Soft Wipe for Episode #2 ? ?

@macnlos
And which "couple" of people should he choose for their feedback ?

 

The idea does seem like a throwback to the original single player Ultima series of games, such that you had to re-roll your new avatar with each new game. But even back then, you could import your previous character -- although it didn't transfer all stats over. In one aspect, I can see this proposal as along those lines and in principle I like it. You essentially will have a different character for each Episode but can transfer some things over.

But I can see how that would be problematic for those playing SotA as a persistent MMO vs. an episodic series of games in a shared universe.

So regarding one problem Chris was trying to solve: Ep2 (quest, content) balancing for players at Level 1 vs Level 100. The very same issue arose when they went persistent in 2016 yet launched in 2018. They didn't care if the main quest line and associated content was trivially easy to those already at a high level by the time the game officially launched. So what's prompting them to reverse that decision for Ep2 content? What lessons did they learn from Ep1 that is driving this?

Despite the controversy, I see the appeal in it. Then again, I could just use one of my character slots and effectively achieve the same result but that would be an opt-in thing. Given that they are discussing this as a potential strict requirement, I would like to know more about their thinking behind this.

What problems are they trying to solve? What were the lessons learned from Ep1 development? Are they fixing the root causes or will they just run into the same issues despite this Episode-specific character requirement?

Totally agreed. Whatever they do, the underlying quest tech should apply for the core (Ep1) game and not just specific Ep2 content. I would love to replay the entire Ep1 game again if they are truly revamping the entire questing experience.

 

Representation of the segments of your user base. If I was to dissect the SotA base, and this is off the cuff, I'd split it this way and want two participants from each of these segment:

Pro-Game - Adventurer
Neutral-Name - Adventurer
Critical-Game - Adventurer

Pro-Game - Crafter
Neutral-Name - Crafter
Critical-Game - Crafter

So that would 6-12 people. I would enlist under an NDA and reward them with something useful (COTOs, City Deed, etc). I only chose to break out Adventurer vs Crafter because this subject is most impactful to them. I would want feedback from the people that are very positive on the game (Pro), people that are on the fence (Neutral) and people who are playing but are critical of the game. You need to have the input from people across the spectrum.

As I said, that is off the cuff. But can you see that there is the basis for shaping the input and controlling the message?​

 

And BTW, this is also a great way to actually engage with the user community. Solicit their input, make them feel as a participant, reward them for their assistance. Imagine if they would have done this for the Duke - Backer - Custom Head Reward. They could have avoided that whole mess.

 

This concept has me very concerned because it was my understanding that this was a persistent and each episode would add addition land with a new but connected storyline.

They talked a lot about eventually adding boats to sail the world so how does that fit into all this as you leave Novia at seasoned player and arrive to a new continent as a new player. Makes no sense to me.

As far as the new story being too easy for such advanced players, who cares. I didn't do any of episode 1's until I was adventure level 80 which made it a cakewalk but I still enjoyed the stories that were told, so who cares if the story is too easy for veteran players. If a veteran player wants to start an alt for episode 2 they have that option, but forcing us to start over is ridiculous.

Novia was poorly designed as there are way too many low level zones. The zones look great but they need to be bumped up to higher levels as it is way too easy to level through tier 1,2, and 3 zones. There is hardly any variety in level 4 and 5 zones which makes grinding boring at high levels.

I am very supportive of this development team and I have enjoyed my time is SotA (over 3000 hours) but things like this start to make me question if they have a vision and roadmap or if they are just throwing spaghetti against a wall to see what will stick.

My financial contributions to this game will be one hold until there is more clarification on this.

 

What section do you put big $$ backers and SeedInvest backers and does their opinion equal a free to play player?

How many free to play players = Tazar’s Opinion? Out of courosity?

My point is it’s a tad more complicated.

 

When I say off the cuff, I mean off the cuff. I don't have any data in front of me, none. I can't tell you how many actual real users that play the game. I can't tell you what they do. I can't even tell you what they invested or spent. Asking me "what about so so" is completely unrealistic.

At this point it's trying to see how well and idea floats or not. After that is determined then you need to measure the impact across the user base. If it's something that sinks you financially then it isn't viable. This isn't an A-B-C thing, this is complicated. And I know it isn't as simple as Portalarium just treated it by cavalierly just announcing it on Saturday Morning like it was should I buy steak or chicken. Didn't you hear the surprise in the Woftam's and Justyn's responses? They were dumbfounded... and they are very Pro SotA!

 

Speaking as someone who put some in, but not nearly as much as Tazar or Winfield, but definitely more than most: That should be irrelevant. The depth of someone's monetary contribution should weigh exactly NOTHING compared to any other backer.

 

I'm hoping they find a better way to solve this problem.

Do other MMO's wipe the game when another land is discovered? I can't see this working as a norm.

 

True but the company has to pay bills and they have to attract people willing to invest. it does not have to a high dollar invester could be someone who buys pledges and bundles vrs people who don’t pay anything. Idk I’m just courious I’m wondering if revenue is a factor is all.

(Btw don’t get all fired up it was a real question about financing this type of project and I was genuinely courious).

Free to play don’t pay

 

I could see a temporary level cap being acceptable, if it came with a mechanic that allows you to remove the cap over time. Every x amount of xp earned doing ep2 content ups your cap by a level. Provided that the cap turns off when doing ep1 content. I wouldn't be happy about it, but with the steep curve in level gain after AL100, I don't see an easy way to make the content challenging yet acheivable .

Losing gear is a deal breaker, though. I spent a lot of gold and time and materials to make the so-so stuff I have. To need to grind away again to eventually get back to a point where I am then "allowed" to spend all that time and gold again? Nope, I'm done.

 

And no I’ve not seen anything or heard anything official just heard second hand what was posted in the blood bay channel.

I’d love to see a official response personally I think this is someone joke gone wrong

 

No fire... just tired.

 

Chris stated as much in the Ask Atos Anything he did on Saturday morning. It was no joke. Even the hosts questioned it, but he elaborated. I'm not sure you can get much more official than Chris.

 

Chris / Atos said talked about this on Saturday morning on that wake up early show at 6am CT. Here is an audio recording of it:



Go to 14:15 in the recording.

 

did not look very hard Did you but the original posts has ATOS, (that is Chris BTW) making those comments and later on another person posted the "Feed from the Ask Atos"

Sorry but I find it very interesting that on reply 152 you question this and have been in the "debate" since page two.

 

Like I said I first hear about this second hand on discord

I did ask for link on the other thread but didn’t get a tag, I will listen to the one just tagged to me though if ur so worried about it

And for the record I’m looking for a finalized post on the announcements.

 

and that alone tells you the difference between old day and NOW Ep 2 should not be a "New Game"f they want to do so then call it that a "new Game" figure out what imports and what doesn't.

HOWEVER since the Ep 1 world will still exist how do you co back and forth.

As it is on the surface this does not think create 5x more problems then anything it might fix.

Of course like other thread

ID the Problem (and in situation like this bring them to light)

Work on a Solution present it see if passes the smell test, and see if ti works.

Implement solution if it works AWSOME, if fails revert and go back to step 2.

We are LONG into a Persistent game witch will have 5 ep, you can not expect players to start a new char each time. Sorry not going to work.


Now if they can come up with a working methodology that can intergrade all players have earned and move forward sure.

However all that was presented was "Like Old" ne chars will have zero exp and just have 2x earning until you reach a level you have already obtained. No way you are going to keep player's if your idea s telling them they will have to spend 1/2 the time and effort they already did just to access what is new.

I am not the only one who is thinking along these lines and it is abundantly clear that this thought process needs to be wiped and a new idea formed,

I am sorry but this thread has reach well beyond maturity and the sides are clear;

Sycophants see all is well,
MOST agree this needs to go away and rethink from scratch.
Few see merit but also see problems with it that will be difficult to say the least.

Devs are circling the wagons to try and make it thru this alive.


Lock is in order TY all for trying to work the angle and present defenses for all sides.

 

Seriously? I'm going to stop replying to you now, I've got my 11 year old that I can converse with and have a better response. I expected more of you.

 

@Weins201

Ok listened to it still not a fan!

Even after hearing I’m still having a hard time believing this is a real idea.

 

I think its a better idea that constantly scaling up tier-levels per episode, until you get like tier 50 scenes, and you're essentially level-gating the world; obsoleting older continents to skilled players, while making new continents useless to new players.

However, its one of the very reasons I hated the whole overemphasis on level to begin with. The game would have be so much better if level didn't matter as much, and tactics > everything else. And game achievement would not be about grinding numbers up.