Curse

Nerel · Jul 16, 2009, 09:56 AM // 09:56

Seasons? now that is hardly fair, female characters in almost any fantasy RPG type game would freeze to death rather quickly.

Arduin · Jul 16, 2009, 10:25 AM // 10:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nerel

Seasons? now that is hardly fair, female characters in almost any fantasy RPG type game would freeze to death rather quickly.

I for one wouldn't mind seeing the females having a bit more flesh on their bodies.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Imaginos

Example.

Players learn that there are rumors of a sleeping Dragon in the area and that prophecy fortells it awakening soon. Elders have sent people out to find potential ways to combat this menace (perhaps a weekend event where some ruins need to be cleared in order for arcane lore to be uncovered...server works together to fight monsters, remove rubble, ferry items back to town etc..) once a specific amount of that has happened or not happened then the next segment of the "Dragon Awakens" story continues, until finally the branching paths merge back at "Dragon is Awake and Rampaging" in an event a few months later and the players must fight the monster off during a single day or a few hours in one day. Those who were on gain a flag/title of "Defender against the Terrible Lizard" or some such which can influence other things later on...

That's one thing I'm a bit edgy about. In Guild Wars, you are able to acquire virtually anything as a new player, as compared to a 4th year veteran. Stuff like Festival hats and such are excluded.

I'd hate putting hours of my time into the quest leading to the rise of the Big Bad Dragon, only to find out after I got back from a 2 weeks holiday that the Dragon has already risen, been slain, and the loot/titles are already given out. One more title I will never be able to acquire on this server, because the event 'has already come to pass'.

mazey vorstagg · Jul 16, 2009, 11:20 AM // 11:20

GW2 is already cited to contain some of the things you're talking about. It's hinted that quests will often run cyclicly, some over a week some over months. For instance, you might arrive at a village only to find that it's been overun by bandits and everything is burning. Following orders from hiding villagers you kill bandits, find their leader (with randomly generated name) , kill him, gather wood for the villagers to rebuild, protect the workers from wild animals as they hunt for materials. Eventually you end up with fully rebuilt town and everything is safe.

The quest would be built around stages where the world dynamically changes for the whole server.

So stage 1: Ruined town with bandits, only advances once bandit leader is killed
Stage 2: Ruined town but secure, only advanced once you gather enough materials (along with other players)
stage 3: completed town, reverts to a ruined town after some time (could be 2 days, a week, 2 months, whatever)

Each stage offers roughly the same amount of quests for players. This kind of quest helps everyone feel like they're getting something done and progresses story whilst not excluding players from grouping up or missing out on the story (they can come back later when the quest area resets).

englitdaudelin · Jul 16, 2009, 05:43 PM // 17:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by mazey vorstagg

GW2 is already cited to contain some of the things you're talking about. It's hinted that quests will often run cyclicly, some over a week some over months. For instance, you might arrive at a village only to find that it's been overun by bandits and everything is burning. Following orders from hiding villagers you kill bandits, find their leader (with randomly generated name) , kill him, gather wood for the villagers to rebuild, protect the workers from wild animals as they hunt for materials. Eventually you end up with fully rebuilt town and everything is safe.

The quest would be built around stages where the world dynamically changes for the whole server.

So stage 1: Ruined town with bandits, only advances once bandit leader is killed
Stage 2: Ruined town but secure, only advanced once you gather enough materials (along with other players)
stage 3: completed town, reverts to a ruined town after some time (could be 2 days, a week, 2 months, whatever)

Each stage offers roughly the same amount of quests for players. This kind of quest helps everyone feel like they're getting something done and progresses story whilst not excluding players from grouping up or missing out on the story (they can come back later when the quest area resets).

Ugh, I don't think I would want to wait for the quest area to reset. It would need to happen really quickly--and that STILL poses problems, because of the various speeds of players COMPLETING the quest. If I forget my cupcakes and speed boost skills, or bring the wrong builds, what if the event passes me by? What if I DC or get called away into real life, mid quest? I guess that would be the tradeoff that happens, especially in a persistent world; while in the instanced world, we would get our own version of the timeline (which, by the way, I prefer).

@Imaginos' post: we already kind of accept this sort of thing with a number of quests: If I've done the quests that kill the facets, in Asuran Lands, and taken the quest reward, I have, as a hero, completed that, and taken my place in the lore. But my same character can group up and re-do the quests with someone else who has them. The instancing certainly does cause these problems in the chronology, but many just accept them, in the name of gaming, or farming points, or whatever.

aapo · Jul 16, 2009, 06:16 PM // 18:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by englitdaudelin

But rather than alter the game for everyone else, I'd like to see my decisions alter the ways the game plays for me--in more ways than altering spawns or getting Brother Tosai's Aura of Corruption. I would like to see a morality, faction, fame, r eknown system that EVOLVES, based on what I do, rather than a static one that makes me a good guy (or gal) from the start.

- So why for the love of God are you playing a MMORPG? Single player games offer all what you seek custom made for the player. See http://www.spidweb.com/ if you care about games having a Storyline.

Imaginos · Jul 16, 2009, 07:20 PM // 19:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by arcanemacabre

True, unless.... Well, unless you have random timed events. Basically, have an event generator of some kind that actually affects the world in many different areas, where players can team up and take the quest, potentially fighting other teams/players to get there and 'save the world.' Whoever does it first gets the special, random item or whatever, and actually affects the world in some way, at least for a few hours or days.

if it's some sort of random event generator then you'd have events repeating themselves and not really letting someone affect the world in a permanent way. That being said I can see how devs could create some sort of long term event that had mini repeatable events that people could take part in to help make a difference.

Example:

The Nauga's are in a frenzy from all the trappers after their hides and have started swarming! protect the town of Skinz until we can find a end to this threat!

(short term repeatable goal is to defend the town at various times from hordes of naugas. long term goal is to find a way to defeat the nauga king and break up his vast army).

short term is repeatable by many players. the long term would culminate in a battle or something only doable once and the whole quest line could span real time months before the final battle.

Imaginos · Jul 16, 2009, 07:28 PM // 19:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by mazey vorstagg

GW2 is already cited to contain some of the things you're talking about. It's hinted that quests will often run cyclicly, some over a week some over months. For instance, you might arrive at a village only to find that it's been overun by bandits and everything is burning. Following orders from hiding villagers you kill bandits, find their leader (with randomly generated name) , kill him, gather wood for the villagers to rebuild, protect the workers from wild animals as they hunt for materials. Eventually you end up with fully rebuilt town and everything is safe.

The quest would be built around stages where the world dynamically changes for the whole server.

So stage 1: Ruined town with bandits, only advances once bandit leader is killed
Stage 2: Ruined town but secure, only advanced once you gather enough materials (along with other players)
stage 3: completed town, reverts to a ruined town after some time (could be 2 days, a week, 2 months, whatever)

Each stage offers roughly the same amount of quests for players. This kind of quest helps everyone feel like they're getting something done and progresses story whilst not excluding players from grouping up or missing out on the story (they can come back later when the quest area resets).

the only problem with cyclic event like that is after the second or third time that said town is "destroyed by bandits" you'd say to yourself "screw them I'm not helping out yet again" and you'd feel that you've made zero impact on the world if they're just going to be destroyed / attacked again.

In horizions when we were cleaning the elvin homelands it wasn't like in two months they reverted back to overtaken. Once they were cleaned they were cleaned. The horizons team failed in that they did not continue with that story line and left the elvin lands only half cleaned/rebuilt and then just went on to other stories that they also never finished following through on.

what good is cleansing the elvin homelands of great evil if the elves never come back? if the houses and stores don't get rebuilt or the players are not allowed to rebuild them all? when months later its still in a half assed finished state with nothing going on? why do all that work for nothing?..and I'm not talking loot but that sense of accomplishment you'd have gotten if you had really fixed up the area.

"I helped to restore the elvin homelands and all I got was this lousy t-shirt"

Imaginos · Jul 16, 2009, 07:34 PM // 19:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by englitdaudelin

Ugh, I don't think I would want to wait for the quest area to reset. It would need to happen really quickly--and that STILL poses problems, because of the various speeds of players COMPLETING the quest. If I forget my cupcakes and speed boost skills, or bring the wrong builds, what if the event passes me by? What if I DC or get called away into real life, mid quest? I guess that would be the tradeoff that happens, especially in a persistent world; while in the instanced world, we would get our own version of the timeline (which, by the way, I prefer).

@Imaginos' post: we already kind of accept this sort of thing with a number of quests: If I've done the quests that kill the facets, in Asuran Lands, and taken the quest reward, I have, as a hero, completed that, and taken my place in the lore. But my same character can group up and re-do the quests with someone else who has them. The instancing certainly does cause these problems in the chronology, but many just accept them, in the name of gaming, or farming points, or whatever.

I agree we already do but obviously people are not satisfied with that kind of thing ^_^ and we are talking about what is "something new" here

I don't think it would be a problem if people missed out on specific quests as long as there was something always going on somewhere that people could join in on, also if there were things of different lengths then that would help too.

As long as players can reap the benefits of what someone else has done in a grander scale of things (playing a new race that was unlocked because said quest was done etc..) then I think people would be ok with having missed a final event. When I joined Horizions there were events that had happened that I missed also that changed some of the world. I just jumped into the next one that happened as much as I could.

Perhaps passing out titles would not be the way to go but perhaps some invisible flag on the character so if they entered said village/town/city people would say "hey you were part of the adventures that came to save us from the dragon, thanks!....here have a discount on my goods."