Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Brainstorming Player driven content options

    • 1315 posts
    January 24, 2018 12:34 PM PST

    ***Edit***  I will be using this thread to deposit multiple ideas as I come up with them as well as talk with others about both my ideas and theirs.  I welcome others to post ideas and offer suggestions on how to improve or elaborate on my ideas.  It is understood that most of these will not be practicle for launch but might be good for minor content updates as the expansions are slowly released. *** End Edit***

     

    One of the ways for an MMO to remain fresh is to utilize and encourage player created and driven content.  Sometimes this can be as simple as organizing an in game hangout/party where everyone just shows up to talk.  In the past I have seen guild give out door and winner prizes for in game contests as well.  Often times these types of content are limited by word of mouth advertising and if one player knows another player.

    What I am wondering is what simple in game tools and mechanics our community as a whole can come up as suggestions for VR to consider implementing a variation of in order to help us create content in the future.  I’ll take a quick stab at a format and look forward to seeing what everyone comes up with.  Maybe Kilson can turn it into a contest for bragging rights.

     

    Tool:  Help Wanted Board

    Purpose:  An in game message board where players can post fetch quests for other players even when their game times do not overlap.

    Game Mechanics:  An interactive menu object located in city taverns.  A player can either post a message with a pull tab like request for assistance with a task in game or an item fetch quest.  The item fetch quest would require a UI where a player could select as specific in game item, set the quantity desired and deposit the stated reward on the board.  The first person to turn in the fetch items get the reward and when the posting player checks the board they can retrieve their requested items.

    Possible incentives: Successfully completing requests and successfully having quests completed increase your ranking on the board systems.  The higher your rank the more difficult of requests you can both accept and post as well as board cost benefits.

     

    Looking forward to other ideas,

    Trasak


    This post was edited by Trasak at February 27, 2018 1:27 PM PST
    • 1281 posts
    January 24, 2018 5:09 PM PST

    Trasak said:

    One of the ways for an MMO to remain fresh is to utilize and encourage player created and driven content.  Sometimes this can be as simple as organizing an in game hangout/party where everyone just shows up to talk.  In the past I have seen guild give out door and winner prizes for in game contests as well.  Often times these types of content are limited by word of mouth advertising and if one player knows another player.

    What I am wondering is what simple in game tools and mechanics our community as a whole can come up as suggestions for VR to consider implementing a variation of in order to help us create content in the future.  I’ll take a quick stab at a format and look forward to seeing what everyone comes up with.  Maybe Kilson can turn it into a contest for bragging rights.

     

    Tool:  Help Wanted Board

    Purpose:  An in game message board where players can post fetch quests for other players even when their game times do not overlap.

    Game Mechanics:  An interactive menu object located in city taverns.  A player can either post a message with a pull tab like request for assistance with a task in game or an item fetch quest.  The item fetch quest would require a UI where a player could select as specific in game item, set the quantity desired and deposit the stated reward on the board.  The first person to turn in the fetch items get the reward and when the posting player checks the board they can retrieve their requested items.

    Possible incentives: Successfully completing requests and successfully having quests completed increase your ranking on the board systems.  The higher your rank the more difficult of requests you can both accept and post as well as board cost benefits.

     

    Looking forward to other ideas,

    Trasak

    As an FYI.

    I don't thinnk you're going to be able to fetch quests for others.  The quest system in Pantheon is based upon a perception skill.  They haven't really discussed how that will be levelled up yet, but quest givers are not going to have ssome visual indicator, like a ! above them, showing that they have a quest to give out.  Once your perception skill gets high enough they will do something to get your attention.

    • 220 posts
    January 24, 2018 5:39 PM PST

    Theoretically, of course!

    Go big or go home: Player developed regions.

    tools: NPC spawners, Mob spawners, Quest development, perception, environment, Chest and loot, Vendors

    Game mechanic: A region is physically designed (houses, roads, terrain, etc) by VR, and "awarded" to someone who successfully implements,writes, and tests all self placed assets in the region on "testserver".  As long as Player continues to fund, itterate, and or expand the region, plat rewards, loot rewards, quest rewards, the region stays live for others to experience.  

    incentives: Playtime increases, Guild bonds, notoriety, infinite itterations on how players can use provided tools to blow the developers minds (think landmark/microvoxels, or customizable boss mechanics, or perpetual low level hunt areas, or tradeskill farms).  

    If you want player driven content, which I think increases game longevity(when done well) then lets just own it, like neverwinter modders. Noone can provide enough content for us, you know it, gamers want daily expansions.  How can you provide enough content? Make the player create it.  

    So I see the future (post-launch) involve additional advancement paths which would make the game more sandboxy. And then, although this will take a bit longer, the ability for players (or a subset of players) to create content themselves. I'm going to leave it at that though as I don't want to over-hype post-launch stuff, plus I'm pretty sure I've already posted in the past about User Generated Content.

    From Aradunes sandbox vs Themepark blog

      

    • 1785 posts
    January 24, 2018 6:05 PM PST

    A simpler, and potentially more effective way of doing the "Help Wanted" board is to allow players to place "Buy orders" via some sort of market interface.  Example:

    I'm a crafter, and I need skullywug hides to make my wares.  Sadly, skullywugs live a continent away from where I operate, and I'd much rather keep crafting than travel halfway across the world to hunt skullywugs.

    So, I place a buy order with a local broker for 100 skullywug hides, at a price of 20 gold each.  I give the broker 225 platinum to cover buying the hides (plus his fee).  Then, anyone who wants can go out and hunt skullywug hides, bring them back, and "sell" them to the broker, who will continue to buy hides for me (and deliver them to me) until the money I gave him runs out.  If I want more hides after that, I'll need to set up another order.

    This fulfills the same sort of goals that a fetch quest would.  It gets players out into the world traveling, and (hopefully) having adventures along the way.  It's driven by players so as long as people need things that are inconvenient for them personally to get, they'll place buy orders for those things.

     

    As for Larr's idea - I like what you propose but I feel that it might not be able to scale to the number of players who would like to participate.  Way back in my MUD days we used to allow players to develop zones (with some quality checks), and it turns out there are a LOT of players who are interested in that sort of thing.  Not to mention, building an entire region's worth of content can take a LONG time, even for someone experienced with development tools.  Then there's the problem of balancing it with the rest of the game....

    However, I do support the idea of using player housing (which we're fairly sure will be an expansion feature) to allow players to develop towns and cities within "unexplored" regions.  In turn, it would not be hard to dynamically spawn basic content based on the presence of those player towns.  I wrote a concept for a "Freehold" system here if you want to look at what I thought might work.

     

    • 1315 posts
    January 25, 2018 5:20 AM PST

    Larr: Interesting idea.  In some ways Wizards of the Coast did that for the Eberron Campaign setting by running a contest for new campaign setting ideas and the winner got $100,000 and a deal to develop the full IP which Wizards then owned.   Not a bad format for VR to consider down the road.

    Nephele: A straight up consignment merchant board is a good idea in my opinion as well.  I believe that if they are localized in to either only work on one board or the boards in a small area it should not hurt the localized item economy that has been talked about.

    In addition to the straight up items for cash transaction I was hoping to encourage more of an items for items system or a quasi-escort another player quest with reward.

    Item for Item example:  Tailor Bob is requesting 4 high quality bear hides and is offering a high quality hand made backpack. (3 listings)

    Quasi-escort: Smith Tom is requesting a combat escort into the nearby mountains to collect rare materials that require master smithing skills to collect.  Time: Thursday 5PM EST, LVL Req. 35, Board rank Silver, 100pp on start of escort and 10% of collected materials. 3 slots remaining.

    The player escort quests are most likely more trouble than they are worth to make mechanical and will only be useful for informing others of a request for help.

    Freehold:  I like the idea and was roughly along the same lines of an outpost system I rambled about in a different post.  The main bit I was tying in was that other players could contribute to the size and upkeep of player cities by placing their “flag” in one.  It would give them a place to bind to for non self binders, some form of offline bonus based on returning home rather than logging out randomly, local exchange rates rather than outsider rates for goods and services.  That sort of thing.

    Another idea

    Tool:  Reserve able public meeting hall

    Purpose:  A large scale public building that can be temporarily customized for the event at a cost.

    Game Mechanics:  A hall merchant has a schedule that players can purchase time blocks to configure the space as desired.  The options will include general decoration themes (guild colors, white wedding, Christmas etcetera) level of catering (Fancy - costs extra but rare foods, standard – get DRUNK, light - food tables look a bit bare, BYOF/B - cheapwads) guest lists (everyone, guild only, select list) and door prizes/ gift table/ white elephant.

    Possible incentives: This one is totally just for fun but could be a good tool for community bonding and interaction.  I actually can’t stop laughing at the antics of a digital white elephant.


    This post was edited by Trasak at January 25, 2018 5:23 AM PST
    • 151 posts
    January 25, 2018 9:15 AM PST

    As long as I can turn off player driven stuff then I am all for it. I don't want to be forced to participate or see it. This kind of falls into the same category as appearance armor and items. I am all for it just don't make me be a part of it if I don't want too be. I may not be interested in seeing someones "creation". Mainly because most of what I have seen in the way of player created content or appearace gear has been stupid in my opinion. If people enjoy doing it cool. Just don't make me look at you or your stuff.

    So having tools to allow players to  make their own quests where they provide the rewards would be cool. If I don't want to do the quest I can just not accept it right? But having players design areas of the world is too much for me in a game that will not have instanceing. I don't want to see players being able to spawn mobs, control loot, or any of that kind of thing. 

    • 3237 posts
    January 25, 2018 11:26 AM PST

    Trasak said:

    Larr: Interesting idea.  In some ways Wizards of the Coast did that for the Eberron Campaign setting by running a contest for new campaign setting ideas and the winner got $100,000 and a deal to develop the full IP which Wizards then owned.   Not a bad format for VR to consider down the road.

    Nephele: A straight up consignment merchant board is a good idea in my opinion as well.  I believe that if they are localized in to either only work on one board or the boards in a small area it should not hurt the localized item economy that has been talked about.

    In addition to the straight up items for cash transaction I was hoping to encourage more of an items for items system or a quasi-escort another player quest with reward.

    Item for Item example:  Tailor Bob is requesting 4 high quality bear hides and is offering a high quality hand made backpack. (3 listings)

    Quasi-escort: Smith Tom is requesting a combat escort into the nearby mountains to collect rare materials that require master smithing skills to collect.  Time: Thursday 5PM EST, LVL Req. 35, Board rank Silver, 100pp on start of escort and 10% of collected materials. 3 slots remaining.

    The player escort quests are most likely more trouble than they are worth to make mechanical and will only be useful for informing others of a request for help.

    Freehold:  I like the idea and was roughly along the same lines of an outpost system I rambled about in a different post.  The main bit I was tying in was that other players could contribute to the size and upkeep of player cities by placing their “flag” in one.  It would give them a place to bind to for non self binders, some form of offline bonus based on returning home rather than logging out randomly, local exchange rates rather than outsider rates for goods and services.  That sort of thing.

    Another idea

    Tool:  Reserve able public meeting hall

    Purpose:  A large scale public building that can be temporarily customized for the event at a cost.

    Game Mechanics:  A hall merchant has a schedule that players can purchase time blocks to configure the space as desired.  The options will include general decoration themes (guild colors, white wedding, Christmas etcetera) level of catering (Fancy - costs extra but rare foods, standard – get DRUNK, light - food tables look a bit bare, BYOF/B - cheapwads) guest lists (everyone, guild only, select list) and door prizes/ gift table/ white elephant.

    Possible incentives: This one is totally just for fun but could be a good tool for community bonding and interaction.  I actually can’t stop laughing at the antics of a digital white elephant.

    I'm actually friends with one of the runner-ups for that campaign that Wizards of the Coast held.  I agree it's a really cool idea.  As far as buy/sell orders, I have advocated for those for quite awhile.  It makes it a little bit more difficult for market players to manipulate the economy (something I always do) but at the end of the day it's healthy for any game/server that uses it so I think it should definitely be considered.


    This post was edited by oneADseven at January 25, 2018 11:28 AM PST
    • 1315 posts
    January 30, 2018 10:38 AM PST

    Next idea, its been done in other games but I thought it would be worth posting.

     

    Tool:  Gift Wrap

    Purpose:  A way to give an item to another player with the item being disguised until the receiving player decided to "unwrap it".

    Game Mechanics:  Work an item at a specific gift wrapping work station, supplying some minor ingredients, to produce a boxed item.  It would be nice if you could put a to and from note on the box.

    Possible incentives: A fairly simple little mechanic to add to the fun of in game gift giving.

     

    Trasak

    • 69 posts
    January 30, 2018 11:28 AM PST
    Player Guild presence, player governance... a way for players/guilds to put their mark visibly on the wider world if they accomplish certain tasks (temporarily).

    Something like they get their guild banner up on city hall, npc recognition, permission to create a public quest, etc.
    • 1399 posts
    January 30, 2018 7:03 PM PST

    Another Idea: Bradslist  (Craigslist)

    This was brought up in thread about Auction House alternatives. To have a portable "newspaper" where players could simply place add's. Be it buy, or sell, items or services.

    It could be searchable .

    it could be portable "you go to town and buy a paper to take on your journeys with you. 

    It could be reagonal, you could buy 10ea. for 5cp and take them to another region and sell them for 10cp each. 

    It would NOT auto deliver anything but it would show if the player placing the add was online and help getting ahold of them such as /tell or /mail

    A person could take bids in their mail "will be sold to the highest bidder that is online when I log in friday at 3pm PST"

    You could offer services "Every Friday at 7am PST to 3pm PST(raid time) I will be supplying ports to anywhere for 10plat each. send me a /tell"  

     

    I can't even begin to think of what, and how else this can be used. But to me it sounds like a steady flow of player driven content.


    This post was edited by Zorkon at January 30, 2018 7:07 PM PST
    • 30 posts
    January 31, 2018 7:15 AM PST

    First, let me say that I really love seeing ideas being offered. I'm always impressed with the ingenuity of players to come up with novel solutions to challenges. I'm responding to this as I look through the lens of someone who watched their favorite game (EQ) devolve into a mess.

    Not to be an old cranky guy, but I am not a fan of the idea of "automating" aspects of the game via a "help / item wanted" list or other mecahnics like auto-porting, auto CR, etc. One downside is that it negatively impacts the need to interract with other players in the world. As an oldtime player of EQ at its release, I have many memories around interracting with other players. I asked questions and got answers and advice. I found people online who had no idea what awaited us in West Karana after leaving Qeynos Hills and so we banded together and explored. Want to make a run from Qeynos to Freeport? Find others who are headed that way in the zone or try to make it on your own (and then find someone in game to help you with your CR). Adding the ability to find all of this stuff in the game to a want ad would kill much of that required interraction and in many ways, simplify it too much.

    I am surprised at myself for advocating against such things as these wanted ads (I hated having to stand around to buy or sell stuff whereas others really loved it), but after seeing what EQ turned into as tasks were simplified and the need to hang out and find help and interract faded away, I realized just how importat thee things were to the game. Some of these "time sinks" really made a huge differernce to the game. Waiting for a boat (had fun talking with others and goofing around plus we've all felt the sting of missing the boat), treking across the world on foot (plan what you do and where you go because it will take a long journey to get there), working to find items needed for a quest or trade Ask others in the area if they have any to sell), all of these pushed players together and created a big world filled with a real community.

    I know that anything not implemented in game will find a home on some message board somewhere which will achieve much the same thing however not having it in-game will encourage more in-game interractions which I feel is a very good thing.

    • 1315 posts
    January 31, 2018 8:17 AM PST

    Draygon said:

    First, let me say that I really love seeing ideas being offered. I'm always impressed with the ingenuity of players to come up with novel solutions to challenges. I'm responding to this as I look through the lens of someone who watched their favorite game (EQ) devolve into a mess.

    *snip*

    I am surprised at myself for advocating against such things as these wanted ads (I hated having to stand around to buy or sell stuff whereas others really loved it), *snip*

    I know that anything not implemented in game will find a home on some message board somewhere which will achieve much the same thing however not having it in-game will encourage more in-game interractions which I feel is a very good thing.

    Having recently started playing on P99 I went to EC to sell of my stockpiled silk and bone chips I have to report that I physically can no longer use chat spam to sell things.  My eyes just get too tired trying to read fast enough for hours on end to make sure that I don’t miss what I am looking for while contributing the to spam as I keep adding my sell macro to the channel.  I am not against needing to talk to a player to negotiate a price or a location for the exchange but I will avoid endlessly waiting for interested parties as I stare at a chat window even if that means I don’t participate in the economy.

    Relying on 3rd party tools and websites to facilitate in-game play is also a dangerous equation.  Those same websites or their mimics are usually the source of viruses and malware targeted at players of the games they serve, early WoW key loggers are a good example.  Additionally during a previous Path of Exile league the main trading website went down in the first two weeks of the league and practically ruined the economy.  Grinding Gear Games had no way to fix the web issues or police the sites for fraud because they had no affiliation with the site, the API that GGG enabled for these trading sites actually caused significant in game performance issues as well.  In the end GGG has implemented a simple version of the trade website on their own site which could have just been implemented in game.

    TLDR:

    1: I’m getting older and sifting chat spam hurts my eyes so no EC style selling for me

    2: Relying on 3rd party sites is a security risk for both players and VR

     

    This next idea is on the boundary between game wish and player generated content.

     

    Tool:  Live Auctioneer

    Purpose:  NPC administrated live auction at predetermined times with a published list and no takebacks.

    Game Mechanics:  Certain cities will have an auctioneer that can be hired to run and advertise an auction for you, as well as a general one.  The sponsor of the auction can set who all can offer items for sale at the auction, the order in which the items are offered, the location of the auction (city location, guild hall or personal house), item submission date, and the cut the sponsor takes.  The sponsor will need to pay a significant amount to hire the auctioneer.

    Once a player is on the list of those who can post items for sale they can deposit items with the auctioneer along with a starting bid price, no hidden reserves.  After the auction completes the seller returns to the auctioneer to collect the proceeds and any unsold items.  The players on the list will have a cut off time, say 72 hours before the auction starts, to post items.  After the cutoff point the sponsor will have 24 hours to rearrange the order after which the list is published at the auctioneer’s office.

    Once at the Auctioneers office players can look at the list of items posted and place prebids on the items, depositing the money at the time of bid.  At the time of the auction players request a bid paddle from the auctioneer which is really a window with the current item for bid and a button to hit either the minimum bid or a box to type in a specific bid.  Each time you bid your current cash is greyed out to cover your current bid.  If you win the final bid then the price is automatically deducted and you can retrieve your item from the Auctioneer’s assistant.  Otherwise the auction operates similar to how websites like Proxibid works.

    Possible incentives: Rather than an always on automated vendor a selective auction can be a good way for players to concentrate their buying and selling activity to a smaller time window.  Additionally players with non-standard play hours can offer items that are hard to sell in their time zone to prime time players, conversely a non-prime time player can prebid an item they really want with an above market price in order to get something they really need that is not available in their time zone.

    Trasak

    • 3852 posts
    January 31, 2018 8:28 AM PST

    While I agree with much of what Draygon says I want to note that much of the way original EQ worked was due to software/hardware constraints not because the developers wanted those things. If we can keep the feel of EQ and Vanguard and merge this with a lot of improvements that almost 20 years have brought this will be far better than taking elements of EQ *because* they were in EQ. As VR has often said, of course.

    Among the things that almost all of us want and that VR is fairly well committed to is more difficulty than is the norm today, slower leveling, less ability to bypass things by racing from one transportation hub to the next, more incentive to cooperate (groups and guilds both) and more tools to make cooperation rewarding. Some of this is EQish but some is not. 

    Some things in early EQ are debatable even among the hardcore old school fans. Not many instances is a given but a fair number here see some benefit to some (perhaps limited to story progression perhaps broad enough to allow a small amount of content to be less readily interfered with by griefers or raid guilds). Some people want no fast travel at all, even to the point of saying no mounts at all. Some accept fast travel between known points and argue that after a while going through the same area slowly is tedium not exploration. Some people want raid or other significant bosses to be on long respawn timers - others argue that camping a boss for hours or days or longer isn't exactly fun and shouldn't be part of Pantheon. Some people want trading limited to a bazaar - in person trading. Others prefer the convenience of a broker or auction house.

    The OP's suggestions (and all other ideas) need to be reviewed on the criteria of will they make the game more fun, will they drain resources from other things, will they improve are harm stability or framerate, etc. How they mesh with early EQ and Vanguard is relevant to a lesser extent - since so many of the target market (us) is disposed to accept things that were in one or both of those games less critically than entirely new ideas. 


    This post was edited by dorotea at January 31, 2018 8:30 AM PST
    • 2756 posts
    February 1, 2018 2:31 AM PST

    Buy orders or player fetch quests would be awesome for crafters and guilds and would be surely a very simple interface to develop.  Nice idea.

    In past MMORPGs I have often come up against resource scarcity or people cornering the market.  It would be great to put up a buy order for resources that lower level players would be happy to check and execute.


    This post was edited by disposalist at February 1, 2018 2:33 AM PST
    • 1315 posts
    February 1, 2018 11:45 AM PST

    disposalist said:

    In past MMORPGs I have often come up against resource scarcity or people cornering the market.  It would be great to put up a buy order for resources that lower level players would be happy to check and execute.

    That is definitely a motivation for me to see it put in both countering market cornering and a good way for lowbie characters to make money from experienced high level players

    Today’s idea is a bit more ambitious to create and will need to be checked by the lawyer to confirm the sign off of copy rights to VR of items created by players.

    Tool:  Weapon morphing tool

    Purpose:  Allow player crafters to create new/unique models through an in-game engine and save the settings for later.

    Game Mechanics:  Each weapon type has a base model: 1 hand heavy sword, 1 hand light sword, 2 hand sword, 1 hand spear, 1 hand hammer, 2 hand hammer, polearm/2 hand spear, dagger, bow, x-cross bow.  The weapons are centered on the character mount point that cannot be altered and a bounding box that limits how the model size.  The base model has an editable 2D center spine.  Each node on the 2d spine is then assigned a 2d polygon normal to the spline.  Each of those polygons have 8 points that can be edited and either a straight line or curved line between the vertices.  Once the spline and polygons are generated the tool smoothly connects the eight control points on each polygon up the spline and the join lines can also be assigned as straight or curved.  Bonus points if hilts and pommels can also be edited. 

    Once the model is generated each polygon can be assigned a color map, texture and light refraction.  The polygons can be grouped so that the assignments can be done as a group but also have edge line patterns and centerline patterns take into consideration the joined polygons rather than individual.

    The available colors, patterns and light refraction levels can be limited by the recipe materials and optional dye components.  Once completed the design along with the required optional materials are turned into a custom recipe that can be saved, copied and sold, or deleted if you really wanted it to be unique.  The potential could be there for particle effects as well if it made sense in the scheme of Pantheon crafting, i.e. adding the soul crystal of a shadow elemental gave the blade a blackened glow.

    Possible incentives: The more players can customize things and really make it their own the more personal attachment to it and Pantheon as a whole.  If crafted items have a significant place in the future of Pantheon then master craftsmen can make signature patterns that themselves can become recognizable as a sought after item.

    Happy Trails,

    Trasak

    • 1315 posts
    February 5, 2018 5:42 AM PST

    This isn’t one of my better ideas but it is still kinda funny.  Fits better after guild halls or player housing comes in but like the rental hall could have a public location as well.

     

    Tool:  Loot Piñata

    Purpose:  Put items into a Piñata that players can interact with until it opens.

    Game Mechanics:  Buy/Craft a Piñata of various shapes and sizes.  Put items in the Piñata container that can then be sealed.  Set the break point as a specific number of hits or random or random within a range.

    Set the swings to consume a ticket which can be numbered or free for all.  Ticket is purchased at some npc or interactive tickertape device.  When the target number of hits is reached the items fall on the ground and are free for all to pick up.  The item will call a hanging scaffolding and likely the tickertape device attached to it.  Once private spaces become available you control who can pick up rewards by controlling who is around or someone who has a “pulled a ticket” buff.

    Pulling a ticket could be set to have a cost or a guild restriction or an invitee restriction.

    Possible incentives: Another party favor that adds an activity that players can fund and initiate.  Could be used/abused as a form of gambling, I don’t personally have a problem with player gambling if cheating can be prevented.

     

    Trasak

    • 3237 posts
    February 5, 2018 6:11 AM PST

    Here is an excerpt of an idea I shared awhile back:

     

    "Create a chapel for each major city that is unique to the race that hails from there.  Allow players to schedule events such as weddings, anniversaries, or baby showers.  Each racial chapel would have it's own look/theme that is reflective of their culture.  Players would have to pay a fee to utilize the chapel, and have the option to rent (additional cost) space from the attached wedding/party hall.  Allow characters to mail out invitations for any event they schedule, and give each recipient the ability to RSVP.

    Whether an event is held in the chapel (moderately expensive, limited capacity) or party hall (very expensive, larger capacity), allow players to pay for optional features that could make the event more memorable and improve upon the player experience for every attendee.  Allow us to serve various dishes that can provide temporary buffs, with each dish requiring it's own learned recipe.  These can be obtained through a mixture of direct purchase, questing, faction reward, or something else.  Each recipe would have it's own set of ingredients, with certain ingredients having more difficult procurement requirements.  Behemoth Stew, anybody?  How about some Dragon Egg Salad?  There are plenty of cool ways to incorporate culinary buffs into the game.

    Another way to further enhance these "events" would be to enable the event planner/facilitator or attendees to give out "heirlooms" at the event.  There could be a combination of heirlooms that provide a variety of benefits.  One such benefit could be a "Return to Chapel" ability.  This would be similiar to the "Return Home" ability except it would return you to a specific chapel and be on a seperate cooldown.  Another heirloom could be a certificate that provides a 50% reduction on broker fees when the owner uses the specific Broker/Auction House that is connected to that cities chapel.  How about a heirloom (or collection of individually acquired heirlooms) that unlock various sets of "twink" gear, jewelery, or both.  These items would be designed to noticeably improve the power of new characters (or Progeny) through a combination of stats or buffs that last until level 20 or so.

    The possibilities with heirlooms are endless, but they would basically function like "guild amenities" from other games.  Just like with the culinary recipes, each heirloom would have it's own set of requirements to unlock it, varying from direct purchase, questing, faction reward, or something else.  The person bestowing the heirlooms to others could inscribe a unique message onto them that can help commemorate the event where it was received.  EG: "Heirloom of Call to Thronefast" (Heirloom must be in inventory for the character to cast the ability) Item description reads: Received on 01/22/2017 -- Commemorating the marriage of Ashe and Logan Blackstone." ex: "Helmet of HolyBuffsMan!" "Received on 01/22/2017 -- Commemorating the birth of Synterria Blackstone."

    There could be small-scope events where only the bride and groom receive heirlooms, but all of the attendees are able to enjoy a nice meal and it's accompanying buff(s).  There could be large scale events where everybody in attendance receives both a heirloom and a meal, but these would be much more difficult to faciliate due to the added cost or a limited availability of resources.  Perhaps there can be tradeable faction credits that can be used to purchase the heirlooms.  Maybe there is a couple who wants to throw an epic celebration never to be forgotten, hosting an amazing banquet and providing a commemorable heirloom to all of their guests.

    I know "baby showers" seem kind of lame in an MMO, but how cool would it be to receive a full set of twink gear for your child?  Hopefully you have a lot of friends because each piece would be pretty costly!  This could be a great way to incorporate some extra social interaction into the game.  Personally, I would find it very rewarding anytime I was able to make a worthwhile contribution in one of these events.   It's always a great feeling when you get to help out a friend, and being able to commemorate these interactions with something tangible would make it even more special.

    Now I understand that this is not something that everybody could/would participate in.  Characters could still have children whether they are married or not via immaculate conception or whatever other method VR wants to implement.  The party halls could still be used for a variety of other settings such as birthdays, holidays, or virtually anything that someone wants to celebrate.  I'm not trying to come up with an idea that gives a benefit that is exclusive to married characters or their non-bastard children.  Any benefit associated with the culinary buffs or heirlooms should be universally obtainable by all, but by making each of them difficult to unlock/purchase, you're not going to see people spamming events for the sake of a food buff.

    Maybe high end guilds would be rich enough to host some sort of daily banquet, but it should be pretty expensive and effectively drain some of their funding.  It would need to be balanced so that a blend of player types are capable of utilizing these party halls, but add a layer of intricacy for the people who are truly vested in unearthing some of the better rewards.  Behemoth Stew and Dragon Egg Salad, for example, would be considered a rare delicacy and only available to the groups of characters that are in the business of slaying behemoths and dragons."

     

    The rental hall aspect of your loot piñata idea reminded me of this.  I am a big fan of encouraging player driven events as I think they would be a great way to touch on the socialization aspect of the game.  I really like this topic and will make an effort to contribute some more ideas.  I shared a semi fleshed out idea for cartography on this thread:  https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/2420/maps-of-various-kinds/view/page/8


    This post was edited by oneADseven at February 5, 2018 6:43 AM PST
    • 1315 posts
    February 5, 2018 6:54 AM PST

    Yah, over all party spaces are likely to be a pretty good return on time investment for VR.

    • 1315 posts
    February 5, 2018 11:03 AM PST

    The game “The Mighty Quest for Epic Loot” was based on an interesting concept of players creating simple dungeons then attacking other player’s dungeons.  The player levels both their attacking character and their dungeon.  Sadly it quickly became pay to win and has already been closed.

    For a Pantheon tie in I would call it something like mini shards.  Player start learning about how Terminus came to be and discovered the concept of world shards.  You learn how to create your own shard seed.  You can grow your seed by exploring distant points in Terminus that are from different world shards or by fully exploring other player’s mini-shards.  What you can put in your mini-shard is based on what you have experienced in the world or other mini-shards.

    After a set period of time the mages guild that helped you create the shards consumes all the shards.  Based on how much energy your mini-shard generated you gain a certain reward from the mage’s guild.  The top x get special rewards.

    Entering a mini-shard requires a full group.  The group leader selects a mini-shard from the list located at that mage’s guild.  The group is transported into the shard and the players have one life to try and find the mini-shard’s essence crystal.

     

    Tool:  Player made challenge dungeons: E-sport

    Purpose:  Create a player created dungeon competition system.  Players create dungeons and challenge other players dungeons in order to grow their own dungeons.  This seasonal based dungeon growth competition will become an E-sport that has little to no effect on the primary progression but will encourage players to re-experience old content each season to regrow your new shard.

    Game Mechanics: 

    1)      Mini-Shard energy generation:  Every hour that the mini-shard is connected to the local Mage’s guild based on the difficulty rating of the mini-shard.  While a group is in your shard it generates 6 times the normal amount.  A group can be in the shard for a maximum of 10 minutes per room before they are teleported out.  If a character dies in your shard its life is absorbed by the shard and is roughly equal to (20 minutes x (# of rooms) – time already spent in the shard) worth of growth time.  If a group reaches your mini-shards essence crystal then all living players are able to copy the essence crystal which gives them access to any component in your shard and grows their own essence crystal by the difficulty level of your shard.  If your essence crystal is copied it disconnects from the mage’s guild for 1 hour for every room in your shard making it so that it does not earn any energy and cannot be challenged again until it reconnects.

    2)      Growing your Mini-Shard:  You can grow your shard in two ways. 

    1. The first is to copy the essence crystals of other mini-shards.  This opens up the build options that exist in the shards as well was adds build points to your shard.  Depending on the difficulty of a specific build option it will require copying more essence crystals to unlock using it yourself, these will stack with method b.
    2. The second method is to find essence crystal fragments throughout the world.  These show up only if you have requested an essence crystal from a mage’s guild and have it on your person.  These can show up in monster loot, randomly on the ground, difficult locations (hardest point in a dungeon), and from harvesting.  Depending on how powerful (difficulty boost) the essence is the more fragments you will need to complete an essence or the harder to get one will be.  The fragments are immediately absorbed by your crystal when you interact with it.  Each fragment also adds build points to your essence crystal.

     

    3)      Building your Mini-Shard (This is the hardest part for VR to create): 

    1. Static parts: At minimum a shard consists of an open space, an entry portal, a locked room, a key and an essence crystal.  Different shaped spaces can be selected, some requiring build points if they make the room more challenging.  The look and feel tile set defaults to the outside location of the mage’s guild the crystal is requested from, different look and feel can be unlocked by essence crystals.  Advanced cost look and feels will have environmental effects as exist in the outer world. Objects like rocks, jumpable walls, plants and simple buildings have no real cost but can effect pathing.  Advanced static items will be unclimbable walls, doors that require keys and other hard obstacles that force you down multiple paths also cost build points.
    2. Dynamic parts: The dynamic parts of shards would be traps/deadly obstacles and monsters.  Each tile set will have a default monster table and basic traps.  Monsters can be set to weak, normal, hard, boss.  They can be linked or single(but will still chain agro) but will have a minimum distance between them when placed. The combat type can be chosen as exists for that mob type essence.  The AI behavior can be selected if the appropriate essence is unlocked.  All of these choices effect the build cost of each mob.  Traps will function in a similar manor.
    3. Keys: Key objects can be placed on the in a container, on the ground, or on a mob. The door will have a lock shape that indicates which type of location the key is at.  Some form of shard check will need to be done to make sure a key is not blocked behind another locked door who’s key is behind the first locked door.
    4. Rooms:  There is a maximum number of build points that can be spent on a single room.  After the build point maximum is reached a new room must be created, an additional room can be added for build points before reaching the build maximum but your shard will be very easy and will be disconnected often.  When you add a room the first room gains an exit portal and your essence crystal moves to the second room and so on.

     

    4)      Challenging a Mini-Shard:  To challenge a mini-shard you need a full group to meet up at the mage’s guild that has the shard you want to challenge.  When you enter a shard your characters are all converted to a generic character profile of at level 30.  Your out of shard inventory and equipment are locked and you are given a basic set that would be reasonable for level 30.  It could be possible for the mini-shard owner to increase what consumables you start with in exchange for more build points to use.  This generic build will include all class defining abilities.  When you leave a shard your mini-shard UI will be saved so that additional setup time will not be required the next time you enter.  You have one life to use in a mini-shard as resurrection will be disabled.  When you die your corpse will be ejected from the shard and sent to the mage’s guild morgue.

     

     

    Possible incentives: Competing for who has the most energy generated could be a fun in game sport that may or may not have any effect on the rest of the game.  I would have rewards for doing well be mostly cosmetic items, collectible/house items or special bags.  There is an opportunity to have at then end of season tournament for all the top 5 mini-shards at each mage guild at central location for a competition that focuses on final difficulty rather than total energy.

     

    I recognize that this is a very ambitious tool and may be more in line with a 2nd or 3rd expansion and certainly too complex to consider for launch.  The UI for the shard building will be will be a mini program in and of itself and may actually be better suited to an out of game editor tool who's results can be loaded into the live game.


    This post was edited by Trasak at February 5, 2018 11:07 AM PST
    • 945 posts
    February 5, 2018 11:34 AM PST
    I could see the "Help wanted board" being used as a Bounty Board or safe escort (caravan guard) request on a PvP server. That could serve to keep grief play and trolling or spamming to a minimum... maybe some opportunity for Paladins or Rangers to RP as the protectors or guardians of their realm haha.
    • 1315 posts
    February 13, 2018 5:51 AM PST

    Slight dry spell of new ideas but here is another interesting one.

     

    Tool:  Painting Easel

    Purpose:  Allow players to create 2d art within the game environment, either to be passed around as inventory items or placed in housing when it is implemented.

    Game Mechanics:  A work station that lets you select a canvas size, in pixels/game object color map, then a really simple MS Paint style tool set. Once the painting is completed it can be added to a frame to create an actual object.  Each painting is signed and only the original player can create new copies of their work.  Bonus points if this can be applied to 3d objects in some way.

    May need to add a “report” button for paintings containing obscene images or hate speech.  May require a player guide to review reports for censuring art.  Also crosses the line into who owns the copy right, VR or the player but a joint ownership clause could easily be written.

    Possible incentives: This could be a very interesting way to build a secondary flow of culture into a digital world.  The opportunity for a very unique style of emergent game play exists as to my knowledge no other game has allowed players to create art within a game outside of cleverly stacked objects in player housing.

    • 258 posts
    February 16, 2018 7:49 PM PST

    I know auction houses and the like have been discussed several times, as have alternatives, but I just wanted to toss this idea into the mix and see what people think...
    For this idea, would like to keep any discussion solely on the idea presented below (like or don't like, plus any additions to the idea) and not on auction houses.

    So, imagine an empty town (moderately sized, but maybe not as big as the normal cities).
    There are only a few basic vendors here. Food, drink, sell your vendor trash, etc...
    There are guards throughout the city with their own faction.
    The city is neutral to all (initially), but building up your faction will allow for several perks.
    The city is divided into districts and full of empty booths and stores.
    Players who have worked on their faction can purchase booths (weekly money sink) where they can place a single 8 slot vendor.
    Players with MAX faction can purchase a shop (weekly money sink) where they can place two 10 slot vendors.
    (Player vendors cannot hold items in bags.)
    (Maybe have different sized shops available?)
    All booths and shops can be customized by the owner: Wall decor, carpets, tapestries, a sign out front, etc...
    Maybe have different "districts" to help organize the shops/booths so that we don't end up with players having to run all over the place with little idea of what vendors have what (like in UO).
    Allow porting classes to port directly to this city.
    Have the city located in a relatively central location. A large island between the continents, maybe?
    My hope is that something fun like this could become the main player-market / AH / EC tunnel trade hub.

    It's neither fully fleshed out nor perfect, but I'd love to discuss this a bit and hear some ideas!

    • 3237 posts
    February 16, 2018 8:59 PM PST

    I would love something like this.  Is there any reason why you picked an empty town?  I think it would be awesome if you had an area like this adjoined to some other major hub destination for increased traffic.  I didn't play EQ1 but I thought one of the main reasons that EC Tunnel became so popular is because it was both accessible and it was an area that a lot of players would consistently travel through.


    This post was edited by oneADseven at February 16, 2018 9:00 PM PST
    • 258 posts
    February 16, 2018 10:25 PM PST

    oneADseven said:

    I would love something like this.  Is there any reason why you picked an empty town?  I think it would be awesome if you had an area like this adjoined to some other major hub destination for increased traffic.  I didn't play EQ1 but I thought one of the main reasons that EC Tunnel became so popular is because it was both accessible and it was an area that a lot of players would consistently travel through.



    I think I imagined it to be an empty town so that it would have a completely player-driven feel, aside from a bank and a few NPCs for food/drink and vendor trash. Also, I thought this would be relatively easy for the developers compared to creating a complete city, and I imagine they are pretty far along with the development of most cities and zones, so adding these sorts of areas to them might not be possible. Plus the lore for this would be simple to write in (small trading village developed into bustling trade hub lol...). But one of the main driving forces behind the idea is to create a single, relatively central hub that both offers amenities akin to an auction house (without the one-stop shop feel) as well as a gathering place for players / traders (neutral to all races) akin to the EC tunnel.

    And it would start out as an "empty town" but would quickly fill with players as they make money, get things they want to sell to other players, and have the desire to create their own shops (with their very own customized aesthetics!). I think this would be really fun for crafters as well. Provisioners/Cooks, for example, could make their shop look like a tavern. :D

    • 1315 posts
    February 19, 2018 6:04 AM PST

    Kaen said:

    I know auction houses and the like have been discussed several times, as have alternatives, but I just wanted to toss this idea into the mix and see what people think...
    For this idea, would like to keep any discussion solely on the idea presented below (like or don't like, plus any additions to the idea) and not on auction houses.

    So, imagine an empty town (moderately sized, but maybe not as big as the normal cities).
    There are only a few basic vendors here. Food, drink, sell your vendor trash, etc...
    There are guards throughout the city with their own faction.
    The city is neutral to all (initially), but building up your faction will allow for several perks.
    The city is divided into districts and full of empty booths and stores.
    Players who have worked on their faction can purchase booths (weekly money sink) where they can place a single 8 slot vendor.
    Players with MAX faction can purchase a shop (weekly money sink) where they can place two 10 slot vendors.
    (Player vendors cannot hold items in bags.)
    (Maybe have different sized shops available?)
    All booths and shops can be customized by the owner: Wall decor, carpets, tapestries, a sign out front, etc...
    Maybe have different "districts" to help organize the shops/booths so that we don't end up with players having to run all over the place with little idea of what vendors have what (like in UO).
    Allow porting classes to port directly to this city.
    Have the city located in a relatively central location. A large island between the continents, maybe?
    My hope is that something fun like this could become the main player-market / AH / EC tunnel trade hub.

    It's neither fully fleshed out nor perfect, but I'd love to discuss this a bit and hear some ideas!

    Kaen I like the idea of a player built and driven city, it reminds me of the company towns of 19th and early 20th century America.  Hopefully it is not to presumptuous that I will go ahead and rewrite your idea in the format I used earlier in the post with a few of my own embellishments.

     

    Tool:  Company Town

    Purpose:  Create a city built 100% around players where they can add configurable options to the town based on faction and a monthly tax on top of an initial cost.

    Game Mechanics:  Baron Wantsyourgold has waived the requirement of a noble bloodline to own property in his new city Prosperous Future, formerly known as Stinking Mud Hole.  To validate this unprecedented opportunity the land taxes are a bit higher than is typical. The monthly taxes will be 5% of the initial purchase per month. All proceeds from any occupation or trade conducted with in the city will be taxed at 10%.  Failure to pay these taxes two months in a row will see your property seized and your deed put up for sale. Any items in your property will be put into storage and will not be released until the missing taxes are paid or 20% of the value of your items, whichever is higher.  Cost to retrieve your items will gain compound interest at 18% per month until the value of the items is reached at which point all property will revert to Baron Wantsyourgold.

    A basic city hall, general store, crafting stations, bank, a travel point and an inn will be placed on a central location.  Players can purchase deeds to plots radiating out from a central location.  The size of the lots, building options, and taxes will be based on the district that the homes are purchased in. 

    Additionally there will be a market area with different sized stalls and primary locations. The larger the stall the more goods that can be placed on display for sale (items are actually visible and mousing over the item will show the stats of the item and the price of the item.  The largest stalls and stores can have back stock of the items for sale to be replenished once sold. The large stalls are all on the central spokes of the expanding market zone and the smaller stalls are on the side alleys.  There are a limited number of large stalls available until a % of the small stalls are occupied.

    Deeds can be traded between players with all upgrades included or bought directly from the city manager if undeveloped or foreclosed.  If players want to trade deeds they need to go to the city office together and sign papers and pay taxes on the exchange, this is for housing, market space, and business store fronts.  The value of a property that the player can purchase is based on their faction with Baron Wantsyourgold.  A player’s faction goes up by doing repeatable quests and by paying taxes and fees.  If a property is outside of your current faction limit the player can pay an additional fee to bypass the faction and pay a higher tax rate until the appropriate faction is reached.

    Possible incentives: This style of expanding city in a relatively central and undeveloped location will allow players to have customized homes without impeding or corrupting the immersion of the purely NPC developed locations.  The player physical market space will allow for offline buying and selling without resorting to a menu auction house.  The tax/foreclosure system will reclaim underused properties to keep the city as dense as possible.  The deed system will allow for prime locations to be traded outside of the foreclosure system as well as build value into unique structures that may have been built or upgraded on those properties outside of the standard options.  Due to the high cost of both having a booth and the sales taxes there will still be a good reason to have hawkers selling their wares under the table or for bulk items of low individual value.  

     

    I hope I have captured the heart of your idea Kaen and not missed any of your key points.  I wasn’t sure how to work in the other factions increasing within the city but I could see hired guards wearing either your guild livery or a faction you select.  To make guards have a purpose though you would need to allow for crime of some sort which may be more grief than gain as it would be player on player.


    This post was edited by Trasak at February 19, 2018 6:16 AM PST