I completely agree. The day / night transition should last about three to five minutes. Long enough to enjoy it and to move to a different area. And different light levels at night would add to the realism as well as to making specific light levels feel more rare and thus more interesting.
There actually is a fairly significant period before night falls. Between 17 and 18 hours ingame time, you will notice that the target bars of NPCs slowly become transparent. This is a pretty good hint for you to get your torches ready :)
But yeah, maybe instead of only changing the target bars of NPCs, maybe the transition of light -> no light could also be smoothed out a bit.
There actually is a fairly significant period before night falls. Between 17 and 18 hours ingame time, you will notice that the target bars of NPCs slowly become transparent. This is a pretty good hint for you to get your torches ready :)
But yeah, maybe instead of only changing the target bars of NPCs, maybe the transition of light -> no light could also be smoothed out a bit.
Thanks for the info. Honestly, I never noticed anything on target bars of NPCs. This said, I think that transition from day to night (and viceversa) shouldn´t consist only on warning to players (be aware that night is coming), but also something to enjoy. The twilight is something that I loved in a few games (EQ to start with, but also WoW and some others) where you could simply wander around and enjoy the changing lights of the twilight, or look for specific spots where from to glimpse an amazing landscape that last a few minutes or even seconds.
Pantheon is a game where you wander through a vast world, mostly outdoors, so the light is essential as a tool to create inmersion. If we think for example about Witcher 3 (one of the most successful RPG games in history), the handling of light was certainly one of its cornerstones. We in Pantheon are going to be wandering outdoors 95% of time, so a slow paced twilight will achieve two objectives: warn players about incoming dawn or dusk (for the night is dark and full of terrors, as everyone knows) and provide with an enjoyable and brief time to wander and discover the beauty of the world, helping inmersion and sense of realism.
I agree the day/night cycle does add something nice to the game. I don't really enjoy how dark it is and how you can't see anything at night. Hopefully they make it so it's a little brighter in the future. It's also a pain to have to switch to a torch all the time. I know there are other light items and sources planned. We will see what happens. Maybe I'm the only one that feels this way about it being too dark. Heh.
OK, I see your point. Maybe something that could be done to address your problem would be to implement a "quest pouch of sorts", that worked as a container for quest items and light sources only, and remained equipped to your belt when you died.
This said, I have several questions for you:
1) Did you consider to get yourself a torch before trying to find your body? I assume that can be obtained at a general vendor;
2) Did you consider to ask for help? Surely there were other players close by halnir camp area, that could have done the run with you, or even rez your corpse
3) Did you consider to wait for dawn? It is not really that long, right? And in the meantime, you could have done something else not requiring something that you had in your backpacks
- Elia
I don't like night, only because it's so damn scary and dangerous :)
I love the game play aspect of the night though.
What I don't like is that as a dual wield class, Ranger, when I am in the dark, I need my torch, but then I am stuck in torch and weapon mode for a fight, should I agro a mob, or need to light to get back to my group during a pull, since you can't swap weapons mid-fight. Torches should not count toward that, or should have their own slot, and then make them so they need repair. This would mean when not in use, one would want to extinguish the torch to preserve it's useful life before repair, thereby cutting down on people just carrying a lit torch around all the time in that slot.