Caliane
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so, perma invis is fine.
as long as there is a realm ability that removes perma invis...
..right.. how about we remove perma invis in the first place?
Camelot Unchained MMO
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as long as there is a realm ability that removes perma invis...
..right.. how about we remove perma invis in the first place?
I agree invisibility as a 'stealth mechanism' is a poor design. I do think there's a place for stealth, though, as long as it's tactical and there are plenty of counters. I'm not sure the CU design ideas are going to work, but I'll approach it with an open mind. I think GW2 so far has done the best job with stealth.
Ironically, most players who were fine with DAOCs stealth implementation were quite happy spotting stealthers with their Odin's Eye, and collecting free kills. At release it was really a poor design.
Caliane
Avatar of War Slayer
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a big problem with stealth is generally, who has it?
Wow was a trifecta. Stealth, stuns, and burst in one package. that is just fucking retarded. druids having perma-stealth was not nearly as big of a problem for example.
Tracking? one of the advantages of perma stealth is how it relates to minimap tracking. its been too long, I dont remember how daoc's minimap worked. one of the things that pissed me off in DCUO was everyone friend and foe showing up on the minimap, making getaways, and sneaking around impossible. lame as hell.
Or just in general, how a player can infiltrate, and of course to what degree. again, wow, where you could literally stealth into opposing factions capital. (fun as hell.. sure..) But this presents a gameplay mechanic that is just game changing. Its like one player can fly, and everyone else can't. that player is just going to be operating on a whole different level. It changes so much about how these games play.
Wow was a trifecta. Stealth, stuns, and burst in one package. that is just fucking retarded. druids having perma-stealth was not nearly as big of a problem for example.
Tracking? one of the advantages of perma stealth is how it relates to minimap tracking. its been too long, I dont remember how daoc's minimap worked. one of the things that pissed me off in DCUO was everyone friend and foe showing up on the minimap, making getaways, and sneaking around impossible. lame as hell.
Or just in general, how a player can infiltrate, and of course to what degree. again, wow, where you could literally stealth into opposing factions capital. (fun as hell.. sure..) But this presents a gameplay mechanic that is just game changing. Its like one player can fly, and everyone else can't. that player is just going to be operating on a whole different level. It changes so much about how these games play.
tf2 cloak and dagger is great and was updated with a counter (that sniper's shield).
more fun when it is not balanced (mind you not game breaking op, but situationally so). just give everyone op abilities so they can qq over eachother and everyone will be discontent and pining over eachothers abilites == every is masochistically happy in mmo terms.
more fun when it is not balanced (mind you not game breaking op, but situationally so). just give everyone op abilities so they can qq over eachother and everyone will be discontent and pining over eachothers abilites == every is masochistically happy in mmo terms.
Azrayne
Irenicus did nothing wrong
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Are you retarded? That's exactly my point, which you missed because you were too busy pouncing on me for 'whining' to read into what I was saying. The problem with invisibility-style stealth is that it leads to every encounter involving it being on the extreme ends of the spectrum. Either the stealthers utilize stealth to their advantage and they get the jump on someone who has no chance of fighting back, or the stealther fucks up/someone counters stealth, in which case they get raped by visible players who are balanced around open combat instead of 1 shotting people from invisibility. Either way, the fight is decided as soon as the first blow is struck, it's always one side or the other getting farmed, which is shitty and boring for both sides.
And of course there's all the times that they fuck with the dynamic in group fights. A huge part of DAoC was the strategy involved in fighting other groups, but stealthers ruined that whenever they were nearby because there's no way to account for their presence, so two groups could hit eachother, be having a great fight where they pull everything off perfectly and are going neck to neck, then have their hard work and skill completely devalidated because a bunch of stealthers pop out of nowhere and lay into one of the groups, leaving one group losing, not through any fault of their own, but to what is essentially a random environmental effect, and both sides being robbed of a challenging fight which they would have enjoyed and learned from. It fucking sucks for both sides.
<quote> Either the stealthers utilize stealth to their advantage and they get the jump on someone who has no chance of fighting back, or the stealther fucks up/someone counters stealth, in which case they get raped by visible players who are balanced around open combat instead of 1 shotting people from invisibility. </quote>
depends on the class/ra the stealther is going up against - people don't get 1 shotted (unless like no/crap gear). nor was landing a fromstealth style wholly contingent on winning -- some went more melee than their criticalline(from stealth); high rr ns would go magic while it was good. i think your perspective is really dependent on when you played. i think the role stealthers played was more to encourage groups of nonstealthers to form up (as well as stealth wars among themselves) and not particularly balanced on a per class basis.
as for stealthers leeching in on 8vs8 groups... yeah that is annoying for the group, but fun for the stealthers. mind you, it's largely a risk for the stealthers too.
if it were the case that stealthers weren't able to interfere with visible group vs group at all i think it'd take away from the game. although, perhaps another quickcast like ability to help out against stealthers might have warranted earlier on.
these annoyances make the game.
depends on the class/ra the stealther is going up against - people don't get 1 shotted (unless like no/crap gear). nor was landing a fromstealth style wholly contingent on winning -- some went more melee than their criticalline(from stealth); high rr ns would go magic while it was good. i think your perspective is really dependent on when you played. i think the role stealthers played was more to encourage groups of nonstealthers to form up (as well as stealth wars among themselves) and not particularly balanced on a per class basis.
as for stealthers leeching in on 8vs8 groups... yeah that is annoying for the group, but fun for the stealthers. mind you, it's largely a risk for the stealthers too.
if it were the case that stealthers weren't able to interfere with visible group vs group at all i think it'd take away from the game. although, perhaps another quickcast like ability to help out against stealthers might have warranted earlier on.
these annoyances make the game.
I played DAOC off and on from release until the end of the classic servers, and never really understood the rage directed towards stealthers. I had half a dozen visibles I played to rr6+, and played every stealther to rr5+ except minstrel and ranger. I didn't play a stealther until they released the classic servers, and it was honestly some of the most fun I've ever had in any game. Stealthers never bothered me when I was running on a visible character. You really had to be un-spellcrafted or unlucky to die to a single stealther on most visible classes, and a total idiot if you died to a group of stealthers more than once or twice in a given night. Playing a stealther was often a totally different meta game within DAOC, just like the 8-man stuff. It took a lot of planning and patience to play one well, and even as a group hitting travel routes to keeps/towers under siege or hanging out at a bridge was risky given the lack of rez/healing and the long travel times.
The best thing about stealth in DAOC is that it allowed parents with kids or anyone that needed to periodically AFK an option to still play, have a role, and have some fun. At one point I was in a stealther guild, and honestly I don't think more than one or two people would have kept a sub if it wasn't for the ability to stealth and AFK. Just about everyone in the guild had young kids or a job that required the ability to have unscheduled periodic breaks. Grouping wasn't an option, because who wants to group with someone that randomly disappears for minutes at a time or isn't always able to pay attention? The balance was that no one ever took us in a real group because stealthers weren't optimal or even very viable for that role (other than maybe a minstrel). I do hope they leave a game mechanic in for a non-movement type permanent stealth or camo where at least you can go off and the woods and AFK without worrying about coming back to a long corpse run.
The best thing about stealth in DAOC is that it allowed parents with kids or anyone that needed to periodically AFK an option to still play, have a role, and have some fun. At one point I was in a stealther guild, and honestly I don't think more than one or two people would have kept a sub if it wasn't for the ability to stealth and AFK. Just about everyone in the guild had young kids or a job that required the ability to have unscheduled periodic breaks. Grouping wasn't an option, because who wants to group with someone that randomly disappears for minutes at a time or isn't always able to pay attention? The balance was that no one ever took us in a real group because stealthers weren't optimal or even very viable for that role (other than maybe a minstrel). I do hope they leave a game mechanic in for a non-movement type permanent stealth or camo where at least you can go off and the woods and AFK without worrying about coming back to a long corpse run.
Oh yes, because logging out and then back in while solo in an open RvR zone on a visible class works really well. Groups really like to wait around for people that need to periodically afk too. Did you even play DAOC, or are you basing this on WoW stealth where an unstealthed rogue is on par with any visible? I played both visibles and stealthers extensively in DAOC, and realm points were gained much easier/faster as a visible than you could ever dream of as a stealther. Even while waiting 15+ minutes for higher RR cooldowns to be up, any templated visible with a brain was a risky proposition at best. Attacking anyone in a group was suicide. A large majority of stealther realm points were gained from fights with other stealthers (aside from archers in keep defense).
Tmac
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Pancreas
Vyemm Raider
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Stealth is a tricky ability to implement well in pvp. The absolute number one advantage in a pvp setting is information. If you know where the enemy is, what classes and numbers they have, what their resources levels are and so on... you can then form a strategy to deal with it. If you don't have that information, then you resort to trying to prepare against estimated threats.
By allowing certain players to completely drop off the radar into a perfect stealth... information gathering becomes much harder. Now you either leave the rest of the players completely in the dark, and balance the stealth classes to be weaker in battle; Or, you start handing out counter stealth abilities to the other classes. This really gets cumbersome. Suddenly there is an entire layer of combat, that all classes have to address, because of a single ability that only one or two classes have access to.
If a game is going to include a perfect stealth mechanic, they really should just give it to everyone, or no one. This would either be awesome or retarded with no middle ground.
Anyways, I think stealth mechanics should be created and defeated, not by discrete player abilities, but by the environment itself.....
A lot of that stuff has been around forever, but I don't think much of it has really been used in an mmo setting before.
By allowing certain players to completely drop off the radar into a perfect stealth... information gathering becomes much harder. Now you either leave the rest of the players completely in the dark, and balance the stealth classes to be weaker in battle; Or, you start handing out counter stealth abilities to the other classes. This really gets cumbersome. Suddenly there is an entire layer of combat, that all classes have to address, because of a single ability that only one or two classes have access to.
If a game is going to include a perfect stealth mechanic, they really should just give it to everyone, or no one. This would either be awesome or retarded with no middle ground.
Anyways, I think stealth mechanics should be created and defeated, not by discrete player abilities, but by the environment itself.....
POV
Lets say a game has a forced close camera. Now you can sneak up behind people. This is a basic form of stealth anyone who has played an fps is aware of.
Noise
You can go astepfurther by implementing footfalls and give players options to lessen the noise they make while moving around. Certain armors and equipment could make sounds (chain mail, pole arms, ect.) Players could muffle these sounds through proper equipment choices and learning certain silent movement/ stalking skills.
Visibility
Eliminate tab targeting, get rid of floating nameplates and ditch the mini-map. Now an enemy can blend into the scenery just by wearing the right color clothes. Camouflage becomes a function of what you wear contrasted with where you stand.
Hiding spots
Place plenty of scenery props around that offer limited concealment to people who take advantage of them. (Bushes, tall grass, hidden crawl spaces/nooks ect.)
Dark Shadows...
Have really dark shadows and limited light sources at night. Make darkness a real issue that needs to be solved by the player instead of providing 1000 points of light for every 100 feet of cavernous dungeon or castle. Make it so it's harder to see into dark areas while standing in the light. And very easy to see lighter areas while sitting in the dark.
All of those items are independent of class. Make an environment that sets up opportunities that players can choose to capitalize on or ignore. Also, each of those items is not perfect. The player is still in the game world and is not pulling some crazy night crawler style, teleportation, stealth hacks, out of their butt. So a smart player who has seen or used some of the stealth tricks before, would know what places a potential ambush may come from. However, if you make the potential places a stealth attack could occur from to be very numerous... then a player trying to look out for an attack becomes weary of checking every spot. Stealth players will then have to learn to strike when their prey shows a lack of vigilance.
Lets say a game has a forced close camera. Now you can sneak up behind people. This is a basic form of stealth anyone who has played an fps is aware of.
Noise
You can go astepfurther by implementing footfalls and give players options to lessen the noise they make while moving around. Certain armors and equipment could make sounds (chain mail, pole arms, ect.) Players could muffle these sounds through proper equipment choices and learning certain silent movement/ stalking skills.
Visibility
Eliminate tab targeting, get rid of floating nameplates and ditch the mini-map. Now an enemy can blend into the scenery just by wearing the right color clothes. Camouflage becomes a function of what you wear contrasted with where you stand.
Hiding spots
Place plenty of scenery props around that offer limited concealment to people who take advantage of them. (Bushes, tall grass, hidden crawl spaces/nooks ect.)
Dark Shadows...
Have really dark shadows and limited light sources at night. Make darkness a real issue that needs to be solved by the player instead of providing 1000 points of light for every 100 feet of cavernous dungeon or castle. Make it so it's harder to see into dark areas while standing in the light. And very easy to see lighter areas while sitting in the dark.
All of those items are independent of class. Make an environment that sets up opportunities that players can choose to capitalize on or ignore. Also, each of those items is not perfect. The player is still in the game world and is not pulling some crazy night crawler style, teleportation, stealth hacks, out of their butt. So a smart player who has seen or used some of the stealth tricks before, would know what places a potential ambush may come from. However, if you make the potential places a stealth attack could occur from to be very numerous... then a player trying to look out for an attack becomes weary of checking every spot. Stealth players will then have to learn to strike when their prey shows a lack of vigilance.
A lot of that stuff has been around forever, but I don't think much of it has really been used in an mmo setting before.
these are awesome ideas. both work really well with itemization. "this chainmail gives me more armor, but it makes me noisier, I don't think I'll wear it" and "this chainmail gives me more armor, but it's bright red (dyed with blood) and it'll ruin my camouflage, so I don't think I'll wear it". these types of tradeoffs make a game really fun.
Denaut
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That is very highly dependent on what kind of game you are making, your classic EQ/WoW content treadmill game, sure you are looking at a minimum of about 20 Million, but there are lots of ways to keep costs down. I think I figured once for a solid PvE MMO you could get away with 5-8 million and still have it be fun with enough content, but it wouldn't be a hand-made content treadmill.
Blackyce
Silver Knight of the Realm
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This is completely incorrect. DAoC Archer/Assassin classes could only one shot at the start of DAoC and they could only one shot cloth casters on a rare occasion. Unlike WoW, DAoC Assassin/Archers could not stun lock their opponents either. Their goal when 1v1 with a non-cloth class, was to get off a big opening and then hope that via evasion, they could get off a stun to finish their opponent.
The whole purpose of the stealth class is that because you can?t stand toe to toe with other classes, you get stealth to pick and choose your fights. Yes I played a both the Archer/Assassin classes in DAoC as well as pretty much all the ranged classes and I had no problem with stealth in DAoC. In fact, my favorite class wasn?t stealth but my Bone Army spec?d BD.
If your group fought at a mile gate and didn?t have your own realm's eyes there you were just waiting to get your ass kicked by the stealthers there. My god, the Mid/Alb Emain mile gates were nothing but stealthier havens for all three sides and they?d hide there looking to pick off stragglers and get out asap. It?s called learning tactics and if you didn?t account for these guys you got your ass kicked.
Seriously, please stop whining because you got your ass kicked in RvR for being an idiot.
Grim1
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Eliminating the PvE aspect has the potential to save a ton on dev costs. But even with those savings they will need more big investment dollars from somewhere. The paypal campaign is ongoing so they will have more than 5.2 mil from small kickstarter type donations, that won't be enough though. Star Citizen's is much more popular and their paypal campaign has only ballooned their bankbook up to 9 mil.