Please stop trying to make this game so easy.

The focus of the developers appears to be centered on lowering consequences, protecting player items, restricting player interactions, and making SotA easier and quicker to access.

Removing corpse runs – Lowers consequence for dying.

Resource nodes – Tells player (who might be enroute to do something else) where desired resources are. Just because you can make a sparkling diamond node doesn’t mean you have to. Nodes should blend in with the environment or be invisible, with a larger collection radius to simulate UO resource collection.

Loot Ransom – Lowers consequence for dying and keeps items in circulation.

Item Repair – Protects players from losing valued items and keeps them in circulation. There’s even been discussion on not reducing max item durability upon repair.

Gear Treadmill – Better items will have to be introduced to maintain player interest.

Inventory – Optional list inventory makes it easier for people to track their items and breaks immersion.

House Decay – Items and deed will appear in your bank if your house decays and keeps items in circulation.

Friendly Fire – No friendly fire makes it easier for ranged and casters to play their role and breaks immersion.

Criminals & Murderers – Limiting these activities to a few zones reduces player interaction and thus greatly reducing player driven content and forcing the developers to provide ever increasing rewards to incentivize players to adventure. Heavy consequences instead of restrictions should be considered to control negative behavior.

Overhead Map – Theoretically made to decrease travel time between game attractions. Majorly breaks immersion.

Ghosts – Limiting ghosts to X minutes was designed to prevent scouting, but also reduces player interaction.

Instancing – Areas limited to an individual or small group reduces player interaction.

Hexes – Invisible zone lines greatly breaks immersion.


The developers are protecting player items far too much. I honestly cannot see a viable crafting economy after a year.

SotA got it right with persistent player housing and being able to drop items on the ground; and are on the right track with combat.

 

Yes, please, I already finished tha game two times.

 

Ridiculous.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

So many assumptions to point out. /tapout too much for me. Maybe someone else will pick this apart.

 

Disagree entirely. Lower the barriers to play as much as possible. The game doesn't go nearly far enough. I'd be perfectly happy to see 100 million people playing on their cell phones. You can still put separation in for the top 1% or so. But lots of casual players strengthens the community.

 

Too easy, too easy.
Someone should make a kickstarter for a game that really tries to replicate the glory days of UO or EQ.
Oh wait

 

Betamox, what a well put together post. Nicely organized too. Thank you for the thought you put into this. Thereafter, I have to disagree with every statement you have made. Since there are 100 posts about this, I won't list them here nor hijack your rant thread.

This part, this part I like. So, we agree on something.

 

Like Ultima Forever?

 

Ultima Forever might have seen success had it not been iPad only.

 

Scarifying convenience "just because" is not a good thing, either. If the game can benefit from not having players do corpse runs, because for whatever reason that might be, then maybe the game needs to remove corpse runs. Besides, most of the stuff you listed don't even make the game harder or easier:

How does that make the game "harder" or "easier"? I think you just want to complain because... why not? People have been suggesting things that you disagree with.

Since when does an economy need to thrive in order to enjoy an RPG? I say !@#$ the economy, it's just a distraction. No game should ever makes changes that effect an entire player base just "for the economy's sake". You could argue that trading blah blah so what? Fun is the only thing that matters and if you believe that trading virtual items can make a game fun... then you are fooling yourself because whatever game you we're playing was never fun to begin with.

I'll share a little secret with you: Trading is actually a convenience feature. And don't "Ultima this, Ultima that" me, either. You honestly believe that the items were balanced for trading?

I'm not against trading... but you make it sound like it's something that needs to be saved. Obviously Richard Garriott's team is going to attempt at keeping some form of economy but if there's no economy, then there's no economy. It doesn't magically make a game fun, just like the existence of combat doesn't make a game fun... nor does difficulty.

The thing to keep in mind is that, just because your old favourite games did it (or didn't do it), it doesn't mean that we should do the same things again. There is such as thing as being archaic and that prevents progress. Instead of just condemning something that new games haven't done properly, how about we try to understand what we were trying to achieve and why it failed.

It also runs on iPhones. Meh, didn't like it. I was hoping for a miniature UO or some kind.. or even just a single-player Ultima with online components but... everything about it felt uninspired.

 

Ohhh Reginald!


I disagree! *drives off at high speed*


Seriously though. I disagree with almost everything you've said for the reasons already pointed out above.

 

Something important I think we all need to remember, is the possibility for much development in an immersive questing system for avatars who choose to be criminals, but choose to refrain from PvP. This sort of gameplay is nearly unheard of in MMO's as far as I know.
If SotA is trying to re-invent online gaming then this should be very important. SO many MMO games focus on the criminal justice and murder system in relation to PvP... And as a result of many players not willing to risk becoming the victim period and all the backlash from having a game where players can have criminal acts and murder committed on them, we have to water down the criminal and murder system a bit.
If we want to play the game as a criminal we should just as easily be able to do it purely PvM. Im tired of online games(or any game period) where your forced to either be purely good, or "nuetral" and chaotic evil or truly nuetral type gameplay just isn't an option. Sure you could murder and loot in the ultima games, but the games always seemed a bit glitchy or "flawed" when you play the game this way, and there were points in the game where doing the good deed was an absolute must for the story to continue.
But perhaps im asking for too much, its probably tough to even have a single player game that caters to being able to choose good, nuetral, or evil. I remember a game called "black and white" that did a good job of this sort of thing, but I didnt much like this game, and it was quite cheesy.

 

I have to respectfully disagree with this. This is the route MWO (MechWarrior Online) took, the devs there also started completely ignoring or dismissing the inputs of longtime Battletech/Mechwarrior fans. Consequently the diehard supporters of the franchise moved on ( to Star Citizen ) & the game currently is mostly composed of new players who don't stick around very long and the churn rate is skyhigh.

You need a balance of both diehard fans & newblood to make SOTA work.

 

What do you consider entertaining?

I believe that complexity sure adds depth to a game, even if the mechanics of the game are simple.

I will use chess as an example, first of all chess must be played by two people, it is a multiplayer. In chess all your actions have deep consequences. A bad move and your whole game crumbles. Therefore the need for thought and planning are essential. Chess also happens to be a lot of fun and very enlightening. The fact of the interaction between two persons creates an environment where you have to measure your actions very carefully, it opens up new possibilities inside your brain every time you realize that you made a bad move or you figure out your opponents strategy. Unlike SotA chess is a win or loose game, though you can always start a new game again. As always you may find yourself pitted against a stronger opponent whom you are unable to beat or against one who is no match at all for you or a challenging one. Same happened in UO. Chess happens to be quite simple in its rules and mechanics, as was UO. Chess also happens to be very complex in the amount of possible outcomes the game can have, the amount of moves available, it is a game with a very profound depth.

On the other hand a game like ultimate collector was entirely pointless. You just walked around buying crap and selling crap and putting crap in displays. And you could not even play all you wanted cause you had to wait. Maybe after reading 1000 items one had a piece of information useful or at least interesting. Same goes for things like farmville or similar games. Same happened in WoW where you just spent 10 hours chasing after some shinny kick ass awesome non transferable non sellable and glittering armor or sword or whatever. They are superficial game with NO human interaction, and sure bla bla in truth the humar interaction was reduced to finding the "right" people for your party and everyone hitting the right bottom at the right time, there in no true depth.

Please explain to me what would you consider entertaining?

If you do not have the time to work a skill would you prefer to just rather buy it? that way you dont have to spend time on working it out and can just jump right into crafting the "most kickass armor ever" on a virtual world?

I believe that disappointment is part of life therefore is something we must face and it should definitely be included in the game. Maybe it sucks to find a bunch of pks everytime you go out but in a way it makes you have to figure new strategies in order to deal with the situation. And certainly there can be controls in order for the situation not to go out of hand. Finding a decaying house was so much fun man, you had a bunch of people hiding eveywhere, it was total chaos and total war, looting was random cause you most likely had to grab whatever you found first, teamwork because part of the process, loners because part of it as well. I mean the only reason it was fun was because of the human element involved. Maybe you had a great hunting trip, you were loaded, but decided to attack an elder gazer who happened to kick your ass in the middle of nowhere. Lost everything. Too bad big guy, now pack your stuff and go try harder!

For those of you that remember, the downfall of UO started precisely when softcore rules began appearing, when "awesome specialized items and skills" started appearing. Simple was good.

Simple with depth vs Shallow complexity.

 

Have you read Darkstarr's post?

I agree in part, but it is too early to tell what they will design and how they will blend in the nodes.

Again, see Darkstarr's post.

It's a tough balance yes, but there are simply not enough systems in place yet for people to determine how easy that makes things.

I don't see how that would impact player interest. In fact a 'gear treadmill' could create an inconvenience for players by constantly pouring in new content at the top and driving out old items, making SwordX awesome today but worthless tomorrow. Ideally there should not be a one-size-fits-all item than can be obtained. Each "maxxed out" crafted item should have its own strengths so players can prioritise according to gameplay.

I agree, but only remove it if they can fix the bag system to make it more user-friendly (not easier, just less frustrating).

Are you saying we should have to 'craft' houses? A potentially good idea.
Players should certainly be warned when their ownership is about to expire.

If this game were more twitch-oriented I would understand, but this is not the case. I don't see how they can't play their role with or without FF.

There are giant PvP megathreads dedicated to this. I personally don't think removing the limits to crime will in any way assist player interaction. Player Killing and other griefing tactics are more damaging for a game than having limits placed on where they can occur.

It is a necessary evil to prevent sharding of servers. All events in New Britannia will be experienced by all players.

Time is precious and is an effective penalty for death.

There is something terribly depressing about coming across an area that has been 'farmed out' and you have to wait for everything to respawn. Hand them $10 million and they might consider alternatives.

Again, the hex map is necessary for a unified persistent world.

 

A strong economy is critical to SotA success. If items deflate in value to the point they become irrelevant, you will see fewer crafters and eventually fewer adventurers which ultimately means fewer subscribers. The direction by the developers suggest that they are trying to make the game pain free for the players by reducing consequences and protecting items. This is an easy approach for them to take, but the wrong one for long term success.

 

I'm not sure. An economy is important for some players, but utterly useless for players like myself; I would rather play a game where there is no player economy whatsoever, a game where player trading does not even exist, than play a game where players are forced to trade between themselves in some way to get what they need or want.

In fact, I have three pledges already, the cheaper of the bunch at the Digital Explorer level (and, thus, granting me access to all five episodes). And I will get more copies of the game as needed in order to be able to craft any item I desire without having to rely on the market.

So, whether or not a strong economy is needed, or even beneficial, depends on the specific mix of players the game got. If there are many players like me in the player base, trying to force players to use the economy will have the opposite effect, and drive players away from the game.

Not me because the game has a money-based loophole allowing players to skip that pesky economic interdependency thing, and I plan to shamelessly use it.

 

I have 3 accounts myself, so I understand where you are coming from. But long term, there has to be a vibrant economy in order to allow trade skills to function as a viable source of income otherwise players will try to focus on being self-dependent which detracts from the social aspect - long term.

 

Which is where I'm not sure.

I'll always be self-sufficient; if I can't be, I won't play the game. A player economy adds little, if anything, for me. Thus, with players like myself, removing the capability of being self-sufficient makes the player stay less time in the game, and not more; any gain in the social aspect is rendered moot because the game itself ceases being enjoyable.

It's why I have multiple accounts. Not to have an advantage, but rather because, the way the economy was described up to now, it would actually drive me away from the game; I'm getting extra accounts so I can, for all intents and purposes, opt out of the economy, in order to be able to actually play the game for a longer time period, and online.

This is where I come from. I don't have anything against a vibrant player economy, but, for me personally, it's not worth pursuing if it means forcing interdependency on the players, the way the game seems poised to do. And, if players that think like me are not rare, forcing interdependency might drive far more players out short term than it could potentially help keep long term through building community.

This has an extra issue in SotA, BTW; players can drop to offline play and still experience everything the game has to offer except for interaction with other players. And playing offline will, obviously, allow the player to be self-sufficient. If there is forced interdependency, then it will force offline any player that values self-sufficiency above player interaction.

 

You should contract a game designer just to make a game just for yourself.