass that it dominates a genre, though? Sometimes these super-massive projects manage to find their own stasis and live long and productive lives, as you can see from the continued success of World of Warcraft. Eventually something will come along to syphon off a bit of WoW’s energy, though. When that happens, the explosion will be much larger than with SWG, but not even an explosion that large will eject all the mass the monster has gathered over the years.
WoW will likely finish its life as a super-massive black hole, a singularity large enough to attract other games to circle in its gravity well. WoW will continue to define the shape and behavior of our industry long after it’s gone. Frankly, I’d call it a very noble finish to a very powerful game.
Lol.
TL;DR Sorry for the long reply and meandering (off to cycle now!) if you take one thing away take this: Family System should encourage (Lucky 14!) "Sim Medieval-Fantasy Management of caste of characters^2 (per player and per communities) small lives producing stories either idiosyncratically or socially and hopefully adding to the games's shared culture and history that player can share.
1: When your thinking hits a groove, the flow seems to come from the groove, and hence it does not feel right to leave the groove!
2: With the Family Scale, each character is born from marriage, is young and starts skill-training (stats could be rolled and some inherited) their bio could be filled in in part by players to hand-craft them, they experience stuff and could die horribly, they marry and raise new generation (possibly abstracted on a crop cycle for the game?! but meaningful length of life per generation (idk 6months to roll the ball) during that time the seasons change, crops grow, buildings are developed, disease may occur, the cycles of life and simulation of fantasy world ebbs and flows...
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Goblin Squad Member
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True, it's "too late for PFO to change track" and as said too risky given the market info that's observable.
When you watch videos of Unity 5, CryEngine4 and Unreal Engine (latest v.)
Unity 5 Highlight Reel - GDC 2015
CRYENGINE Licensee Trailer – GDC 2015
Unreal Engine 4 - GDC 2015 Features Demo Trailer
it's easy to see why.
PFO if it works will be an MMO-Kingdom-Building sim. EVE pretty much a grand RTS strategy game but on the MMO scale successfully. One of the things that doesn't work for me with the avatar EQ/WOW system is the playing jogging all over the place; the pace of the game and density of player characters and model landscape all don't work for me in mmorpgs, they feel fake and it loses immersion. I also think the pace is wrong for a game that's intended to be played for a long time as well as of course looking graphically inferior to the above examples. Even Life Is Feudal or Gloria Victus let alone Kingdom Deliverance or Bless etc "look more real/immersive".
I even think the pricing structure is going to work better for PFO adopting the Family structure -
The Pyramid Social Structure of Peasant Families -> Minor Barons/Dukes -> Lords -> Overlord(s) in Kingdoms in maps as per the pattern expressed above ie for any major battle huge armies need to march and logistic to "pass the large gaps" between realms sub-systems with the peasant families micro-systems. Fielty via the above too ie Families locked into Loyalty to a particular "upper" above them.
The sub system in conjunction with the social progression system unlocking the higher career roles only eg Overlords gain taxes from peasants in their main city this cost is needed as well as title as well as infrastructure from city/castle for certain buildings, functions only those players can access ie rule.
I think working on these social systems is the key with appropriate grading of pricing structure. Rogues would only come from Peasant families for instance... and would spend time thieving in cities from buildings leading to city militia AI guard provision by rulers or not... eg alignment and rules.
The other thing: It helps with the population perception, each player being more of a manager of a team with their own social ladder to climb to power and lands and running estates if they get higher from peasants running profitable going concerns eg land rent from the peasants to pay for soldiers who are bound to their immediate upper lord only.
With the londer distances, The Inns/Taverns on the roads become major high-way refuelling centers and rest/overnight centers. With Clerics healing and disease etc are important as well as Temples for bringing back some souls rarely. Or on battlefields some of the fallen % may be injured minor or major and then check see final survivors %. Given caste of characters you can also have kidnapping and ransom...
I'm not sure how difficult getting bards to do music would be as small chars: http://floriandcp.itch.io/campfire-web
Playing a tune might boost a moral meter or such ,making more productive (in work) or effective (in combat)
Rangers might be scouts for armies and move normally over heavy terrain with other chars slowing to a snails pace...
These feel like characters "playing a role". Instead I think the multi-class skill-training system PFO has for x1 char and sub for alts again, is going to end up with having to fit into one enormous system and each needing to be effective for worth of investment from players paying 15$ a month.
For example, having small chars go to the inn get drunk and activate unarmed pvp where the little chars are beating each other senseless - some players might go too far and beat prone bodies that then die fuelling aggro in the community. The chars/workers go to the inn if worked too hard/too long to "cool off" and that's when the trouble begins.
The other big thing is food supplies and production and consumption. This should be a major initiative to running everything else and storing during Winter and so on as well as guarding from sheep rustlers trying steal sheep to sell elsewhere. Hopefully sheep will cost a fair bit. I like the idea of players creating a Farmer's Union for pricing their food in the markets. A poor harvest (rainy Summer) could affect prices too.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Just to add to the above: A Marriage System could:-
* Secure next generation of characters "being generated".
* Can swap one player's one character m/f with another player's character f/m in an exchange of characters between families
* A social progression "weapon/path" for players via influence/allegiance system
* A method to ostracize players into being unable to "generate their next generation of characters"
* The mechanism with which "rolling new characters" with semi-random and semi-selected traits
* Creates Family Trees for stories and history and relatedness
etc.
Anyway the above 1st part = graphics ; 2nd part = Story with continuation (specific feature extension description) in this post added above.
What's the point?
I just peeked at Crowfall musing that the Archetypes they have have "character progression". Actually from the little I looked at you know what they have: Combat progression not Character progression. When you look at it in this way comparing to the above I think it helps hit home. I was just also looking at how enticing combat is when it is FPS Fantasy combat, an example: Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide | Pre-Alpha Sneak Peek Trailer | GDC 2015 . That combat looks awesome and in an IP I enjoy a lot.
I think there's 2 huge problems with PFO atm:-
1. Combat
2. PvP
I think the above makes the point about combat-avatars vs character-avatars. If using the marriage example above, this can be a form of competition (who gets to marry up) and conflict (which Family gets ostracized and can't marry). The Economy works in similar indirect way and that's good too. The Fielty System would again work this way. having a suite of characters again opens up possibilities for interactions and relations (eg: death and soul returning (rare), hostage and ransoming, murder and mortality, banishment, dishonour to the Family) and so forth.
Coming back to Combat:-
1. Quality: Is it fun?
2. Focus: Can I avoid it? Do other things?
3. How much of the game dev has spent on combat vs other gameplay?
Now onto PvP:-
1. PFO ticks all the boxes for a PvP mmorpg in perception (Open world, loot, combat focus, erasing of territory by big guilds etc)
2. It's considered content when PvE content is too pricey and not catered to such an extent as Themeparks normally do. And given the combat focus of conflict above... the writing is painted red on the wall.
Here's one of Ryan's previous comments on this:-
I'm increasingly worried that the messages coming out of the community don't match what will actually happen in game, and the disconnect between what people hear, and what they experience, will cause blowback. So I'm trying to be blunt when asked this question directly:
"Will I get killed regularly in Pathfinder Online by other players?"
The answer to this question is "yes you will".
American football is not a game about tackling, but tackling happens on almost every play. Pathfinder Online is not a game about killing other players, but your character will be killed by other players regularly.
Pathfinder Online is a game about conflict. One mode of conflict is combat. It will be the primary mode of conflict as Early Enrollment begins. Suggesting otherwise creates a false impression of what the game will be like that will potentially cause a huge problem as we launch.
Our goal, as developers, and our goal, as a community, needs to be to work to make those conflicts meaningful rather than random, and we need to work to identify, and remove, players who only want to inflict meaningless deaths on other players "just for the lulz". But we owe it to ourselves and to the game to be upfront and honest when people ask us if they're going to face character death at the hands of other players. Because they will.
I think it's already an argument on "how severe will PvP be" as it's already into the conversation due to combat focus of conflict. Edit: Coincidence or Serendipity: 2 minutes ago?
And then you're left with those who want to PvP and THAT to be good quality...
Cut to the chase: So on the one hand, PFO is drawing in the PvP crowd then on the other hand it has to convince players that it's not "PvP-focused" but combat focused "you will die (at the hands of other players" THEN it sells itself as Pathfinder Online to Pathfinder TT players...
Mbando called this "The Rhetorical Challenge" of PFO. Well here's where I think the answer to that challeng lies, in both name and in design:-
Pathfinder's Kingmaker Online (PKO)
You're actually telling players what this SCALE of game is tending towards and if you actually follow that scale faithfully, you de-emphasize singular avatar combat (and hence pvp) as just a important sub-set amongst a big group of such systems that combine together to produce the Vision: "Kingmaker" as per the Campaign from the TT (see above link: Is Kingmaker right for you? A (nearly) spoiler-free evaluation).
To test this theory, there was an article over at Massively OP: The Daily Grind: Would you play a Game of Thrones MMO?
Just read the comments, from I presume mmorpg players of various mmorpgs... you get the distinct impression of the sum total of their collective impressions and visions:-
1. GoT => WOW mmorpg aka Themepark IP
2. GoT => EVE mmorpg aka "Murder Simulator 101
3. GoT => BLANK!!!
If I'm not mistaken all the comments assume the EQ/WOW Avatar Engine of experiencing such a story/world. MMORPG = EQ/WOW mmorpg tropes of:-
* Combat avatar perspective
* Progression system derived
* Combat mechanics derived
* Rule-Sets that work around these...
* Fluff/World environment at this scale to experience for the player
I think the match I'm trying to make here is:-
Kingmaker and Game Of Thrones both match in SCALE OF STORY attempted? It also appears to me that to realize Fantasy (earthbound) at this scale and complexity successfully the graphics need to be simplified to approximate appropriately at this scale?
TL;DR Full apologies for the old record impersonation; think the discussion has finally connected full-circle ("the circle is complete" !). The Name, The Design, The Implementation... the harmony of components; just the market that remains a stickler!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Just to mention:-
The bit to come to is the Drain statements: Now here's the interesting part, the Wilderness regions which are not secured with outposts or roads (the way to get to them) these are procedurally generated and randomly re-generated from time to time with devs adding new/different landscape (same biome) dungeons, mobs and other pitfalls and interesting things - as well as being a really large wilderness in total. This design is already being used in both CU and Crowfall to an extent. I'm fairly sure I recommended here long before they announced their plans. ;-)
Of course many were coming up with procedural solutions for dynamic world creations long before:-
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Goblin Squad Member
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Total War: Warhammer—the factions, the units, the heroes
It's getting a good deal of fanfare and buzz.
I think Total War is probably a bit too sophisticated a system for PFO (ie it's a full game in it's own right), but the SCALE idea is I think a killer USP for PFO that is of course not part of the MVP phase - which regrettably is another problem PFO has to overcome to really "take off".
At the RTS Scale I think PFO would have been able to proposition the game more closely to the design document and it would fit better the premise of the kickstarter.
=====
I was playing around with some numbers imagining the age cycle of characters.
With Humans: 1-6 months = 10 years of age per month for basic working assumption and then using a slightly random dying of old age formula for 60-90 (ie months 7, 8, 9). A regeneration CYCLE locked for month 3 hence age 10 chars appearing in month 4 and workable (ie no kid chars). So you get a nice amount of time playing as chars for 6 months. Month 3 would be "Marriage Season!" New chars would be possible to create each month 3 cycle for new players joining the game and just use proxy progenitor chars BEFORE the actual chars are created - these in fact could be priming chars to "set up the chars" before they start as it were.
Similar calcs could be done with variable regen time also but longer life-span for eg Elves, Dwarves as per the lore eg 12 months idk is 120 old for an elf: Could be approximated downwards to fit the year.
=> One of the most interesting basic assumptions that might "pop out" of defining the game in this way...
You can break down the life-cycle into more or less 6 months. Each month represents 10 years.
So 30 days ~av. = 3 days per Year of life. Those 3 days are 24hrsx3 = 72 hours
Proportion of a year a human is "expected to work"
You could break down 72Hrs (for humans):-
* Heavy Labour work: % energetically possible of those 72Hrs afterwhich the char will take on injury and even perm. injury, exhaustion, chance of death from poor condition and the reverse optimal Heavy Labour working conditions, pattern, % of time.
* Variable Other grades of work as befits (simulation and economy requirements!) using the basis above.
* Some concession to regular players habits
* Some scope for scripting routine tasts so "bots can be positively employed to add more simulation to the world while players are off-line but hitting caps given the calcs of "work done" via the above basis method.
To remember, chars have limited skill-training "capacity" in-built. Secondly they have finite life-time to train and to work / do useful things with concordant skill-trained required level (for profit or positive execution of work). This all factors in in terms of:-
1. Chars have total limit on economically energetic useful work possible
2. Chars are fixed per player according to Sub of Family Size as well as marginal payment via a Plex like system and of course in-game gate-keeper access ie actual gameplay achievement/social progress
3. Number of chars are limited to Regen cycle ie births
4. Encourages more families to run -> increases subs or Sub variable size == matched by overhead of management of chars and time playing game to fee each player finds is comfortable for them.
5. Could lead to interesting choices/management for players for gameplay and planning and conniving!
6. Variations could be promoted per race as with breeding per race also - leading to more holistic representation of the races with their own quirks and cultures between players but can mingle/mix nonetheless as well as themed racial realms eg dwarfs mountains mines comes up a lot. And different cycles interacting in interesting ways eg long-life elves.
I think getting a time-basis for work -> economy and numbers of families competing could be a very powerful basis for regulating the game's growth of economy. Rules could be added for marriages and locking assets to families -> clans. Social progression could be regulated via marriages and Fidelity systems between families and clans.
Family-break-ups could be as interesting as "dynasties of families in power"!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Raph's next:-
The first thing that had to happen to enable this was to get rid of the classic advancement paradigm. Why? Because it is geared entirely around only rewarding combat. Past systems that attempted to reward alternate playstyles, such as giving XP for exploration, always felt tacked on compared to the rich systems surrounding combat — which include weapons, clothing, armor, levels, and more.
It's interesting that a lot of the ideas build off the previous:
>"You have to start with the dynamic world data structure, so you can build anywhere."
Looking at the above idea concerning avatar life-cycles from birth to senescence in 6 months and playing with numbers to then derive from 1 month = 360 days (near enough 1 year: 12*30) and reaching 72 Hours to then use as 12 minutes per day to then reapprox. for game play session times of x3 = 36 minutes: 24 minutes of daylight + 12 minutes of night or even less. With seasons per more or less 7.5 days per month year ie changing the factor by 10 years representing 4 seasons.
All of this data then feeds into the game systems and the player game times such as crop cycles and hence food prices... but also adding more "Meta- data" tags to things to collect data such as the location of a battle and tracking the deaths there and so on. Then all this information being collected for players to create Wiki-like articles on the time-line and history of events in PKO (PFO) and various other such reports.
Edit: 2nd part:-
This may seem insane in these days of massive FPS communities, e-sports, and the like. But games driven by skill, as opposed to RPGs, had always suffered greatly in the online games space. They tended to have a fraction as many users as the RPGs did, because the skill barrier, particularly in player-vs-player games, was very high and newbies were chased away. Stats showed that for the RTS and FPS genres, when online play was offered, only a fraction of users would actually engage in it on a regular basis. Not only was it much more latency-sensitive than an RPG combat system with phase-based combat, but if you had a bad spot, you lost.
[...]
The result should have been not unlike a tactical card game: executing specials targeted at trying to undermine your opponent, pushing into stances, getting skills that allowed you to tumble from prone to standing quickly again, and so on.
[...]
Right about now, to any player of SWG, what I have described in tandem with the “bouncy” nature of HAM as I originally pictured it, is probably sounding completely unfamiliar to them. And that’s because combat in SWG was a disaster
[...]
One of the professions I most regretted losing was that of Writer. Quite simply, I wanted to provide in-game feeds for the entire fansite community. I wanted the web fandom inside the game. If you were a prolific blogger writing about the game, it seemed to me that you were a truly material and significant addition to the game community, a massive driver of loyalty, and incredibly important.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think mmo-rpg's have the most attractive advantage in all genres of games (perhaps excluding games that are conducive to skill or modding skill ie skill games) and that's the persistence of social online communities and sharing of the same story experiences.
I posted this in the other thread asking about "sell me PFO?". It was outside directly addressing the issue, so here to state the implicit/inherent guiding or indeed RULING assumption in the above, as I see it:-
It's this:-
>"To make a game (more?) worthwhile, is to produce not only a fun (flow?) experience but value added/extended outside of the actual time spent playing the game."
Tolkien touched on a theme within this: Fantasy in part being a "Recovery" device. It's a little like a guided meditation or for example a conscious routine at the beginning of the day before work to settle one's thoughts and feelings into a center of composure and control. This I find before a busy day, about 10-15minutes really useful and indeed during a day to find a small slot for this, to "recover".
One of the really notable examples of a specific type of value-added has been how some players can make huge amounts of real money from mmos via RMT. It's a bit like playing the stock market using automated software. PLEX appears to be a natural development in this direction in that it motivates playing to be able to pay off the sub fee ie value-added as well as playing to play. It helps "bring it in-house" more as a natural extension of the game, and obviously so put like this, I think.
Another dimension is: Skill as above: Persisting with certain actions that engage skills is probably likely a healthy use of time in the capacity of games where "recovery" is also being exercised: It reminds me of the huge popularity of "fuzzball" at one of my work places as workers seemed to "like hummingbirds at a nectar-feeding station topped up on a boost of energy" in the space of 5-minutes or so before heading back to the telephones, clients, work pressures and desk work.
And another dimension again is: Social Connections. I think this is another obvious statement, yet if you break it down ie simplify it, there's (insert desired adjective: eg "shining") insights to be had... and this one is left for "thinking about in your own time".
But I'm going to come back to another dimension that ties this all together: Story.
Dr. Johnson's dictum that "Man is the cooking-animal" could equally be that "(hu)man is the story-telling animal".
Paizo’s Adventure Paths are amongst their most popular and exciting products, but they can be intimidating. Designed as epic campaigns taking PCs from first to fifteenth level – or higher – they can consume years of both game time and real time. Thus it is crucial to understand exactly what you are getting yourself – and your group – into.
Kingmaker consists of six full-length adventures that take the PCs from first level to about eighteenth. The campaign has two distinctive themes: wilderness “sandbox” exploration and kingdom-building.
It's interesting that there's the scale of epic concerning "Zero->Hero" in the Life-span of the Character. And it makes me think this is concerning Exploration adventures + raising a Kingdom in x1 lifetime.
However looking at it from the pov of the Kingdom-Building itself, you change the focus of the time-span.
Here's a description of a game that attempts to have the play running a squad of heroes atst as a story over 300 years of a kingdom from Double Fine:-
MASSIVE CHALICE is a tactical strategy game set on an epic timeline from Double Fine Productions. As the Immortal Ruler of the Nation, you'll take command of its heroes, forge marriages to strengthen your Bloodlines, and battle a mysterious enemy known as the Cadence in a war lasting hundreds of years.
Key FeaturesBloodline Genetics - MASSIVE CHALICE features an innovative Bloodline system that allows the player to marry heroes together to produce children. The Bloodline system uses a randomized genetic code for every hero. Their children can end up with the best (or worst!) gameplay-impacting traits of their parents.
Permadeath - The heroes in MASSIVE CHALICE age over the course of the timeline and eventually pass away. This forces the player to engage in the beauty of permadeath and always juggle an imperfect party of heroes with which to do battle!
Bloodline Relics - If a hero has fought valiantly enough when they inevitably pass away, their weapon has a chance to become a Bloodline Relic. This powerful Relic can be passed down to any character of the same house in order to carry on the legacy of the fallen hero!
Long View Strategy - Because the war lasts 300 years, players need to take a long view of their strategy. Decisions have to be made dozens of years in advance and long-term planning is incredibly important. That 3-year-old toddler is going to grow up to be your most reliable melee fighter sooner than you think!
There's the appreciation that for 300 years and at a kingdom's perspective you gain:-
* Family Tree
* Senescence
* Change as a function of the timescale which the story is focusing on
I think there's a mash-up here personally and the same with PFO of scales. It's an RPG that wants to be epic.
One of the things about mmorpgs:-
"Everybody gets to be the hero, then no-body is"
"The World does not change concerning player actions"
"Full-time professional adventurers don't have time for also being kings and politicians" - to add!
=
One of the core things in GAMES is that the player avatar is intended to reward the player's actions and decisions. However the by-product of such a system if you convert it to the context of story-generation ei narrative (not merely mechanical system of play) is what you often (very often) get in films:-
* The main character is a vehicle for the viewer to experience an "EGO-TRIP" of vicariously living the main character's attractive story: Eg James Bond: Gets the girl(s), gets the gadgets, looks and talks cool and absent-mindedly saves the world after ensuring everyone in the story knows how cool he is.
* The main character often kills and kills and kills and kills lots of baddies (see mmorpgs where mobs are "loot-pinatas" to mow down remorselessly.
* Oh did we also say the viewer or player also expects their character to be immortal and any time THEY make a failure "it's ok"?
Looking at mmorpgs from technical reasons why characters don't die - they only fall over!
* Your EQ/WOW Engine character is a Hero as per the perspective. This ego-trip demands it or else the player/viewer would be disappointed. Some films have this: You can watch a real DOWNER Westerner that does this that inspired Tarantino.
* x1 char dying would be bad business to reroll and losing all your work (ie grind issues, repetition etc)
* Technical glitch of chars dying at any time over a network.
* Investing in sub means that money to repay must be persistent gains
* Follows the concept of character progression via power increase of stats
I think with a change in scale all these tropes of mmorpgs can be relegated in service of story at the scale that fits:-
1. Thousands of participants
2. Systems involving big data and numbers cycling within multiple systems (which lead to emergence of order from complexity ie self-organization)
3. A changing world with many variables
4. Scale change of view and of time and of people and place: Different information leading to different decisions by players.
5. Biggest boon: The de-emphasis on combat + power = progression measure of a character. Instead of linearity we could have cycles of progression in game; cycles of the game-state (population, seasons, stresses and strains on the economy interacting with player interactions on these things) and sustaining game-balance via removal of bloat of power from linear progression.
6. Re-focus on the virtual world building of interacting systems with the characters components of this, the ant-farm approach.
7. More interesting stories of loss and family endeavour, more systems for social interaction; the stronger simulation will perform the function of story (as above stronger for players) - one of those functions is not the ego-trip... which is exploited by the P2W monetization systems aka "FUN PAIN" ~ Ramin Shokrizade
8. Plays to MMO- strengths that other genres cannot compete with ie sheer number of players, sheer scale of canvas of story ie Epic.
I think if any designer wants to emulate eve on the fantasy guise this is the right approach as per Game Of Thrones and Kingmaker.
Some interesting conversations on permadeath:-
Death of a Spaceman ~ Chris Roberts on Star Citizen
Why I Hate the Term “Permadeath”
It does not seem like many have countenanced the concept of changing the scale and changing the perception of death of a life to a cycle of lives over a longer time measurement and this changes the focus of the details of x1 story vs xN stories.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Bludd asked a couple of powerful questions in another thread:-
What aspects of PFO can be directly traced to Pathfinder, and uniquely Pathfinder?
Enter any one of those games and ask yourself, does this feel like I am in a world based on those IPs?
This is at the root of things and the path to success. So the challenge has been accepted and an example will be fashioned.
Let us take a system in Pathfinder that is worthy of being labelled: "Iconic":-
ALIGNMENT SYSTEM
SCALE:-
1. PnP PF: Small Group of players
2. MMO PFO: Thousands upon thousands of players
How do we square the circle or scale it up?
Answer:-
1. In PnP PF Alignment = Moral Compass = Psychological Interpretation of character's likely reactions and reactions of others to that character.
2. In MMO PFO Alignment = Applicable Society = Political Interpretation of a character's position in a type of society and hence a type of state that fits that type of society.
Here are the Alignments:-
LG, LN, LE, NG, NN, NE, CG, CN, CE
Apportion the political system of the players of a realm via Alignment:-
- LG = Direct Democracy
- CE = Anarchy
- NN = Corporatism?
- LE = Totalitarianism
- CG = Delegative Democracy
- NE = Despotism?
- NG = Representative Democracy/Dictatorship
- LN = Communism?
- CN = Autocracy (Might Makes Right)?
Etc. You can also add additional markers around or above or additional to:-
- Theocracy
- Monarchy
- Aristocracy
It could be that the system of sharing of power dictates the alignment of the settlement which informs the players of their relations with their shared neighbours what that system of rules is based upon. Within that you could have variable Alignments of characters living in those settlements or indeed Reputation System of the Family and the characters as a different measure created by players themselves between themselves. It should be noted the way these are expressed is via the INSTITUTIONS or lack of them in Realms and their effective enforcement or not (via AI Guards for example the rulers can apportion) - we can see the seeds of a Punitative and legal system here from property as a basis to competition and conflict and cooperation. There is also evolution of realms and preferences of players and freedom to choose. The Institutions are an important idea for the managing and representation of these systems for players to manage and run realms. ie the buildings concept extended adding the need for higher-upper roles for chars to train in.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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I see lots of germs of ideas for great MMOs here, but I don't see much that wouldn't require writing off a huge part of work already done in order to incorporate into PFO.
Are you sure that you're not designing a MMO based off of Crusader Kings or Europa Universalis? There's probably a niche for that somewhere, but I think that there are some pretty hard problems to solve first. What would the players' goals be in a MMO succession game, and how would a player that spent only 12 sessions with a character (semiweekly for 6 months) feel that they were accomplishing something?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I see lots of germs of ideas for great MMOs here, but I don't see much that wouldn't require writing off a huge part of work already done in order to incorporate into PFO.
Alas, that's true. Alas imo at least.
I see lots of gems of ideas for great MMOs here... Are you sure that you're not designing a MMO based off of Crusader Kings or Europa Universalis? There's probably a huge niche for that somewhere...
Lol at myself, I read it that way to begin with. Just goes to show. :-)
Are you sure that you're not designing a MMO based off of Crusader Kings or Europa Universalis?
Some extant egs to illustrate that there's a genuine (at least as far as I can be sure of my own conclusions) ideological (is that the right word?) framework that is informing this thread, the ideas with-in... In no specific order, these are real egs, ie pieces just as the above game references are pieces too, only a part of the framework:-
1. You'll notice online forum communities derive a large part of their stickiness to "online drama" fuelling social interaction. This applies to mmorpgs but also their own particular forums too and guild websites.
2. EVE the players often comment on a large part of the gameplay is the meta- ie planning and discussing before actual online engagements and activities. Perhaps EVE mirrors 1. better than other mmorpgs?
3. Combat mechanics misplaced focus:
“If you want a ‘combat’ game I would honestly look elsewhere,” he said. The emphasis MMOs place on combat—especially MMOs with PvP—make this seem like a death knell for the game. “It is pretty meh,” he admitted, mentioning “issues around targeting, hit detection, desyncing,” and so forth. Ouch. That seems pretty brutal, especially for a game boasting open-world PvP.
4. The issue is that it's a circular loop between: Improving combat vs the focus on Roles which then can leverage the "online dramas" that I believe is a stronger market attractant to players: Unmasking the Avatar: The Demographics of MMO Player Motivations, In-Game Preferences, and Attrition
5. To come back to the reasoning: Game A does X, therefore to get X but with MMO, just Game MMO-A = vundebar ["\ˈvu̇n-dər-ˌbär\"]! (except it's a niche of a niche...) ; the framework is informing more than that: So it's just as applicable to do a sort of "forensic" on Kingmaker:
Where do you focus in an MMO of Kingmaker: The Kingdom or the party group?
6. I'm worried some of the above is taken as deliberately vague so as to shield against criticism by appearing to be "thinking at a higher level" and hence avoiding the basic implication of the solution suggested in the thread: RTS games << RPG of the 3D avatars which are "big on the screen" ie difference between player "running their avatar like a radio-controlled robot" vs "being their avatar in game". However, I think future mmorpgs are being pushed in this direction whether they like it or not, there's a "Rodentia browser mmo mix of strategy and mmo" (it's a mish-mash of the 2 alongside each other: Trying to have your cake and eat it); then Crowfall:
The MMO. Can it be saved from itself? The genre is synonymous with massive success -- rarely. More often, it's earned a reputation for persistent mediocrity, as hyped titles come on strong and soon fade from popular consciousness.
That's because they're all measured against the yardstick of World of Warcraft. Maybe it's time to try something different.
...and make a "pretty hardcore game for people who want a visceral game experience," Walton says.
"WoW has become synonymous with the MMO. While healthy for them, it's maybe not healthy for the overall market," Walton says.
So their first step is to throw out the design wisdom of World of Warcraft "by going back to the beginning" of the genre, when its creative potential seemed so huge. "Something was lost," Coleman says. "We've seen a lot of stagnation."
He sees "fertile ground... that we never fully developed." The plan is to create a strategy/MMO hybrid title, cognizant of the inherent differences between the genres -- a game that continually provides "that initial rush, that initial adrenaline feeling of mystery and awe and exploration, and jockeying for power and position," Coleman says.
..."The strategy layer [is] connected directly to a player-driven economy," Coleman says, and veteran MMO designer Raph Koster is consulting on the title to help design that economy.
Hmm, just look at this picture in the article: The ""EQ/WOW Engine"" of Crowfall. The mention of the economy + strategy connection is good however. In fact I've coined a phrase for this contention... tbc... .
There's probably a niche for that somewhere, but I think that there are some pretty hard problems to solve first. What would the players' goals be in a MMO succession game, and how would a player that spent only 12 sessions with a character (semiweekly for 6 months) feel that they were accomplishing something?*GULP!!!* :-D
Good questions, what I think is that as per the above 'tbc' I can only do a full article on this subject to first set the scene before then actually showing the APPROACH to answering the above, which is far from actually demonstrating it works... that is derived from the basic high-level view that is itself is based on the "simples" eg time and space along with the tbc focus (keeping that wrapped atm) and then quickly getting the sytem running and only demonstrating it works via actual adjustment during player data. However, the approach (you can guess tbc) sticks to the focus that is where for example PFO's real strength lies - not the where all the WOW Contenders To The Throne bodies lay strewn!
I'll see if I can write up an article over the next few weeks (or months) on all this using more means to communicate (pics, tables, calcs, references, structure, framework etc. Why not another 'dang' project... and to avoid some of the constipation that can occur with online discussions involving everybody's different opinions clamouring for primacy (!):-
@Whoever used my name (Andius) in the comments to the first article linked above. I agree with the general message of your post. Interested to know who's going around claiming to be me though if you'll PM me your real identity.