Green Monster Games - Curt Schilling

You know what? Fuck specific requests for such and such art style with this that and the other thing. Here"s what I want for artwork in a game.

I want a cohesive art style. I don"t care if it"s so realistic I cut my eyeballs on the sword edges, or if it"s so cartoony that getting drunk makes you vomit rainbows. I want all the different pieces of the world to look like they fit together like they should. That means when you have a campsite, with a few tents and such, it"s not just a few models plopped down. Your art team has to go further than that, to different pieces of the world. If there"s tents there, and active creatures, then there should be areas where the grass is worn away, yes? If there"s a path somewhere, it likely needs more than just a different color of ground. It needs a reason, and it will likely need more identifying features like rocks, posts, and other things. The gist is, you can"t create anything good with just models, or just textures, or suchlike.

There"s more quality you can add, beyond that, though. Diversifying and identifying players is an important piece of art design. This means humans look relatively similar to eachother, and that human architecture fits with the humans. This means that different factions of the same non-human race might actually have different architecture to go with it. To clarify, Spoon elves would theoretically have different architecture and stylings than Fork elves, but all would be identifiably elven. If that"s too many art resources, then get rid of Fork elves. Leaving Fork elves in, with Spoon elf stylings, means they"re really just stupid Spoon elves.

Lastly, I"d like to see a little bit of equality in genders. I don"t care if you"ve got gratuitous panty shots and cleavage galore, give it in equal measure to both genders. If you leave it out for one gender, leave it out for another. I personally don"t care either way, and I think you"d probably get the best results by giving everyone a choice between modest styling and exaggerated sexuality.

WOW actually does that very well. So does LOTRO.

I will just say that Warhammer Online"s "public quests" is a good idea. With proper refinement and making the events more dynamic by mixing scripts, AI and player influence, it could add longevity and some spontaneity/surprise to any MMO.

Sure, systematically thwarting the bandit threat is neat, but wouldn"t it be cool if the event wasn"t always the same deal over and over? How about if it took the bandit lord to spawn, roam around "recruiting" other bandits, then capturing a small village and sending out raiding parties until players intervened? Sometimes a player will find the lord when he"s still alone and nip it in the bud, sometimes a group will take out the lord and his posse before they ransack the village, and sometimes the event will mature to "Public Quest" status that requires the aid of a number of folks in the area to finish off the baddie invasion.

It"s a rough idea, at best, but something that I feel has been sorely missing from games in general, and MMOs in particular.

Since you asked-- I want 27 classes with a subjob system. Given the eight types of class archetypes: tank, healer, melee dps, magic dps, debuff, buff, pet and CC -- there are 29 unique combinations of this archetypes. Combine all these classes with a subjob system and you never have to worry about balancing for solo (subjob system will take care of that) and just have to work on designing group and raid content around the 8 archetypes. There should be enough archetype abilities in anyone group that no one should ever be LFG for Healer or etc.


Classes are:
Tank Classes
Tank + Healer/Tank+MDPS/Tank+ADPS/Tank+Buff
Tank + Debuff/ Tank + Pet/ Tank + CC

Healers Classes
Healer + DPS/Healer+MDPS/Healer+ADPS/Healer+Buff
Healer+Debuff/Healer+Pet/Healer+CC

Melee DPS Classes
MDPS+ADPS/MDPS+BUff/MDPS+Debuff/MDPS+Pet/MDPS+CC

Arcane DPS Classes
ADPS+Buff/ADPS+Debuff/ADPS+Pet/ADPS+CC

Buff Classes
Buff+Debuff/Buff+Pet/Buff+CC

Debuff Classes
Debuff+Pet/Debuff+CC

Pet/CC Class
Pet+CC

Two classes are degenerative (ADPS+MDPS and Buff+Debuff) so total of reasonable classes is 27.
* * *
Oh re Khazar"s post - I do NOT want to see equity in avatar protrayal. I"m all for T&A showing on female avatars -- but I must say no buttcracks on the male avatars. The MMORPG audience is largely male and that isn"t going to change with your MMO.

tad10 said:

Combine all these classes with a subjob system and you never have to worry about balancing for solo (subjob system will take care of that) There should be enough archetype abilities in anyone group that no one should ever be LFG for Healer or etc.

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Did you actually play FFXI? This is armchair designing at its best. Your "subjob system" gives players freedom to advance a single character, it has no direct correlation to balance. Even with the freedom of subs, most main classes had at best 2 or 3 subs that worked with any amount of synergy, i.e. your tank was Pal/war or Nin/war.

I want a game with the least amount of classes but maximize game styles. Tad you"re insane. Class balance is required for any successful game. If you have to many classes certain classes will begin to become redundant. Just look at EQ2. Classes need to be unique that offer something no one else has because if you don"t then classes will be dropped for other classes that end up doing it better. Also, each class needs to be able to viably solo as well.

My Class structure:
Tank
Healer
Melee DPS (Physical, Magical??)
Range DPS (Physical, Magical)
Hybrid Tank/Heal
Hybrid Heal/DPS
Hybrid Tank/DPS
Pet Class

Instead of creating a separate class that debuffs/CCs, just have certain support classes (hybrids) offer debuffs and CC. Or spread them around all the different classes.

Get rid of the dam warrior and healer. I am so sick of them. That is all you ever see people asking for, "need a healer" "need a tank." People waste more time trying to find one of those 2 than anything else. Design a dam game where you just don"t need these two classes anymore. Actually EQ was like that when it first came out (talking pre planes). You literally could have any group makeup be successful, except, of course, against Naggy or Vox (but they were initially designed as raid targets anyways).

I may be insane Draeg -- but my class structure gets rid of the pure classes -- which cause the "we need X" problem and causes balancing problems. Either everyone is a pure class or no-one is. Mix and Match has got to stop.

So if you"re not going to have 8 pure classes then everybody should be a hybrid. EQ2 almost got it right.

With everyone a hybrid almost any group makeup can work.

Taking a minimalist approach to game development is imo a good idea. In just about everything, the more complexity that you add to a project or user interface that less intuitive it becomes (thats a huge issuen in WoW UI"s IMO).

Take Classes diversity for instance:
If you have too many races and too many classes you lose a lot of what one would consider the intuitive recognition of what a class does. In WoW for isntance people easily understand what the Priest, Warrior, and Mage. However, when you talk about warlock paladin rogue hunter and shaman interpretations vary.

What I mean by this is that the way in which a Warrior, Priest, Rogue, or Mage is interpreted is generally universal. But as you create classes with more overlap the universal interpretation of a class type tends to lose its meaning. For instance, a "rogue" in Shadowbane could also be considered a "barbarian rogue."

The same can be said about any other aspect of an MMO, from gear to spells to even mob AI. IMO a minimalist approach to design is always a good way to go (not completely minimalist obviously) so that you avoid "overdoing" it.





In regards to spells and WoW and Doors. Having something as a "spell" really isnt that important from a programming perspective. Its really only indicative of how their spell system was designed and testifies to the quality of their code. I say quality because it means that they are able to transfer aspects of code to accomplish things in a completely different part of the game. In this case casting spells as a player on mobs/players and interacting w/ objects.

TBH I find that very impressive about Blizz, but Im also not suprised to see it coming from that kind of a dev house.

I don"t understand the problem people have with a healing class. Healers play a fundamentally important role in group-based gameplay. I do see people being sick of the Holy Trinity, but I think Mythic has started off on the right foot with a few adjustments to how the healers work. Sure, that Goblin Shaman can sit in the back and spam heals, but truth be told, their heals are going to be much more effective when they are standing in the thick of combat, gaining their Waagh! and using that Waagh! to formulate better and quicker heals. Class structure can be innovative and still remain in the Tank -> DPS -> Healer triad. I think the holy trinity works, but I think that it"s time people get a bit innovative with their classes. Class skills should be unique enough to encourage several modes of gameplay through the class.

It is one of the major issues I have with WoW. I really like the talent system for what it can do, but I also hate it because of what it does. And that"s let people who are morons run around as Fury Warriors and then wonder why they can"t get 5-Mans for gear at 70 (they don"t want to tank). I"m a believer that if you roll a certain class, you should be willing to perform the major role of the class at some point. I had a Priest I raided with for a long time at 60 that was a Holy/Disc priest, and I didn"t mind it at all. Of course, I am someone who has a mindset of: what can I do to make the guild stronger, rather than what can I do for myself.

Looking over tad10"s class chart, I see some good ideas, but I also see way too many classes. I get where you"re coming from tad10, but damn man, not every game is meant to support that many classes. Warhammer Online can support 24 classes because it"s a Realm vs. Realm game where each race is supposed to represent each army. That works for that game, but without knowing in depth what sort of IP the 38Studios crew is playing with, you can"t really begin to design too many classes, but overall one class I personally like seeing in fantasy-based settings is a Bard.

Yes, I love these crazy guys. Loved "em especially in FFXI, and I kind of wish WoW had a pure buffing/debuffing class like this. I actually did more work on my Bard in FFXI then I did when I played a Dark Knight or Warrior, or hell, I think I"ve never had to do as much. Running from the front of the group to the back of the group keeping songs refreshed while tossing out a heal here and there kept me busy, which made grouping a little less tedius. I"d much rather be doing something and having to pay attention to what I am doing than spamming my 1 key like I did on my Mage. I also enjoyed the Vanguard Bard for the short period of time that I played that game. I"m just partial to the class because of what designers can do with these guys, really.

Something I do think that should be looked at from FFXI were the skill synergies (I forget what they"re called). It was really cool to see your Samurai start off a chain followed by some other class and see some nice damage, and then your Black Mage came in with a heavy nuke that gained extra damage because there was an Elemental Synergy between the combo & the spell. It really added some flavor to the combat, and I hope to see something similar to it someday.

tad10 said:

I may be insane Draeg -- but my class structure gets rid of the pure classes -- which cause the "we need X" problem and causes balancing problems. Either everyone is a pure class or no-one is. Mix and Match has got to stop.

So if you"re not going to have 8 pure classes then everybody should be a hybrid. EQ2 almost got it right.

With everyone a hybrid almost any group makeup can work.

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True but if you have 27 classes and change one classes spell, you have to take in consideration how that effects 26 other classes. It"s a dev and balance nightmare. Not that I have any real Dev experience, but I built MUDs back in the mid 90s and balancing out something simple like that, I remember, was a pain in the ass. I couldn"t imagine doing it for a real game.

When I log into a game and see a list of 27 classes to play and I"m a noob, it just seems ridiculous.

Draegan said:

When I log into a game and see a list of 27 classes to play and I"m a noob, it just seems ridiculous.

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It is ridiculus. EQ2 and VG have too many classes, plain and simple. EQ2 especially.. and how many damn buttons does each class have? It"s just out of hand.. more is not always better. Fewer more polished classes that have meaningful abilities > massive overlap with redundant abilities.

I can appreciate the need for more than 1 viable tank class and more than 1 viable healer class to avoid the holy trinity, but going to far in the opposite direction is just as bad.

Maxxius said:

Get rid of the dam warrior and healer. I am so sick of them. That is all you ever see people asking for, "need a healer" "need a tank." People waste more time trying to find one of those 2 than anything else. Design a dam game where you just don"t need these two classes anymore. Actually EQ was like that when it first came out (talking pre planes). You literally could have any group makeup be successful, except, of course, against Naggy or Vox (but they were initially designed as raid targets anyways).

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If you don"t like the whole tank and healer paradigm don"t play Fantasy MMOs anymore. Simple as that.

I honestly thought the EQ1 setup of classes was pretty solid. The overlap wasn"t horrendous and the three tanks definitely had niche fights where they were superior, though because of shit like defensive you were required to use a warrior in many. That was a mistake that altered the course of the game for the worse, but the overall differences between the classes was pretty solid. I think WoW really went the wrong direction when it came to class design, in that you have classes that don"t perform their expected roles in some situations due to their talent spec. Dps warriors, shadow priests, dps paladins. I"ve always been a proponent of easily going through the lfg lists and what not finding out someone to fill a necessary role within the group without having to guess which talent spec they might be using. I don"t remember ever sending a tell in EQ asking if someone were a healing cleric or a dps cleric. The flexibility of the talent system is sort of offset by this, and I would prefer more defined class roles. That, and the very flexibility of that system is a major weakness when it comes to the average player. How many people leveled to 70 as a ret paladin? How many ret paladins are wanted in groups? Same with enhancement shamans, dps warriors and the rest of the class talent setups that do not capitalize on the strengths of the parent class.

Anyway, I definitely feel that a larger number of classes that actually represents what the classes can do as opposed to fewer classes that are partially flexible is a better system.

Unless of course you are using the FFXI subjob system, as all developers should. Then less is ok too, because the combinations of those classes will more than likely cover individual tastes as well as variance in non-solo environments.

Draegan said:

If you don"t like the whole tank and healer paradigm don"t play Fantasy MMOs anymore. Simple as that.

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That"s a stupid retort. If people followed that there would never be change. There were many games that never used the tank/healer model. IMO it is that tank/healer model that causes players more grief than anything else. Can"t tell you how many times groups fold for a lack of either one, or how many hours wasted trying to find either one. You hear enough whining about how you want to encourage people to group instead of solo, but the bottom line is people get sick and tired of waiting around trying to find one of those "Needed" classes.

It"s not stupid, the tank and the healer are at the very heart of what a Fantasy RPG is. The only way it"ll change is if you change genres.

What would you suggest instead?

Know wtf you are talking about before responding. NWN (the FIRST real MMO) and Darksun Online (the precursor to EQ and which EQ copied alot of) were never tank/healer centric. DSO characters for example were tri-classes. Even EQ wasn"t that way until it came out with its expansions. Where do you think the whole "holy trinity" term came from, it began with Kunark, tho now I would change it to dynamic duo.

If you design a system where in order to advance you need certain specific classes in all the meaningful encounters, that just begs for the same old complaints about can"t get groups for this or that. It needs to be changed it is as simple as that. Tad"s suggestion really isn"t that out of line (God I can"t believe I am actually somewhat agreeing with him).

The only problem I see is people will eventually figure out which classes work best in group encounters and ignore all the others.

Cadrid said:

Sure, systematically thwarting the bandit threat is neat, but wouldn"t it be cool if the event wasn"t always the same deal over and over? How about if it took the bandit lord to spawn, roam around "recruiting" other bandits, then capturing a small village and sending out raiding parties until players intervened? Sometimes a player will find the lord when he"s still alone and nip it in the bud, sometimes a group will take out the lord and his posse before they ransack the village, and sometimes the event will mature to "Public Quest" status that requires the aid of a number of folks in the area to finish off the baddie invasion.

It"s a rough idea, at best, but something that I feel has been sorely missing from games in general, and MMOs in particular.

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Good idea in concept, bad idea in reality. Presumably, this bandit lord will grow more powerful and drop better loot as his entourage of destruction grows. When I and my powergaming buddies figure this out, we will follow the bandit lord around and keep a close eye on him, ready to scream at and berate any foolish newbie that might seek to harvest him before he"s fully ripe.

"YOU STUPID FUCKING NEWBIE! DON"T KILL THE BANDIT LORD YET! HE DOESN"T DROP AN EPIC FOR 12 MORE HOURS!"

"Oh... sorry. Well when can I can kill him?"

"NEVER. THEN HE IS MINE."

The need for massive healing during a fight creates a situation where or more people must provide that healing. Its not dynamic, its not responsive, its whackamole with hp bars.

Now...if you switched things a bit and still had the possibility of people receiving that much damage but gave healers mitigation abilities, directional shielding, blocking, etc, etc then the healer is fighting what the monster is doing instead of fighting what the hitpoint bars are doing.

The healing role has been turned into a health battery more than anything else. You fill people up. If you were to change it so they protected people from going down in a dynamic and fun way then you would be doing well.

Gaereth said:

Now...if you switched things a bit and still had the possibility of people receiving that much damage but gave healers mitigation abilities, directional shielding, blocking, etc, etc then the healer is fighting what the monster is doing instead of fighting what the hitpoint bars are doing.

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That"s what VG was going to try to do long ago with the slow round-based combat. With perception skills that let you know what a mob was going to do a couple of seconds before he did it so you could attempt to counter it. Apparently it"s harder to do while keeping it fun then it sounds. It makes combat super-slow, and for a single player game it would be fine.. just like turn-based games can be great.. but in an MMO I don"t think it translates very well. People want responsiveness and control, not delays.