Monsters and Memories (Project_N) - Old School Indie MMO
- Thread starter Flobee
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Ukerric
Bearded Ape
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If I can get the same items in a non-contested instanced version, why should I even bother doing the non-instanced one and find my targets gone? The only reason would be "I want the item to twink", which will not be the primary motivation of players, or "I want the item to sell at the AH", which would be the motivation of chinese farmers (and maybe some players).
In any version that features the two versions of dungeons with exactly the same items, with just the difference between tradeable and untradeable, I expect 95% of the players to go to the easy, no hassle instanced version for their gear.
Lambourne
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
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I think current TLP EQ isn't a bad compromise, there's the DZ version so you can actually raid at your planned time, and then there's the open world version that you can hit for bonus loot if you have the people to do so when it pops. It seems to be incentive enough as is.
Anything said about combat design? Balancing around downtime like early EQ had massive side effects, like not having a bard or an enchanter made your group perform at half its potential. I think it's no accident that EQ moved away from this model over time, first with mana regen self buffs and FT items, long lasting KEI, and eventually fast regen out of combat. It's just not particularly fun when your wizard can only cast one spell on every other mob without mana regen. Is sitting to med even a good idea anymore? Most of the time the player is just sitting there doing nothing.
Anything said about combat design? Balancing around downtime like early EQ had massive side effects, like not having a bard or an enchanter made your group perform at half its potential. I think it's no accident that EQ moved away from this model over time, first with mana regen self buffs and FT items, long lasting KEI, and eventually fast regen out of combat. It's just not particularly fun when your wizard can only cast one spell on every other mob without mana regen. Is sitting to med even a good idea anymore? Most of the time the player is just sitting there doing nothing.
ili
Blackwing Lair Raider
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If the game is about " Adventuring is at the heart of the game " then camping shouldn't be a thing. Random events should happen while groups are out adventuring. Rare mobs should not just spawn in on a place holder, in a static " camp " spot, they should be triggered by doing a task. Kill X amount of Rats and a Rat Lord spawns for your group. Bring gems of darkness to X location to Spawn the King of Loots. Camping was always a shit system.
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ili
Blackwing Lair Raider
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Also, raiding, does game like this " A focus on scheduled and ever-changing content & NPC behaviors " need raiding. I don't think so. Not at the start anyway. Maybe later when the game matures, and still, if the game is " ever-changing content " and the focus is on Adventuring than raiding isn't a must have.
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Khane
Got something right about marriage
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This is the kind of thinking that gets you to a point where developers start believing they know how every player will play the game and starts designing systems to babysit players instead of a game world.
People run around picking contested flowers so they can sell them on the AH in current MMOs and you think selling actual gear that could fetch a good price or be usable by themselves on alts would only motivate chinese farmers and "maybe some players".
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Fogel
Mr. Poopybutthole
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I loved Guk/Sol/Seb etc way more than anything in WoW. You're grinding through your camps and someone in Ass/Sup calls for help. Either its someone your group hates and you run over and mock them, or its some new people or friends and you run over and save their ass, Either way, it makes it more enjoyable then "Alright guys, lets run the same instance the same exact way for the 100th time". Wow was just way to sterile and "balanced". Pull more than you should have? Just leash them or run back as a ghost. Yeah, corpse runs in EQ sucked, but so did being able to just blindly run around in WoW with no skin in the game.
/Rose tinted glasses off
/Rose tinted glasses off
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TJT
Mr. Poopybutthole
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It goes without saying that the EQ developers never intended camping to even be a thing. They presumed people would dungeon crawl for stuff then exit. Not find convenient spaces in the zone where mobs didn't path(Safe Hall in Guk), use invisibility spells to get there, and set up shop. That was completely unintended gameplay. But it became how the game was played. Sure it was foolish to think that. But it was the first of its kind in this way. No real way to predict that even though in hindsight it's the most logical way to play the game.
Just like Feign Death pulling and similar shit.
You need to remember that they built it off of MUDs where that shit didn't happen.
Camping in Seb for the 100th time was certainly more interesting than running Heroic McDungeons with 5 90 degree turns 100 times over. That is no bullshit.
Just like Feign Death pulling and similar shit.
You need to remember that they built it off of MUDs where that shit didn't happen.
Camping in Seb for the 100th time was certainly more interesting than running Heroic McDungeons with 5 90 degree turns 100 times over. That is no bullshit.
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Tmac
Adventurer
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The repeatable +better dungeons are what killed WoW for me. Having to run the same shit 4 different times to get the same gear w different stats as asinine.
Whether you liked it or not, we should all be able to recognize it as the laziest form of progression ever invented.
Producer: “How can we radically reduce development costs in progression?”
Developer: “I mean we could just tune the same instance to be infinitely more difficult.”
Producer: “Do it!”
Developer: “It could potentially be really boring for most pla...”
Producer: “Do it!”
Whether you liked it or not, we should all be able to recognize it as the laziest form of progression ever invented.
Producer: “How can we radically reduce development costs in progression?”
Developer: “I mean we could just tune the same instance to be infinitely more difficult.”
Producer: “Do it!”
Developer: “It could potentially be really boring for most pla...”
Producer: “Do it!”
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TJT
Mr. Poopybutthole
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Ulduar Hardmode was a genius design IMO. I loved that shit.
Of course, they immediately shit on it and never tried it again.
Khane
Got something right about marriage
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The Mythic+ system could have been a great success if there was any real reason to keep pushing keys. As it stands the only reason people do it is because of a third party scoring system and yet there are still people who do it simply for that. If they added achievements and cosmetics/mounts at certain difficulty tier thresholds it could have been very interesting. Instead they took a great idea and sucked all the life out of it.
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Ukerric
Bearded Ape
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Oh, believe me. If it were me, there would be the open-world version AND NOTHING ELSE.
But I'm also keenly aware that, based on how players have played in literally every game since, if you put an instanced version where it's loot guaranteed, no competition, the same items, etc... 95% of the people will merely run the instanced version. So you are not designing your game around an open contested world - you are designing your game as an instanced dungeon running game, WITH a bonus open world dungeon for a few hardcore.
Just be aware of exactly what kind of game you are making. And its consequences.
ili
Blackwing Lair Raider
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Camping and killing the same re-spawns a million times over to grind exp or killing a place holder a million times to get a named mob to spawn, for X item, is just as crappy a system as running the same static instanced dungeon 100+ times over to grind loot or exp. At that point there is no adventure and the players are just mindlessly grinding to progress to the next grinding spot. Another issues with camping and static dungeon grinding is that, most people are only doing X spot or dungeon because they know they need X item from that camp/dungeon. There is no adventure in that, there is no mystery, its just running through the paces. The world needs to be dynamic, loot needs to be dynamic, not static, like Kithicor Forest, in EQ, it changes at night, zones, and the world, could also change with seasons, or weather.
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Cybsled
Avatar of War Slayer
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Right. EQ1’s model for dungeons was dogshit. Just like electricity, people will always go to the path of least resistance.
I can count on one hand the number of times my guild tried to do dungeon crawls in the under itemized, poorly tuned dungeons in EQ1. We found a couple cool items (I got some clicky in Velious or Luclin that let you summon your own bandages, which was useful as a monk since you could bandage while FD), but consensus was it wasn’t worth the time and risk (which is why people gravitated to easier shit like Velk labs, karnors entrance, upper seb, etc).
It is very difficult to maintain a scaled dungeon crawl experience AND have it non-instanced with any sizable population. You either have to pseudo instance (basically shards when it hits a certain population point, which would come with its own issues since people would try to find ways to exploit to get their own shard...off top of my head, flood dungeon with alt accounts to take up space or “win trade” with other groups) or create some other type of mechanic that reduces camping but also doesn’t reduce the dungeon to empty rooms with spawns all being murdered once they pop.
I can count on one hand the number of times my guild tried to do dungeon crawls in the under itemized, poorly tuned dungeons in EQ1. We found a couple cool items (I got some clicky in Velious or Luclin that let you summon your own bandages, which was useful as a monk since you could bandage while FD), but consensus was it wasn’t worth the time and risk (which is why people gravitated to easier shit like Velk labs, karnors entrance, upper seb, etc).
It is very difficult to maintain a scaled dungeon crawl experience AND have it non-instanced with any sizable population. You either have to pseudo instance (basically shards when it hits a certain population point, which would come with its own issues since people would try to find ways to exploit to get their own shard...off top of my head, flood dungeon with alt accounts to take up space or “win trade” with other groups) or create some other type of mechanic that reduces camping but also doesn’t reduce the dungeon to empty rooms with spawns all being murdered once they pop.
TJT
Mr. Poopybutthole
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There were certainly a lot of complete trash dungeons in EQ that nobody ever went to. Nearly all of them had at least something to go after though and EXP bonuses. I liked that you could go off the beaten path in those dungeons and just do your own thing. If you wanted.
But yes everyone will generally do some level of cost-benefit analysis and head to Karnor's Castle over Dalnir's Crypt.
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Ukerric
Bearded Ape
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Charasis. Considered by many to be awesome, but hogtied by keying requirements.
City of Mist. Extremely good dungeon, too remote to be popular.
If you want to maximize your content use - the cost of designing said content vs the number of players who will use it, yes. Those zones are anathema.
ZyyzYzzy
RIP USA
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Ukerric
Bearded Ape
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And yet it was half-empty 80% of the time. All the popular locations were easily accessible by everyone. If you needed a third party to get there, only a handful of premade went there, on a scheduled run planned long in advance.