Poll: Which aspect of Shroud of the Avatar captivates you the most?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Cerus, Feb 7, 2018.

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Which aspect of Shroud of the Avatar captivates you the most?

  1. The Avatar's Story / The Ultima legacy

    30.3%
  2. World exploration

    38.0%
  3. Housing and Player Towns

    35.9%
  4. My guild and fellow players

    26.8%
  5. Community events and activities

    7.7%
  6. Crafting

    27.5%
  7. Trade

    14.1%
  8. Combat

    32.4%
  9. Other (Share it in the thread)

    15.5%
  10. Following the SotA development process

    4.9%
Multiple votes are allowed.
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  1. smack

    smack Avatar

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    I chose Other for Emotes. They are the best thing about this game. How can we have such fun dance parties without them? It allows players to express themselves in creative ways and dare I say it -- makes the game so much more immersive! Also, NPCs need them to accurately convey intent and emotion rather than resorting to descriptive text. And I love how some quests end with a back flip. Huzzah!
     
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  2. Spartus

    Spartus Avatar

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    I also agree with the above as one of my 3 reasons, it has now turned into a learning experience, even though it sounds a little bizzare when you think about it. But I also want to add that being a game from Richard Garriott was probably the first reason I am still captivated with SoTA, as he/Lord British symbolized the computing fun and adventures that I had in my youth.

    My second reason was probably that it ran on Linux. Wonderful, I thought! I didn't have money at the time of the Kickstarter, but I monitored it closely and when the cost of entry lowered to something I could afford, my friend and I signed up right away. My friend was a DAoC/WoW/Minecraft player and knew nothing about Garriott or the Ultimas but was intrigued by Camelot Unchained, but I kept telling her, "Wait, you'll see, Garriott is a master game-maker and SoTA will be like DAoC but better! Better than Camelot Unchained!". She did like the visuals better than WoW, they were more DAoC-like, but hasn't played SoTA in over a year. I let her down.

    From the start, the SoTA crafting system looked like it would be really good, felt like the Ultimas, nice and complex, the item names were nice. That, along with the idea that it would be an open-world sandbox, excited me the most. By the way, a lot of mechanics about the game years ago looked really cool, but for some reason the rapid development in those areas quickly stagnated, leaving the mechanic crippled for the years that followed. Whether or not this was by design or the development work simply went elsewhere (bug fixing, balance, polish?), the very big changes stopped a long time ago.

    But my fun diminished when I had to be at a crafting table, and I couldn't just craft or put a table anywhere (like Minecraft/Wurm), and some of the items only had use if I had a house or deed (which I couldn't afford once the game went persistent), and so then I was like "Dang... guess I have to run around and adventure instead", as I wasn't about to seek out help/charity from other players. I could deal with that since the "master game-maker" was behind it. :) But when I went out into the world, I just stood there, looking around. I can't dig up stuff, I can't find stuff other people dropped, I can't build stuff, I can't plant and grow stuff. C'mon! This is the 21st century! I could of course do the quest run-around thing, but I don't care for buggy game content that I will burn through and then have no replay value (like in so many modern games). I wanted a sandboxy, procedural simulation with an Ultima flavor that I could play as long as my hardware held out. Richard, I ask you seriously, Are you blown away playing your game?

    Today, my only hope for a changing world, my only remaining captivation, comes from what the developers add on each release, and there are not many left in the version I paid for, as the world doesn't change on its own. I logged in to R50 just once to confirm that I could move around with acceptable framerate, then logged out. I plan to clear my quest log when the game is released in March and make a final attempt to fully explore the world and try to find the "fun" part of the game that people talk about.

    But I want to clarify something that I've noticed in recent years: Many people that say that they love playing SoTA will not give you substantial details on why the game is so fun. In historically fun games, the memories made are so voluminous that people recite old events and times (UO, for example). Many role-players/decorators, though, will indeed tell you why they have fun, and it makes sense that they are having fun, but the rest tend to keep their positive comments short and vague. I do like @Jack Knyfe 's comment above, which is a bit unusual, as he and his group are trying to squeeze some fun out of the game by manipulating items/actions in unintentional ways--all power to him. But we shouldn't have to work so hard to "find the fun"--again, the game should blow you away by its very nature or something is wrong.
     
  3. Barugon

    Barugon Avatar

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    One of my choices was Other because I'm looking forward to the potential when there are more active players.
     
  4. Kpopgurl

    Kpopgurl Avatar

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    Other. Looking forward to more UO like features and sandbox elements.
     
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  5. majoria70

    majoria70 Avatar

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    I put pots and housing, world exploration, guild and fellow players and out of the 3 pots really are the most developed imo. Quests have drastically improved from the few I've recently done like the witch quest. I just loved that one. It really was adorable.

    I love the game and the dream of possibilities I see still coming to this game as more and more is developed and systems are more fleshed out and completed such as;

    Fishing and fish types, quests, fish lore, bait, better land interesting fishing loot and message in a bottle like maybe a call for help or a treasure map soaked and hard to read, and fish recipes

    Agriculture -when it gets some interesting things going on such as fertilizers, mixing seeds, finding special seeds, superfoods or unusual food ingredients, and components as examples

    Crafting - more coming on this

    Exploration - still too much opened areas with not enough to find, like behind waterfalls you may find a mystery, too many empty rooms atm, not enough reason to revisit scenes except to grind not explore and of course this is so much better and more interesting than earlier. We have lots of wonderful things. Lots of cool scenes for once overs. Sending lots of hints.

    Still we are said we will get achievement system coming in game.
    PvP factions, wars, pvp questlines, bounty hunting and hopefully bounty quests.

    I know so much more is coming. I am interested in so much possibility about this game. When Boating to fish and explore waterways on boats, treasure hunting, mounts and I really really want horse racing on those mounts. The game needs to advertise the what's coming also. That is very important imo.

    So When the developers get to these systems this game will truly shine for many years to come. This game will be the game to play.

    I must play our theme song, well it is mine for this game. It always makes me think of Sota now, well and the chick flick movie lol ;). I have been here dreaming for so many years for this game to get all it needs. Yeah well since I have been here since 2013 that is and this is what I have done is Dream, Dream, Dream of the possibility of this game. Yeah I know get a life Majoria lol ;)

    Edited for clarity.

    Lyrics

    "Dream" Roy Orbison

    Dream, when you're feeling blue
    Dream, that's the thing to do
    Just watch the smoke rings rise in the air
    You'll find your share of memories there

    So dream, when the day is through
    Dream, and they might come true
    Things never are as bad as they seem
    So dream, dream dream

    Dream, when the day is through
    Dream, and they might come true
    Things never are as bad as they seem
    So dream, dream dream

     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2018
  6. Arkah EMPstrike

    Arkah EMPstrike Avatar

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    I really needed a 4th votecuz imway into the abc music too. Alot of times i log on solely with the intent of making or playing abc songs
     
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  7. Vallin Tregres

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    The housing system and the fact it’s an LB title. The nostalgia is heavy with this game. :D
     
  8. Helvig Ingvildsdottir

    Helvig Ingvildsdottir Avatar

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    Other: When I get lucky and get to roleplay with people, that's the great moments in SotA. There are so many features here that encourage RP, but "hardcore" RPers are few.

    Least interesting to me:
    • Crafting (because currently it is just a pain in the neck)
    • Trading (I play the game to relax and leave it to others to play it is a job)
    • The Avatar's story (IMO does not fit a multiplayer game)
     
  9. Time Lord

    Time Lord Avatar

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    Mundane life of a townie... It's normal life and tending to things, "work on it" ;)~TL~
     
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  10. Mapper

    Mapper Bug Hunter

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    Great poll, results are what I’d expect, however

    Is it not worrying for an mmorpg that community is the least voted option? What are Shroud doing to tackle this?
     
  11. Rada Torment

    Rada Torment Community Ambassador (ES)

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    Happy to see World exploration is winning. I love the world design of the maps we have but I know they can give us more interaction and more exploration.

    Second and third, story and combat.
     
  12. Paladin Michael

    Paladin Michael Bug Hunter

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    1. To watch the progress of the game, something I wished to do with other games in the past
    2. Exploring the lands and following the lore and paths of the Avatar
    3. Training skills and learn to handle them
    4. Crafting to build that Kind of stuff fitting to my Character
    5. Meeting people while travelling around
    6. Providing constructive Feedback for improving the game
    7. Receiving a Box with real items in a time most games are just a kind of downloaded Bits and Bytes...
    8. Monthly updates
    9. A forum to share thoughts...
     
  13. Black Tortoise

    Black Tortoise Avatar

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    Other: pimpin out my badass outfits. The pattern tech! Stuff being dyeable!

    Come on, like you Ultima players diddnt get into the deep culture of pimpin out your avatar ;)
     
  14. Cerus

    Cerus Avatar

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    I am really surprised that there is a relatively balanced distribution (apart from "Community Events and Activities"). I agree that this part is maybe too specific and should be listed with things like Guilds and Emotes as "social interaction".

    "Following the development process" has been mentioned often enough to give it an own spot in the Poll I think :rolleyes: (I invite you to edit your selections @Azzamean @Mykll @Preachyr @Spartus @Paladin Michael @Hazard and whoever else would put this under their personal Top 3).
     
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  15. Last Trinsic Defender

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    Other.

    @ 1. Avatar's Story
    Normally I like a good story. But there is not much of it right now. Only a few quests - most of them bugged or unclear (solo -> working / group -> not). What to do? Add 100s of quests.
    @ 2. World exploration
    This is a bit of fun but not enough. After some weeks of wandering around you know most of it. Peeking into areas to hope that a crate is now filled, a mob is repositioned and a texture has changed? Nah ... What to do? Add more secrets, self-changing areas, more randomness, more random side-quests.
    @ 3. Housing and Player Towns
    Housing is the point which made UO great. But the mix of POT and housing is painsome (fun in the beginning and in the end paying tax like in RL, no customers and you get the idea what loneliness means). What to do? As long as housing is part of the financial model of Portalarium it won't work for a bigger community. There are already no lots available for normal towns and villages - the raffle is not sufficent to offer a perspective for new players. There are already other RPGs with a better housing-concept.
    @ 4. Guild
    Guilds are always fun and important. They live from the power of the members. In every game. Nothing special here.
    @ 5. Community events
    Not much seen so far. Sieges are nice but always the same level of NPC and the final boss is hard to handle for 1 or 2 ppl.
    @ 6. Crafting
    Since you need recipes from loot to go on in development it is nearly impossible to develop a satisfying crafting-experience. To buy missing recipes from player-vendors is too expensive for casual players. What to do? Rework some skill-trees and reset the skills before going out of early bird. I know that's not popular but removes a big discrepancy between current population and - hopefully - new population.
    @ 7. Trade
    Empty town-vendors. Empty player-vendors. Too expensive player-vendors in hotspots. What do you expect? All ideas of traderoutes, mountain-passes and others things are not in the game right now. Trade in its current state is merely an idea.
    @ 8. Combat
    This has improved slightly in the last months and offers some fun. Some more places for actions in the bar would be crutial. The skilltrees are acceptable. The screen-rate doesn't go well with the action and sometimes you are dead - your screen didn't even notice. What to do? Improve the graphicroutines, rethink the balance and damage of melee-range-magic. And most of all: give more ingame-informations and data about skills, gear and actions. Even mobile-games offer more data about chars in other games as SOTA.

    What remains? A bit of this and a bit of that. This keeps me here but it needs big improvements in programming and gameplay .. not a starting-party and other festivities. At first the work and afterwards the celebration.
     
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  16. kaeshiva

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    This.

    The adding of recipes to loot was a heavy blow to casual crafters both increasing the cash sink a hundredfold and/or putting additional reliance on fighting capability in order to craft.
    I suggest if crafting work orders do become a thing that these should be added to whatever sort of reward bag you'll get from that, so that you can actually advance in crafting - by crafting.
    While a reset isn't really viable this far into persistence, increasing recipe availability would really help remove the giant wall that new crafters face.
    Other suggestions such as allowing crafters to 'craft' a recipe (using paper/other materials) that they know to pass it on also have merit. Even if the cost of this were more than the original 250 gold buy price, it would at least create availability whereas the current system leaves a lot to be desired. Availability is subject to RNG, and you can open 500 bags and not get the recipe you need = poor system.

    Want to make a bronze sword, how do I do it? Pick most sensible answer....
    a) I know how to make a copper sword, so I figured it out (discovery)
    b) Another player taught me how to do it (teachability)
    c) An NPC taught me how to do it in exchange for some service I did for them
    d) I bought the recipe from a shop
    or..
    e) I found a piece of paper in a bandit's pocket that explained it, and I immediately destroyed this paper after reading it so nobody else could learn from it.


    How cool would it be to set up crafting libraries with dropped recipes where folks could go and learn? There'd still be a market for selling them, but this would allow a whole new level of community project for guilds/towns to do...

    I know there's economic reasons why this was implemented, but its...well, bad. And I know there are people making a fortune selling these things, but we really didn't need more cash sinks on crafting as crafters don't make any money as it stands.
     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2018
  17. Paladin Michael

    Paladin Michael Bug Hunter

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    I asked DarkStarr about, why findling so many recipies in loot, well the answer was like: they also want to craft stuff ;)

    Well, I would prefer to have them to buy at different merchants, and cloth and weapon depending on the style of each Region, special ones could be be found as loot...
     
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  18. Ben_Hroth

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    I included Other - the sense of sandbox progression is really intriguing. Going from Ranged to Life to Fire to Earth to Blades to Death to Moon to Subterfuge to Polearm is such an interesting way to level and progress.
     
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