Please remove teleport scrolls

THIS please. And not because I'm too lazy to explore the world ( I am doing that ) but because I'm bored with the travel tedium. In Ultima 6 we were given the precursor to UO's runes... 8 colored stones, obtained by questing, which we could then Mark and Recall to. I think a limited system of marking favored locations would be a fun idea. The marked stones / runes could be non-transferrable, quest obtained items that you had to EARN. After which they could be used to specify popular points of travel.

Now before someone poo-poos this idea... I've been banging around the question of whether this game will spread out or if you'll have a single economic pole like London ( or Britain in UO ). My feeling is that no one is going to BOTHER shopping every npc vendor for the best price on a whatever. Players who place their homes out in BFB ( bum **** Britannia ) are not going to sell a thing because they get no traffic. I recall when the UO devs introduced Luna, suddenly the ever-populous Britain bank area died out, and along with it the new player experience of having immediate access to this critical density of people. UO had developed an economic pole with Britain at its center, and everything else was an economic satellite, and that functioned OK, but Luna screwed it up. In other words the play-space became ever-bigger and population shrunk, leaving us with a dearth of social content. My concern about SOTA is that Owl's Head is the emergent "pole" just on momentum of the test cycle and players are dissuaded from venturing too far off Hidden Vale. Most of these towns are crap too because they don't have critical services like each of the eight major cities in UO would.

 

Dummest idea I Have ever heard, nothing worse then the slow go no were quick waste of time movement system we got already, if any thing we need to make it so we can move around more easily, no restrict it any more then it already is.

 

I appreciate your thinking here. Just as a thought experiment, what would be the practical result of marking and recalling around? People as you say, are aggregating in Owl's Head and Brittany. The same thing happened in UO around Britain and Vesper ( early game ). The satellite locations were only, in my opinion, viable because players could recall to them. This play-space is designed for more players than there are ( and should be ). Maybe more will play when the game is in "release", but cynically until I see release, hey Final wipe looks like release. I take a wait-and-see view because this funding model really looks like a low-stress soft-launch, but by the time Portalarium gets around to promoting release, it's possible this game will, to the market, be already an old game. So in a sense the game is going to launch on the momentum of what's seen? I don't know. But what I think is... they need to DESIGN it in a way that doesn't require that critical mass of players in every corner of Novia, and where even a smaller playerbase CAN get to and from needed services and keep that "fun" factor going.

I used to work for a table-top game company in Philadelphia called Merit Industries, and my boss there was this grumpy old cuss named Peter, and despite his eccentricities, the ONE thing he drilled into our heads is the question of whether the game was FUN. Nothing else really matters. Realism, if it's not FUN, doesn't add to the game. Pain and frustration, if it's not addictive, doesn't add to the game. YES you need the game to be challenging. What is the balance between challenge and tedium? That's what they need to answer. I find SOTA addictive. Just not necessarily the travel. I don't recall travel in any of the Ultima single player games being particularly onerous, but then again I was 12, so who knows.

 

OK howbout this :

Create 9 regional quests of varying difficulty ( spread out across Novia so to require the player travel to the area and adventure in it ) that yields a totem object. This could be a colored lunar fragment that fell from the sky ( work it into the fiction ), which when presented to a master trainer teaches you a non-tiered spell ( in the same manner as we acquire Summon Phoenix with Phoenix feathers ), and have a spell for each of the 9 magic disciplines. This spell will recall you to one of 9 associated lunar rifts. Add some cooldown, reagent consumption and focus cost and call it done.

So for example, let's say I like to adventure around the Drachvald Graff Mines and I also have a house on the Perennial Coast near Ardoris. I make it a point to complete a quest in each of those areas and end up with a yellow and purple lunar object - some crafted totem tchotchke thing with unique backstories - which are elementally associated with the Sun and Moon disciplines. I then find a master trainer for each and they teach me a spell in the Sun and Moon discipline. I now add that to my non-combat deck and I can recall back and forth between a lunar rift they've added in both areas. I've essentially EARNED the convenience of traveling to a place I've already explored. I don't see how this is in any way game-breaking, if anything it will encourage players to consume the games' designed content.

 

Personally i am for most of what the Baron is advocating here, i myself haven't used one teleport or recall scroll as yet as i find everywhere quite easy to get to and from. Granted i do on occasion start on the map if I'm in a location that would be a pain to re go through especially overweight, which really needs to be addressed in a patch. I don't mind running across the map to and fro, it takes no time generally at all and i do try to do this in multiplayer mode mostly to help the world feel a little more alive to new people, as its always good to see others and the world isn't full of ghosts who build houses.

Teleport scroll's should have their uses and should help facilitate players meeting up with their friends but i think zapping from one end of the world to the other, bypassing as yet not fully implemented control points and the like is detrimental to the game and any further attempts to make economical variance and location as in region matter.

What i would be for with teleport scrolls is maybe a few differing types, costing more to produce or more scrolls needed to be used due to the distance travelled/ control points missed, etc. So long as there is an increased cost involved, which makes the player think is it worth it, or shall i run, or shall i get through here and then use it will help control the over use. But the choice for the gold rich/ time constrained is still there.
If you were teleporting within a region, say to a friend in a town within that region, who lives out in the sticks and its a bit of a chore to get to, only one scroll is required or a regional scroll. However if you were teleporting to a friend the other side of the world then maybe 3 normal scrolls would be needed or a world scroll to be used. This would encourage players to try and bypass the extra costs by getting to the areas they could use a cheaper scroll, generally the other side of a control point but would also allow them to be bypassed for an increased cost.

I am however also for a form of recall and mark runes! But in a similar vein to how i described teleport scrolls, the further the distance the bigger the cost. People off the beaten track, which incorporates about 90%+ of the population still need to get some form of passing traffic and an ability to sell there goods. It is not good that all the KS backers have the foot traffic locations under their control from day one, as it will only discourage new players from getting into this market or even playing the game when they see their hard work going mouldy on their never seen vendor. I am out of the way, my choice as i had the option of picking a more heavily used route, i would like to see more traffic, but i still would be where i am if i never sell a single item. But for many others they want to be able to compete to a degree with higher traffic areas, which will always see more sales due to their location, but at least have a small slice of the pie themselves.

How i would maybe implement this would be that players with a property and likely a vendor can make their own runes which have a similar cost to regional scrolls, but are only a mark point of that property. These can be given away freely, or sold on a vendor for a nominal cost, and maybe stored in a rune book by other players and can be used once that player is within that region, for the cost of a regional teleport scroll. What this would help do is to let players who's vendors are found and liked, be found again, no matter their location, be it hidden away behind a hill or in a POT or in a POT underground. This encourages other players to go and explore for better shopping deals, and for them to only have to make the effort to get to that particular region for themselves to be able to 'find' this great vendor, hidden away in the sticks. Prime foot traffic locations wouldn't matter as much then, they would still be optimal locations, but would allow all players the chance to compete and their efforts appreciated, which can only increase overall player satisfaction and retention.

 

Man, this was one monster of a thread. o.o All-in-all, just put a timer on how often one may use the scrolls seems like the best middle ground. The world is small as it is, does not take very much time to get anywhere even without scrolls so this 'regional' economy idea is already kinda moot, and a timer would solve the abuse of people just popping around all willy-nilly to wherever with no recourse.

(BTW, you can't really force a certain type of economy to exist, or else it's not REALLY a free, individually driven economy now is it?)

 

One other thing they could do is limit the production of scrolls per day. Like wow does with its crafting.

 

Another option would be to allow a teleportation % of error based on the scroll creators alchemy level. Failure would teleport the user to some random location. Kinda like old school D&D.

 

This is exactly what I was thinking. Isn't there a way to expand upon Teleport scrolls without them being a burden to anybody? When there were runes to exact spots in UO everyone loved it, and I'm certain that people will love the option here. However runes being dated.

I must assume that, still being in Alpha, anything like this is going to be on the table eventually, and I believe that keeping Teleport scrolls are worth it to the people who do not abuse them.

Zoning was a system created to help test features and it was abused and accepted. For testing purposes it should be a requirement for developers to have Teleport for their purposes, and we are given a very very restricted form of it.

How does removing Teleport scrolls and/or diminishing the feature affect the average player or new player in a beneficial way. In my opinion removing or diminishing Teleport any further would polarize the user base in the worst way possible.

 

We need additional features added, not existing removed or limited. My recommendation is to implement a Summon skill. Summon would enable you to bring a party member to your location. The summoned person must click to accept the summons.

This ability could either be added to a high end magic user tree, perhaps chaos. Chaos would be perfect since sometimes the summons might summon to a wrong spot.

Alternative add the ability with another scroll.

This feature would assist with grouping and events. Increasing social interactions and increasing the bonds to keep more playing the game.

So please implement the ability to Summon another.

 

good point @davenrock

If players can teleport to any friend in any part of the world, and even more than that if they bought 40 accounts they could have 40+ characters scattered around the world without having any friends and still teleport. If we can't stop it, and scrolls for teleporting exist, why not just teleport to the town you want instead of to a friend? If players can friend their alt accounts (like me), then we can use those alts knowing that we can teleport to that town any time day or night.


Why not have both scrolls and skills to teleport? Since we can ultimately friend anybody or at least buy enough accounts to teleport to the place we need any hour of the day, why not let players have a scroll and/or skill to summon and teleport a group?

If it costs 20 reagents and a wood pulp for a scroll, what if it costs 50 reagents plus a skill level to cast a Rift Spell (gates for teleporting an entire party or guild from one part of the map to another).

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I can see why gates can be a problem with an over crowded instance, but perhaps the level of the caster can determine how many players can teleport thorough that gate. ??? That way once the gate is summoned the server will know if an existing instance has enough room. Would that still run the risk of a second caster from the same guild opening a gate to go to the same place separating the guild at the destination?

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all hypothetical, not actual demands from me. Whatever, I just hoping this sparks ideas, or confirms ideas already in the works. Whatever happens is fine with me. I don't mind either way.

Personally I have no problem walking around the map. The only time I use a scroll is if I am going to be late for something.

 

This would be great for moon magic imo. Moon magic has been needing something to entice more people to use it.

 

This is the first time I have ever agreed with the good Baron. The OP is correct. What in the heck is the reason for choke points if anyone with a friends list can teleport anywhere they want at any time essentially without cost? I would argue take away the scrolls and take away the checkpoints. (Hmmm starting to disagree here lol).

 

Using the checkpoints / control points as a "reason" to limit travel options is kind of a joke.
They aren't really inhibiting anyone, they're just adding additional time/loadscreens to travel and part of the reason people want to use the scrolls in the first place, not because the control point is difficult but because it is two extra loadscreens between you and where you're going. I feel the same way about Perennial Trail and the random instances that pop up. Just a waste of time, a delay, an annoyance, since Sandy Chapman got nerfed there is absolutely zero reason for me to want to get into Perennial trail to fight 80 hp wolves/bandits and all I'm going to do when it pops up, is walk out, or maybe grab a cotton bush if one's close enough. Then I'll apologise to whoever's waiting on me to meet them because I got dragged into the pointless instance.

The control points are kinda the same. They aren't keeping anyone from getting anywhere - people were running through them on Day 1.

Want actual regional economies? Removing the scrolls isn't enough. Adding a 5 min or 10 min 'delay' because people have to walk isn't enough to keep them from getting there especially if its going to save them a good amount of money.
The things in the game currently that are designed to regionalise players are not working. Even without the teleport scrolls. Make players do a quest to access NPC vendors in areas beyond Soltown so that the local residents trust you. Or add some sort of faction building mechanic with the good people of Wherever. Given the convolutedness of quests as currently implemented, this should slow everyone way down.

 

We are in Alpha, and the game will get further optimized. Load screens will not be nearly as long. The control points will probably get more populated with monsters also. Regional economies are by design, from the very beginning. Random encounters are by design from the very beginning.

 

I agree with this, summon would be a great addition to our travel options, especially in an environment where players very often show each other locations of POI's like resource gathering scenes, special vendor deals etc. Id also like to see a Lunar Rift spell for transporting multiple party members at one time. It could easily be placed deep in the Moon magic tree. Same rules apply for instant travel in both situations, cant travel if overweight.

 

There still should be a cost. Time+effort/distance = cost (set monetary value/foot)

 

I've never used any of my teleport scrolls. Is this actually an issue?

To clarify I have no issues with their removal because I've never felt like I needed one.

 

Ya I have mentioned summoning a few times over the years. I would love to have it like the warlok spell in WoW. Maybe takes COTA to use.

 

Yup, they sould cost more !!!

+1