From tonight steam, I was dismayed to see that we can see what our teammates are casting, and how long it's taking them to cast somthing. I don't know if this is a needed QOL element.
Along those lines, I'm hoping we can't see what the mobs are casting until we've "learned" the mob, or fought it mulitpule times so we know it. I just feel like it takes away from the game that we can see what everyone else is donig all the time.
IMO: (partially agreeing/disagreeing)
From tonight's steam, I was happy to see that we can see what our teammates are casting, and how long it's taking them to cast somthing. I believe this is a needed QOL element.
Along those lines, I'm hoping we can't see what the mobs are casting until we've learned to recognize the spells/abilities, or fought it mulitple times so we know it. I feel like it adds to the game that we can or will see what everyone else is doing all the time.
vjek said:
I was happy to see that we can see what our teammates are casting, and how long it's taking them to cast somthing. I believe this is a needed QOL element.
Why do you think it's needed? I want to learn to trust the people I'm in a group with, I don't feel I need to see what they are casting AND then, think I need to comment on what they are casting and when they are casting it. I think this is what will happen. PUG's will be discouraged as soon as you can see what everyone else in your group is constantly doing since everyone will think they know best and it'll only open things up to arguring and big d*** contests. IMO.
Kittik said:Why do you think it's needed? ...
IMO, because it will provide two things. 1) I can see that others in my group are performing their role. 2) I can anticipate the timing of abilities and maximize the setting & exploitating of status effects on enemies.
In other words, it will help me and everyone in my group to be more effective by providing us enough information with respect to timing our beneficial and harmful combat actions that we're using to perform our role(s).
Yeah, I think thats why I don't want it. It just seems cheap. Getting to know, after a long time of playing, others abilities due to seeing the animaiton is one thing, having it flashed in your face just ruins it for me.
It takes away any effort to actually learn the game....again...IMO.
And yes, we'd all want to micromanage everyone in our group, and seeing what they cast and when is a great way for all of us go tell everyone else how wrong they are playing their class. Yeah, that's going to go great for an online game.
Kittik said:Yeah, I think thats why I don't want it. It just seems cheap. Getting to know, after a long time of playing, others abilities due to seeing the animaiton is one thing, having it flashed in your face just ruins it for me.
It takes away any effort to actually learn the game....again...IMO.
And yes, we'd all want to micromanage everyone in our group, and seeing what they cast and when is a great way for all of us go tell everyone else how wrong they are playing their class. Yeah, that's going to go great for an online game.
So turn it off. Close the chat window. Here's where another toggle is needed because many of us want to see that information. Seeing in a chat window that someone in my group is casting/doing something that I can then enhance or otherwise affect it by responding with a spell/ability of my own is a far better option for many because that information always appears in a specific location on the screen. Being force to hunt around the screen in the hope of catching some idiotically tiny icon or identifying some specific spell/ability effect out of the multiple dozens out there does not lead to players getting better. It frustrates players. Its information we need to know right then and there. Having it appear where we want on the screen is hugely important.
I'm not as concerned about other players as much but I agree.
When an npc is casting a spell I hope what spell is being cast isn't shown. Hell, we don't need to see the bar with the cast time indicator. The casting animation is plenty.
As is it's going to be my main focus trying to read the name of the spell being cast on the npcs bar. Not a great design choice imo. Seems a bit hand holdy and micro managy...because thats a word.
It's going to turn some people off who don't want to focus on it and it marginalizes the ability of those who are skilled enough to time interupts without needing a cast time bar. Let the skilled players stand out. There is no need for a NPC cast time bar that lists the spell being cast.
But the stream was great. One of my favorites.
It must be pointed out that the UI elements that are displayed to you by the Client are a representation of the information that you would be able to notice if you were personally there in your characters shoes.
For example:
HP bar = Seeing the wounds and damage inflicted by weapons. This goes for enemies, allies, and yourself.
Since it would make the game extremely complex graphics wise if every single Model in the game had to have dozens of stages of wounds coded in, in order for you to see how much damage you've inflicted and animations of the enemy doubling over in pain and suffering to show you how close to death it is... it is the standard practice to just show a HP bar instead that represents those wounds and agony that would be visible to your character.
Casting Bar with Spell names = Hearing an Enemy Caster chanting his spell "I call upon the elements to purge the Magic Effecting the Ally I am pointing my Finger towards." as he extends his hand out towards his Mezmerized Ally.
The casting bar is a representation of how long it takes for the Caster to speak the words and/or do the gestures for the Spell, it replaces the need for the Dev's to record Audio Words for each spell (which will be very repetative), and create unique Animation Gestures for each Avatar Model for every single entity in the game that will have the ability to cast said spells.
Now you may argue that said spell will be in some sort of special magic language that only those of a class that uses that same kind of magic will understand... but if I was to hear a Caster yell "Goo Goo Gaa Gaa!" and point a finger at his Mezmerized ally and it Purges the magic that is holding his Ally mezmerized... I'm going to assume that "Goo Goo Gaa Gaa" means Purge Magic.
@Kittik suggests that this spell name shouldn't be shown until After you've experienced it by seeing an Enemy use the spell. This is a valid idea and would be consistant with how things would work. Yet that would only mean that the Dev's would need to take extra time to specficially add extra code into the game, just to keep a spell name and cast time a secret from you for the very first time it's cast in your presence, which would then make you familiar with it and it can go to being shown. Seems like a bunch of extra work for the Dev's that's only going to effect each character only once per spell. And in fact it would also add extra work for the server or client on every single spell cast as the system needs to check a data table to see if the character is flagged as 'Seen this Spell before' and then decide if it should Hide the SpellName and CastTime or show the SpellName and CastTime based on the result of said data table check.
Now, it might be argued that Spells could be imagined to be non-verbal and require no gestures, and are instead just occur whenever the Caster 'Thinks' them. Thus there is no warning of any kind that a Magical effect is about to occur. This is totally plausible and something that could be done... but if this were the case, then they could not balance combat with players having any ability to 'inturrupt' these Magical effects. Since there would be no warning of any kind until the effect of the Magic occurs, there would be nothing a Player could do to predict and react in time to counteract such Magic. So if VR wants players to be able to have counter play with Magical effects, then they cannot use a Silent and Visually dormant Magical system.
Now I also can predict that some may argue that the player should just learn the Particle and Sound effect for each spell. This is valid as it's probable that as players become more practiced it's likely that many of them will start to recognize these effects and won't need to look at the spell bar to know what's happening. But this shouldn't be an excuse to pretend that your character is deaf and blind while he's fighting and that its only the Player behind the Monitor that can see and hear what's going on.
This also assumes that the Dev's will have the time to code unique Particle and Sound effects for every unique spell. In many MMO's this is not the case and the Particle and Sound Effects for spells are not unique for every single spell. Often it's easier for the Dev's to code a Particle and Sound effect for a Type of spell that gets used for each of that similar spell type. For example a Heal spell may make the casters hands glow Blue and have a Tinkling Sound, but this is the same effect and sound for each of the Heal spells.
Hopefully the VR team will not have to resort to this and Particle and Sound effects for spells will all be unique and identifiable. But we can't guarantee this.
Philo said: "As is it's going to be my main focus trying to read the name of the spell being cast on the npcs bar. Not a great design choice imo. Seems a bit hand holdy and micro managy...because thats a word.
It's going to turn some people off who don't want to focus on it and it marginalizes the ability of those who are skilled enough to time interupts without needing a cast time bar. Let the skilled players stand out. There is no need for a NPC cast time bar that lists the spell being cast."
Like I said above... this is like suggesting that your character is deaf and blind while fighting.
Yet I will give Philo the benefit of the doubt that he is actually suggesting that the game could give you a different notification type that a spell is being cast and let the player himself learn the casting time for said spell through experience and remember it and count out the time in his head himself so he knows how soon he needs to inturrupt. This is what he means by the 'cast bar' being too Hand Holdy. This might be a valid arguement, since it puts the onus on the player rather than your character to learn the casting time of the spells he faces.
Yet it is my opinion that if this is something that my character would learn and know due to his experience... it isn't a crutch that this information is displayed to me the player each time it's applicable. I like to think of it as if my character is hearing and seeing the spell being cast and is thinking to himself 'Uh Oh... that Enemy is chanting the Purge spell and it takes 3 seconds to say' and me the Player is reading my Characters mind as he thinks it and then counts it down '3.... 2.... 1... Boom' as he listens to the spell words being spoken. All of this is simply represented on the screen as a 3 Second Cast Bar with the word 'Purge' on it for simplicity to represent what I'm reading from my characters mind.
I may be way off base here but I suggest that some of what is seen in the stream may be to let watchers know more about the abilities of our characters and the enemies have and does *not* necessarily imply that these bars will be in the actual alpha release - when we get to it. Much less game release.
Personally I find bars for teammates distracting and unnecessary and bars for enemies highly useful. The bar for enemies gives information that we might well have if we were actually there a few feet away rather than looking at a monitor and perhaps barely able to see the enemy figures much less identify specific hand and arm movements and hear the spell words they utter.
Titanias said:
What kind of raids are you guys on that is complete silence? Every raid i have ever seen, someone will pick up on the cue that something is casting and yell "STUN" in voice chat.
Exactly. It's way more fun talking to people and having engagement umongst the players in a group/raid rather than all of us sitting there quitely reading casting bars.
GoofyWarriorGuy said:
It must be pointed out that the UI elements that are displayed to you by the Client are a representation of the information that you would be able to notice if you were personally there in your characters shoes.
We are there...we have a clear visual representation of what the toon is doing, not to mentions particle effects and sounds of each ability. I've played EQ2 for years. I know so many classes abilities simply based of their particle effects and sounds they make. I don't need to have it on a billboard in front of me to know what my group mates are casting.
To those that mention a toggle. Ok, fair enough. I'll take that then please. Having that big ugly bar telling me what everyone is doing is going to be annoying as hell in a 40 person raid.
Kittik said:
Titanias said:What kind of raids are you guys on that is complete silence? Every raid i have ever seen, someone will pick up on the cue that something is casting and yell "STUN" in voice chat.
Exactly. It's way more fun talking to people and having engagement umongst the players in a group/raid rather than all of us sitting there quitely reading casting bars.
Why would those casting bars stop you from talking to people?
Kittik said:To those that mention a toggle. Ok, fair enough. I'll take that then please. Having that big ugly bar telling me what everyone is doing is going to be annoying as hell in a 40 person raid.
You will be happy to hear that VR has stated more than once that they intend for the UI to be very flexible in terms of us being able to turn on/off all the individual parts of it and to position them wherever we wish.
I do not find the cast bar for allies a problem, but I also do not think it is required. You should just trust that people know what to do. Let them play their class.
As for the enemies, that bar needs to be removed. It's just another "dumb it down for the WoW croud" feature. Stop trying to Netflix and Chill while playing the game, pay attention. It adds difficulty to the fight that is SORELY needed. Being told exactly what's about to happen so you can counter everything takes all the difficulty out of the fight.
With the shown depth, I am completely fine with having both bars. In fact I think it's necessary for players to make informed decisions when facing the various challenges to be able to see what they are attempting to interrupt and decide whether it's worth it to use or eat the ability because you'd rather try to stop the heal or stun or whatever else you know the mob might do.
Before people get to worked up, it seems very likely this is just for testing. It would be especially useful as far as testing npc ai like we were being shown so it is easy for the devs to see exactly what is going on during combat in real time while they are on different characters.
Lets wait until we get confirmation that this isn't only for testing before we get overly worried. It seems very unlikely that a challenging game will show all of this in its final state.
Having the cast time/spell name shown in real time would be similar to having the "deep stats" page we were shown in one stream available to the players in game. Don't expect it. It's just "pulling back the curtain".
1) As philo says, this seems likely a testing feature
but if it *is* to be a feature
2) We all know, if it is there and gives extra info that other players will expect you to know, you will be 'gimping' yourself if you turn it off and potentially cause issues and arguments "Why did you do that?! You could see I was casting X!" "No, I couldn't. I hate those UI spell bars" "Well, you're an idiot! Why the heck would you turn them off and cause the group problems?!" etc.
3) For some (me) I totally get the concept of recognising what your group mates are casting, but the on-screen bars are unimmersive and unattractive. I don't want to turn them off, I want the info to be in a chat window. In Everquest, a lot of casters would make macros that announced their spells - it worked great and was filterable/ignorable if you didn't want them.
4) I agree with some that it *should be* something your characters have to *learn* to recognise accurately, but given a macro can be made to announce exactly what you are casting (or people can just tell you in voice chat), it would be a bit pointless to try and make it a 'realistic' game feature.
5) For enemies, though? I'm really not sure players should ever have the ability to somehow "know" what enemies are casting and exactly when and how long, etc. For one thing it seems to dumb down an important aspect of combat (learning what enemies are capable of) for another it seems very unrealistic and unimmersive. You could make the case that 'spells' are readily recognisable, but you could also make the case - and it feels more probable (realistic and immersive) to me - that a Ratling casting a spell would be (and look) very different to a human given the presumably vast difference in the creature themselves and how/where they learned that magic. Also, you will no doubt see a dragon, say, that under the hood as a game mechanic, is technically a high level 'wizard', but I would think that when they 'cast a fireball' even if it is effectively a 'wizard spell', it shouldn't be represented that way in game.
The thing we can all agree on is that it would be helpful to know if these cast time bars/spell info are intended to be there for more than testing?
Can anyone on VR help us out?
@Kilsin
Could you let us know the intended direction?
A toggle wouldnt change anything in this case.
Players will always take the path of least resistance.
Hopefully we get confirmation from a dev one way or the other.