Rambling Feedback From A Trial Player (It was quick feedback for a little while...)

So, having known about SoTA for quite a while and never really taking a good look at it since it's always been "this thing that maybe might happen several years from now", I just happened to decide to look into it a few days prior to the 2nd trial so I decided to give it a go.

I did a fair amount of research before going into it, so I didn't run into many stumbling blocks mechanically. I ran into some quest oddities which I reported as I went along but they didn't throw me. In fact, for me anyway, picking apart all the systems and how they work and adapting to their quirks is kind of the best part of trying out a new MMO.

I played about six or seven hours over the course of the next three days and in the end found myself extremely at odds as to if I would buy in.

On the one hand I enjoyed:
- The way NPC interaction was handled (the clickable reference bar for known phrases helps a ton btw)

- The community and as expected from hearing the previous trial, there were tons of people looking to help newcomers out.

- The moments where I wondered through a moongate (or at the time what I simply knew as "what's this blue thing?") and found myself on the other side of the map, or when I found weird hidden notes here and there.

- The skill system, particularly as a caster with the various schools of magic and affinities. Didn't really get far enough to do anything with decks but they seemed interesting.

- That crafting and the crafting economy (in theory...) is important in the day to day of the game and not just "maybe useful occasionally if at all" as is often the case.

- The zones to overworld map travel. Obviously a contiguous world is preferable, but I'm sure there's reasons/limitations that resulted in this decision (most likely easier to drop in modules/towns/land plots), and it eventually grew on me.

- The darkness! Having weather and nights/areas that are actually dark and need to be lit is always nice and something missing from many games that prefer to stay perpetually lit or have odd 90% day, 10% night day cycles (and the night isn't all that dark even then).


On the other hand, there were things that, I didn't necessarily "not enjoy", but they threw me:

- While the community was great, sad fact is there isn't many of them at the moment. Not much to be done about that, kind of a chicken and egg problem, but it made adventuring around a pretty lonely experience most of the time as any given area you went in felt like you were in there by yourself with the exception of a few towns. Guilds certainly help with this to a degree I'm sure. Maybe toss newcomers into a "starter guild"? If that causes chaos with everyone just staying in that guild forever, maybe force people out after a set period or something? There seems to be an emphasis on having very large towns but while those are great in theory, it makes the above strike home more when you're in a sprawling city and you're the only one there.

- The 1 skull/starting areas feel very "samey". The overall zone size is relatively small as well. I tried going around to a few of them by the Truth and Love starting towns and it seemed like I was consistently in a swamp, forest, or a combination of both with a rock formation over yonder with either wolves or skeletons, and then another formation elsewhere with Thugs, and that's your lot. I've tried looking up streams and such to get a feel as to if this varies up or if the zones get larger as you go on but couldn't come back with much. Some later areas seemed a bit bigger but couldn't be sure by what I saw.

- Finally, and perhaps the biggest thing, is that I never managed to get a sense of purpose or "reason for being" in the game. It very much felt like "whelp, I'm here, time to punch skeletons for the next six hundred hours because of reasons." I felt this way for a two primary reasons.

Early level design: as mentioned before, early on (and possibly later, I wouldn't know), it feels very samey. You're fighting one of three things in one of two templates in very similar looking adventure areas. There are some interesting little tidbits and secrets there but not enough to really keep me peaking behind waterfalls if you know what I mean. You're left with the sinking feeling of "If I'm doing this now, is this also the next 10,100,1000 hours?" Wondering off into the Catacombs was honestly one of the more interesting parts of the whole adventure to the point where I was tempted to just stay down there and pop right up into town whenever I needed.

Lore and your place in the world: Being more of a sandbox, there's no hand to guide you or grand mission to exalt you and drag you along and that's all well and good. The end result is you need to effectively find yourself and your reason for being there. That said, it's fairly difficult as, up front anyway, there is very little to latch onto. There's no factional conflicts you can take part in, no racial identities, no overarching struggle to take part in or contribute to or even watch unfold. From my limited time with it having poked around, talked to NPCs, and rummaged through books; this is what I know of the world. You're an Outsider, humans and elves scuffle from time to time, there's two factions of elves, the undead are shambling about, the sky exploded 400 years ago, and theres some titans that represent the 3 virtues. Outside of the more linear Virtue quests, anything else you do is just you kind of kicking it around this place. You're expected to fight things, but to what end? You don't have anything to protect, to save, you're just kind of fighting for the sake of it.
Random Interjection about the lore/setting: In a lot of ways, I think it's playing it too safe/close to traditional old-school fantasy to the point where it seems a bit flat. I know RG was hesitant to lean into the clockpunk/steampunk bits but honestly, it could probably use more of it to give the world a bit more character.

All together it left me with this very listless feeling of enjoying skilling up, enjoying the community, and enjoying this kind of "Renn Faire" like atmosphere of things, but also ultimately feeling like everything I was doing was pointless and that I was just "punching skeletons to punch bigger skeletons in a different swamp".

I'm well aware that, to varying degrees, much of this is down to personal taste and interpretation and the stuff that isn't can also be attributed to the development state. "The sandbox is what you make of it". But try as I might (and I tried, I spent a considerable amount of time agonizing over if I would pull the trigger or not as I tried to work out how much time I should invest on something I might not come back to), this is what I ended up making of it.

For now, I'm likely holding off. Mainly because of that last big throw; not really being able to get a feel for where things are going and "to what end" anything worth doing in the game is worthwhile. If I'm going to advance, gather, hoard, decorate, or generally live in a world, I need something to latch onto. Be it defending the guild town or repairing the thing or, I don't know. Something. Right now it just feels like everyone is spinning their wheels. I'm still interested enough to pop my head in again next Trial or further down the line though. Anyway, hopefully something in this mess helps.

 

that was an amazing feedback... I would strongly suggest that you try the game again after the "new starting areas" are released... they are doing a huge revamp of the starting areas, it will be bigger and there will be more things to do before you leave the starting areas to venture through the rest of the world... I believe that will come in Release 41... if not then Release 42... welcome to New Britannia

 

That is really good feedback. Thanks for posting your experiences!

 

Thanks for taking the time to provide such good feedback. To the point here, because the game is still in development, the primary reason we all have is to assist that effort. Even simply by playing we give them the data they need to make things better, but there is also bug reporting, providing feedback (as you did), and more. The benefit is that we all get to map out a purpose and place before release. I agree it is hard to find a purpose because the new player experience needs to be improved and will be. (One of those thing still very much in development). But I also do know that part of the struggle to find purpose its that there is a lot of freedom to establish it for yourself.

 

Welcome @Valkadesh and great feedback! i would also suggest waiting for R41-42 when they add the new starting areas i think it will be much better;D

 

Welcome @Valkadesh !!!

 

Quick update to this:
Getting all of that out "on paper" as it were let me sort through some things as I read over the responses. While I'm still unsure if I'm going to find something that will drive me forward on a regular basis, I did end up picking up the game. I figure at the very least I'll be able to pop my head in on a regular basis to see how things are going and hop in when the urge strikes. I figured I should warn you all that you're stuck with me now

 

Welcome @Valkadesh , I look forward to seeing you in-game sometime.

 

I agree on the "What's the point" bit, unless you find your own point. I've opened 5 stores, that's my point. But I WOULD like to really get sucked into the game proper.

Viola and I keep giving it a go, and we both agree that the combat is getting better ever release. But I've been mashing monsters since I was 5, so that by itself isn't super enticing to me. I think the Blood River Massacre sums it up nicely for me. If you take the time to explore, there's this awesome tree home down by the lake, just screaming to be explored. When you get there, it has some crates inside, no people, no nothing. I get that same empty feeling in most of the instanced areas up through 3 skulls, where we still hang out. Like "There should be something here, there's a mystery to be discovered" but at the moment there isn't.

I don't think this is a permanent thing, I believe that as time goes on they'll keep doubling back around and adding interesting story/exploration to the scenes.

My tip to avoid grinding (as much) for gold: If you find yourself not playing for a stretch, take the couple minutes to log in and grab you Basic Income from the Oracle. Just leave your avatar in one of the buildings. If you're gone for a month you'll have enough money for a piece of medium high end gear when you get back, or be a small part of the way toward affording a row lot.

 

We have a big list of areas we certainly want to circle back around to and complete, both in story, quest, and general adventuring. Each release we hope to accomplish something in this regard, and I hope you feel that we have been doing so with our recent uncloning announcements.

 

Great Feedback..... AND Welcome to Shroud!

 

@Berek Yes, I think you are on it, things keep getting better. Literally every month is better than the last.

Since you're working on the New Player Experience, I would really suggest fleshing out the Battle of Solace Bridge/Blood River opening scenes soon, not just the new scene AFTER them. I know you'll eventually get to these, but peppering a bit more content in now as you focus on the early stages of gameplay could go a long way.

For instance, the Druid house is begging for something interesting to be there, an NPC, some bandits, something. Edvard or Roger even says "Go explore if you like" and then there is zero interesting content to find.

In Battle of Solice bridge, you have that Elf Archeologist, he's also begging to have more interesting stuff done with him. A tiny little quest, or start for something later.

Both areas should have some really low level enemies as well, why make them go to another zone to practice combat? They've just finished the bridge, let them go beat up some weak wolves.

Don't know about the 3rd starting area, I imagine it's similar.

 

@Valkadesh. Oh thank you for that perfect feedback. What you say is so true in regards to the above I quoted. Sota is still missing 'reason to play'. I mean many of us who are here have our own 'reasons to play' which is to provide feedback to the @Devs that we need 'reason to play' and more.

Some things I see missing is in-game achievement system, bulletin boards telling of supplies needed, or events happening and wanted posters from players who participated in pvp quests earning criminal points to make them wanted for a reward and is repeatable, repeatable quests for crafting merchants with crafting supplies or equipment as the reward, done once a day or less often, fishing quests daily and challenges for biggest fish of the day or for a particular type of fish. Reasons to explore quests and achievements are needed badly. Each region should have its own daily quests.

Achievement system should provide all over game discoveries and more discoveries need to be added like if you climb to the top of a mountain an achievement ding happens and you discover it, plus you should find things and speaking of finding things, treasure hunting is a big desire from this community so we will rally for it too. And treasure hunting would take you all over the game and treasure maps could be fished up or found

So why some of this isn't done yet is man-power limitations. A quest writer is being hired to help out, although I think we need 3 of them .

So stay tuned and thank you so much for your feedback. This game will continue to be developed and your feedback helps so much.

edited for more thoughts on treasure hunting and more

 

Something I'll add about exploration. When I started feeling a bit off about the area's I had started in, I was really tempted to explore other areas but, at least on Novia (I had assumed the islands would be high level areas but that appears to not be the case), there's a limited number of one skull areas and the difficulty of the higher skull areas prevents you from checking them out much. Things like the gates/passes made navigating the overall map tricky at first as well. I understand them being starter areas that are going to be left behind (more or less) eventually so you don't want to go nuts with them, but at the same time you want them to be a strong first impression. The new starter area planned should hopefully help in that regard.

Speaking of the skull system and "leaving things behind", something you might want to consider now, rather than when that hole is dug too deep to climb out, is putting reasons for powerful characters to stop back into 1 - 4 skull areas from time to time. Not sure if this is something that already exists to some degree that I haven't stumbled on yet, but content abandonment and becoming top-heavy are issues that tend to crop up when you gate areas like this later on in the games life as the majority of the community finds its way to the high end (skull 5) areas of the game. This leaves the rest of the world feeling fairly "barren" for newcomers. Additionally, you end up with the bulk of your community utilizing only a fraction of the overall developed content. This often leads to focusing development on that top half, making the first half of the game more or less a slog to meet up with the rest of the community/bulk of the content. You can see this in many of the more traditional vertical progression games like WoW etc where they go as far as to just catapult new players to max level to get around the issue which is the least elegant way of handling it I can imagine (as you're basically just saying goodbye to everything you've developed below max level). An ideal setup is a smooth gradient of difficulty levels with people of varying power/levels mingling between them for different reasons. In the past this was done by simply jamming low level and high level creatures in the same area but there are other ways to do it. Can't say if this is entirely applicable to how this game is laid out until I get further into it but it came to mind.