Quick Thoughts

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Heradite, Aug 19, 2019.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. Xee

    Xee Bug Hunter

    Messages:
    2,199
    Likes Received:
    2,993
    Trophy Points:
    153
    I have been here since 2015, I have seen this game grow from nothing to what it is today.

    It has been a long road with so many changes it would take years to go over everything.

    I love this game because of what it can be and what it will be eventually. There is a lot in the game from extensive crafting system, one of the best housing systems in terms of what you can do with decos etc.
    the dungeon system which is still in its infancy which one day will grow I hope into something more. The combat which can be used in many ways from decks to old fashion locked skills, from tab target to action cross-hair there is something for all.

    The open ended class is pretty awesome mixing various skills to make a specific deck for each activity you require. Myself I have a deck for dealing with undead, a deck for dealing with living creatures, multiple decks for dealing with different bosses and every week I test and play with new skill combos to find what works best along with the gear I have or find. I know some find the combat clunky still which after talking to many I think is related more so to the delay (cool downs) more then anything. When I play with my friends everything is pretty fast pace almost more like a shooter. Well other times it almost seems turn based because of the time to stack, and the cool downs it comes off like I hit, they hit which for some classes I can totally understand how it would not be fun.

    I do think there is a few things for sure which some above have touched on which is something that would help improve things alot.
    We need more quests, and more reasons to explorer. There is both large and really small zones, that some have reasons to exist well others do not. I would love to see things added to make each zone have a purpose. Like why is there a tower on that hill? why is this town full of undead. There is developer vision in some of these zones where they have given it a rough concept based on what mobs are there etc, but beyond that there should be more. think of UO series where every npc had a job, would get up and go to bed. we have some of that in the NPC towns but the rest of the world is pretty static. Bandits should have schedules, they should talk to each other when not in combat and do things to give them more life and reason to be where they are. Adding many random things to reward exploring would be awesome. I have explored some but not all locations and still finding some neat places. However beyond a visual they have no purpose. One day I think we will get there as stated this is a small team and there is only so many things they can do at once. This is where I think the player NPC's coming can spice some things up. Would love to have the ability as a player to setup an NPC that gives a quest to get me beetles and in return it gives them a reward cash or other. I also want to send people into my dungeon to retrieve things and rewards. Keys to unlock new locations and more.

    In Long term we will get all this I am sure but the road is long and we are only at a walking pace. That said like all games of past, those that wait get rewarded. I can't tell you the number of times I completed everything in other mmo's to be bored waiting on them to expand. Then left to play new to only regret it later when I hear how awesome things have gotten. Then trying to go back to see you are so far behind those that stayed that it gives me some regret. I can see with Shroud what they are working on what some of their vision is and this time I have been enjoying the slow progress knowing what could be based on what they have been working on. Following the game allows me to see what new content comes with each month, as well through twitch, discord and forums I can engage the dev's with issues and other ideas openly and get feed back directly back. If you are unhappy with something use your voice and talk to the devs and players just like this thread so that perhaps as a community we can come up with better ideas to whisper into the ears of the overlords.

    this is the first mmo that I have played where alot of my wishes have come true. Its the only game I have played 4+ years in an mmo. oOther mmo's usually only seem to hold my attention for about year. I don't believe its because of the money I have spent but rather that I enjoy those around me and helping grow my own space and build up wealth until the day I can trade up to a castle, or sell off half my fortunes to build something new.

    I look forward to the future and what will come.
     
  2. Vladamir Begemot

    Vladamir Begemot Avatar

    Messages:
    6,194
    Likes Received:
    12,076
    Trophy Points:
    153
    Gender:
    Male
    Achievements might not be considered "immersive" but they sure give players who like them a reason to burn a lot of hours. And they give an easy way to figure out what quests you haven't done yet.

    I know I spend a lot of time finishing achievements in Civ and similar games. I'll start a while new game just to do 3 of them.

    Shane we don't have that going on here.
     
    Spoon and Chatele like this.
  3. Heradite

    Heradite Avatar

    Messages:
    733
    Likes Received:
    1,110
    Trophy Points:
    105
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Hollywood!
    I don't have a problem with a game that allows players to create their own fun. That's great! And in a multiplayer game like this one, it should be encouraged! But the game itself should still be fun. I do think for instance Final Fantasy 14 could use less hand-holding. But like, I want to be able to create my own fun in Shroud...but I also want the game itself to be entertaining. It shouldn't depend on the players/community to create entertainment value.
     
  4. Beaumaris

    Beaumaris Avatar

    Messages:
    4,289
    Likes Received:
    7,415
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Caladruin
    You may be right. I haven't revisited many scenes since early launch. The scenes themselves worthy of another look. But there just isn't much to ….. find … except crafting materials.
     
    Chatele likes this.
  5. Heradite

    Heradite Avatar

    Messages:
    733
    Likes Received:
    1,110
    Trophy Points:
    105
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Hollywood!
    So today I went back in for an hour. I managed to after like 45 minutes go from 3 iron to the 5 I needed. Then I slayed some chickens before I talked to a farmer who gave me the feathers I needed. Whoops! Went back to the quest giver and he was like "here's an arrow". Not sure if I got just an arrow or more? But if I did all that effort for one freaking arrow, I'd much rather go back to quests that are "kill X animals for 5,000 XP and 500 gold".

    Luckily he also gave me an arrowhead and some maple board. With the extra feathers I had, he said I could go to the crafting table and make arrows. Even though I had switched to sword/shield, I was huzzah! I can make my own arrows. The game said all I had to do was go to the carpeting table. I did that. I could not craft arrows despite have the ingredients. I'm like what? The guy TOLD me how to do it! Not sure if he gave me a recipe or not but I don't think he did but luckily I went to rewards and used the recipe there but I don't think a normal player has those backer rewards.

    If he did give me a recipe, he should tell me I need to use it before I can craft things. If he didn't give me a recipe, then he needs to give me a recipe and tell me to use it (the game should also make it more clear when I get stuff). This is basic stuff. This is Early Access snafus not for a game that's like a year away from being "launched".

    (I also killed an alpha wolf which was kinda close but I did it and even got some collar from skinning him so cool. I also went to the abandoned village but had to flee despite taking down the boss character (Bloody Bones) which for some reason the ballad wasn't on him. I did find an amnesiac ghost but before I could really start his quest three skeletons attacked me and I had to flee.)

    Anyways do I have to be in a party with someone to heal them? Or do I have to flag for PvP? Doesn't matter I guess. Anyways will try to complete more of the tutorial quests next time I get to play.

    (I will say amnesiac ghost and the farmer's love for his dead prized chicken made an impression. Why can't the other NPCs in the area do that?)
     
    Vladamir Begemot likes this.
  6. Cordelayne

    Cordelayne Bug Hunter

    Messages:
    3,333
    Likes Received:
    11,010
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Washington, DC
  7. majoria70

    majoria70 Avatar

    Messages:
    10,347
    Likes Received:
    24,869
    Trophy Points:
    153
    Gender:
    Female
    Location:
    United States
    Sometimes you don't need a recipe. Just drag the items to the table and if the word craft lights up then press it and there you go. And sure the game could mention more about it but some things don't hold our hands. ;) although many of those that at first didn't now will to some extent.
     
    Sulaene Moon and Jaesun like this.
  8. Anpu

    Anpu Avatar

    Messages:
    7,944
    Likes Received:
    9,015
    Trophy Points:
    153
    Location:
    Hemut
    Lily Byrd and majoria70 like this.
  9. Barugon

    Barugon Avatar

    Messages:
    15,678
    Likes Received:
    24,293
    Trophy Points:
    153
    Gender:
    Male
    Any recipe that is re-teachable is also discoverable.
     
    majoria70 likes this.
  10. Lars vonDrachental

    Lars vonDrachental Avatar

    Messages:
    1,095
    Likes Received:
    1,547
    Trophy Points:
    125
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Germany
    Well if you are just listen to what others say the freedom of this system is indeed void and the same goes for the felt need to be one of the 0.1% top players by grinding all day long…this is basically your own decision and SotA is offering you the freedom to play the game just as you decide without judgment whether right or wrong as long as you like it that way but there is no real need to follow those suggestions as you can have a lot of fun aside of these high expectations. E.g. I’m currently lvl 89 or 90 and play since the beginning with some thousand hours of playtime. I guess today others can reach that lvl within the first week but I don’t care that much about what others do. In the beta and the first year I did a lot of RP but after many avatars I have known left the game or changes their way to play SotA I put my focus more on to my avatar fitting challenges and of course decorations. :D
    I still avoid the grind groups as this would quite fast remove for me a lot of fun as I most of the time I prefer if it is some kind of difficult to survive. This way I still play in T6 scenes or sieges or random encounters as in those scenes I can fight a lot, can get good resources for crafting but also die a lot if I’m not careful and take too much risk or act unmind…e.g. the added high end taming pets I have to look at as they are still unconquerable to me (they are healing nearly as fast a I can do damage) and that way this added an additional suspense to many scenes as I have a lot of “Oh, holy s***…I better start running away”-moments. If I would join the UT grind groups I guess I would lose those experiences quite fast as the number of moments or enemies that are telling me “you are too weak for this” would get fast fewer and fewer and I would really miss the feeling that the world I explore is dangerous.

    Well actually there are NPCs without any quest references that are not telling the same stuff as other NPCs around them and most of the time these are the NPCs the early backers "helped" to create.
    We had not much we could suggest…basically just the name and some short sentences about the background we would like to see for a specific NPC but at least sometimes the devs used that short background description to create some individual sentences for that NPC.

    As far as I know there is just one dev creating new decorations like the mannequins while at least three devs are working on new scenes. Creating a complete new decoration item might need up to 40h while creating a scene might need more than 400h and that way decorations are much more often in the release notes than new scenes. Also the dev who is creating decorations is most likely not a world builder and that way he is best used in creating some decorations or houses for us or as scene decoration.

    I think Chris already mentioned in his streams that they are looking at other games and are also in direct contact with other developers…but I guess they are not looking that much at games with a $100+ million budged. ;)
     
  11. Bedawyn

    Bedawyn Avatar

    Messages:
    791
    Likes Received:
    986
    Trophy Points:
    93
    He does give you multiple arrows, I believe it's 500. But he's one of many places where the message in the loot window looks like you're receiving a disappointing one item instead of the multiple you're actually getting. You're right that this is a fairly dumb error on the devs' part that should have been fixed ages ago. No one wants to be told they went to ANY trouble at all to get just ONE arrow, and this is a particularly bad place for that message, since it's likely to first quest most new players will do.

    Not sure what your problem was here. The arrow recipe is one of the basic ones that all players start with.

    Hmm. Since you're detailing things but not mentioning one significant detail, I suspect you somehow missed that part. You did give the collar back to the farmer, right?

    Bloody Bones isn't the boss. :) The village is just one of the places he might spawn. Whether he's carrying the book or not is also random.

    Captain Kinsey has a bit of it, though you don't really see it until near the end. And I think they might have "simplified" some of it out -- there used to be a great little exchange about her father and the fact that she was just on vacation in Solace Bridge when everything went down. It was brief, but I thought it added a lot of context, made her feel more like a real person and less like a bot. But I haven't been able to find that dialogue bit lately :-(

    But overall, yes, I do find the Solace Bridge NPCs to be rather drab, it's part of why I thought it was mistake when they recently decided to send everyone there instead giving us choice between the three starter areas -- personally I think Solace Bridge is the worst of the three.
     
  12. Heradite

    Heradite Avatar

    Messages:
    733
    Likes Received:
    1,110
    Trophy Points:
    105
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Hollywood!
    I mean there's a difference between holdings hands and a tutorial just not telling you how some game mechanics work. But yeah the craft button didn't light up for me until after I used the recipe.

    Shouldn't need a player guide to do something so simple though. ;)

    1) Thanks for the clarification but yes the game should make it more clear how many arrows you get.

    2) Maybe because I found it under rewards? I don't know.

    3) Yes, I did give the collar back to the farmer!

    4) Does this mean I have to keep killing him until I get the book? If so....yikes. I'm not a fan of random loot drop rates for quest items when it comes to specific monsters. If I'm only playing an hour (which is likely) then that means a lot of time wasted.

    5) That's not a good thing to hear that they decided to "simplify" it by taking away her personality lol.

    1) I mean that's fine but not every player is like this. I'm not a big fan of just killing for no reason in most games (only game I like grinding is Pokemon lol) so I'd rather have a quest objective that gives me a reason to go somewhere. I don't like "kill XX monsters" quests BUT like if a quest is like "go to this dangerous area to kill a specific monster or get a quest item" and I have to kill the monsters in my way...that's the sweet spot. But I also like to get more powerful and at some point overpower weaker monsters. Otherwise, I feel no real sense of progression with my character. Not sure if SOTA's good this though.

    2) That's cool but in general, beginning areas all the NPCs should be unique. You can have the more generic NPCs later on when the player is hooked.

    3) Well I get creating scenes takes more time but like one of the complaints I hear is the lack of monster variety so that dev creating decorations could instead be used to create more monster types. Also, 40 hours isn't a lot when you're on a monthly release schedule (I know they are trying to be more common). I think the mannequins took more than one dev though based on the release notes I think it was a team effort since they had to change systems to add them? Or something?

    They should look at $100+ million budget games and $5 million budget games*. Sure they can't do everything FF14 does. Nobody really expects them to. But they can get ideas and see what's working for them and what isn't and think about what they can carry over here.

    *Although right now I don't think SOTA has close to $5 million for development lol. I don't know the company's financials though.
     
  13. Bedawyn

    Bedawyn Avatar

    Messages:
    791
    Likes Received:
    986
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Absolutely! That's another reason I think the other outskirts are better than Solace Bridge. There's more fighting in the other areas -- but it's necessary fighting to defend yourself. And in Blood River, because of the storyline, by the end I really WANTED to kill the bad guy, 'cause he was nasty and deserves to die, even though I'm normally a self-defense-only fighter. In Solace Bridge... you get bandits who don't attack you even after you've killed the guy right next to them. Zombies who wander around so slowly they're no danger to anyone. And the cultists who stay in their small village and aren't a real threat unless you go looking for them. Add the higher-level players hanging around, and the other newbies, and the people with the dragon pets, and there's just no reason whatsoever to believe the NPCs actually need your redundant help, which means any killing you do is meaningless. :-(
     
    Heradite likes this.
  14. Fenrus MacRath

    Fenrus MacRath Avatar

    Messages:
    313
    Likes Received:
    749
    Trophy Points:
    55
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Out of the Blue and into the Black.
    I get that too. Its not right or wrong, its personal preference. I don't pull a hair for the storyline of this or any other MMO. At best its an afterthought, but that's just me. A game like FF14 wouldn't appeal to me . I have been disappointed by so many MMOs in the past , mostly because they cater to a crowd of players who aren't serious gamers, they want to check all the boxes and get their gold star. I loved WOW before any of the expansions. When you had to struggle to get to level 60 and that was it. It took my group of friends almost a year to get there and it meant something. I am entertained by the exploits of my friends and foes inside of shroud. I like mounting all of my dragon heads on the wall and making my own "story" .
    We aren't going to keep every lookie lou who pops in for a free trial. It weakens the game when we try to appease those players. It frustrates the hardcore base who have legitimate gripes that aren't being fixed because some uber noob is feeling "Less than" because he cant turn in an outlands quest he probably didn't even bother to read thoroughly. I know its not what Port wants from a business stand point. I know they would like to pay salaries / keep the servers turned on and such and new players are the way to do this. I just wish ther was a way to reach the type of players we need. Players with Grit, not Fickle Fannies.
     
    Last edited: Aug 22, 2019
    Jaesun and Sulaene Moon like this.
  15. Fenrus MacRath

    Fenrus MacRath Avatar

    Messages:
    313
    Likes Received:
    749
    Trophy Points:
    55
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Out of the Blue and into the Black.
    This would be very cool, Like the real world, most people aren't following a single or even multiple "Storylines", they are just wondering what to make for dinner or trying to get away with something naughty.
     
  16. Heradite

    Heradite Avatar

    Messages:
    733
    Likes Received:
    1,110
    Trophy Points:
    105
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Hollywood!
    I created a separate character in Single-Player Offline and man. I was able to complete the gathering missions a lot quicker since I was able to find the resource nodes. I also set down a tax-free village lot in Soltown (I can move the house as I move through the story I guess) but was disappointed I couldn't get a container to just put stuff in so had to use a bank. I'm a bit worried about control points since having to capture them every time I want to move to a new region (or wait for the lunar thingy) is gonna be super annoying in single-player offline. Hopefully, I also don't have to pay taxes. That would be silly. Also I have some weird bug where in discussions with lots of text the game kicks me out of the conversation before I can finish reading what the person has to say. Oh well, I'm sure I missed nothing important. It was just exposition setting up storylines.

    For some reason, the mini-map takes super long to load even in single-player offline. Bad! Also why are maps being dropped when I seem to have the mini-map for every map? And why does the mini-map act like I'm online?

    I have to say the drop rates in single-player offline seem to be a lot more reasonable. Anyways am I going to need to create a new save when the new release comes out? Or can I keep using the same save? @Chris

    (What am I doing asking? You guys don't care about single-player offline lol. Too bad you don't have mod tools so people can mod the heck out of single-player offline. With this community, they might be able to salvage it.)
     
  17. Xee

    Xee Bug Hunter

    Messages:
    2,199
    Likes Received:
    2,993
    Trophy Points:
    153
    hmm thought the control points would be the same as the multiplayer which you can now bypass... or am I wrong?

    As to maps next release there are new maps to replace the existing map. as to the ones that drop those are from the original map system that was discontinued. Those are now collector items.

    You should be able to continue after any update / patch from where you left off from what I know. Or are you talking about when EP2 comes out? you should also be able to craft bags and chests to put things in rather then using your bank. banks on the other hand are all linked now so should not matter as every town has your stuff.

    There are a few instances where an NPC walks away well talking which breaks conversations, or in some cases I found that they had a delay before they did an action which caused the same scenario. The problem though Is I did not care enough at the time to write down information to report and once you complete a quest unless I roll up and alt I will not know what the quest was to report it now.

    The drop rates in single player are much higher then multiplayer that is for sure. the game was always always designed as multiplayer with single player play-ability so there should be very few differences between the two.
     
  18. Heradite

    Heradite Avatar

    Messages:
    733
    Likes Received:
    1,110
    Trophy Points:
    105
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Hollywood!
    1) I don't know I haven't been to a control point in a long time lol. I would normally just die, use my ghost to find the Ankh, and resurrect on the other side.

    2) Hopefully the new maps are better and more helpful but I doubt it lol.

    3) Thanks. I don't see why in single-player offline I have to craft bags/chests. Sounds arduous.

    4) For a game that was supposed to be selective multiplayer, it is a pity they designed the game primarily for multiplayer in mind when single-player was promised from the start...but I have a philosophy that if you're going to do something, you should do it right. So I guess I just have different ideas than the dev team. Oh well. They are making the game they want to make and while I agree very little with what they've done, that's their right. I can only try to see if I can enjoy their game or not. :)
     
  19. Xee

    Xee Bug Hunter

    Messages:
    2,199
    Likes Received:
    2,993
    Trophy Points:
    153
    1. yep you can walk through them now. They did a major few months of updates for making quality of life better through things like this and teleport to any zone you already visited.
    2. new maps on the test server do load much faster as they are stored local once generated. Not sure though how often they regenerate this is done on scene load. going to do some more testing on QA.
    3. its because the game is all designed the same for both single and multiplayer with weight on items so because the game is based on the core it is the only option rather then unlimited inventory.
    4. it is selective. the core is all the same, quests etc. the only major difference I see beyond better drop rates is you can have companions you can summon rather then group with friends. From my view I play pretty much single player on the multiplayer side because it feels more alive and offers the ability for me to ask questions to other players. I do still go out sometimes and play with others but I am more in the game to craft and sell to others.
    I do know that when some backed the game they thought the game was going to be a spin off of the ultima single player series. It was designed as a successor to Ultima online based on similar lore and virtues.

    As a person that plays solo alot I can tell you on both sides that you can in the end solo all the current content at some point once you get high enough skills. Next patch however is the first high level group dungeon that should be very challenging for the top players, I am not sure how that will play out in single with companions.

    on the note of saved game the single player is completely on its own so if you ever did try the multi you will have to roll a new character as its non-transferable.
     
  20. Heradite

    Heradite Avatar

    Messages:
    733
    Likes Received:
    1,110
    Trophy Points:
    105
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Hollywood!
    3) I meant I should just be able to buy the chests. I shouldn't have to craft them. I'm fine with weight and limited inventory on person!

    I am pretty sure I'll never get to that high-end dungeon but I doubt the dev team is thinking of the single-player offline balance for it right now. (I have two characters in the multi already).
     
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.