What's the point of enemies?

At this point of the developpment, I'd say it is still unclear whether the behaviour of the AI now is representative or not of its behaviour in the release, in episode 2 and so on...

I don't think Portalarium has the financial ability to developp something like big blue from scratch. However, they could plan to create NPC schedule for every zone they create/ have created. Technically, it should not be too difficult (they've already done that in ultima 7 as you said).

Nonetheless, I think it's a lot of work because it must implies to do it for every single NPC spawn with markers on points of interest (campfire, bedroll, cave for animals), pathfinding QA, triggers, proper animations and so on. The schedules should probably take death and respawn in account, someway. Also the schedules should include multiple alternative for ensuring NPC won't become predictable. Finally, as some NPC are attacking each other insight, dev should ensure that their schedule don't lead too often to situations where players simply loot dead warlike NPCs...

Sure, I hope they will improve that and make the game even more immersive but this a matter of priorities, probably.

 

It's like the difference between ESO and Skyrim. Superficially similar, but many who loved Skyrim cannot stomach ESO. However Bethesda was not trying to make a single game with dual playing modes, so they had the luxury of not trying very hard to cater to both audiences. Portalarium cannot avoid that particular tightrope, and it will be interesting to see the result.

 

From the looks and sound of it. Most of the major AI stuff for npc/mobs is coming later down the raod. Itll be piece by piece as they create the animations and rigging for them to do differnt tasks. But i cant imagine its higher on the list than our avatars animations and modeling and all that which is coming into play now.

But hey npc go and laydown now and so can we. which is one thing you had been asking for. its getting there.

 

Umm... No. It's a trend for MMOs, yes... but it was never MEANT to be this way.

It's really, REALLY hard to participate in a conversation like this when the OP has made it abundantly clear throughout the history of being in these forums that he/she has an agenda against MMOs and has delusions that single-player games are inherently superior by the mere fact that they're played offline.

There is no discussion here. The OP already has made his/her mind and feels like he/she needs to communicate something that the devs are already paying attention to (it's just not in the game yet). And he/she's doing it while waving a pretentious "single-player" banner.

@Lord_Darkmoon News flash: Skyrim NPCs don't provide anything that MMOs can't. Take a stroll in Skyrim beyond the villages and towns (where all the NPCs were carefully scripted with SPECIFIC routines) and you'll find generic animals and bandits that are just loitering for your amusement.

I get it that you want something more advanced, I really do. Who in these forums doesn't? However, if you think that single-player games are already doing it, then you need to look closer and update your repertoire of MMOs because your single-player games are no different than most modern MMOs.

... As far as enemies and how they inhabit their world is concerned.

Nor would it be a fair representation of the MMO genre if it failed to do so. And, contrary to the OP's beliefs, it certainly would not be "because MMOs".

 

Ahh this seems like a good post to express the relevant need for PVP.

As Ive mentioned before AI is weak, we can watch the enemies and learn their moves, "sneak past the enemy to get to the real point of the scene", because we know exactly what the NPC enemy will do, we know his every move! Sequence is the same all the time (welcome to AI!) even if the AI is random we can figure out where in the sequence the enemy NPC is.

Insert PVP, now we are talking, you have no idea what im doing, i might be leading you into a trap! I might be suckering you to a choke point! Why am i here, for any reason! I could be waiting for you? I could be looking for something special, i could be chilling with my friends, waiting for you to attack and meet your demise, or i could plain out be chasing you down to kill you! Maybe one of my friends was killed by you and now its time to pay the price? Maybe im here NOT to attack you, but to heal you when the group of PVPrs are hunting you down, maybe im just a random healer, helping you when you need it? Maybe there are too many PVP here for me to kill, and im waiting for someone like you to come in and team up with!? Maybe im not the sheep hunter, but the wolf in sheep's clothing waiting for the Hunter to come along and destroy him.

Notice no AI, just what i want to do! It could be beneficial to you or non beneficial, depending on my mood at this given second or your standings with me? You'll never be able to figure out my MO! so you never know what is in store for you good or bad. I can be helpful or hurtful! Enter PVP now you never know!

 

I don't think that SP games are superior to MMORPGs, I think that they are very different. And I think that we see more and more of those differences now that the game gets closer to "release".
You can't deny that there are differences. Sure an MMO can be very close to a SP game but nearly all of them are not, simply because MMO players expect different things from a MMO - and this is totally fine.
For me the problem is bringing those things that make both genres unique together and I simpy cannot see it yet. I simply cannot see yet how those features that are different can work together.
How do I know that there are differences? Aside from seeing them in the game, you just need to mention the word "immersion" here on the forums. Most MMO fans will make fun out of the person mentioning the word. Immersion is something that is important for a story-driven game that wants to create a simulated world. Monsters that respawn out of thin are are not very immersive. Enemies wandering around in circles waiting to get killed are not very immersive. Repeatable quests or constantly respawning bosses are not very immersive. Those things don't support a simulated world. But MMO fans don't care about those things as they expect something else from an MMORPG. Immersion is not a priority. But it is with a single player RPG. As SotA wants to be both this creates a conflict. How immersive can the game be without alienating the MMO fans?
Not all single player games have schedules or interesting behaviour for monsters/enemies but they at least try to give the impression that enemies are not just cannonfodder. In MMOs it is extremely obvious by how enemies behave and are placed in the world that they are just waiting to be killed. For MMO fans this may be ok but someone who expects a single player experience will notice this immediately.
This does not mean that SP games are superior to MMORPGs but simply that they are very different and that it won't work in a SP game to have MMO enemy behaviour.

 

I feel all this is being discussed in a confusing way. Some justify the way enemies are displayed because it's as it should be, and the conversation drifts towards the single player experience. Why should we accept that in the multiplayer online part enemies should be standing xp bags? What's wrong in wanting a more organic experience in the scenes, and move the grinding to the overworld map via roving encounters?

Ludwig makes the real point. That's not the problem, that's the perspective we should take. So i wonder again... Assuming the devs take their time and effort to develop more organic behaviors in NPCs... why they belong only to Single Player Offline?

It just creates a conflict if you keep the first statement as an undeniable truth. SP and MMOs have been different until now... but do they really need to be that different? it's obligatory? Let's forget about differences, and focus on the similarities. Let's put the RPG back in MMORPG. Because the way SotA works (multiple playing modes available with scaled scenes accesible from an overworld map) I'm sure we can have an immersive, organic world without taking away the MMO part and, in fact, offer a fresh and different experience (what the clone market actually needs).

The problem here is not in the how, but in the when. This is an iterative process and (of course) having the game working properly is more important that introducing elements that favor immersion, mostly because the game not working properly is unimmersive per se. Recently i reported a bug where i suffered damage after dodging. So... the game tells me i dodged but i receive a hit! how is that possible? Did the attack ricochet back to me? So it's not only unimmersive, but it's also unfair. So there's a priority.

As i stated in my previous post, i think when roving monsters are in and random encounters are expanded it's a good moment to start creating a foundation that can be further expanded over time, to end up having a truly immersive experience both in multiplayer and single player. Because i'm here to bring those two experiences together, no to keep them apart.

Actually it does! but i miss the wolves on the right, and the undead at the left... maybe there are some spiders on those trees behind them?

 

@KuBaTRiZeS Thank you. You've managed to put in a far less aggressive tone to things that I've been arguing and trying to say ever since I joined these forums. Well said!

Tabula Rasa (A Richard Garriott game, by the way) is an MMO that had enemies respawn by having spaceships coming down from the sky and have the aliens drop out in combat zones. Richard Garriott games have always been focused on the "immersive" aspect of the medium and I know you know the Ultima series so I don't understand how you see Shroud and not think that the dev team isn't already painfully aware of the current shortcomings currently featured in the pre-alpha.

What annoys me is that you see things like "loitering enemies" and "repeatable quests" as a de-facto description of the MMO genre when it clearly isn't.

I really want to know where you got the idea that stupid things like "loitering enemies that respawn out of thin air" and "repeatable quests" are even required or wanted in an MMO? There's a reason why people think the MMO is dying; it's because NONE of us want the things you associate MMOs with in their MMOs.

You should definitely play the original GuildWars (or do extensive research on it, at the very least). It'll open your eyes as to what MMOs can do... weird things like perma-death sidequest-NPCs. None of the enemies respawn at all.

Where I think people could make fun of (and this is slightly off topic) is that you also have to understand that this is a video game; no one cares how immersive a game can be if it isn't any fun.

What? Like Zelda? Dark Souls? Dragon Age? Baldur's Gate? The Witcher? Ultima? Help me out, here. None of them do what you describe and/or do what decent MMOs don't already do.

You're right about one thing: Game-play is priority.... or should be in any case! To say that "MMO fans don't care about X or Y" is practically putting words into their mouths, especially if you're not part of that crowd. It's a very "us vs them" attitude to have.

I'm a huge, HUGE fan of MMOs... and none of my MMO friends wants what you claim we want. So where do you get that idea? I LOVE the Elder Scrolls Series btw, I pretty much dedicate a Youtube channel on Morrowind and Skyrim and I can very confidently go point by point as to how Skyrim isn't that much different and could work as an MMO with little to no "design" changes (Elder Scrolls Online, btw, is not the solution despite my enjoyment playing it).

 

For all your repeated ranting that online is inherently bad and you can't have a good story experience in online, I think this thread is an example of where online games can shine.

Computer games are very limited in what enemies can do because AI is limited and very difficult. The enemies in a game like Dragon Age: Inquisition have better combat tactics than this game, because they've had lots more money and time to work on combat AI. But even one of the most expensive single player games like that have enemies just standing there like idiots most of the time until you walk close enough to draw aggro. Overall they are idiots and serve no purpose other than to initiate combat, give you XP and drop loot.

Players almost always provide a far greater challenge in combat and story. Human controlled interactions can be much more meaningful, whether they are roleplaying a character concept or not.

If you want a real enemy and a real antagonist that does more than act like an idiot mob, players can provide that.

 

It would also help the discussion if we'd stop comparing the entirety of the single-player games to mostly a single MMO from 2004... made by a company that is known for simplifying things for the sake of fine-tuned/calculated game-play. So as popular as it was back in the day, even then it was considered shallow for its time. An MMO who's qualities evaporated since 2008, I might add.

 

welllllll.... aaaaaactually....

He kinda did.

 

I wonder...If NPCs have schedules, then which time would they be set to? The NPC's world or the Avatar's? If set to Novia time then would they rush about going to and from home/work/post many time an hour? If I remember right they would celebrate a new year every two of our weeks.

 

This thread hits the nail on the head. By seeking to cater to as wide an audience as possible, the driving forces that make online games fun like goal attainment and PvP have been pretty much discarded or cheaply capitalized, leaving what seems to be a pretty mediocre experience. By trying to make a multiplayer game at all, a lot of coding time has been devoted to it, thus taking away from what could have been a focused single player experience like Dragon Age. At the end of the day I fear neither will be done well.

Episode 1 better be pretty amazing or I fear this game will go down as a cautionary tale in how not to make a game.

 

You should not fear. Fear is the mind-killer.

 

Dragon Age Inquisition had a massive budget and years of development. And it still has all the NPC enemy mob flaws discussed here. I don't see how a primary single player focus magically eliminates these issues that pretty much every game on the planet has.

 

Well you are thinking too much about AI and less about deliberately constructed and path focused scenes, which make up for in a big way the AI challenges. In fact AI is almost a moot point.

 

This thread is yuckville.

@Lord_Darkmoon

I think its been clearly stated that enemy spawning and AI will be different in SP. And will come later down the line. its in the notes even. So cool your tots.

 

~Great Balls of Fire!~
No @Leostorm ! I won't cool my tots! I like my tots to keep nice and hot, the way they should be !
Many great ideas have come from such spirited debate which have resulted in many great things within our game.
Our game isn't even a booger yet. It's more like that stuff that just get's you finger sticky

"There's nothing in our game solid enough to be flicked out into the universe yet"
~Time Lord~

 

But that was what was brought up in this thread.

DA:I won all these game of the year awards and was called one of the biggest and best single player RPGs in years.

It had clusters of random mobs just standing around, waiting to be killed, just so they could respawn later. Pretending that this issue only occurs in online games is a bit odd.

 

@Time Lord
Im well aware of this. But snarky doomsday talk isnt productive.
Now if this OP and thread had been about what AI functions wed like to see then wed all be happy to chime in on what we think is needed in a little less hostile manner.