Why not just kill the API?

As one of the people that build and share tools that make use of the API, I would like to see some wider discussion and clear explanations as to why these action continue to happen.

For me, the more information that is removed from the API, the less useful the services I provide based on it are.

What, exactly, exactly is the harm in the player base knowing when and where fish are caught? What about artifacts? What about every other event in the game? Why do we have to skew the time stamps? Why can't we have the vendor data?

The "API" is nothing more than a log of events in the game, which players can choose to be hidden from. Why not provide an exact copy of all the data, that is clearly collected internal, to the community. Minus the data from players that make the choice to hide there event, of course.


Am I waisting my time and money providing these tool???

 

The removal of just aquarium fish I personally don’t feel is a bad thing.

The rest of the information, especially how you have it organized is still very needed and relevant. Like just the basic commodities, for example. And was surprised at how much people brew….

 

I don't really understand this change either. I don't think it makes a big difference for deco fish but I don't follow the reasoning behind it.

Artifacts give a player power so maybe??? I can see them not in the api? But deco fish are DECO.

If the change is to allow people to find the fish on their own they can already not look in the api. In fact the first few days the fish came out I made sure not to put a location in universal chat when I linked the fish I had caught but instead just whispered people who asked. Now I will be listing the location of each fish I catch along with the link because I think that type of information should be shared not kept secret for a select few to profit from. (and no the api is not only open to a select few we have two player run sites that make it very easy to access).

Having this type of thing on the api allows us to catch bugs which will inevitably happen, like when creatures are removed from game by accident (happened to both fero brown arachnid and now legendary lions shortly after each was introduced). If the dev team was larger maybe someone could regularly check up on that type of thing but unfortunately that is not the case and it is nice to have some way of verifying how many of something has been seen in game before just posting bug reports which would just get ignored on the assumption we hadn't spent enough time looking.

 

If you're going to spend the time to implement a treasure hunt system that eventually will just be written down in a list, why even bother at all? That's been done before, not going to help the game much. Figure out a way that it's always random with no way to write down a list. Then you can actually have good rewards for completing it instead of crap that will just get farmed like crazy eventually. Make it hard to complete and rewarding. That's what people want, not some copied idea that's been done before. Then you don't need to hide the api.

 

The element of discovery. Initially people will have to try and figure it out. And then it will be word of mouth. Which may or may not be accurate. You at least have the impetus to go out and try to find it. Just my opinion.

 

Catnip/Portalarium always reserved the right to hide some stuff from the api, that was OK - what is NOT OK is to change stuff secretly with no explanation. Do it if you think it is needed, but do not hide that you did it, tell us what is changing and why. Otherwise the stated commitment to always being open with the playerbase erodes yet again, and for the stupidest possible reasons - we didn't bother thinking about being clear or making the minimal effort to do so.

 

The answer is. Yes!

 

I guess that's better than nothing. The problem with stuff like that is after a while it becomes just another thing to grind. If it was randomized enough to completely keep locations hidden it could be more rewarding. We have enough stuff to grind already. It would be nice to have something different.

 

Perhaps Pirates!

 

I agree that random is more challenging and also more fun for those who like exploring and searching for things.

There are mechanics in SOTA to do this. In Tanglemire, chests and barrels appear in "random" spots. Instead of the map document depicting a path, the document describes a "glowing arrow" on the map that points the way to the treasure - which is implemented with a blue search magnifying glass on the compass like other quests use. Reading the document/map activates the compass. The scene knows where the object being searched for is - so having the compass activate correctly should not be an issue even though the location is not a constant.

Once the object is found - the quest resets; destroying the map in inventory for the finder and moving the treasure to a new location. Of course this updates the location on all maps/compasses in scene, as they are based on actual treasure location. Location could also update on having no players in scene, timer, or other triggers. If multiple players are trying for the treasure - first one to find it will cause the others to look somewhere else - because it moved. The "rabbit" in Atos could be updated in a similar manner - once the conversation closes after the rabbit is found - they move to a new spot.

To be more complex - multiple way stops along the treasure route; finding the next clue in the path - as has been built in Vikland. Those also can be "random" locations with clues to be "dug up" if desired. They can also be points of interest - as they are in Vikland - using statues or other things as waypoints.

Such "treasure maps" would cause explorers to wander back and forth across the scene - possibly finding spots of interest to visit along the way. Personally, I have found more interesting parts of scenes while following various quests then I might ever have seen otherwise.

Just some thoughts on building more random with what we already have. Thanks!

 

I am sure either way it will be fun and exciting. there are so many ways and this could just be one type of system, there could be many ideas on the table, the more ideas you put into here the more ways the devs can look at it as a whole and see between what they have working on the back end to what players ideas are in mind and never know sometimes the idea players have are easier and better and sometimes like Chris once said us players may think its pretty in our minds lol... but...

 

My 2 cents on the API and deco fish:
I'm very much a treasure hunter. I had a blast in the past 2 weeks treasure hunting for deco fish, WITH the information in the API. You see, one cannot treasure hunt totally blind, there has to be some kind of hint where to look for something.

I used the information from the API to figure out in which other areas one could go looking for rare deco fish, for I'm convinced there are still zones in game that might give a yellow tang or longfin bannerfish that are as yet unknown. I have been thinking about the zones where the fish have been found, if there is a common feature in them, and what other zones might have the same feature. I spent most of my time fishing in those zones, and I was very proud to discover a yellow tang in one of the zones that should have them, according to theory. There's still 2 other zones on my list that SHOULD have yellow tang or bannerfish and I fish them regularly

Now this for me is serious treasure hunting, and I love it! And I wouldn't have been able to do it without some information from other players. The API hasn't hurt my fun, it enabled it.

 

The fishing api change is on live.

 

SotA devs confuse "discovery" with "clueless wander" more often than not.

 

I prefer to use the words fun and enjoyment.

 

How about the expressions "artificially implemented nuisance" and "challenge"?

 

We'll know for certain when they wander in to "surprise mechanics"