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  1. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Try to gain a new skill in WoW without levelling. The distinction of horizontal vs vertical levelling is done because you have two directions of progression: vertical, giving you higher power, horizontal giving you different powers. But the main point why we're giving those direction names is...
  2. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    The ability to be in multiple guilds simultaneously in A Tale in the Desert was extremely interesting, game-wise. At one point, I was in: - A serverwide french-speaking guild - A local guild with people I worked various tradeskills with - The Bedouin guild for mutual help on passing tests...
  3. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Nope. That's not horizontal levelling. That's vertical levelling. Vertical levelling: 5 tiers. Tier 1, my sword does 100 dmg. Tier 2, my sword does 150 dmg. Tier 3, my sword does 200 dmg. Tier 4, 250 dmg, tier 5 300 dmg. That's vertical levelling: your power value increase. Horizontal...
  4. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Probably. Note that you're supposed to be able to pick additional tiers for other classes while playing as, say, a Warrior, so the additional classes end up being a source of "new skills" you use for your main class, even if you never ever use that class itself.
  5. Ukerric

    Is the MMO Market imploding?

    Have you looked at the allakhazam link I did put to refresh your memory? I did play DAOC, and did questing, and I constantly had 10+ quests in progress all the time until around level 25. Fedex, collect, etc. The quests may not have given you enough XP to level just doing them after level 12...
  6. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Because tiers aren't horizontal levelling, they're vertical. The horizontal part is getting tier 5 in forty different vertical silos, each independent from the other, each that can be progressed completely independently from the others, and the fact that you're tier 1 or 5 in the wizard class...
  7. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    There's however a major difference. XP is fungible. One point of XP gained killing a bear, completing a fed-ex quest, uncovering a new mini-map area, is equal to the other point of XP. As a result, you can go to the place where XP is most efficient, and do it to the exclusion of nothing else...
  8. Ukerric

    Wildstar Launch Thread - Server: Stormtalon | Faction: Dominion

    Because you can't trade $15 month subscription for in-game value. Remember: the guy who is buying CREDD for $20 isn't going to buy it for a 1 month subscription: he buys it to sell in-game for gold. So the question is: are you going to get more gold for $20 from players or from farmers? The...
  9. Ukerric

    Is the MMO Market imploding?

    That's from the fact that you didn't had glowing yellow exclamation marks around. There were a ton of NPCs giving you exactly the same quest systems as WoW (fetch me this; go there to give this guy this token; kill bears and take their asses)... it was just easy to forget about them since they...
  10. Ukerric

    Is the MMO Market imploding?

    I beg to differ. Dark Age of Camelot had almost exactly the same questing system. The only significant difference I can think of was the quest marker above the NPC's head. (they had a severe lack of quest content at the later stages of levelling, but the system from 1 to 30+ felt like WoW)
  11. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    That's not shortsighted. That's what people WANT. Obligatory car analogy: When cars appeared, they were clunky monsters. People would endlessly tinker with them, dismantle and rebuild them from scratch; swap in and out parts to get better mileage and faster speed. Fast forward to today...
  12. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Well, considering the max sub number occurred after POP... nope, most people didn't stop playing EQ after Planes. Most people stopped playing EQ when WoW released, period. Maybe YOUR guild dissolved at that time, but in general, no, people kept on playing. Another anecdotal experience: I...
  13. Ukerric

    The Elder Scrolls Online

    Fair or not, people ARE going to judge that game based on this. Not everyone, probably not even the majority (since you tend to get hardcore gamers and pure fans at that stage) but quite a lot. Me? I've judged the game BEFORE playing, and passing over it. No big deal.
  14. Ukerric

    Official EQ Landmark discussion

    It was very different however, since Mojang didn't support servers for people; everyone could pick and stay at whatever version (stable or not). They redid the world gen (oh "Gargamel", how we miss you...) multiple times. Heck, our group's play world still bears the scars (chunk borders) of beta...
  15. Ukerric

    The Elder Scrolls Online

    Worse. The player might think twice about buying the item if he has to go thru additional loops (like finding bookmark, logging in, using the authenticator if any, navigating menus...). Impulse buy for the win!
  16. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    You haven't thought that out. Really, really out. We're in an alternate timeline. The basics are that the Combine Empire is at war with the Ring of Scale, for centuries, has been kicked out of Amaril/Tunaria/Antonica/whatever, and are only coming back. You learn about those two dragons...
  17. Ukerric

    The Elder Scrolls Online

    P2W means any item that gives you a gameplay advantage that no player not using the cash shop can achieve in a reasonable time frame. Anything else is convenience (sometimes real big convenience, such as a 2nd character slot, or more than the paltry bank slots you being with) or cosmetic (same...
  18. Ukerric

    Star Citizen Online - The search for more money

    Remember when the original funding goal was $2M? And the industry apparently thinking that there's no more market for a space sim? https://robertsspaceindustries.com/funding-goals
  19. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Well, to be honest, you do have a virtual magic hint book. It has a Google rainbow logo on it. The only question is, do you open the hint book you have in-game, or do you open the hint book in the browser windows next to your game? You all seem to have difficulties about the difference...
  20. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    What are those quests thing you speak of? You mean the epic weapon quests, right? First thing: If you do assume a WoW-theme-park-exclamation-point-quested-gearing-model, then, yes, it fails. If you don't, then it should not. You always complain about the on-rail-thing, and the very first...
  21. Ukerric

    BLESS

    Korean MMOs are all style, no substance. The quintessential McMMO. And don't forget: it's F2P (of course), meaning it's P2W (being Korean market).
  22. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    It is going to be only semi-dynamic. It's mainly static because Rallying Cry have only one end. Halas IS founded. Qeynos FALLS to the dragons. You can speed it up or slow it down, but you won't be able to alter the final result. What is going to be different here is that, unlike Asheron's call...
  23. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Yes. And the game really begins at max level, we know that.
  24. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Sandboxy Rallying Call: Players on server A have provided about 70% wood and 30% stone, most of the buildings in Halas are large log halls. Players from B provided 80% stone, 20% wood, and the buildings are all about sturdy stonewalled homes. Actual EQN Rallying Call: Players on server A have...
  25. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Recipe for a sure-fire "key" access to zones: - If one of the characters on your account is enabled for the zone,everycharacter on the account is enabled - You can be enabled by obtaining the key (loot / quest / flag)orby defeating a majority of the encounters of the zone (zone has 5 bosses...
  26. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Nope. Gaining abilities via levelling is: 1) Fungible (XP gained on killing Orcs in Crushbone is completely equal to XP gained on killing Gnolls in Blackburrow) 2) Linear (you get The Mighty Bash first, then the Small Kick next, then the Vital Knock next) 3) Static (every warrior gets...
  27. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    It does two things: 1) You can choose to become a wizard out of combat, swapping gear, weapon and skills. 2) You can pick any of the 4 generic wizard class skills that match one of your warrior class skills. If the war is (see above) 1 offense, 1 movement, 2 defensive, and the wizard is 2...
  28. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Nope, they're faction/race/specific character-locked. They specially took Paladin as an example to say you couldn't improve the class if you didn't "live the life of the paladin". Meaning that, if you fuck up your faction, and the class trainer doesn't want to talk to you, then you can go from...
  29. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    It's a bit simplistic. The "aggro" is a good basic model, it dictates your target. What you need, rather than the base model of increasing aggo with modifiers is a per-ability aggro list with highly dynamic values. There's a general "threat" value, which is, for example, equal to the current...
  30. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    That's not AI-type stuff, that's ecology. We had numerous talks with UO devs at Nevrax back when Ryzom was started about it. And the end was that it was a "Turing error" (it was Alan Turing who said something like "when I design a submarine, I don't look at fish biology", and yes, it was his...
  31. Ukerric

    The Mighty Quest for Epic Loot (f2p MMO)

    They also got a lot of web-based F2P games (Heroes of Might and Magic Kingdoms, Settlers Online...)
  32. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Nah. GW2 has TEN!
  33. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    I don't know. Minecraft's procedural content did generate a lot of epic-type landscape and challenges, even if they toned it down a bit for consistency's sake (if I say "gargamel", do you know what I'm talking about?). And that's with essentially one person doing it at the time. Thing is...
  34. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    However, from what they said, XP isn't all you need to progress. I think it goes like that: - To progress from tier 1 to tier 2, you need to spend XP to level each of the 12 of your class abilities to tier 2, which unlocks your tier 2 class. - To progress from tier 2 to tier 3, you need...
  35. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    It's not about whether the AI is smart or not, it's chiefly about how players do interact with each other, and which roles strengthen which other roles. The AI can be stupid, or smart, and all you need to adjust in practice is the HP and DPS of the mob. You can have an ultra-smart AI, but...
  36. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Well, not exactly. The point is, the game can be either: - Very easy: Not require any role whatsoever in a group to be able to kill a given mob (trivial "every ratonga for itself" DPS zerg scenario) - Simple: Require combos of specific roles, not necessarily tank+heal, but one of which is...
  37. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    They should do it ATITD-style. You can use your login to access your spouse's character. Anytime (unless she/he's logged in already, that is). No divorce allowed.
  38. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    And WoW found the solution. Hit your "switch to shadow" button, and start melting faces. The question isn't about classes, it's about roles. All Lithose's metaphors of supply lines aside, you can have 6 people soloing the mob together, or a group doing the mob. The difference is that a...
  39. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    Math is hard, eh? Ok, let's walk you through the formula. XP needed to reach level N = F x 1000 x N^3. XP at end of previous level = F x 1000 x (N-1)^3. So, XP required during the level = F x 1000 x ( N^3 - (N-1)^3). Quick, what's the result? It's F x 1000 x (3xN^2 - 3xN + 1), because the...
  40. Ukerric

    EQ Never

    It wasn't given by the devs, it was simply figured out by players. Levels weren't hardcoded, they were computed with a very simple formula. Hell levels arose because one dev couldn't do simple math. Max xp for level N required a total of N^3 * 1000 * fudge factor, which started at 1.0 and then...