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[WoD] Thats World of Darkness for the unlearned!
Caligo
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
First off, a small introduction:
World of Darkness
A merger between Crowd Control Productions and White Wolf, Inc. was announced at the annual EVE Online fanfest in ReykjavÃk, Iceland, in November 2006. As part of the deal, it was announced that White Wolf would be adopting the EVE Online intellectual property into a RPG, and CCP explicitly stated "There will be a World of Darkness Online", referring to a MMORPG version of the game. However, the manner in which it was conveyed suggests that the game is not yet under development, and therefore a product release might be years in the future.[1] According to the latest news, work has already begun on the WoD MMORPG and full time production is to commence within the year.
So basically, the people who made Eve Online and the people who came out with all those funky Vampire books merged, and plan to make a kick ass (we hope) MMO.
A little history on White Wolf, Inc.:
Publishers of various titles including:
Vampire: The Masquerade
Werewolf: The Apocalypse
Mage: The Ascension
Wraith: The Oblivion
Changeling: The Dreaming
Kindred of the East
Hunter: The Reckoning
Mummy: The Resurrection
Demon: The Fallen
Orpheus
These all represent a Rulebook and a varying number of Sourcebook supplementals on anything from specific clans and tribes to gadgets and entire citybooks describing all the supernatural denizens. In parallel to these settings, White Wolf has developed historical settings for their major product lines. They include:
Vampire: The Victorian Age (set in the late 19th century)
Werewolf: The Wild West (set in the 19th century)
Mage: The Sorcerer's Crusade (set in the late 15th century)
Wraith: The Great War (set during and immediately after World War I)
Vampire: The Dark Ages (12th century version that was later reworked into the Dark Ages product line)
Dark Ages (13th century Middle Ages) versions of the settings:
Dark Ages: Vampire
Dark Ages: Werewolf
Dark Ages: Mage
Dark Ages: Fae (Changeling)
Dark Ages: Inquisitor (Hunter)
What do we know about the actual MMO?
WoD MMO Wish List - There are a few things that make gamers have wet panties, I will try to list some of mine.
Why did I make this thread?
Because a lot of MMO's these days suck. Hard. I also happen to know that the game is still early in development. I may also have an inside track at the company, so I could be a conduit through which awesome information flows. Thats why I'm asking people who respond to write about what they would like out of this type of MMO. If you have some good ideas, I'd like to compile them and give them to the developers to make sure that this isn't another game that comes out and fails miserably within the first few months.
Pertinent Links
FAQ from Planet Vampire
What is the name of this new game?
That hasn't been announced yet, but many people simply call it "World of Darkness Online." We'll change the name of this section as soon as we know what the game will be called!
When will it be released?
There is no release date yet, but CCP has set a tentative timeframe for a release in 2011 or 2012. A 4 or 5 year development cycle is pretty standard for MMOs.
Will the game be set in the Old World of Darkness or the New one?
White Wolf is only publishing new products based in the New World of Darkness, so this game will feature Vampire: the Requiem, and quite possibly Werewolf: the Forsaken and Mage: the Awakening as well. Neither White Wolf nor CCP have given any hints about exactly which games will be included at launch. A WarCry.com article mentioned concept art depicting a werewolf, but this has not been confirmed by any official CCP/WW sources.
Will there be subscription fees?
Judging from CCP's current MMO EVE Online, there will most likely be a subscription fee for the World of Darkness game.
Cheers
World of Darkness
A merger between Crowd Control Productions and White Wolf, Inc. was announced at the annual EVE Online fanfest in ReykjavÃk, Iceland, in November 2006. As part of the deal, it was announced that White Wolf would be adopting the EVE Online intellectual property into a RPG, and CCP explicitly stated "There will be a World of Darkness Online", referring to a MMORPG version of the game. However, the manner in which it was conveyed suggests that the game is not yet under development, and therefore a product release might be years in the future.[1] According to the latest news, work has already begun on the WoD MMORPG and full time production is to commence within the year.
So basically, the people who made Eve Online and the people who came out with all those funky Vampire books merged, and plan to make a kick ass (we hope) MMO.
A little history on White Wolf, Inc.:
Publishers of various titles including:
Vampire: The Masquerade
Werewolf: The Apocalypse
Mage: The Ascension
Wraith: The Oblivion
Changeling: The Dreaming
Kindred of the East
Hunter: The Reckoning
Mummy: The Resurrection
Demon: The Fallen
Orpheus
These all represent a Rulebook and a varying number of Sourcebook supplementals on anything from specific clans and tribes to gadgets and entire citybooks describing all the supernatural denizens. In parallel to these settings, White Wolf has developed historical settings for their major product lines. They include:
Vampire: The Victorian Age (set in the late 19th century)
Werewolf: The Wild West (set in the 19th century)
Mage: The Sorcerer's Crusade (set in the late 15th century)
Wraith: The Great War (set during and immediately after World War I)
Vampire: The Dark Ages (12th century version that was later reworked into the Dark Ages product line)
Dark Ages (13th century Middle Ages) versions of the settings:
Dark Ages: Vampire
Dark Ages: Werewolf
Dark Ages: Mage
Dark Ages: Fae (Changeling)
Dark Ages: Inquisitor (Hunter)
What do we know about the actual MMO?
- They expect a four year development cycle. The merger occured around this time last year, so I'm hoping a year of planning has already occured.
- I know they are hiring for a US office to develop the game, so if you kick ass as making games, I'd check it out.
- An MMO set in the current world? Thats unheard of!
WoD MMO Wish List - There are a few things that make gamers have wet panties, I will try to list some of mine.
- I have fantasies of an MMO reproducing real architecture and cities from present day, and then letting supernatual beings romp around in them. How fun would it be to explore various European cities whilst running along rooftops.
- The variety of potential player entities is enough to tease the imagination. How would you decide between playing a vampire, a mage, a werewolf, a wraith, changeling, human (hunter), mummy, or demon!?
Why did I make this thread?
Because a lot of MMO's these days suck. Hard. I also happen to know that the game is still early in development. I may also have an inside track at the company, so I could be a conduit through which awesome information flows. Thats why I'm asking people who respond to write about what they would like out of this type of MMO. If you have some good ideas, I'd like to compile them and give them to the developers to make sure that this isn't another game that comes out and fails miserably within the first few months.
Pertinent Links
- http://wiki.white-wolf.com/worldofdarkness/index.php/Main_Page
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_of_darkness
- http://www.worldofdarkness.com/
- http://forums.gamespy.com/world_of_darkness_mmo_general_discussion/b50383/p1
FAQ from Planet Vampire
What is the name of this new game?
That hasn't been announced yet, but many people simply call it "World of Darkness Online." We'll change the name of this section as soon as we know what the game will be called!
When will it be released?
There is no release date yet, but CCP has set a tentative timeframe for a release in 2011 or 2012. A 4 or 5 year development cycle is pretty standard for MMOs.
Will the game be set in the Old World of Darkness or the New one?
White Wolf is only publishing new products based in the New World of Darkness, so this game will feature Vampire: the Requiem, and quite possibly Werewolf: the Forsaken and Mage: the Awakening as well. Neither White Wolf nor CCP have given any hints about exactly which games will be included at launch. A WarCry.com article mentioned concept art depicting a werewolf, but this has not been confirmed by any official CCP/WW sources.
Will there be subscription fees?
Judging from CCP's current MMO EVE Online, there will most likely be a subscription fee for the World of Darkness game.
Cheers
Caligo on
0
Posts
CCP already has the most orginal MMORPG out there (that is successful)
so am curious to see what they have planned for the game architechture. would CCP go with what they know and model the skill systems like they do with eve, or would they make something completely different.. like a man with a tape recorder up his nose.
Changelings will make or break this game for me, but it still has potential for awesome otherwise.
Maybe someone can explain the gameplay aspects in each of the WoD types (mage, vampire, werewolf, etc.).
I DEMAND a game that does not conform to the crap we have today. I don't want a re-skinned clone. I want fresh new ideas...
"A player that choses to be a wraith cannot interact with any other PC races while they are alive. They can explore the world and manipulate living creatures, but will only be able to communicate with other PC when they have been dead for an amount of time."
See how easy that was?
Also, I have no idea how well time travel would factor into the game, but it'd be a neat way to integrate all those various time periods the OP mentioned.
... actually, screw that, just put it in the Victorian era.
If we're really, really, REALLY lucky, we'll get the option to play a spirit. Which I would do even if the stats sucked.
They are not going to do a new game based on Apocalypse, Masqeurade or any of those titles.
No, that's not what happened... At least from the last time I read the books. WoD 2.0 is a whole new setting, they scrapped everything and restarted from scratch.
As far as how I know this (about any game their doing being in this setting), I don't for sure. But white wolf has given up on their previous lines and focused on their new brands, so I highly doubt they are going to turn around and make a game based on their old brands all of the sudden.
I can't see why they wouldn't use the standard nWoD. They certainly wouldn't use oWoD unless they're planning on using V:TES to pull the CCG crowd in.
I can't see how it won't kind of suck though, as they won't be able to force roleplay...which means its just vampire and werewolves killing shit for fun. Not very WoD.
Ravnos(if that's his name), the Antediluvian, or founder, of the Ravnos clan was killed in the 3rd edition I believe. I guess the story changes just to keep settings a bit fresh, and to coincide with more novels.
Right, I meant that it was a whole new system, though the new system happens to share many of the old clans and a lot of other similarities. But before it started, Gehenna and/or the Apocalypse officially happened in the last system.
pants will explode
If not then I am still very interested as I love Werewolves and Vampires.
Mine already did.
Most of the stuff in Bloodlines can already go into an MMO pretty easily, really the only thing in it that makes it single player is the ending and major NPCs not being around anymore if you offed them.
Hell, most of the major NPCs that change in the course of the game are in buildings anyways, so you could instance all the buildings and make the city areas (Santa Monica, Downtown, Hollywood, Chinatown) the 'shared' areas, sorta like Guild Wars...
Just Finished: Borderlands (waste of $7)/Mario Brothers U/The Last Story/Tropico 4
Currently Playing: NS2/ZombiU/PlanetSide 2/Ys/Dota2/Xenoblade Chronicles
On Hold: Prince of Persia: Warrior Within/GW2/Scribblenauts
Coming Next: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones/X-Com Classic
Will it keep the nWoD theme?
This will be hard to do in an MMO. I'm not expecting decent roleplaying or whatever, but that the game itself feels like an nWoD game. If they can make it feel like Bloodlines (or an equivalent based on whatever super you're playing), then I'm cool with that.
The second:
Will it be PVP centric?
nWoD is light on the super vs. super elements. Werewolves can't go around slaughtering the fuck out of whatever, because they aren't automatically at war with anything that isn't also a werewolf, for example.
It's even pretty light on intrasuper conflicts outside of "bad guy" factions.
Having knock down, drag out fights in the barrens of the city isn't what nWoD is about. They happen occasionally, but they're extremely rare, real shit + fan moments. Big fights happening all the time would be lame.
The third:
How will advancement happen?
In EVE, even with non-linear advancement, you can only really benefit from advancement in a linear fashion.
In WoD, after you max out one stat, you can just move on to the other. And the more stats you have, the more powerful you can become. And of course, supernaturals who raise their supernatural power stat (which is the foundation for all their magic juju) can eventually raise their attributes and skills higher than the base cap...
And since you can take advantage of your powers pretty much all the time, you just keep getting better.
That's pretty non-sustainable in a PVP centric game. You thought titans were rough in EVE? Wait until you see a Blood Potency 10 vampire with 10 in each stat and all Disciplines maxed.
Seriously - if ANY RPG setting would make a god-damned awesome MMO, it's motherfucking Exalted.
I had this thought today. nWoD would be hard to make into an MMO and maintain the feel. Exalted on the other hand, not so much.
It also allows the game to be far more story driven. You can have graduated levels of areas like most MMORPGs, but instead of having 50 people in the zone, you'd just have your team of 5, a la COH strikeforce or whatever it was that you played 10 missions in a row together. That would keep your character importance high, you can impact the world, and shit can go down without it breaking the story line.
It also allows for an excellent opportunity to build a game around having some permanent NPCs and settings. Hell, they can allow you to own houses, build your own little clan, a la Neverwinter Nights 2 or something... and as the badass of your team, you team up with your boys (other players) and go change the world.
The biggest obstacle I see to this MMO is generating content. As of now, CCP isn't so practiced in filling their game with a lot of content; most of it is player-generated. Let's face it: space is, by and large, empty. A bustling metropolis, on the other hand, requires a lot more work to create and represent in a way that satisfies the player. I personally feel CCP is not up to this task, but that is just opinion, and only time will tell the quality of product they turn out.
In fact, based on that, I am assuming that WoD Online will take place almost exclusively in one large city, just with some wilderness areas set up for werewolf lowbies (unless werewolves start out in the city park, a possibility). One of the things I think this game will excel at is generating the right atmosphere for different parts of the city, namely that "Security Levels" will translate well into representing wealthier parts of the city versus the nearly lawless slums.
One other obstacle of the game is managing combat power levels, especially when dealing with PvP content. Werewolves are more powerful than vampires in toe-to-toe combat in almost all cases, so how do you balance this? One possible way is to grant vampire characters thralls with which to increase their prowess in combat, but this may lead to a level of micromanagement that discourages the average player. You could also enforce server population control, thus ensuring there are more vampires than werewolves, but this may anger players by forcing them to play something they may have no interest in playing.
There is a lot of work ahead for CCP, and hopefully they've got the funding and know-how to put something out that meets or exceeds anticipation and expectation.
"Go up, thou bald head." -2 Kings 2:23
Base Power takes x secs to cast
and from there you can add stuff, increase cast time or fatigue or whatever. If you do this in front of a human the world says "nah" and you get whacked hard. Make it perma-death as well and there won't be many mages, but when you see one, its respect time.
AKA want to cast a fireball?
Take medium ball base, add fire, add range, add cast on move to make your own fireball spell. It takes 9 secs to cast and does moderate damage. Want to set stuff on fire? Sorry, thats another second added to cast time.
Maybe you just want to replicate a gun that never runs out of ammo, so its only a low chance of paradox.
So you pump up item creation, and buy a gun, and enchant a clip....sure you aren't great with a gun, and other classes cant use it, but you dont have ammo concerns anymore.
You could even make new spellparts cost experience points....
Hell if you could make a system where you pick and choose elements to make your own spells Id buy it so hard.
White FC: 0819 3350 1787
Darkness: The Darkening
They're like 20% rules (which are often hard to understand, contradictory, or statistically backward) and 80% awesome, awesome, awesome fluff and background.
If they let WW handle the writing and handle the mechanical implementation themselves, I think this will be pretty sweet...
Here's hoping for the other changing breeds, though. Gonna Shiva some bitches with mah panther...
As for rules and game mechanics and such, I beleive that mostly up to CCP. Often the strict rules don't translate into a real time setting very well, and the game mecahnics need to be changed. I think most people look for the overall "feel" and setting that an IP provides such as WoD, instead of the nitty gritty.
For those of you wanting a Diablo/Guildwars type thing, don't be rediculous. Too many of those retarded instance games have been given the MMO title (a whole other can of worms). An RPG should never be limited. It's the massive 50 vs 50 battles that really make things insanely fun. Those instanced games get old fast, because you are just doing dungeon runs over and over.
I was thinking something like UO, except not the cheesy isometic graphics. Imagine Morrowind, but in the present, and with hundreds of people all running around.