dorotea said:((Will our characters will be locked to a chosen server, or will we be able to login with our character freely across all servers PVE or PVP?))
Hard to see how that can work since it has been said that VR will monitor populations and open new servers (and close old ones) once the old ones have what they consider to be the right number of characters or accounts. Having characters created on one server able to be logged in on another server would defeat the purpose of this.
I think you've confused something being done out of necessary to be a design goal.
dorotea said:
Also the economy and ease of leveling is likely to vary between types of servers. Suppose that one can level twice as fast on a pvp server. Or half as fast. Or get twice the platinum in a set amount of time. Or half the platinum. The issues with allowing either easy transfers or access to any server are obvious.
Personally I find it irrelevant, these are not really true issues, but rather child like complaints, just like two kids fighting over who got the bigger cookie.
dorotea said:
Also consider whether names are unique per server or unique across all servers so that if someone takes *my* name on server X I cannot have it on server Y. If unique per server, again the problems are obvious.
In my opinion names should be unique across the board, regardless. Should I name my character Vladimir Hathor on server A, there should never be another Vladimir Hathor running around on server B
dorotea said:
Finally consider the importance many people want to place on reputation in a community. Works better if the community is one server not every server combined.
Your certainly entitled to your opinion, but I do disagree with your last sentence.
Aradune said:philo said:I'm curious how Brad or other VR members respond to those of us who think that having :
NPCs only you and your group/guild can communicate with. Other players cannot bother them.
Is not actually an open world game?
Locking special mobs does not = on the rails game
Pantheon is most definitely open world.
Can you elaborate on this please Brad? That is about the shortest response I have ever seen you write ;).
A game doesn't have to be on rails for it to be not open world. Any instanced game is not open world. An open world game at its core is about players being open to interact with each other. The example given isn't that unless I am missing some specifics about how it will work?
((In my opinion names should be unique across the board, regardless. Should I name my character Vladimir Hathor on server A, there should never be another Vladimir Hathor running around on server B))
You too are entitled to your opinions, and I think on names it is likely to work out with one unique name across all servers. That seemed to be the way they were leaning but much can change.
This works very poorly with unique first names. If someone takes Dorotea 30 seconds ahead of me on a single server I am barred from that name on 19 other servers? It is hard enough to be the first one to get a good name on *one* server.
With uniqueness limited to the combination of two names this assures I can always get the first name I want - anywhere - so I am not concerned. I am not sure there is a good reason not to make the combination unique only on one server but if VR so decides I will assume it wasn't by rolling a D20 and they had a reason.
My opinion on reputation seems like the only possible answer but if you disagree, perhaps it isn't. It seemed self-evident that if the community was 10,000 players a higher percentage is likely to know and care if you are a douche than if the community was 100,000 players 90% of whom weren't even on the server where you engaged in the douchedom.
Super stoked on both new dev diaries. Love the new innovative approaches toward what instancing/etc will mean as far as making content accessible on realms/servers.
Also excited that PvP is on the menu, & being supported by a PvE foundation.
both reads gave more hope & appreciation for the direction this ship is sailing.
Looking fwd to having toons on both types of servers!
disposalist said:I'm waiting for objections from some.
In a world where two people doing the same quest work their way through an open world dungeon to get to a monster at the end that both need to kill for that quest, some will *want* the contention of the monster being spawned and both fighting over it. They will *want* to 'beat' others to get that kill, or it's devalued considerably.
If the "only you and your group/guild can communicate with. Other players cannot bother them" thing happens by both getting an instanced monster the other cannot communicate with, that doesn't feel open world. If that thing happens by only one getting the monster to spawn and then only that one being able to talk to them, is that much better than fighting over it? It just means you make it a race to the trigger point rather than a fight after the trigger.
I should be clear: I am *not* someone who wants the contention. I like the idea of, once the monster is triggered, it 'belonging' to the triggerer. Even if you have to race to the trigger, and if someone else gets it you have to at least wait for them to finish the encounter (even if you have to wait up to, say, an hour), though I think that might turn dungeons into speed runs sometimes, which isn't great, at least you can just wait your turn in the same play session if someone else 'beats' you to it.
To me "open world" = cooperation/community, but I just know that some folks I've discussed this with before will see the removal of the fight over the 'final' monster as a removal of the whole point of the dungeon run. To some "open world" = contention/competition and, even though I don't agree, I do understand.
Maybe there could be different rules for different servers? Maybe PvP servers should have contended bosses? (It does seem that PvP might be the ultimate 'contention' for people that really want that competitive feel?)
Not all boss mobs or quest to a special mob encounters will involve locked mobs. Locked mobs will be used when it makes sense. Often they do, and often they don't.
dorotea said:With uniqueness limited to the combination of two names this assures I can always get the first name I want - anywhere - so I am not concerned. I am not sure there is a good reason not to make the combination unique only on one server but if VR so decides I will assume it wasn't by rolling a D20 and they had a reason.
This is currently the direction we are heading. Two names in RL came about when cities formed and populations of people became dense. People figured out that 'Michael' was not sufficient when keeping track of people (checking into a hotel, opening a bank account, etc.) Now, with 19+ years of online gaming there are many, many more gamers that are or will be attracted to MMOs with persistence (meaning your character doesn't go away or is reset at the end of a session of gameplay). We had difficulty in EQ with only one name unique. CS issues were one of the worst for reasons I'm sure you can surmise. People trying to get their name only to find out someone else already got it left a lot of people pretty unhappy. They dealt with it. Some got creative, like putting special characters in as a substitute for the real character, so their name ended up kinda like what they wanted.
In 2019 this simply isn't going to work. There are so many more players, a solid subset of which are going to be attracted to Pantheon. Creating your character and then finding out you can't have the first name you want is really going to upset a lot of people, people who have used a fantasy or at least a gaming name for years, if not decades. And they identify themselves with that name, just like I do with Aradune Mithara. WoW also had some very real issues with this. People would create characters just to reserve a name. Eventually WoW would periodically delete those characters (not that hard to see that they were not being played). But that was just a band-aid. I emailed Rob Pardo, who was Producer on WoW as well as taking up various other roles while at Blizzard and while working on WoW (he’s a great guy, btw, and crazy smart). He told me if he could go back in time he'd use two names with the two names, not the one, unique. We don't have to go back in time because we've not yet launched. Back to RL briefly, most people, at least in western countries, have 3 names. Some even 4+. Why? Because RL population has grown significantly since people went to two names.
We don't have to go that far as we're not dealing with *that* many people. But two names with both names being unique is obviously very essential to MMOs going forward. You get the first name you want and so do others. Your last names differ, which is what makes this work. In the game if you are in a zone with another person with the same name a couple things happen. First the chat UI lets you know there are two and you can likely choose the one you want to, say, send a /tell to. This is a bit of a hassle though. That's where aliases come in. Anybody on your friends list you can assign an alias to. And nobody knows it but you. So if a friend has a pretty common first name and you're in a zone where multiple people have that name, you will have already aliased the one that is your friend. /alias Aradune Mithara BigDork. Now the chat system will accept BigDork as your friend and you can send /tells or whatever to BigDork and the right person gets that tell. And you can alias anybody on your friends list so this is useful above and beyond the unique name issue: for example, if you have a friend who has a long and difficult name to type, just alias him too, give him a short alias and communication will be much easier.
Again, the above isn't set in stone yet, but it is the direction we are currently heading. Please do poke holes in it or ask questions about it -- all questions or perceived issues welcome.
What I haven't covered is the issue of multiple realms (servers/worlds). Does your unique first and last name exist globally, across all realms, or just on the one server where you created your character? What do you guys think? I think I prefer globally because I would always want to make an Aradune Mithara, regardless of realm. Maybe I want to divide my time between a regular server and an RP server – in this case, I would want to have the same name. (btw, Aradune Mithara is a GM name and can’t be used regardless. But I assure you, when I play for real, with my good friends, I want that name (which shall always be secret) to be mine and mine only.
This I will tell you hasn't been given enough thought yet. We certainly can see some problems either way. Maybe you guys can lead us to the true course. Regardless, we'll solve these types of issues before launch, in alpha/beta. Not everyone will be happy with what we do. Heck, not everyone will be happy with the two names unique system either. You can't always please everyone. That said, I've yet to see a real problem found with it. Having the chat interface help you if there are 2 or more players with the same name plus the implementation of aliases covers every issue I can think of, and I've been thinking about this issue since EQ, since the CS problems we had, since the unhappy people who let us know how unhappy they were. VG was going to have it, but at the end when we were rushing and running out of time (actually we DID run out of time), lots of things planned were discarded, not just the Two Unique Names system.
I'm also curious and you hard core gamers who play virtually every game that comes out may be able to tell us: has there been another game using this system? If so, which one, and were there any issues? Was it an MMO with persistence? I'm truly curious if Pantheon will be the first to go this route or if somebody else felt the same way in the past and implemented it or a similar variant for their game.
Lastly there is another solution, but I'm not a big fan and I don't think it will resonate with you guys either. In many chat systems you make your identity by giving it a name which it then sticks a random number on the end of that name. So if you're the only Aradune in that channel, or whatever, it just showed as Aradune. But if you were in a channel, or say, watching a really popular twitch stream, you'd see yourself as Aradune8154. Another Aradune might be Aradune9033. And so on. You get the name you want, but often you'll see the 4 random numbers. Anyway, I just wanted to throw out the only real alternative I've run across in many years, and I think it's inferior to the unique two names system. What are your thoughts?
thanks,
-Aradune
Please no UID stuck at the end of a name. May ease coding, and would certainly keep multiple Aradunes separate, but it destroys immersion for me, making the high fantasy realm feel more like a social media feed.
Two names unique globally would be my preference. Back in 1999 it was possible, while recruiting for The Soerbaird, to get our same names / reputations on multiple servers. I doubt that is possible today unless guaranteed by the game itself.
-go get some sleep!
I’ll say I’m not a fan of having numbers as part of my name, I do love the Nickname system described, and I would certainly prefer my name be unique across all realms.
The youtube/twitch example is a good enough reason to me, I would hate to get constant tells because some streamer had the same name as me on another realm by malicious intent or coincidence.
philo said:Aradune said:philo said:I'm curious how Brad or other VR members respond to those of us who think that having :
NPCs only you and your group/guild can communicate with. Other players cannot bother them.
Is not actually an open world game?
Locking special mobs does not = on the rails game
Pantheon is most definitely open world.
Can you elaborate on this please Brad? That is about the shortest response I have ever seen you write ;).
A game doesn't have to be on rails for it to be not open world. Any instanced game is not open world. An open world game at its core is about players being open to interact with each other. The example given isn't that unless I am missing some specifics about how it will work?
Aradune: Players will always be able to interact, although, for example, if a high level player casts a powerful buff on your noob, the system will scale down the buff to where it's helping you but it's not making you superman for the duration of the buff. You won't be able to tear through content or be virtually invincible, etc. So, yes, there are some restrictions on player interaction. Another would be no-trade items -- while most items in Pantheon will be tradable, some won't. Quest items won't. Epic Quest items won't.
So really there's never this pristine environment that gives you the total freedom you are implying.
Back to the locked mobs issue, we won't always use them, but we'll use them when it makes sense. You can still see the mobs, but yes, you cannot interact with them.
Are those restrictions that make the world less 'open'? I don't think so, but it really depends on your definition of open world. If it's absolute, then yes, Pantheon is not open world. Neither is any other MMO I can think of either.
But we're making a game here. The goal is to entertain the community. The goal also is to have a game, which means a variety of systems and mechanics. In order to actually have a real game, a game must have rules. By definition 'rules' are usually some sort of restriction (no, you can't be a druid and a wizard, for example... at least not in Pantheon).
When we refer to Pantheon as 'open world' we mean it's not on rails. There is no golden path. You can go anywhere you want, though you likely won't survive if you wander into a higher-level area. There are no quest hubs with indicators as to which mob has the next quest. We don't want the feeling that the game is pushing us to go to specifically the next area or to fight certain mob(s) if you want to unlock another part of the world. Additionally, we will reward travel and exploration, although I'm not ready to go into detail there yet.
This, to me, sounds pretty 'open'. The fact that games inherently have rules is something everyone has come to expect because without them I just can't see how a game can be healthy and fun.
In the strictest definition of 'open world' the concept of no rules may exist. But it only exists in people's minds. Every game will have rules restricting you in some way. Early on in mudding some people tried to truly make games with no rules, no restrictions. They ended up being glorified chat worlds. There were no goals, there were no levels, items could be had by anyone and didn't have to be earned. Some of these 'games' did evolve and became MUSHes, not MUDs. They were hard to implement, maintain, and grow. But a very few were kinda cool. They started offering user generated content. It was like a very primitive attempt at creating a world like the one depicted in Snowcrash, where individuals controlled their area, and other entities (groups, guilds, cities, mega-corps) controlled their area. You could travel between them, but you often had to meet the requirements of that region. It was an 'open world' in that people could do with their areas what they wanted (or in the case of the actual MUSHes, they could do whatever the people who controlled the MUSH allowed to be implemented – often there was a theme chosen, say the Wild West, so you’re area needed to mesh with the greater world – pretty cool, but a rule and restriction. Obviously, a lot of limitations existed -- you were programming in a MUSH framework that ran on a UNIX box. They were text based, not VR (VR wasn't even a dream at that time). So, at least for me, they were fun for a while, and it made me dream of Snowcrash and where games could go and advance in the decades to come. But in every case, I grew bored quickly. They just fell short in so many ways. AND I wanted a game with rules, and I wanted to excel in a multiplayer game with then hundreds of people on the most popular MUDs (most had far fewer players).
So, true, pure open world games were not actually games. They might be frameworks, but then you eventually encounter the framework and find that it created restrictions in some capacity. The pure open world not-games were really just toys for the owners. Technology to really make some of these dreams a reality didn't exist then, and they still don't exist today. Maybe ten years? 20? We shall see, but I don't see myself playing a game as good as Ready Player One anytime soon. And, of course, even Ready Player One and the world in Snowcrash had rules.
Long story short, I returned to MUDs quickly after playing around with the MUSHes. My goal was to become the ranger with the best DPS in the game, to join an uber-guild, and to see and experience areas only a few other people had ever seen. I needed to find and earn the best equipment to get my DPS up as high as possible, but still have an armor class of 100 (the max) if I ever ended up tanking a mob, even for a short duration. This took a lot of time, just like similar goals in MMOs take a lot of time and effort. But damn, when I finally achieved it, the highest DPS Ranger in the entire game of 300 people or so? I'll never forget it. I'll never forget being accepted into one of the uber-guilds -- it was called Crimson Sigil, btw. And, in my opinion it was far more open world than on rails. You were really left, starting at level one, to learn the game, to survive, and to start forming groups because mobs quickly required a group to defeat them. I made friends with whom I am still friends. I even got to hire some of them to work on EQ.
I didn't cover everything, but you can read the above and learn a lot, a lot about me personally as a gamer, etc. I tried to evolve those text games into a graphical, commercial game. It worked and worked well. EverQuest sold several million copies and at its peak had 550k paying subscribers. Yes, future games like WoW achieved unbelievable numbers. They were also key in growing the online game space, for which we are grateful as that means there are even more people looking for a game like Pantheon than say in 2015, or 2010, etc. In any case, the Vision came from playing the best MUDs and then very carefully determining what made them so compelling to play. A lot of it had to do with understanding human nature and then certain personalities. We used this Vision in EQ, tried to make it a reality in VG, and it's still guiding us with Pantheon. It's been adjusted here and there because of new tech, trying to understand all of the new personality types that entered online gaming that never would have enjoyed the MUDs I did. We've decided to make a challenging game, a game about grouping, co-op, teamwork. A game where players will have memorable shared experiences. A game where you can build up your character’s might over time and only limited by time. We know most people now can play perhaps 2 hours a day. They still want the same experience, but they have to deal now with being a grown up -- getting married, having kids, getting a serious job. We also believe many younger players who've never experienced what we're making will be attracted to it, just as much as we were, but only if they know about it and something about it catches their eye. This makes them investigate the game, learning more about it in detail, after which some may cease to be interested but many won't. Many younger players will find Pantheon as their first true MMO and a big subset of them will fiend on the game. This is true with every generation -- it's just how you reach different generations that can vary, that can vary a LOT.
Wow, I got to talk a lot about the old days, the early 90s. I was able to explain why MUDs appealed to me and why I studied them so very carefully. I talked about open world vs. rails in that era, and that it was open worlds that truly appealed to me. I made the case that open world in the 90s pretty much means the same thing in 2019. And hopefully, in addition to learning more what makes me tick, you'll also think about the true, complete, 100% open worlds which were not games but rather toys. Hopefully I adequately explained some game theory, specifically that all games need rules. All games restrict you from certain things, from doing certain things.
Is Pantheon an open living world game? I believe so strongly that it is and it will be and it will stay that way. But rules and restrictions cannot be totally avoided. An Open World MMO tries to restrict you as little as possible. They try to give people freedom, even if that freedom results in their death (which may include some nasty penalties). They try to build a world that allows you to go where you want. Rather than one large area being high level, and then another mid-level, and then another low-level... or even multiple areas but similarly designed... we want higher and lower level players to interact. We think that adds to the community and the bonding that takes place. And actually, we don't think, we really know, because we've experienced it ourselves in the past (for me, the distant past). We're not going to guide you through the world with quest hubs. We're not going to create 'golden paths', paths through the game and through the world that if you stay on them, you'll receive superior rewards relative to someone forging his or her own path. And later, beyond release, we'd love to experiment with User Generated Content, allowing players to affect the game world to a much greater degree.
This, again, to me, is a description of an open world game. Locking mobs where it makes sense, scaling spells when cast on characters much lower level than you, creating behaviors (really, rulesets) for NPCs so that they really vary and every encounter isn't exactly like the prior one. Boss mobs reacting accordingly when zerged by twice as many people than it was designed to challenge. There's the perception system, the event system that tries to vary populations in the world, often based on players triggering those events, all to make the world less repetitive and more dynamic. . No cash shops, no pay-to-win. I could go on, but I'll stop as the post is getting long.
Ultimately, these rules and restrictions are essential. Games need them. Games absolutely need them if we want systems like the ones I've described. We want as few as possible. We are making an open world MMO, a living world. And locking some mobs doesn't suddenly remove us from the official open world master list (I'm kidding, of course -- I don't know of any such list).
It's really up to the player. Now there are more choices and a variety of games than ever before, and it will only continue to grow. Gaming is bigger than movies! But still, if it's a game, it's going to have some rules and restrictions. There are no games without them -- attempts have resulted in toys, virtual toys on your computer that you can, to a very limited degree, play with. Real open world games are like Pantheon and some others, although in recent years they've gone away, the hyper-casual gamer getting his way, with solable, easy, guided on rails MMOs taking the forefront -- but not for very long, I assure you. People are now craving for what we and others are offering because they remember. And then there are people also craving such an experience, but they don't exactly know what they want, what it is exactly, and where to get it. Until now. Pantheon targets everyone, all age ranges, because we believe in one important truth, one not everyone agrees with, but we certainly do: in every generation there will be a significant subset of players who crave games like Pantheon. Many also will not, and will head to games that try to please everyone all of the time. The owners try to monetize them as quickly as possible, because most of them don’t stick around. They buy stuff with RMT, they try to play the game only to find most casual games are also very easy. Easy to advance, easy to obtain items, gear, etc. No necessity to form real groups with other people – you occastionally see other people, depending on where you are, a shared region or an instanced one. Some realize that ultimately this is no fun – they’re not experiencing a community and they don’t need to form real friendships. You may as well be playing an ‘online’ iPhone app, where you have a base and you attack another base. But that doesn’t happen until the owner of that base logs in. Then the battle takes place and you are updated the next time you log in. These games are actually called social online mobile games. Social? If that’s social, what is an MMO with a world you'll want to explore and call home because it calls to you.
'nuff said. We may end up agreeing to disagree, and that's ok. But I thank you for the opportunity to take the subject matter much further and into much more detail than one normally sees in a forum post. I hope people enjoy it.
-Aradune
Aradune said:dorotea said:...two names with both names being unique is obviously very essential to MMOs going forward. You get the first name you want and so do others. Your last names differ, which is what makes this work...With uniqueness limited to the combination of two names this assures I can always get the first name I want - anywhere - so I am not concerned. I am not sure there is a good reason not to make the combination unique only on one server but if VR so decides I will assume it wasn't by rolling a D20 and they had a reason.
The only issue I see with this is confusion for those of us wanting to be identified as the same player no matter what character.
My plan would be to have surnames consistent and first names different for each character. A paladin named Valorous Disposalist. A Dire Lord called Bloody Disposalist. A Druid called Woody Disposalist. Etc.
With the proposed system, others could have a rogue called Devious Disposalist or a Paladin called Disposalist Valorous.
To me, this would definitely lead to confusion and strong possibility for impersonation and grief. It allows no way for me to avoid that confusion, that I can see.
I wonder if players might be able to opt for unique Last Names? Pay for them, even?
Essentially, is it even really a first name and last name? It sounds to me it is effectively a single unique name but you are allowed one space as a delimiter.
One other thing: I suggest, no matter what the system used, that the real player name can be easily found out or at least some unique id per character so confusion can be avoided in situations where you really need to identify a player or at least a character so CS can identify the player. I can recall many situations in multiplayer games where players intentionally have chosen a difficult to remember or type name because they wish to 'get away' with being toxic in whatever way. Names using unusual characters that 'hide' like an "i" with an accent (ì) or confusing combinations of capital I and lowercase L which, depending on font, look identical. Etc.
Note to all - in the thread on these diaries in the announcements forum - Aradune asked for some summaries of important issues for the game and the community. Some of us tried our luck summarizing issues - up to about a dozen this morning. We missed many - feel free to add more. Names for example. Some we may have worded poorly or allowed our personal biases to unfairly warp what were intended to be unslanted discussions. Corrections are welcome.
((What are your thoughts?))
Hard to resist answering a question like this. I won't even try.
1. Whether names should be unique by first name or by combined first name and surname. Both sides of this issue have advantages - this is self-evident. If the answer was clear you would already have made a firm and absolute decision not be merely leaning towards one approach. On balance I agree with the way you are leaning. I feel that any potential confusion because multiple characters have the same first name will be outweighed by the benefits of letting everyone get the first name they want if they are flexible on the last name. As I recall Final Fantasy XIV used this system and it seemed to work fine. People are used to dealing with multiple people in the real world with the same first name. We can do the same in Terminus.
2. Whether names should be unique by server or across all servers. Here I like the idea of uniqueness by server. If there are four normal ruleset servers and I cannot get *my* name on one I can try the other three. Servers will probably have their own communities. If a community on server X gets used to me being Moiraine Damodred (no I won't use that name) will it confuse people if someone else on a different server uses that name? I think not.
Granted with unique two place names the issue is limited. I can *always* be Moiraine something on as many servers as I wish. But I see more benefit to having any name available X times (X = number of servers) than I do to having any name available only *one* time for the entire game. Especially since if only one use is allowed it may well be taken by someone that won't even be playing it but reserving it for future use or even for sale of "naming rights" on ebay - yes that does happen.
I'm happy to hear that the current direction is having uniqueness be determined by first+last. I really, really hated having to fight other people for my character name in other MMOs. Some people don't care about their character name, but I am not one of those people :)
And I'll agree with Kumu that some kind of player ID attached to the end isn't really a great user experience. It's an option, but it really feels unimmersive to see that exposed in the UI.
disposalist said:Aradune said:dorotea said:The only issue I see with this is confusion for those of us wanting to be identified as the same player no matter what character.
My plan would be to have surnames consistent and first names different for each character. A paladin named Valorous Disposalist. A Dire Lord called Bloody Disposalist. A Druid called Woody Disposalist. Etc.
With the proposed system, others could have a rogue called Devious Disposalist or a Paladin called Disposalist Valorous.
To me, this would definitely lead to confusion and strong possibility for impersonation and grief. It allows no way for me to avoid that confusion, that I can see.
I wonder if players might be able to opt for unique Last Names? Pay for them, even?
Essentially, is it even really a first name and last name? It sounds to me it is effectively a single unique name but you are allowed one space as a delimiter.
One other thing: I suggest, no matter what the system used, that the real player name can be easily found out or at least some unique id per character so confusion can be avoided in situations where you really need to identify a player or at least a character so CS can identify the player. I can recall many situations in multiplayer games where players intentionally have chosen a difficult to remember or type name because they wish to 'get away' with being toxic in whatever way. Names using unusual characters that 'hide' like an "i" with an accent (ì) or confusing combinations of capital I and lowercase L which, depending on font, look identical. Etc.
why not do something more immersive like a realm plus number?
so daring(first name) dispolist(last name) of the 7th dark realm?
better than daring dispolist#7dr1337, XxXd1sp0li5tXxX, or some other abomination of a name noone can do.
~4 digits, a light/dark/water/earth/fire/wind/null realm~(this part can be hidden but used as an identifying tag like a social security number but fancy)
edit- daring dispolist of the 420th earth realm is a different person.
dorotea said:Note to all - in the thread on these diaries in the announcements forum - Aradune asked for some summaries of important issues for the game and the community. Some of us tried our luck summarizing issues - up to about a dozen this morning. We missed many - feel free to add more. Names for example. Some we may have worded poorly or allowed our personal biases to unfairly warp what were intended to be unslanted discussions. Corrections are welcome.
summary for pvp concerns:
1. faction based or flagging battle royale style
2. botb(best of the best) party based ladder system and battlegrounds
3. pvp progression(thinking about this hopefully a civil discussion thread can be had with this)
i can understand if the questions can't be answered because the pve foundation isn't there for pvp to be built yet. if this is the case, would like clarification :D appreciate the consideration.
philo said:I'm curious how Brad or other VR members respond to those of us who think that having :
NPCs only you and your group/guild can communicate with. Other players cannot bother them.
Is not actually an open world game?
Hey everyone,
As most of you know there has been quite a flurry of posts by Brad over the past few days. While new communications are definitely exciting, anytime there is a dense amount of thoughts/ideas/information exchanged very quickly it can lead to confusion and misperception, especially in a written context where clarifying back-and-forth is difficult. So with that in mind, I want to highlight a few things for context:
1. Brad's blogs and forum posts consist largely of Brad's ideas and opinions. Unless officially stated, they should not reflect definitive decisions or directions. The same applies to me and anyone else speaking on behalf of Pantheon - unless it is clearly stated to be an official stance or direction, it should be received as an idea pending team discussion, vetting, approvals, etc.
2. With that context in mind, I'll give you all an example. Brad's ideas on Advanced Threat Assessment, mob-locking and instancing are not ideas I fundamentally agree with. I certainly believe they have merit and are worth consideration, but I don't personally believe they are the best solutions for the issues they seek to address. I have a different approach to handling contested content within an open world game like this that does not involve mob locking that I feel strongly we need to explore. Plus, you as the community are full of amazing ideas on this topic as well which we absolutely glean from. But that is the key, exploring the merit and edge-cases of an idea/direction thoroughly before crystallizing it as a final approach. This kind of "creative tension" is a good thing and healthy for the overall design of the game. When we have more definitive, official decisions to share with you all on how we will be handling these issues, you'll be sure to know.
3. Another example is with PvP. Some of you may know how big of a PvP fanatic I am. And yes, while PvE-centric players certainly made up the majority in the past, I think it could be argued that PvP-centric (or at least PvP-interested) players make up just as much if not more of the percentage of online gamers today. Ever since my days playing on the Sullon Zek server in EverQuest I've been convinced that the type of PvP experience you could create by building on a strong PvE foundation would be exceptional. But PvP is more than just players attacking each other. Part of the reason PvP has become so popular is because of all the systems, reward structures and rulesets that have been embraced and evolved along the way. You can rest assured that Pantheon will offer a truly robust PvP experience from as many different angles as we can support by launch, and dedication to seeing those offerings deepen and expand post-launch.
The last thing is to reiterate the start of a new approach to streaming. This is key and one of the most important things to say about it right now is that it was largely inspired by you the community - we hear you and we want to do right by you, and this new streaming plan will represent our passion and commitment to that goal.
Thanks for reading - onward and upward.
Chris 'Joppa' Perkins
"This kind of "creative tension" is a good thing and healthy for the overall design of the game."
While this is only a bit from your overall point, I feel this needs to be addressed as the above post may look like two people are at odds within the creative aspect of the game. As someone who has both managed and worked in operations that require creative thought, problem solving and venture analysis, there is no more important instance than that of competing ideas. It's when everyone is in consistant agreement that you drastically limit your potential.
Joppa said:philo said:I'm curious how Brad or other VR members respond to those of us who think that having :
NPCs only you and your group/guild can communicate with. Other players cannot bother them.
Is not actually an open world game?
Hey everyone,
As most of you know there has been quite a flurry of posts by Brad over the past few days. While new communications are definitely exciting, anytime there is a dense amount of thoughts/ideas/information exchanged very quickly it can lead to confusion and misperception, especially in a written context where clarifying back-and-forth is difficult. So with that in mind, I want to highlight a few things for context:
1. Brad's blogs and forum posts consist largely of Brad's ideas and opinions. Unless officially stated, they should not reflect definitive decisions or directions. The same applies to me and anyone else speaking on behalf of Pantheon - unless it is clearly stated to be an official stance or direction, it should be received as an idea pending team discussion, vetting, approvals, etc.
2. With that context in mind, I'll give you all an example. Brad's ideas on Advanced Threat Assessment, mob-locking and instancing are not ideas I fundamentally agree with. I certainly believe they have merit and are worth consideration, but I don't personally believe they are the best solutions for the issues they seek to address. I have a different approach to handling contested content within an open world game like this that does not involve mob locking that I feel strongly we need to explore. Plus, you as the community are full of amazing ideas on this topic as well which we absolutely glean from. But that is the key, exploring the merit and edge-cases of an idea/direction thoroughly before crystallizing it as a final approach. This kind of "creative tension" is a good thing and healthy for the overall design of the game. When we have more definitive, official decisions to share with you all on how we will be handling these issues, you'll be sure to know.
3. Another example is with PvP. Some of you may know how big of a PvP fanatic I am. And yes, while PvE-centric players certainly made up the majority in the past, I think it could be argued that PvP-centric (or at least PvP-interested) players make up just as much if not more of the percentage of online gamers today. Ever since my days playing on the Sullon Zek server in EverQuest I've been convinced that the type of PvP experience you could create by building on a strong PvE foundation would be exceptional. But PvP is more than just players attacking each other. Part of the reason PvP has become so popular is because of all the systems, reward structures and rulesets that have been embraced and evolved along the way. You can rest assured that Pantheon will offer a truly robust PvP experience from as many different angles as we can support by launch, and dedication to seeing those offerings deepen and expand post-launch.
The last thing is to reiterate the start of a new approach to streaming. This is key and one of the most important things to say about it right now is that it was largely inspired by you the community - we hear you and we want to do right by you, and this new streaming plan will represent our passion and commitment to that goal.
Thanks for reading - onward and upward.
Chris 'Joppa' Perkins
Thank you Joppa for the insight, it is good to hear that there is imput and different views rather than just a singular one. This is good for the overall health of the game.
Joppa said:Brad's ideas on Advanced Threat Assessment, mob-locking and instancing are not ideas I fundamentally agree with. I certainly believe they have merit and are worth consideration, but I don't personally believe they are the best solutions for the issues they seek to address. I have a different approach to handling contested content within an open world game like this that does not involve mob locking that I feel strongly we need to explore.
It's been nearly 18 months since this exchange between you and Lassiz on a stream:
Lassiz: "How does mob tagging work?"
Joppa: "That's a pretty heavy one to get into. The plan for right now is for MDD (Most Damage Done) to be the way we handle mob tagging. That of course then raises a lot of questions, a lot of caveats, it's a very philosophical question to, as far as why we chose to go that way. It has a lot to do with our decision to make Pantheon an open-world game. At PAX this was one of the most commonly recurring questions ... it's that pair, right, is it open-world or is it instanced ... and if it's open-world, how do you guys plan on handling X?
There is a lot to say there ... it really gets down to the heart of what Pantheon is. We've seen ... since that classic era of games, we've seen very very few games that are made in that model if you will. Whereas you can see a huge myriad of games that have been made in the more modern model ... and that's great, but for us, we see an opportunity to recapture that older classic way of doing things and bring that into the market today because there really isn't anyone embracing that right now the way we want to and so what that means is:
Open World ... and we go into that eyes wide open and then say okay there are some really amazing benefits to an open world game because of the way it builds community, the way the shared experiences are able to happen, those social bonds and constructs that are created ... but then there are also challenges ... and ... it would take a long time to speak to, but it's good to say that we are aware of those things and we're designing with those things in mind."
It seems that there is some internal disagreement on how some of these things should be handled, and there is nothing wrong with that. The best ideas are those that pass through debate, vetting, and to some degree, conflict. With that said, I think it's important that you share some of your ideas. You mentioned previously that this topic, in particular, was the most commonly recurring question. You mentioned that it would take a long time to speak to, and that the game is being designed with those things in mind. How so? What has been designed over the past 18 months that would help the community feel better about the direction that you intend to go? This topic is the most popular of all for a reason. It's an important question with seemingly no answer in sight. It would be awesome if you could open up some dialogue with the community and enlighten us as to how you would go about solving these issues. I have shared my thoughts on FTE vs MDD previously and I'm going to paste them here again as a reference. If you think any of these points are inaccurate, or that I am missing something, please let me know. Until new information is revealed I can only go off of how things worked in EQ -- that game didn't have a good reputation when it came to fun/healthy competition, and I always felt pretty strongly that Vanguard was designed with FTE to overcome many of those issues. I would love to hear more information on how competition can be fun/healthy in Pantheon while using MDD for kill-credit. I'm equally interested in learning how bosses wouldn't be trivialized by zergs without the use of encounter locking.
First To Engage (FTE) Mechanic
Pros:
Cons:
Additional Considerations:
oneADseven said:Joppa said:Brad's ideas on Advanced Threat Assessment, mob-locking and instancing are not ideas I fundamentally agree with. I certainly believe they have merit and are worth consideration, but I don't personally believe they are the best solutions for the issues they seek to address. I have a different approach to handling contested content within an open world game like this that does not involve mob locking that I feel strongly we need to explore.
It's been nearly 18 months since this exchange between you and Lassiz on a stream:
Lassiz: "How does mob tagging work?"
Joppa: "That's a pretty heavy one to get into. The plan for right now is for MDD (Most Damage Done) to be the way we handle mob tagging. That of course then raises a lot of questions, a lot of caveats, it's a very philosophical question to, as far as why we chose to go that way. It has a lot to do with our decision to make Pantheon an open-world game. At PAX this was one of the most commonly recurring questions ... it's that pair, right, is it open-world or is it instanced ... and if it's open-world, how do you guys plan on handling X?
There is a lot to say there ... it really gets down to the heart of what Pantheon is. We've seen ... since that classic era of games, we've seen very very few games that are made in that model if you will. Whereas you can see a huge myriad of games that have been made in the more modern model ... and that's great, but for us, we see an opportunity to recapture that older classic way of doing things and bring that into the market today because there really isn't anyone embracing that right now the way we want to and so what that means is:
Open World ... and we go into that eyes wide open and then say okay there are some really amazing benefits to an open world game because of the way it builds community, the way the shared experiences are able to happen, those social bonds and constructs that are created ... but then there are also challenges ... and ... it would take a long time to speak to, but it's good to say that we are aware of those things and we're designing with those things in mind."
It seems that there is some internal disagreement on how some of these things should be handled, and there is nothing wrong with that. The best ideas are those that pass through debate, vetting, and to some degree, conflict. With that said, I think it's important that you share some of your ideas. You mentioned previously that this topic, in particular, was the most commonly recurring question. You mentioned that it would take a long time to speak to, and that the game is being designed with those things in mind. How so? What has been designed over the past 18 months that would help the community feel better about the direction that you intend to go? This topic is the most popular of all for a reason. It's an important question with seemingly no answer in sight. It would be awesome if you could open up some dialogue with the community and enlighten us as to how you would go about solving these issues. I have shared my thoughts on FTE vs MDD previously and I'm going to paste them here again as a reference. If you think any of these points are inaccurate, or that I am missing something, please let me know. Until new information is revealed I can only go off of how things worked in EQ -- that game didn't have a good reputation when it came to fun/healthy competition, and I always felt pretty strongly that Vanguard was designed with FTE to overcome many of those issues. I would love to hear more information on how competition can be fun/healthy in Pantheon while using MDD for kill-credit. I'm equally interested in learning how bosses wouldn't be trivialized by zergs without the use of encounter locking.
First To Engage (FTE) Mechanic
Pros:
- Can be leveraged to create a clearly defined "claim" mechanism that allows players to compete with minimal drama.
- Removes a large degree of potential petitions that require interpretative intervention.
- Creates an environment where all capable teams are encouraged to show up and compete for contested content.
- Allows the development team more control as it pertains to creating truly challenging content.
- Preserves the integrity and challenge of encounter design by preventing zerg-like behavior.
- Allows players to focus their efforts on tackling challenging content rather than out-performing other players.
- Allows more group/raid compositions to be viable by alleviating the inflated value of specific classes that are ideal in a DPS Racing environment.
- Allows players to utilize a larger portion of their kit by removing the "DPS Trumps All" mentality. #HotbarRealEstate
- Alleviates the insurmountable power gap that is often associated with the DPS Racing formula.
- Helps guilds retain their top players by ensuring that their efforts remain relevant. #CommunityMatters
- Creates an additional incentive to prioritize the disallowance of automated scripting software.
- Completely eliminates kill-stealing across every tier of content. (Not the same thing as leap-frogging.)
- High likelihood of having an impact on overall retention and profitability. #OpinionsMightMatter
Cons:
- Requires additional programming, funding, and design considerations. #ThreeBulletsInOne
- Can be difficult to implement down the road if above considerations are not factored into the early stages of development.
- Viewed negatively by players who desire a pseudo-PVP element to be integrated into PVE.
- Removes an element of player interaction depending on method of implementation and other design considerations.
- May encourage training due to the nullification of kill-stealing.
Additional Considerations:
- EQ2/FFXI/Vanguard all used FTE to great effect and were renowned for having challenging content. Beating that content felt extremely validating because it proved that your group/raid was capable of conquering content as it was designed and without outside interference/assistance, which is paramount in a true risk vs reward environment.
- If damage dealt is the only qualifier of mob "ownership" (like EQ), then "kill stealing" is an invalid term, because it inherently implies an alternative means of determining mob ownership, which invalidates damage dealt as a metric. Holding both positions at once is cognitive dissonance.
- Many players want a fair chance to experience content without being trampled over by others. A tagging system is fair and does not promote the rich get richer mentality that is painstakingly attached to the DPS Racing model. In order for this to work, the game needs to be truly challenging which leads to the next bullet.
- The FTE mechanism shouldn't be viewed as a tool that allows people to "first hit something" for "easy credit." Encounters should be really challenging, and the preparation phase should be vital to your success (which is something that has been emphasized a great deal for Pantheon). If we get to the point where players are more worried about securing the pull than they are with how they're going to deal with the challenging boss they just engaged, the game isn't hard enough. Your #1 focus should ALWAYS be based around a clean pull to prevent a mob from promptly destroying your group/raid. Winning the pull is a secondary consideration that should punish you if you're greedy & pull something while being under prepared.
- DPS Racing reinforces the "it's about the destination rather than the journey" mindset. Players will be driven to grind to maximum level, with no sleep, and kill everything possible until they beat the game. You can spend a solid 2-3 weeks focused 100% on getting to end-game and killing every boss while there is no real competition from players who would otherwise take longer to get to that tier of content. Been there, done that, and to be quite honest, I'm tired of playing the villain. Once you establish a lead in this race, you can basically coast your way to the finish line (any future contested content) as long as players continue to show up and leverage the power gap that can be achieved by rushing to max level.
- In order to prevent true long-term competition, ultra-hardcore players are encouraged to play in such a way that revolves around the above bullet. The common policy is to rotate sleeping shifts (4-6 hours) between multiple players. While one person sleeps, the other person boxes their character (albeit at limited efficiency.) When that player wakes up, they rotate duties with the other person who was boxing their character. It allows players to stay logged in, grinding, 24/7. There is a reason why people are willing to go through these extremes. It gives such a massive advantage toward the DPS racing model that it becomes nearly impossible for any other guild to compete with them. (Note that some guilds will do this regardless of what mechanic is adopted in order to secure WW position for various raid kills. There is no issue with that. There are major issues, however, with creating a system that rewards this behavior with an ever growing chain reaction of power spikes to those who get there first. It's a simple formula that can be leveraged to unthinkable benefit, and has been for nearly 20 years.)
- If you want to give people a reason to show up because they at least have a chance to down a distinguished boss, first-tag is the way to go. I have watched second or third tier guilds beat contested content due to the first-tag system and it's a truly awesome thing. It made competition feel alive because everybody had a real chance to win. A lot of people have voiced their concerns on how DPS Racing ultimately feels like "PVP" on a "PVE" server. Should players be more concerned about the epic dragon they are fighting, or the power of that other raid of "heroes" beside them? Should the underdogs have a chance or not? If they do, guilds have a much better chance of retaining their top talent rather than see them being assimilated by the DPS-Racing juggernauts that monopolize the entire competitive landscape of a given server.
- Systems are intrinsically tied to community politics. Without systems, the game wouldn't exist in the first place. Community comes after systems, because the entire fabric of how the community can interact and behave is contingent on how the game itself is configured. It is of the upmost importance, in my opinion, that the game is not designed in such a way that encourages degenerate behavior. If the game allows a single player to kite a named boss around for extended periods of time, the game isn't hard enough. There are plenty of ways to prevent this type of "cheese play" from working, especially with bosses.
Fantastic! oneADseven you wrote this as a mirror of how I feel in regards to community interaction being tied to the rules of the game mechanics.
Regarding locking, tagging, MDD, FTE, etc:
Personally? I don't care if it's MDD or FTE. I've lived with both and will be content or unhappy with both.
However, with respect to tagging, I strongly believe that tagging for quest credit should absolutely be a thing, for contested quest content.
If a mob is spawned for you? No, there should be no quest credit for tagging. You take down that mob with your allies.
If an open world mob is required for you to advance your quest? Yes, you should get quest credit for being present for and participating in the kill. Even if that means you have to do 1% damage or >0 damage. Whatever.
Why? Because I've seen the 20+ year ongoing social disaster of being unable to complete quests because the most toxic guild on the server makes it their mission in life to kill all contested quest mobs, period, forever. Specifically and only for the purpose of preventing anyone else in the game from progressing. Will the target demographic pay for the privilege of bored players blocking their entertainment? Who would want to?
So yeah, on this issue, I am going to lean heavily towards the "it should favor the questing player" side of things.
Regarding the Phasing vs. Open World.
Joppa, I'm unable to imagine or remember a logical solution that does not involve encounter locking (or something that contains all the same benefits of encounter locking, but isn't called encounter locking), that handles the problems that Phasing or ~Instancing solves. I mean, if you have a/the solution? Tell us.
Because.. the scope of the problem and the features of the solution? They're both very narrow.
If another player can affect the mobs that are part of your quest, or activity? That permits social toxicity. If they can't? Awesome. Great. But that's encounter locking, effectively, if not in name.
I don't think, logically, anyone can design a solution that both allows anyone in the world to see & kill anything/everything at any time, and still guarantee quest NPCs won't be interfered with.
And to be clear, for myself and those in my guild? We don't care if you use encounter locking for quests. Go for it. It's a great solution.
I'm not a big fan of the invisible NPC's/Phasing, but even that would be better than letting UberGuild876 destroy or block weeks or months of effort because they were bored.
If all Quest mobs spawn for me and my allies, and only we can target, interact, and/or harm/heal them? A great implementation, from my perspective.
Vjek hit on something that I feel should be amplified. It's just my opinion, but the best approach is to utilize the method that best fits the context of what the player is doing and why they're there. This is true whether we're talking about locking/tagging, or systems that allow people to buy and sell, or the way that mobs spawn in dungeons vs. the open world (just to name a few).
I can see some things such as quest targets using FTE tagging for kill credit, while other things such as world bosses use MDD calculations. I can see triggered encounters being locked to the group or raid that triggered them, and other static/dynamic spawns being contested. I think the key though is to understand that both options are actually options, and use them in the situations where they make sense. The same thing goes for advanced threat assessment, phasing, instancing, or any other tool. The goal should be to provide a gameplay experience that fits the context of the encounter. If it's something that players are intentionally looking to kill for a quest or as part of the natural progression of the area's story, then set things up accordingly. If it's something special that shows up randomly as a surprise to players then treat that appropriately as well.
So for what it's worth that is my feedback on that topic for VR. Don't force yourselves to choose one or the other. Use both where they make sense.
@Aradune and @Joppa Thank you both for taking the time to post, much appreciated. So much information to unpack with all of Aradune's blogs and the insights Joppa added.
On the narrow topic of names, 2 names works for me and would rather not see numbers tagged on at the end though Stellarmind did post an interesting idea of how to do it keeping immersion in mind. I do hope the names are only server locked and not globally so you could have the same character name on different servers. I love the idea of being able to create an alias for your friends.
vjek said:Yep, agreed, Nephele. If they use them all, where and when appropriate? No issue here, and it would likely end up being the best for the subscribers and their retention.
speaking of this: bdo(action based mmo) uses a combination of first to loot(i should note that this is only for regular mobs and looting operates differently in this game) and most damage done as well as a participation loot
also they use a mix of quest encounter locking mobs and boss phasing. it works really well. a large majority pvpers will probably be okay with this. i know when i'm doing quest(story driven, not repeatable type of quests) or bosses(pve) i don't want to be disrupted since it should be challenging without the addition of pvp(i know shocking coming from a pvper, but most pvpers i talk to prefer this) as far as farming, grinding, exploring or open world activities goes... hehe it's open game.
