An introduction and intial impressions

Hello, everyone. I've been putting off getting into SotA since I stumbled across the original Kickstarter, in part to see how things were going to progress and also in part because I was still a little stung by the investment I'd put into Tabula Rasa (and we all knew how that turned out). Noticing there had just been another new release, R14, and liking what I had been watching over the past year-ish, I decided it was past time to give Lord British another chance.


Who am I? Well, like many of you, I had a love affair with Ultima Online. Like many of you, I've long considered Ultima 7 (I & II) among the greatest RPG's of all time. Even beyond that, I originally found myself immersed in Ultima VI - one I feel is often overlooked, but that's neither here nor there.

Ultima Online... Ahhh, those were the days. I was lucky to happen upon it early enough that I was in-game from day 1. And, as I'm sure is a common theme around here, it changed my life. From the same "I got owned by a rabbit!" story that we all shared as one of our first experiences, to the prospect of braving the Reds lurking at West Brit Pass making me shake in fear, to the mass spam of "Guards!" when some newbie had the misfortune to go grey at the bank... No game before or since stirred the same emotions in me, or was responsible for the sheer multitude of memories.

It's that "since", in the prior sentence, that brings me here.

Ignoring the debacle that Tabula Rasa became, there's no name in RPG's (in my opinion) more iconic than Lord British. Starr Long was responsible for many of the experiences I had in UO. And Tracy Hickman, while I was never a fan of Dragonlance in my AD&D days (Forgotten Realms FTW!), I did always enjoy the novels. If this hydra of creative minds can't create an experience to rival my memories of UO - Nobody can.

Which brings me to my intial impressions of the game, as it stands in R14.

Pros:

• The "no handholding" manner of questing and conversing. As NPC's get more fleshed out, I can see many more opportunities for "hidden" dialogue options, which could not happen with a traditional point-and-click RPG dialogue.
• Overworld travel - at first, this turned me off. What, no walking from one city to the next, like going from Yew to Minoc? But after some time, it began to feel the same, while allowing for faster travel over longer distances than would otherwise be possible. I've only had one random encounter, and it felt close to the same as wandering into a pack of baddies in UO (aside from the load screen, which I won't include as a con - you get used to it).
• Cities - Intermixing NPC buildings and PC homes makes it feel much more "alive" than if the cities were NPC-only.
• Graphics/optimization - For being two items that are slated for improvement beyond their Pre-Alpha state, I was pleasantly surprised by both. I don't have a beastly system, by any means, and everything runs smooth and looks pretty darn good.

Now, for the Cons:

• Levelling - Levelling has no place in a UO game - whether this is a direct descendant of it or a spiritual successor, it doesn't matter. You're talking about the same player-base either way - and they're (for the most part) not going to like the "Earn XP, level up, distribute points" cycle. To be honest, the idea of having a character of specific level is what turned me away from ever playing any of the other MMO's over the years. The use-based system in UO set you apart from everyone else, and to abandon that sets the game back.
• Deck Building - Combat feels fluid, and aside from some balancing feels good - until you get to the special abilities/spells. Having a limited number of tactical options (if they're locked) or depending upon a random draw to use a special ability or spell that your character knows? This is a glaring problem, and ruins not only the tactical aspect of combat, but also the immersion. If your character knows how to cast a fireball, and has the focus available to do so, there's no reason he shouldn't be able to cast the spell. Adding an artificial limitation like that doesn't add anything to the game, it takes away from it.
• Focus? Going off the last item, why does casting a spell cost focus in the first place? Why remove mana? Your core playerbase has already had it drilled into them/us that mana is a mage's best friend, and focus is a warrior's. Why move away from such a standardized concept?
• Crafting - As I understand it, crafting was much better before R14, and the recipes actually made sense. So I'll wait and see on that one.
• Resource Gathering: If I want to chop some wood, why artificially limit me to chopping "just the orange ones"? Again, you're eliminating immersion. The same goes for ore. Cotton, Garlic, Nightshade all seem okay, if maybe a little too hard to find the latter two. And, a minor nit-pick, but it feels like skinning and scything take too long compared to mining and chopping. Also - shearing sheep? Milking cows? Et cetera? Forgive me if those are planned, I didn't know.

Suggestions:

• Remove levelling/XP altogether OR earn stat points only from levelling. Make all skill gain use-based.
• Remove the Deck system, and make the special moves and spells earned at specific levels of skill.
• Introduce toolbars, similar to those in the Action RPG genre.
• Go back to a HP/Mana/Focus system, with the values determined by the player's stats.
• Some crafting ingredients that are purchase-only should be able to be gathered. Feathers come to mind, for example.
• Crafting recipes should always be logical, and materials should never be redundant. Timber/board? Ingot/bar? Simplify a little, but not too much. Multi-step products are great, but ensure there's reward equivalent to the effort.
• All rock formations should be able to be mined at any spot, the ore nodes that exist now could be changed to simply show what ore is in a specific formation, should be un-minable, and disappear when a formation is mined out (along with a notification "There is no more ore to be gathered here"). Adds immersion.
• All trees should be able to be chopped. Instead of the felled tree remaining, make it despawn a bit after falling. Again, adds immersion.
• Once resource gathering skills are put in, one should make the particle effects on the harder-to-see plants more pronounced.

Well, that's my two cents. Looking back at the number of cons, you'd think I don't enjoy the game... On the contrary, I do, and I want to see it last.
X

 

Welcome to the community!

This is as much a spiritual successor to Ultima VI and VII which you mentioned as it is to UO. You say they need to get rid of leveling because UO didn't have it, but VI and VII did. UO encouraged if not necessitated a macro. Grinding is not playing and it isn't fun. I don't support systems that reward macroing over playing.

You get special skills through advancing through the skill tree whether you use the deck or not. The brilliance of the current design is that players are free to do a traditional skill/hotbar system, the glyph system or a hybrid.

The game has a toolbar.

The game does have HP/Focus based upon character stats.

I think you can get feathers from chickens. The plan is eventually to gather most anything in game and craft most anything in game.

 

Welcome Entrappedmind! Always good to have another opinion. Some of the comments imply you did not play it enough to get more comfortable with it, but overall its good. Anyway, it is a million miles from the release and a lot will change, so can't blame you for not digging in.

 

Very true, in regard to the macroing. Of course, that was latter-day UO, not early. Early UO, macroing didn't exist, and you could spend a year before you hit that magic 700. I'm with you against grinding, though. The key is to find a happy medium, where you earn more skill by playing than would be possible to earn by grinding. Then again, that was the thought behind movement based skill gain - and the advent of 8x8 macroing.

In summary, alright, you got me. lol.

My problem with a locked deck (the toolbar you're referring to) is that is costs more Focus per skill when used that way, doesn't it? If not, then perhaps I'll get used to it in time.

I know it has HP/Focus, but didn't know they were based on stats - thought they were purchased/upgraded separately.

Haven't gotten any feathers from them myself, that was just a top-of-my-head example. I'd read elsewhere that one component of most recipes would remain purchase-only, as a method of controlling the economy. Maybe that was just a theory rather than fact.

Thank you for the welcome!

 

No, Tahru, you're absolutely right. I played it the majority of yesterday, thought about my experience during work today, and came home to post my impressions. I did note they were initial impression, maybe I should've emphasized just how initial they were. Heh.

 

With a deck/glyph system, you buy a skill multiple times to have it come up multiple times. If you only buy it once for a locked bar, you'll find the focus cost quite expensive. When you buy multiple copies of that skill, the focus cost goes down for a locked deck. Or you could just spend all those extra skill points you saved by only buying each skill once and put them in increasing your focus.

 

Welcome!

 

Stupid me. I wasn't paying attention when allocating points, and assumed that more points meant improved skill. Well, that only holds true for innate skills. Whoops. Added a few more, broadened out to further skills, and now have a deck of 15 that's seeming to work decently. Thanks for the advice - that probably wouldn't have been necessary had I simply paid attention to what I was doing. lol.

And thank you, Sir Stile.

 

I do believe there is a modifier skill that allows the caster to mitigate some of the extra focus costs for locked skills. I haven't followed the dev blogs as closely as I would like, but I would like to think a lot of the randomness and lock penalties are to prevent "master combos" like UO had. Exp, exp, hallie hit, ebolt

 

Entrappedmind Welcome and great first post. I think you put forth a lot of great constructive and astute observations. Well done!

 

Welcome. Well thought out.

 

@Entrappedmind, welcome! I share your view regarding the level based combat system. There is nothing special about skill based progression that makes it any more prone to macroing, and I'd love to see SotA move away from level based combat progression. Also enjoyed your comments on the deck system, and while a fixed deck is an option there are significant penalties for choosing it over the randomized deck. If you hang out on the forum long enough you'll find a number of people share your perspective.

I believe at one point it was said by the dev team that both skill based combat progression, and a more traditional fixed combat toolbar were still possibilities on the table. But, the current implementation has been here for awhile now and I bet due to forward momentum neither will change. However with the right feedback we might be able to help shape the current implementation to something a little bit closer to what we want.

 

Welcome, Entrappedmind!

I had similar feelings about the deck system until I really used it and experimented with the variations you can apply. I recommend trying out each of the three methods: traditional (locked glyphs), full deck, and hybrid. Personally, I maintain a hybrid where I keep a heal spell locked for emergencies and let every other glyph fly at random.

Keep in mind that the more points you put into a skill, the more often it will be drawn in the deck. So, while it may seem that you have to wait for a particular skill, you really don't if you applied several points to it. In other words, if it's a skill that is important to you and you believe you will use it frequently, you can either apply several points to it and ensure it is drawn quickly, or you can always lock it and it's there for use as needed (at a moderate focus cost unless you also apply some points to focus reduction).

Hope this eases some of your concerns regarding the deck system. I also recommend you take a look at The Mad Hermit's youtube videos on the subject. He's extremely helpful for folks who are learning the game.

 

I can't stress enough how much I would like to see this happen. Im not a fan of the current node system for gathering wood and ore. It reminds me of the way they have implemented gathering in SWTOR and ESO (yuck). The node system works fine for gathering smaller plants, but I loved lumberjacking and mining from UO, and was truly hoping that system would be implemented here as well. Perhaps it still will be... ( cross fingers)

Also, I agree agree with some of the feedback about combat. I have found myself staring at cooldowns on a hotbar again... Ugh.

 

Welcome!

Great post. Lots of good impressions to think about.

However, I'm still hung up on your comment about Tabula Rasa. ;-)

I don't feel "stung" at all. It didn't last as long as I'd hoped, but I don't regret investing in the game and to this day it's still in my list of my five favorite MMOs.

 

Perhaps it's my own fault - It didn't turn out anything like I expected/hoped - and I'm not a sci-fi fan to begin with. I just hoped, with it being a brainchild of Garriott, that it'd be - I dunno - special. Y'know?

That's exactly the "feel" I'm hoping for as a finished product, as well. Glad I'm not alone.

Beat you to it. Nice avatar, by the way!

One can only hope. While everyone's advice has helped me become more confortable with the deck system, it still doesn't feel natural or ideal. I just can't shake the notion that if it's a spell or skill my character is capable of performing, there shouldn't be an artificial roadblock preventing me from doing so. A game with Lord British's name on it, in my opinion, should be all about empowering the player to do whatever s/he wants, however he wants - not restricting him/her.

Being recognized for a first post by SotA quasi-royalty? Sweet!

And you want to prevent that why? Can you honestly tell me that combo isn't permanently embedded in all our memories until the day we die? I consider that something to embrace, rather than avoid.

 

Figured I'd swing back and update... After 3 days, I'm sitting at level 32 with 24k gold. Figured out a couple good decks to use, but I still feel like I don't do very much damage to the baddies - which is offset by the fact that the only things I've found that can touch me are ghosts and liches with their Death Magic. Also found a few "sweet spots" for earning XP, primarily around Deep Ravenswood - Getting 1k XP per Bear Patriarch, 1k per Elder Wolf, 1.4k per Giant Red Spider, and 600-800 from anything else in there.

So, how am I doing, time-wise? Ahead of the curve? Behind it? I feel as though I've levelled fairly quickly, but I'm lagging a little behind in gold. Opinions? Suggestions?

 

What

Hello, and I like all these suggestions but for the Focus/HP I'm cool with what we have... except for magic I would like to see SotA take a bit from Ultima Underworld and use actual runes in someway for casting... All good though..

 

Agree 100% on removing the deck system entirely.

 

One further update, since it's (in my opinion, anyway) a substantial milestone for any game - Got my first house! It's just an Ardoris Row House, but it's got a good view (as opposed to the other lot I found, my scenery would've been the front of a neighbor's house. Blah!) and, as a special little bonus, the front door is at the top of one of the ladders leading from the water below. So there's a built-in easy shortcut. Unfortunately, I need sleep... So it'll be a few hours before the house becomes a home.