zewtastic said:Porygon said:
You mocked my statement regarding being naive. So I just wanted to see how you felt. I've invested into the game also. I'm fine with open world. I know what type of gamer I am and I know where my status on the server will be.
And you know open world? I highly doubt it.Porygon said:
My concern is longevity of the game. I know exactly how it will happen.
lets get a game first before planning some grand scheme of 'Porygon lengevity'. forest for the trees youngster.Porygon said:
There are a ton of players on these forums that yearn to recreate the thrill and excitement of everquest (I do as well). The design of modern MMOs has them wanting more, and pantheon will deliver.
A ton? Not likely. There seem to be very few actual original EQ players that were not 6 years old at the time. EQ, the original disappeared somewhere around 2002-2003. Your experience is of an Everquest long after it was original. Your EQ is whatever bastardized version SoE morphed it into, long after Brad and Co. had left the stage.Porygon said:
For example, when I started playing eq I didnt know what raiding was. I never knew I would become so entrenched in an aspect of the game such as that. So it didnt matter if i want able to partake in it. Once i learned of this feature, it's been my goal in every mmo since then.
Nobody knew what raiding was before 1999.Porygon said:
There will be players on these forums. Arguing against instances, because they think they will be able to compete or they think they will have what it takes to make it... but they can't and they don't. In an open world game there will be 1 guild per server (in most cases) that dominates the raiding scene from the get go. And other guilds will not compete. Now at first that's fine because it'll take secondary guilds a while longer to organize and gear up... but once they do, they will expect a system that allows them to attempt raids.
Your inexperience with gaming is never more obvious than when you throw around hyperbole stating how you know how things are and will be. Using words like 'never' and 'always' are typically a dead giveaway. What happens on servers with guilds and raiding is up to players to decide. Instanced MMO's squelch that organic social development. A contested open world makes aspects like guild domination and raiding much more immersive. I'm not sure who this is that's expecting something, other than maybe some millennial?Porygon said:
If VR is unable to create this system they will take to the forums and complain, because that is what people do. When a massive amount of players begin to ask VR to change their system, they will have nothing else to do than to listen (just like wow). So they will either change it to some form of lockout system (which all of them are easily exploitable [all of them that I've seen]) or instances. If you want to talk about ways to exploit them. You can PM me if you really care.
Once again with ridiculous unsubstantiated and frankly childish statements. Trolls and whining are as old as human history i suspect. The bulletin boards in 1998 had it's share, now we have you. Not all people do as you and the other whiners do. You are the tiny, tiny minority of complainers that scream and kick. The rest, the majority, are a little more normal and go on with their lives.
I'm so glad you outted yourself as a cheater though. It kind of makes sense now why you want instancing so bad. Made it easy for you to powerlevel with hacks? Macroing? Dupe items? exploit bugs for loot?
To be quite honest with you Zew, open world can and at times will have some very toxic moments, it the risk of it being open world and I'm not just talking about from a raid perspective either but the whole world, now I want it to be open world and no instancing but to say something like what you said makes me wonder if you were in original EQ to behonest lol. Your opinion about it being the guilds on the server making the choices on how the raids will be handled a d such is kind of foolish, greed will always win over one way or another, might not be just one guild but I'd guess for open world raid content there will be a max of 3 guilds but more than likely 1 to 2 guild running the shkw, just look at all the open world tlp servers on eq now, it speaks for itself and to think it going to change simply becuase it a different game is naive. But this is my 2 cents, and the other way to stop this kind of thing from happening is lock outs on an open world, it a rough pill to swallow but relying on the community to police themselves when it comes to raid content is going to be hard becuase it only takes the one guild to step out of line and fight so.ething they shouldn't have and than the whole community gets mad and start over reacting and grabbing at everything they se til the "policing" is forgotten and never done again like I've always seen in all my eq experience.
zewtastic said:Porygon said:
You mocked my statement regarding being naive. So I just wanted to see how you felt. I've invested into the game also. I'm fine with open world. I know what type of gamer I am and I know where my status on the server will be.
And you know open world? I highly doubt it.Porygon said:
My concern is longevity of the game. I know exactly how it will happen.
lets get a game first before planning some grand scheme of 'Porygon lengevity'. forest for the trees youngster.Porygon said:
There are a ton of players on these forums that yearn to recreate the thrill and excitement of everquest (I do as well). The design of modern MMOs has them wanting more, and pantheon will deliver.
A ton? Not likely. There seem to be very few actual original EQ players that were not 6 years old at the time. EQ, the original disappeared somewhere around 2002-2003. Your experience is of an Everquest long after it was original. Your EQ is whatever bastardized version SoE morphed it into, long after Brad and Co. had left the stage.Porygon said:
For example, when I started playing eq I didnt know what raiding was. I never knew I would become so entrenched in an aspect of the game such as that. So it didnt matter if i want able to partake in it. Once i learned of this feature, it's been my goal in every mmo since then.
Nobody knew what raiding was before 1999.Porygon said:
There will be players on these forums. Arguing against instances, because they think they will be able to compete or they think they will have what it takes to make it... but they can't and they don't. In an open world game there will be 1 guild per server (in most cases) that dominates the raiding scene from the get go. And other guilds will not compete. Now at first that's fine because it'll take secondary guilds a while longer to organize and gear up... but once they do, they will expect a system that allows them to attempt raids.
Your inexperience with gaming is never more obvious than when you throw around hyperbole stating how you know how things are and will be. Using words like 'never' and 'always' are typically a dead giveaway. What happens on servers with guilds and raiding is up to players to decide. Instanced MMO's squelch that organic social development. A contested open world makes aspects like guild domination and raiding much more immersive. I'm not sure who this is that's expecting something, other than maybe some millennial?Porygon said:
If VR is unable to create this system they will take to the forums and complain, because that is what people do. When a massive amount of players begin to ask VR to change their system, they will have nothing else to do than to listen (just like wow). So they will either change it to some form of lockout system (which all of them are easily exploitable [all of them that I've seen]) or instances. If you want to talk about ways to exploit them. You can PM me if you really care.
Once again with ridiculous unsubstantiated and frankly childish statements. Trolls and whining are as old as human history i suspect. The bulletin boards in 1998 had it's share, now we have you. Not all people do as you and the other whiners do. You are the tiny, tiny minority of complainers that scream and kick. The rest, the majority, are a little more normal and go on with their lives.
I'm so glad you outted yourself as a cheater though. It kind of makes sense now why you want instancing so bad. Made it easy for you to powerlevel with hacks? Macroing? Dupe items? exploit bugs for loot?
This is hilarious. You look like such a fool.
Not that I'm pro instancing, but have they changed the FAQ recently? All it says about instancing (apart from re. housing and population) is: -
20.1 Will the game have instances?
Pantheon will support instancing to a limited degree, using it primarily for storytelling in a linear fashion, perhaps at the end of an epic quest. The vast majority of content, however, will exist in non-instanced shared zones.
VR saying it will be supported "to a limited degree" and giving an example of when it will be used hardly closes a door on the possibility of using instancing to resolve conflict where content becomes highly contentious or elsewhere.
"The vast majority of content, however, will exist in non-instanced shared zones" does not mean "we will never use instancing to stop powerful guilds from blocking raid content for months on end".
As I say, I'm not pro instancing and I'm not saying the above because I want instancing, I am saying it because I feel people really need to stop trying to suppress discussion that strays into areas they don't like by attempted belittlement and by narrowed and personalised interpretations of things like VR's FAQ.
Everyone's definition of 'old-school' gaming differs slightly and sometimes greatly. Some will think instances are the downfall of the world, but also think fast travel is fine. Some think fast travel can ruin the game, but Auction Houses are fine. Some think Auction Houses are evil, but are fine with exuberant cosmetics, etc, etc.
We'll just have to keep giving and discussing our opinions and trust in VR to make the best of them.
To the OP: I was there at EQ1 launch and enjoyed the "challenge" and "rawness" but this so-called hardcore game died for a reason....
Besides, every so-called "hardcore" mechanic that you described will divide the community; a significant minority will not be penalised and it will just suck for everyone else; this significant minorty will have access to port bots, drag bots and pocket rez's (logged out nearby) in addition to multiple accounts to port back to town to sell.Like nature. People will find a way to circumvent difficult/annoying mechanics.
Instead, it's better to give people a reason with motivation to experience and live these mechanics. For example, make the game beautiful so they want to take the boat instead of instant porting. Or give someone an achievement for dying 5 times in that 1 zone with a unique title... etc. Just my 2cp
5% of the games population will take the boat because its "pretty". Then its insta port. Insta sell. Insta buffs. Insta mana regen. Insta everything woohoo!! Some of these forum threads are insanely comical. I wonder if any of the forum warriors who are fighting for everything easy mode, if they actually played EQ at launch. Or if they actually experienced a game without instantly getting everything handed to them. It doesn't divide the community (the dbags will be known), it brings the community together. And no, I dont want an EQ clone.
I love it when people use nonsensical hyperbole to try and make other people seem unreasonable.
The honest truth is that in most MMOs, players don't just get "everything handed to them instantly". Outside of occasional cash shop purchases in F2P MMOs (I only ever buy cosmetic stuff), I've put effort into every piece of gear, every mount, every toy or costume or whatever else in every MMO I've played. Stop pretending that anything short of launch EQ just gives you everything for logging in.
Kastor said:5% of the games population will take the boat because its "pretty". Then its insta port. Insta sell. Insta buffs. Insta mana regen. Insta everything woohoo!! Some of these forum threads are insanely comical. I wonder if any of the forum warriors who are fighting for everything easy mode, if they actually played EQ at launch. Or if they actually experienced a game without instantly getting everything handed to them. It doesn't divide the community (the dbags will be known), it brings the community together. And no, I dont want an EQ clone.
If we want to grossly generalize we certainly can. We can talk about the forum warriors that want the game to be tediously slow, with 4 hour boat rides and everyone being forced to spend 2 hours a day shouting in chat to sell thier 5 coppers worth of goods, leaving them, if they have a job and sleep with about 30 minutes of actual adventuring and exploring which will be taken up be finding a group.
But it is ok because the forum warriors that complain about any reasonable amount of convenience want trash mobs to take 15 minutes to kill with a full group spamming a basic rotation.
When you hyperbolize such as you have and I, for demonstration, have, you actually do not further the conversation. You do not make your point because you are not arguing against anything real. It is like saying we should have universal healthcare because everyone that doesn't think so wants to have people dying en masse to easily curable diseases.
You are minimizing the people that don't want to spam chat or take very long periods of time getting to a group, or waiting on a guildy to make it to you. If I want to be tediously bored, there are jobs for that. I can get a hot dog cart and make actual money, have as much fun, get free hot dogs to boot! The bullying of those that oppose the 'everything the way I want it!!!!!' entitled rather makes me feel as though the 'community policing' advocates are worried that GM might keep them from cheating others.
Honestly it doesn't much matter to me. I have 2 copies of the game. I will have a porter on each copy and will have my insta-travel. This is because the people who made tons of money because porting was so unbalanced. I do hope they correct that. Make druids significantly worse than clerics to counter the instant travel or why have a cleric? Make wizards significantly worse then rangers or why have a ranger?
All that the tedious mechanics will cause me to do is make sure I have a couple of classes I do not like to counter it. If it goes that way, no worries I will have pocket rezzers/draggers/porters and it will not matter that you got your way, because I will still get mine. Or maybe, if you make the game boring enough, I will thank brad for all the fun I had on Vanguard and part ways.
I will not pay some jerk for a rez or a port. Never, unless I have people waiting on me. If that is the case, it will not be a community building moment. I will not be making friends. I view the people that exploit those systems very slightly above those who exploit bugs.
alephen said:Honestly it doesn't much matter to me. I have 2 copies of the game. I will have a porter on each copy and will have my insta-travel. This is because the people who made tons of money because porting was so unbalanced. I do hope they correct that. Make druids significantly worse than clerics to counter the instant travel or why have a cleric? Make wizards significantly worse then rangers or why have a ranger?
All that the tedious mechanics will cause me to do is make sure I have a couple of classes I do not like to counter it. If it goes that way, no worries I will have pocket rezzers/draggers/porters and it will not matter that you got your way, because I will still get mine. Or maybe, if you make the game boring enough, I will thank brad for all the fun I had on Vanguard and part ways.
I will not pay some jerk for a rez or a port. Never, unless I have people waiting on me. If that is the case, it will not be a community building moment. I will not be making friends. I view the people that exploit those systems very slightly above those who exploit bugs.
My solution will be to accept that I cannot be everywhere whenever I want to. I'm confident that there will be plenty of things to do locally and nice people to do it with.
Bronsun said:This is what happens when just enough information is written down, but not enough information is there for us to grab hold of. It creates a vacuum of speculation and worry. Maybe we should let the dev's and the game they're making have its moment.
I like this idea. Let the game grow and evolve. I have faith in Pantheon and VR. There has been some great ideas posted on these forums by everyone over the years, including the forum warriors from both sides. Keep it up :-)
Kastor said:5% of the games population will take the boat because its "pretty". Then its insta port. Insta sell. Insta buffs. Insta mana regen. Insta everything woohoo!! Some of these forum threads are insanely comical. I wonder if any of the forum warriors who are fighting for everything easy mode, if they actually played EQ at launch. Or if they actually experienced a game without instantly getting everything handed to them. It doesn't divide the community (the dbags will be known), it brings the community together. And no, I dont want an EQ clone.
When it comes to playing a game where things aren't handed to us, I'll always reflect back on my experience in FFXI.
1) FFXI utilized an XP Chain feature. There were no free bonuses handed to you simply because you added another player to your group. You worked for every last bit of XP and that's why it was such a valuable resource.
2) FFXI leveraged de-leveling as part of the death penalty. If you died while having no XP buffer you would de-level.
3) FFXI had limited fast travel. If you wanted to take a ride on an airship you needed to to complete an access quest first. I think the airships ran every 15 minutes.
4) FFXI was extremely group centric. Solo viability was really limited and the best XP could only be found in a full well-rounded group.
5) Stats were incredibly important. An item with +5 accuracy / ranged accuracy, -10 defense, and -20 shadow resist was considered amazing.
6) 99% of the game was open-world. Instancing was extremely limited and mostly reserved for storyline events. The only exceptions were Dynamis and BCNM's.
7) Competition was embraced. Resources were finite and because of this, FFXI had the best economy I have ever seen in an MMO. Whether it was harvesting resources, crafted merchandise, or rare drops ... most items had incredible value that was retained for years.
8) There was no mini-map or GPS. You could acquire maps but they were pretty rare overall and never showed a blinking light for where you were, or where you were trying to go.
9) Quests were meaningful. I remember working on a quest that became available at level 40 for my paladin. It took weeks to finish this quest and required the help of several groups of players.
10) Every player had to re-level at least one sub-class in order to be fully efficient on their main character. The sub-class feature went a long way toward ensuring that all level ranges were filled with players, that each tier of the economy remained vibrant, and that ghost-zones never became a thing.
11) Reputation was incredibly important. Rather than rolling alts, players were incentivized to re-level new classes on their primary character. Very few people rolled alts and this created a really tight-knit community where players recognized each other by name regardless of what level/class someone was at any given time.
12) NPC AI was ahead of it's time. There was a range of aggro detection methods that included sight (field of vision was 60-75% degrees in front of the NPC and extended about 15 meters), sound (enemies could hear you if you move within 8 meters of them regardless of the direction they are facing), scent (enemies didn't detect you via scent but they would use it to track you. You could throw them off by jumping in water or being in an environment that is raining ... or using deodorant after turning a corner and hiding). Some NPC's could detect players who cast magic from far away ... some could detect players who were low on HP. Whether you were navigating a dungeon or above ground, the world was trying to kill you, and moving from place to place was an awesome mini-game in and of itself.
All that said ... FFXI also used regional auction houses. There were 4 regions total and there was a limit on how many items you could have for sale at any given auction house. With travel being so meaningful, I never used more than 2 auction houses at any given time. I'm sure there were players who would move goods from one AH to another for a profit. When it came to making money I tried my hand in all 3 spheres ... harvesting, crafting, and adventuring, and they were all highly profitable if you knew the lay of the land.
When I reminisce about FFXI, I can't help but remember all of the cool things that I never accomplished. That's what made that game so awesome. The developers weren't force-feeding accomplishments and achievements to the player base. They created a vast world with finite resources and let players figure things out. I am definitely in the camp that wants to avoid participation trophies and over the top convenience.
I think regional auction houses will be great for Pantheon. I also hope they take a look at the death penalty and consider axing the idea that our loot remains on our corpse. I would love to see corpse rot added as a mechanic but don't see how that's possible unless the loot-bound variable is removed. This is my personal preference. I don't want insta-everything ... I want a hardcore game, but one that is also fun and has a ton of replay value. More than anything I just want to see a return to the huge open world so I can get my William Wallace on.
oneADseven said:We need to get over this hump of player segmentation. I have almost 2,500 posts on this forum and I still feel like an outsider because I never played EQ. Imagine that!
Don't sweat those people and I don't want you to feel like an outsider.
I'll say up front that I played EQ for many years and it is my favorite game of all time (and I am playing nearly classic EQ right now on EQR), but I'm not one of those who is afraid to admit that EQ had its fair share of faults. It's a relic of an era when it was all we knew. It was an early pioneer and pretty much nobody had any idea of what things are good or bad in an MMO, because pretty much nobody even knew what an MMO was.
Brad has made it clear that he knows a lot of things that were in EQ simply did not contribue to a good game. There are things that did not add value to the experience of the game. These are things that weren't pluses to the game. They were simply "all we knew". But many here aren't even willing to listen to the comments he (Brad, the Godfather of this design) has said.
Don't fear, my man. This game will not be made to be as annoying and tedious as some vocal ones on this forum think they want it to be (boring and annoying tedium is not "difficulty" nor does it promote some great social construct as some here seem to think). That much has been made crystal clear.
Searril said:oneADseven said:We need to get over this hump of player segmentation. I have almost 2,500 posts on this forum and I still feel like an outsider because I never played EQ. Imagine that!
Don't sweat those people and I don't want you to feel like an outsider.
I'll say up front that I played EQ for many years and it is my favorite game of all time (and I am playing nearly classic EQ right now on EQR), but I'm not one of those who is afraid to admit that EQ had its fair share of faults. It's a relic of an era when it was all we knew. It was an early pioneer and pretty much nobody had any idea of what things are good or bad in an MMO, because pretty much nobody even knew what an MMO was.
Brad has made it clear that he knows a lot of things that were in EQ simply did not contribue to a good game. There are things that did not add value to the experience of the game. These are things that weren't pluses to the game. They were simply "all we knew". But many here aren't even willing to listen to the comments he (Brad, the Godfather of this design) has said.
Don't fear, my man. This game will not be made to be as annoying and tedious as some vocal ones on this forum think they want it to be (boring and annoying tedium is not "difficulty" nor does it promote some great social construct as some here seem to think). That much has been made crystal clear.
Of course EQC had problems and wasn't perfect. In my opinion, EQC's problems paled in comparison to the problems of WoW and the EQ-Live of today. Of course this won't be an EQC clone or a clone of anything, but it will update and modernize what made games at that time good. I haven't seen anyone who wants a clone here. What people want are something different from WoW and EQ-Live, while improving what was good and what did work. You mentioned that 'many here aren't willing to listen to Brad,' do you have an example of that? I haven't seen that as of yet.
Excellent answer Searril.
My total time with EQ was under an hour. After the MUDs I tried AC briefly and DAOC not at all briefly then went to EQ2. After EQ2 I tried EQ but the interface seemed so primitive in comparison. All those slash commands to memorize and few menus. Had I tried EQ first I would quite likely have stayed there for many years.
Yes I recognized from even a brief trial that EQ was a better *game* in many ways but I couldn't get past the interface.
VR seems to be aiming for an EQ/Vanguard-inspired game with many things intentionally thrown in to appeal to the nostalgia of EQ players but where they think they can do things better in 2018 than could be done in 1999 they will.
On the forums I tend to argue that things can be done better today and limitations should not be imposed on Pantheon merely because EQ had no choice but to accept them - but on the other hand I agree that where it doesn't weaken the game or risk copyright/trademark issues taking things from EQ and Vanguard is wise.
I don't know why the porting is such a point of contention. I'm in agreement with others to just let them develop their game and see how it turns out. Maybe players will need a reagent to port? If there was a tradeable commodity associated with porting would that alleviate concerns with paying someone else for a port? At the end of the day it's not just free plat for the people porting. They have to spend time that they could be using to do something else. By including a reagent that anyone can find, now you are simply trading that time, with maybe a little extra going to the player who is giving up their time to take you somewhere.
Time is money.
Syrif said:Just a thought - an interesting trend is subscriptions of WoW and EQ-Live have been declining condiserably, yet subscriptions during EQ Classic steadily increased. No clone, but improving what worked is ideal :)
Wow. Ok so I assume by eqc you mean like classic to SoV... by which you would also need to break WoW into a wow classic model... because subscriptions during wow classic - wrath of the lich king make every other mmo ever look like a miserable failure.
And also, even now the subs that wow live gets make eq1 look like a joke.
Porygon said:Syrif said:Just a thought - an interesting trend is subscriptions of WoW and EQ-Live have been declining condiserably, yet subscriptions during EQ Classic steadily increased. No clone, but improving what worked is ideal :)
Wow. Ok so I assume by eqc you mean like classic to SoV... by which you would also need to break WoW into a wow classic model... because subscriptions during wow classic - wrath of the lich king make every other mmo ever look like a miserable failure.
And also, even now the subs that wow live gets make eq1 look like a joke.
right.. but I'm not comparing amount of players 'now vs then' as you are. Computers are a dime a dozen. I am only stating the trend where subs steadily increased during EQ Classic and where subs have been significantly declining with EQ-Live and WoW. That's a fact as far as I know.
Syrif said:right.. but I'm not comparing amount of players 'now vs then' as you are. Computers are a dime a dozen. I am only stating the trend where subs steadily increased during EQ Classic and where subs have been significantly declining with EQ-Live and WoW. That's a fact as far as I know.
Plus the fact that I have yet to see information anywhere that would lead me to believe that Pantheon is striving to be anything other than a niche game for a subset of the MMO market. There are pretty lengthy posts from Brad discussing this deliberate strategy of targeted audiences vs. appealing to the masses and he used other businesses who do that as an example.
An example would be RAM trucks. Should RAM trucks make a car? Should they also make a hybrid or electric vehicle? How about motorcycles? Airplanes and busses? I mean, we're talking transportation here, right? Maybe they should try to meet the needs of everyone who needs transportation, because surely they will fail if not.
What would happen if you waked into a RAM truck dealer and asked to buy a car? They'd probably point you to the car dealership across the street, right?
Parascol said:Syrif said:right.. but I'm not comparing amount of players 'now vs then' as you are. Computers are a dime a dozen. I am only stating the trend where subs steadily increased during EQ Classic and where subs have been significantly declining with EQ-Live and WoW. That's a fact as far as I know.
Plus the fact that I have yet to see information anywhere that would lead me to believe that Pantheon is striving to be anything other than a niche game for a subset of the MMO market. There are pretty lengthy posts from Brad discussing this deliberate strategy of targeted audiences vs. appealing to the masses and he used other businesses who do that as an example.
An example would be Ram trucks. Should Ram trucks make a car? Should they also make a hybrid or electric vehicle? How about motorcycles? Airplanes and busses? I mean, we're talking transportation here, right? Maybe they should try to meet the needs of everyone who needs transportation, because surely they will fail if not.
Here is an excerpt of a lengthy post from Brad that should be considered.
"Also, as awareness grows, so also will those drawn to Pantheon be less sophisticated... what I mean by that is less aware of the game, of MMOs it draws from in the past... they may be younger.... they may be used to different gameplay, pacing, style. Yes, they may even feel entitled and think that the game should be made exactly how they would like. And no, not all of them will end up liking the game. But I absolutely believe a bunch of them will -- the gamespace has grown more than 10 fold vs the number of online gamers in 1999 (when EQ launched). That means more than the group is larger -- it means more varieties of people with differing tastes and experiences will enter this community. Please realize that this happening is essential to the success of the game. It might be tempting to just write-off or ignore or marginalize this incoming group of people (mostly younger folks, millennials). But we can't. We need to engage them, take the time to explain why you are excited about Pantheon, what makes it tick, what it's bringing back that has been missing so long from MMOs, and also the exciting new game mechanics and features that we're building up and upon the foundational MMO experience we already mostly have in place. Let them know why they are seeing what they are seeing in these twitch streams. Take the time to politely point out what makes a game like Pantheon so unique (nowadays) and fun in ways that most current MMOs aren't. There really isn't a game like Pantheon in development right now of which I'm aware. I like that. I like the idea of filling in this gap and providing a long missed experience for a large group of old school gamers who have literally felt orphaned by the less social, less community focused, less cooperative and flat-out easier MMOs of late.
But our target audience is bigger than that group. We are casting a broader net, so to speak. We are absolutely convinced that a large group of younger players will end up loving the game, assuming we can reach them, show them something that seems fun and interesting, provide answers to their questions no matter how simple or sophisticated. These people love Dark Souls, Call of Duty, the better MOBAs, the survival games -- they crave both challenge and risk and reward, but they also crave experiencing these things together with other real people. There's just something that's part of human nature where if you experience something exciting, dangerous, tension-filled, etc. and you experience that with other actual people, those events have a greater impact and create much deeper and longer lasting memories. So our challenge (the dev team and the community's) is to figure out how to reach these groups and explain to them what they're looking at, why things work the way they work, and how much FUN these games can be."
https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/blogs/151/178/how-to-get-through-to-people-who-just-don-t-get-it
That seems like a pretty robust population to draw from. I always see people saying that VR is looking to make a super niche game for a small segment of the MMO population. It seems to me that the target audience is much broader than what most people think. VR isn't just looking for people who played hardcore MMO's back in the day. They want the new wave of gamers who will appreciate this kind of game just like we did 20 years ago. It's imperative that Pantheon is designed as a game that is challenging and heavily reliant on players working together to overcome those challenges. There needs to be high replay value (which means we shouldn't be wanting to bash our face into our keyboards) and compelling risk vs reward. An EQ redux isn't going to cut it if VR is trying to hit a grand slam.
Pantheon needs to be more difficult, more fun, and less tedious. This doesn't mean that the game needs to be super convenient ... but there are tools that can be put into place to help ensure that the desired experience is more widely achieved. VR just needs to pick their poison and only follow through with systems/features/mechanics that adhere to their stated tenets and the grand vision that ties them all together. A lot of people seem to think that reskinning EQ is a part of that grand vision -- it is not. It can be used as a source for inspiration ... this is perfectly fine ... but the "EQ Way" should not be viewed as the default position every single time two parties disagree. FFXI was one hell of an MMO and I have been going out of my way for almost 2 years now to discuss some of the systems/features/mechanics that made that game special ... but every attempt is met with resilience because somehow that "magic" is foreign or unproven.
alephen said:Honestly it doesn't much matter to me. I have 2 copies of the game. I will have a porter on each copy and will have my insta-travel. This is because the people who made tons of money because porting was so unbalanced. I do hope they correct that. Make druids significantly worse than clerics to counter the instant travel or why have a cleric? Make wizards significantly worse then rangers or why have a ranger?
All that the tedious mechanics will cause me to do is make sure I have a couple of classes I do not like to counter it. If it goes that way, no worries I will have pocket rezzers/draggers/porters and it will not matter that you got your way, because I will still get mine. Or maybe, if you make the game boring enough, I will thank brad for all the fun I had on Vanguard and part ways.
I will not pay some jerk for a rez or a port. Never, unless I have people waiting on me. If that is the case, it will not be a community building moment. I will not be making friends. I view the people that exploit those systems very slightly above those who exploit bugs.
Seems fine to me; If you want to spend all that time/money leveling alts just to be able to do those things yourself more power to you. I imagine you'll end up spending more time/money in the long run than the rest of players who don't mind engaging others for their services like ports/rez etc. Personally never had a problem paying someone a small fee for use of their time to help me, even friends.