So I wanted to open this up for discussion...
I really liked what I saw in this climbing skill and the animations involved with it. This sure beats always having to follow obvious paths and opens the game up for some very unique and fun game play. I really enjoyed watching the group climb the icy cliffs together and it became obvious you had a more difficult time judging mob aggro with the hidden spots and different elevations.
I cannot wait to see some of the other areas of the world that involve the climbing skill... Well done and thought out VR.
I was really impressed by the design of the path(s) up in Amberfaet - they were much less obvious than I'd have expected. Felt much more like a real cave dungeon with adventurers just figuring out how to get up! Really, really glad that sort of design is making it into Pantheon.
Agree with everyone above, climbing is great. Should constantly consume stamina though (at a slower rate the higher your skill, or with buffs etc.), making cliff climbs risky except for those ninja-like scouting experts in the party (who then throw down ropes for the rest of us). I loved watching them go vertical, Amberfaet was a treat.
I was totally and pleasantly surprised by the whole climbing feature and I liked it alot. It's something you don't see often in MMOs. Couple things of note;
1) Being the first player or group to explore areas is going to come with some tough challenges now. Just trying to find all of the ledges to progress is going to be a challenge let alone secret areas that require ledges to get too.
2) Not sure HOW in depth I would like this feature to be though. Do we want it to level up and have to work on our climbing skill? Or is it a ability we have that doesn't require leveling up sort of like our jumping ability? Do we allow every class to have it or do we allow just a few and these classes have to climb up and get other players up with other skills such as rope or a summon spell? Rope has been in both EQ and VG I believe and would be a cool combination of skills to get players around. Etc etc
3) Could be interesting to see other uses created for climbing. You could use it to get around areas and hard to reach places but what about using climb in other areas of the game such as boss mechanics or simple group encounters or even puzzles.
I'm excited for this, I was thinking about the subject of ladders and verticlaity and how much it's not seen in MMOs before the stream.
but what im also interested in is how they mentioned there will be ropes you'll need in some situations.. I wonder if maybe classes like rogues have the ability to get to higher climbing levels, where in higher level dungeons you'll need one to climb up and toss a rope down to everyone else. or maybe just if it is for when you have one person whose climbing skill isn't as high as the rest they don't get left behind
The climbing system is awesome. I have a couple of questions, which may have been answered already:
1) How will climbing surfaces be found? Will there be a visual indication of some sort that the surface is climable? Or will players just have to discover them via trial and error (i.e. jumping into every rock)?
2) Will there be any indication when we lack the skill to climb a climable surface? And how will we know what the skill requirement is for a climbable surface?
3) How do you increase your climbing skill?
Wellspring said:The climbing system is awesome. I have a couple of questions, which may have been answered already:
1) How will climbing surfaces be found? Will there be a visual indication of some sort that the surface is climable? Or will players just have to discover them via trial and error (i.e. jumping into every rock)?
2) Will there be any indication when we lack the skill to climb a climable surface? And how will we know what the skill requirement is for a climbable surface?
3) How do you increase your climbing skill?
Glad you all enjoyed seeing Amberfaet :)
My answers are subject to change as we continue forward:
1) Trial and error is a thought, but for the sheer amount of rocks/platforms/crates etc. in the world that will likely appear climbable, I think that would be overly fatiguing to players constantly checking everything. Most likely, we will have some kind of subtle visual cue to let players know.
2) I don't see Climbing being a black and white skill, as many other skill types should be. I see the Climbing skill having more of a soft range of success in the middle. In other words, let's say you have a Climbing skill of (72). I could see a 10 pt. range on either side of that number (62-82). This range would determine when a surface becomes trivial (always able to successfully climb/shimmy) or impossible (unable to latch on at all). Within that range then, there would be a chance of 2 things happening:
- I fail to latch on and fall (which would be devestating when performing a jump latch over a gap with a long fall beneath you!) When a latch is successful, the subsequent pull up would be as well.
- I successfully latch, but need to shimmy horizontally to get to where I can pull up. During that shimmying, there is a repeating check against your Climbing skill vs. the surface to determine whether you slip and lose your grip.
Climbing skill will effect the chance of one of these two things happening. Either the chance to fail a latch or slip gets smaller as the Climbing surface grade gets lower compared to your skill, all the way to trivial with no chance of failure. Or, the chance to fail a latch or slip gets larger as the Climbing surface grade gets higher compared to your skill.
To put all that together - I have a Climbing skill of 72:
a. Climbing surface, grade 61-. This is trivial to me, I can climb/shimmy all day without failure.
b. Climbing surface, grade 65. This is non-trivial to me. I have a good chance of successfully latching or shimmying, but there is a small chance I could fail at one or both.
c. Climbing surface, grade 79. This is non-trivial to me. I have a good chance of failing to latch or shimmy, but there is a small chance I could succeed at one or both.
d. Climbing surface, grade 83+. This is impossible for me to latch or shimmy.
3) I can't give the full answer to this question yet, other than to confirm actually climbing surfaces will be a significant way you increase your Climbing skill. However, we obviously don't want someone spam climbing the same rock all day to max the skill. We want Climbing to be a prized and valuable skill among players, and so we will be putting some good thought into how you would actually go about improving and eventually mastering this skill, and there will likely be tasks/quests involved at different points :)
Chris "Joppa" Perkins | Creative Director
Joppa said:Wellspring said:The climbing system is awesome. I have a couple of questions, which may have been answered already:
1) How will climbing surfaces be found? Will there be a visual indication of some sort that the surface is climable? Or will players just have to discover them via trial and error (i.e. jumping into every rock)?
2) Will there be any indication when we lack the skill to climb a climable surface? And how will we know what the skill requirement is for a climbable surface?
3) How do you increase your climbing skill?
Glad you all enjoyed seeing Amberfaet :)
My answers are subject to change as we continue forward:
1) Trial and error is a thought, but for the sheer amount of rocks/platforms/crates etc. in the world that will likely appear climbable, I think that would be overly fatiguing to players constantly checking everything. Most likely, we will have some kind of subtle visual cue to let players know.
2) I don't see Climbing being a black and white skill, as many other skill types should be. I see the Climbing skill having more of a soft range of success in the middle. In other words, let's say you have a Climbing skill of (72). I could see a 10 pt. range on either side of that number (62-82). This range would determine when a surface becomes trivial (always able to successfully climb/shimmy) or impossible (unable to latch on at all). Within that range then, there would be a chance of 2 things happening:
- I fail to latch on and fall (which would be devestating when performing a jump latch over a gap with a long fall beneath you!) When a latch is successful, the subsequent pull up would be as well.
- I successfully latch, but need to shimmy horizontally to get to where I can pull up. During that shimmying, there is a repeating check against your Climbing skill vs. the surface to determine whether you slip and lose your grip.
Climbing skill will effect the chance of one of these two things happening. Either the chance to fail a latch or slip gets smaller as the Climbing surface grade gets lower compared to your skill, all the way to trivial with no chance of failure. Or, the chance to fail a latch or slip gets larger as the Climbing surface grade gets higher compared to your skill.
To put all that together - I have a Climbing skill of 72:
a. Climbing surface, grade 61-. This is trivial to me, I can climb/shimmy all day without failure.
b. Climbing surface, grade 65. This is non-trivial to me. I have a good chance of successfully latching or shimmying, but there is a small chance I could fail at one or both.
c. Climbing surface, grade 79. This is non-trivial to me. I have a good chance of failing to latch or shimmy, but there is a small chance I could succeed at one or both.
d. Climbing surface, grade 83+. This is impossible for me to latch or shimmy.
3) I can't give the full answer to this question yet, other than to confirm actually climbing surfaces will be a significant way you increase your Climbing skill. However, we obviously don't want someone spam climbing the same rock all day to max the skill. We want Climbing to be a prized and valuable skill among players, and so we will be putting some good thought into how you would actually go about improving and eventually mastering this skill, and there will likely be tasks/quests involved at different points :)
Chris "Joppa" Perkins | Creative Director
Are there going to be important areas (dungeons/raids) that REQUIRE you to have a certain climbing skill in order to access? is climbing going to act as a barrier to content?
@Joppa Awesome. It sounds like you guys have put a lot of thought into the system, and I really like the direction you're going with it.
Using quests at various stages in order to progress your climbing skill in conjunction with regular climbing skill ups, that is a great idea! *two ogre thumbs up*
Joppa said:Chris "Joppa" Perkins | Creative Director
The Dungeon looks great.
Few Questions/Concerns:
1) how is climbing going to relate to class design? There was mention of rogue and ropes which is neat but also worries me that there could be unintentional oversights on an area/dungeon that could possibly punish a group for not bringing "X" class? I imagine it is a difficult balance to find where you make classes unique in utility while mainatining "balance" in regards to climbing fetaures?
2) Rotating or random "climbs": I am not sure how difficult this would be to implement but I thought it might be cool and a way to keep either a (dungeon here and there or parts of a zone) fresh by having random spawns of a climbing formation (pattern). It could be passed off as rocks falling or breaking over time to keep immersion. After the first players pass through a cool climbing pattern, the suprise might diminish over time as people learn the specified pattern of that location or it is posted online. With a varied spawn and sequence, players will always have to keep an eye out or test out new paths.
Thanks
If Druids can impact the enviroment or weather. Maybe instea dof a lev spell, per se, thet can offer a cyclone type thing that pushes a character up.
That way, to one persons post iof there is a cave like half way down a ravine crevasse, everyone could jump and the druid would call forth the cyclone to puff everyone up, to fall again , anothe puff (like the A-Team movie when they are falling in the tank.."Ahhhh!....Tank moves up from firing, tank falls..."ahhH!" - heh). and then when close ot the end or target, falling into said cave like (Kirk and Spock in Startrek into darkness)
So even if low climbing skill on one character, the druid would have to watch to be sure eveyone gets accross, for if one falls, the druid could cast the puff spell and call forth the small cyclone to uplift the group member they may get a hand hold in another place and need to crawl up form there.
Then at higher levels the cyclone spell could be powerful and dangerous maybe like the anti-grav spell. That would be something in the newbie zones. High powered druid whooshing up all the low level monsters so they fall to their death, and newbies walking into a rain of bodies to loot while they wait for respawn....if it works that way, that is.
Joppa said:Wellspring said:The climbing system is awesome. I have a couple of questions, which may have been answered already:
1) How will climbing surfaces be found? Will there be a visual indication of some sort that the surface is climable? Or will players just have to discover them via trial and error (i.e. jumping into every rock)?
2) Will there be any indication when we lack the skill to climb a climable surface? And how will we know what the skill requirement is for a climbable surface?
3) How do you increase your climbing skill?
Glad you all enjoyed seeing Amberfaet :)
My answers are subject to change as we continue forward:
1) Trial and error is a thought, but for the sheer amount of rocks/platforms/crates etc. in the world that will likely appear climbable, I think that would be overly fatiguing to players constantly checking everything. Most likely, we will have some kind of subtle visual cue to let players know.
2) I don't see Climbing being a black and white skill, as many other skill types should be. I see the Climbing skill having more of a soft range of success in the middle. In other words, let's say you have a Climbing skill of (72). I could see a 10 pt. range on either side of that number (62-82). This range would determine when a surface becomes trivial (always able to successfully climb/shimmy) or impossible (unable to latch on at all). Within that range then, there would be a chance of 2 things happening:
- I fail to latch on and fall (which would be devestating when performing a jump latch over a gap with a long fall beneath you!) When a latch is successful, the subsequent pull up would be as well.
- I successfully latch, but need to shimmy horizontally to get to where I can pull up. During that shimmying, there is a repeating check against your Climbing skill vs. the surface to determine whether you slip and lose your grip.
Climbing skill will effect the chance of one of these two things happening. Either the chance to fail a latch or slip gets smaller as the Climbing surface grade gets lower compared to your skill, all the way to trivial with no chance of failure. Or, the chance to fail a latch or slip gets larger as the Climbing surface grade gets higher compared to your skill.
To put all that together - I have a Climbing skill of 72:
a. Climbing surface, grade 61-. This is trivial to me, I can climb/shimmy all day without failure.
b. Climbing surface, grade 65. This is non-trivial to me. I have a good chance of successfully latching or shimmying, but there is a small chance I could fail at one or both.
c. Climbing surface, grade 79. This is non-trivial to me. I have a good chance of failing to latch or shimmy, but there is a small chance I could succeed at one or both.
d. Climbing surface, grade 83+. This is impossible for me to latch or shimmy.
3) I can't give the full answer to this question yet, other than to confirm actually climbing surfaces will be a significant way you increase your Climbing skill. However, we obviously don't want someone spam climbing the same rock all day to max the skill. We want Climbing to be a prized and valuable skill among players, and so we will be putting some good thought into how you would actually go about improving and eventually mastering this skill, and there will likely be tasks/quests involved at different points :)
Chris "Joppa" Perkins | Creative Director
Is this new to the MMORPG world? I can not think of any mmorpg that has used the climbing skill in this way.
I was pleasantly surprised to see climbing in the stream. I enjoyed jumping and climbing in DDO (and got very proficient with it) so I will probably feel right at home. Looking forward to hearing more details about how you level up the skill and the implications this has on gameplay.
Suggestion:
Shaman spell: "Spirit of the Monkey"
Temporarily increase your climbing skill by 20.
