Going back and actually reading that EQNexus article, I noticed a few things that make the original cherry-picked bullet points seem not as bad:
You can still play specific roles within combat, and some classes can be built to tend toward support, defensive, etc.
Players perform roles in combat and customize their abilities to trend their class towards things like tank or support, but you will not build a class that ONLY has tank abilities and have that as a required tank class for every group.
Utility classes will be rewarded for their efforts.
This is a good bit better, but it doesn't completely square with "raids do not require specific classes or roles". If you don't need a tank, then there's no point in tank abilities existing, and so on.
I disagree. I like playing tanky characters. May not deal maximum damage but take a licking and keep on ticking. There will be more do to then raids.
I don't understand why anyone would want that. I have good memories of playing that game because at the time it was good, but games have evolved a lot since and there is no way I could go back to that gameplay. I tried too.
Combat was so bad, My dad used to two box and he could just leave his warrior on auto and get up and leave for minutes and come back and throw a heal or two and win. Getting a group together would take as much time or more as actually doing anything. I like what I've heard from EQ Next.
A lot of EQ is just dated by modern MMO standards. EQ was groundbreaking in so many ways for its time, and I'm glad the devs are not afraid to try to push the MMO genre forward again. I'm tired of seeing copycat MMOs released every year, and I'm tired of the on-rails MMO experience.
I actually like the model guild wars 1 eventually set. You can single player around this major world, but eventually you're going to partner with groups to get smarter and more efficient, plus other people are fun to talk to.
I liked dungeon finder in WoW, but it was also the most soulless introduction to an MMO ever. You're FORCED to party with other people you not only don't care about, but dislike, because of the trinity model.
I just hope the combat and classes don't end up feeling like GW2. Because that had to be one of the least fun MMORPGs I have ever played. It was just incredibly shallow. And right now what they are describing is almost word for word how I would describe GW2 so that makes me nervous. For now my enthusiasm has dropped dramatically, but who knows how the game will turn out.
I always liked stuff like City of Heroes. It had classes designed for specific roles, and in general grouping they were helpful to have a mixture of but not really mandatory. Or going back further Asheron's Call which didn't have classes at all, crowd control consisted of standing in a hallway so enemies couldn't get past. Also didn't really have any mandatory requirements for specific group quests.
Basically the concept of the Holy Trinity being necessary to make a fun and functional RPG, is not accurate and detrimental to the genre if everyone does it because everyone else does it. I am glad EQN is not doing it.
I am totally willing to buy that you can have interesting combat dynamics with focused teamplay without a Holy Trinity setup. However, seeing as there don't seem to be any particularly compelling examples of this, and in fact are a number of glaring counterexamples (such as GW2), I would really expect the developers to provide a "here is how our dungeons / raids / group encounters don't suck" as soon as possible.
Tank / Healer / DPS evolved out of previous combat systems because it greatly facilitates the design of interesting encounters. It's not just some random idea that happens to be in vogue.
Watched the video, I'm impressed and actually excited about an MMO for once.
-Voxel components means more impressive magic (you could see the ice wall spell shatter into voxel) and attacks in more interactive environments than we've seen to date.
-Procedurally based AI MMO is another chance to deliver on the world even Bethesda and Radiant AI haven't been able to fully realize in single player titles.
-I would love to play in a world where you can't just look everything up on the Internet and execute a script to accomplish it due to the changing world.
The concern I would have is with so little rules players could just quickly get a lot of mine picks or tunnel spells or whatever and go directly to the hot loot level and take over, or completely genocide or lock down a creature type. Or grief and control resources. Remember Star Wars Galaxies and mayors building towns right on top of the Krayt dragon hunting grounds and declaring it a PVP zone? I don't mind if this stuff occurs per se because it would make things damn interesting but there needs to be some kind of release valve built into the system.
Did they say anything about how race factions are going to work in the video or anywhere else? I skipped the first 20 minutes of sand painting and what not so it might be there but I'm not brave enough to go back.
I don't know if it was here or elsewhere that someone acted incredulous that EQN can pull of its AI tricks in an MMO format when not even singleplayer games have ever really been able to practically employ some of the things they're reaching for (The failed promise of Radiant AI keeps coming up), but if you think about it for a moment this is actually something you might wholly expect to emerge first in an MMO space.
In a client-server environment you have a big MMO server farm acting as a cloud computing center to handle thousands of AI calculations for all the orcs and dragons and whatever in the game, which is something that simply could not happen on the same level if all that AI was crunching locally on your system. It seems to be the case that technology has far outstripped the ambition of designers in regards to what passes for MMORPG AI, which has not really become any more intelligent in the past 15 years-- your average monster in Rift or TERA or GW2 or any other modernish MMORPG is just as stupid and predictable as a Crushbone Orc.
So maybe there's a lot of processing power overhead that can be leveraged for a more complex approach to AI, and it isn't as pie in the sky as it all sounds.
Didn't someone mention that they think this AI system was designed by someone else and SOE is just licensing it? I think it had something to do with Kickstarter. Anyone got a link? I'd like to learn more about that.
To be clear, I know that that it not financially viable to make EQ Next into what EQ2 should have been, but I'd certainly play it. The combat I've seen in EQ Next vids so far just seems so overdone. We'll see what happens. I signed up for beta.
The radiant AI comparisons don't fly with me because from what I've heard this is way more macro than that. We're not talking one individual living their life. We are talking a tribe of orcs having a rather simple set of rules to go by that makes then dynamic and responsive. It's less radiant AI and more original xcom escalating war from 1990.
I'm an Orc commander, my camp has been destroyed so now my tribe is more nomadic wondering around sticking to areas that player population is low. I send out settlers to try to start a new camp. If they aren't killed it grows. Then I can send out more and send supply runs to them, if nobody interferes I prosper. If players from an area keep messing with me maybe I send a raiding party into that area.
That sounds badass as an mmo and that's exactly how xcom AI played 20 years ago.
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AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
Didn't someone mention that they think this AI system was designed by someone else and SOE is just licensing it? I think it had something to do with Kickstarter. Anyone got a link? I'd like to learn more about that.
edit- Currently the Storybricks guys have a sort of proto-game (as shown in the video) to show off how everything works. It is a bit like RPG Maker, but still in early alpha. The actual AI system is fully developed.
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That's kinda the point though Disruptor: None of these individual elements are highly original, but the sum of their parts has never been done in an MMO format before. I give Sony a lot of credit here for going out of the mold, and even taking a chance on a Kickstarter project tech, etc.
The radiant AI comparisons don't fly with me because from what I've heard this is way more macro than that. We're not talking one individual living their life. We are talking a tribe of orcs having a rather simple set of rules to go by that makes then dynamic and responsive. It's less radiant AI and more original xcom escalating war from 1990.
I'm an Orc commander, my camp has been destroyed so now my tribe is more nomadic wondering around sticking to areas that player population is low. I send out settlers to try to start a new camp. If they aren't killed it grows. Then I can send out more and send supply runs to them, if nobody interferes I prosper. If players from an area keep messing with me maybe I send a raiding party into that area.
That sounds badass as an mmo and that's exactly how xcom AI played 20 years ago.
It's like how some people just forget about a certain zone/area right?
Except in this game, when you forget about it. That commander/chieftan grows in power. Soon the orcish horde has taken over almost the entire zone, deforested the trees and hewn the rock. Not the exact quote, but this sounds appropriate. "The fires of Isengard will spread. And the woods of Tuckborough and Buckland will burn. And all that was once green and good in this world will be gone. There won't be a Shire, Pippin."
That's kinda the point though Disruptor: None of these individual elements are highly original, but the sum of their parts has never been done in an MMO format before. I give Sony a lot of credit here for going out of the mold, and even taking a chance on a Kickstarter project tech, etc.
My point wasn't to Downplay the concept it was in response to the "if Bethesda couldn't do it in a single player game how can they in an mmo." And my point is we aren't looking at anything as ambitious as radiant AI. What they want to do is awesome but not that crazy
Didn't someone mention that they think this AI system was designed by someone else and SOE is just licensing it? I think it had something to do with Kickstarter. Anyone got a link? I'd like to learn more about that.
edit- Currently the Storybricks guys have a sort of proto-game (as shown in the video) to show off how everything works. It is a bit like RPG Maker, but still in early alpha. The actual AI system is fully developed.
Thanks for the links! From what I've seen of this so far, this is way more in-depth than I thought it was going to be, especially for an MMO. If they can use this AI engine for combat, that would be impressive as well.
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SpectrumArcher of InfernoChaldea Rec RoomRegistered Userregular
The radiant AI comparisons don't fly with me because from what I've heard this is way more macro than that. We're not talking one individual living their life. We are talking a tribe of orcs having a rather simple set of rules to go by that makes then dynamic and responsive. It's less radiant AI and more original xcom escalating war from 1990.
I'm an Orc commander, my camp has been destroyed so now my tribe is more nomadic wondering around sticking to areas that player population is low. I send out settlers to try to start a new camp. If they aren't killed it grows. Then I can send out more and send supply runs to them, if nobody interferes I prosper. If players from an area keep messing with me maybe I send a raiding party into that area.
That sounds badass as an mmo and that's exactly how xcom AI played 20 years ago.
It's like how some people just forget about a certain zone/area right?
Except in this game, when you forget about it. That commander/chieftan grows in power. Soon the orcish horde has taken over almost the entire zone, deforested the trees and hewn the rock. Not the exact quote, but this sounds appropriate. "The fires of Isengard will spread. And the woods of Tuckborough and Buckland will burn. And all that was once green and good in this world will be gone. There won't be a Shire, Pippin."
Yes, give me that.
Look man, no one went into Mistmoore for a reason. Stupid out of the way zone.
Man, I loved grouping in Mistmoore at the front of the zone. Every time someone went into the castle, we all prepared to run out of the zone because we knew a train would be coming soon.
I hope they can encrypt the data files or something. I can't imagine something like Kedge Keep going unfound for 9 months like it did when EQ came out.
Is anyone concerned about Class-Convergence based on the skill system they described?
In as much as distinct "classes" seem to have 'cookie cutter builds', it feels like more customizable systems have even fewer choices.
"He piled upon the whale's white hump the sum of all the general rage and hate felt by his whole race from Adam down; and then, as if his chest had been a mortar, he burst his hot heart's shell upon it." -Moby Dick
Is anyone concerned about Class-Convergence based on the skill system they described?
In as much as distinct "classes" seem to have 'cookie cutter builds', it feels like more customizable systems have even fewer choices.
I'm not really "concerned" about anything at this point. We don't know enough about anything and things can always change, right now they are promoting the game and generating hype. We'll see what actually shakes out in the months/years to come.
But in this particular instance no, I like the system they described.
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AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
Is anyone concerned about Class-Convergence based on the skill system they described?
In as much as distinct "classes" seem to have 'cookie cutter builds', it feels like more customizable systems have even fewer choices.
To be honest, their system sounds (to me at any rate) very similar to say FFXI or maybe more accurately FFXIV (which actually does allow you to mix and match certain skills from other classes).
Which is only a good thing IMO.
A Capellan's favorite sheath for any blade is your back.
Having 4 bars of buttons is bad, but I'm concerned only having 4-8 buttons or whatever is too few. Sure, in most MMOs you rely on a core set of 4-8 buttons, but there were always a few situational abilities that were nice to use as well. I feel this may hamper encounter design or make stuff feel too spammy.
Having 4 bars of buttons is bad, but I'm concerned only having 4-8 buttons or whatever is too few. Sure, in most MMOs you rely on a core set of 4-8 buttons, but there were always a few situational abilities that were nice to use as well. I feel this may hamper encounter design or make stuff feel too spammy.
Well you can change out of combat, so you will still have your situational abilities you can switch to for certain fights, however you need to know the situation in advance. But that really only would matter for group/raid content, which you usually have someone in the group who knows what the hell is going on, I would hope. For solo content(or even small groups) how often do you ever need those situational skills in other MMOs? Pretty damned rarely or never.
From what I've been reading, the class/skill system seems to be a mash-up of GW2 and Secret World. It sounds like each class will have skills associated by weapon type (like GW2) and that we will be able to mix and match skills for a given weapon type from each class. Does that sound about right?
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The PC Gamer article mentioned players having access to 4 weapon skills and 4 class skills on their bar, I assume the class skills are not dependent on any weapon type. Like certain mage skills you could use even if you were using a battle axe. Also each class would have two weapons each, but no word on how many classes will have skills for each weapon or even how many weapon types the game has.
4-8 buttons is probably so it translates well to ps4. Which I'm pumped about since I hate PC gaming and I want to be all up in this game
I hear the PS3 interface for XIV is decent, and that's 16 buttons.
PS3 interface in FFXIV is smart because it uses the shoulder buttons to bring up other buttons. so you'll have ability 1-4 on your bar and 5-8 on your bar and when you use the bumper ability 9-12 will come up and the other bumper gives you 13-16
It's very smooth
NNID: delphinidaes Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
From what I've been reading, the class/skill system seems to be a mash-up of GW2 and Secret World. It sounds like each class will have skills associated by weapon type (like GW2) and that we will be able to mix and match skills for a given weapon type from each class. Does that sound about right?
My theory is that they're going to borrow from the original Star Wars Galaxies (pre- patch that changed everything) model. It really had no 'real' levels either, you used skills and leveled them up by using your weapon and you could mix and match your classes, but had a limited number of skills you could learn at one time. However add a bunch of polish to it to make it more interesting.
That's kinda the point though Disruptor: None of these individual elements are highly original, but the sum of their parts has never been done in an MMO format before. I give Sony a lot of credit here for going out of the mold, and even taking a chance on a Kickstarter project tech, etc.
My point wasn't to Downplay the concept it was in response to the "if Bethesda couldn't do it in a single player game how can they in an mmo." And my point is we aren't looking at anything as ambitious as radiant AI. What they want to do is awesome but not that crazy
Not trying to put you on the spot or call that view out as wrong, but how do you differentiate Storybricks from Radiant exactly? I mean I'm really hazy on the details of Radiant since that hype storm so long ago, but I thought at the most basic level of both it's just the promise that devs can throw all these things into a box and content will be produced for everyone on some level right? Like the old game of Life coding simulations, but with dragons. I want to believe but I can just see a lot of problems between A and B developing.
The main one being not enough work put in by devs to simulate enough of the possible behaviors of a living being, or things like shorcuts found by players to farm all the loot producing beings in a small concentration camp box somewhere once they figure out how to attract them with the right AI bait etc.
Things like this that cause sandbox/game to just become sandbox with no game elements at all in other words.
I guess its just the level of the promise. As cool as their stuff sounds, it sounds attainable. Radiant AI was a lot bigger hype. Not just dynamic quests based on NPC response. But like, living breathing AI with entire realistic daily routines based on their desires. This seems more like just specific evolving quests and responses based on said desires and pretty hand scripted binary branches. Another difference is we know a lot more about how storybricks works based on some in depth videos from the devs since they were trying to get it kickstarted. The expectations are lower cause I see what it is, and it doesn't seem like anything too amazing.
I've no idea how to interpret this on the EU beta reg page: "Are you a registered user? In that case you do not need to register." Does that mean all Station accounts are applied by default?
I don't understand how this game is "Everquest" in any form. It still looks really good though and I'm more interested in this than I would have been in an EQ3.
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I disagree. I like playing tanky characters. May not deal maximum damage but take a licking and keep on ticking. There will be more do to then raids.
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Combat was so bad, My dad used to two box and he could just leave his warrior on auto and get up and leave for minutes and come back and throw a heal or two and win. Getting a group together would take as much time or more as actually doing anything. I like what I've heard from EQ Next.
The game you want is a game that nobody wants to actually make.
Investing millions of dollars in EverQuest HD is financial suicide.
I liked dungeon finder in WoW, but it was also the most soulless introduction to an MMO ever. You're FORCED to party with other people you not only don't care about, but dislike, because of the trinity model.
Basically the concept of the Holy Trinity being necessary to make a fun and functional RPG, is not accurate and detrimental to the genre if everyone does it because everyone else does it. I am glad EQN is not doing it.
Tank / Healer / DPS evolved out of previous combat systems because it greatly facilitates the design of interesting encounters. It's not just some random idea that happens to be in vogue.
I feel like if they nail the sandbox aspect real well it'll overshadow any possible problems the combat could provide.
I mean I hope the combat will be good but I'm willing to put up with a lot of shit if it can give me a really good sandbox game
-Voxel components means more impressive magic (you could see the ice wall spell shatter into voxel) and attacks in more interactive environments than we've seen to date.
-Procedurally based AI MMO is another chance to deliver on the world even Bethesda and Radiant AI haven't been able to fully realize in single player titles.
-I would love to play in a world where you can't just look everything up on the Internet and execute a script to accomplish it due to the changing world.
The concern I would have is with so little rules players could just quickly get a lot of mine picks or tunnel spells or whatever and go directly to the hot loot level and take over, or completely genocide or lock down a creature type. Or grief and control resources. Remember Star Wars Galaxies and mayors building towns right on top of the Krayt dragon hunting grounds and declaring it a PVP zone? I don't mind if this stuff occurs per se because it would make things damn interesting but there needs to be some kind of release valve built into the system.
Did they say anything about how race factions are going to work in the video or anywhere else? I skipped the first 20 minutes of sand painting and what not so it might be there but I'm not brave enough to go back.
In a client-server environment you have a big MMO server farm acting as a cloud computing center to handle thousands of AI calculations for all the orcs and dragons and whatever in the game, which is something that simply could not happen on the same level if all that AI was crunching locally on your system. It seems to be the case that technology has far outstripped the ambition of designers in regards to what passes for MMORPG AI, which has not really become any more intelligent in the past 15 years-- your average monster in Rift or TERA or GW2 or any other modernish MMORPG is just as stupid and predictable as a Crushbone Orc.
So maybe there's a lot of processing power overhead that can be leveraged for a more complex approach to AI, and it isn't as pie in the sky as it all sounds.
To be clear, I know that that it not financially viable to make EQ Next into what EQ2 should have been, but I'd certainly play it. The combat I've seen in EQ Next vids so far just seems so overdone. We'll see what happens. I signed up for beta.
I'm an Orc commander, my camp has been destroyed so now my tribe is more nomadic wondering around sticking to areas that player population is low. I send out settlers to try to start a new camp. If they aren't killed it grows. Then I can send out more and send supply runs to them, if nobody interferes I prosper. If players from an area keep messing with me maybe I send a raiding party into that area.
That sounds badass as an mmo and that's exactly how xcom AI played 20 years ago.
Indeed, that was me.
Here is an article on the SOE and Stortbricks (the AI system) partnership.
This is a Storybricks Dev blog article... thing.
edit- Currently the Storybricks guys have a sort of proto-game (as shown in the video) to show off how everything works. It is a bit like RPG Maker, but still in early alpha. The actual AI system is fully developed.
It's like how some people just forget about a certain zone/area right?
Except in this game, when you forget about it. That commander/chieftan grows in power. Soon the orcish horde has taken over almost the entire zone, deforested the trees and hewn the rock. Not the exact quote, but this sounds appropriate. "The fires of Isengard will spread. And the woods of Tuckborough and Buckland will burn. And all that was once green and good in this world will be gone. There won't be a Shire, Pippin."
Yes, give me that.
Thanks for the links! From what I've seen of this so far, this is way more in-depth than I thought it was going to be, especially for an MMO. If they can use this AI engine for combat, that would be impressive as well.
In as much as distinct "classes" seem to have 'cookie cutter builds', it feels like more customizable systems have even fewer choices.
I'm not really "concerned" about anything at this point. We don't know enough about anything and things can always change, right now they are promoting the game and generating hype. We'll see what actually shakes out in the months/years to come.
But in this particular instance no, I like the system they described.
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To be honest, their system sounds (to me at any rate) very similar to say FFXI or maybe more accurately FFXIV (which actually does allow you to mix and match certain skills from other classes).
Which is only a good thing IMO.
Well you can change out of combat, so you will still have your situational abilities you can switch to for certain fights, however you need to know the situation in advance. But that really only would matter for group/raid content, which you usually have someone in the group who knows what the hell is going on, I would hope. For solo content(or even small groups) how often do you ever need those situational skills in other MMOs? Pretty damned rarely or never.
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I hear the PS3 interface for XIV is decent, and that's 16 buttons.
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PS3 interface in FFXIV is smart because it uses the shoulder buttons to bring up other buttons. so you'll have ability 1-4 on your bar and 5-8 on your bar and when you use the bumper ability 9-12 will come up and the other bumper gives you 13-16
It's very smooth
Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
My theory is that they're going to borrow from the original Star Wars Galaxies (pre- patch that changed everything) model. It really had no 'real' levels either, you used skills and leveled them up by using your weapon and you could mix and match your classes, but had a limited number of skills you could learn at one time. However add a bunch of polish to it to make it more interesting.
Not trying to put you on the spot or call that view out as wrong, but how do you differentiate Storybricks from Radiant exactly? I mean I'm really hazy on the details of Radiant since that hype storm so long ago, but I thought at the most basic level of both it's just the promise that devs can throw all these things into a box and content will be produced for everyone on some level right? Like the old game of Life coding simulations, but with dragons. I want to believe but I can just see a lot of problems between A and B developing.
The main one being not enough work put in by devs to simulate enough of the possible behaviors of a living being, or things like shorcuts found by players to farm all the loot producing beings in a small concentration camp box somewhere once they figure out how to attract them with the right AI bait etc.
Things like this that cause sandbox/game to just become sandbox with no game elements at all in other words.
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