Ashes of Creation

Neranja said:

I have to ask: Why would you allow GM privileges to be tied to the client and not the logged in account?

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Was questioning that myself honestly. You would think it would it be a server side flag on the account. Doesn't matter now though.

There's not enough testers to populate all the alpha servers atm so the low pop server im on hasn't progressed a node to village stage yet. Which means no mounts yet.

As far as alpha one goes though, its fantastic. The promise is there but again the game is so far from release. Alpha one is the equivalent to 1-20 of WoW testing. We're not at the scarlet monastery level 40 cap beta stage, if that's what anyone is wondering - not even close.

What i'm saying is, the game is and will be great, but it's so far away that there's no point in putting it on your radar atm. The scope of the game is massive - an ever changing world shaped by players and the amount of systems they need to build and put in place still desires enormous amount of work. The combat is worse than new world and has zero soul. There's 3 basic classes implemented which are basically there for testing purposes(tank, healer, ranged dps). The current combat/class implementation is more bare bones than OG classic WoW, barely in for testing. Again the game is so fucing far away.. no one should be really looking at it.

Alpha one is mostly testing their current level 1-16 mini game world and how it interacts with a lot of players. They need another 4 to 6 months to bug fix and polish this area/game play loop. IMO the real observation will be over the 1 month play test that starts later next week, this will showcase the current node system better.

If you thought New World combat was bad, AoC blands that to a whole new level. Lol.

I played/streamed it for like 5 hours today and got to a little past level 5, just my opinions.

First off, for an Alpha 1 the game felt real smooth and I'm optimistic that if fleshed out for another ~2 years it'll be a solid game.

In no particular organization:

Mob level spread seems really awkward, I assume this is related to the node based system but it needs some work. I had quests point me to an area and mark themselves as level 6 content but the mobs in the area are level 15. Meanwhile just over a hill there are level 1 mobs that also for some reason give kill credit.

Very pleased with the amount of unique NPC models, I think on 1 screen I saw more than in the entirety that I saw in New World.

Loot... where is it? Every NPC I killed dropped 1 of 3 different shards, 2 were vendor food and the highest tier (which mostly drop off elite/group mobs) is non-vendorable but the description text states you could do something else with it, presume crafting related.

EXP values for mobs need adjustment. A normal level 3 mob has ~140hp and gives like 70xp. A elite/group level 3 NPC has ~1400HP and gives ~90xp. Group XP split seems to be evenly divided with no bonus for full party so clearing a dungeon of high level mobs was producing nearly no xp vs just soloing and 2 shotting NPCs.

Damage scaling seems weird while leveling. Enemy HP keeps going up but my damage seems to have stayed the same. This is a little extra awkward because ability tooltips don't show damage/range values this might also be related to gear stats--

Gear stats, I couldn't find a way to upgrade my armor but I think this is more because its in Alpha 1. There were armorsmith vendors that did have gear with higher level Reqs than my starting stuff but as far as I could tell it was all significantly worse. There was no Armor value / Damage values and instead most stuff had % physical mitigation or % physical disable mitigation or like % physical damage increase. I couldn't figure out if weapon type mattered whatsoever since none list any stats.

Holding down autoattack feels really annoying, especially when grinding on high HP group trash.

Lack of some way to see what a NPC has targetted makes healing awkward, healing through the NPC by targetting it always seems to default to yourself.

Nice graphics that didn't seem to tax my machine nearly as much as New World did.

Cleric feels fun, at least at lower levels which is always good for a support class.

Quest design is same ol same ol, some have kind of obnoxious "run halfway across the world and talk to 1 npc then run all the way back to turn it in" step that reek of wasting player time.

Tradeskill nodes seem very few and far between and oddly populated. I found a lot of herbs but barely any stone/ore.

Xerge said:

What i'm saying is, the game is and will be great,

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That's a pretty bold declaration. Will have to remember that and see if I can paste that again in 1-2 years for fun.

I'll ask again, anyone playing or played that didn't pay at least $500 to get in? I want to hear their thoughts.

Didn't pay a dime, I got in via f&f alpha invite as I am friends with a developer. be more specific plz on what u want to know.

Edit: Fuck it i'll just break it shit down. I've already stated you shouldnt have this game on your near future radar.

Client - Under developed; sound channels aren't separated, can't change some keybinds, etc.
UI - Nope.p
Combat - basic bitch implementation atm. At lower levels you will push a couple of buttons and then it your Q, combat doesn't evolve past this, there are some movement abilities. but otherwise There's no point in even talking about it. There's no combo point system, no rage, no build up, no anything no class mechanics. HOwever bosses do have cool abilities right now.
Character development - Nope. You gain skill points as you level to distribute between passive/active abilities currently.
Character creation - no. fuck off. Few races, 3 classes. Dwarves roll when they jump. What the fuck ever nothing to see really.
Game systems - very bare bones
Zero point in any tester commenting on anything number related, its all a mess atm
Spell effect system is truly awesome, just not enough variety yet
World - gathering is not satisfying
World - this game world is wild to see in person on high settings for an MMO. Feels amazing to be in, larger than life, love running around it. 10/10
World - Draw distance. god fucking damn.
World - No day/night cycle yet though
World - monstr variety and design is great.
World - Node system is really fucking cool. The system is in place and works, players fully influence the world around you. It's cool shit.
World - Unreal engine in action, fucking love it. Get wreckt WoW, FF14, ESo.

Xerge said:

Didn't pay a dime, I got in via f&f alpha invite as I am friends with a developer. be more specific plz on what u want to know.

Edit: Fuck it i'll just break it shit down. I've already stated you shouldnt have this game on your near future radar.

Client - Under developed; sound channels aren't separated, can't change some keybinds, etc.
UI - Nope.p
Combat - basic bitch implementation atm. At lower levels you will push a couple of buttons and then it your Q, combat doesn't evolve past this, there are some movement abilities. but otherwise There's no point in even talking about it. There's no combo point system, no rage, no build up, no anything no class mechanics. HOwever bosses do have cool abilities right now.
Character development - Nope. You gain skill points as you level to distribute between passive/active abilities currently.
Character creation - no. fuck off. Few races, 3 classes. Dwarves roll when they jump. What the fuck ever nothing to see really.
Game systems - very bare bones
Zero point in any tester commenting on anything number related, its all a mess atm
Spell effect system is truly awesome, just not enough variety yet
World - gathering is not satisfying
World - this game world is wild to see in person on high settings for an MMO. Feels amazing to be in, larger than life, love running around it. 10/10
World - Draw distance. god fucking damn.
World - No day/night cycle yet though
World - monstr variety and design is great.
World - Node system is really fucking cool. The system is in place and works, players fully influence the world around you. It's cool shit.
World - Unreal engine in action, fucking love it. Get wreckt WoW, FF14, ESo.

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Thanks for taking the time to summarize your thoughts on that.

Out of curiosity - what are your thoughts on the server performance/networking? I skimmed some threads and what I read indicates it is 1) has improved over time, 2) was decent on Alpha1 but still had some lag/rubberbanding.

Related, I had the following observations -
1) their Alpha1 schedule update specifically mentioned server performance & networking as an area of focus
2) the world is very very low npc density (also seems low density on things PCs can interact with - ie objects)
3) NPC AI (combat & roaming, etc) seems the most basic imaginable - even with agro, npc assist radius, levels, etc
4) testers commented that, even though only 1/8th or so was in, that even the eventual world size seemed a bit small

Do you have any thoughts on the accuracy of those impressions I got? They do collectively suggest server performance & the networking stack could be having some severe limitations. Also related - the complete combat revamp (backend & all) started in March - seems like it might be related too. I mean, Alpha1 is exactly the right time to be working on improving that, so it's not a huge deal, but is definitely something many MMOs have never really gotten right and their progress on it will be something to watch closely.

First said:

Thanks for taking the time to summarize your thoughts on that.

Out of curiosity - what are your thoughts on the server performance/networking? I skimmed some threads and what I read indicates it is 1) has improved over time, 2) was decent on Alpha1 but still had some lag/rubberbanding.

Related, I had the following observations -
1) their Alpha1 schedule update specifically mentioned server performance & networking as an area of focus
2) the world is very very low npc density (also seems low density on things PCs can interact with - ie objects)
3) NPC AI (combat & roaming, etc) seems the most basic imaginable - even with agro, npc assist radius, levels, etc
4) testers commented that, even though only 1/8th or so was in, that even the eventual world size seemed a bit small

Do you have any thoughts on the accuracy of those impressions I got? They do collectively suggest server performance & the networking stack could be having some severe limitations. Also related - the complete combat revamp (backend & all) started in March - seems like it might be related too. I mean, Alpha1 is exactly the right time to be working on improving that, so it's not a huge deal, but is definitely something many MMOs have never really gotten right and their progress on it will be something to watch closely.

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I believe they've spent the majority of dev. on world building and player interaction with the world and it shows. I'll simply say your observations are correct. I don't really align with the world size seeming small though; current MMO worlds are small in scale and make the player feel normal, in aoc you feel small in a large world, it gave me Everquest feelings to be out exploring something huge. The finished world will be huge especially with no fast travel until certain land nodes progress to extremely high tiers.

Density, minor systems, and anything number related should be ignored. This was a backend test before the month long, and i'd say it was a major success. The game world they've created genuinely works and can exist in a persistent state, like the big boys; for example, the servers did not crash during last night's siege test. Sooo to me personally they are at WoW alpha 1-20 stage. I think WFH has held them back a lot - hopefully the team gets into the new office soon.

Those shards that can be "used for something else" are used to start caravans

Watched some streams yesterday and honestly, after the initial shock where everyone realized this wasnt going to shit unicorns in Alpha I think this looks like it has promise. There's a soul to the game. It needs a TON of work, a TON of polish and probably a fair amount of system redesigns to get to a release state but I think it's salvageable in a way many games are not. I am a bit worried that all the EQ2 people involved in it means the combat wont ever be improved to an acceptable state.

The "action combat" thing seems DOA and they probably should just ditch it and incorporate the elements they want into tab target. Also, promote the environment design guy and put him in charge of the UI

tower said:

The "action combat" thing seems DOA and they probably should just ditch it and incorporate the elements they want into tab target. Also, promote the environment design guy and put him in charge of the UI

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Why do you feel this? I enjoy switching between the two personally.

Also if anyone's interested i'll be posting screenshots, streaming, and can answer questions on discord for the month long test.

What's some good combat that you might expect from this game? Is there an example of an mmo with good combat? What's the best?

I really struggle to understand combat that is social, not boring, and not button-mash-all-the-time syndrome.

Are there examples? Do you want to adopt from non-mmo?

I REALLY disliked the mage targetting when i played one over the Siege tests. The camera always felt too close to the ground so using ground targetting abilites was awkward and clunky. Getting/keeping a player targetted for single target spells also felt very unreliable and i tried both the traditional targetting as well as the action target system.

Haven't played with action target on cleric/tank yet.

Octave said:

What's some good combat that you might expect from this game? Is there an example of an mmo with good combat? What's the best?

I really struggle to understand combat that is social, not boring, and not button-mash-all-the-time syndrome.

Are there examples? Do you want to adopt from non-mmo?

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I enjoyed Wildstars combat outside of how the ground became just a mess of telegraphs. Definitely more on the action end of the spectrum though. Alpha 1 AoC reminds me more of EQ2 era games, which isn't the worst thing as long as it's polished.

Wildstar combat was my favorite. AION was alright, Tera was good too. Wildstar was my favorite because of limited action slots (think how many spells in EQ you can have on bar) and their interrupt armor system was good.

Damn I was trying to remember what game I’ve seen that terrible font/color scheme for enemy /player names before. That’s definitely a gift from a former eq2 dev. I know it’s just placeholder but good god they could have thrown a dart at the wall and picked a better font

Yeah, those sorts of very basic design elements being bad even this early is not encouraging but theres enough encouraging things to hope that theyre responsive to feedback and fix them

If i was going action combat route, I would def look at poaching developer(s) from the eastern game companies that worked on such. All their games seem to have fun combat(Tera, BnS, BDO etc). It's smooth, fun to play and most don't go too much into "Swamp player with too many abilities". Wildstar's was also good, as was GW2 imo.