Outskirts notes

First, I'm pretty happy with it, it looks great and I think it will be a win. I will bump this when I update it, but put all the info in this top post so Devs can quickly see it all.

• Since we get repeatedly told to check in with Captain Kinsey, I think it would be great as a Task.
• Whether that happens or not, getting up there and having Captain Kinsey tell me to help the Lord who I've already talked to and got the quest from, was a disappointment. I would like to get a second quest to do at the same time as doing the Lord's quest. Ie, bring the painting to the lord, bring the bandit leader head to the Captain.
• Corporal Helois waves at me but has nothing to say that the 2 previous soldiers did. It's a letdown.
• Fishing guard and Lord both wave at me after getting the quest from them.
  
• Lt. Tilton needs a popup explaining how the skill tree works.
• Lt. Tilton (or other skill trainers if player gets out without opening) needs more obvious indication of how to open attack, bar, etc. Met a new player in Live server today that had totally missed it at Soltown but knew it existed, just not how to get it.
• I've got a map of Solice Bridge in my hotbar, but I've already left by the time I open it
• Fishing pole is already equipped but fishing guard says to equip it. Maybe say "make sure you have a fishing pole equipped.
• She says to use the fishing skill but there has been no explanation about loading glyphs on bar, using it from skill menu, or anything.
• Does fishing not pop up a loot window?
  
• Fishing guard doesn't respond with Item Transfer to Salmon, only to Fish.
• Running from the boat to the camp is empty. Getting quests doesn't make sense here here, how about Undead on the way up to the top? With skirmishing guards? Players have little fighting in Solace Bridge, it would be nice to get a bit more in before starting the talking.
• If the loading platform at the top were a little farther out, you could put a pallet at the bottom and let players "elevate" up, perhaps past the Undead.
• Perhaps Ingots from Scrap recipe to start with, or on the Crafting Vendor?
• Ore is notoriously hard to recognize when starting SotA. Put one in a super obvious place, like on the big rock on the other side of the rope bridge, by the guard.
• The Exit arch is really popping in, my settings are Maxxed
• Bear is a nice challenge
• Let players use the beefstock and such to cook (it's value 0 so I am assuming it won't work at the moment)
• Get the players used to the idea of food, have an NPC give it to them and instruct them to eat before battle
• Teach sprinting somehow, a race, a message that must be delivered super fast, etc.

 

I'll add my thoughts here too.

I think the concept of having outskirts is a great one! The scene is a fairly good size and there is a lot to explore.

What I find unfortunate and a bit of a letdown is:

a) The lack of quests.
b) The distance between quests.
c) The lack drama.

This is the aftermath of terrible undead attacks! Where are the desperate survivors trying to cope with their loss? The tents are all empty. Why are there so many guards that have no quests to offer, they all refer you to Kinsey, but Kinsey has only a gives a few quests? There is a fishing quest, but no other gathering quests? What about hungry people who need food? Where is a quest to get meat so those poor refugees so they can cook something up? Oh...because the only survivors are the Lord and Lady Langston. But maybe the guards need to eat?

I have not visited the other outskirts areas yet, but so far I see Solace Bridge Outskirts as a wonderful foundation that needs to be more fully fleshed out - I would daresay *delayed* a release or two so that more quests can be added that provide better continuity and some excitement.

Honestly, there is no sense of urgency here. I think new players need a reason to get emotionally invested in the story. Else this is just a beautiful, empty scene with a few scattered quests that only matter to get some gold and XP.

 

Generally enjoying the Outskirts. Finishing the night with just having found the painting.

I didn't die except because I was Alt-Tabbed for testing. I could see new players dying, but I don't believe it's crazy hard. I did have to retreat a few times, and had a close call. Thank goodness my rusty daggers are whirling death!

Stats that I can see (my skill tree is stuck on Crafting so I can only tell you the stuff that's being tracked)

Oh, I opened up the combat bar,unlocked deck and more skills early, if players don't load out their bar they'll be hurting (unless it automatically does it when buying new skills with nothing loaded)

Blades: 48
Thrust: 9
Air's Embrace: 12
Stone Fist: 10 (was doing major damage sometimes, really saved me)
Ripost: 11
Healing Touch: 19
Heightened Awareness: 14 (should that really be on at the start? I would have turned it off but my skill window was stuck when I finally got around to it)

I've got 1283 Gold, having foolishly not known that Maple Tree bark is worth a lot more on the open market, and dumped things I didn't know are valuable to players.

 

Just spent some time here and your points pretty much echo mine. Hope to see some polishing of this area. I think it's great to see these outskirts as they will help out new players.

 

Try not to be disappointed yet @Alexander and @Fionwyn Wyldemane , I'm sure they have a whole bunch that's mapped out, and even going to be implemented this week.

Very helpful to the Devs is to put down specific things you think should/could be in the Outskirts. I bet you have a few insights that they didn't think of.

They like bullet points.

 

As noted in the release notes this is the first revision, and more content/quests will be added. The benefit/curse of seeing content go live as it's written...

 

I hear you Lum and I do apologize if I came off as discontented or not loving the outskirts. It's sometimes a challenge to give constructive feedback in situations like this where it's a new area in the first iteration! I often hesitate to say my piece as it's terribly difficult to convey my heart via text...unless it's poetry...lol.

So here's my heart on the matter at hand - the outskirts is A+ for a first iteration and I am very much looking forward to seeing how it metamorphoses over time! My previous comments were simply first impressions from a *new player* perspective.

 

I tried Solace Bridge Outskirts, and as all new areas, it is beautiful. Yet, I encountered following problems quest-wise:

Spoiler: Quests

• Recovering the painting + the alchemist: with no idea where to go (it was my first quest), I decided to follow the road. The first meaningful thing I found was the cemetery. I opened some valves (no effect on anybody), fought undead, found the alchemist. He wanted nothing from me, just to sell some reagents. Much later I spoke with Kinsey, and she mentioned that her scouts saw some funny-looking alchemist, and I should check on him. I went there again --- the same text, nothing new. I did some other quests. Now it appears that the alchemist quest is all that left for me. Yet it does not appear in my Journal, nor in the current tasks list. The alchemist signals that he has a quest for me, but he doesn't give it to me. I went over his whole visible vocabulary, tried words at random (e.g., he says something trivial for "Kinsey"), but no cigar. I am at loss.
  
  • Just like @Vladamir Begemot mentioned before: it was very confusing to take the painting, yet nothing changed visually. I have to check my inventory to make sure I did take it.
• Fishing: three clay nodes next to the fisher. One has 1 clay, another is completely empty (?), the third one has 2 worms. The first worm catches a bass. The second catches nothing. After some waiting: three more clay nodes appear, two of them empty (?), the last one has 1 clay. Bummer. Thinking logically I went to the sea (that's where salmon is), found more clay nodes, most of them empty (???). Disappointing. I think noobs should never see empty nodes. In fact I would suggest to fill them with clay and worms to the brim, so the lack of resources is not going to be a disappointing factor in the initial scene.
  
• Heirlooms: I found one before I got a quest for it. Then I've met Héloise, which tells about it, and asks to bring her some. I gave it to her, and got some XPs and money. Next I am talking to Kinsey, and she gives me that quest! I go find another heirloom, and complete quest. Yet, it was confusing, because I didn't remember where I found it in the first place.
• Alpha wolf: that one was straightforward, yet all wolves were running away like a roadrunner on steroids probably being led by example of the alpha wolf, which was the fastest. After several utterly frustrating unsuccessful attempts to kill the alpha wolf with a halberd (and I am not a noob!), I switched to a bow, and killed them immediately. My takeaway here is simple: if an avatar is a melee guy, and cannot handle ranged weapons or spells, they will have a difficult time to do the quest. Something should be done about that.

 

I totally agree - I have been pretty dedicated to playing since persistence but had to get help from another player on how to fish....it was not intuitive.

 

I fully agree to the opinions above. The outskirts are a great add, and will probably be very rewarding after some iterations. The landscape is great!

At the moment there are quite a few things to polish though. Mostly the conversations imho: People should know each other (say 'Heloise' - oh she is at the tents at the backside of the camp. something like this for all key npcs). And especially they should know what they said themselves! And react at least a bit when fed their own words.

Then that lord couple .. Ok, he is more into the value of the painting than anything else, but both should at least react when I tell them i have found the grave of Liliana.
That grave needs a bit of polish, too, i feel. It reads 'pay respect to this grave', but gives no clue. The mouse is green when hovering on the grave/vase, but is clicking/E-ing it the right thing to do? Everywhere else that would either destroy the vase or take it.
I tried to bow towards the grave, no reaction. Finally dared to double-click it, that seemed to be the right thing - made me bow and gave some strange sound I think. But I would have expected at least some text in the message window, or even better a small entry in my journal.

Also the quest entries in the journal: They should update when I finish the quest. Not 'I should return the painting' anymore, but 'I returned the painting.' Applies to all quests here it seems.

 

Journal entries do not change because like a real journal, it consists of your notes of events at the time. When a quest is finished another journal entry denoting that is written.

 

Understood. But then these finishing notes are missing.

 

That's very interesting, I hadn't thought of that. We are all used to the way games usually do things that making a "real" journal in game actually seems like a bug.

 

A good compromise for tasks could be to use one/two/mutliple pages for each task and add updates to the right section, rather than following a purely chronological order.
Tasks would then be easy to read and follow up, while the "notes" follow the chronological/diary style.

I also find it confusing that some quests are listed in the Knowledge Journal, while some are in the Tasks. A clear separation for all "real quests" vs travel notes would be very welcome.

 

Map of Solace Bridge that gets put in your utility hotbar has no icon what so ever when you start the game.... so you have no clue its here other then hitting 1 out of combat and then some magical map appears. (if you drag and drop it again the scroll icon then appears)