DAoC
Submitted by Abalieno on March 29, 2007 - 01:35.
Nostalgia (and referring to this, there's a rule: you only have nostalgia to things you lost, or traits of them that you lost, not to things that are done better). Then I'm done.
Mythic released today a patch with a few good changes (archer classes excluded) and I was writing a bit on the forums. It summarizes well my idea on the game (DAoC will remain my very own crusade and inspiration) and goes back to a lot of fundamental principles that I discussed on this site about mmorpgs in general.
--
One idea I'd propose if I was the producer (wink to Walt): plan a mini-expansion to be released this Fall.
- Price: $5.
- Purpose: completely scrap and reprogram/redraw the UI, with the goal of making it scalable so that it looks the same no matter of the resolution, which is a feature that should be STANDARD for every game. And then make it more functional, organized and responsive, with a fixed, well designed layout that leaves behind the old-style dockable windows and then buy a readable/polished/aliased font.
Giving DAoC a better "impact" while simultaneously work on the structure (meaning the PvE treadmill and a reorganization of task dungeons) would help greatly to make the game once again presentable and a first step to start drawing new customers.
--
Since they are retooling with the Frontiers. Redoing the keeps in order to fix LOS problems and make the client perform better is something I STRONGLY support, but it isn't all that the game needs.
The two most important things from my perspective are:
1- Make once again the keeps the protagonists of RvR.
2- Work to remove stalemates at those keeps so that it's fun to play there.
The bias toward 8vs8 groups made the game unplayable for me and, I'm sure, for many other players. But in particular it killed completely the accessibility for new players. When 90%+ of the RvR is accessible only in specialized groups the consequence is that a majority of players are flat out excluded.
What is left in the average experience is to sit LFG at a keep for hours. Or walk around solo just to feed points to a roaming gank group.
THAT's the FIRST problem in DAoC currently: the game needs new players, and the very few players are turned off by the UI and boring PvE first, and the complete inaccessibility of PvP next.
That kills the game. Checkmate in two.
So for me the only solution is to bring back that cooperative feeling and realm pride that we had back then. When people grouped together to fight for communal objective. And when ALL the realm joined up for some crazy battles. Everyone grouped everyone else. Everyone was doing its small part. And there were BOTH specialized groups and casual groups working together. It was fun, exciting and it built the community.
The point is to make the RvR easily accessible and fun once again for all the players, while trying to make the battles at the keeps a bit more dynamic instead of boring stalemates where you wait, wait, wait and wait.
Submitted by Abalieno on February 18, 2007 - 12:48.
There was a relevant news about DAoC I originally decided not to comment, but I want to answer on a specific aspect.
The news is that all the stuff you could get from ToA, the used-to-be hardcore PvE stuff that many believe ruined the game till the release of "classic" servers with ToA stuff stripped off the game, well, all this stuff can now be "bought" with bounty points.
The bounty point are some sort of PvP currency, so the bottom line is that previously PvE exclusive stuff is now accessible directly from PvP. I guess everyone welcomes this (LATE) move.
It works like an alternative path but you would lie to yourself if you would think this corresponds to a "choice". Ideally you like PvE and get this stuff from PvE, while if you like PvP you get the same stuff from PvP. Choice is good but the point is that in the practice there's no real choice (if not when things are completely soloable): you have to stick and adapt to what everyone else does.
Then you also have to see what is the conversion ratio. Mythic could even decide to make these items absurdly expensive in order to not make the PvE obsolete. But it would be a very bad move.
So, in practice, I agree with Apache. Mythic "killed" ToA and, yes, they may as well delete the ToA zones. That content is now completely mudflated. It lost its function.
I wanted to reply to this post in particular:
On one hand, the changes look wonderful, until you realize that once again, as always, the benefit here is for the "have's" and the "have not's" are left out in the cold. How so you say? You need an income of RP's from NF to benefit from any of this. How does anything in 1.88 make NF any more attractive for the casual gamer? Being slaughtered by stealth zergs and RR10 8man's isn't many people's idea of fun. Standing around at portal keeps LFG for 2 hours when you only have 2 hours to play is not many people's idea of fun. You can't earn bounty point in the battlegrounds, why not? Last time I checked battlegrounds were realm vs realm combat... So how does the casual gamer actually GET the rps needed for the bounty points? The powergamers reap 100% of the reward here and the casuals get screwed....again.
Until Mythic realizes that the powergamer is not keeping this game afloat, casuals are, the game will continue to experience it's steady bleed off of players. Over time, casuals get sick and tired of being overlooked while powergamers are catered to over and over and over again. up to 25% of the players of this game are the so called uber powergamers which leaves a significant pool of players 75% to further bleed off the population. Mythic needs to figure out where their bread is really buttered before the prime time population for all servers is 2500...
The real problem runs deeper. Problem in DAoC is that there's no influx of new players, so what's left is long time veterans in high ranks and teamspeak.
While in the past the "hardcore" portion was there, but still somewhat balanced by a group less hardcore and welcoming new players and casual groups, the more the game declines, the more those few players who are left are veterans with powerful characters and a strong guild organization.
So here there's both a problem of game design (strong bias and support to the 8vs8 meta-game) and a problem of community (game becoming increasingly niche and driving away new players).
Problem is that all this is the long-term consequence of choices made by Mythic a while ago.
Submitted by Abalieno on February 8, 2007 - 00:59.
From an interview with Copper:
what we're doing is taking the resources we would devote to an expansion - artists, quests, content, programmers - we're taking those guys and they are all focused on delivering high-level content every two weeks.
When you replace the last bits of game development with "live events" it means it's really over.
Submitted by Abalieno on November 30, 2006 - 17:14.
I promised myself to not comment or criticize DAoC anymore, but since it deals with one of my ideas I want to add something.
Reading the boards I see the players complaining about two main points when the relic system is discussed:
1- Adding another RvR space was stupid. PvP action needs to converge, not being spread even more.
2- The bonuses aren't appealing enough to remain interesting in the longer term.
The point is that while Mythic copied exactly my idea (you can compare their official description page with my original idea to see that one is the carbon copy of the other) those two points are the only ones who were left out and that represent the ONLY difference between Mythic's implementation and my original design.
Mythic: These relics provide temporary bonuses, but in order to keep the mino-relic, the wielder must actively participate in RvR.
The wielder (and his group, if not solo) of the mino-relic must participate in RvR combat in order to maintain the mino-relic and its effect. Each mino-relic has a feed rate (the number of enemy kills required over a specific time period); there are different feed rates for different mino-relics.
HRose: In order to keep them on your character, you need to "feed" them by killing the players on the opposite factions and have a role in the conquest, participating actively in the PvP. Exposing yourself. If you are hiding you won't be able to fulfill the "feed" requirements and you'll lose the artifact.
Mythic: If the wielder of the mino-relic does not get sufficient kills to sustain the mino-relic's feed rate timer, the mino-relic "decays" from the player and it is returned to its encounter location in its locked state.
HRose: If the feeding requirement aren't met, or if the player with the artifact has been logged out for too long, not meeting the active requirements, the artifact is reset to the original PvE instance that will remain sealed for a set amount of time depending on the type of the artifact.
Mythic: Mino-relics cannot be taken out of RvR areas and cannot be stored in keeps.
HRose: They artifacts aren't usable in PvE, they lose all their properties if they are brought in a PvE instance.
Note: since the relics need to be "fed" the prohibition to take them out of RvR zones that Mythic added is superfluous.
Mythic: The wielder of the mino-relic is visible on the RvR map and the zone map (or dungeon map) via a special icon.
HRose: The other faction will also know that one of the artifacts was summoned and will be able to "divinate" your position in the map. They can track you down. you will be hunted.
Mythic: If a player is carrying a relic upon death, LD, or logging, the relic will drop to the ground. Due to this, mino-relics will constantly change hands while they are active. This complex game of "hot potato" will present a fresh new twist for standard RvR play.
HRose: If you die in a PvP battle, your artifact will be dropped on the ground and one of the players in the opposite faction can loot it and use it, acquiring the powers that were yours.
So. I'm paranoid, egocentric, or maybe my "feelings" are a bit justified?
Let's see these differences concretely.
1- Adding another RvR space. Even if my idea wasn't traced upon DAoC, it still avoided that mistake. While in Mythic's implementation these relics are taken from PvE encounters in another, huge, RvR space (the labyrinth). In my idea the relics/artifacts were taken from an instanced PvE-only space. The players could "race" toward a relic. When a relic was captured, all the instances would be sealed.
This effectively removed the mistake of adding another RvR space while providing a perfect environment for truly challenging encounters. Getting an artifact, in my idea, was really the "hardcore" part (to then be brought back to the rest of the community via the full-loot system and feed reqs). The harder PvE experience in any game. Something that happens rarely, not every day. Plus it was also planned to be tied to an innovative, different placement of "PvE raids" (more about the new form of raids).
2- Mythic's relics aren't all that desirable. They are relatively small bonuses to skills, nothing that created directly new forms of gameplay and that the players carve. It's just about adding yet another kind of items to loot and toy with. Completely forgivable after the novelty wears off, as they don't really have a "place" in the gameplay. They are a transitory "cool" system. A gimmick. Instead in my idea the role of relic/artifacts was more significant. I often described them as the "heroes" in Warcraft 3. It was something planned with a strong impact and, instead of small bonuses to skills, each relic/artifact was supposed to infuse and channel new powers. Not just significant for their impact in a battle, but also graphically spectacular.
One interesting part of my ideas is that a relic/artifact would mutate graphically the aspect of the player. And this idea of "mutation" and "corruption" was taken directly from my own source of inspiration, Michael Moorcock's Elric.
This second point is particularly important because it's not the first time that Mythic wastes good ideas with a poor or inadequate implementation.
The ideas were valid, and not because they were my own. The idea of the "hunt", of the mutation and the collaborative, "epic" effort to take down a player demi-god, with a spectacular graphic impact on the battlefield. Those were seeds and they needed water, not sand.
Conclusion: while there are parts of my idea that would have required more work than what Mythic has allocated to it, from the other side the "divergencies" between Mythic's implementation and my idea are what the players are complaining about. Some of them required more work, but some of them are blatant design flaws that I had avoided.
Moreover I also proposed Mythic in another context to add another RvR zone. So was I stupid too? No, because I proposed a special zone that wasn't "always on", but that would open only on special occasions. When the new zone was open all the players were supposed to converge there and leave the classic frontiers deserted, this zone would remain open for one, two or three days and after the event was complete the zone would be sealed till the next "event", that could trigger one week or more later (for example you could set it open for 36 hours and triggering every 10 days). With the purpose to not overlap with the standard RvR activity while offering a different kind of gameplay (physics system in that case) and also giving the feel of "epic" and "uniqueness". Something that the players could "wait for" with anticipation.
And also something that has never been seen before.
Submitted by Abalieno on November 28, 2006 - 22:12.
-Part 1-
This spawns from a blog post where Ubiq talks a bit about Mythic's Warhammer (at least what he reads about the game).
Now I already followed and discussed things in the past, so I could better portray how Warhammer PvP and territorial control should work. *IF* what I understood is correct and there haven't been significant changes in the meantime (I give them the benefit of the doubt).
You can see one of my previous analysis here (or check its category).
In short you may think to Dark Messiah multiplayer and have a good idea about how this system (here I'm focusing on the territorial control) should work.
At the "endgame" Warhammer should have five zones for each of the three "war fronts". One war front for orcs/goblins vs dwarves, one for Chaos vs Empire and one for Dark Elves vs High Elves.
Of these five zones two should be the rival "capital cities" raid zones that Ubiq talks about. The ultimate siege that may trigger the definitive victory and the supposed "reset button".
Now, as in Dark Messiah, each of those zones should be closed and instanced "scenarios". If your faction achieves particular objectives and "wins" that scenario, there's a "map switch" that moves ideally closer to the losing faction capital city.
So these capital cities aren't player-populated "hubs", but only combat scenarios that are "unlocked" through a campaign mode that implies the victory on previous maps/scenarios.
You start from the neutral map -> win it -> move to the one closer to the enemy capital city -> win that too -> and finally the "capital city" scenario is unlocked -> win it -> (supposed) system reset
If Mythic is smart, only one of the five endgame maps is going to be active at the same time (outlining the campaign progression), so a player should have a choice between three maps where he can go PvP (one for each warfront). Helping a lot to focus the PvP action instead of dispersing it among too many zones as it currently happens in DAoC.
On the other side, if there are too many players packed into one zone, the instance system triggers and creates more balanced "mirrors" of the same scenario.
So this should address effectively the two main issues, the convergence required for the PvP and the overcrowding.
-Part 2-
Ubiq: That being said, the question I’m most interested in is how a side that has been utterly decimated to the point that the capital is in ruins can hope to come back to turn the tide. While I genuinely love city conquest scenarios (I feel they capture the ‘massive’ part of what MMOs are supposed to be), most territorial control games are progressive - a game design term meaning that the winners tend to keep winning, as they gain more and more spoils of war, and more and more players on the losing side feel the desire to join up and/or play. This problem was a very tough issue for both Shadowbane and Dark Age of Camelot to deal with.
Long ago I had proposed an idea for DAoC that I think would work well (if not, I’m still wondering why).
Basically each keep can be upgraded to level 10 and levels make guards stronger, among other things.
Currently all keeps can be upgraded to level 10 with no limits (if not limits of time).
My simple idea was add a fixed cap for each realm.
For example you have five keeps for each realm, 15 in total for all three realms and you give each realm a cap of 50 points.
Since you begin with five keeps, you can upgrade all five of them to level 10, using up all your 50 points.
But then, as you conquer keeps from other realms the situation changes and you need to spread those points. You’ll likely try to upgrade your new keep so that it is well defended, but doing so would mean removing levels from your other keeps to upgrade the new one.
The other side of the medal is that the realm losing one keep gets back those 10 points that it used there. And the idea was that you could “overload” the level of your keep above ten, but where every point above ten would cost (x-10)+1 (so to go from a level 10 keep to a level 11 you would need to use two points, to go to 12, use 3, then four and so on).
The result would be that the more a realm expands, the more it becomes also harder to defend, because it exposes more weak spots as the points need to be spread between more keeps, while the realm who is losing can concentrate the strength on a stronghold and make it really hard to capture.
This means that the realm who is losing isn’t left staring passively, but it is given the possibility to counterattack effectively through smaller strike teams aiming at the weak points.
The overall idea is the one of the rubber banding. The more you force a situation, the harder it is to maintain it.
(that was the problem back then. Today players don’t even care about keeps and it’s all reduced to 8vs8 ganking groups)
Jason Booth: Territory is tricky, but I think it can be done in a satisfying way. I think the trick is really in convincing people that the inevitable loss of territory is part of the fun. It’s hard to convince people of this, so it must be some fundamental part of your reward system instead. Push the boulder up the hill, get distracted by shinny cookie, let the bounder roll back down again - but you get to keep your cookie.
Instead I think it can be done through gameplay. My idea is that being on the losing side with the possibility to turn the tide can be even more satisfying and fun than being on the winning one.
The problem is to provide gameplay alternatives, ways to effectively counterattack so that the losing side has something to do.
If what is left to do is get steamrolled by a zerg for the next two hours, the player logs out frustrated. The point is to offer gameplay alternatives.
The point is to foresee these situations, and design solutions so that the game offers things to do in those cases.
About the "reset button" or the boulder pushed up hill, Mythic model in DAoC is already stronger.
The donut is represented by the relics. Not only you get to keep the donut/relic, but the donut also becomes a “ransom” that the other realm will eventually want to get back.
So a victory doesn’t also lead to a reset (after a relic is captured things slowly fall back in normality) but also as the starting point for what's next.
Submitted by Abalieno on November 11, 2006 - 18:14.
DAoC's test patch:
Performance Related Fixes (Catacombs Client)
- Fixed two memory leaks relating to trees and tree shaders.
Walt:
These days, our oldest assets in game are in Player Housing and Shrouded Isles. At this stage the vast majority of our art assets in game are solid, and we really need tech improvements to make things shine.
Yes, very true.
Submitted by Abalieno on October 2, 2006 - 14:08.
Some infos on DAoC's relic system:
the relics- basically there are 23 minotaur relics, 1 is in cathal valley the other 22 are hidden insice the labrynth which u need to find. these relics have special bonuses, weather its group or self bonuses.. examples are- more damage, encumbrence bonus, replenish arrows or something.. superstealth (yeah like we need more damn stealthers..)and other random bonuses they didnt tell us. these relics drop when you log out, ld, or die. if you die with a relic it drops and ANYONE can pick it up, even an enemy realm person. and the way u keep the relics on you is you "feed them" and when i say that i mean realm points.. if you afk for 30minutes ur relic will have decayed by then, and respawned inside the labrynth for someone else to find. if your group sucks and you keep dieing.. ur screwed as well. also if you have a relic you will be displayed on the /rw map.. like a blinking dot will be on you..
Those four parts I have underlined were unannounced and a sort of confirmation that they actually took my design as a source of inspiration, at least, as those were also described rather closely. See my rants.
The artifacts are also limited in number. The most powerful artifacts are unique and one and only one copy can exist in the PvP world at once.
If you die in a PvP battle, your artifact will be dropped on the ground and one of the players in the opposite faction can loot it and use it, acquiring the powers that were yours.
In order to keep them on your character, you need to "feed" them by killing the players on the opposite factions and have a role in the conquest, participating actively in the PvP. Exposing yourself. If you are hiding you won't be able to fulfill the "feed" requirements and you'll lose the artifact.
The other faction will also know that one of the artifacts was summoned and will be able to "divinate" your position on the map. They can track you down. you will be hunted.
Heh. It's a bit discouraging.
(btw, there was also another idea that I didn't have an occasion to write down and was about making the "feed" requirements adjusting the intensity of the power of an artifact. On my original design this also translated to a mutation of the visual aspect of a character, increasing size, turning demonic-like and so on. The idea was to make the power and visual mutation progressive instead of sudden as you pick up the artifact. You feed the artifact with souls (through realm points) and the power increases progressively, mutating your character, to decay slowly if you don't kill other players for a certain amount of time.
I was thinking about a visual bar going from 0% to 100%. If it falls back to 0% the artifact returns to its original location(PvE) while if used (feeding souls) its power goes up till it reaches 100%. The rate of decay would be also progressive, so that it decays slowly when it is closer to 0% and very fast when it is at 100%. To simulate some sort of brief "berserk" effect when in full power. I thought it would be fun.)
Submitted by Abalieno on August 31, 2006 - 12:54.
This game is so dead.
On the forums people are complaining because it is now pretty obvious that noone is left on DAoC after Warhammer, the expansion and everything else. And I don't mean the players. Apparently there isn't anyone anymore working on the game beside all those guys they hired from QA and CS that are now probably rolling their thumbs and stare blankly. Or have VERY BAD ideas.
The pace of development is spiraling down at a much faster pace than the subscribers count.
The last test patch segment arrives after more than two weeks and only contains some database changes. These changes have an impact on the gameplay, but quite "cheap" to implement. As if the designers are trying hard to impress the players more than trying to seriously make a better game.
At a first glance you could say that the new changes are good. All the buffs will now last (WoW-like) from half to a full hour. So less annoyances for the players.
But you see, DAoC isn't designed as WoW (where there isn't a "buffbot" class that casts nearly all the buffs in the game) and you cannot port those kind of features like that without breaking the game. If the timers are shorter THERE IS a reason. In fact this applies even to the resists buffs, which have a *significant* impact on the gameplay if you can specialize a toon completely on them, with then the possibility to cast the buff on just EVERYONE (since the resists buffs don't use the concentration pool).
And yeah. This means buffbots EVEN on the classic servers.
Why? Because the resists buffs, again, aren't concentration based. And the range limit on buffs on the classic servers works only on concentration based buffs.
P.S.
And the minotaur model was shown on the test server as well. And, ugh, it's not so good.
Standard troll model with a different head plugged in. No tail, no hoof. Probably no dedicated animations either.
Complete lack of style whatsoever, and the hair are ridiculous. Mythic is getting lazier than ever. Shadowbane isn't my idea of good art, but at least they gave it a more beast-like feel and not just a standard body with a super-deformed head taken out of a Disney's movie.
Mid and Hib versions are even uglier due to bad colors/light used.
P.P.S.
Haha. Best quote from FoH:
I saw that minotaur this morning. It was on the front of my cup of Brown Cow brand Yogurt.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 27, 2006 - 00:19.
Wordpress spam filter swallowed (I think) my comments over at Lum's blog, so I'm going to save them here, nyah, nyah!
It's undeniable that DAoC has some of the best art I've ever seen in a mmorpg. In many cases far superior even to WoW, even if crippled by some overall carelessness and things too rushed out and approximate. But what is sure is that they have some GREAT talent. And that kind of talent is inestimable as you just cannot find it easily.
I don't remember anything particularly great in ToA (but I also never went too far), but I was definitely impressed by what the artists did with Catacombs and all that came after it.
I praised DAoC's art in many occasions, even if I don't exactly know who I'm praising. Maybe it's that guy (Mat Weathers) Lum is talking about, maybe it's someone else, maybe it's the whole art team.
I know I am easily amazed by smaller details like this, this and this. That's some magistral work on those textures. Definitely not something you see often. And remember that at least one player stopped there to stare in awe.
At the beginning the art style was a bit too generic and not particularly inspired, but with the time it became much more consistent and today the quality of the art is the very LAST problem that DAoC and Mythic have. Maybe some approximate execution and lack of polish, but the overall quality and skill that the artists have shown is simply awesome.
The same for Warhammer. The art in Warhammer is already head and shoulders above WoW's character's art. Without a doubt. Mythic has definitely the potential not only to be on par with the quality of the other game, but easily suprass it. Also because they are building a PvP game, so they need again to consolidate the space and not make an infinite number of zones. The initial screenshots shown were a bit deluding, in particular because of the lightweight atmosphere they chose compared to the more harsh and worn look we were all expecting for that setting, but with the time things seem improving and even for Warhammer it looks like that the quality of the art will be its last problem. The dwarf model is still the one I like less as it is too imprecise and undefined, but what they did with the orcs and goblins seems very good. And I do hope that a particular attention goes into giving them unique and appropriate animations.
Give a look for example at this orc in shiny armor. That's the idea I have when I think to inspired armor that fits the setting. That's why I CANNOT HATE MORE the direction that WoW is taking, with all those goofy, exaggerate, plastic armor pieces that Blizzard started to patch in post-release. Imho the equipment of a character should be defined exactly in the game world. It's not a model and a color/texture. I want to know the material it is made of, I want to know where it came from, I want to know the utility of it. I don't mind some exaggeration, and I love how each item has an unique look that is suddenly recognizeable, but if you compare that orc from Warhammer to whatever you see in WoW nowadays you can easily understand why I'm starting to love Warhammer's art direction and hating the path that WoW is taking now.
That orc in that page is awesome. the model is detailed enough, the textures well done and every piece of the equipment fits perfectly the setting and it is suddenly recognizeable. It looks great and it looks unique. I just love it and I hope that for the whole game they stick to that style (and I want to see what they do with Chaos).
But this is also why browsing through my old screenshots in DAoC and looking at the progress in Warhammer makes me feel furious. Because Mythic has and still is wasting the so great resources they have. Wasted because of the not so great design. They have great artists, but terrible designers (and a crippled client).
And the result is that those great resources they have are NEVER put at a good use.
DAoC had and still has the numbers to be the best, and yet it has to struggle in the relative mediocrity.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 22, 2006 - 12:22.
From an interview with Sanya:
The dungeon (with its maze of twisty passages all alike)
It sounds more like the art team going lazy or moved to Warhammer :)
I'll repeat:
- The RvR didn't need more space added, it needed space cut and consolidated
- If you think about it for more than two seconds a maze-like environment doesn't look so great for PvP action
- "twisty passages all alike" and "largest single dungeon in any MMO", I'm sure you get the point
There's a confirmation that the dungeon will be RvR, though.
How can this be a good idea? I'll wait for more details to be revealed.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 18, 2006 - 15:43.
Another part on the same topic because I wasn't able to fit all I wanted to say in the other post. In this case more opinions directly on the features of the expansion.
To begin with: noone is writing about the expansion on a forum beside the specialized ones about the game. This says a lot about the appeal of this expansion towards new or returning players.
Then, from what I read, everyone has taken "The Labyrinth" as an RvR dungeon. I don't know from where that idea is coming because after I read the expansion details that thought didn't even pass by my head. I don't know if my brain just refuses to accept bad game design, but if that dungeon is an RvR dungeon then it's really a bad idea.
This is one of those things that are obvious to just *everyone*. The game definitely doesn't need more space where to fit the RvR. It needs LESS. And everyone KNEW that already when "New Frontiers" was in the design stages, with everyone wondering why the hell Mythic didn't reduce the number of zones. It was just stupid.
When I read that announce I thought it was just one massive dungeon, maybe even instanced, but just for PvE. The press release doesn't specify it's "RvR" and, if true, it would be a so bad idea that I didn't even contemplate it.
The games HAS ALREADY a massive RvR dungeon. It's called Darkness Falls and it is already largely ignored by the players. If you wanted to give some weight to this aspect of the game then it would have made sense to revitalise it (and not just graphically). I really dislike when the game design isn't well polished and new ideas goes right to overlap and crowd another part of the game that shares the exact same purpose.
As I wrote in the last discussions about PvP, the PvP needs a "convergence". More locales only damage the game, in particular when so much space is already there wasted and without a purpose.
In those ideas that I had suggested for the expansion I also proposed to add a new RvR zone, but with a significant difference that can be used as a template to judge similar attempts about adding more space. In that idea the new zone was designed to be "alternate" to the RvR frontiers. It was planned to be sealed for most of the time, so with the players forced outside of it. While, when open, it would become the focus, with all the players converging there. It was the frontier OR the new zone, not both together at the same time.
So it wasn't just another zone always available, but a new space that "triggered" under certain conditions. So that its role didn't overlap nor replaced the standard zones.
If the rumor is confirmed I would really like to know what's the purpose of that new RvR dungeon. In particular when they underline so much that it is going to be the biggest dungeon ever. I imagine the slogan: "You will never meet the same player two times". A great feature for a PvP game.
By definition a "labyrinth" is PvE. Not really the best layout to host some PvP action. Maybe I'm wrong but when Mythic says "largest single dungeon in any MMO" I suddenly imagine the exact same corridor cut and pasted ad infinitum. Already with Darkness Rising they went with those huge locales but thin on content. Advertising "size" today is like a warning, as people know that worthwhile content isn't proportional with size. You don't want to be "Dark & Light".
While I was thinking about what could be possible with a labyrinth and some PvP I started to think about moving walls, traps, the possibility to rotate entire sections of the labyrinth to trap the players inside or made them lose orientation and so on. I even thought of walls that become progressively more solid over time, like graphically fading in and out. Then I also thought about group of players trapped within certain sections and then respawn directly in the dungeon if killed. There could be some interesting possibilities to explore, adding some dynamic elements and give some player control over them. But I seriously doubt that it's what Mythic is trying to do. And no matter how good these ideas could be, the problem of adding too much space when the game is already too spread thin would still cripple whatever you may add.
In all the cases, all the ideas I imagined were about the players and not about respawning mobs. Noone likes to PvP in a dungeon crowded with monsters. The game has already PvE/PvP dungeons. One is Darkness Falls, the other is the underground tunnel in the frontiers. Both largely ignored. Adding one more? Why?
The dungeon will be located under Agramon and my suspect is that it will inherit is uselessness. So, instead of worrying about the damaging effect it could have on the RvR population/concentration, the risk is that it will instead go completely ignored already after a few weeks it will be patched in.
AT LEAST the rumor about instanced RvR revealed to be false. And if it was a feature-cut, then god bless it.
This dungeon will be also populated by mechanical creatures. Here only a note to make because I'm kind of used to the superficiality/carelessness with which Mythic implements things (they are usually quick and respect the deadlines, but the results are poor): mechanical things, even before how they look, need special animations. I put my hands forward here because I've seen one screenshot of a pet you can get, and it's just an animal model with a mechanical skin. As a style I would pick something more odd and awkward, with mechanical things that move and attack oddly, instead of just taking the standard monster types and reskinning them to look metallic.
About the new race and class I don't have much to say because I wrote about them in the other post. The fact that the minotaur can use a two-handed weapon with one hand doesn't really shock me because I know that the designers will have to compensate it somehow. It's a bad idea to advertize the power of a new class in a PvP game because it only leads to players screaming about unbalances already before the game is out.
DAoC usually had quite original and diversified classes to offer. That's a merit. For now there isn't much about the "Brawler" class that makes it look like something really interesting.
About the lootable relic/artifacts idea I won't comment either, for now. It's one that I know really well because I've juggled with it for a few years. So I know quite well the risks and purposes of it. I'll wait to see the details before adding my comments (if I'll be around by then). I'll just say that the idea fits an expansion well. There's always the problem that you cannot touch the RvR with "optional" content. But in this case these items are unique (at least in my idea), so while they will influence ALL players, those who use/carry them are still unique cases. You just need one player with the expansion who can loot/carry the item, then everyone else can play around. It doesn't unbalance the game or is felt as "unfair" from that perspective as it cannot be made mandatory for all players as it happens instead with the ToA items and abilities, which are "farmable".
And finally we have the new item slots and the Champion levels. About the Champion levels I can only grimace a bit. They are neither bad nor good, I will have to see how they continue the paths. I also cannot comment much because I never went about the first level, as I didn't finish the last PvE encounter and the kills in RvR didn't give enough points to see the bar moving.
The items slots have the problematic implication and risk to become another ToA. And people would hate this already on the principle. I continue to believe that DAoC NEEDS PvE, and that some PvE can be good IF MADE ACCESSIBLE. But even here I don't have enough elements to comment. Those item slots could be just reserved for the relics (I doubt it), but in every case it's too soon to rant about them.
Lastly a feature that isn't in the feature list and that I want to discuss exactly because it isn't there. All previous expansion with the exception of the last included new technology. New engines, graphic restyles and upgrades. The biggest leap forward was with Shrouded Isles with the whole new engine that partially fixed a mean memory leak that corrupted the screen after a few hours of play, then the higher res textures and a bunch of other details. After it we had ToA with another new (laggy) client, SpeedTree, new multi-layer terrain textures and the support for some new pretty effects. Catacombs didn't change much in the engine (that is noticeable) but it brought the all-new character models (with mixed results). And Darkness Rising didn't introduce any new technology either but it accompanied the reskin of Darkness Falls and the capital cities. Minor graphic reskins have continued with the Live patches, but this new expansion won't bring anything from that perspective. No better technology, no restyles. And I underline this because DAoC's client is really, really bad and would definitely need work. Even if most of its fault are due to Netimmerse/Gamebryo (the engine they licenced). For example the awful performance and stutter if you play in windowed mode, the impossibility to resize/maximize the window and so on. And you can add the UI to the list.
But that kind of development isn't competence of DAoC's current team, I suspect. Those who can touch those sort of things would be already busy with Warhammer.
Btw, if you remember Sanya said that the delay of the announce was also because they were granted more resources and so they could re-add features that were cut. Well, with a second glance at the feature list I really wonder what they were going to put in the expansion if the plan was to add even less than that.
And, quoting from the other post:
However, we've got some things coming down the pike that will almost certainly have an impact on those numbers.
I hope it wasn't this expansion. Because I seriously doubt it will have even a slight positive effect on the population of the game.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 18, 2006 - 08:00.
Some more "neutral" comments after the whiny post.
It looks like someone else took my role.
See, the truth is that DAoC's fanboys and fangirls are VERY HARD to please and I would dare to say that we were even spoilt along the years. When Mythic stops trying, we notice. And our original enthusiasm and dedication backfires.
From my point of view the content of this expansion was quite predictable. After all the rants about the classes in the Catacombs expansion and all the efforts that Mythic had to spend to tweak them along the months, the choice to use just one class shared by the three realms became more and more attractive.
The real problem is that the game has already way too many classes. At this point one more is BETTER than three. Zero would be even better than one, but this expansion for Mythic is like a duty. Something that they have promised and now they have to finish even if they don't really want to. Because now that the Warhammer is the focus of the attention and of the "serious" development, DAoC is just a burden. A dead weight.
They had to fit something in this expansion. And classes and races seem to be obligatory in the recipe even when they are POISON, as in this case.
If you read the negative feedback about this expansion you notice that the general opinion is quite uniform. There aren't many complaints about the features themselves (well, there are. But I'll return on this), but more concerns about the direction the game is taking.
Because the point is that this expansion IS NOT what DAoC would need. That's what people see. That's what Amber is ranting about in the link above, and even what I read in a comment here. But what's new? How is this different from ALL previous expansions? None of them really helped the game. Darkness Rising, Catacombs, ToA. In a few cases they damaged or deviated the game from its track. Not helped.
This isn't a problem of resources available. This is a problem of an overall model of development used. By definition the expansions are the only way possible to develop significantly the game. To do that kind of stuff that the Live team cannot do alone. At the same time the only real part of the game that can be made optional (which is the true problem) and expandable is PvE.
Please notice: optional and expandable. Take these two terms, then think about "revitalizing the game". How's that "optional and expandable"?
That's the point. It was the real problem since the beginning. The core of the game and the potential and scope of an expansion pack part ways. In the same way ToA derailed the game when the players wanted the RvR to improve. And not that kind of PvE that they can find in a better shape in other games.
But the RvR and all the basic structure of the game CANNOT be worked in an expansion. Because those parts aren't "optional and expandable". They need the opposite, they are mandatory and need to be consolidated because there's already way too much space wasted. CCP solved this problem with Eve. They have a sandbox and they adapt to its model. Eve HAS expansions. And those expansion CAN improve radically the CORE of the game. But they aren't optional.
So the point is: do not expect that kind of development on an expansion. Not only because it isn't possible, but because it would even damage the game if that significant work would be restricted to an expansion pack and not the totality of the players (and the game).
Mythic had to deal with that. And their plan to minimize the side-effects was to use the expansions to expand and improve the PvE, while bundling the "technology upgrades" with it. While along the year they tried to work on the RvR and all the other parts of the game that couldn't be made optional. That's how we got the "New Frontier" and all those WoW-like eases of use that started to trickle in the game. Looking back, that's how we got the original masterpiece that was Darkness Falls.
If you ask Mythic what's their plan about "revitalizing the game", they answer: "we have done that and always continue to do that." Now the real question is: are they doing it effectively?
My opinion is that they aren't doing enough, and I always specified that it's not a matter of resources, but the way they are used. But then I would also say that that "Catacombs" damaged more the game than ToA. It took Mythic two years to admit the flaws of ToA, and it took them even more to admit the flaws of "/level 20". I wouldn't be surprised if one day they'll even admit that Catacombs design was a big mistake.
Yes, I have ideas about how you could revitalize the game so that it could go from a negative to a positive growth. That idea they "stole" from me didn't have that purpose and cannot be blamed for it. At least I could suggest some serious attempts that could make that a possibility. Many of these ideas are already in all I wrote. One of these is a reorganization of the overall structure behind "Catacombs" that doesn't directly touch the content, but only the overall scheme and function. Doing something along those lines while also making the whole expansion (content) free for everyone could already do something. Then you could do the other part working on all the Battlegrounds in the game and convert them to the "Permeable Barriers" design strategy (see point 2), while also working on the BGs to make them all unique and special (with specific rewards and perks), instead of moving linearly toward a complexity.
Want another idea that could draw the attention of more players without requiring too much work? PvP classic servers:
- You take the classic server rules, no ToA, no buffbots
- You unify all the underground zones in "Catacombs" so that all the three realms share the same structure, used also as a "subway" connecting the three realms
- Make all the private instances, public
- Instead of the current "free-for-all" mode of the DAoC's PvP servers, you retain the three hardcoded realms factions
It would require a quite significant effort to work on the technology (but I think it could be possible with Doom-like "visportals"), but it would also be great if all the Catacombs zones could be made "seamless", with no zoning. Becoming one big seamless PvE/PvP environment.
Of course the negatives are that it's yet another server that thins even more the population on the other servers. But, still, it risks to be insanely popular if well executed. And then you can work on the idea, adding mini-games and objectives in each dungeon and maybe doing the impossibe: REMOVE the frontiers entirely. And then reintegrate parts of them directly on the classic zones. With the realms becoming the RvR territories and the players taking control of Ludlow, Prydwen Keep, Cornwall, Ardagh, Mag Mell and so on. In a full PvP world.
So much is still possible. DAoC could still have a so huge potential and still have a lot to say. It could still make pale even the newer game and find its own noteworthy place in the market without getting overwhelmed. The game has still that kind of strength. But it's a strength that you need to recognize and then pull out of it.
You decide if Mythic is doing that or not.
I believe that not only Mythic made many mistakes along the way (which isn't bad and can lead to improve) but that they are still making them, and even easily predictable ones. The server clusters were a partial mistake, Agramon was a mistake, Catacombs was an announced disaster whose true effects are only visible today. The implementation of boats, PvP missions and rules to ease the realm unbalance way too weak and inappropriate in some cases.
The point is: there is so much that could be discussed, but I cannot believe that you really hoped that this expansion was going to solve the long-standing problems that this game has always had at the core.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 17, 2006 - 16:25.
Some precisations are due after I claimed that Mythic "stole" my idea.
To begin with, I wrote it in a somewhat ironic tone, because I'm definitely not furious about that. As I wrote, the expansion actually looks better than how I expected and I'm glad that they added something interesting into it beside the usual rehated food. Some new design, new ideas. Not just the cow to milk.
So I'm glad. I was waiting for the announce of the press release and I was expecting it to be totally deluding to the point that I wouldn't even have bothered to write about it here. Instead I'm writing and definitely not in a negative way.
Now what's important to consider is that whether Mythic really stole my idea or not is... completely irrelevant. There are two reasons:
1- It's not possible to demonstrate in any way that Mythic stole that idea directly from me
2- I lose EVERY right to complain about my ideas being stolen the second that I write them here publicly
Still, I think i have the right to point this out. I mean, I'm one of the most snubbed and scorned blogger about these games. Still my ideas prove to be valid, eventually. That's what I'm pointing out.
Let's take a look at this expansion. One new race, one class, some more skills, items and a dungeon. If the feature list stopped there we would have the death of the game design. There is absolutely NOTHING that would tickle the interest or draw the attention of a potential player. Nothing to talk about because it's just the same reheated food, the kind of stuff you pull out of the hat when you have absolutely no idea about what to fit in an expansion pack. Like if the expansion pack was more a inconvenient obligation to fulfill instead of an opportunity to realize better the potential and ambition of a game.
The death of game design because it's a total abdication to develop and improve the game, and just milk the cow till there isn't nothing left.
So. Honestly. Give a look at that feature list. Read it and then tell me if the idea that they supposedly stole from me isn't the ONLY ONE that makes that expansion pack at least slightly more interesting. That's the point.
That's MY OWN IDEA. There isn't any fucking doubt that the idea is my own. Then, MAYBE, someone else could have had it in the exact same way I had it. I doubt it, because it looks like it's EXACTLY the same, applied in the exact same part of the game, with the exact same purpose and mechanics (and maybe the designers read it here, forgot it and then thought they had it themselves...). There are a bit too many coincidences, but let's still assume that Mythic didn't deliberately stole that idea. And that they had it entirely on their own.
Let's take the Mozart example. Mozart composes some of the most incredible songs ever, in Austria. Then, at the other side of the world, at the same time, there is someone else who composes the exact same songs. It is an absolute coincidence but this doesn't change anything about the validity of those songs. One will become famous and popular, the other not. That other guy at the other side of the world can still do what Mozart did.
Now I'm definitely not Mozart and that idea is just a small one. I don't care if Mythic stole it from me or if they had it entirely on their own. But it was still my own idea, that I defined in detail, examining and explain all its design implications. An idea that I developed entirely on my own and that maybe was then imagined by someone else entirely on his own. The point is: that idea was valid.
See, in a couple of months this site you are reading will be forgotten. When Mythic will release the expansion everyone will recognize that type of PvP design as their own. Yes, I'm glad when I see my ideas being actually put into use and turn into practice. Because if I write them then it means that I believe they are valid and that people would enjoy them. So I'm glad if this happens. But I think you can also understand how this is terribly frustrating for me.
It is frustrating because I'm always mocked and laughed at. "Haha, look. Another idiot with a blog who thinks to be special". And I will be laughed at RIGHT NOW because I believe to be so special that a Mythic employee read that idea here and then decided to steal it.
Ryan "Nerfbat/Blackguard" Shwayder wrote a while ago that he wasn't going to write his own design ideas on his website because he hoped that eventually he could use them in a game. Well, instead I do write those ideas for a similar reason. I write them because I know I won't have that opportunity, no matter how much I want it.
I know that those ideas I have will never see the light of the day. I write here for that reason. This site is "the ladder to see the stars". Because I love that world, be part of it, contribute, to discuss things, analyze, examine, find solution to problems and dream of (im)possible things.
I couldn't be more happy if someone sees how these ideas are good and put them into use. Because that's ultimately what I would like to do. And even more than that: the opportunity participate. See, it's the completely opposite idea of feeling like a genius above everyone else. I don't feel like that, instead what I dream of is being there and do these kinds of things. Work with people who I have esteem for and share that kind of passion.
If I'd know for sure that Mythic came here and stole my idea I couldn't be more happy. Because it would be a demonstration and a confirmation that those ideas have some worth. And that they aren't just words wasted on the internet by yet another idiot. But that's also what it is frustrating. Because I will never be sure if I actually had contributed to that idea or not. And, in the case I did, Mythic will never even turn in my direction to give me credit.
Instead I will continue to get ignored and mocked, by Mythic in the first place and RIGHT NOW. That's what's frustrating, when you do something and it's valid, but never recognized if not when someone else takes it and takes all the credit. It's a feeling of impotence that even grows when you see how what you do could be, in fact, valid.
And IN PARTICULAR when you always searched a more direct dialogue and all you got was being ignored. And ignored after your ideas are taken and rebranded without even glancing back.
See, I have NO PROBLEM to say that the great majority of the design ideas I have at an high level were inspired by what Dave Rickey was doing on "Wish" before he was kicked out and the project killed (one year later, but it died the one before). I have no problem to admit that without this community, other bloggers, the message boards and all the rest MY HEAD WOULD BE EMPTY about these things. I'm the first to draw from everything I see. Use everything as a source of inspiration. From comics, to books, to movies, to games I play and the ideas I get while I play them. Nothing is original because one things flow after the other and it isn't even possible to remember what were all the influences. We all contibute to a discussion, a line of thought. Everyone is a source of inspiration. But I DO give credit to all that. And I would give credit back to Mythic itself because DAoC is still the game I loved the most and that inspired me the most.
I started to write exactly a few months after "Wish" as a result of that frustration. See a game with a great potential being driven to the ground. So this site came as the result of a *need*. Because in the month and half that I've been involved with the beta of the game I was totally absorbed by it and when I saw everything thrown away, I felt the need to continue along that path. And save something. Let it continue. Put it into use.
So the purpose is about making the ideas flow. Work together because that's what I do. I don't just write here and "enlight" the readers with my superiority. Instead I read every other blog, I participate in message boards and I go deep into everything I see. This because the ideas come from there.
The real point is that I just don't belong where I'd like to be. I'm just an anomaly. This site and all the rest are a way to deal with all that even if I know the way things work, and that it's not my place.
So the frustration is the essence of it all. I know it well and some more of it doesn't really change much things. I'm happy that Mythic is going to use a valid idea for the expansion pack.
At the same time you can understand the frustration because I see something to which I dedicate myself, taken away. While I'm still the idiot of the village and have to swallow it.
So I'm not saying "You bastards, that's my idea and I want it back NOW." Instead I'm saying "I think that's a good one and, if well executed, can improve the game. So go on and do it. And maybe go read all I write about it so that you could find suggestions to avoid making some mistakes and better realize it."
But also remember that I was here and made that work entirely on my own. I don't have a team to work with and, without that one idea, the expansion would have been quite forgettable.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 16, 2006 - 19:10.
I have only five minutes to comment, but I'll continue later.
The site of the expansion has a somewhat "retro game" feel that I actually like.
The features are better than what I expected:
- One new race (Minotaur) shared by the three realms, as anticipated
- One new class (Mauler) shared by the three realms, as anticipated
- Champion Levels 6-10, as anticipated
- New dungeon: The Labyrinth - Under Agramon (not specified if instanced or shared, but it shouldn't be RvR)
- Cerberus, end-game encounter
- New Item Slots - Mythical Items. To get from the Labyrinth. No other details about these.
And, the biggest one, imho:
- RvR relics that you bring in RvR but that make your character get hunted by other players
No specific details about this either, but I'm pointing to it because... IT'S MY OWN IDEA!
I'll link later (or right now), but if you go see the early pages of the "Dream mmorpg" category you can see how I was imagining powerful PvP items (artifacts) that turn the carrier into a Demi-god. In my design idea, these objects were surely "overpowered" (unbalance in PvP is FUN!), but also "full loot". In the sense that other players who killed you could steal them from your body and becoming themselves a Demi-god.
These powerful items could be summoned only inside very hard PvE instances and then brought back to the PvP world. There were also some limits so that you had to "feed" the item, preventing a player to log out with it and keep it outside of the game for too much time and also forcing the carrier to go out and actually kill people instead of just hide somewhere. In my orginal idea carrying an artifact also "mutated" the graphical appearance of the character, making him bigger and meaner and recognizeable on the battlefield.
Here's an excerpt from the orginial design:
These artifacts make a player near to a demi-god. One player wielding one or more artifacts can fight alone and win against multiple opponents and will be really, really hard to take down without an organized effort from the opposite side. These demi-gods are supposed to become the focus of the PvP in a similar way to how the "heroes" were used in Warcraft 3. They are special and unique. They artifacts aren't usable in PvE, they lose all their properties if they are brought in a PvE instance. In order to keep them on your character, you need to "feed" them by killing the players on the opposite factions and have a role in the conquest, participating actively in the PvP. Exposing yourself. If you are hiding you won't be able to fulfill the "feed" requirements and you'll lose the artifact. When you have an artifact with you your character will change its appearance and you'll be recognizable in the battlefield. Even graphically you'll transform into a demi-god. The other faction will also know that one of the artifacts was summoned and will be able to "divinate" your position in the map. They can track you down. you will be hunted. If you die in a PvP battle, your artifact will be dropped on the ground and one of the players in the opposite faction can loot it and use it, acquiring the powers that were yours. The artifacts are also limited in number. Each type of artifact can have only a fixed (and really small) nuber of "copies" active in a PvP world. The most powerful artifacts are unique and one and only one copy can exist in the PvP world at once. If an artifact is unique, the instance where it can be summoned will be sealed till the artifact remains in the PvP world. There isn't a time limit to the persistence of an artifact in the PvP world, just its "feeding" and "active" requirements. If the feeding requirement aren't met, or if the player with the artifact has been logged out for too long, not meeting the active requirements, the artifact is reset to the original PvE instance that will remain sealed for a set amount of time depending on the type of the artifact.
Now I don't know if Mythic's relics implementation is really similar to that old idea I had since we only have that line in the features list. But I have suspects :)
Who wants to take bets? And who wants to bet that my idea will still be better than Mythic's implementation?
OMG! THIEFS IN MY HOUSE! :)
Submitted by Abalieno on August 12, 2006 - 14:25.
If you look at the graph of total players in the US, not really:
More or less the game is losing players since February 04. Steady in the last couple of months but not sitting in a very positive condition since it's still sitting at the very bottom of its overall performance.
If you look at the graph of total players in the EU, not really either:
Right now the two regions have 50% of the subscribers (or better, active users) respectively, and both used to have much more months and years ago. A rough esteem of the number of total subscribers would put them at around 120-130k or slightly less considering the trends of the game.
Then Sanya said something about Gareth (one of the no-TOA servers) trending up in the last Grab Bag, and I went to see:
Yep, trending up and quite surprising. Is this an inversion of tendence? Well, it's something but it still needs to be reproportioned if you look at the other cluster that shares the same ruleset of Gareth:
Gareth gained around 500 players, the Lamorak cluster lost nearly 400. More like a migration considering that the cluster has continued to decline since Gareth was taken as the "preferred" server.
Still, Sanya is right when she says that clustering Gareth could lead to issues. The servers usually cap at 3000 players and it doesn't really matter if the servers are clustered instead of merged since the RvR zones is where the problems will arise (since those are shared). It would be possible right now, but would there be the risk of DAoC gaining some new players?
However, we've got some things coming down the pike that will almost certainly have an impact on those numbers.
You've got me curious.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 5, 2006 - 12:57.
Folks,
I really like how I'm all ballistic against Mythic these days. I seriously don't know why, actually I'm quite enjoying writing this and I do it with no anger :)
I was reading some comments on the Vault about Mythic and DAoC's unannounced expansion and started to think about "half-truths".
So they really have *no shame* to announce that they are hiring and that it's the reason of the delay on the announces about the expansion, and everyone swallows that and sees it as a so positive thing. Of course Sanya pays attention to not reveal how many devs left in the meantime to justify the income of new devs. So: half-truths. Or better: half-lies to make appear everything positive.
Growth or inadequate compensation? You can imagine what I'm thinking ;)
What about facing the truth and demonstrating that all my suspects and bad mouthing are wrong?
Mythic, do this: gather an headcount, staggered from the beta of DAoC till today, every six months. Leaving out everyone who doesn't work directly in the game, so including only designers, artists, programmers, coordinators. Everyone who touched directly the game, leaving out CS, QA, marketing and everything that isn't directly related to build the game for what it is. Then put those numbers on a graph and publish it.
If I'm wrong and the graph still shows a positive curve, Mythic will have a quite effective marketing tool to demonstrate that the support to DAoC has always remained strong and that they still believe in the game as they claim.
If I'm right we'll never see that graph.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 5, 2006 - 11:24.
Folks,
DAoC was supposed to announce the features in its fall expansion a few months ago. For the previous expansions the press releases arrived around March/April, if I remember correctly. This time the first delay arrived with the E3 because Mythic wanted to hype Warhammer instead of letting it compete for the attention with DAoC. Like if it could have been a risk. My suspect is that they just didn't want to be easily identified with the title of "DAoC makers" and instead appear, at least to those who aren't knee deep in the mmorpg industry, as the new kids on the block.
(After all Mythic is only interested in those who never heard of it, or those who played DAoC so long ago that they don't remember anymore why they left and just have sweet memories of it. The current players who learnt who the real and recent Mythic really is? Those are not important. Firstly because if they swallowed DAoC so long, they are probably going to buy Warhammer even after all the bitching, secondly because relating to them would be actually have to face the *merit* of what was being done. And not just the fluffy, sweet memories or the hype for the future. Those are players that will be harder to seduce and that are a potential danger to the image of the company. Those have memories.)
Then they said that the announce would arrive in June, then the sellout to EA was announced, then it was July and every other week of July:
First, please, let me say that I too am a little frustrated. Every time I ask, the answer is a very confident-sounding "Within the week! Don't fret!" About three weeks ago, I started making little mewling noises, and pointing out that maybe saying that Every. Single. Week was starting to sound, you know, stupid.
Now it's August but it still seems that this expansion is so secret and special that it still cannot be announced.
I'm hearing the announcement will be next week, but I no longer expect you to read that with a straight face, and that's cool, I understand.
In the meantime lots of details leaked anyway. In an interview they said there was going to be a new race (minotaur) shared by all the three realms, and a new class (mauler). Then there were even rumors about a deal with Vivox (same as those working with Eve-Online) to offer voice chat support and use DAoC as a test bed for Warhammer, who is also supposed to have voice chat.
When people made you wait for something for so long, then expectations rise. I mean, there must be a reason why the features in an expansion are so precious that they cannot be disclosed with the players of the game's community for MONTHS. It's not like people really care about DAoC, it's not like there will be earth shattering innovations. In fact it's Sanya herself to anticipate the cold shower:
I CAN tell you that you shouldn't be getting all psyched about the announcement, which is really aimed at people who don't read the Herald.
Like if people who don't read the Herald give a shit about DAoC's next expansion.
Players shouldn't be getting psyched because most of the features are already known? Maybe people shouldn't be getting psyched just because this expansion has really nothing to say.
On the Vault I was already commenting:
I suspect that the delay is due to an agreement that needs to be finalized.
My suspect is that they are going to offer voice chat in the expansion as a test bed for Warhammer, waiting to receive confirmation from Vivox and finalize the details so that they can make the proper announce.
There will be hardly something else in the expansion beside that, the new class and race, and some redundant PvE stuff to keep the content team busy.
Oh, and probably that supid idea of instanced PvP.
Hmm. Instanced PvP (what a terrible idea for DAoC), Minotaur... Labyrinth.
The guess about the voice chat is just my very own speculation, so it's quite possible that there's no truth about it (beside that Vivox really contacted Mythic). Sanya gave also more hints, since the press release about the expansion is going to be deluding anyway:
we flashed up small sections of larger concept art - weird mechanical things. At another event, we put up a big piece of concept art, this one a kind of bloody, skinned thing with horns. This concept art is pretty effectively foreshadowing what we're going to put in the press release.
Again, I'm sorry about the lack of expansion information to date. It is totally killing me, because I've SEEN what they're building!
Ohh, I'm so THRILLED! Uhm... No, I'm not.
DAoC was driven to the ground a while ago and this expansion is another useless, superfluous stretch. I guess that the concept art she refers is about the PvE portion of the game. DAoC has shown in the past GREAT art and locations, always destroyed in potential by very bad game design and execution. That concept art doesn't do anything for me, but that DAoC's next expansion still has pretty art isn't really a feature that could impress. It was the same for previous expansions, and it didn't really help.
Again what I wonder is where the game designers are gone, what's the vision for the game? Is there anyone at home beside polls and devs who are waiting to be promoted to Warhammer?
It seems not, and for a very valid reason:
"We need to coordinate this with EA." Most recently, the delay was over something really good for us all, in the long term - we are staffing up the Camelot team by TEN more positions. That's awesome news for the expansion pack we've been building for months, but it did mean we should hold off on the expansion announcement, since adding back some previously-cut features was viable.
Only Sanya could sell this as a good thing. As I wrote in many occasions, a high churn rate in the dev team is only a recipe for failure. Good games only come out of consolidated dev teams who learnt how to work together and developed competence, experience and synergy. Not from a bunch of guys thrown together at random just because the company is in the middle of a big shift. And I really wonder what the fuck there is to coordinate about a press release whose features were all announced and about which noone gives a darn thing.
What is sure is that noone cares about what Mythic is doing on DAoC beside those players still subscribed. What is even more sure is that the feature list on this expansion appeals noone if not, again, those same players (and the instanced PvP may well be a death kiss even to the little worth that was left in the PvP, as Catacombs task dungeons were the death kiss to the game's PvE side). DAoC was driven to the ground, the original team gone and I strongly doubt that all those fresh guys coming from QA and CS will be able to refill the company of its leaked value and ambition.
Maybe it will happen and they will even do a better work. Excuse me if I'm skeptical. In fact I believe they are just being used as disposable fuel. To burn and leave by the road when this deal with EA will start to show its rotten fruits.
Why the secrecy? Why the delay? This really is bad form on Mythic's end. They have NOTHING to lose if they were to tell us all their plans for the expansion right now. Really, what negative could come from just letting the people who are funding the expansion in on what it might possibly contain?
You really want to know? Because they have nothing to show. And because they know it.
So, think whatever you want. But there just isn't another one on the internet who can write so much about a useless expansion that isn't still even announced.
I want a cookie.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 3, 2006 - 15:29.
I've received today the third issue of E-ON (the fourth is already out, but I'm always one behind) and there's an interview with CCP's CEO, Hilmar Petursson:
E-ON: Do you think it's risky that CCP has all its eggs in one basket? Shouldn't you be working on EVE 2, or some generic fantasy MMO by now? Isn't it slightly insane, the resources you pour back into Eve?
Hilmar: I would say it makes perfect sense. I would actually use the word 'insane' to describe someone that didn't stick with their product through tough times, who failed to do everything humanly possible to make it reach the success it deserves (I am using the phrase 'humanly possible' loosely here, btw).
I feel that question so fucking irritating (and maybe made with that purpose). Even more so because that kind of mindset is so widespread between both industry people and players.
It's not 'insane'. It's completely RETARDED. How could you consider those questions legitimate?
The reason why Eve can count on more than 100k (currently surclassing DAoC by a fair amount, confirmed even by the total number of concurrent players online) instead of 20k is BECAUSE they poured back into it so many resources. If they didn't, Eve would have joined the already quite big pool of failed projects, or at least never moved from those 20k it had. Zero-growth.
Why it would be reasonable to demolish all that Eve has built along the years to make a prettier sequel? Why it would make sense to always go back to zero?
You could say that Eve is successful just because it was lucky that noone else tried to revindicate that niche of the market. But let's even assume that SOE or someone else with big money decided to go after Eve and "own" it. You would really think that it would be easy to develop a similar game with that huge scope from zero, spend three or more years into it and then expect to outclass what Eve is right now, plus all that CCP would be able to achieve in the case they really sustain this kind of aggressive development for those three years?
Not doing that would be like applying the mudflation to the real market. You build value (Eve 2) by devaluing what you have (Eve 1). It wouldn't make sense, instead, to consolidate the value you have already and that you know is solid?
Or maybe people think that gambling is serious business?
I cannot believe how marketers and industry people can say that it's more risky to try to increase the value you have instead of selling it off. The best way to secure the market would be about developing a core game that is valid and profitable. Then you work from there, reinvesting all you earn from it so that you can move out of reach of your competitors. That's how you can distantiate them, that's how you gain a definite advantage and are able to feel a little more safe.
And when you are able to reach a reasonable safety, you don't stop there. Instead you use that advantage and your experience to continue to anticipate what others will be able to do. And you lead, and you increase your capital and value ON TOP of what you have. Not by devaluing what you have.
Instead if you keep abandoning projects to try new ones, then you are just going to be blown away by the first wind, because instead of consolidating what you had, you just dispersed it. All the little value you had, and all the value you could have produced. And you'll finish with NOTHING in your hands because you threw everything away like that.
Take the example of Mythic. With DAoC they achieved a relevant position in the market. For a while they kept consolidating that value and the company grew and bacame more solid. Then they moved their resources on that bad idea that was Imperator, and then Warhammer. The result is that now the only valuable product that Mythic has is still just a betrayed DAoC that is quickly sinking into oblivion and all that relative safeness that Mythic had secured as a company, completely gone. To the point that their only possibility left was to sell out:
I saw that our games had to change. We were already changing Camelot, but not enough. Not fast enough.
At the time, Mythic was independent. And so if we failed with Imperator, there wouldn’t be anyone to bail us out.
With all the money and resources wasted on Imperator, with DAoC sinking like a plumb, of course going with Warhammer from scratch was risky. It wasn't just another attempt between many to grow the company from there and secure more value. It was "or it goes, or it's over". Because they drove themselves into a corner. Because they burnt all that relative safety, as a company, that they achieved.
It's too easy to fill your mouth with money then. It's too easy and it won't be for long.
The truth is that Mythic, despite the great start, despite the surprising and impressive growth, is now smaller than CCP. Losing to that sci-fi game without avatars that obviously couldn't be as successful.
With one game only that when, rarely, people talk about, talk about in past tense.
--
And Matt Firor isn't different:
Really, to be successful, a MMO title must be perceived as successful when it launches. If it is not seen as a major contender, and have buzz and excitement among its community the day before it opens, it will almost certainly fail. It's a situation unique to MMOs in the gaming industry.
Yeah, tell that to CCP and Eve. Tell that even to Scott Hartsman and EQ2, which started as an announced spectacular failure and instead was surprisingly able to become at least a decent game and secure a moderate success, even if still deluding for its initial expectations.
In fact it's true. It's a situation unique to MMOs. Only one of these games is able to have a disastrous launch and still manage to fix its problem, improve with the time and become one great game one day. Only MMOs can evolve, only MMOs have second chances.
On single-player games it doesn't happen. If they launch and they suck you can patch them later all you want. But they'll never sell.
The launch for a MMO is important only for one simple reason: because after years of pointless hype, lies and false hopes, the players can finally see the game for what it is, and not for how it was presented.
The king is naked.
Submitted by Abalieno on June 11, 2006 - 10:09.
One of the minor but constant problems in DAoC is that the test server has always had extremely low population, which doesn't help Mythic to test the patches thoroughly. In the years they tried many times to encourage the players to play there and there were guys like Uriel who transformed this problem in some sort of personal crusade. But the results are rather poor and Pendragon is still not so useful as it should and could.
A while ago Mythic decided to encourage the players through special events, prizes and by hinting that they were going to listen feedback only from those who actively tested the changes before venting off. I think I participated to one of the first events, a few months before the launch of "New Frontiers". I don't remember exactly how it worked or what we were supposed to "test", but it was in the form of a simple PvP siege to a keep with one realm defending and two trying to get in. It was kind of fun. DAoC's "real" PvP is always plagued by specialized groups and arranged 8vs8 encounters or the alternative of *extremely long* downtimes while you sit at a keep waiting for leaders to decide what to do next. Having a "directed" experience with a set goal and all players focusing on it was fun, with no downtimes or dicking around.
Then the server crashed. But, again, it was some of the best fun I had in the game. And it crashed because we were a lot of players involved in a rather massive fight. Things that don't happen often anymore, sadly.
Recently I've seen Mythic promoting every kind of awkward events, like "naked races", and I really wonder what they are trying to test like that.
The problem of the "test server" and convincing people to play there is a general one afflicting every game. And it's for this reason that it's kind of interesting to see WoW's test servers with the exact opposite problem. Queques going constantly above 5k. More than five thousands of players *waiting* to test, with another 3500 stuffed in. Plus all those who tried to get in but didn't bother to persist.
Of course this is partly due to the scale of things. WoW has like more than 200k of contemporary users, while DAoC is today around 11k. But this isn't the only reason. Months ago the patches were more interesting (like the addition of the Battlegrounds) but the test servers were relatively empty.
When things changed? When Blizzard started not only to allow server transfers (Mythic does this too), but when they also added premade characters at max level and even fully equipped, epics included. The test servers became suddenly "true" test environments. People started to flock there to test new talents builds and classes that they didn't bother to level up, even raid content to be prepared when the patches will arrive on the live servers.
Now let's see things nowadays. Mythic is going to add a new Battleground (Cathal Valley), with a 45 - 49 level range. Well, I'm interested in this. It's Emain. The layout of the zone should be exactly as Emain in the "old frontier". It should be a relatively small zone where the PvP could be quite intense instead of excessively slow as it is now on the "New Frontiers". So I'd gladly test this, without the need for "events" or other oddities to motivate me. But I cannot. You are a fool if you think that I'm going to create a new character to level up to 45 and equip it just to test a BG. I cannot transfer my characters there either because they are at level 50. I cannot de-level to get in the BG, which is capped at 49.
The point is: are the players "not testing" because they don't want to, or just because the testing environment offered is simply not appropriate?
Blizzard learnt this. They give you premade characters ready for the use and people liked this because they could finally "test". For their own interest and the game. So I wonder. Why it isn't reasonable to ask for a test environment where I can make characters and set their level manually, test skills, get all kind of equimpement from a "dispenser" without the need to farm for money, infinite respecs and all the rest?
If one game like WoW, where the character progress and discovery is the WHOLE game, doesn't worry about spoiling the fun by offering premade characters, then I wonder why DAoC couldn't do that and more. With a game where the fun is actually *crippled* by the mindless progression that the "Catacombs" expansion managed to stupidify beyond belief.
I'd be glad if I had the possibility to level up manually a character to 49, outfit it with decent equipment, spec it properly and running a few minutes later right in the new BG to have some fun. And maybe respec or try another class if I want to.
But there's more to this. Developing such a system now would mean eating a significant amount of programming resources to a game whose support is being slowly eroded. Is this worth doing just to support a test server?
Not at all. Or maybe it is.
When the new Battleground will be patched on the live servers, I won't be able to play there again. I wish I could, but the same problem on the test server applies here. I'm not going to endure to level another character and equip it up to level 45 and above just to step in the new Battleground. The grind is unsustainable even if leveling is absurdly fast nowadays. But it's just excessively dumb and I don't have access to dedicate powelevellers like the 90% of those who still play the game. I won't bother even if I would have an interest to play.
And here's the "revolutionary" idea, that could also excuse the work I suggested above on the test server: what about allowing the characters to "de-level" temporarily and access all the Battlegrounds in the game, from the first to the last, instead of getting locked in the current one only?
The implications of this simple idea shouldn't be underestimated and the result could justify the use of those scarce resurces that the game still has. It is something similar to what I suggested for Warhammer and I think it's something worth experimenting since it could have a strong, positive impact on both games.
I think it's time to dare for DAoC. Which doesn't mean about risking to ruin even what is left, but about pushing it closer to its real potential. This idea is just about giving the players a choice they don't have currently. A change of rules that could be simpler and cheaper to implement but with a stronger impact since it's about changing and streamlining structures more than adding tons of new content. Improving the accessibility for new and veteran players more than alienating those few who are left. I think the game needs an impulse, a push. And I think this idea could be a very good start.
I'll return on this to explain better.
Submitted by Abalieno on May 20, 2006 - 06:18.
What I wrote here below about the "bolts" was a complete misunderstanding on my side.
They aren't talking about crossbows (who still suck, btw) but the spell "bolts", like fireballs and such.
Ugh.
Submitted by Abalieno on May 18, 2006 - 08:54.
As anticipated, this year Mythic brought only Warhammer to the show (E3) and left DAoC behind. That the great majority of the resources were moved to the new project is undeniable and obvious. I just wish they would openly admit it and plan the future of both games accordingly, instead of continuing to answer with half-lies and badly concealed resignation.
The trend is also obvious (a year ago they had the launch of the classic servers to invert the progressive downward trend, this year nothing will stop it). No, it's not the game being old. It's just the commitment being shifted to Warhammer, with DAoC obviously suffering from a conservative development that just aims to continue to push it forward till it lasts.
DAoC is already dead, and it started to die when Mythic began working on Imperator. I could try to analyze the game design and development to point out where things aren't working and how they could improve, but at this point it's just pointless (as it always was) so I'll avoid to waste my time mourning.
Instead I'm still interesting to write a few words about the upcoming stuff. Despite the absence from the E3, some details were still leaked about the upcoming expansion:
What they would say is that the new expansion, which will be officially announced soon, has one new race and one new class. Anyone, from any realm, can unlock the class on an account by account basis and then make characters using it. The race comes free with the expansion.
They plan to launch the expansion on their 5 year anniversary later this year.
The official announce is expected for June but the expectations about the announce are really low, I think. This expansion will hardly have "something to say". Nor it will add much to the game.
For all things that could be tried in an expansion they just decided to go with something rabidly innovative: one new race and one new class. After the huge creative effort to produce that idea they couldn't be bothered with all the balance problems that could arise, so the wonderful solution: we'll make the race and class available to all three realms so that there's only the bare minimum to balance and we'll avoid all the complaints.
Instead on the forums people are complaining because they see this as lazy work. A demonstration that not much can be expected for this game if not what's barely necessary as an excuse to kick it forward foe a few more months while Warhammer is being worked on.
It's unclear if the long delayed rework of the tradeskills will be part of this expansion or if it will come staggered through the live patches. What we know is that both the expansion and the bigger changes on the tradeskills will arrive this fall. And that these changes won't be anything groundbreaking.
From my point of view another new class is ALREADY WAY TOO MUCH. They aren't lazy there, just stupid. I really don't know who feels the need for another class. At this point I really wonder if it's the case that Mythic wastes even more resources on this sort of stuff. I don't think the players are asking this, nor I think it will help the game.
You don't have any good idea for the expansion that is viable with the resources you have available? Ok, don't do one. There's so much to do, if the group is small better organize it to make some worthwhile, precise changes on the core points instead of wasting them on stuff that adds nothing and even risks to fuck up the game even more.
Or maybe NOT doing a patch would be already too innovative for Mythic?
Anyway, with the upcoming patch (1.84) they are also focusing on the bolts:
They also plan to focus in on bolts. There is a lot of talk about them and Mythic worries they’re not being used as intended and are having a detrimental effect on RvR. As it finally reached the top of their balance heap, they’re thinking of changing it so bolts only fail when cast on someone already involved in hand-to-hand melee combat. They want them to be an opening gambit, a long range RvR strike. They’re not supposed to be used close up. However, some view them as too hard to use and, as such, refinements must be made.
This is more interesting because I'm going to watch how they'll solve this, and then I'll mock them because I can already see the lame direction where they are moving.
It's true that right now the crossbows are unusable and worthless. The controls are horribly designed. To fire a bolt you need to press the appropriate hotkey, stand completely still for 5 seconds or so (loading the crossbow) and then you'll be able to fire the bolt, still if you don't move. On top of this the bolts can miss like a normal arrow. It's quite obvious that these controls are clunky and it's really hard to find a situation where the crossbow is worth using. So yes, there's a problem.
From the few words I quoted, Mythic is looking into the mechanic. Their goals are:
- make them an "opening gambit", reducing the miss rate
- avoid them being used in melee
Now those two goals hint to a lame solution that they used on the fireballs. An absurd mechanic that I'm sure everyone who played DAoC still remembers and that just MAKES NO SENSE: if you fire a fireball at a target not engaged in combat, the fireball hits and deals damage. If the fireball is fired at a target engaged in combat, it misses.
I don't know. That's really a stupid mechanic for a fireball. It's already deluding the fact that a FIREBALL doesn't do AOE damage as in every other game that makes sense. You know, the single-target typical magic attack is not a fireball, but the magic arrow. On top of this there's the fact that you have to check if your target is in combat or not, or the fireball will be uneffective.
It's rather obvious how stupid and not consistent this mechanic is. It's just BAD DESIGN all around. It doesn't make sense, it's counterintuitive and genre breaking. It has all the possible flaws all at once. What happens now? That they are going to "fix" the bolts (another broken mechanic on its own, as explained) by porting to them the way the fireballs work.
Great plan there.
And I'm writing this because these changes are still being designed. I'm putting my hands forward here and we'll see how they'll change this.
Now here's my point of view.
There are bows and crossbows. There must be some traits that differentiate them and the VERY FIRST THING you have to consider when you design the implementation of these objects in the game is about identifying those traits so that you can replicate them in the game.
Roughly:
- a bow shoots faster but it is less precise
- a crossbow has long reload times but it's much more precise
Here we have already a basic mechanic that can be easily ported to any game, DAoC included. Not only. It is also consistent with those two goals that Mythic defined above. The crossbows should be more precise (so more probability to hit than a bow) but slow to load (so not really usable if you are in melee).
See? It's not that complicated. What is left to do is to examine how the crossbows work in the current game (described above) and plan the concrete changes. Which are just two rather trivial modifications to the current system:
1- Preload. The possibility to load a bolt on the crossbow and keep it readied to be fired at any moment and till the character keeps the crossbow equipped.
2- Change the to-hit mechanic. Flat rate 95% "to hit" if the character is standing still when the bolt is being fired, progressively reduced with the running speed down to a minimum of 50%.
That's all.
Those two simple changes achieve prefectly the goals that Mythic set. They are balanced in the game and are also consistent mechanics with how a crossbow is supposed to work and how people expect it to work in a game. Without the need of the lame solution that makes the bolt miss if your target is engaged in melee.
With those changes the crossbow will REALLY become an "opening gambit" for the tank classes, because they would be able to load the bolt and then fire it later. At the same time the long reload times (cannot reload if you are interrupted) would make it impossible to use a crossbow if the character is engaged in melee. Which is what makes sense in a situation like that.
Take this as another design challenge.
Want to bet that Mythic's solution will be much worse than mine? I even gave them the advantage of the forewarning ;)
EDIT: I later discovered to have misunderstood the whole thing. Mythic isn't talking about crossbows but about fireballs (and that quote from mmorpg.com tricked me with its mistakes).
If, as announced, they remove the in-combat check on the fireballs/bolts, then it is all good. It should have been like this from the very beginning and I passed a full year arguing with Therrik (former Wizzy TL) about this.
If it's too overpowering just rise the recast timers and add a minimum range. I expect to hear complaints from the players, though.
Submitted by Abalieno on April 13, 2006 - 13:12.
No surprises. DAoC follows a quite predictable schedule since it is repeated each year with minimal changes, so we are at the moment of the year when the first details about the upcoming expansion start to be disclosed and the moment when I start to be deluded.
Well, we don't have much right now:
A note for Camelot fans who cringe at having to read all this: Dark Age of Camelot is great, doing fine, they’re working on an expansion, and they plan on working with you to keep making the game better, more exciting, and more fun to play. There’s a new quest system in the works, a new race and class coming, and most importantly, a new form of RvR gameplay. And their producer said outright, flat out, that Camelot is their flagship product and they plan to keep improving it for years. You guys will have plenty to play for years to come.
Now DAoC is an odd game because each time they announce an expansion you aren't there starting to marvel and counting days. Instead you just hope they don't fuck everything up and it's exactly where my mind goes when I think to "a new form of RvR". Instanced, I'd add.
I'm not sure my account will survive till the expansion. There are rumors, somewhat confirmed by an in-game survey, that Mythic is thinking about experimenting with voice chat services. If it is going to be a feature for Warhammer they could start to test it in DAoC, probably offering it as a "feature" bundled with the expansion.
As I often wrote I hate the voice chat and DAoC has been one of the very few games where it is not necessary and not even so widespread outside the ganking groups (which I despise as well). You could always say, "so don't use it". The point is that when you support it directly, it becomes mandatory for everyone. So you have to swallow it. And this is only the tip of the iceberg since Mythic keeps moving the game in directions I don't like.
I already log in rarely, and when I do I never manage to get a group. So not only my motivation is very low (and my faith in Mythic below the ground), but I cannot play even when I want. Instanced RvR and voice chat are good enough reasons to quit.
They keep trying something else while what they have already is still crippled despite having still a good potentail. I'd like to see significant changes to the current RvR, not another lame implementation of ideas leeched from WoW.
On the servers the players are decreasing (even if this is the time of the year when every game tends to lose some activity), confirming what I was thinking: it's not with the class changes that you keep people or attract new players. Class changes and balance tweaks are a "given". They don't "add value" to a game nor increase its appeal. Put in a simple way, they are "jumps in the place". They don't move forward nor backwards if they don't go totally wrong. I repeat that DAoC needs to "wake up" its playerbase and start to be more aggressive toward the competition. The game has qualities that need to be brought up, but I think they are destined to remain dormant forever.
A new class? Yawn. A new race? Yawn. A new quest system? *rise eyebrow* It will be surely some automated shit. I bet. With every new expansion they don't add a new piece. They remove it, and right now DAoC has not much left. PvE is completely dead. RvR is next on the list (and already progressing well).
I think at the core there's one main issue. Mythic isn't anymore able to "tune in" with the desire of the players. To suggest them something they want to hear and to play. So the disaffection. This is a broken record for me. But I continue to believe that leeching the "new" Warhammer community is a trick that won't last long. The problem is at Mythic, it isn't in DAoC.
Every expansion is a chance and now they are losing the train. But, hey, it was at arm's range.
Submitted by Abalieno on March 20, 2006 - 06:19.
After one week trying, I was finally able to join a group in DAoC. We still sit and wait for the majority of the time and I got less than 2k or RPs in total, but at least it was something.
The problems I see are still the same. From a side the RvR should be made more alive, because right now the game is extremely specialized into 8vs8 groups and nothing else. From the other the game needs some value in the PvE side because the shameless use of the instances dumbed everything down to an unacceptable level. A game with just PvP cannot survive and the success lies in the blend between the two.
In the first case (making the RvR pivot some more around the keeps and sieges, the actual RvR) my idea on the open PvP model could be easily adapted to achieve the same goals:
What about rewarding more RPs the more you fight closer to a keep?
Think to it like a 'gravity center', toward which people are attracted.
It would also help casual players to find groups more easily since not the whole game would be based on 8vs8 specialized, closed groups.
This idea could work for a very simple reason:
If they reward A LOT more RPs for conquering towers and keeps, we could arrive at a scenario where the realms AVOID each other to keep farming RPs while fighting just the guards (since long sieges would be an useless delay that both sides would like to avoid).
Instead if the keeps are transformed into gravity centers that multiply the RPs the closer you are, the points would still come from the "direct kills", so promoting the actual PvP instead of
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