The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
What would you consider a better system?
To me simply untying it from the monetization scheme would be fine.
Alternately, maybe something like Shadowbane (but much improved). In Shadowbane you needed to find rare runestones to learn certain skills. Done properly this would let you REALLY control the rarity of talents/magic in the world, and it would be untied from the monetization scheme.
There would be no grinding.. these would be ultra-rare (or whatever frequency was desired for each skill) BOP type drops or item spawns that were consumed on use. The player would simply have the ability to consume it or destroy it. Once consumed they would open the talent or skill line etc...
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
What would you consider a better system?
Charging a subscription. No alpha classes and no rng lockboxes. If you want to make magic rare make a long epic quest to learn it, or for healing powers a epic quest to be granted the powers. Randomize the quests to avoid spoilers. Heck even a rare drop book to learn stuff would be better. GM created disciples. Random NPC's who will only take on one student.
Even if you don't want to have a subscription, do cosmetics or something else, RNG lockbox alpha class is just a recipe for fail.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
What would you consider a better system?
It's not his job to consider a better system.
Well imho just not having both of those is a better system.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
What would you consider a better system?
To me simply untying it from the monetization scheme would be fine.
Alternately, maybe something like Shadowbane (but much improved). In Shadowbane you needed to find rare runestones to learn certain skills. Done properly this would let you REALLY control the rarity of talents/magic in the world, and it would be untied from the monetization scheme.
There would be no grinding.. these would be ultra-rare (or whatever frequency was desired for each skill) BOP type drops or item spawns that were consumed on use. The player would simply have the ability to consume it or destroy it. Once consumed they would open the talent or skill line etc...
That works.
Also runestones were awesome, werebears represent!
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
What would you consider a better system?
It's not his job to consider a better system.
I was just simply curious what he thought a better system would be. That's all. I'm not saying it's his job.
Help me Bioware, you're my only hope.
Is ToR going to be good? Dude it's Bioware making a freaking star wars game, all signs point to awesome. -G4tv MMo report.
This is just IMO but when something is rare and powerful it becomes a game changer. Putting things like that in the game can be fun depending on the gap it makes between the average Joe and the hard core gamer. But when something can be gained like that with cash that's where my objection becomes strong. That's what this looks like. Buy a bunch of souls, 4-5% chance means about 20 souls to get something epic. This is where it becomes IMO no longer a game, but a vending machine to become top dog. That's bad game design and I hope this is not what this is.
Love the heading for Magic. So on char creation you have a 5% chance you can roll a magic user when thats added to the game. Sorry if I wanna roll a healer or a wizard, I dont want a 5% chance the soul I bought will be able to do what I want.
And I can understand that. However there is certainly no shortage of other MMOs where you can go out and create a character with exactly those freedoms.
So you like the idea of not picking what your char is skilled at? Decide you want to roll a 2h sword warrior to find out its good at magic. Or you want to roll a bard to find out its skilled at farming. Or that you decide to play that warrior anyways knowing that facing someone who has that boost to using swords, you just wont stand up as good as them in combat, thats something you like?
This is the attitude that I just can't wrap my head around. I am perfectly willing to play a game by its rules. If I jump on and after a while find that it sucks I may complain and leave, but I don't understand the idea that because things will happen randomly and not in my 100% control I just can't do it.
Man people, loosen up your grip on the stick a bit.
I get that the 40 dollars or whatever is a serious investment that you must spend months contemplating and fussing about. Should I do it? What if it isn't any good? You call your lawyer, talk to your financial adviser. Then you go and speak with your spiritual leader in the community if you have one: Father/Rabi/Imam/Pastor/High Wizard/Guru/Monk Should I do this?
Because the stakes are high. If you give them the money you may not be able to get it back. At some point you may realize that you gave money to the evil free to play world government, and have in fact damaged freedom.
You start drinking, lose your job, and eventually your family. The hard drugs come next and you find yourself trading sexual acts for that next hit, just trying to not feel terrible.
And it was all because you bought a game that took your control, and asked the amount of money you would spend on a pair of shorts and a few t-shirts.
MMORPG players are often like Hobbits: They don't like Adventures
The "souls" are like lock boxes in other games. You get 3 to choose from with your initial spark. 5% chance at magic means the power games will be "re-rolling" to unlock. This means more revenue for the company. At least that's the theory.
That seams horrible to me at least in SWG the Jedi alpha class had to be unlocked and you couldn't pay for a chance at it. I guess Pay 2 King is going to be Pay 2 Magic as well.
To be "fair" there were plenty of people buying their way to Jedi back then, such accounts were in high demand on "gray" market sites. They sold for extraordinarily high prices for the times.
If the devs aren't selling such things, someone would be. IN the end it's a matter of who profits, the devs or gray market sellers. Because either way someone will be buying their way to the top.
Why not just design a better system?
Alpha classes with RNG lockbox monetization sounds like crap to me. I could be way off base and it's just speculation, but that's what this 5% special powers on a soul thing comes across as.
What would you consider a better system?
It's not his job to consider a better system.
I was just simply curious what he thought a better system would be. That's all. I'm not saying it's his job.
Allow me to expound. I don't have a better suggestion. I don't have a better idea. I don't have a better solution or system. I don't need them to say something smells fishy about this.
Love the heading for Magic. So on char creation you have a 5% chance you can roll a magic user when thats added to the game. Sorry if I wanna roll a healer or a wizard, I dont want a 5% chance the soul I bought will be able to do what I want.
And I can understand that. However there is certainly no shortage of other MMOs where you can go out and create a character with exactly those freedoms.
So you like the idea of not picking what your char is skilled at? Decide you want to roll a 2h sword warrior to find out its good at magic. Or you want to roll a bard to find out its skilled at farming. Or that you decide to play that warrior anyways knowing that facing someone who has that boost to using swords, you just wont stand up as good as them in combat, thats something you like?
This is the attitude that I just can't wrap my head around. I am perfectly willing to play a game by its rules. If I jump on and after a while find that it sucks I may complain and leave, but I don't understand the idea that because things will happen randomly and not in my 100% control I just can't do it.
Man people, loosen up your grip on the stick a bit.
I get that the 40 dollars or whatever is a serious investment that you must spend months contemplating and fussing about. Should I do it? What if it isn't any good? You call your lawyer, talk to your financial adviser. Then you go and speak with your spiritual leader in the community if you have one: Father/Rabi/Imam/Pastor/High Wizard/Guru/Monk Should I do this?
Because the stakes are high. If you give them the money you may not be able to get it back. At some point you may realize that you gave money to the evil free to play world government, and have in fact damaged freedom.
You start drinking, lose your job, and eventually your family. The hard drugs come next and you find yourself trading sexual acts for that next hit, just trying to not feel terrible.
And it was all because you bought a game that took your control, and asked the amount of money you would spend on a pair of shorts and a few t-shirts.
Boy did you ever go off the deep end with this post. Maybe I missed post in the thread, but I'm pretty sure no one here was discussing prostituting themselves over this game.
Talents are unlocked randomly through game play, not by buying a "lucky" soul pack.
As far as I can tell from info presented in this thread, Talents are not revealed at the time that you start playing your character. So you can't just keep buying "soul packs" until you "get a good one".
The lockbox analogy does not work on that level.
But that raises another spectre.
CoE is a game, and everything that happens is dependent on game code. There will be clear logic behind the "random game play" that unlocks a Talent.
If Talents confer significant power, then a section of the community will make it their life's work to decipher the formula. It would represent the "road to riches", both in and outside the game. If the reward is high enough, this will inevitably result in widespread attempts at hacking and cheating.
That leads to horrors like SWG's "holo-grind", where players endlessly force themselves to do things they don't enjoy, just so that they can get that ultimate reward. Some of them were even grinding not because they really wanted a jedi, but they feared what would happen if other people had them and they didn't !
If PVP'ers are "forced" to do all the Story-related activities in the hope of unlocking a powerful Talent, there will be consequences. Some will get bored and mean and try to disrupt everyone else.
Talents are unlocked randomly through game play, not by buying a "lucky" soul pack.
As far as I can tell from info presented in this thread, Talents are not revealed at the time that you start playing your character. So you can't just keep buying "soul packs" until you "get a good one".
The lockbox analogy does not work on that level.
But that raises another spectre.
CoE is a game, and everything that happens is dependent on game code. There will be clear logic behind the "random game play" that unlocks a Talent.
If Talents confer significant power, then a section of the community will make it their life's work to decipher the formula. It would represent the "road to riches", both in and outside the game. If the reward is high enough, this will inevitably result in widespread attempts at hacking and cheating.
That leads to horrors like SWG's "holo-grind", where players endlessly force themselves to do things they don't enjoy, just so that they can get that ultimate reward. Some of them were even grinding not because they really wanted a jedi, but they feared what would happen if other people had them and they didn't !
If PVP'ers are "forced" to do all the Story-related activities in the hope of unlocking a powerful Talent, there will be consequences. Some will get bored and mean and try to disrupt everyone else.
And after all that work and scheming and long nights...their character dies of old age.
I honestly wonder why some people plays games sometimes as the actual point of them seems to get lost in some desperate ego trip for peer approval.
Play the game, enjoy the drama, have fun.
I am glad people like Caspian are designing games the same way I am glad people make shows where Ned Stark gets his head removed. Hollywood endings are boring and predictable MMORPG's are boring.
And at the end of the day you all have 1 very simple way to not play a game with a system or design you don't like.....Don't play it.
Talents are unlocked randomly through game play, not by buying a "lucky" soul pack.
As far as I can tell from info presented in this thread, Talents are not revealed at the time that you start playing your character. So you can't just keep buying "soul packs" until you "get a good one".
The lockbox analogy does not work on that level.
But that raises another spectre.
CoE is a game, and everything that happens is dependent on game code. There will be clear logic behind the "random game play" that unlocks a Talent.
If Talents confer significant power, then a section of the community will make it their life's work to decipher the formula. It would represent the "road to riches", both in and outside the game. If the reward is high enough, this will inevitably result in widespread attempts at hacking and cheating.
That leads to horrors like SWG's "holo-grind", where players endlessly force themselves to do things they don't enjoy, just so that they can get that ultimate reward. Some of them were even grinding not because they really wanted a jedi, but they feared what would happen if other people had them and they didn't !
If PVP'ers are "forced" to do all the Story-related activities in the hope of unlocking a powerful Talent, there will be consequences. Some will get bored and mean and try to disrupt everyone else.
100%
Look once the game is released, if it's released, the cats out of the bag and its not going back in. All best intentions and meticulous planning goes out the window and it's now fully in the hands of your player base. There have been more proven developers with better ideas and vast resources who have designed systems intended to keep things rare and difficult to achieve. The only uniformity is that they've all failed, or at least the barriers have proven far less taxing than originally thought. Developers always, yes always, underestimate player ingenuity and commitment.
It doesnt matter how difficult, long and arduous you make an achievement in a game, developers will underestimate the players and they will find out the shortest path to said achievement in short order, and after power gamers have had their fun with it, it'll end up being all over the internet.
People -will- break the game, and the system and do things that you never intended with it. Ill listen to Raph Koster, that's what he says on the topic. I highly suggest SBS read his entire blog and his book, since he has more experience with this topic than any developer. And they have no experience with it at all.
Maybe they can learn where he and his veteran team made mistakes. Because all I see so far is hubris and idealism. Sure, you wanna believe in what you're doing, you have to. But you also have to take a long hard look around you before you leap. I believe they have failed to do that, and it could prove devastating to their design.
And after all that work and scheming and long nights...their character dies of old age.
I honestly wonder why some people plays games sometimes as the actual point of them seems to get lost in some desperate ego trip for peer approval.
Play the game, enjoy the drama, have fun.
I am glad people like Caspian are designing games the same way I am glad people make shows where Ned Stark gets his head removed. Hollywood endings are boring and predictable MMORPG's are boring.
And at the end of the day you all have 1 very simple way to not play a game with a system or design you don't like.....Don't play it.
I agree many people will take it too far. But telling them to stop or to play something else won't do much against it. Might as well tell your cat to stop chasing the red laser dot.
This is a PvP focussed game, even small advantages will be crucial. And we are talking about potentially huge advantages here. People will go out of their way to game&exploit the system, it's just how it is. Thus the system needs to be extremely well designed from the ground up or the whole thing comes crashing down, having a negative effect even on those who don't chase the shiny and could be happy with it as it is.
That picture is pretty clear. You have a character in a traditional wizard outfit with a traditional glowing magic staff with his hands up while aoe fireballs rain down on a city. I don't see any siege weapons in that picture. It could be someone crying out because God is raining down destruction but there's nothing in the picture that supports that reasoning.
I understand wanting to attract people but think about the message you're putting out.
And yet the text that goes with the picture is ignored so it is worth repeating: -
"There are legends of powerful magic existing in the world of Elyria long ago, but no one has seen or heard of it for thousands of years..."
It also says...
"There are whispers of Magic Use, the ability to Travel, Shapeshifting, Healing, Animal Speak, Planes Walking, and many other things, but they are quite rare, affecting less than 5% of players"
With that picture its clear. So keep rolling souls your 5% can get you a soul that can Travel, Shapeshifting, Healing, Animal Speak, Planes Walking, and many other things. Bothers me for two reasons. Its connected to the monetization and this will become like cash shops with lock boxes where people spend a fortune to get the char they want.
Can't wait to check out those siege weapons! Who needs magic when you have catapults that can shoot meteors out of the sky.
That picture is pretty clear. You have a character in a traditional wizard outfit with a traditional glowing magic staff with his hands up while aoe fireballs rain down on a city. I don't see any siege weapons in that picture. It could be someone crying out because God is raining down destruction but there's nothing in the picture that supports that reasoning.
I understand wanting to attract people but think about the message you're putting out.
And yet the text that goes with the picture is ignored so it is worth repeating: -
"There are legends of powerful magic existing in the world of Elyria long ago, but no one has seen or heard of it for thousands of years..."
It also says...
"There are whispers of Magic Use, the ability to Travel, Shapeshifting, Healing, Animal Speak, Planes Walking, and many other things, but they are quite rare, affecting less than 5% of players"
With that picture its clear. So keep rolling souls your 5% can get you a soul that can Travel, Shapeshifting, Healing, Animal Speak, Planes Walking, and many other things. Bothers me for two reasons. Its connected to the monetization and this will become like cash shops with lock boxes where people spend a fortune to get the char they want.
Can't wait to check out those siege weapons! Who needs magic when you have catapults that can shoot meteors out of the sky.
Don't be silly, they said that Magic would be rare, not Engineering !
Hey at least these guys were smart enough to wait until they had grabbed an initial chunk of cash before making it blatantly obvious that there is nothing more to their game than p2w transactions. It's more than can be said for 95% of the con jobs going on right now in the industry.
Hey at least these guys were smart enough to wait until they had grabbed an initial chunk of cash before making it blatantly obvious that there is nothing more to their game than p2w transactions. It's more than can be said for 95% of the con jobs going on right now in the industry.
If I'm correct the studio has explained their pricing model in details months before accepting any money from their fans, so the text in bold makes little sense to me.
From the developer journal #16 (January 2016): "The other thing to consider is the cost of a Spark of Life. If you only live 3.75 months, then for our currently estimated price of $29.99 per Spark of Life, it still means you're only paying approximately $7.99 per month. That's half the price of a WoW subscription! That's right. If you're an active, daring player who plays every single day and manages to die every single day... you can continue to play CoE for 1/2 the price of a WoW subscription.
On the other hand, if you manage to cheat death, don't play regularly, or do so in the safety of a hamlet, town, or city, then you're looking at anywhere from 9 to 14 months of play... for roughly $30."
The rest of the DJ is full of details about the pricing model.
If your message alluded to the Kickstarter rewards, then I guess it doesn't make much sense either since the backers got informed of their content more than a month before the pledges got collected.
Looks like it's still mostly a cesspool of cynicism and misinformation about CoE being passed around on this site. Makes having a discussion about it here pointless, really. You could copy and paste some of the negative paragraphs directly into the Star Citizen forum and you probably wouldn't be able to tell they were posted here originally. What a waste ... oh well.
I think the reason for this is that the information on the site needs to be organised and updated. I read the information in the forums and it's often said, yes that was said 6 or 8 months ago but... then they quote a conversation recently given that was never posted as an official update. They really need to put the latest information in one place. Or you would have to constantly read every conversation written down by their staff at the time in the forums, in irc, and other locations, which most won't do. When was the last time their Q&A was updated?
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
Looks like it's still mostly a cesspool of cynicism and misinformation about CoE being passed around on this site. Makes having a discussion about it here pointless, really. You could copy and paste some of the negative paragraphs directly into the Star Citizen forum and you probably wouldn't be able to tell they were posted here originally. What a waste ... oh well.
I think the reason for this is that the information on the site needs to be organised and updated. I read the information in the forums and it's often said, yes that was said 6 or 8 months ago but... then they quote a conversation recently given that was never posted as an official update. They really need to put the latest information in one place. Or you would have to constantly read every conversation written down by their staff at the time in the forums, in irc, and other locations, which most won't do. When was the last time their Q&A was updated?
I agree with this very much. Its one thing i wish they would make a higher priority.
Having to hear second-hand that the talent system works differently than how it is depicted by the website itself, frankly, is embarrassing. It should be somewhere official. At the very least, redact or remove the DJ that gives disinformation.
I started following this game almost a year ago and kept up with the Q&A's religiously, so I am mostly up to date on the latest word. However, coming into this brand new, i could see it being really overwhelming and frustrating trying to learn what's still true, what's outdated, which hour long Q&A i need to skip through to find information on a certain idea, etc. Its kind of a mess honestly.
Last i looked, the CoE wiki was far from complete or else i'd point people there.
I would think their community managers could work on collating and centralizing that information since it directly affects the knowledge of the community, but I guess not...
Comments
Alternately, maybe something like Shadowbane (but much improved). In Shadowbane you needed to find rare runestones to learn certain skills. Done properly this would let you REALLY control the rarity of talents/magic in the world, and it would be untied from the monetization scheme.
There would be no grinding.. these would be ultra-rare (or whatever frequency was desired for each skill) BOP type drops or item spawns that were consumed on use. The player would simply have the ability to consume it or destroy it. Once consumed they would open the talent or skill line etc...
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
Even if you don't want to have a subscription, do cosmetics or something else, RNG lockbox alpha class is just a recipe for fail.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/Also runestones were awesome, werebears represent!
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/Help me Bioware, you're my only hope.
Is ToR going to be good? Dude it's Bioware making a freaking star wars game, all signs point to awesome. -G4tv MMo report.
Man people, loosen up your grip on the stick a bit.
I get that the 40 dollars or whatever is a serious investment that you must spend months contemplating and fussing about. Should I do it? What if it isn't any good? You call your lawyer, talk to your financial adviser. Then you go and speak with your spiritual leader in the community if you have one: Father/Rabi/Imam/Pastor/High Wizard/Guru/Monk
Should I do this?
Because the stakes are high. If you give them the money you may not be able to get it back. At some point you may realize that you gave money to the evil free to play world government, and have in fact damaged freedom.
You start drinking, lose your job, and eventually your family. The hard drugs come next and you find yourself trading sexual acts for that next hit, just trying to not feel terrible.
And it was all because you bought a game that took your control, and asked the amount of money you would spend on a pair of shorts and a few t-shirts.
I don't have a better suggestion. I don't have a better idea. I don't have a better solution or system. I don't need them to say something smells fishy about this.
As far as I can tell from info presented in this thread, Talents are not revealed at the time that you start playing your character. So you can't just keep buying "soul packs" until you "get a good one".
The lockbox analogy does not work on that level.
But that raises another spectre.
CoE is a game, and everything that happens is dependent on game code. There will be clear logic behind the "random game play" that unlocks a Talent.
If Talents confer significant power, then a section of the community will make it their life's work to decipher the formula. It would represent the "road to riches", both in and outside the game. If the reward is high enough, this will inevitably result in widespread attempts at hacking and cheating.
That leads to horrors like SWG's "holo-grind", where players endlessly force themselves to do things they don't enjoy, just so that they can get that ultimate reward. Some of them were even grinding not because they really wanted a jedi, but they feared what would happen if other people had them and they didn't !
If PVP'ers are "forced" to do all the Story-related activities in the hope of unlocking a powerful Talent, there will be consequences. Some will get bored and mean and try to disrupt everyone else.
I honestly wonder why some people plays games sometimes as the actual point of them seems to get lost in some desperate ego trip for peer approval.
Play the game, enjoy the drama, have fun.
I am glad people like Caspian are designing games the same way I am glad people make shows where Ned Stark gets his head removed. Hollywood endings are boring and predictable MMORPG's are boring.
And at the end of the day you all have 1 very simple way to not play a game with a system or design you don't like.....Don't play it.
Look once the game is released, if it's released, the cats out of the bag and its not going back in. All best intentions and meticulous planning goes out the window and it's now fully in the hands of your player base. There have been more proven developers with better ideas and vast resources who have designed systems intended to keep things rare and difficult to achieve. The only uniformity is that they've all failed, or at least the barriers have proven far less taxing than originally thought. Developers always, yes always, underestimate player ingenuity and commitment.
It doesnt matter how difficult, long and arduous you make an achievement in a game, developers will underestimate the players and they will find out the shortest path to said achievement in short order, and after power gamers have had their fun with it, it'll end up being all over the internet.
People -will- break the game, and the system and do things that you never intended with it. Ill listen to Raph Koster, that's what he says on the topic. I highly suggest SBS read his entire blog and his book, since he has more experience with this topic than any developer. And they have no experience with it at all.
Maybe they can learn where he and his veteran team made mistakes. Because all I see so far is hubris and idealism. Sure, you wanna believe in what you're doing, you have to. But you also have to take a long hard look around you before you leap. I believe they have failed to do that, and it could prove devastating to their design.
Might as well tell your cat to stop chasing the red laser dot.
This is a PvP focussed game, even small advantages will be crucial. And we are talking about potentially huge advantages here. People will go out of their way to game&exploit the system, it's just how it is.
Thus the system needs to be extremely well designed from the ground up or the whole thing comes crashing down, having a negative effect even on those who don't chase the shiny and could be happy with it as it is.
Can't wait to check out those siege weapons! Who needs magic when you have catapults that can shoot meteors out of the sky.
Those are obviously space-based catapults...
I'm sorry, I can't hear your whisper over the sound of your meteor shower.
lol
On the other hand, if you manage to cheat death, don't play regularly, or do so in the safety of a hamlet, town, or city, then you're looking at anywhere from 9 to 14 months of play... for roughly $30."
The rest of the DJ is full of details about the pricing model.
If your message alluded to the Kickstarter rewards, then I guess it doesn't make much sense either since the backers got informed of their content more than a month before the pledges got collected.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
Having to hear second-hand that the talent system works differently than how it is depicted by the website itself, frankly, is embarrassing. It should be somewhere official. At the very least, redact or remove the DJ that gives disinformation.
I started following this game almost a year ago and kept up with the Q&A's religiously, so I am mostly up to date on the latest word. However, coming into this brand new, i could see it being really overwhelming and frustrating trying to learn what's still true, what's outdated, which hour long Q&A i need to skip through to find information on a certain idea, etc. Its kind of a mess honestly.
Last i looked, the CoE wiki was far from complete or else i'd point people there.
I would think their community managers could work on collating and centralizing that information since it directly affects the knowledge of the community, but I guess not...