Green Monster Games - Curt Schilling
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I think it is beyond a niche game now. There are enough players that would just plain veto a zero-PvP game that it is hard to ignore.Ninajrr said:
I could not disagree more though that one needs a unified rule set. In fact, I think that"s fucking moronic.
PvE is about fighting shit that is many times more badass than you are. The synergy (and AI limitations or design) of having 10, 25, 40, 72 or 256 badasses is what takes down a beast that is multiples of times more badass than you. Not because it is smarter, no no... because it is dumber and your raid uses smart shit to kill it. It beats on your tank. Perhaps due to work you did to make it do that but in the end that is what happens. You heal that tank and you reduce it"s HP. You do a bunch of other shit in any modern encounter but that"s all "we smart!" stuff. It works and that"s the foundation of RPGs.
PvP is about fighting your equals, with strong biases for those that play more or have been gear-rewarded otherwise. It"s not the only bias, one can also have world PvP where awareness and co-ordination or rule knowlege helps or trumps. In DAoC, that was king and I think my little concentrated force there was as good as it got. I had a blast of course but FRP was hadly a model for long-term PvP that kept the masses happy. Of course that too washeavilyinfluenced by PvE but that was where Mythic fucked up. Can"t blame a brother for running with the tools given hey?
The other PvP is arenas and those are structured to hell and back. They are almost perfect and could be a perfect little thing except that they are hindered by PvE mechanics and worse yet, bleed over in reverse as well. Why? There is no reason really to change things for PvE from PvP or vice versa, it"s just lazy design in my opinion.
ToeMissile
Pronouns: zie/zhem/zer
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Sorry, badly typed.ToeMissile said:
No reason totweakI guess would be a better way to put it. Have separate rules and be done.
I think you whine too much sometimes.Zehn - Vhex said:
Cast times arn"t a relic it"s just a genre feature. I agree you personal story about your paladin is heart felt, and I really do cry on the inside for you. Maybe Paladins do need an instant cast in that case. But to get rid of cast times as a whole? Terrible idea.
You have to balance out powerful spells from weak spells and that is through cast times. I like the idea of running around pew pewing everyone with puffs of light and fire but I want those cool ass spells too. I want a doomsday spell also. But in order to have that cool kickass big spell you need to balance it with the delay in casting it.
If you just want a shit load of instant cast things just roll another class.
Things you can"t complain about anymore:
Cast Times
Mana
I"d love to see another game do something like Steampunk vs Magic. I thought that was great.Azrayne said:
I wouldn"t say casting time is a relic, but it isn"t necessary. Use things like LOTRO"s combo type system that"s built into basically every class. You have to do a build up of other moves to access it, make it cost a ton of energy, give it a big cooldown etc.
Zehnpai
Molten Core Raider
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NPC"s being smart enough to go after the softest targets only really works in games where you can protect said targets. To use the team fortress analogy, most people -do- go after the medic first but I can always stand behind the guy I"m healing or hide out of sight, stuff like that.
In most MMO"s, first off you"d need viable collision detection. And at that point all we"d do is corner the npc so he can"t get around the tank and be done with it.
I agree as a mechanic it needs to eventually evolve, but I don"t think we"re quite there yet. I mean to be honest, if 99% of these NPC"s were smart as soon as they saw us coming they"d run for backup. It"s like evading NPC"s in WoW. Shouldn"t they be smart enough to go find a couple other NPC"s with ranged attacks and own the shit out of our exploiting asses?
Ah well...
I think removing heals would be a pretty neat first step though. You look at Reliquery phase 1 where you cannot heal and you get a general idea of what I was thinking of in Zehn the MMO. Your "real tanks" try to take the bulk of the damage but if you want to survive you need to learn to find ways to prevent it and spread the damage around.
You kind of avoid the silly scenario where Illidan doesn"t just go, "You know what? Fuck this." and walks around one-shotting your healers.
In most MMO"s, first off you"d need viable collision detection. And at that point all we"d do is corner the npc so he can"t get around the tank and be done with it.
I agree as a mechanic it needs to eventually evolve, but I don"t think we"re quite there yet. I mean to be honest, if 99% of these NPC"s were smart as soon as they saw us coming they"d run for backup. It"s like evading NPC"s in WoW. Shouldn"t they be smart enough to go find a couple other NPC"s with ranged attacks and own the shit out of our exploiting asses?
Ah well...
I think removing heals would be a pretty neat first step though. You look at Reliquery phase 1 where you cannot heal and you get a general idea of what I was thinking of in Zehn the MMO. Your "real tanks" try to take the bulk of the damage but if you want to survive you need to learn to find ways to prevent it and spread the damage around.
You kind of avoid the silly scenario where Illidan doesn"t just go, "You know what? Fuck this." and walks around one-shotting your healers.
Caliane
Avatar of War Slayer
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Well, I think the huge mitigation variance in WoW is a major design flaw. It really does make more dynamic fights impossible. A hit for 500000 damage on a warrior will be reduced to 10k, and then have a 60% avoidance. That hit on anyone else would actually be a 45k+ hit. that really reduces your ability to make fights anything but "tank and spanks" of the target being locked down on your tank. Thats lame.Zehn - Vhex said:
I am a fan of active "real" tank skills. Like Warhammers, Guard. Abilities that function to prevent the target from hurting others in both pvp and pve through mechanics and not artificial hate generation.
Disarm, charge, snares, guard, things like that. The defensive class using active abilities to mitigate damage to themselves and others.
I"m not sure about collision detection. I think it tends to be more grief and a pita then anything else more often then not.
How about moving away from the concept of damage dealing as a "class role" instead? That makes more sense. In a class-based type of game, everyone ought to do relatively similar overall damage (though class A might have higher burst than class B, etc) with classes differentiated by the other specific jobs they perform. Using such a setup, group content would have to be designed around more than a tank and healer and some half-trained chimpanzees--in other words, not like Warcraft instances. Tanks in general should have weak AE threat and healers ought not to be able to out heal the combined damage output of several monsters at a time. Multiple-mob pulls therefore require additional strategy beyond, "plow through it." Hence, players other than the tank and healer actuallymatter.
Such a system might not work well in a "40 people beat on a big creature" raid (stacking healers, etc). That"s not a bad thing. Throw that outdated paradigm in the trash heap where it belongs. If you want to have a raid, design it as a war between a lot of players (multiple groups) and lots of monsters or NPCs. That allows individual contribution to matter beyond his place on a damage meter, while requiring the teamwork and coordination which raiding players enjoy.
Danth
Such a system might not work well in a "40 people beat on a big creature" raid (stacking healers, etc). That"s not a bad thing. Throw that outdated paradigm in the trash heap where it belongs. If you want to have a raid, design it as a war between a lot of players (multiple groups) and lots of monsters or NPCs. That allows individual contribution to matter beyond his place on a damage meter, while requiring the teamwork and coordination which raiding players enjoy.
Danth
The mana system has become so staid, it would be refreshing to see a workable alternative.Draegan said:
An interesting alternative to mana would be a "Concentration" system.
Simplest example : when running your conc is "0", immediately you stand still your conc is made to "1" and you stand still or take no actions your conc builds.
Spells have a conc requirement to be cast. Some can be cast at 0 (while running) some at 1, others take increasingly more. Using this as a basis, even the simplified example could be altered, but then you could branch out into multiple options on how to develop it.
Some spells may remove an amount of conc. Maybe some abilities raise your base conc. Perhaps other classes buffs increase the rate your concentration increases.
If not used for pure casters, this would be a great Bard system. The whole mana thing is just so old and taken for granted.
No, please do.Ngruk said:
With Dark Elves, FAT ogres, and big, ugly trolls.
Oh, and a tree city, but maybe a slightly safer one to walk around in.
Big_w_powah
Trakanon Raider
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You know, tatoo this on your fucking forehead.Ngruk said:
Do not makegenerichigh fantasy shit.
While I"d love steampunk vs magic, steampunk, steam-engine technology vs Alchemy (HINT FUCKING HINT ON THE STEAM SHIT), high fantasy is still fun for me.
Note, I left out that big ass word. Generic high fantasy is bull shit. Add twists, innovate the fucking genre. If you make high fantasy--It needs to NOT be EQ 2.0. It needs to be a challenging game, have real fucking death penalties, an evolved mechanic set and combat system (See Vanguard Design Docs for wounds/body part targetting), interesting character development system (i.e. FUN classes ala Blood Mage, or some other form of character advancement outside of a class->level system)..
Think outside the motherfucking box.
Oh, and if you do decide to go more high tech--Include melee. Fuck games without melee. I like to get in the action.
A Chrono Trigger style world would be a pretty cool MMO setting. Not necessarily the time-travel, but the default time you start in where it"s mostly high fantasy with some steampunk elements like Lucca"s inventions and the other robots thrown in.
Agreed. I"ve also thought a world akin to Final Fantasy 6 would make for a great MMO template. You"ve got medieval weaponry, some steampunk (e.g. airships, Edgar"s tools, the Empire capital) as well as the magic and fantastical fauna (with an explanation for their presence in the world).Grave said:
Following that route verbatim may be a bad idea (both legally and creatively), but a small melting pot of such can certainly bring about a breath of fresh air.
So you mean, like wow. I mean, wow has medieval weaponry, a bit of steampunk in your terms(goblin/gnome technology) and magic and fantastical fauna, and it even has spaceships and alternate dimensions.Cadrid said:
I"m a big FF6 fan, but the setting isn"t really original, especially as a FF. What made the game so great was the cast and the story, and well the graphics/combat too on the technical side(the game still looks decent nowadays which says a lot about the quality back then) but the universe, while awesome in the context of its story, was very generic. Evil oppressive empire, rebels, crazy guy, unearthing ancient powers to control the world and saving the world stuff, nothing really special.
It"s also to note that robots/19th century technology and stuff are present in most current/past MMOs. Mostly in the form of gnomish stuff. Obviously not in LoTRO but well. Just adding some robots doesn"t make high fantasy original, it"s already the norm. It"s like dinosaurs, at first you might think wow it"s original, then you remember most MMOs actually use dinos in them.