Thoughts On State of SOTA

Hey guys, so this is a collection of my thoughts on the current development and progress/plans for what is SOTA. Thoughts, suggestions, complaints. Bit of everything, with a lot being the general feeling from myself as well as some of the people I play with.

Know in advance that this is going to be a very long post, covering a lot of issues.

I decided NOT to break it into different threads, as most of the topics have already been debated or argued over by the masses in one form or another. Unfortunately this often leads to the actual original point of the posts getting ignored, or swamped out (and quite often by non factual statements or un supported opinions). So take the post as you would like.

Today's take on SOTA -

I want to start off by stating that I am a huge fan of the game. I've clocked in close to 900 hours since persistence, and I've invested in the idea that this game is going to be relatively successful. I regularly play with my brother, and friends both I've known all my life, and some that have spanned strictly across several games. Most of us ( myself less then most) have invested a ton of money into this game, from basic store purchases right up to a purchase of a POT. So i make a lot of statements that i DO have game time put in to make them.

I am confident in the dev's team to create and sustain a successful game. They have proven that they DO listen to the community which is both a good thing and a bad thing. They have shown they want to tackle a LOT of play styles and game types with SOTA which is ambitious but not a bad thing. I've been vocal about my confidence in them up to this point. And while i feel they have cut a lot of corners, i understand that a lot of whats been cut is to get them further down the road, so they can come back and reinforce or add things later. That all being said -

My confidence took a massive hit with the state of the game the last 2 weeks. And I understand that coding, updating, patching, performance and all that is a complicated process. But i cannot wrap my head around the decision to leave a broken patch in place through, A - The holidays that a ton of people had time off to spend on SOTA, and B- Right after (im assuming an approval) for a steam sale. I do not / have not seen a reason they didn't revert back to an old patch, before leaving for 2 weeks. The state of the game (still currently today) has left, id argue 1/2 the players in one form or another experiencing pretty ridiculous issues.

If it was just crashing issues, then fine. But inability to even load zones. Inability to PLAY 1 of the 3 base styles of play ( Archer , mage , fighter ) and inability to do much that isn't Solo.
A quick look at bug forums, or playing in MMO mode will show you some of the issues that were left in play. Myself, someone who usually plays a few hours a day, or a lot of hours every other day, simply didn't log in more then 20 minutes since the patch it was left on.

*Blight this is an alpha/beta * -
SoTa is well past the point that bugs making the game unplayable in one form or another, should be left for more then a day or 2. The point in development that the game is at, the amount of funding, and the proximity to the real release date all should point out how simply .. *not cool * this is. Leaving these issues UNANSWERED in the public forums on top of this, is just as bad.
A simple * Sorry folks we broke something with that last update, a fix is coming in a day or 2 after our guys get back is set! * would do a lot. But nope. During prime time of a Steam sale, and one of the big holiday stretches where everyone has free time, the game basically got shoved to the side to play other things. This is bad for not only the developers, but the players that have invested time and money with the impression this game is on the right path to a successful future.

Steam reviews - The timing of this falls in with what whats a pretty disgusting issue. The previous reviews for SOTA on steam were awful, and well within their rights to be. The state of the game now is leaps and bounds past where it was when a lot of those reviews came out. This sale was the first real step to put a nice positive dent into those reviews that will directly effect the success of the release of the game. My own personal take on this, was that it was damaging. I had 2 friends buy it simply because of the sale. And then realize about 1-2 hours in that if they were duo ing or running all 3 of us, the game was so out of sync, they basically put it down. We played something else, and i dont expect them to come back. How many other identical cases were like this? How many spent even less time because they didn't have a Blight telling them to give it a chance, only to not have a real defense for the state it was in? So really. Why was it put on sale in the first place? The dev's have stated that they had no intention of advertising the game til more of the kinks were worked out. Which i agree with. Doing so early, causes bad reviews, making a successful release harder. No?
This makes me think that the player base has taken quite a hit over the last little while, and that maybe the new players coming in arnt staying enough to keep the testing community to a satisfied level. This brings me to my next point of interest.

The difficulty of starting in SOTA --
ORC has done a ton of recruiting lately. And a large part of this was due to our original player base hitting end game and getting a little bored. This lead to bringing in more ORC players from other games, who ended up bringing in a lot of new players. This has shown a few glaring issues for some of the population issues i find in SOTA to be related to the sheer .. id say difficulty, but its more of a ... vagueness. I say this in the sense that nothing in SOTA is overly difficult, but more of a pain to find the mechanics.
One of the massive issues is the tutorial. Its no secret on the forums, or to 1/3 new people you ask, the tutorial is very, very frustrating. Ive lost players due to the sheer frustration of the mechanics of the tutorial.
Im beginning to think a better tutorial .. or should i say.. new user friendly ( as im sure going back and making a new character id find it easy and good).. is pretty unrealistic to ask for at this point.
I recommend adding a simple *starting help* popup box under the window selector. Make it come up at the start, and able to be re opened on request just like *titles*.
This box could be a simple tips/short mechanics explanation. Simple things like.
*Hit Tab to activate courser mode!*
*Hospitaller are people willing to help! Don't be shy to ask!*
*Click or type the underlined dialogue selection to advance a conversation!*
*The pikes outside of zones show the difficulty in skulls 1-5!*
*Exp is accumulated upon kills, and skills only go up upon use!*
*Trying to do every skill becomes demanding quickly! Choose wisely!*
*Buy new crafting recipes at the associated NPC!*
etc etc
The loading tips were the first real good step I've seen in the last few months. But can take it a step further with VERY little work for adding this, and even if it saves 5 players, it was worth your time.

EDIT - Ive been told you get a starting hand book with a lot of this type of info in this? Might need to either add a notice or a pop up as 90% of the people we just talked to were like??? What there's a starting handbook?!!?


I really do think the idea of not having a new person starter guild was a mistake. We've taken in numerous players that i assure you wouldn't have played past the 3rd day if we hadn't have picked them up from sheer frustration/the boring this game is solo (i understand there are some that enjoy it, but id argue the majority doesn't).
This really, really needs to be looked at again.
That being said, i don't believe the cost of starting is absolutely terrible. Our new guys don't have many issues once they have a little guidance.

Lastly regarding this, the Translated Names in World Map option needs to be default. This is another step your forcing people to do that just adds frustration, and is a simple fix to make it new player friendlier. I weigh the reduction of frustration over the *immersion break* as acceptable for people turning it off, instead of having to turn it on.

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Lack of Story / Quests -
This is actually an easy one for me.
Im confident in the sheer ability of Tracy and RG to provide an adequate story. I feel there are a ton of base towns and history in place and planned for the single player to be meaningful.
I do think that if your hoping for this game to be as for filling in solo play as Skyrim or another purely single player, story driven game, you will find that the compromises they make to incorporate MMO will cause issues. That being said i fully believe they can deliver a successful and exciting story. I really do wish they would elaborate a little more on the plans in this regard.
I also have a lot of respect for the community that is already in place working to create events and such. And i expect that to continue as long as the game keeps rolling, so that definitely helps.

PVP ----
Ahh PvP..
IMO what should be the main goal of the *End Game Combat* in SOTA. Lets be realistic, once you've killed the end game bosses a few times.. what else is there to do? Sure decorating. Housing, RP stuff and all that is good endgame as well. But any and most competitive players will look at PvP as the end game goal.

Now i love the open world PVP concept. I really do. And it's a good filler until more.. and i hate everyone calling it *meaningful pvp*. Myself, that means * Goal Orientated PvP *. I really don't know what their plans are for shard falls. Right now they are kinda of pointless, as the flag can be activated anywhere. I'm hoping they have some long term plans to make shard falls fun and have the PVP focused in them. That being said, i'm yet to see any real plans in incorporating them.
They really need to add some kinda goal to it. There are so many good ideas floating around from keep captures ( team based ) to factions.. etc etc.


Now to deal with more ... present issues in PVP.
I propose 3 changes that i think will help hold it over until they add Goal orientated PVP.

1 - The simpler of the matter, reduce Player to Player damage.
2 - Add that simple bounty system i talked about before.
3 - Fix the CC resists being broken.

1 - Elaborating -
Anyone that's participating in PVP realizes that it gets a little longer fights as you get going, but compared to most RPG games, the actual fights are very short. Especially group fights. IMO this eliminates a lot of the strategy, deck building and team synergy that could be in this PVP game. Right now, with the popular setups, a proper duo an drop just about anyone in under 3 seconds. Now, im all for ganking, ambushing and such, but even if you duel someone 1v1, the fights really dont take long (if you have a character designed specifically to kill someone as quick as possible). I think that by reducing player to player damage, even by something like 20% overall, it will make better more exciting and memorable fights. It will make deck setup, and synergy between you and your group more important then getting the first skill off, while not eliminating the advantage this adds.

My only concern with this change, is the availability of so many escape skills. Such as sprint and dash, too many fights might end because people simply run away non stop.

Another proposal to counter this might be to add a movement decrease after a certain damage % ? Or the inability to Spring/Dash when your health is below 50% for example.

2 - The bounty system i was talking about earlier was as follows.
Lets say you have 5 armor pieces on you, and 5 garbage pieces in your backpack. Right now it would be about 10% for you to have a specific armor piece come up for ransom. I propose a simple change to keep the open PVP concept fresh. I propose every consecutive kill you get increases the chance of you dropping something actually equipped.
So lets say i have a 10% chance to drop my shield. After my first kill, the chance for me have the shield go up on ransom goes up to 12%. Then 14%.. then 16%.
I also propose under the GM amount when clicked on someone there be a skull with their current consecutive kill count.

This does 2 things. This adds some sort of small yet non abuse able reward to ending someones Kill-streak. Yet allows PVP'ers to have a simple bragging rights tag as well.

The way i see it, if you were to add any kind of outside bonuses to kills, you can abuse it with friends. This might stimulate a little more bounty hunting, while adding some *bragging rights* for the higher end guys.
Then you get someone like Vallo Frostbane who lets say is 50x kills in. He basically has a 95% chance of when you kill him, to drop something actually semi valuable (something actually equipped) Because lets be honest. The ransom currently is ignoble, but not only that its completely easy to bypass.
I think this is a VERY simple add on to make things a little more fun.

(That being said, i understand this is again, able to bypass it by letting friends kill you and never going on a streak. But i think every death should be a solid 50% chance of currently equipped item or non equipped backpack item. And that this current system so broken and easily bypassed its a joke. Im not a fan of full loot deaths, but i shouldn't be able to ensure i NEVER loose something im wearing. Make it 50% for equipped or non equipped. Simple. )

I know this sounds like a penalty to someone who is doing well, but im sure someone whose getting 3-5-10 kills with no deaths, can handle might actually having to pay for something on death, aswell as they will appreciate the competition of racking up consecutive kills.
This also repels, yet doesn't prevent someone from killing new people. I think its a win win win.

3 - Simply look into some of the threads about the CC resist, and durations being easily abused and broken.
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This turned into a longer post then intended, so im going to refrain from elaborating on Crafting, and the current state of the economy for now.


All in all, other then this lapse with the broken Sync / ranged issues, i think the devs have done a pretty good job. I also understand and can see that any and every change thats been made has backlash from 1 party or another, and i imagine its tough.

With that! Keep at it team, you guys have a LOT of stuff to get to this year, but if you stay focused i think you guys can accomplish the majority of what you've set out to do, and end with a solid enough foundation you can elaborate on it to continue a successful push.


Edit - I have some thread links to add for references.

 

One thing i want to add that i forgot about.
Is Polar should seriously consider a *Compensate for holiday frustration* gift out to the current players.
A free coto, or 3 or something for everyone across the board, to make up for the frustration cause over the last few weeks?

IMO i dont need them, but i honestly think it would be a nice gesture, especially to show the new people you attracted with steam sale, that fixing and success of the game is your main focus. Little gesture might go a long, long way towards those that havnt quit yet, and the groups of friends that joined up together and are dealing with the sync and broken ranged, issues.