Taken from http://massivelyop.com/2016/04/25/brad-mcquaid-pantheon-pax-east-2016/ :
"Change is also important when it comes to your characters, so that you don’t wind up stuck needing a tank with your character only able to heal. Several systems are being proposed, such as a system allowing you to bring your alt to the same area as the rest of your party if, say, you need a Rogue to disable traps rather than your half-healing half-tanking Crusader for a while."
Are they saying that we are going to be able to log out and bring in an alt into an already made group? If so, boooo!
It is possible in WoW when a warlock is in the group. Warlocks can summon other players to the group. Maybe it is a similar mechanism.
Greetings
Sounded like the point that he was trying to make there is that there will be more than one way to skin a cat. They don't want there to be only 1 viable combination of classes to achieve anything. Dunno about that bring an alt thing. Of course people will bring alts to do some things, but nothing should require that by design. Thats what you do for lack of a better alternative.
I changed my comment cause I feel like I over-speculated with too little info.
I've reread the quote and really it can be taken in many different ways. I'm confident that VR is not going to introduce some weird feature that goes against all their game tenets. Well, pretty confident anyway. :)
I interpret it the way you do Anistosoles, and I don't like it either. I believe it's been said that some type of Call of the Hero would be in-game, but this does sound like if you're a part of the group, you switch characters and your alt will automatically appear with the group.
The good thing here, is that it was just an example given, stated that it was one of "several systems that are being PROPOSED" - so I wouldn't worry about it for now.
This will solve the constent mmo issue of never having enough healers as main characters. Everyone always wants to play a dps or tank. This is a new idea to the lack of clerics that all mmo's seem to have.
Maybe I'm too black and white but if you need a rogue bring a rogue. If you need a tank bring a tank. I don't expect to go into an area that requires fire protection but only bring cold protection gear.
It would likely work with the Caravan System (similar to what was in VG). You can 'dock' multiple characters in the Caravan and they move with your group/guild, whether they are online or offline. When you log in with a character that is part of a Caravan you have the option of appearing where the group/guild logged off. In the case of a dungeon, you will appear at the entrance. If you logged off your Crusader and then logged in your Rogue, he/she would be at the entrance to the dungeon you guys are in and would have to be Call of Hero'd to where the rest of the group was at.
Aradune said:It would likely work with the Caravan System (similar to what was in VG). You can 'dock' multiple characters in the Caravan and they move with your group/guild, whether they are online or offline. When you log in with a character that is part of a Caravan you have the option of appearing where the group/guild logged off. In the case of a dungeon, you will appear at the entrance. If you logged off your Crusader and then logged in your Rogue, he/she would be at the entrance to the dungeon you guys are in and would have to be Call of Hero'd to where the rest of the group was at.
Almost forgot about that little piece. Never used it though.
I think its a good idea for fast group changes if you need it, but does that open things up for an exploit? Get your top toon to drag all the other to the good farming location? Not sure if that is accurate but it was the best thought I had with zero coffee.
Ox
I haven't come out on these forums ever in disagreement on a system yet but this sounds absurd to me..... I can see this being completely misused. Time will tell. I just dont agree with how it sounds but then again im not game developer and dont know how exactly this will affect on the game.
Amsai said: Again. A bit over the top. Can we not call down everything that isnt from the EQ rulebook please?
Pendulum swings both ways, you are always salty aganist EQ vets as well. The majority of EQ vets don't want the a clone of EQ, but the tenets it was founded upon expanded on, not changed. Having a caravan system with CoH readily available goes aganist it.
Similar to mentoring - why take the level 35 rogue who is LFG when a 35 rogue who's twinked with a guild group can be caravaned in and CoH'd? You already know that player's skill set and gear, why take the chance on someone new?
I get systems that are created to try to "assist" in grouping, but, if the game needs all these systems to promote or assist in grouping, then it's failed. People grouped in EQ because they had to, there was no other alternative way to advance. Create an environment like that again, and people will be forced to group, and they will learn to group or they will suffer through painful soloing. If the game's content isn't designed nearly solely for grouping, it doesn't matter what innovative systems are created - people will solo.
I'm all for a system like this. My group of friends that game are all parents, so we all have to step away from time to time, and this helps alleviate that gap of time that we may have to go AFK and fall behind. I'm an old school EQ guy myself, but I don't think the equal level of being "hard core" EQ had should carry over 1:1 to Pantheon. This sounds like something I would welcome.
Edit: Gah, when are we getting a spell check on these boards. :)
Raidan said:Amsai said: Again. A bit over the top. Can we not call down everything that isnt from the EQ rulebook please?Pendulum swings both ways, you are always salty aganist EQ vets as well. The majority of EQ vets don't want the a clone of EQ, but the tenets it was founded upon expanded on, not changed. Having a caravan system with CoH readily available goes aganist it.
Similar to mentoring - why take the level 35 rogue who is LFG when a 35 rogue who's twinked with a guild group can be caravaned in and CoH'd? You already know that player's skill set and gear, why take the chance on someone new?
I get systems that are created to try to "assist" in grouping, but, if the game needs all these systems to promote or assist in grouping, then it's failed. People grouped in EQ because they had to, there was no other alternative way to advance. Create an environment like that again, and people will be forced to group, and they will learn to group or they will suffer through painful soloing. If the game's content isn't designed nearly solely for grouping, it doesn't matter what innovative systems are created - people will solo.
What Raidan said.
Totally agree with Raidan here, I only very briefly played Vanguard, but i thought the caravan system was way too easy mode. Falling behind your friends if you need to log off is actually an important part of the social experience, how often in RL did you talk with your friends about what you did in Everquest last night, or what you plan to do today.. if you put in a caravan system, all of your friends will now be able to easily hook up with you wherever you are, and will most likely be experiencing the stories you may have told them (and naturally imbellished upon) with you. This leaves very little to talk about outside of the game, and it also makes it much easier for a group of friends to stay together, and not have to meet new people, and bring more friends into your circle.
Quite literally, caravans and mentoring systems are the epitomy of anti-social structural gameplay designs, almost as much as instancing IMHO.
If any of these systems are to be considered, I do hope that they are extemely limited. You should not be able to caravan for more than 1-2 hours, and no more than once or twice a day. As far as mentoring is concerned, I do believe you should have to have both parties present at an NPC in town, activate the mentor, and you should only be able to do it once per day. I also don't think it's a good idea for you to match their level if they ding, I think you should remain at the level you mentored to, and once it isn't helping anymore, you can't do it again that day. Mentoring should also be limited to level 10-20, no higher.
Without limitations, these systems can be extremely abused, me and my friends would never have the need to invite anyone else to our group or guild, we would work strictly off alts and people already inside our structure. I know people don't like the word force, but I really think it is necessary to force people to meet new people, and to need other people, otherwise as human nature entails, we won't.
Rallyd said:If any of these systems are to be considered, I do hope that they are extemely limited. You should not be able to caravan for more than 1-2 hours, and no more than once or twice a day.
Actually, I'd be ok with this.
Limiting the "caravan" type system is something I could get behind. That way, if you're grouping with some friends, and ya'll decide to move on to a different area but you have to log off for a moment, but will be back in an hour or two, this ensures that when you're back you're still with your friends.
Any longer than that though, and it should not work, in my personal opinion that nobody cares about.
-Tralyan
Rallyd said:Totally agree with Raidan here, I only very briefly played Vanguard, but i thought the caravan system was way too easy mode. Falling behind your friends if you need to log off is actually an important part of the social experience, how often in RL did you talk with your friends about what you did in Everquest last night, or what you plan to do today.. if you put in a caravan system, all of your friends will now be able to easily hook up with you wherever you are, and will most likely be experiencing the stories you may have told them (and naturally imbellished upon) with you. This leaves very little to talk about outside of the game, and it also makes it much easier for a group of friends to stay together, and not have to meet new people, and bring more friends into your circle.
Quite literally, caravans and mentoring systems are the epitomy of anti-social structural gameplay designs, almost as much as instancing IMHO.
If any of these systems are to be considered, I do hope that they are extemely limited. You should not be able to caravan for more than 1-2 hours, and no more than once or twice a day. As far as mentoring is concerned, I do believe you should have to have both parties present at an NPC in town, activate the mentor, and you should only be able to do it once per day. I also don't think it's a good idea for you to match their level if they ding, I think you should remain at the level you mentored to, and once it isn't helping anymore, you can't do it again that day. Mentoring should also be limited to level 10-20, no higher.
Without limitations, these systems can be extremely abused, me and my friends would never have the need to invite anyone else to our group or guild, we would work strictly off alts and people already inside our structure. I know people don't like the word force, but I really think it is necessary to force people to meet new people, and to need other people, otherwise as human nature entails, we won't.
Couldnt agree more, I am hoping more and more that there is a Hardcore server where I can avoid all this modern day MMO bull crap. Starting to get a bad feeling about watching another hope go down in flames...Still have faith but its being shaken pretty hard
I don't love the sound of this. I tend to agree that if left to its own devices it would probably discourage free grouping more than anything. (Not to get the thread off topic but I completely disagree with the concepts that the results of this sort of system and mentoring alone would have the same effect) That being said though I don't think we should get to up in arms about it. Most alts that you can switch in and out in a valuable way like this would have to be close to the same level, or they would be useless in the higher level dungeon. That kind of limits the effects of this to the end game unless it is combined with mentoring which could then become problematic.
I think in general the goals here are to create a mechanism that works well for small populations and the power and capabilities of those systems to help the small population can be fleshed out in beta. I would say it is better to have and then tweak or remove a system in beta than it would be never to have a chance to test a system that might be necessary for the health of the game.
Raidan said:Amsai said: Again. A bit over the top. Can we not call down everything that isnt from the EQ rulebook please?Pendulum swings both ways, you are always salty aganist EQ vets as well. The majority of EQ vets don't want the a clone of EQ, but the tenets it was founded upon expanded on, not changed. Having a caravan system with CoH readily available goes aganist it.
Similar to mentoring - why take the level 35 rogue who is LFG when a 35 rogue who's twinked with a guild group can be caravaned in and CoH'd? You already know that player's skill set and gear, why take the chance on someone new?
I get systems that are created to try to "assist" in grouping, but, if the game needs all these systems to promote or assist in grouping, then it's failed. People grouped in EQ because they had to, there was no other alternative way to advance. Create an environment like that again, and people will be forced to group, and they will learn to group or they will suffer through painful soloing. If the game's content isn't designed nearly solely for grouping, it doesn't matter what innovative systems are created - people will solo.
/Totally Agree Raidan :)
Yeah, all the EQ Ultras who are so afraid of things which were not in classic Everquest, afraid of anything which smells remotely like innovation, all who "threaten" to not play this game because 'oh noes, it's not Everquest in all regards, but a new game in its own rights', I can't understand why you prefer to not play this game and give it a chance.
Are you aware that Everquest itself was pretty innovative and that people with mindsets expressed here would've killed it right on the spot because it wasn't exactly a copy of their past beloved games just with better graphics? Back then innovation was ok, but god forbid all innovation had to stop with Everquest? NO GAME will be more everquest-y than this one. Even if it contains things not known in Everquest.
Can't you just wait with the laments that the sky is falling and have some faith that Brad and his team will pull this off and keep their promises? This is a NEW game, and it'd be only fair if you would be at least as openminded as you were back then when playing Everquest for the first time. He never said that he will make a 1:1 copy, so don't act as if he had!
Duffy said:Yeah, all the EQ Ultras who are so afraid of things which were not in classic Everquest, afraid of anything which smells remotely like innovation, all who "threaten" to not play this game because 'oh noes, it's not Everquest in all regards, but a new game in its own rights', I can't understand why you prefer to not play this game and give it a chance.
Are you aware that Everquest itself was pretty innovative and that people with mindsets expressed here would've killed it right on the spot because it wasn't exactly a copy of their past beloved games just with better graphics? Back then innovation was ok, but god forbid all innovation had to stop with Everquest? NO GAME will be more everquest-y than this one. Even if it contains things not known in Everquest.
Can't you just wait with the laments that the sky is falling and have some faith that Brad and his team will pull this off and keep their promises? This is a NEW game, and it'd be only fair if you would be at least as openminded as you were back then when playing Everquest for the first time. He never said that he will make a 1:1 copy, so don't act as if he had!
We are not AFRAID (bad choice of words on your part but whatever) of things that were not in clasic Everquest...we are worried about to many hand holding dumbing down ideas being put into what many of us consider our last shot at a truely old school MMO. We have seen this happen to many times before, a great new game appears on the horizon but convinence features keep being added until it becomes just MMO clone 157.... Yes we want innovation, but honestly you really think a mentoring system is innovative? Just about every game out there has a system like that and they are all pretty much broken. This is a discussion forum, where people DISCUSS topics that they are worried about. The simple fact that we are willing to discuss it is a good sign, I know if things get to bad on the convinence front I wont keep discussing it, I will simply stop following the game. Its VRI's game and they can make it however they want, but they said they wanted community input and I hope to all the gods in the pantheon they listen.