Crowfall

Here is the latest info dump from crowfall


Crowfall: MMO - Throne War Simulator

after watching that video and the comment "When I play football, I don't get a reward I carry into my next game" and "the only reason I am fighting for anything other than supremacy and bragging rights is because I want some reward" "those two things don't necessarily fit"

can someone flesh that out for me? Are they saying nothing you win in any campaign will carry over into the next and that it's a nonstop resetting of the ladder?

There might be some changes since I last read their planned rulesets, but there will be some campaigns that let you bring in gear (maybe varying degrees of resources as well; I don't remember specifics) while there are other campaigns that you come in naked like the terminator.

Some campaigns let you bring stuff in, some do. You choose which ruleset you want to play.

Saw this on the forums yesterday... so excited.

Tyrant_sl said:

Our first test is a pre-alpha test. Our pre-alpha testers will be the first test group for this test.Expect us to do this first test over a few weeks, as we want to be able react to feedback and have new game builds as we expand the test group.

We've already said that we'll be letting the alpha 1 testers into this test also (in groups, in the order of their pledging).We are doing this in order to get more testing feedback (there simply aren't enough pre-alpha testers to give us all the feedback we'd like, plus it's appropriate to reward early backers where we can).

By the time we close the pre-alpha test, we'll schedule our next test based on both our ongoing development plans and what we learn from (and must react to) this first pre-alpha test.

This is a great topic for us to expound on in a founders update sometime during the coming weeks.

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Tuco_sl said:

Nothing they say about that subject matters much right now. They'll probably have a long testing phase and near release we'll see just how important your trophy from the previous season will help you in the next.

My guess? It all depends on A: Whether the game is fun enough that people don't mind playing the game hard only to see their shit get reset next week or month. B: If the PvP community they're marketing to will endure resets. C: If they can monetize the game while resetting all the important bits.

None of those key factors are something they can answer until heavy playtesting. Personally I think they'll find that the campaigns need to be reset every couple weeks at the longest, and a lot of it will hinge on whether the gameplay is more fun than most MMOs are and whether they can minimize most of the bullshit we put up with in MMOs. If they give up and revert to a more GW2 style reset where you get to import most of your stuff, it'll be a failure to achieve their goal for me.

Put a different way, I think their model should be less Shadowbane and WoW and more Starcraft and DOTA. Quicker matches and enjoyable gameplay throughout the game. When you're executing your build order in SC you're not thinking, "Man this grind sucks but once I tech up the game will be so much fun." like you do in MMOs.

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Im going the other way on this. A reset server was introduced in Shadowbane and everyone hated it to the point there was never a second season. Id go for longer campaigns, let the people who really want to fight it out do so for 4 months, those who dont can log in, have fun for a month or two then take a break before the next one. In general a game that does resets like this isnt going to have a high constant population(see reset ARPGs like Diablo 2/3 or PoE). You need to bring people back for your resets, not burn them out with a constant turnover. You will have the diehard fans that carry a campaign during the slow times.

I agree I think the best campaigns will be measured in hours and days rather than months.

Enough time for initial onslaught and land claim, build up, siege / defend once or twice each major base and win condition. Guilds that lose their bases just move on to the next campaign/ or join others and the remaining battle it out till a victor or winter forces one.

Guild cred would be measured in number of campaigns played and won and a good team would win 5-6 in a year while a great one would push into double digits.

I could see people losing social lives to this easily though like WoW in the early days, since you would always be prepping for the next campaign to get that win over your rivals who just tied up the score with you.

Also shorter campaigns would allow for unique one off rulesets like big head mode or gravity is at .5 normal mode or explosions are 5x as big mode, so many possibilities... which would all "fit" into the lore since each campaign is a different planet.

Harkon_sl said:

Guilds that lose their bases just move on to the next campaign/ or join others and the remaining battle it out till a victor or winter forces one.

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I find this assumption to be terribly wrong through experience too. Most players in this wont belong to the guilds that have been together for a long time, they will be in guilds that formed exclusively for this game with very little attachment to it. Historically when guilds like this lose their home, they dont pick up and rebuild easily, they end up shedding a large amount of players and after a campaign or 2 just wont have numbers/will to reform.

Right but if you keep the campaigns short enough a loss or 2 is no big deal because the time invested is short. Worse would be a long campaign when the guild loses their keep and then they have to keep on playing in the same world against an entrenched opponent with a low chance for any sort of comback. That's what causes despair and people to give up hope, not the loss itself.


There is a reason that a MOBA is still the #1 online game in the world pop wise.

Just look at LOL matches when losing people tend to want to surrender at 20 and move on to a new match rather then have to play a comeback game, I've seen it happen all the tiers from bronze to plat.


I guarantee you that on average people will be more open to staying in a guild and going to a new campaign to try again from scratch than having to rebuild against an entrenched winning opponent.

EDIT: Also having shorter campaigns allows guild to try out people for a match or two to see if they fit and provides a good break/join point for people to change guilds.

Much will depend on how much you can do in the campaign worlds. If you roll into a keep ruin and 30 minutes later can upgrade it twice. 2 hours after that have it seized and destroyed and the enemy has taken it and gotten an upgrade already then fast campaigns will have to be a reality.

If it takes you a week to get the resources to upgrade it once, but with that upgrade you can now increase the force that your entire warparty has for the life of the campaign world then a longer campaign will be key.

I feel with what they have said it will be like the launch of a new server in Wow or Archeage, the landrush in Archeage was incredible, and imagine if the plots were not laid out the same on every server. Crowfall is going to have a randomised landmass, with variable contestable points of interest.

I really feel like it will be like every 3 to 6 months a new server opens and you have free server transfers of your character. But instead of the same land it is changed, and getting shit done means your whole guild can have a defensible advantage. People are going to lose their shit over this game if it is made right.

The chance to pay back the fuckers who teamed up and kicked your teeth in last week in a huge ass 5 guild battle when you were winning with your uberguild up till the last minute. On a fresh server with noone knowing the ground layout or maps before hand. God damn make the game fast ACE I am half chub already!

I think what I am going to like about it is I can play a few campaigns. Do something else RL, different games, whatever and when I come back to play again I am not two three months behind everyone else. I am not so sure on the EW sounds like it is just housing? Which I have never cared about in any game.

It will take getting used to for me since I have always chased the gear carrot. But I am willing to try something different.

Tuco_sl said:

Another aspect to campaign length that people don't talk about a lot is that you can make the large-scale PvP rules much more brutal if you're tuned to shorter campaigns.

Longevity is built paid with the cost of the winner not being able to obliterate the loser. In a true sandbox PvP environment a winner can be decided in an evening, and they can destroy the enemy base in a weekend. At that point the campaign should be over.

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Or move on to the next opponent. Say its a map of 20 guilds or so each with a castle what will keep the campaign going for a bit will be the time it takes for a guild to consolidate territory and move on to the next target.

Massing troops and gear at the correct location attacking a 2nd castle but then being attacked by a different opponent. This is where guilds even massive ones can get fucked over if they don't plan correctly and doubly so if they have territory in the middle.

They're going to allow espionage in the game? O fuck. I mean, I'll probably never do it but that's something from EVE that I always loved reading about people dicking other people over.

Definitely, I haven't played with PRX since GW2 but I'd imagine others over myself being much more trusted obviously, that's a given.

I don't think it will happen much, but it'll happen a handful of times and I just can't wait to see what comes of it. Who doesn't love MMO drama when it's not their guild/friends?

Tuco_sl said:

From my experience in a FFA environment communities will solidify into two distinct groups. Who is in each of these two groups will change quickly, but generally there will be two groups. And if the games' rules allow for it and the field is level, once one group gains an upper hand they will obliterate the other group. Morale is super important and most people are pussies, or more correctly, most people only have fun when they are winning and won't play a game they aren't having fun in.

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I agree that that will be the endgame but I believe the bulk of the campaign will be the formation of those groups either through diplomacy or conquest.

How quickly something like that happens will depend on map size as just looking at EvE for example they have Mega Alliances but always more than just two even to this day.