Safe to say endgame PvE isn't going to be very tuned, then? Especially for healers.
Yup.
It'll sure be interesting.
I was thinking about this, and it actually has the potential to be just the opposite.
We are assuming that since HoTs, DoTs and things that proc wont have icons and numbers showing when they happen/expire, then endgame can't be tuned well.
Well... why not? Why can't it simply be more difficult because that info is missing? A good healer will manage to keep HoTs up efficiently without buff icons and timer mods, while a bad healer will just be bad unless they learn to do the same.
On the other hand, anyone wanting hard endgame raiding in a new MMO should probably be ready for Wildstar and not even care about ESO at all.
So, I was thinking about this... I'm not looking for some kind of screaming match, and I hope we can just talk about stuff, without getting all "NO, FUCK YOU!"
If you strip out basic information, and rely on "tells", you do (by default) ramp up the difficulty. I agree there. Simply because it's not about watching pictographs flashing to tell you when to press buttons, it's going to be a little more difficult.
Take Monster Hunter for an example. It doesn't tell you when the poisons drop off. There's no flashing icons for when the shock trap is about to end. You have to watch for tells, learn about timing, and generally hold onto the seat of your pants. But, lots of people (lots) don't like the MH system. They can't even parse it, and call the game maddeningly difficult. Lots of people don't have the kind of reaction time, situational awareness, and observational skills to make those systems work. The population of your average MMO just isn't that kind of player. They're playing pretty princess dress up and being enamored with particle effects (neither of these things are bad, nor exclusive with any other group of players).
So you've got to dumb that shit down. You've got the make the encounters doable by even the most unskilled of player, lest you make the game "too difficult" because they are "paying for it!"
The following assertion is an educated assumption. Based on literal decades of MMO playing, thousands of hours playing video games with people, and a general interest in how games work (thus a great deal of research).
Without the UI information, even if the encounters are designed to be challenging, they will be nerfed. People will complain, and unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty (which I would admire), it won't matter if your healer is good or not. You couldn't lose, unless you try. They can't have it be difficult because of the lack of information. Even if it was billed as that kind of game, you and I both know people are treating ESO as something it's not, that shit won't stand.
Now, this doesn't apply to ESO's true endgame, the RvR system. In there... A good healer will count. A tank who can read tells and has those observational skills will probably be a hero. I just don't think they'll be able to pull that off in the PvE end game. Sure, there will be a few things which require top notch skill, but by and large... It won't matter how "good" you are, because the bar will be set so low. Remember, for every player who's playing for the RvR, there's three playing for the PvE.
I fully disagree that they should be removing this informational stuff. While it won't effect me in any way, because I can read tells and have quick reaction time... I know many people who will suffer from this. When I play MMO's with my wife, I often have to resort to pointing out the buff/debuff icons on the various UI elements. She's just not a person who's watching for tells or can identify graphical markers as quickly as I can. In ESO, she'd fall into the "unskilled" group of players, and generally be a burden to a group trying to perform "well". I also disagree that it increases any kind of "skill". It simply removes a path of understanding, it doesn't make those who can already read those elements, any better at it. It will just create a gulf between those who "can" and those who "can not". It will be a frustrating experience for those who need that direct information, they'll be dying and underperforming, needlessly.
Those who needed more direct information are fucked, and too bad that's the way you parse data.
Will this cause a certain percentage of those players to get better? Probably. We are adaptable creatures, and lots of people will learn the new system and be fine. That said, I disagree on the difficulty point. If anything, I think PvE encounters will be easier for a long while, until the population at large doesn't need timers/icons/counters to understand how to play their character. Players have been trained to look for that data during big encounters, it's going to take more than a few months at the end game for them to be broken from that. What would happen if you have thousands of players frustrated and failing at the end game PvE because they're folks who need direct information to understand an encounter?
Not good things for Zenimax's bottom line.
But, I don't know. I could be totally wrong and they don't give a fuck about that mass of players. They could be totally alright with an "Adapt or Die" mentality, and not be looking for a billion subscriptions. Maybe they're just making the game they want, and don't care if you can't parse it.
There will still be Youtube videos on how to beat bosses. Limiting the API/mods doesn't change that.
Even with WoW mods, as crazy as they were about telling you exactly what to do, raids still failed encounters. When I played WoW it took my guild at least two dozen attempts to beat Yogg-Saron, but after we did, we failed less and less, and eventually it was old hat. The difficulty of the encounter never changed, we just kept trying.
Safe to say endgame PvE isn't going to be very tuned, then? Especially for healers.
Yup.
It'll sure be interesting.
I was thinking about this, and it actually has the potential to be just the opposite.
We are assuming that since HoTs, DoTs and things that proc wont have icons and numbers showing when they happen/expire, then endgame can't be tuned well.
Well... why not? Why can't it simply be more difficult because that info is missing? A good healer will manage to keep HoTs up efficiently without buff icons and timer mods, while a bad healer will just be bad unless they learn to do the same.
On the other hand, anyone wanting hard endgame raiding in a new MMO should probably be ready for Wildstar and not even care about ESO at all.
Valid points
But, I don't know. I could be totally wrong and they don't give a fuck about that mass of players. They could be totally alright with an "Adapt or Die" mentality, and not be looking for a billion subscriptions. Maybe they're just making the game they want, and don't care if you can't parse it.
That'd be pretty cool.
You raise a lot of valid points, and I agree with your last statement that I hope they are just making the game they want. Normally I am all about accessibility for games, particularly in the MMO genre, but when you are trying to step out of the general MMO mold in some fashion (combat in this case) I also feel you need to either go big or go home. Wildstar is taking a more half-hearted approach (Similarly to GW2) which I feel will be detrimental to the game overall (even though it will certainly be more accessible) so I am hopeful that ESO will take a more hardened approach and as you say, make the game they want to make.
If it is done well, and the design works with their vision I believe the playerbase will come and adapt. It may not get the numbers initially as other games, but if the game is quality enough, the players will come.
Personally I don't know anything about the elder game of this game, having only played the very beginning content, so I'm content to wait and see what actually happens and how the content is designed before I make any assumption about it.
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I'm just saying they don't have to dumb down encounters due to having less information available directly to the player(s).
You're right. They don't have to.
My point is, I think they will. I think that by alienating (even temporarily) a portion of your players because they don't know how to parse what's going on... They will have to lower the difficulty. If not, they will further alienate those players... To the detriment of the MMO part of the game.
If they don't (and maintain difficulty), that will be both impressive and remarkable. I do not doubt that they will hold their ground, but I also won't be surprised when they nerf encounters because: "I CAN'T TELL WHEN MY TANK IS ON FIRE AND I BLEW ALL MY MANA TRYING TO HEAL HIM SO WE WIPED AND THAT HAPPENS EVERY TIME SO MAKE THIS EASIER."
Zenimax has already said, a few times now, that they're designing the game knowing full well it's for a more "niche" market.
Does this mean they won't change things to make the "not as skilled" players happy? Not necessarily, but so far they've stood by their statements on the overall goals of the game. It's very possible that they're underestimating just how big a group of people they may be alienating by not changing this stance, but on the other hand, based on what people have said from the PTS, it sounds like they ARE catering to a degree:
Content up to 50 is fairly trivial. Even content through the VR ranks isn't particularly difficult though it does ramp it up considerably. MOST players will be able to play through their zones and experience the main ESO story. However, the adventure zones and VR dungeons (Endgame PVE group content) are meant to be much harder and for the person that wants that difficulty. So there's an awful lot of content for people who want to play the game casually and then there's also plenty of additional content at cap for the people who want to go through difficult encounters.
This isn't really different than other MMOs. There's basically "endgame" for casual players and then there's additional harder content for the more "hardcore". Currently there is almost no information out there about the harder content as most PTS players seemed to have ignored the VR dungeons and the first adventure zone won't be released till sometime shortly after launch. But up until that point, even people who aren't particularly "skilled" can get through content.
Safe to say endgame PvE isn't going to be very tuned, then? Especially for healers.
Yup.
It'll sure be interesting.
I was thinking about this, and it actually has the potential to be just the opposite.
We are assuming that since HoTs, DoTs and things that proc wont have icons and numbers showing when they happen/expire, then endgame can't be tuned well.
Well... why not? Why can't it simply be more difficult because that info is missing? A good healer will manage to keep HoTs up efficiently without buff icons and timer mods, while a bad healer will just be bad unless they learn to do the same.
On the other hand, anyone wanting hard endgame raiding in a new MMO should probably be ready for Wildstar and not even care about ESO at all.
So, I was thinking about this... I'm not looking for some kind of screaming match, and I hope we can just talk about stuff, without getting all "NO, FUCK YOU!"
If you strip out basic information, and rely on "tells", you do (by default) ramp up the difficulty. I agree there. Simply because it's not about watching pictographs flashing to tell you when to press buttons, it's going to be a little more difficult.
Take Monster Hunter for an example. It doesn't tell you when the poisons drop off. There's no flashing icons for when the shock trap is about to end. You have to watch for tells, learn about timing, and generally hold onto the seat of your pants. But, lots of people (lots) don't like the MH system. They can't even parse it, and call the game maddeningly difficult. Lots of people don't have the kind of reaction time, situational awareness, and observational skills to make those systems work. The population of your average MMO just isn't that kind of player. They're playing pretty princess dress up and being enamored with particle effects (neither of these things are bad, nor exclusive with any other group of players).
So you've got to dumb that shit down. You've got the make the encounters doable by even the most unskilled of player, lest you make the game "too difficult" because they are "paying for it!"
The following assertion is an educated assumption. Based on literal decades of MMO playing, thousands of hours playing video games with people, and a general interest in how games work (thus a great deal of research).
Without the UI information, even if the encounters are designed to be challenging, they will be nerfed. People will complain, and unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty (which I would admire), it won't matter if your healer is good or not. You couldn't lose, unless you try. They can't have it be difficult because of the lack of information. Even if it was billed as that kind of game, you and I both know people are treating ESO as something it's not, that shit won't stand.
Now, this doesn't apply to ESO's true endgame, the RvR system. In there... A good healer will count. A tank who can read tells and has those observational skills will probably be a hero. I just don't think they'll be able to pull that off in the PvE end game. Sure, there will be a few things which require top notch skill, but by and large... It won't matter how "good" you are, because the bar will be set so low. Remember, for every player who's playing for the RvR, there's three playing for the PvE.
I fully disagree that they should be removing this informational stuff. While it won't effect me in any way, because I can read tells and have quick reaction time... I know many people who will suffer from this. When I play MMO's with my wife, I often have to resort to pointing out the buff/debuff icons on the various UI elements. She's just not a person who's watching for tells or can identify graphical markers as quickly as I can. In ESO, she'd fall into the "unskilled" group of players, and generally be a burden to a group trying to perform "well". I also disagree that it increases any kind of "skill". It simply removes a path of understanding, it doesn't make those who can already read those elements, any better at it. It will just create a gulf between those who "can" and those who "can not". It will be a frustrating experience for those who need that direct information, they'll be dying and underperforming, needlessly.
Those who needed more direct information are fucked, and too bad that's the way you parse data.
Will this cause a certain percentage of those players to get better? Probably. We are adaptable creatures, and lots of people will learn the new system and be fine. That said, I disagree on the difficulty point. If anything, I think PvE encounters will be easier for a long while, until the population at large doesn't need timers/icons/counters to understand how to play their character. Players have been trained to look for that data during big encounters, it's going to take more than a few months at the end game for them to be broken from that. What would happen if you have thousands of players frustrated and failing at the end game PvE because they're folks who need direct information to understand an encounter?
Not good things for Zenimax's bottom line.
But, I don't know. I could be totally wrong and they don't give a fuck about that mass of players. They could be totally alright with an "Adapt or Die" mentality, and not be looking for a billion subscriptions. Maybe they're just making the game they want, and don't care if you can't parse it.
That'd be pretty cool.
Love the monster hunter example. MH is my absolute favorite skill based game.
In the middle there you said the most important thing, "unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty". I don't know if they have really stated what their goal is on difficulty. I think anyone wanting the next competative raiding game, they should go with Wildstar. ESO is far more concerned with the immersive feel than who can keep 100% HoT uptime or something.
I also have played MMOs since MUDs and what not. So I fully understand that some shit needs to be dumbed down for the mass appeal. I just don't think it needs to be done through icons for buffs, timers, procs, etc. They can simply make hard modes and easy modes of everything. Hard would account for those who can read the tells and will still perform at a min-maxed level without buffs, timers, etc. Easy mode would have the numbers low enough so that the masses can still pass the content. This sort of thing might step on some peoples toes, because I'm sure a lot of people think they are really good at endgame raiding... but they have probably spent the last decade just starting at numbers that add-ons provide them through icons, boss timers/warnings, etc. Which if you ask me is not challenging at all.
I'm different though, in that I feel games should allow people to fail. DOTA is a great example of this. There are people who are never going to get better at the game, period. It gives an infinite possibility of choices on how the play the game and some people will never ever expand on how they play to get better. Those people still have fun, but will remain on the same "tier" for as long as they play. This sorta thing is of course more acceptable in a game like DOTA, the MMO world has people wired to where "everyone is a winner". GW2 did this to the extreme and personally I got bored as shit with it because of that.
Did you read the developers response to the mod changes? He pretty much says they are sticking to their design and the information from all the UI mods does not fit that at all.
That's really good to hear. I'll admit I haven't totally kept up with all the information about this game.
You've hit on something which is more central to my point, @Kyanilis. Accessibility.
In most games there's that casual v. hardcore content split, right-o. What will be curious, is if they have the content in place to help people transition from one to the other. Is the casual too casual? Does it prepare you for a more reaction and attention based "hardcore" experience? By the time I'm 50, will I (if one of the "unskilled") have learned enough that I could jump into the more serious content if I want? Or will I just be unprepared and beaten about the head until I learn the new systems through painful trial and error?
Questions. Lots of questions. These guys have introduced a lot of divergent mechanics, I'm intensely curious how it will play out. I really hope it's well.
Safe to say endgame PvE isn't going to be very tuned, then? Especially for healers.
Yup.
It'll sure be interesting.
I was thinking about this, and it actually has the potential to be just the opposite.
We are assuming that since HoTs, DoTs and things that proc wont have icons and numbers showing when they happen/expire, then endgame can't be tuned well.
Well... why not? Why can't it simply be more difficult because that info is missing? A good healer will manage to keep HoTs up efficiently without buff icons and timer mods, while a bad healer will just be bad unless they learn to do the same.
On the other hand, anyone wanting hard endgame raiding in a new MMO should probably be ready for Wildstar and not even care about ESO at all.
So, I was thinking about this... I'm not looking for some kind of screaming match, and I hope we can just talk about stuff, without getting all "NO, FUCK YOU!"
If you strip out basic information, and rely on "tells", you do (by default) ramp up the difficulty. I agree there. Simply because it's not about watching pictographs flashing to tell you when to press buttons, it's going to be a little more difficult.
Take Monster Hunter for an example. It doesn't tell you when the poisons drop off. There's no flashing icons for when the shock trap is about to end. You have to watch for tells, learn about timing, and generally hold onto the seat of your pants. But, lots of people (lots) don't like the MH system. They can't even parse it, and call the game maddeningly difficult. Lots of people don't have the kind of reaction time, situational awareness, and observational skills to make those systems work. The population of your average MMO just isn't that kind of player. They're playing pretty princess dress up and being enamored with particle effects (neither of these things are bad, nor exclusive with any other group of players).
So you've got to dumb that shit down. You've got the make the encounters doable by even the most unskilled of player, lest you make the game "too difficult" because they are "paying for it!"
The following assertion is an educated assumption. Based on literal decades of MMO playing, thousands of hours playing video games with people, and a general interest in how games work (thus a great deal of research).
Without the UI information, even if the encounters are designed to be challenging, they will be nerfed. People will complain, and unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty (which I would admire), it won't matter if your healer is good or not. You couldn't lose, unless you try. They can't have it be difficult because of the lack of information. Even if it was billed as that kind of game, you and I both know people are treating ESO as something it's not, that shit won't stand.
Now, this doesn't apply to ESO's true endgame, the RvR system. In there... A good healer will count. A tank who can read tells and has those observational skills will probably be a hero. I just don't think they'll be able to pull that off in the PvE end game. Sure, there will be a few things which require top notch skill, but by and large... It won't matter how "good" you are, because the bar will be set so low. Remember, for every player who's playing for the RvR, there's three playing for the PvE.
I fully disagree that they should be removing this informational stuff. While it won't effect me in any way, because I can read tells and have quick reaction time... I know many people who will suffer from this. When I play MMO's with my wife, I often have to resort to pointing out the buff/debuff icons on the various UI elements. She's just not a person who's watching for tells or can identify graphical markers as quickly as I can. In ESO, she'd fall into the "unskilled" group of players, and generally be a burden to a group trying to perform "well". I also disagree that it increases any kind of "skill". It simply removes a path of understanding, it doesn't make those who can already read those elements, any better at it. It will just create a gulf between those who "can" and those who "can not". It will be a frustrating experience for those who need that direct information, they'll be dying and underperforming, needlessly.
Those who needed more direct information are fucked, and too bad that's the way you parse data.
Will this cause a certain percentage of those players to get better? Probably. We are adaptable creatures, and lots of people will learn the new system and be fine. That said, I disagree on the difficulty point. If anything, I think PvE encounters will be easier for a long while, until the population at large doesn't need timers/icons/counters to understand how to play their character. Players have been trained to look for that data during big encounters, it's going to take more than a few months at the end game for them to be broken from that. What would happen if you have thousands of players frustrated and failing at the end game PvE because they're folks who need direct information to understand an encounter?
Not good things for Zenimax's bottom line.
But, I don't know. I could be totally wrong and they don't give a fuck about that mass of players. They could be totally alright with an "Adapt or Die" mentality, and not be looking for a billion subscriptions. Maybe they're just making the game they want, and don't care if you can't parse it.
That'd be pretty cool.
Love the monster hunter example. MH is my absolute favorite skill based game.
In the middle there you said the most important thing, "unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty". I don't know if they have really stated what their goal is on difficulty. I think anyone wanting the next competitive raiding game, they should go with Wildstar. ESO is far more concerned with the immersive feel than who can keep 100% HoT uptime or something.
I also have played MMOs since MUDs and what not. So I fully understand that some shit needs to be dumbed down for the mass appeal. I just don't think it needs to be done through icons for buffs, timers, procs, etc. They can simply make hard modes and easy modes of everything. Hard would account for those who can read the tells and will still perform at a min-maxed level without buffs, timers, etc. Easy mode would have the numbers low enough so that the masses can still pass the content. This sort of thing might step on some peoples toes, because I'm sure a lot of people think they are really good at endgame raiding... but they have probably spent the last decade just starting at numbers that add-ons provide them through icons, boss timers/warnings, etc. Which if you ask me is not challenging at all.
I'm different though, in that I feel games should allow people to fail. DOTA is a great example of this. There are people who are never going to get better at the game, period. It gives an infinite possibility of choices on how the play the game and some people will never ever expand on how they play to get better. Those people still have fun, but will remain on the same "tier" for as long as they play. This sorta thing is of course more acceptable in a game like DOTA, the MMO world has people wired to where "everyone is a winner". GW2 did this to the extreme and personally I got bored as shit with it because of that.
Did you read the developers response to the mod changes? He pretty much says they are sticking to their design and the information from all the UI mods does not fit that at all.
I agree on the failure point. And I think that's vitally important. It shouldn't really be impossible to fail, as it is in GW2.
Here's my worry: That the failure will be attributed to the lack of information, as a scapegoat for people who don't want to really adapt. And it'll snowball into this demon from hell excuse, and bring everything crashing down. You know how these people are.
I really love the Easy/Hard idea. Like, holy shit. That's how they solve this problem by and large. The issue then becomes rewards, off the top of my head I'd simply say that a Hard-mode would get 33% more rewards, but the exact same rewards. That way no one gets to bitch about "THOSE DAMN RAIDERS!", but the damn raiders get to flex their various digital penii.
I'm different though, in that I feel games should allow people to fail.
I think this is important as it plays central to ESO's dungeon design. They KNOW you will fail, you're EXPECTED to fail at least once or twice. Every boss in a dungeon drops a filled soul gem. Why? These items are used for two things: Recharging enchanted equipment and revivals. Your weapon won't lose its charge over the course of one fight so why make it so all bosses drop one? Because they know players WILL die and instead of saying "Well, too bad" you get a "Oh, hey, congrats, we know you'll have a tough time on the next fight too so here's a free revive."
I mean I know you can't revive mid-fight, but it lessens the sting when after the first wipe everyone can, basically without penalty, get a free rez AT the boss instead of having to run all the way back.
That's really good to hear. I'll admit I haven't totally kept up with all the information about this game.
You've hit on something which is more central to my point, @Kyanilis. Accessibility.
In most games there's that casual v. hardcore content split, right-o. What will be curious, is if they have the content in place to help people transition from one to the other. Is the casual too casual? Does it prepare you for a more reaction and attention based "hardcore" experience? By the time I'm 50, will I (if one of the "unskilled") have learned enough that I could jump into the more serious content if I want? Or will I just be unprepared and beaten about the head until I learn the new systems through painful trial and error?
Questions. Lots of questions. These guys have introduced a lot of divergent mechanics, I'm intensely curious how it will play out. I really hope it's well.
From some of the videos PTS people have made, the game is way to easy when leveling up. So that part will be accessible to everyone. Then once hitting veteran ranks, its still rather easy at first. However the time to hit VR 10 is supposedly longer than the intial 1-50 grind, by a lot. So that long grind from VR 1-10 is that transition and how well they pace that is the question.
You certainly don't get to 50 and then jump into hard content. Not even a bit. Endgame gear has a VR requirement, so in a way there are 10 tiers of gear to progress through. That's the main "long term" endgame grind.
Lot of people in this thread eager to tell other people to fuck off, this isn't for you, aren't there?
I'm picking up TESO for RvR either way, because I know I'll enjoy it and perform well with or without the extra information. Unless the tells get refined more (and I get a computer than can keep up) it won't be as complicated as I'd hoped, but still.
PvE, on the other hand, I'm not at all optimistic about for reasons I and others have laid out.
That's really good to hear. I'll admit I haven't totally kept up with all the information about this game.
You've hit on something which is more central to my point, @Kyanilis. Accessibility.
In most games there's that casual v. hardcore content split, right-o. What will be curious, is if they have the content in place to help people transition from one to the other. Is the casual too casual? Does it prepare you for a more reaction and attention based "hardcore" experience? By the time I'm 50, will I (if one of the "unskilled") have learned enough that I could jump into the more serious content if I want? Or will I just be unprepared and beaten about the head until I learn the new systems through painful trial and error?
Questions. Lots of questions. These guys have introduced a lot of divergent mechanics, I'm intensely curious how it will play out. I really hope it's well.
So far it sounds like this:
1 - 50: Pretty trivial, you get to play the game at a fairly low skill level. You can get used to all the game mechanics because all the mechanics will be there, though if you're not 100% on your game you can still pretty easily recover. The dungeons in this range seem like they enforce the mechanics even more, but even if you die it's not impossible to be carried through the dungeon by your group. Pretty much anyone should be able to have this experience.
VR 1 - 10: Difficulty starts ramping up here. This is the real transition period. You start encountering the harder dungeons and you may die a lot more if you don't have the mechanics down. This is the "casual" endgame as it's definitely more difficult and you're still getting more gear as you gain ranks. It's a gradual ramp up. It's where you also go to other faction areas and do their quests. Plenty of people who aren't super skilled can likely still do this especially if they avoid group specific content, but it will give you a better idea of what to expect afterwards.
At VR 10 (and beyond): Adventure zone and the real "endgame dungeons". This is where it supposedly "gets real". This is all group content and we're all (somewhat) patiently waiting on details. This is the "raiding" endgame, as in for the players who want the hardest experiences of the PVE endgame.
I think it's lame that there's a level grind, and then another level grind. That's fuckin' dumb.
But, at least they have some kind of preparedness system in place.
I think this is mostly there because when you hit 50 you're literally at 1/3rd of the content. You can't really open up the world (and other factions) at that point and then have no real progression.
Is it the best system? Maybe not. But the way it plays out looks like it works. I do agree that it seems really weird to do, why not just raise the level cap to 60 and expect people to be at the end of their faction's areas by around 50? But maybe they wanted a more "tiered" system so they can separate people who are going 1 - 50 from the players who are in the VRs a bit easier.
It's about bread crumb rewards. The player hits 50, they get all amped up and are happy. Then they start on the next grind. Personally, I hate the "level grind" regardless of how it's masked. I'd prefer some kind of "key" system. At least that way I wouldn't constantly feel like "I'm just going to replace this gear next level." That's just me though. I don't like levels.
I think it's lame that there's a level grind, and then another level grind. That's fuckin' dumb.
But, at least they have some kind of preparedness system in place.
Yup.
Its also just doing the content of the other factions apparently. Which is why it will take about twice as long to get VR10 as it did to get to
I don't think its the best idea either. But long term it at least sounds like it will be time consuming, which is essentially how endgame PVE feels to me after the intial fun wears off.
You know, I was following this thread and thinking to myself "Dammit Zenimax, I can't believe you're not going to give us all the information we're used to having!"
Then I realized that I've put 60+ hours I've put into Dark Souls 2 in the last 2 weeks, a game in a franchise I consider to have some of the absolute best and most satisfying game design in the history of gaming, that lets you fail when you make mistakes and makes you learn from them, and says fuck you if you're mad that it doesn't tell you everything you feel you need to know.
And it's been the greatest gaming I've had since the first Dark Souls, and Demon's Souls before it. And if it's Zenimax's vision that this game will be won or lost by me not having knowledge of how long poison is going to tick on me or whatever, then I'll accept it and enjoy the game anyway.
Better that than just catering to what vocal "fans" want even if it means not following their own vision for the game.
It's my opinion that ESO will "succeed" or "fail" based on the RvR end game and not the PvE raiding end game anyway. I applaud them for doing Veteran rank stuff and all that, but I just can't help but feel that in 2014, too many people just don't want to rinse and repeat raid encounters week in and week out for loot any more. It's fine for a game to have that, but I don't think you can maintain a subscriber base off it any more. There are simply too many better PvE games on the market that people could go play.
At any rate, my early access only kicks in on Tuesday (damn youuu GMG), so oh well.
Blame Zenimax for this. Basically if you bought standard edition from them you'd still get 5 days early access, but standard from anywhere else and you only get 3 days. Doesn't matter where, just if it's "not Zenimax"
Basically they're 12 person content with a timer and leaderboards. So raids? But guilds that get the best times will have publicly viewable bragging rights. Prior to right now they hadn't said anything about this. So append this to my VR 10+ experience above.
Adding fresh new systems helps broaden the experience for all players, giving you even more things to do on a given day. As an example, we might introduce horse racing. For those players who have fed their horses and think they are ready to test their riding skills…
I support this, but only if the bug of falling off your horse randomly still occurs.
On the other hand, anyone wanting hard endgame raiding in a new MMO should probably be ready for Wildstar and not even care about ESO at all.
This. Don't adopt a dog if you really just want a cat. It isn't fair to either if you.
Except I don't think we really know how the gameplay of the endgame stuff is going to play. Especially as it's done without the previous API and such. So I'm not sure if we 100% know for sure if it's the kitty cat that we've been wanting for so long, or a jaguarundi.
We know it's not going to be predominately Turkish Angora, despite the pictures the shelter had put up previous about it, because of whatever analogy might work for the API change I'm sorry I'm not that clever.
But even though it might not be that particular breed, if instead it's looking like it'll be more of a Himalayan-Persian mix instead, that still sounds like wonderful cat that would also be a joy to own. But I wouldn't pretend that such a mix is likely going to be a better swimmer (if introduced to water early enough), or that because it lacks the general predisposition for swimming found in some other breeds, this will indicate any skill at swimming will show that the cat is flat out a better cat because it is having to work harder at doing it?
Basically, having fun times during the summer in a shallow inflatable pool with said kitty, something that before was a decent possibility, is still possible but less likely. And if that was the only reason I was getting the cat, then maybe that would be a deal breaker, but it wasn't the only reason. And it's certainly no reason to think that I would want a dog instead.
Wow, I misunderstood. I thought you were implying the purist "It's the adventure and the journey!" (which would be a semantics difference. You call the experience an "adventure" I call it a "grind". Either way, it's the same exact thing.)
MMO levelling is not a grind when the actual areas you're exploring are fun, the story is fun, and the gameplay is fun.
Even when I played WoW my first character to max level I never felt a grind. Because I was exploring cool new areas for the first time, etc. Granted some of the necessity of doing a bunch of side quests to get exp to progress is not the most satisfying.
But for the best example I have of MMO levelling not feeling grindy I'd point to SW:TOR. The game's end game was a huge blunder. But playing my Jedi Knight from 1-50, and seeing not just my class story but also the planet arcs of Tatooine, Alderaan, Hoth, etc. was in no way a grind to me. I was so freaking engaged with the story that levels meant nothing outside of getting new abilities. The game fell apart completely at max level for me, but the ride was amazing and I wouldn't trade it in.
From what I've played of ESO I'm not going to feel a 1-50 grind at ALL? Why? For the same reason that playing Skyrim wasn't a grind. It has fun gameplay, and most importantly, it's just fun to explore. I will do what side quests I feel like, but mostly I will just be exploring everything. When I find a public dungeon and explore it like a motherfucking Goonie finding treasure and skyshards I'm not going to feel like I'm grinding through level 27. I'm just going to be having fun.
The word grind has been co-opted to mean so much shit that it really isn't. Grinding comes from when we're talking about stuff like original Everquest, where literally to progress to higher content you'd need to find a group and just pull enemies in a dungeon to a safe resting spot for hours and hours to level. You weren't exploring dungeons and areas. Even if you did explore them, you'd still have to sit and grind in a group or solo if you were certain classes to get to the level required to go to the next place. It was a different time in gaming, and a place where grinding was actually a real thing.
No modern theme park MMOs have really anything that resembles actual grinding outside of stuff like WoW's reputation/daily grinds, which are most definitely grinds. The actual levelling experience of WoW consists of constantly going to new places doing quests, doing dungeons maybe once each, and moving on. It's simply not a grind.
Now, all these words are prefacing the fact that I will willingly admit I think it's possible to make a huge badass MMO world with 0 levels at all. Just set me free at the start and tell me to go anywhere I want. Maybe certain things will be harder if I don't have X skills and what not, but the actual numerical levels are not necessary. I think that's the best possible way to go if done right, but it's also harder to do right because it's easier to go "This zone is for levels 40 to 45, this zone is for 45 to 50, etc.
MMO levelling is not a grind when the actual areas you're exploring are fun, the story is fun, and the gameplay is fun.
It's more about presentation. If the MMO is all about end-game raids, then making me sit through 50 levels before I can play the game you want me to play is dumb.
I'd say that SWTOR does not follow that formula, what with the class and planet stories. The end game raids are something to do when you get there, not the goal of the game itself.
A guy a work told me about the D-K Effect, and it was a fucking revelation.
As soon as I read the article on Wiki, a list of people I work with popped into my head, as they fit the profile exactly.
I'm torn on whether Dunning-Kruger needs to beaten into everyone's head in public schools. On the one hand, it serves as a constant reminder to rethink your self-assessments. On the other, I think it may lead to meta-Dunning-Kruger, and people think they get it when they don't and then make even worse choices and self-assessments (recursively inflating their skill assessment, etc).
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This. Don't adopt a dog if you really just want a cat. It isn't fair to either if you.
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So, I was thinking about this... I'm not looking for some kind of screaming match, and I hope we can just talk about stuff, without getting all "NO, FUCK YOU!"
If you strip out basic information, and rely on "tells", you do (by default) ramp up the difficulty. I agree there. Simply because it's not about watching pictographs flashing to tell you when to press buttons, it's going to be a little more difficult.
Take Monster Hunter for an example. It doesn't tell you when the poisons drop off. There's no flashing icons for when the shock trap is about to end. You have to watch for tells, learn about timing, and generally hold onto the seat of your pants. But, lots of people (lots) don't like the MH system. They can't even parse it, and call the game maddeningly difficult. Lots of people don't have the kind of reaction time, situational awareness, and observational skills to make those systems work. The population of your average MMO just isn't that kind of player. They're playing pretty princess dress up and being enamored with particle effects (neither of these things are bad, nor exclusive with any other group of players).
So you've got to dumb that shit down. You've got the make the encounters doable by even the most unskilled of player, lest you make the game "too difficult" because they are "paying for it!"
The following assertion is an educated assumption. Based on literal decades of MMO playing, thousands of hours playing video games with people, and a general interest in how games work (thus a great deal of research).
Without the UI information, even if the encounters are designed to be challenging, they will be nerfed. People will complain, and unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty (which I would admire), it won't matter if your healer is good or not. You couldn't lose, unless you try. They can't have it be difficult because of the lack of information. Even if it was billed as that kind of game, you and I both know people are treating ESO as something it's not, that shit won't stand.
Now, this doesn't apply to ESO's true endgame, the RvR system. In there... A good healer will count. A tank who can read tells and has those observational skills will probably be a hero. I just don't think they'll be able to pull that off in the PvE end game. Sure, there will be a few things which require top notch skill, but by and large... It won't matter how "good" you are, because the bar will be set so low. Remember, for every player who's playing for the RvR, there's three playing for the PvE.
I fully disagree that they should be removing this informational stuff. While it won't effect me in any way, because I can read tells and have quick reaction time... I know many people who will suffer from this. When I play MMO's with my wife, I often have to resort to pointing out the buff/debuff icons on the various UI elements. She's just not a person who's watching for tells or can identify graphical markers as quickly as I can. In ESO, she'd fall into the "unskilled" group of players, and generally be a burden to a group trying to perform "well". I also disagree that it increases any kind of "skill". It simply removes a path of understanding, it doesn't make those who can already read those elements, any better at it. It will just create a gulf between those who "can" and those who "can not". It will be a frustrating experience for those who need that direct information, they'll be dying and underperforming, needlessly.
Those who needed more direct information are fucked, and too bad that's the way you parse data.
Will this cause a certain percentage of those players to get better? Probably. We are adaptable creatures, and lots of people will learn the new system and be fine. That said, I disagree on the difficulty point. If anything, I think PvE encounters will be easier for a long while, until the population at large doesn't need timers/icons/counters to understand how to play their character. Players have been trained to look for that data during big encounters, it's going to take more than a few months at the end game for them to be broken from that. What would happen if you have thousands of players frustrated and failing at the end game PvE because they're folks who need direct information to understand an encounter?
Not good things for Zenimax's bottom line.
But, I don't know. I could be totally wrong and they don't give a fuck about that mass of players. They could be totally alright with an "Adapt or Die" mentality, and not be looking for a billion subscriptions. Maybe they're just making the game they want, and don't care if you can't parse it.
That'd be pretty cool.
Even with WoW mods, as crazy as they were about telling you exactly what to do, raids still failed encounters. When I played WoW it took my guild at least two dozen attempts to beat Yogg-Saron, but after we did, we failed less and less, and eventually it was old hat. The difficulty of the encounter never changed, we just kept trying.
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Yes, a challenging encounter will be challenging until you figure out the challenge.
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You raise a lot of valid points, and I agree with your last statement that I hope they are just making the game they want. Normally I am all about accessibility for games, particularly in the MMO genre, but when you are trying to step out of the general MMO mold in some fashion (combat in this case) I also feel you need to either go big or go home. Wildstar is taking a more half-hearted approach (Similarly to GW2) which I feel will be detrimental to the game overall (even though it will certainly be more accessible) so I am hopeful that ESO will take a more hardened approach and as you say, make the game they want to make.
If it is done well, and the design works with their vision I believe the playerbase will come and adapt. It may not get the numbers initially as other games, but if the game is quality enough, the players will come.
Personally I don't know anything about the elder game of this game, having only played the very beginning content, so I'm content to wait and see what actually happens and how the content is designed before I make any assumption about it.
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You're right. They don't have to.
My point is, I think they will. I think that by alienating (even temporarily) a portion of your players because they don't know how to parse what's going on... They will have to lower the difficulty. If not, they will further alienate those players... To the detriment of the MMO part of the game.
If they don't (and maintain difficulty), that will be both impressive and remarkable. I do not doubt that they will hold their ground, but I also won't be surprised when they nerf encounters because: "I CAN'T TELL WHEN MY TANK IS ON FIRE AND I BLEW ALL MY MANA TRYING TO HEAL HIM SO WE WIPED AND THAT HAPPENS EVERY TIME SO MAKE THIS EASIER."
Does this mean they won't change things to make the "not as skilled" players happy? Not necessarily, but so far they've stood by their statements on the overall goals of the game. It's very possible that they're underestimating just how big a group of people they may be alienating by not changing this stance, but on the other hand, based on what people have said from the PTS, it sounds like they ARE catering to a degree:
Content up to 50 is fairly trivial. Even content through the VR ranks isn't particularly difficult though it does ramp it up considerably. MOST players will be able to play through their zones and experience the main ESO story. However, the adventure zones and VR dungeons (Endgame PVE group content) are meant to be much harder and for the person that wants that difficulty. So there's an awful lot of content for people who want to play the game casually and then there's also plenty of additional content at cap for the people who want to go through difficult encounters.
This isn't really different than other MMOs. There's basically "endgame" for casual players and then there's additional harder content for the more "hardcore". Currently there is almost no information out there about the harder content as most PTS players seemed to have ignored the VR dungeons and the first adventure zone won't be released till sometime shortly after launch. But up until that point, even people who aren't particularly "skilled" can get through content.
Love the monster hunter example. MH is my absolute favorite skill based game.
In the middle there you said the most important thing, "unless Zenimax is willing to take a stand on difficulty". I don't know if they have really stated what their goal is on difficulty. I think anyone wanting the next competative raiding game, they should go with Wildstar. ESO is far more concerned with the immersive feel than who can keep 100% HoT uptime or something.
I also have played MMOs since MUDs and what not. So I fully understand that some shit needs to be dumbed down for the mass appeal. I just don't think it needs to be done through icons for buffs, timers, procs, etc. They can simply make hard modes and easy modes of everything. Hard would account for those who can read the tells and will still perform at a min-maxed level without buffs, timers, etc. Easy mode would have the numbers low enough so that the masses can still pass the content. This sort of thing might step on some peoples toes, because I'm sure a lot of people think they are really good at endgame raiding... but they have probably spent the last decade just starting at numbers that add-ons provide them through icons, boss timers/warnings, etc. Which if you ask me is not challenging at all.
I'm different though, in that I feel games should allow people to fail. DOTA is a great example of this. There are people who are never going to get better at the game, period. It gives an infinite possibility of choices on how the play the game and some people will never ever expand on how they play to get better. Those people still have fun, but will remain on the same "tier" for as long as they play. This sorta thing is of course more acceptable in a game like DOTA, the MMO world has people wired to where "everyone is a winner". GW2 did this to the extreme and personally I got bored as shit with it because of that.
Did you read the developers response to the mod changes? He pretty much says they are sticking to their design and the information from all the UI mods does not fit that at all.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You've hit on something which is more central to my point, @Kyanilis. Accessibility.
In most games there's that casual v. hardcore content split, right-o. What will be curious, is if they have the content in place to help people transition from one to the other. Is the casual too casual? Does it prepare you for a more reaction and attention based "hardcore" experience? By the time I'm 50, will I (if one of the "unskilled") have learned enough that I could jump into the more serious content if I want? Or will I just be unprepared and beaten about the head until I learn the new systems through painful trial and error?
Questions. Lots of questions. These guys have introduced a lot of divergent mechanics, I'm intensely curious how it will play out. I really hope it's well.
I agree on the failure point. And I think that's vitally important. It shouldn't really be impossible to fail, as it is in GW2.
Here's my worry: That the failure will be attributed to the lack of information, as a scapegoat for people who don't want to really adapt. And it'll snowball into this demon from hell excuse, and bring everything crashing down. You know how these people are.
I really love the Easy/Hard idea. Like, holy shit. That's how they solve this problem by and large. The issue then becomes rewards, off the top of my head I'd simply say that a Hard-mode would get 33% more rewards, but the exact same rewards. That way no one gets to bitch about "THOSE DAMN RAIDERS!", but the damn raiders get to flex their various digital penii.
I think this is important as it plays central to ESO's dungeon design. They KNOW you will fail, you're EXPECTED to fail at least once or twice. Every boss in a dungeon drops a filled soul gem. Why? These items are used for two things: Recharging enchanted equipment and revivals. Your weapon won't lose its charge over the course of one fight so why make it so all bosses drop one? Because they know players WILL die and instead of saying "Well, too bad" you get a "Oh, hey, congrats, we know you'll have a tough time on the next fight too so here's a free revive."
I mean I know you can't revive mid-fight, but it lessens the sting when after the first wipe everyone can, basically without penalty, get a free rez AT the boss instead of having to run all the way back.
From some of the videos PTS people have made, the game is way to easy when leveling up. So that part will be accessible to everyone. Then once hitting veteran ranks, its still rather easy at first. However the time to hit VR 10 is supposedly longer than the intial 1-50 grind, by a lot. So that long grind from VR 1-10 is that transition and how well they pace that is the question.
You certainly don't get to 50 and then jump into hard content. Not even a bit. Endgame gear has a VR requirement, so in a way there are 10 tiers of gear to progress through. That's the main "long term" endgame grind.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I'm picking up TESO for RvR either way, because I know I'll enjoy it and perform well with or without the extra information. Unless the tells get refined more (and I get a computer than can keep up) it won't be as complicated as I'd hoped, but still.
PvE, on the other hand, I'm not at all optimistic about for reasons I and others have laid out.
But, at least they have some kind of preparedness system in place.
So far it sounds like this:
1 - 50: Pretty trivial, you get to play the game at a fairly low skill level. You can get used to all the game mechanics because all the mechanics will be there, though if you're not 100% on your game you can still pretty easily recover. The dungeons in this range seem like they enforce the mechanics even more, but even if you die it's not impossible to be carried through the dungeon by your group. Pretty much anyone should be able to have this experience.
VR 1 - 10: Difficulty starts ramping up here. This is the real transition period. You start encountering the harder dungeons and you may die a lot more if you don't have the mechanics down. This is the "casual" endgame as it's definitely more difficult and you're still getting more gear as you gain ranks. It's a gradual ramp up. It's where you also go to other faction areas and do their quests. Plenty of people who aren't super skilled can likely still do this especially if they avoid group specific content, but it will give you a better idea of what to expect afterwards.
At VR 10 (and beyond): Adventure zone and the real "endgame dungeons". This is where it supposedly "gets real". This is all group content and we're all (somewhat) patiently waiting on details. This is the "raiding" endgame, as in for the players who want the hardest experiences of the PVE endgame.
I think this is mostly there because when you hit 50 you're literally at 1/3rd of the content. You can't really open up the world (and other factions) at that point and then have no real progression.
Is it the best system? Maybe not. But the way it plays out looks like it works. I do agree that it seems really weird to do, why not just raise the level cap to 60 and expect people to be at the end of their faction's areas by around 50? But maybe they wanted a more "tiered" system so they can separate people who are going 1 - 50 from the players who are in the VRs a bit easier.
It's about bread crumb rewards. The player hits 50, they get all amped up and are happy. Then they start on the next grind. Personally, I hate the "level grind" regardless of how it's masked. I'd prefer some kind of "key" system. At least that way I wouldn't constantly feel like "I'm just going to replace this gear next level." That's just me though. I don't like levels.
Yup.
Its also just doing the content of the other factions apparently. Which is why it will take about twice as long to get VR10 as it did to get to
I don't think its the best idea either. But long term it at least sounds like it will be time consuming, which is essentially how endgame PVE feels to me after the intial fun wears off.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Then I realized that I've put 60+ hours I've put into Dark Souls 2 in the last 2 weeks, a game in a franchise I consider to have some of the absolute best and most satisfying game design in the history of gaming, that lets you fail when you make mistakes and makes you learn from them, and says fuck you if you're mad that it doesn't tell you everything you feel you need to know.
And it's been the greatest gaming I've had since the first Dark Souls, and Demon's Souls before it. And if it's Zenimax's vision that this game will be won or lost by me not having knowledge of how long poison is going to tick on me or whatever, then I'll accept it and enjoy the game anyway.
Better that than just catering to what vocal "fans" want even if it means not following their own vision for the game.
It's my opinion that ESO will "succeed" or "fail" based on the RvR end game and not the PvE raiding end game anyway. I applaud them for doing Veteran rank stuff and all that, but I just can't help but feel that in 2014, too many people just don't want to rinse and repeat raid encounters week in and week out for loot any more. It's fine for a game to have that, but I don't think you can maintain a subscriber base off it any more. There are simply too many better PvE games on the market that people could go play.
Blame Zenimax for this. Basically if you bought standard edition from them you'd still get 5 days early access, but standard from anywhere else and you only get 3 days. Doesn't matter where, just if it's "not Zenimax"
GMG didn't have a say in that, I'd bet.
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Yes. Imperial editions, regardless of where you purchased them, get 5 day early access.
Also we are now at 4 days remaining which is arghghhasd
Too close. I neeeeds it.
Semantics!
Basically they're 12 person content with a timer and leaderboards. So raids? But guilds that get the best times will have publicly viewable bragging rights. Prior to right now they hadn't said anything about this. So append this to my VR 10+ experience above.
I support this, but only if the bug of falling off your horse randomly still occurs.
We'll call it "EXTREME horse racing"
We know it's not going to be predominately Turkish Angora, despite the pictures the shelter had put up previous about it, because of whatever analogy might work for the API change I'm sorry I'm not that clever.
But even though it might not be that particular breed, if instead it's looking like it'll be more of a Himalayan-Persian mix instead, that still sounds like wonderful cat that would also be a joy to own. But I wouldn't pretend that such a mix is likely going to be a better swimmer (if introduced to water early enough), or that because it lacks the general predisposition for swimming found in some other breeds, this will indicate any skill at swimming will show that the cat is flat out a better cat because it is having to work harder at doing it?
Basically, having fun times during the summer in a shallow inflatable pool with said kitty, something that before was a decent possibility, is still possible but less likely. And if that was the only reason I was getting the cat, then maybe that would be a deal breaker, but it wasn't the only reason. And it's certainly no reason to think that I would want a dog instead.
Why put me through that? I don't need fifty levels of tutorial.
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My b. Home slice.
I agree. Levels are dumb as fuck.
Even when I played WoW my first character to max level I never felt a grind. Because I was exploring cool new areas for the first time, etc. Granted some of the necessity of doing a bunch of side quests to get exp to progress is not the most satisfying.
But for the best example I have of MMO levelling not feeling grindy I'd point to SW:TOR. The game's end game was a huge blunder. But playing my Jedi Knight from 1-50, and seeing not just my class story but also the planet arcs of Tatooine, Alderaan, Hoth, etc. was in no way a grind to me. I was so freaking engaged with the story that levels meant nothing outside of getting new abilities. The game fell apart completely at max level for me, but the ride was amazing and I wouldn't trade it in.
From what I've played of ESO I'm not going to feel a 1-50 grind at ALL? Why? For the same reason that playing Skyrim wasn't a grind. It has fun gameplay, and most importantly, it's just fun to explore. I will do what side quests I feel like, but mostly I will just be exploring everything. When I find a public dungeon and explore it like a motherfucking Goonie finding treasure and skyshards I'm not going to feel like I'm grinding through level 27. I'm just going to be having fun.
The word grind has been co-opted to mean so much shit that it really isn't. Grinding comes from when we're talking about stuff like original Everquest, where literally to progress to higher content you'd need to find a group and just pull enemies in a dungeon to a safe resting spot for hours and hours to level. You weren't exploring dungeons and areas. Even if you did explore them, you'd still have to sit and grind in a group or solo if you were certain classes to get to the level required to go to the next place. It was a different time in gaming, and a place where grinding was actually a real thing.
No modern theme park MMOs have really anything that resembles actual grinding outside of stuff like WoW's reputation/daily grinds, which are most definitely grinds. The actual levelling experience of WoW consists of constantly going to new places doing quests, doing dungeons maybe once each, and moving on. It's simply not a grind.
Now, all these words are prefacing the fact that I will willingly admit I think it's possible to make a huge badass MMO world with 0 levels at all. Just set me free at the start and tell me to go anywhere I want. Maybe certain things will be harder if I don't have X skills and what not, but the actual numerical levels are not necessary. I think that's the best possible way to go if done right, but it's also harder to do right because it's easier to go "This zone is for levels 40 to 45, this zone is for 45 to 50, etc.
A guy a work told me about the D-K Effect, and it was a fucking revelation.
As soon as I read the article on Wiki, a list of people I work with popped into my head, as they fit the profile exactly.
I'd say that SWTOR does not follow that formula, what with the class and planet stories. The end game raids are something to do when you get there, not the goal of the game itself.
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I'm torn on whether Dunning-Kruger needs to beaten into everyone's head in public schools. On the one hand, it serves as a constant reminder to rethink your self-assessments. On the other, I think it may lead to meta-Dunning-Kruger, and people think they get it when they don't and then make even worse choices and self-assessments (recursively inflating their skill assessment, etc).
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