Pan'Theon: Rise' of th'e Fal'Len - #1 Thread in MMO

It's funny to see the wide gap between what some people want here. I would have thought a moddable UI was something everyone would have wanted, and then you have tad10 saying it should be at around the 6 million mark? I just can't imagine an MMO without a moddable UI these days... at all. I feel like it shouldn't even be a stretch goal, it should be core to the game.

There were plenty of things I loved about EQ, the unmoddable vanilla UI was NOT one of them

Tuco_sl said:

I'm not a huge lore guy but yeah the collection of fallen planes colliding together in an earthquake doesn't really grab me.

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Tananthalas_sl said:

I really like the lore so far but it can easily got o shit fast depending on what they do. My biggest concern is if they are throwing gods around like rag dolls why should I as the character give a crap about them? This seems like a major plot issue right off to me.

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When I first read it my immediate reaction was "Oh..so we're starting off at Planes of Power." The concern is valid because I felt, at least with EQ1, that the gods should have been the end-all-be-all of encounters. Where do you go after killing the gods? If we're running into and defeating gods too soon what else do we have to look forward to? Non-gods-but-from-another-dimension-so-we're-more-powerful-than-gods ala Omens of War?

Khane_sl said:

It's funny to see the wide gap between what some people want here. I would have thought a moddable UI was something everyone would have wanted, and then you have tad10 saying it should be at around the 6 million mark? I just can't imagine an MMO without a moddable UI these days... at all. I feel like it shouldn't even be a stretch goal, it should be core to the game.

There were plenty of things I loved about EQ, the unmoddable vanilla UI was NOT one of them

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I assumed that as well, SWTOR launched without a moddable (or even movable UI) and it was a pain.

Khane_sl said:

It's funny to see the wide gap between what some people want here. I would have thought a moddable UI was something everyone would have wanted, and then you have tad10 saying it should be at around the 6 million mark? I just can't imagine an MMO without a moddable UI these days... at all. I feel like it shouldn't even be a stretch goal, it should be core to the game.

There were plenty of things I loved about EQ, the unmoddable vanilla UI was NOT one of them

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yeah, the UI thing is boggling me. hell the UI was one of the things, I was referring to, when I suggested, that should be part of the base game, and I wouldn't want to play the game at all, if that goal is not reached.

Aradune_sl said:

It really allows us to tell a linear story for a special quest, have a scripted event at the end (I thought it was pretty cool recently in EQ 1 where Luclin walks to her throne, sits down, and has a monolog). I wouldn't worry about the item rewards, the vast majority of good items will come from open world areas.

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sounds like something similar to what ffxi did with missions to tell the story of each starting city. as long as most of the good raid stuff is from open world, i don't mind seeing both types

tad10_sl said:

Imperative to hit crafting goal so they can give crafting to silius and we can avoid another slappy.

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lol make a tier that will limit sillius just to crafting

Lost Ranger_sl said:

Long as they are taking suggestions...

Rethink your class stretch goals. Ranger/druid seems fair, but bard/monk is outrageous. If you want class goals then put knights on it or something. Druids, bards and monks are classic core classes that shouldn't be missing, and shouldn't take a fortune to unlock.

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There are alot of suggestions for changes both based personal opinions like the above and more general reasons - Can they do that, change the kickstarter goals, pledges and stuff around mid-campaign? If so, to what degree? I'm just asking because it sounds generally exploitable, without implying Pantheon is a con job. Because if anything besides adding new tiers as old ones fill up is against the KS rules then that ship sailed.

I also think there is too little information on mechanics and just a general lore overview with some quotes, I did expect more in both regards. I suppose they can do weekly updates as announced but as is I'm not as excited as expected.

Leadaas_sl said:

First time I've ever participated in a Kickstarter, did the 45. What would be a normal(ish)/expected amount to see roll in day one for a project that is looking for a couple million or whatever?

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Lets see, if you go by something similar (not many MMOs on KS),Pathfinder Onlinewhich got just over 1 mil, you can see the overallpledge graph here

tad10_sl said:

Stretch Goal Order should be:

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Ranger
Gnome
Druid
Halfling
Bard
Monk
Crafting
UI
Adventure Area
Additional Continent
Armor Sets
PvP
Sky Content
Elementals
Reptilian
Housing
Player Farms
Player Choice Race
Water Content
UGC
Mobile app

Juggled your list around to make more sense for content and player interest.
UI should be a higher priority but the classes and crafting should at least be mandatory imo.

imo the first 8 things on your list shouldn't even be goals, but I guess that downside of crowd-funding.

Mr Creed_sl said:

There are alot of suggestions for changes both based personal opinions like the above and more general reasons - Can they do that, change the kickstarter goals, pledges and stuff around mid-campaign? If so, to what degree? I'm just asking because it sounds generally exploitable, without implying Pantheon is a con job. Because if anything besides adding new tiers as old ones fill up is against the KS rules then that ship sailed.

I also think there is too little information on mechanics and just a general lore overview with some quotes, I did expect more in both regards. I suppose they can do weekly updates as announced but as is I'm not as excited as expected.

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I don't think they can change tiers but can add new ones. Don't know about stretch goals. Agree they need to emphasize it is trinity based game or rather tank heal cc dp#s based

@LL works for me

Rhinohelix_sl said:

If we are talking about stuff we dislike, the lore has already lost me. It's not really a world, its a collection of "fallen" planes where god-kings roam looking for adherents: Terminus. Seriously? I would have much preferred a D&D campaign style backstory for this. You need to hit people in the nostalgia feels: This seems far outside of that, although the net may be the same.

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Pretty much first impression also, and you might think it silly but lore can make or break a game for me. 'Terminus' and Nexus as a deity name had me groan. Tbh I was hoping for a bit more "down-to-earth" fantasy and this is pretty much the opposite. I mean I managed to deal with space goats and starships in TBC so this might be ok, just not what I hoped for/expected I guess.

Vinyard_sl said:

With Silius on the team, itemization will be great np np. Just look at DoV for EQ2

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Wait, that fuckwit was responsible for DoV itemization? I put up with a ton of BS in EQ2, but that was the nail in the coffin. Probably the worst mistake I have ever seen in all of MMO gaming. Stupid, lazy, short sighted... I could go on and on.

Almost angers me enough to want to rescind my pledge. Brad better reign that jackoff in.

So if you don't meet the stretch goals for Bards or Monks, what happens to all the content which could best be dealt with by having those classes present? And if you introduce the classes later, and the playerbase has developed methods to deal with content without those classes, how do you then make them viable, by creating new content designed specifically with them in mind or just hoping players will just incorporate them into the existing meta.

Look at EQ1 Beastlords and Beserkers. Was there content (group/raid) where having them present was seen as an absolute necessity or providing a significant enough advantage to turn away other classes.

arallu_sl said:

Also, in case someone was going to update the first post:
The Visionary Realms Team:
Brad McQuaid
Salim Grant
Jason Weimann
James Rochelle
Tony Garcia
Lenny Gullo
Noel Walling
Corey LeFever
Frank Beleno
Benjamin de la Durantaye

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Can we get their gaming or forum names as well please just in case they hide behind some other names. I want to make sure I am disgruntle at the right people.

cinge_sl said:

imo the first 8 things on your list shouldn't even be goals, but I guess that downside of crowd-funding.

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You're right. Revised list:
Should be core content:

Laerazi_sl said:

These are the unique elements I saw:
"Get spells/abilities from killing bosses"
"We have a target audience"
"A mindset that Designed Downtime should be a part of the game to ensure players have time to form important social bonds."
"An expectation that the path of least resistance should also be the most entertaining"

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GW1 did the spells thing nearly 10 years ago, removing that is one of the failures of GW2. Anything ever produced has a target audience, woohoo. And anyone will say, it's one of the arguments behind many nerfs in plenty of games. The intended downtime thing is actually unique to them.

Quaid_sl said:

Dat 5.9mil stretch goal. Custom servers would be badass.

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I think that's a very pointless goal actually, but to each their own.

Aradune_sl said:

It really allows us to tell a linear story for a special quest, have a scripted event at the end (I thought it was pretty cool recently in EQ 1 where Luclin walks to her throne, sits down, and has a monolog). I wouldn't worry about the item rewards, the vast majority of good items will come from open world areas.

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Are you aware of what GW2 does regarding personal storytelling? I found their ability to instance of any given area of the game world depending of the story needs very flexible, it's a powerful tool they barely scratched with their game. No idea if Unity can do that though. Essentially they dont need to make instanced space that's otherwise inaccessible, they just made the world, and take the parts of it they need for a story step and instance them in any shape or size.

I fully support this just for the off chance that my preferred style of MMO might make a return, but there are already some points that cause me concern from the Kickstarter pitch and the Q&A that I'll throw out here for discussions sake:

• Combat: There aren't a lot of details yet so I may be jumping the gun, but just the comment about being bored of MMO combat and wanting more reaction and strategy--while it sounds good on paper--is a current fad that I think is damaging to the core fundamentals that made early MMOs (and RPGs for that matter) long-lasting experiences with a compelling drive to constantly improve your character. When you add too many reactive action elements and introduce too much "chaos" to the basic combat mechanics thinking it is more exciting, you not only make combat more exhausting over long periods of time (which is how you want people to play a game like this) but you also divorce more and more of combat from the character and put it on the player instead. I'm not saying one way is better than the other across the board - I am saying for a group-based long-term MMO I think it is more appealing to the audience this game is for to have the character and their equipment and available spells/abilities mean more than their own personal "skill." We don't need to go back as far as EQ1 combat, but I think there is something to be said for slowing it down and making items and character power be the thing that really matters. Dodge-rolling and blocking and skill shot aiming and all this stuff we're seeing attempted in current MMOs goes against that in my opinion.
• Instancing: I'm normally in favor of this when used properly like Brad mentioned above (basically only for heavily scripted story sequences or encounters that simply can't be open) but I think for this game it's the wrong direction for several reasons. The main thing that can set a niche lower-budget MMO like this apart will be a more immersive world with player-interaction and community driving much of the enjoyment of the game. Instancing hurts that every time it is used, and while as I said above I'd normally be fine with it for story purposes, I actually think this game would benefit from being very story-light. Generating compelling story-based content is extremely time-consuming and expensive even for developers with a huge budget. You'll have a much better chance of success creating an interesting backdrop for this world and just letting players explore it and interact with things and places and other people inside it. Think Dark Souls and how interesting that world feels without any real "quests." Look at how popular games like Minecraft, DayZ and Rust are, where it's all about interacting with the world and other players.
• Death: Speaking of those popular titles, why are we still so afraid of meaningful death? Things have shifted. Even Minecraft, a game played by a huge variance of demographics, essentially has a very punishing death mechanic in terms of lost items. Dark Souls, DayZ, and so on are massively popular among hardcore gamers. It sounded to me like the pitch was to make an MMO for those of us who want that sort of thrill and challenge and risk vs. reward - death is crucial part of that. Brad called it "tedium, not challenge" in the Q&A and that worries me. He then goes on to answer a question about dangerous exploration and only mentions wandering into higher level zones, which is no different from current MMOs if death doesn't mean anything. Brad, you said yourself this game isn't for everyone. Who is it actually for? Going on to say the encounters will be challenging and you just need to wipe until you succeed is no different than WoW or any other MMO. Encounter-wise, WoW is more challenging than EQ was. But it certainly doesn't feel as meaningful. Loss is necessary for gain to have true meaning.
• Crafting: It really bums me out that this is a stretch goal. An open-world game like this would really benefit from a decent crafting system at launch. Again, it goes back to creating good systems that put things in the hands of the player to create their own goals and their own content so that you don't have to spend precious resources creating content that is only going to be consumed and thrown away. It's too expensive to do that.
• Items: And related to the crafting point, while items aren't heavily discussed in any of the current material I hope careful consideration is being taken with itemization and how gear is awarded/traded/potentially lost. To me, more than anything else, this is what made EQ work so well in the early days. The player-run economy thrived, items really meant something because good stuff was difficult for the average player to obtain, and that attachment added to the fear of death and loss like few other games have achieved. I think a happy medium could be found--I'm not necessarily saying outright "do what EQ did" because I don't think it was perfect--but making players really look at and care about every item they acquire will go a long way towards getting people invested in their characters. And that "hook" that we all remember is vitally important. The fact that it's missing from modern MMOs and we don't care much about anything we've done or achieved in them is one reason it's so easy to put them down and leave.

Brad gonna spend all your monies on killer cali medical chronic and coke.

Shame they're going for rather generic lore/races/classes.