Ambushes Being Actual Ambushes

Whilst wandering around the map today, a thought struck me that it would be nice, instead of just zoning into somewhere and fighting the awaiting mobs, to enter into scenes in an actual ambush type of situation; to give some examples of what I mean...

Attack By Giant Spiders: Player enters scene webbed up inside a tree. Cut webs off to start fight
Attack By Humans: Player falls into a pit trap and has to scramble out of it. Rope trap around the ankle? Player has to cut off rope first. Taking an arrow to the knee? Quick bandage or reduced movement speed. Ambush is in the mountains? Rockslide interupts travel, player spawns inside chaotic rubble.
Attack by Bears: Player gets leg stuck in bear trap. Lockpicking skill to get out.
Attack by Skeletons: Player falls into an underground tomb/barrow. Fight way back to surface.
Attack by Cows: Player zones in cuddling cow, and has to resist it's leathery lures to get control back...

You get the idea; little vignettes which add to the basic scene. Admittedly a lot of this may already be planned for later, but I'd like to see some sort of story behind being attacked, rather than just "Mobs leap out at you!"

 

So, right now, when you are moving through the world map and enter a location, that means "zoning in the scene" and you start safe or surrounded by mobs AND your suggestion is that sometimes one should start in middle of some action? Sounds very good to me. Especially those cows. I ALWAYS appreciate the unique.

 

Great ideas Nemo. I love them. Our random encounters just came out recently. I believe the plans are to have interesting scenes in them, things that will make you want to have a random encounter in fact. That is what the Devs stated in the last telethon they did. So far it is sometimes irritating, especially if you are on your way with a group going somewhere and they complain to you about stepping in the wrong place lol. I tried to say how dare you say that, I most certainly did not, but you know how some people are lol Anyway I am glad they at least added resources into the scenes, some of them actually have quite a few resources. Welcome to you Cast Chaos and also Nemo, but you may have been here a while right? or not? **cheers anyway**

 

LOL that last one made me laugh! Im all for ambushes like that!! Good job!

I could also see a Caravan or traveling vendor being attacked and you have to jump in and help them or they die, then get some reward for helping the caravan or traveling vendor! Yes you are right something more exciting need to be in the randoms! I really like the skeleton ambush scenario the best!

 

I do not like these, I would not mind traps in random encounters, but I do not want to be said, hey you fell for the trap, you are so stupid. I want to be given option to avoid the traps or fights. I want to start the encounter before I am attacked and have option to survive it using stealth or speed and all my brains...

Of course, if I rush straight for the exit without noticing the trap(s) on the way there...

 

I've been here a while, just changed my user name to the one I'm likely to be using in Shroud; but I left my avatar as it was for a while so people recognise me

I don't know if the Devs plan to have any kind of "ambush avoiding" skills on the main map or not, but I'm not opposed to one existing. It would almost certainly end up taking points from your other combat skills though... Anyway, I don't think that being captured is illustrative of stupidity though, rather that in a dangerous world I'd like to see more concrete explanation for where that danger is coming from and why you were forced to stop and deal with it.

 

I am not saying I want to want to avoid ambushes on the map. I want to avoid them in random encounters.

 

One can get into an adventure or trouble without will, so being tied into a spiderweb right at the start doesn't imply that your character did something wrong off-camera. It just skips build up and starts right with the action. Even in cartoon episodes, I preferred when they started right on the scene, instead of slow build up and filler conversations just to pass time and give a needless amount of reason for the real action to happen.
And if one could get into the listed situations only by failing a trap/challenge, then it means one would need to purposely fail one just to get into the exciting part of the action.
So, I'd completely welcome scenarios where I'm already in a challenge when a new area loads. FINALLY some fast paced action instead of an eventless run through a whole continent or boring teleporting from one action location to other, like in all nowadays MMORPGs.

We need new things that newer were. The more unique and unexpected, the better.

 

I think you're getting a little hung on up on definitions there; random encounters on the map more or less are ambushes ... at least, unless you believe every single monster is standing out in the open along a road, and you just happen to walk past them and cannot resist stopping to say hello? That I have to say is a little unrealistic. As would be having some sort of flag on the map which says "Trapdoor Spider Attack Here", so you could use stealth or some other skill to get past it...

Furthermore, that there be ambushes, where something lies in wait or sets traps to catch you that you can't predict, is important however; What proves someone a hero, or skilled, talented etc. is not that the entire world operates openly and predictably, because anyone can be a hero if they have a crib sheet of the likely test ahead of time; what proves them heroic is that they have no guarantee they'll pass the test, or even know what form the test will be in, but follow a heroic code all the same, and triumph over what ever comes their way.

Thus as CastChaos says, throwing curveball challenges at the player not only explains why your quest to get to Kingsport was suddenly interrupted by spider-tickling, but also doesn't mean you did something wrong; rather it's an opportunity to prove you can do something right, against the odds.

Obviously they can be over used; not every spider attack should start with you webbed up. And sometimes, you just gotta stop and cuddle that cow! So yes, sometimes you just see Spiders running towards you, or a resistible udder (It's possible, but I've not met one yet). But if we're going to have random interruptions, we need to feel the character has some reason to take them seriously, lest they just be a gameplay pausing annoyance.

 

The devs have said right now they just put in the ability for random encounters. They haven't worked on meaningful specific encounters, but that is coming in the future.

 

I quite disagree with this Not only it is annoyance as it stops my gameplay but furthermore it implies my character did something wrong for getting in the web, while not having any issues killing all those spiders after freeing himself easily...

What I would imagine for random encounter on the road is that you start at one end of the map with road across. You can go back, which sends you to location from which you entered the map. Or you can go forward, there might be trap, there might be valuable ore node of the road, if you dare to explore... You never know if the encounter has trap (and enemies) or hidden treasure or both. I think that encounters having nothing are too boring to be included.