WoW
Submitted by Abalieno on August 27, 2009 - 17:32.
My understanding is not perfect, especially when he starts to babble, but from halfway through till the end he really seems to realize some core problems that go against all he "designed" up to this point. Permeable barriers and all.
Tom-Chilton-IGN-Video-Interview
Enjoy the backpedaling, smart ass.
P.S.
It looks from the video they are redoing water effects with this expansion. RotLK was shadows, this one water. We are in the future. Tech and design. So advanced. Think of all the progress in the last few years. Unbelievable.
Submitted by Abalieno on March 30, 2009 - 17:55.
1- Blizzard has no competition and they don't need to try anymore to stay ahead. There isn't any need to fight even on the last thousands of players. They win, everyone else lost. Game over.
The patches are getting slower and more insubstantial, filled with pages of convoluted class changes. It's quite obvious that the there's no creative push behind this and that they are only trying to please the current many subscribers, especially the ones still heavily invested in the game. There is no attempt to reach further.
It's also quite obvious that resources are being moved. A while ago Blizzard was only working on WoW. Now they have WoW, Starcraft, Diablo and another MMO project. They were never able to do more than one thing at once and now the focus will start to shift. As always in this industry you only see the effect of what happens behind the scenes a few years later. It starts now, the effect will come later.
The lead designer, Jeff Kaplan, left WoW to move on the new project. We know only of the public figures but it is obvious that he is followed by many more that work in the back.
WoW is now in the (un)capable hands of Kalgan. Have fun.
2- Lum quoted various pieces from a conference (where industry people only go to feel proud, boast their cultivated shortsightedness, feel validated among equals, avoid challenges, avoid reality, shake hands, and whose game design relevance is a negative number) where Jeff Kaplan talks about quest design. Jeff Kaplan is in my "good guys book" and I'm not entirely sure if he was mocking the audience thinking that they would only grasp the superficial level anyway, and so talk in a language they could understand.
It's not the specific of what he says to be wrong, it's the overall sense. I only read Lum quotes but those ideas were considered good ideas "on paper" that revealed to be poor in practice. Bottom line: these ideas should be avoided.
That's a wrong conclusion. Wrong interpretation. It's about trying to understand aspects of the game with only one rigid model. That's the inner flaw. It's not in the quest ideas, it's in the approach.
Everyone of those examples isn't just a "good idea on paper". Gone bad in practice. Why? Because it obviously was a bad idea even in paper? Nope. It was a possibly good idea with an inappropriate execution.
That's the point: good ideas with bad execution. All of them.
Take the example of the quest in Stranglethorn. The idea is cool. It is also not an obligatory quest, so if you don't like the added layers you can always skip it. Where's the big flaw of that quest? Not in the concept. It's in the limits of the inventory. So. You may solve the problem by erasing the quest entirely. Or you may fix the one problem. In this case you could create a container object that takes 1 slot in the inventory and that can contain all the parts that can be then taken and sold in the auction, traded or whatever.
"For a single quest to consume 19 spaces in your bags is just ridiculous."
That's right. That's why you solve the one problem, as the cool concept behind the quest wasn't to consume all those spaces, but to create an economy and add a new layer.
Now this is an example, but every one else following is the seed of the same consideration: inappropriate quest concepts because they don't fit the standard framework. Not BAD quest concepts. Just quest concepts that step out of the limited tools given.
Problem is the framework, not the material. The problem is execution, not quest concepts. Given that implementation, the quest didn't work. But this doesn't make it an universally bad quest that wouldn't or can't work in other cases.
The "quest chains" aren't bad because of what they are. They are bad because the quest UI is standardized and doesn't support them properly (in fact the only way to see even a short chain quest is to use MODs like Wowhead). It's again a flaw in the framework. You are bringing creative ideas to a framework that doesn't support them. Either you dump all creative quest concepts, or you invest in programmers that expand the framework to support new quest types properly. But, again, the rigidness of a framework is the real true cause of a good or bad idea applied to it. Its context.
So enjoy your GDC. Either I'm overestimating Kaplan, or he was there just to deceive you with apparent sincerity. He keeps the good lessons (solutions) for himself.
P.S.
Ubiq on this as well. That would lead to think that he doesn't get it either, but look further, deeper. That's the hidden war he's doing to Bioware. His purpose is there. Nowadays when devs have an hard time to impose themselves internally, they rant externally.
Submitted by Abalieno on February 18, 2009 - 19:07.
A comment on Tobold's blog about the higher and higher requirements to be able to join a group:
It really is about the risk on the time invested. In the second week of January, or so, it seems the majority caught up with the achievers, and all of a sudden there was a severe drop in the competency and preparedness of the average PuG'er. I started leaving a lot of heroic groups five minutes in when I'd end up doing over 40% of the damage or our "tank" had 18k health. The situation has degraded with PuG raids. I've seen a Naxx10 fail because six of the DPS were doing less than 1500dps.
To me, it's an issue of respect. I invested time and effort into ensuring that I am competent and well-equipped enough not to hinder the success of the run. I expect the same in return from other players. DPS should significantly outperform tanks in their role. Tanks should have at least 5k more health than I do and be able to hold AoE threat. Healers in heroics should have enough spellpower to spare a heal on someone other than the tank, and enough awareness to see when they're needed.
Slackers who seem to think attendance qualifies entitlement show disrespect, and are undeserving of my time and effort.
I am disgusted.
Not at the reaction of this player (sample of a general trend) but of the fact that a massive game encourages and promotes this type of interaction.
It's also counterproductive, as the more requirements rise higher, the harder for new people to reach that level. A social fracture.
Submitted by Abalieno on November 15, 2008 - 02:06.
From an interview:
We are adopting a new kind of philosophy towards raiding which is kind of inspired by the way we did Zul'Aman, which is that we want the raid to be accessible, you know, not just for 10-man groups but also 25. Then kind of have a hard mode built in so that you get rewarded for doing it in a way that's more difficult. Sort of with Zul'Aman, doing it in a shorter time, rescuing in the prisoners, that sort of thing. So that's kind of what we have in mind, a hard mode for it.
Submitted by Abalieno on November 14, 2008 - 01:32.
I gave a quick glance at WotLK credits. It seems that the happy trio got promotions.
Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan is now "Game Director"
Tom "Kalgan/Evocare" Chilton is now "Lead Designer"
Alex "Furor" Afrasiabi is now "World Lead Designer"
The hard part is getting in the loop.
Submitted by Abalieno on November 12, 2008 - 22:48.
Interesting.
Account page
Useful tool
EDIT:
Not really, it still requires a CD-Key, without a way to get one online.
Submitted by Abalieno on October 3, 2008 - 17:05.
It's fun how things are developing. After Kalgan pathetic defense of Arenas we got Tigole turning things on their head.
But first an explanatory, spontaneous discussion I spotted on guild chat earlier today:
Now the wonderful backpedaling:
Actually, we have been discussing new battlegrounds quite a bit lately. Wrath of the Lich King will feature Strand of the Ancients (attack/defend) as well as Wintergrasp (non-instanced, world PvP).
But past that, we are exploring ideas that would involve expanding our Battleground content in future patches and beyond. We believe we have some strong ideas for improving Battlegrounds and PvP as a whole in the game and we're definitely going to focus on improvements in the future. Now, it's very early to be talking about some of this stuff but I think it's important for the community to know that it's on our minds.
Our general thought is that we could provide more BG content over time. The BG content that we could provide could be of higher quality with a higher degree of accessibility. Overall, we'd like to have more content and variety. We also want the gameplay experience in the BGs to be better directed. We're also exploring the concept of a complimentary "competitive" bg system as well. Over time, we'd like the focus of PvP to shift back to being more BG-centric and more focused on Horde versus Alliance -- the core of our game.
We're also planning on improving some Battleground and PvP features in general. For example, we want to give you the ability to queue for Battlegrounds from anywhere in the world. We're also going to explore EXP gain through the PvP system as well as low level itemization to support that.
Please don't take this post as a promise. This won't be an overnight process. Not all of these things are set in stone and guaranteed to happen. It would take us a while to shift in this direction. But these are some of the current thoughts on the development team. I think it's important for you guys to know some of our thought process in regards to PvP.
Yep, not an overnight process. It requires Kalgan to be fired first, now that he is way beyond recovery.
Third and fourth paragraph are a shameless Warhammer rip-off. "We believe we have some strong ideas". Oh yeas, I'm sure. Just that they aren't yours.
And it's late for you. The "core of your game" doesn't exist anymore.
Submitted by Abalieno on October 3, 2008 - 16:53.
It seems that my personal crusade isn't anymore personal.
Why wasting words when some players can make the perfect summary:
YOU'RE GOING TO ARENA, AND YOU ARE GOING TO LIKE IT, YOU HEAR ME?!
AIN'T NO WAY IS THE BOTTOM FALLING OUT OF THE GLORIOUS PYRAMID OF SKILL MY ARENAS HAVE CONSTRUCTED, I WON'T PUT UP WITH THIS CRAP. COME WOTLK, YOU'RE ALL GOING TO GET YOUR HANDS DIRTY IN MY LINE-OF-SIGHT, COUNTER-COMP, RUN-AWAY-AND-DRINK, BURST-THE-WARRIOR, TRAIN-THE-LOCK, OOM-THE-HEALERS, FLAVOUR-OF-THE-MONTH, SAND-BOX CREATION THAT IS THE BE-ALL-END-ALL OF ANY KIND OF PVP EXPERIENCE YOU PATHETIC RETARDS WILL EVER SEE IN ANY MMO OF YOUR SHORT INSIGNIFICANT LIVES. I MEAN JESUS CHRIST YOU GUYS SHOULD BE SIPHONING OFF SOME OF YOUR GRANDMOTHERS PENSION TO ME CAUSE THIS IS JUST SO GOOD.
AND IF ANY OF YOU SKILLESS WORMS DARE THINK OTHERWISE YOU"RE GOING TO HAVE TO SETTLE FOR PVE BLUE GEAR, GOT IT? GOOD LUCK PVPING IN THAT CRAP, YOU'RE GOING TO BLOODY-WELL NEED IT. THEN AGAIN, THAT'S ALL YOU BATTLEGROUND / WORLD PVP LOVING FAILURES DESERVE. HELL, YOU'RE LUCKY YOU'RE EVEN ALLOWED TO BUY WOTLK WITHOUT HAVING A PERSONAL RATING OF 2200. WOW ISN'T ABOUT FUN ANYMORE, IT'S ABOUT GODDAMN SKILL, YOU HEAR ME? AT LEAST WATCHING THE GLADIATORS (THAT ARE PROBABLY BETTER THAN YOU IN RL AS WELL) MORTAL-STRIKING / DIVINE-STORMING / SHADOW-STEPPING YOUR NOOB ASS INTO OBLIVION IN BATTLEGROUNDS WILL KEEP ME AMUSED AS I CREATE THE NEXT TIER OF ARENA GEAR WHILE BENCHING DOUBLE YOUR BODY WEIGHT WITH ONE ARM.
LOVE,
FROM YOUR PVP OVERLORD AND COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF,
KALGAN
Submitted by Abalieno on October 3, 2008 - 01:50.
When I first read about this issue I misunderstood it and thought was related to arenas items requiring a certain rating to be used and not just to be earned, which was discussed months ago. Then the second time I got it right: they were putting arena rating requirements EVEN on battlegrounds/honor items.
It was so utterly stupid that I thought right away that it was some unintended beta transition. No way it could make into release.
Instead it's deliberate.
What a fucking rambling idiot. He was always, but he's now surpassing every record and even PRETENSE of plausibility. Who the fuck runs Blizzard to allow that this jerk is still around AND a senior designer who continues to fuck and ruin the PvP in every way possible? How it's possible that most of the rest of the design is so brilliant while this guy can still do as he pleases? Where is the rest of the team? Why no one says anything?
The reason behind the retarded change is summarized this way:
However for now, we don't have a way to measure "skill" in a battleground in a way that getting the "best" items in the game through battlegrounds would feel equitable when compared to what is required as far as co-ordination and success in pve to get items of equivalent power.
it's more of a natural consequence of the fact that because we have a way to measure success that feels reasonably balanced against pve, we're able to put high-end items there, which on its own creates the focus of importance.
They want a "morally right" game where rewards come for "skill" and not for sinking time.
Since in PvE endgame the rewards only come if you "win" the l33t raid game, and if you keep failing you get nothing, they wanted this even on PvP and thought that rewards should only come from "winning" and not for trying, or participating. They don't want to reward persistence, they want to reward success. You have to be worthy.
Now, as a principle, the idea is even plausible even if unacceptable for a *game*, since players are supposed to have fun no matter of their limits. You know, the best game is the one that makes you think you are very good, not the game that slaps you in the face and laughs every time you fail and makes you feel like you are the very bottom of the food chain.
But let's put this concern aside for a second. Rewarding "skill" as opposed to time sinks and grinds. Sounds palatable. And maybe it is, if it wasn't for the fact that the principle of rewarding "skill" through "power-ups" is one HUGE CONTRADICTION. It's just plain stupid. Unmotivated.
What if for next Olympiads Usain Bolt starts 20m ahead of everyone else since he won this past edition? But, oh, Kalgan replied to that argument:
Of course, I realize that the subject of "skill" is another topic of debate on its own, with many players citing gear quality and team comps as factors in determining the outcome (some seem to go as far as to imply that it's all that matters). Clearly, those factors do influence the outcome, but not in a way that makes skill irrelevant. If that were the case, it wouldn't be very hard to step onto the stage with some of the pro-gamers in the tournament and take them down in a match of even gear and comps. However, I can assure you that while I consider myself (for example) a pretty respectable player when it comes to arenas, I and a pair of similarly skilled teammates probably wouldn't win more than 1 in every 100 games against the top players despite using identical gear and comps. Like it or not, that's skill.
First. The case of competing with identical gear is not a playable case. It doesn't happen. And what happens isn't that players who wear crap are "bolstered" to the item quality of "top-players". What happens is that those top-players HAVE A FUCKING ADVANTAGE OVER PLAYERS WITH LESS SKILL *AND* LESS POWERFUL.
It's not equal footing and it's not even weaker players brought to the level of stronger ones. It's just giving advantages to who is already ahead, so that this relative situation is preserved.
Second. The implication that there's skill in the game doesn't justify in ANY way that those who have the skill must have artificial advantages added on top of that skill. QUITE THE CONTRARY.
Sure there's skill. Usain Bolt may as well win even if *I* start 20m ahead of him. But this doesn't fucking justify the fact that HE has the right start 20m ahead *of me* simply because he has that skill. QUITE THE OPPOSITE.
So it's really a matter of plausibility, not game design. We are far away from any possible game consideration. This is plain obvious: you just CAN'T justify an irritating change in the game as a moral principle. Because the premises of that principle are, as demonstrated, completely wrong and unacceptable. So that justification doesn't work.
The true reasons why this is happening are twofold. The first well explained on Q23:
A lot of players have simply given up on the arena due to the fact that they don't find it fun getting pounded 10 times for a meager amount of points. Unfortunately, those lower-tier players are needed to keep the arena ladder functioning properly, since somebody has to have a shitty rating in an ELO system. Instead of finding a creative or rewarding way of luring players back into the arena, Blizzard is simply requiring them to come back in because they can't get battleground PvP gear otherwise.
The other reason is Tom Chilton and his e-peen.
It's all about the rewards, and these rules are made SOLELY so that these rewards stay "secured" in the hands of a selected few.
And then I thought it was genius.
Politically it's the metaphor of capitalism. The concentrated power and wealth in the hands of some limited few and wasted mindlessly, while the rest of humanity has nothing and is treated like garbage. And the "righteousness" of it all.
The game is the celebration of that. The self-preservation of power through rules made by those who exercise that power and self-made morals to justify it. Selfish and blind.
You can't learn anything more useful than that.
P.S.
Feedback starts from here.
Submitted by Abalieno on August 23, 2008 - 12:55.
Now Blizzard risks a Crisis on Infinite Earths.
From an interview:
It's actually not instances. What we do is we have different world states, and depending on what quests you've completed, it changes what world state you're seeing.
what we call the phasing technology. There's quests that you do when you arrive at a town that's overrun by Scourge, it's like a "Choplifter" quest, you have to fly in and rescue villagers. As you bring them back to your quest hub, those villagers are there permanently for you, whereas if somebody who hasn't done the quest shows up, they don't see them.
There goes the last pretense of creating a world.
That kind of feature is extremely easy to implement. If it didn't exist till now it was simply due to scruples. Wasn't there any other better way?
Submitted by Abalieno on June 30, 2008 - 12:58.
When I wrote on the forums that I believed Blizzard had an advantage building WoW's zones because of some black magic in their editor, everyone went against me.
Well, I'm still absolutely convinced that there's some secret sauce right there. Call it how you want, the gist of what I meant is that for each zone Blizzard makes a terrain "palette" that guarantees:
1- A consistent and unique look throughout the whole game, and distinctive for the each zone.
2- That even if the zone designer sucks, things still look pretty and WoW-y.
Or: everyone can take that black magic editor and make a WoW-y quality zone in no time and with no experience. Even I.
"Evidence".
See the ridge in the background? Compare it to what we are used to see.
A "new feature" in WotLK is that they built a new palette/preset for the terrain, and the rounded hills now look more sharply cut.
The simple thing I wanted to underline is that what you see there is not the result of an awesome zone designer who spent his life modeling EACH of those tiny hills and bumps, but of a tool in the editor that allows even a monkey to quickly use it and get a consistent look that makes every screenshot recognizable. That consistent look that everyone praises.
Then I don't know if the zone designer person is ALSO responsible for the preset making. My point is that the "genius" is in the editor and preset. And that the making of a zone is much, much more trivial and easy than how people expect. And more concerned instead with the "flow" and structure of a zone.
But the "look" and prettiness are for the greater part merit of the editor and presets. And that if WoW still looks prettier than other games out there it's because the designers can use standardized tools that guarantee consistency and quality.
And it is not new (Warcraft 3).
P.S.
The controversy is that my theory is that other MMOs companies don't seem to have the same pre-planning and strong automated tools, so more vulnerable to the fickleness of their zone designers. Lack of consistence and all the rest.
Or: it's about the gears, not just about the people.
Blizzard has better gears, or spends more time making better gears. No matter who they hire, they guarantee already that the quality is high and up to their standards (at least for zone design).
Submitted by Abalieno on May 1, 2008 - 19:05.
Taking a cue from D-One who pointed to a counter-rant of a moderator against those who hate the Arenas in WoW.
The truth is that anyone saying "arenas suck!" doesn't actually think they suck, they're either just trolling, or they have a specific and related issue/problem. I think we're able to break those reasons out though, filter everything down and get to what the issues actually are, see what may need to change or be fixed, and get down to it. If they're not the right kind of PvP for you, fine, hopefully we can address that by giving you more PvP in other places, if you don't like PvP at all and are afraid they're taking time away from the content you do enjoy - don't worry, they aren't, if you want to like the arenas but feel there are inherent issues with them, we hope to address those as well.
Well, the truth is in that my own case I DO think Arenas suck and SHOULD be entirely removed from the game.
Not because every aspect of the game I don't like shouldn't be liked by anyone else, but because the gameplay concept behind the Arenas is inappropriate for WoW. A mmorpg based on some degree of persistence and, in particular, on character progression, doesn't fit with a *good* arena game that is more aimed at competitive, and balanced gameplay and no real "RPG".
My suggestion:
- Strip the Arenas part from WoW. Make it an entirely different game. Make it accessible through the same client, Make it even playable as standalone paying a 1-2 dollars subscription for those who just want these arenas. Then add a tiered system where each tier gives you the choice between same-value armor sets, so that you can combine the pieces freely while also keeping the players in the same tier balanced. And then keep a sense of progression by putting better equipment in higher tiers, but without letting players in different tier compete between each other. Make it that you can even export your WoW-normal character, getting evaluated by a system and then put in the proper tier to compete fairly.
That would please everyone. Those who don't like the arenas, and those who like them and would like a more fair environment in which to compete.
It wouldn't work, though. Because what I think is when the players bought the game, they wanted to play a MMORPG. Not eSport.
Submitted by Innsmouth on April 25, 2008 - 01:35.
Player: Please, please, please release a Season 4 Arena and don't introduce ANY new gear.
Then I think you will have a VERY good indication how popular the Arena is on its own merits.
Kalgan: About as popular as a Sunwell without any loot in it?
Submitted by Abalieno on April 23, 2008 - 18:58.
After this I'm done commenting mmorpgs for a while, because as I already explained it only leads to more and more. And I don't intend to waste my time.
I was reading some news about WoW's arena's system. And those news fit exactly the model I anticipated and that I summarized with this lame image:
Now it all looks obvious, but at the time it was pure guesswork as we were five months before the release of the expansion and the PvP revamp. Everything I wrote in that long post was quite correct and I remember on the forums I had to fight a battle because everyone continued to repeat that Blizzard learned from mistakes and that you could save up arena's points, and so, ideally save up enough of them to buy the best rewards.
While I was saying that no, Blizzard didn't learn a damn thing and that no matter what people expect, the arenas system was made by Kalgan for his need of being l33t. And so they were going to add some kind of reset system to make Arena's reward truly l33t, either by resetting your points after each arena season, or by adding rank requirements.
My point: nothing is going to change. They are maintaining the status quo where a small subset of players have access to the best gear, while the majority sits at the bottom of the pyramid. So making the elite stronger, and the noobs noober(?).
And now I read of the two upcoming changes:
1- They are rising rank requirements for arena loot
2- They are stopping powerlevelling
I never participated in a single arena's match, but I'm sad to see I was right. From what I read you can't purchase arena's loot with points, but you also have to maintain a certain rank. EXACTLY LIKE IN THE OLD HONOR SYSTEM.
From Tobold's blog comments:
This will remove most people below 1500 now from the arena, creating a whole new playing field. And arena ratings on honor gear? Ridiculous.
It seems to me like the Arena has turned into what the honor system was at it's launch. Something for the hardcore players. And of course as usual, the casuals will be steamrolled even if they've got a set two seasons below the current.
It seems that with patch 2.4 and this PvP announcement that Blizzard is returning to the WoW 1.0 model of hiding gear and patterns in inaccessible raid dungeons and behind PvP rating/ranking obstacles.
There will always be teams who win against better geared opponents because they outplay them. But this will get harder and harder. Just think about how much damage a S4 warrior will do to a S2 equipped cloth or leather wearer. With an equipment spiral like that, skill matters less and less.
And I'm writing this because I'd really want to see in the face those that FOR MONTHS argued with me. And then make fun of me if I point out to them that once again I was right.
The morale is in the article:
Saving your points (or even your honor) for Season 4 may not be as effective anymore though, if you can't also muster up the ratings to purchase the gear.
Last Kalgan's move to catassing. You know he is l33t. And you know where he's heading with all this.
Then there's the powerlevelling. Every idiot playing a MMO knows that it would be stupid to let a level 1 player group with a level 60 player and gain the level 60 player's experience.
Apparently, considering they are fixing it now, Kalgan didn't think of this:
Together, these rules (which Tom Chilton alluded to but did not reveal in a recent interview) should mean that a person cannot simply ride a high rating team to victory, but will instead need to fight their way up the ladder to gain points regardless of what team they join.
Because before you could group with the l33t and get their points/ranks. Which created the perfect opportunity to offer RMT to be up there for one turn, grab the loot, and leave.
And with this Kalgan made the last move to make arenas exactly the same of the past honor (catass) system.
Congratulations. You are back home.
Old summary:
- The Honor system is pure catass, players complain for two years
- Blizzard gives up and transforms Honor points into currency
- But doing that then every player will be able to eventually get the best rewards! *SHOCK!*
- So they nudge back the Honor system in the food chain
- And add on top an Arena system that is more Hardcore than ever and whose rewards dwarf everything that was in the game till that point
Submitted by Abalieno on April 18, 2008 - 19:01.
This has been my theory since the first hours I've seen WoW's client with my eyes. I was discussing this on the forum today, so I will repeat here the concept, also because I think it's one of the most important aspects that made the game successful and that I've NEVER seen commented.
Outside of Dave Rickey, who wrote in his blog about the importance of tools and how always the worst programmers are put to develop tools, as it is not fun or really gratifying. Can't post the link because it was swallowed by the internet along with the blog.
So look at this sample picture that was posted.
It is nothing crazy, but it explains my idea. See all those tiny hills that make the mountains in the background? Now, do you think that a designer modeled and textured every one, one by one?
So here I repeat my theory.
--
I believe that a lot of WoW's beauty comes from ground textures and terrain modeling.
My controversial opinion is that it isn't about good art, but good TECH.
If you notice WoW's terrain is modeled in a way that is easily recognizable and every zone has the same rounded style. What I think is that Blizzard is using an editor that with a few clicks of your mouse creates pretty terrain while also placing textures on the fly, depending on the height and slopes.
Not only it allows them to keep that style consistent, but I also think they can make the terrain very quickly (and a new zone is just a set palette of new textures). Even the grass placeable are probably added by the editor itself.
What I'm saying is that this editor must have some preset brushes that do everything on their own (mostly). You give a general direction, a few mouse clicks and the terrain comes to life with all the textures placed and blended following a precise formula. That ALSO makes all the game, everywhere, look consistent (because they turned textures and modeling conventions into RULES, then applied by the editor itself).
Even *YOU* can make a pretty zone in a very short time, if you had the right tools.
--
You can import WoW's textures even in NWN2, so what?
I'm talking about tools that let you manipulate objects. Not the objects themselves. You can let someone make a picture pixel by pixel, or you can give him some broader tools. What you are saying here is that MS Paint is the exact same program of Photoshop.
SURE IS.
But can't you see that doing what Photoshop does into MS Paint would require years of work?
Tools.
So: try to use NWN2 editor to make a small zone with the terrain that look similar to WoW. Even use an existing zone as a model. I'm sure it will pass six months and you are still tweaking things.
And I'm sure it would only take a few hours to make a good looking zone with the editor Blizzard is using and that is giving that consistent look to ALL the terrain in ALL their zones.
You think this is the result of awesomely awesome art direction, or that maybe there's one slave who's doing all the terrain in all WoW. I say it's because a multitude of designers are using the same tools, so producing similar results.
And I know this because I did use tools in various games, and I know that the most difficult thing is to actually make things look DIFFERENT from everything else in the same game and produced by the same tools.
--
In short: WoW's designers are using Photoshop-level tools, all other designers doing other MMOs are using MS Paint-level tools.
Generalizing and simplifying a lot, that's why everyone else is behind.
--
Follow up here. In the same way Warcraft 3's editor as the "apply cliff" tool, WoW likely has an "apply rounded hill" kind of tool that automatically shapes the terrain AND applies appropriate textures. With no effort at all.
Submitted by Abalieno on April 15, 2008 - 05:53.
So saddening:
Tom Chilton, Lead Designer: The big objective is to build WoW into a viable eSports game platform.
And then worse:
Tom Chilton: Before this, we didn't really have a good forum for competitive eSports. WoW PvP was just kind of there. For example, our battlegrounds always had the limitations of the Horde having to play against Alliance, it was very themed toward the conflict within the game itself.
So the "eSport" is a way to surpass the "limited" form of factional-themed PvP.
This is surely a new drift that wasn't there in their original plans. Subjectively: for the worse.
Tom Chilton: I'll tell you, it's been a slow evolution. When WoW first came out, we didn't really have any semblance of organized PvP. We had Tarren Mill versus Southshore...
GameSpy: Which was awesome!
Tom Chilton: That's nostalgia speaking! I remember you were interviewing me at E3 a couple years ago and you not thinking that it was so awesome.
We kind of slowly went from there, to trying to bring some organization to it with the Battlegrounds. Giving the game a little more capability for players to feel like it was a fair, controlled encounter. Then it was (the arenas) a natural evolution from that.
Natural evolution.
Submitted by Abalieno on February 9, 2008 - 19:51.
Cosmik on WoW's Honor Points, about one year ago:
The first curious thing is that you don't get your honor points immediately. Instead you get an "estimate", which tends to be far too low, and then get your real honor points the next day. Imagine experience points worked that way! "We estimate you have gained experience for two more levels today, but come back tomorrow for the exact value and the actual reward." I wondered, if honor points are given out on an absolute scale now, why would it take one day to calculate the honor points? It's better than the previous once-a-week calculation, but still not very logical.
My reply, one year ago:
Yeah. That question is gold. That's exactly what I was wondering a week ago on Q23, we are on the same line. No one could really understand this and the best guess is that it's all STILL because of those FUCKING diminished returns. My god, sometimes Blizzard is so absolutely stupid that isn't believable.
This can really make sense only in Kalgan's mind, because for the rest of the world this is blatantly flawed. And at this point isn't anymore just flawed, but also completely unexcused.
NO ONE STILL HAS A CLUE ABOUT HOW THIS SYSTEM WORKS.
THAT "best guess" was the friggin cause of all the fucking mess the Honor System was.
Proof coming from TODAY's patch notes (currently 2.4).
* Diminishing returns on honor for kills is being eliminated.
HENCE:
* Honor will now be instantly calculated, and available for player use.
My point still stands:
I'll tell you what you should do: you should demote that designer who is responsible for all this and replace him with someone who has at least half a clue. I do not want Kalgan fired. But I DO want him REPLACED. At least. Take his own responsibility for all this shit.
But, even more important, why the fuck PvP has to always receive this treatment? I mean in general, why the fuck PvP has always to be the afterthought? Why it always has to have the worst, careless design?
If your average bloggers figure out game design better than a team of senior designers who are paid to do that job professionally and have better insight about how the game works, then something is wrong.
Admit your failure on this system, and face your responsibilities.
Submitted by Abalieno on January 30, 2007 - 03:46.
The "collection quests" (meaning those that require you to loot "x" objects that may or may not drop) are a quest type that is often criticized by everyone because it feels grindy and frustrating. Many also wonder why they just don't all get replaced with the more straightforward kill-quests.
I don't think that collect quests are bad but the players don't like them. Still I believe these types of quests shouldn't be removed as they fill a different role than simple kill quests. They should be tweaked, though.
While playing in WoW's Outlands and even the starting zones I noticed plenty of quests that weren't well balanced. In particular those that require you to collect different kinds of items are usually badly balanced. Often there is one object type that is ALL OVER THE PLACE, while the other much more rare. This tends to feel frustrating.
The point is: it's not the quest type to be bad, it's the balance. The quest type just exposes the quest to this vulnerability.
Rule for collection quest and non-grindy gameplay: It's ok till you don't push players to kill respawns.
That pretty much guarantees that a collect quest is a good one. It also feels better from the point of view of the immersion. "Respawn" is a workaround mechanic to refresh the world, but it should be as invisible as possible from the player's perspective. In the case of collect quests the "respawn" becomes an ACTIVE mechanisms of the quest itself. This is all kinds of WRONG.
As an example, one of the first quests in the Outlands (Alliance side, but I guess mirrored even for Horde) asks you to collect 12 badges from the fel orcs in Zeth'Gor. The place is big enough, but with just a few players around and about a 50% (or less) chance of getting the badges you'll HAVE TO kill respawns at some point. In my case I killed the orc in the forge five times before I was able to complete the quests. This is grindy. Players should be presented new challenges, even with minimal variations, but at least some. If I have to kill the exact same mob, in the exact same location, then the game starts to feel grindy. And I shouldn't be put in the condition for this to be required.
This is bad. A quests that makes you kill respawns is bad. It's a very simple rule. And in the classic game there are more than one quests where not only it happens that you kill respawns, but in some cases YOU HAVE TO. As there aren't enough mobs to complete the quests if you don't wait for respawns. It even happens that you exterminate a zone, but the quest requirements still aren't complete (concrete example: it happened me two days ago collecting venom sacks in Stonetalon near the lake).
Come on. This kind of balance and game design is very easy to understand and to execute. WoW could use some tuning. It's not hard.
Submitted by Abalieno on January 19, 2007 - 17:30.
The title is appropriate.
Now I'm not anymore so upset of having lost the honor points bonus of the last month. And all those players who ground honor points for two months now see the result: some less fun playing the expansion. The same applies to raiders. You get some fun before, and some less fun after. A compromise.
I'm quite happy of my own. The very first two introductory quests in the Outlands are already offering me upgrades to my relatively crappy gear (and I even did some raidin'). I'm taking this veeeeery slowly so that I can play for a bit longer before hitting the raiding wall again.
But this is also the main topic now. The mudflation. Raph wrote a few things about this. But he talks about the economy, where in WoW this aspect is completely IRRELEVANT. He obviously speaks a bit in general, but WoW has other problems, concretely.
It's not necessary to make a big list, because WoW's economy is the one that works better. And it works well because it's very simple (and we can argue whether this is good or not). It's all ruled by money sinks and, imho, applied even too diligently. My 60 warrior never got more than 40 gold during his lifetime and I also had to go farming (something that I really despise) in a few cases because I was completely broken and couldn't even afford repairs. Epic mount? No thanks, I despise buying money more than I despise farming.
What are the main money sinks in WoW? Training skills as you level up, repairs and "maintenance". Maintenance including all the added money required to support high-end activity such as raiding.
That works. The economy works even too well. But, again, it's pretty irrelevant for the player. What instead matters in WoW is the CONTENT mudflation. And the content mudflation works on different premises.
Mudflated content (in my own definition) is content whose functions overlap. Two pieces of content have the same function in the game, one is clearly better then the other, and it replaces the other. The result is: content is removed from the game.
Also: path of least resistance. When we have two paths, one is preferred over the other. Such are games.
We design games with content reduction in mind. I already underlined the absurdity of this concept more than two years ago, the week that Blizzard announced the expansion. I also pointed out what was going to happen and why:
The rise of the level cap is a quick "fix", both in the sense of game-drug and as a functional and effective way to give back to the players that experience that they loved along the way and that faded when they hit the top, when they had to adapt their habits to the bigger raids and guilds. It works basically like the nostalgia. It's like if you are warped back ten levels without even remembering to have gone through them and have to repeat the experience like if it was the first time. In this genre the possibility to refresh the sense of awe and achievement is definitely something precious and satisfying for the players. So: why not?
While we can argue whether the current content will go or not right in the toilet, what is sure is that the current *progress* will.
We could assume that the players will retain their current gear for most of the hike to 70 but if this is true Blizzard would lose one of the strongest "fun" points: the sense of achievement. In the current game levelling is fun because you acquire new skills, spend talent points, get access to the mount and acquire progessively and constantly new gear. If the next 10 levels become just a grind with each level just giving out higher stats and nothing else, the "magic" would vanish easily and the expansion would finally feel rather dull. A game where you retain the same sword for 10 levels is a game that isn't fun. So what could happen? Where is the line that will part the brand new level 60 character ready to move to 70 and those other players that have been at 60 for more than one year and collected all sort of powerful items? From my point of view the expansion will HAVE TO replace the gear for *all* the players.
And the implicit contradiction: why we burn and remove content when content production is the bigger problem we have today? Scott Hartsman offered the answer to this:
All of that “database deflated” content is called “shared experiences,” and they’re critical to a game’s success in the era in which they’re relevant. In the long run it loses value. That’s a given.
However, it’s absolutely critical to have it there in the short term, in order to get a game to the point where it can actually lose that value. That’s a problem of success. We should be so lucky to have that content beginning to lose its original value.
What happened in WoW with the expansion? The first result is obvious. It completely erased all the content from level 58 and above. Every instance past BRD is now completely USELESS. And I'm not exaggerating.
In particular. The most useless piece of content of the whole game is now that "tier 0.5" they added about a year ago after all the protests against the raiding game. Completely. Useless.
The point is: the mudflation from the perspective of those who build these kinds of games isn't THE PROBLEM. The mudflation is THE SOLUTION. Read Raph with this in mind.
P.S.
And if you are a good game designer you would also notice that for a new player the quality of the game is inversely proportional to the mudflation. The more you open the gap between the early and late game, the less players around, the more the solo grind is prolonged.
Submitted by Abalieno on January 18, 2007 - 17:56.
It was discussed these days that Blizzard didn't offer a digital download of their expansion (I commented this on Brandon's blog).
Well, they are going to. Or at least I read it and I'm sure. It's just that these days I read things and then forget where. So go find the link yourself.
Now. If only they offered it in time for the release I could have spared the ~$60 for taxes+shipment of my US copy.
Yes. $60 for importing, $40 for the actual game.
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