Hey all,
Was just thinking the other day as i became horribly lost trying to make my way through upper guk to a group in lower (after not going there for about 12 years lol) and i kind of got thinking that a possibility in Pantheon would be the ability to leave a trail behind you when you are adventuring into an area, this could be used to help you get out in an emergency but it could also be a trail that is picked up by a new group member coming to try and find you.
I dont mean that there is a magic trail that is obviously left everywhere you walk and definitely not like using the find option on EQ with a floating glowing yellow line. I mean that most likely in conjuction with the perception system you could make your way through an area whilst keeping one eye on the ground looking for tit bits of the trail that is left behind by your group. So maybe like uniquely coloured pebbles that feintly appear when you activate perception, this wouldnt be an instant trail to your location, maybe you could add to the concept by having a limited number of these pebbles and the person who is dropping them has to select their locations they put them on the ground and manually drop them. with only a limited number to use there would be enough space between the "pebbles" to leave you guessing sometimes. and just to be sure you know it doesnt create any kind of easy mode, this doesnt mean that you can just go into a dungeon and know that a particular trail will lead to you to partiular area, you would restrict the time the trail is visible. I havent given it much thought really but i thought i would just throw it out there as i became perilously lost in Guk lol!
Edit: Definitely not trying to take away from the wonder of exploring, by not being an easy path to follow you would still enjoy the terror of the unknown as you move through an area. It would be potentially very dangerous to follow an unknown trail if you found one, it may lead to a boss room that is very agro where a group has just wiped and.... oops your dead.
Any thoughts?
Couldn't you do that with trash gear ? When you drop gear it would look like a little brown sack on the ground, of course you wouldnt have control over another player coming and just picking it up before your friend could come and see it but it could work..lol Would be pretty crazy if the mobs themselves could pick it up as well and maybe equip it .. wow, yeah wouldn't be a good idea then :(
It will probably sound like too much work but I am from the D&D age where you would take a piece of physical paper and a pencil and draw a crude caveman map. The map would look nothing like reality but it gives you the basic idea of where to go and where you have been. When I would first enter a zone I would follow the wall to the right and start mapping from there. The idea of sime kind of in game map drawing skill or somethingt was brought up n a few other threads.
Next to the character portraits on the screen there is an arrow indicating the direction of the party member in relation to you. Of course, that isnt always helpful in a 3 dementional space :)
But I agree with Jamie, nothing like exploration and taking out a pencil and paper and mapping it out yourself.
I certainly recall having to find/make a paper map for many of these areas - particularly places like Sol A and B .... what with dead-ends and up and over type areas.
That is not to say I would be averse to (perhaps) Rangers (or maybe anyone who invests time/effort in the skill) having a 'tracking' type skill. That way when you came to a junction, you could use your tracking skill to see if there were any signs of passage from toher people etc. Of course this would get 'fainter' (ie harder to detect) as time went by etc. Plus you might pick up the wrong tracks... oopsie.
Well with the weather system, like being outside, would make it hard to find any trail or track, even the best of trackers cant really track in a blizzard or sandstorm. Though in a dungeon or castle, their should be something. Or again like you all said make some paper boxed map.
Evoras said:I certainly recall having to find/make a paper map for many of these areas - particularly places like Sol A and B .... what with dead-ends and up and over type areas.
That is not to say I would be averse to (perhaps) Rangers (or maybe anyone who invests time/effort in the skill) having a 'tracking' type skill. That way when you came to a junction, you could use your tracking skill to see if there were any signs of passage from toher people etc. Of course this would get 'fainter' (ie harder to detect) as time went by etc. Plus you might pick up the wrong tracks... oopsie.
I would think that would make sense for Rangers and rogues for sure. Maybe an aspect of their perception system.
Lower and Upper Guk even with a map was very confusing. There were a bunch of times where it would take forever to get a group because I did not know how to get to my group or people in the group just didnt want to come and get me because they themselves didnt want to get lost or die because invis would drop. :(