No Binding everywhere!!!!!

I'm so happy about this change. Finally immersion is less broken for me. I will now rightly be able to recall where I want to and not have to walk around like some non-mage peasant.......

 

here here, I thought exactly the same thing reading this.

 

I have been playing a lot of the offline version lately and I have said how the teleport scrolls are a waste as they are only linked to a Friends list.

So that being said, making teleport scrolls actually for bind spots (weather you pay extra for them or not) really is the most Logical thing I have heard.

This would not only make teleport scroll useful in both worlds it would also make both worlds use the same system as well. (easier to maintain and cleaner code for the company)

Just think about this... in terms of game slowing devises....

A Hugh friends list that has to update every time your friends move around (consumes lots of memory and time)

A Set number of spots that would only change if the player changes a bind spot.

Also think about this... Binding to spots instead of friends list also means you actually have to go out to the spot in the first place to create the bind... instead of ohhh that person on my list that I have never talked to is at XXXXX let me jump there to see what is there....

So when you take the above line into account then the idea of IMMERSION becomes personal

In my offline game I actually took the time to visit EVERY town crier in EVERY town..... Now that is Immersion....

 

Don't see the issue there.

Never have I ever seen this happen in UO with the traditional runebooks......and if it did....so what?

The social aspects of UO was really nice. If someone asked me for a gate somewhere then I would open a gate.......it's nice to help people.

People teleport everywhere in Novia anyway.......thats why friend lists are populated with people who they dont know......just to teleport. Nothing really changes other than its a more formal approach and leave friends lists to be what they are supposed to be.

Just pointing out that we have done "tedious" for too long. The ex UO community would love to be able to teleport properly, advertise their shops in busy towns, create rune libraries for the masses, teleport to dungeons to help friends out when called upon.......all these little things that made UO great have either been missed completely or enabled through an unintended consequence. If RPers want to RP a lonely struggle against the elements going from one side of the map to another, then that is up to them, it's a choice.........But why subject other gamers to the same process which to many is undesirable?
There is no doubt Portalarium is desperate for a larger playerbase. "Tedious" is no longer an option (it hasn't worked), the game needs to adapt and overcome the current stigma by creating new features and content that generally appeals to many gamers not just a small proportion of those who currently play.

 

I like the idea of being able to have more bind spots, especially the idea that I can choose a bind spot inside an adventure scene (at the skull marker).

We all have favorite hunting spots and even with the friends teleport-book, you still have to have a friend either in the area you want to go to or at least close. There are times when even with 100 friends online I can't find one directly where I want to go... so I have to settle for something close and then run through a few load screens.

But, if I can bind right inside the scene I want to go to, I will pay the gold to buy that bind point. It will save me lots of wasted time that I could otherwise devote to actually playing the game.

So IMO, this will be a much welcomed QOL change.

 

I would like to see Skull Markers/Dungeon Entrance Scenes for Non-Player Housing Areas, but would also like to see individual housing in player populated areas so people can mark shops etc.

 

Do you bind to an object, or to a map location? Not all scenes are final. What happens when they update / unclone a scene? Bind to an object, and they move the skulls, no problem. If you bind to a map location, and now the new location is in a bad place (under map or in rock) what happens?

 

Starr said you would be binding to the skull marker just inside the scene entrance.

 

And you really think this is goong to happen in SotA? One of the main reasons I prefer teleporting to walking is so I can avoid looking at yet another loading screen.

I‘m looking forward to seeing how this will be implemented, have any specifics been revealed? I could imagine something like binding to your own lots to be free and binding elsewhere possible with an incrementally rising cost.

 

Sums up your entire post. As for the rest it's really going into personal preference territory as to how much 'tedious' is really tedious.

I take it you didn't spend much time in the reagent shops.

In any case, I'm not going to spend time debating what % of players prefer this or that vs who the hell cares what the "minority" thinks. I'm a little tired of the "well everyone does it anyway" and the "Well it doesn't affect you" (which isn't really accurate but some refuse to acknowledge it) arguments.

Basically what I'm seeing far too much of boils down to this. You got a group saying the other side basically wants to "force" the other into a certain playstyle while simultaneously insisting the game be changed in their own favor. Am I the only one who thinks that's a little hypocritical? Players disagree but the conversations read more like arguments over personal preferences rather than thoughtful discussions of design and often they don't get what exactly that design is going to be.

What exactly IS going to happen here? I'm pretty sure it's not a rampant unlimited bind point free for all. If it's only 2 or 3 extra bind points then the argument that it's not much different than now isn't far off the mark. Neither would it be if there's a store cost attached to it. I'm not saying I like the direction this is going but neither do I like rainbow sparkly dyes but it is what it is. I'm also not saying it's the end of the world, though I don't agree with the assessment that the world is going to end if we don't do it either. Not unless Portalarium comes out with statistics that actually support that assessment.

 

I’d rather they add something where we could manipulate the Lunar Rift to travel to the 8 towns.

You would probably see a lot more people gathered around there.

 

Ok, you're obviously reading stuff that isn't there and making waaaay too many assumptions about my intent. I'm sorry you take offense at me simply stating what IS.

These are simply definitions:
Wanting to change an entire mechanic because it suits "your personal" playstyle, is by definition selfish. Wanting everyone to have to deal with "punishments" because you personally enjoy them (or had to deal with them, so now so must everyone, forever) - kinda same deal. I'm not making a judgement here, or calling names, I'm simply describing what it is. This is in no way personal. I have not named a single name, I'm referring to this as generally as I can.

I reiterate the point that what needs to be considered is "what is best for the game as a whole" for it to be successful now and in the future.

This is a hotly debated topic with people at both extremes arguing vehemently for what they want. People get emotional. People take offense where none was intended because someone points out that 'their way' may not be the 'best way'.
I'm sorry but if one side's supporting arguments to keep us in the dark ages are "immersion" (ship LONG sailed) and "personal preferences" - that's fine. Its a valid opinion and I've stated such. I disagree with it. I'm still looking for where I've insulted someone. I feel that the naysayers are lobbying for something detrimental to the game because of personal playstyle preferences (which are currently and will remain viable even with multiple bind points by simply exercising their right and choice not to use them). Is this insulting? Is the "anti-convenience" position so flimsy that we must resort to fingerpointing and name-calling?

@redfish The only person who has made this personal here, is you, by calling me out repeatedly for having an opinion different than yours, and trying to make me out to be some sort of monster because I'm in favor of convenience features that I believe will help the game as a whole.

I really laughed at this, because you are doing exactly what you accuse others of. You're questioning my integrity and attacking me personally because of some perceived insult that imply isn't there.

 

Not really on my list of expectations no, and that wasn't really the point because I don't expect this to be a limited feature. I brought it up as an example of how players would use unlimited binding. In the case of UO there was incentive to buy out reagents people were using recall from shop to shop to buy up as much as they could as quickly as they could do to shopkeeper's limited supply and respawn cycle. I suppose it's more of a commentary on player impatience than anything else. It also took a lot longer to travel anywhere normally in UO. The guy in Vesper begging for a gate, could've ran to Minoc in 5 minutes.. relatively speaking it simply was not that far to go.. just down the road. In SotA you can traverse the entire continent in that time.

 

"It will offload the friends list from being a teleport list" - I was waiting for Port to remove that glaring loophole entirely. But, with the complete annihilation of any semblance of regional economies, I guess that hope is gone.

In a way, I think I empathize with the RPers now. They've gotten a lot of the same answers. "If you don't like it, don't use it".

The fun is ruined if you're not on an even playing field. If Port decided to start passing out potions that permanently maxed out your skills, to counter another "time sink"...and if I objected, I'd probably be told the same thing. If I didn't like it, I was free to just do it the hard way - intentionally sabotage myself while everyone else is whizzing by me.

It's not a question of punishing others, or forcing them to play my way. It's me joining a 5000 meter marathon back in 2016, and finding myself in 2018 one of a few who aren't using the "instantly teleport to the end" option... out there jogging along all alone. Jogging those 5km was at the core of the event. Now people can just use the teleporter. What's the point?

A game is about challenges, and overcoming those challenges. Yet, one by one, those challenges are being amputated, until one day, this truly will be just a dance party simulator. There's a lot of arbitrariness and disagreement about what"s "valid" challenge or not, or what "immersive" or not. If this game had been closed-development, it wouldn't have collected a lot of non-like-minded people who joined at different points.

This experiment of a game has been dogged by one consistent problem - expectations. People who pledged on the KS had a set of expectations of what the game would be - and for many, it didn't hold up. They're gone. Other people, like me, joined up, because we liked the game we saw. That game is being dismembered each release, it seems, and is less and less meeting my expectations.

Keep changing the core spirit of the game, and more and more people will be alienated. I guess we can still hope that we will be replaced, after we're left behind.

 

@kaeshiva

Sorry, no. You originally said people with my opinion were engaged in "intentional" outward inflicted selfishness, which is a statement about our character. And despite the fact I said it was insulting, you continued again in this last post to describe us as wanting to punish ourselves, like we're sado-masochistics and don't want the game to be fun. You say you're just stating "what IS." If you don't want to see that as insulting, fine. But if I took the same cynical approach towards people I disagreed with, I could easily come up with just as insulting adjectives, saying people who have your opinion are lazy, and dishonest, and selfishly interested in RMT over fun or the success of the game (none of which I believe). But I didn't.

I'm not emotional.

I just decided I had a couple of choices : 1- Engage in the same discussions we have every five months, and re-litigate the same arguments, and have nobody really try to understand what I'm saying, because they're more interested in making it personal than discussing the issue, so five months later, we can have the arguments again. 2- Ignore these topics to avoid this. 3- Report certain posters to the mods. 3- Make a point about the personal language in these posts.

 

I don't really know enough to butt in here but for me you're striking a more generalized chord I'd just like to comment on, not intended to be directed at anyone in particular. I feel like this happens a LOT. I know it certainly has to me and it's frustrating. If you don't go out of your way to be absolutely clear on something people can get defensive and make assumptions about your intent and meaning. Someone has an idea, I might point out something I think they may want to consider and suddenly I'm totally against them and their idea when I never said anything of the sort.

And so many other topics..

This one's a bit of a double edged sword. Though what I wanted to comment on mainly was differing opinions on what is actually good for the game. Personally, I don't think the size of the game as it stands is enough to give bind points that much value in the grand scheme of things. If it were such a no brainer than why is it a hotly debated topic?

That said, additional episodes will give teleporting more value however, that comes at the cost of future forms of fast travel which could receive less attention if nobody is expected to use them because teleporting is easier? So will teleporting be limited in the future? (ie between continents) Or will moving ships be dropped? What concerns me in a lot of these arguments is so many people focused on those personal preferences on either side, thinking their way is better for the game.. but little exploration of how it actually affects the game beyond their own personal experience or other issues at play. For example, if travel was more interesting / fun, fewer people would care to teleport everywhere.

Take the recent bypass of sieges.. only reason that was a problem is because of how many there are. Reducing their occurrence would've solved the same problem. There's more than one way to solve most game design issues, some better than others, but most debates seem to fixate on just the one way.

I'm not going say this move in of itself is or is going to be a bad one. My bigger concern is overall direction. As I said earlier. Convenience for the sake of convenience is not good design. A game that is too easy yields less reward for the player and interest is lost. Much depends here on what features they're depending on to hold people to the game..

 

I think there's two separate issues being intermingled here that might be better served in isolation from each other rather than lumped together.

1. Many players have strong, often legitimate but conflicting ideas of how other players' behavior can enhance or detract from their gameplay. This is not a trivial issue, but mechanics is not the most effective place to be addressing it because it's a social/political problem, not a programming problem, so programming alone can't solve it, and for the most part just shifts the unhappiness with other players to unhappiness with the game itself, and rarely does any particular side have a significant enough of a majority for this to be a good business decision.

Generally this is handled by having separate servers so that players with similar gameplay styles can congregate together and limit their perceptual contact with other valid but conflicting playstyles. If a population isn't big enough to support multiple servers, then it probably isn't big enough to support hard-coded social homogenization that isn't absolutely necessary. However, that doesn't mean players are powerless in trying to achieve the environmental experience they want to achieve, but it would be more effectively done by player-created content to build and support congregation areas than put on the shoulders of the devs.

2. The overworld is an artifact from single-player gaming, and therefore needs more work to be more satisfying in a multiplayer environment. This is a problem stemming directly from development decision, not player behavior, and therefore totally reasonable to expect development action to resolve. But solutions don't have to be a type that limit desired gameplay options. For one example out of many that could be considered, you could let people have their teleports for personal gameplay or logistical reasons but still have simulated traffic on the overworld by having ambient wagons and hot air balloons on the map that path according to popular origin-to-destination routes to give a sense of population movement and activities without limiting or mandating individual player choices.

 

I've just read through every post on these 4 pages and I still don't see you discuss anything to do with multiple bind points. It seems every post you have on this topic to tell someone how offended you are at their "insults"

Can we all at least try and stay on topic and actually discuss multiple bind points?

 

Clearly we just have a difference of opinion on what constitutes an insult. You repeatedly badgering me and questioning my integrity fits my definition. And now you've called me cynical as well, although, I'll admit that's probably fair. I have never once said that "Playername is selfish" or made this personal - as you continue to do. I've even in the very same post you take issue with, acknowledged my respect for people who choose to play the game with additional difficulties imposed.

You seem to keep zeroing in on my "outward inflicted selfishness" comment, which you call "insulting" but have yet to actually deny its veracity. You can package it how you want, but this is indeed what is happening, its a very "I like it like this so we all must suffer" argument that I see repeated again and again and again instead of actually discussing alternatives or compromises or what is better for the game as a whole. It is, very simply put, the desire to "have one's own way" despite a number of reasons why that may not be the best course of action, and I will say it again - I find that to be a selfish position.

I've yet to see an argument "against" say, multiple bind points such as this topic, that gives a good, well reasoned argument why these would be bad for the game, or how NOT making this change is going to draw in more players, or increase retention of existing players, or make the game better in some way. Its a difficult ask, because its the incumbent position - this is the way things are -now-. If we are not satisfied with the game's popularity/retention/whatever with the way things are, then a change is needed.

Arguing against change/improvements just seems counterproductive -as does nitpicking semantics - so on that note, I wholeheartedly apologize if I have insulted you or anyone else by calling you selfish. I invite you to please tell me how keeping things the way they are right now makes the game better, or suggest constructive changes to the system under discussion that would not compromise your opinions/beliefs. What sort of fast-travel enhancement compromise would you suggest?

Personally, I think some sort of substantive XP-investment or cash-sink element would be applicable here, since I think with the recent already implemented changes to encounter/siege/CP we're in a pretty decent position. Would I pay 5000 gold to "bind" myself to the Elysium mines entrance and save myself the load screen? Absolutely. Would I do a quest for this privledge? Absolutely. Craft a bindstone to use, etc? Again, absolutely. Can I live without it entirely? Again, absolutely. I think a system of attuning oneself to different markers has great quest/tradeskill potential in what the character must do to unlock this ability, and encourages thorough exploration of scenes for completionism purposes. I'd much prefer something like that, than just logging on one day and "bam, you can bind anywhere off you go."

If we can get past the perceived insult, and start working together to come up with costs-for-benefit methodology that satisfies (or at least, angers less) both parties, I think that is more productive discourse.