Pan'Theon: Rise' of th'e Fal'Len - #1 Thread in MMO

Devnull_sl said:

Except that TSW is a terrible example because:

EverQuest Next does not require the use of tanks and healers. Our combat mechanics and our AI do not support dedicated healers and focused tanks.

With systems like that EQN will end up with one to a few optimal, totally homogenized, role-less, cookie cutter specs.

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I think that assumption is short-sighted.

DotA games developed roles out of nothing and they turned into the established meta - if roles were so pointless the meta shaping in DotAs would be 5 ranged dps or 5 bruisers or whatever. Instead, the players themselves took the dozens of classes with different specs and developed a meta that depends on players filling specific roles, and players get downright hostile if anyone tries to buck that trend. Odds are outside of solo combat you'll see the same trend. Just look at GW2: All you need is 5 of anything with a brain, but still the community developed roles (dps-tank and haste bitch, nobody said their roles were any good ... but try getting groups with odd builds that dont fit into established molds).

Now if you are opposing people being able to solo - as much as I like group focus I doubt you'll ever see a mainstream project that doesnt allow for solo play. I've said it a couple of times during the last year in the pre-EQN reveal hype, but our only chance to get that is kickstarter (which is kinda ironic considering the thread I'm posting in).

If Pantheon really doesn't fund, I'm calling it quits, as in not even trying any new MMOGs.

Those EQ:N bullet points are an abortion.

So, instead of relying on a competent tank (or two) and a competent healer (or two) organizing a bunch of incompetent mouthbreathers, everyone is going to have to be highly competent on individual levels to succeed in EQN. It sounds great until the average gamer is your core audience and it's too hard for them. What will happen is the game will be a small, challenging niche (not likely they'll let that occur), there will be constant raging and flaming on the forums about how everything is too hard, or the game will be dumbed down so the average gamer can contribute in his more meaningful role, which means a small group of highly competent gamers will steamroll everything and probably eventually get banned for basically just being good at the game.

In short, MMO AI didn't necessitate the holy trinity because it wasn't sophisticated enough. The holy trinity was needed to make games playable, and the AI was programmed to facilitate that play style.

Or, maybe they really did revolutionized combat the way GW2 did with the new, non-trinity still-need-roles combat that in the end didn't work and was the shittiest part of GW2 by far.

popsicledeath_sl said:

I don't like the 'you can be everything' syndrome in games because what it means is I'll have to be the one to constantly switch. It's like working a job where you're the one that knows how to do everything, which means other assholes will be lazy or their incompetence rewarded and you'll then be stretched thin constantly trying to do all the important things nobody else knows how to do or do as well. No thanks. At least in a trinity or role-defined game if you're the healer, you'd better learn to fucking heal or gtfo, instead of just making the few competent people constantly fill whatever the most important role is that minute.

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I dont want to dismiss that concern entirely but I think it's exaggerated. Of course that's guesswork on my part, maybe you can max it all in within a couple of months. But looking at how long it takes to max all starships and equipment in EVE (downright impossible), collect all champions in LoL (Visa aside) and sufficient rune pages/runes, knowledge of their nuances and proper item builds... takes a fair bit of time and most people focus on a few champs and greatly favor one or two roles.

I'm thinking the players that pick a role and focus on it will be more in demand then the casuals that dabble in everything but do everything half-assed. I'm certainly not interested in any rogue/necro/mage shit and wont spend time on it "just because"... leave that to people that 6-boxed their alt army in EQ or have 2 90s of every class in WoW in top gear. Seeing a guy in plate armor with a boar pet, dual daggers and wizard aura active will be a huge noob alert in EQN.

Mr Creed_sl said:

I think that assumption is short-sighted.

DotA games developed roles out of nothing and they turned into the established meta - if roles were so pointless the meta shaping in DotAs would be 5 ranged dps or 5 bruisers or whatever.

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Sorry, but I think the comparison to MOBAs is far more short sighted. MOBAs are very much intentionally designed to be role based and class based. RIOT develops league with the meta absolutely in mind. In MOBAs your champion is extremely focused to a specific role and there are game systems (limited champion pool, draft, counter picking, banning) that limit the available selection you have at any one time. You're not picking Leona and going full AP caster. MOBAs are also a PVP game, which introduces a whole other level of mind games and counter picking. Playing against MMO AI, regardless of what SOE does with it, is not going to be even close to the same as a MOBA match.

GW2 has developed roles in part due to the classes being unique from each other and Arenanet designing them with that in mind. There are areas where the classes do not overlap. A necro doesn't have the choice of performing some of the same functions that a guardian can and visa versa. If the game was class-less and everyone had all the trait lines and skills I doubt you'd have as many of those player defined roles.

You can have role-less and you can have class-less. But when when combine both it doesn't work, in my experience.

Edit: Also, if teams could pick all the same 5 champion, I guarantee they would quite frequently.

popsicledeath_sl said:

In short, MMO AI didn't necessitate the holy trinity because it wasn't sophisticated enough. The holy trinity was needed to make games playable

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i absolutely agree with this. to cite an example aside from GW2, imagine pve encounters in UO.

Devnull_sl said:

Sorry, but I think the comparison to MOBAs is far more short sighted. MOBAs are very much intentionally designed to be role based and class based. RIOT develops league with the meta absolutely in mind. In MOBAs your champion is extremely focused to a specific role and there are game systems (limited champion pool, draft, counter picking, banning) that limit the available selection you have at any one time. You're not picking Leona and going full AP caster. MOBAs are also a PVP game, which introduces a whole other level of mind games and counter picking. Playing against MMO AI, regardless of what SOE does with it, is not going to be even close to the same as a MOBA match.

GW2 has developed roles in part due to the classes being unique from each other and Arenanet designing them with that in mind. There are areas where the classes do not overlap. A necro doesn't have the choice of performing some of the same functions that a guardian can and visa versa. If the game was class-less and everyone had all the trait lines and skills I doubt you'd have as many of those player defined roles.

You can have role-less and you can have class-less. But when when combine both it doesn't work, in my experience.

Edit: Also, if teams could pick all the same 5 champion, I guarantee they would quite frequently.

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Cross-genre comparison is crude, I'll give you that. I argued pretty much that point in the Archeage thread.

But your Leona example is the point I was making - at certain levels of play people absolutely do that. People will do that in EQN too, and you'll recognize them as useless just as quickly. And the point that riot designs to fill those roles is also true, as will SOE. They said they'll have healers, just that they arent required for everything. So they make you to pick each role once for a dungeon like Blizzard does ( and neither does Riot, 5 ranged carry team is hilarious) but it will likely be more effective to cling to the roles that form to be best able to handle the storybricks AI.

Hence my assumption that even with freeform multi-classing commonly accepted roles will appear. Not necessarily tank/healer/cc (EQ, tank/healer/dps (WoW) or dps/dps/dps/haste-bitch (GW2), but whatever fits the game naturally. I just hope the roles are more interesting and varied then the way GW2 turned out.

Dumar_sl said:

If Pantheon really doesn't fund, I'm calling it quits, as in not even trying any new MMOGs.

Those EQ:N bullet points are an abortion.

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I am with you sir, although i will likely take a spin with Archage and if any of "the Repopulation, Pathfinder Online, and shadowrun online" see the light of day i may try those.

mkopec_sl said:

Bottom line is that this genre need another leap forward. Another evolution. And im glad that someone is finally stepping in with AAA type money and trying it. Scoff at this all you want but its what this genre needs. And while a niche type EQ game would be nice, thats not the future. Its again, looking to the past. the answer, no matter how much Dumar wants it to be, is not in the past but in the future.

Whether it works out for EQNext remains to be seen, but Im excited as fuck that someone is trying to make something new, something that has never been tried before, rather than WoW clone #50.

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sorry, but you're wrong. EQN literally already exists: it's called GW2, and it sucks. it's a failed idea. the "Everyone can do everything" mantra doesn't work. homogenizing everything isn't the answer. if you combine chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and mint chip all together, you get a bowl of brown mess that tastes like shit.

I think I just got sick of getting to play a huge variety of styles in Rift...... only to end up always the healer on my mage because I was better at it and reluctantly agreed I'd rather not wipe constantly even if it meant I had to do the heavy lifting I didn't want to be doing. Shit, I ended up tanking on my rogue out of necessity too, which at least was fun, in groups that WHILE I was tanking people would be talking shit about how rogues can't tank.

These were mostly pickup groups, of course, but still, letting anyone be anything means letting the average idiot be even more atrocious as the competent people end up doing even more heavy lifting. This is how it's always been, but at least before you could expect the idiots to have one, single, well-defined class they might be able to figure out over the course of a year. And you were doing the heavy lifting on a class you wanted to play, not as the role everyone else needed or expected you to play.

And the AI? It'll either be dumbed down to the point it's not challenging to anyone who can put 2 and 2 together in a meaningful way. Or it'll be a constant whine-fest because it's too hard. Or it'll just end up more zergy shit like GW2.

Just because you make a game where people CAN do amazing things if they put themselves in the position to, doesn't mean it will happen. It's better, imo, to force people into the position that gives them a chance to at least not be terrible. These do-it-all-when-you-want-it systems let even more people be terrible and it's not fun to play if you're even semi-competent.

etchazz_sl said:

sorry, but you're wrong. EQN literally already exists: it's called GW2, and it sucks. it's a failed idea. the "Everyone can do everything" mantra doesn't work. homogenizing everything isn't the answer. if you combine chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and mint chip all together, you get a bowl of brown mess that tastes like shit.

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+1

It's ridiculous to draw conclusions until we see how MOB behaviour works. It could be a failure like GW2, but we simply don't have enough data yet, and we won't until combat goes into Landmark at the earliest.

Be more smarter.

Scientology class and watch the money come rolling in.

They could be sitting with 300,000 or so if they just been honest and said "hey, we need 100,000 to get a demo done and get our idea off paper and into the unity engine". they got greedy and it cost them. I want to say "i'm out" but what other MMO is there to go too?

Soygen_sl said:

9 more days before this heads to the Rickshaw?

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Give us some time to rub salt into the wounds you killjoy.