Curse

JoDiamonds · Aug 02, 2005, 09:56 PM // 21:56

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Originally Posted by monkeyink

I'm not going to go into further discussion on this because there really wouldn't be any point. There's no problem with being creative and making suggestions like this but as a programmer, I can say that these suggestions are not developer friendly AT ALL.

You are mostly right, but to be fair, brainstorming crazy ideas is a great way to start. As a game designer, the goal is rarely to just be programmer friendly. =) It's not reasonable to start off with the programming limitations, except in a very broad sense. Instead, you come up with a ton of ideas, and sort them and mix them up, and then try to pull out the best ideas that are also feasible. But that comes much later in the design process.

At least some of the things suggested are quite doable, and aren't necessarily restricted to this class, necessarily. Just for kicks, let's go over the complaints:

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First, not a single skill in the game requires two skill slots. Do you have any idea what kind of work would be involved in retooling to skill bar to accomadate that 1 dual-slotted skill?

This is, in general, a great way to balance certain skills, and a good tool to have available to designers. You complain that it would be for only one skill; what an absurd presumption. Not only will the expansion include multiple dual-slot skills, we're going to throw in some skills that take up to 3-4 slots! More than that would just be silly.

Of course, this reduces variation in builds, so we'll have to consider carefully if we want this in general. But if we do, it's not nearly so bad to extrapolate use out over time.

Also, there's tricks to get around the implementation problems sometimes, by tweaking design. It's not so hard to just empty out the slot after the slot that has the dual-slot skill. The skill still only takes one slot, but the "dual-slot" ability only takes place when moving skills around. You can only put it in slots 1-7, and it knocks out the slot after it. If you put a skill in the slot after it, it knocks out the dual-slot skill.

See, that's not so hard on the programmers. (I'm not saying it's trivial, but since we're adding dual-slot skills to all classes, it's probably worth it.)

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Second, Spirit Power is completely absurd. It's an attribute that you can put points in which will increase your "Spirit Pool", increase your energy regeneration, gives you a larger energy pool AND affects skills? Oh, yeah...that'll definately happen.

Well, ok. Balance comes during development. Certainly, anything that increases energy regeneration is like the third rail of Guild Wars game design rules. The design as given is certainly overpowered, and does show some lack of design experience, but most people overpower whatever they design the first time. They want people to use it, after all. (This isn't always a conscious thing.)

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Third, they aren't going to give a character a +75% running speed increase.

Not quite like this, but I could see it happen. It would require some enormous kind of counterbalance that's not present here.

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Fourth, they aren't going to give one class TWO primary only attributes

Yeah. That seems fairly unlikely. Worth mentioning in brainstorming, but of all things this seems most likely to be immediately discarded.

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Fifth, they aren't going to implement a points system that is only usable by one class. Why would this class use "Soul Points" and everyone else be forced to use Faction Points?

Because no one would use something like that... adrenaline? Exhaustion?

Come on, this isn't so unreasonable. It's unrefined, but a perfectly good idea. One of the best things about many role playing games of any kind is how different characters have different "resources" and limitations.

All told, little of this could be used exactly as described, I'd imagine, but lots of good ideas. The ideas that get used come out of quantity more than quality. 99% of ideas are crap in general, but that just means you need at least a hundred of them. =)

JoDiamonds · Aug 02, 2005, 10:06 PM // 22:06

Pirates can totally fit into this world. What do you think the Cathans are, anyway? ;-)

I mean, Pirates are just thieves in a boat. We can have thieves on boats!

monkeyink · Aug 03, 2005, 05:47 PM // 17:47

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Originally Posted by JoDiamonds

You are mostly right, but to be fair, brainstorming crazy ideas is a great way to start. As a game designer, the goal is rarely to just be programmer friendly.

I agree with you 100%. I should have explained myself a little better. With a game such as Guild Wars that has already been developed, tested, balanced, re-tested, there are certain constraints in the engine/design that would make certain changes/updates much more time consuming than others.

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Originally Posted by JoDiamonds

Not only will the expansion include multiple dual-slot skills, we're going to throw in some skills that take up to 3-4 slots!

I'm assuming by this comment that you have an inside scoop on things to come. That sounds awesome and I look forward to seeing multi-slot skills as I'm sure the powers they provide will be quite astounding. In my defense though, I don't have that kind of inside scoop. I was simply saying that re-tooling the skill bar for *1* skill was asking a bit much. Re-tooling the skill bar to accomodate several 2-4 slot skills for several classes is a much more reasonable request.

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Originally Posted by monkeyink

Fifth, they aren't going to implement a points system that is only usable by one class. Why would this class use "Soul Points" and everyone else be forced to use Faction Points?

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Originally Posted by JoDiamonds

Because no one would use something like that... adrenaline? Exhaustion?

Sure, make it function more like Adrenaline or Exaustion (have it expire over a certain ammount of time) and I'm all for it. Perhaps I misread but the description made no mention of Spirit Points being temporary. To me it sounded more like Faction points in that they build up over time and you are free to spend on super attacks whenever you like. The "Spirit Pool" is what got me confused I guess. It sounded like a second Energy Pool that just stays with you until one of your skills taps into it.

Thanks for the great feedback on my critique. I'm glad I got some support and some counter-points on my comments.

JoDiamonds · Aug 03, 2005, 07:47 PM // 19:47

I should be more clear: I have no inside scoop. I am completely speculating, and have no authority on What Will Come.

On the multiple slot thing, was more a prediction of what wouldhappen. You are absolutely correct that it would not get implemented for a single skill, but if they liked the idea they'd just use it for multiple skills.

But overall, I'd agree that this thread has mostly been a nice, friendly, productive discussion. =)

Snuk the Great · Aug 03, 2005, 10:45 PM // 22:45

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Originally Posted by JoDiamonds

Pirates can totally fit into this world. What do you think the Cathans are, anyway? ;-)

I mean, Pirates are just thieves in a boat. We can have thieves on boats!

Lol, I would love to some kind of battle on water system, just don't know how completely but I think it would add some extra dimension into it (maybe add fishing to or something :P). Anyway I am drifting off topic...

Krank · Aug 04, 2005, 12:35 AM // 00:35

i would love a rouge character, they were always my favorite to play in Diablo/knight online/everquest, dual wielding FTW