If you have an actual valid post of merit, feel free to make it. Meanwhile what I've described are the actual undeniable factors involved in combat, and calling them "dumb" doesn't change that.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
There are two main reasons why MMO's (not in every MMO) have faster combat encounters and not the more difficult and longer challenges like in Dark Souls.
1. Many MMO's design is all about character progression and for some (imo outdated and stupid) reason, there is this idea that a character is not complete before it reaches max lvl.During a large part of the levelling journey, combat feels very bland because of this. Especially in tab based MMO's.
2. The combat system in many MMO's is just too simple and repetitive to remain fun in longer trash fights. In most cases it doesn't leave many options for tactics, beyond pulling more mobs then wanted. Levelling is often done solo, for which the trinity system is a bad design too. If your class can't spec dps, you would have a snorefest in long lasting fights.
The moment you leave levels and vertical gear prog. out of a MMO, or make them less meaningless, people tend to get confused and start to rage about how it is not even a MMO or asking what is the point to play? There is a group of players that just craves the quest checklist , achievements, arbitrary levels and vertical gear progression. Especially this lvl and gear progression turns most of the content into trash in terms of difficulty. This design always ends up having very easy combat and group content with easy to write guides.
TL;DR OP doesn't seem to realise that there is a large group of players really not interested in Dark Souls kind of combat.
Dark Souls was only used in the comparison for the purpose saying combat and preparing for combat is the number one essential for almost all video games. Obliviously you have other games like Sims and such, but mmos are based around combat.
Dark Souls is based on very hard combat, I'm definitely not saying mmos should be as such. But take combat away from Dark Souls and you have a weak shell, of basically nothing.....This is the reason I used Dark Souls ( just an extreme example ). If you take away the medium combat of an mmo, again you have a weak shell.
As for #1 - If developers are doing their job on a good quality mmo level progression should be fun and a journey. If anyone has a better idea, I'm sure everyone would like to know, but as it stands now level progression is still the best solution.
As for #2 - Many older mmos had very good combat. Tanks relied on armor, Healers relied on healing, Casters relied on kiting, Hunters and Rangers relied on snares and traps. And Fighters relied on speed. The possibilities are endless, and even today this can be improved. This NEVER REALLY GOT OLD, developers decided to take it away with easy ( nothing matters ).
Old MMO's didn't have good combat. It was slow archaic tank, spank and very obvious utility according a pattern that never changes. The depth was in meta knowledge. Not in combat itself. Most alternative approaches for encounters were about exploits or other unintended(by devs) behaviour. Not by design anyway. Only people who maybe never played other games before (insert EQ/SWG age MMO) might claim that was good combat. Old MMO combat would never survive in this day beyond being niche. Even MMO's have now become faster paced. It was all designed to slow you down and make you sub longer. As game they were not good. Just new (I fell for it too, but lack the rose coloured glasses I guess).
Combat has never been the focus in MMO's until recently. And even now it is still some weak diluted version of great combat games like Dark Souls. And this is because a MMO has to cater to the lowest common denominator. Bad players that just want to play a MMO for more reasons then just combat.
I agree with your comment on #1 though. But the devs still don't do it. It is still not about the journey (even though they sometimes even claim it), but about becoming max lvl. In design, and in player behaviour. Even a heavy story based MMO like SWTOR, which tries to make the story interesting from start to end, has poor character design for this purpose. You start with such boring and badly balanced combat at the first half amount of lvls (vanilla). While the story tries to slow you down so you are able to enjoy it, the poor early combat makes it tough to also do that.
But I am also someone who thinks that lvl and gear based progression simply makes it very difficult to make the journey and combat at low lvl interesting. Devs realise that its done once and then people stay at max lvl a lot longer. So most balance and combat is focussed at max lvl. And a lot of players want to feel superpowerful vs old mobs. This is what turns combat in most MMO's into trash. Just look at the recent changes in WoW. Pruned even more abilities and after 100 dings you have a handful of tab based abilities with no diversity.
They literally give you 12 skills to choose from at a time during combat. I think there is a potion bar to boot (which of course there are many potions in WoW) Every encounter is insanely more simple in that game.
I agree with basically your entire post, but it's misleading to focus too much on skill count.
Keep in mind there are only about 9 things you can do in chess. 9 'skills', essentially. (each piece type's unique movement, plus castling, en passant, and promotion)
Games like TF2/Overwatch similarly provide very few skills per character, but it's the nuance in how those skills can be used and how they interact with other skills that gives each game its depth.
So even though you're right about ESO, it's not skill count but a lack of nuance that causes the lack of depth.
Post edited by Axehilt on
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
There are two main reasons why MMO's (not in every MMO) have faster combat encounters and not the more difficult and longer challenges like in Dark Souls.
1. Many MMO's design is all about character progression and for some (imo outdated and stupid) reason, there is this idea that a character is not complete before it reaches max lvl.During a large part of the levelling journey, combat feels very bland because of this. Especially in tab based MMO's.
2. The combat system in many MMO's is just too simple and repetitive to remain fun in longer trash fights. In most cases it doesn't leave many options for tactics, beyond pulling more mobs then wanted. Levelling is often done solo, for which the trinity system is a bad design too. If your class can't spec dps, you would have a snorefest in long lasting fights.
The moment you leave levels and vertical gear prog. out of a MMO, or make them less meaningless, people tend to get confused and start to rage about how it is not even a MMO or asking what is the point to play? There is a group of players that just craves the quest checklist , achievements, arbitrary levels and vertical gear progression. Especially this lvl and gear progression turns most of the content into trash in terms of difficulty. This design always ends up having very easy combat and group content with easy to write guides.
TL;DR OP doesn't seem to realise that there is a large group of players really not interested in Dark Souls kind of combat.
Dark Souls was only used in the comparison for the purpose saying combat and preparing for combat is the number one essential for almost all video games. Obliviously you have other games like Sims and such, but mmos are based around combat.
Dark Souls is based on very hard combat, I'm definitely not saying mmos should be as such. But take combat away from Dark Souls and you have a weak shell, of basically nothing.....This is the reason I used Dark Souls ( just an extreme example ). If you take away the medium combat of an mmo, again you have a weak shell.
As for #1 - If developers are doing their job on a good quality mmo level progression should be fun and a journey. If anyone has a better idea, I'm sure everyone would like to know, but as it stands now level progression is still the best solution.
As for #2 - Many older mmos had very good combat. Tanks relied on armor, Healers relied on healing, Casters relied on kiting, Hunters and Rangers relied on snares and traps. And Fighters relied on speed. The possibilities are endless, and even today this can be improved. This NEVER REALLY GOT OLD, developers decided to take it away with easy ( nothing matters ).
Old MMO's didn't have good combat. It was slow archaic tank, spank and very obvious utility according a pattern that never changes. The depth was in meta knowledge. Not in combat itself. Most alternative approaches for encounters were about exploits or other unintended(by devs) behaviour. Not by design anyway. Only people who maybe never played other games before (insert EQ/SWG age MMO) might claim that was good combat. Old MMO combat would never survive in this day beyond being niche. Even MMO's have now become faster paced. It was all designed to slow you down and make you sub longer. As game they were not good. Just new (I fell for it too, but lack the rose coloured glasses I guess).
Combat has never been the focus in MMO's until recently. And even now it is still some weak diluted version of great combat games like Dark Souls. And this is because a MMO has to cater to the lowest common denominator. Bad players that just want to play a MMO for more reasons then just combat.
I agree with your comment on #1 though. But the devs still don't do it. It is still not about the journey (even though they sometimes even claim it), but about becoming max lvl. In design, and in player behaviour. Even a heavy story based MMO like SWTOR, which tries to make the story interesting from start to end, has poor character design for this purpose. You start with such boring and badly balanced combat at the first half amount of lvls (vanilla). While the story tries to slow you down so you are able to enjoy it, the poor early combat makes it tough to also do that.
But I am also someone who thinks that lvl and gear based progression simply makes it very difficult to make the journey and combat at low lvl interesting. Devs realise that its done once and then people stay at max lvl a lot longer. So most balance and combat is focussed at max lvl. And a lot of players want to feel superpowerful vs old mobs. This is what turns combat in most MMO's into trash. Just look at the recent changes in WoW. Pruned even more abilities and after 100 dings you have a handful of tab based abilities with no diversity.
I can't argue most you say, in fact I agree. However Old combat did have good combat.
Vanilla WoW for example, trying to figure out how to get that chest from the Merlocs on the beach if your all alone. Every class could do this, yet every class had to do it differently.
Or better yet, group play like Scarlet Monastery, If played right this could be easy, randomly going in and blasting everything gets groups killed. Stubborn casters that would draw groups to them ended up in group wipes. Instead all you had to do is go around a corner and the caster will follow.
Comments
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Combat has never been the focus in MMO's until recently. And even now it is still some weak diluted version of great combat games like Dark Souls. And this is because a MMO has to cater to the lowest common denominator. Bad players that just want to play a MMO for more reasons then just combat.
I agree with your comment on #1 though. But the devs still don't do it. It is still not about the journey (even though they sometimes even claim it), but about becoming max lvl. In design, and in player behaviour. Even a heavy story based MMO like SWTOR, which tries to make the story interesting from start to end, has poor character design for this purpose. You start with such boring and badly balanced combat at the first half amount of lvls (vanilla). While the story tries to slow you down so you are able to enjoy it, the poor early combat makes it tough to also do that.
But I am also someone who thinks that lvl and gear based progression simply makes it very difficult to make the journey and combat at low lvl interesting. Devs realise that its done once and then people stay at max lvl a lot longer. So most balance and combat is focussed at max lvl. And a lot of players want to feel superpowerful vs old mobs. This is what turns combat in most MMO's into trash. Just look at the recent changes in WoW. Pruned even more abilities and after 100 dings you have a handful of tab based abilities with no diversity.
Keep in mind there are only about 9 things you can do in chess. 9 'skills', essentially. (each piece type's unique movement, plus castling, en passant, and promotion)
Games like TF2/Overwatch similarly provide very few skills per character, but it's the nuance in how those skills can be used and how they interact with other skills that gives each game its depth.
So even though you're right about ESO, it's not skill count but a lack of nuance that causes the lack of depth.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I can't argue most you say, in fact I agree. However Old combat did have good combat.
Vanilla WoW for example, trying to figure out how to get that chest from the Merlocs on the beach if your all alone. Every class could do this, yet every class had to do it differently.
Or better yet, group play like Scarlet Monastery, If played right this could be easy, randomly going in and blasting everything gets groups killed. Stubborn casters that would draw groups to them ended up in group wipes. Instead all you had to do is go around a corner and the caster will follow.
Very tactical