Comments on: Darkfall NDA Lifted, UO Wants Their Backpacks Back

By: IainC

IainC — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 13:21:57 +0000

chimp : The guy who writes this blog should play the game before writing snarky posts.

He did. Ten years ago. He even wrote the same things about the same problems back then. Welcome to the land where everything old is new again.

By: chimp

chimp — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 10:20:34 +0000

The guy who writes this blog should play the game before writing snarky posts.

By: J.

J. — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 02:44:58 +0000

EpicSquirt : @J. “The Mordred Problem” is a problem of levels and not a problem of free for all PvP.

Actually, it's more of a problem where people who want to PvP are either haves or have-nots when it comes to "ability," and "ability" is purely defined by the mechanics of the MMO at the time, and that further, the "have-nots" will eventually give up and find some other game that's fun unless there's something else for them to do, leaving the "haves" as kings of the dustheap until they, too, bail.

By: EpicSquirt

EpicSquirt — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 15:50:19 +0000

@Vetarnias Yeah, the melee combat looks broken. The complete skill system might as well be broken, I don't know. Raising through training (using) might be the wrong approach due to macroing. Giving experience or some kind of karma instead (for something) which would allow to raise skills to certain levels in exchange would be my preferred solution.

By: EpicSquirt

EpicSquirt — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 15:45:57 +0000

@IainC
Yes, but level-based systems treat this crap as features! Many games with levels have stuff like to hit and to miss modifiers, e.g. lower level characters can’t hit high levels and high level characters get to hit bonuses. Why?! Usually it just forces everyone to level as fast as possible to the maximum level, even in DAoC’s battlegrounds it was almost impossible for a level 20 to kill a level 24 character.

The developers who developed games without levels but games with skill-systems in place which put in effect all the weaknesses of a level-based system, they totally missed the point of a skill-based system (which should not offer exorbitant advantages to trained up skills btw.).

Anyway, the recently released MMOs I’ve played (TR, AoC, Warhammer) and DAoC all suffer from the level difference problems.

If one guy in Darkfall or Guild Wars (which has just level 20 for PvP characters) has always a 100% chance to gank 8 newbies we shall talk again.

By: Wufiavelli

Wufiavelli — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 15:39:39 +0000

The devs have even said they are not to happy with the hype around their game. They want a small core and that is what it needs. All these people thinking it is the next war or aoc really need to know what they are getting into. As for audience with this i will leave that to time.(have debated this before and we both failed to convince the other).

Also though this game is extremely rough around the edges, stable as hell. But things are just not balanced correctly, skill gaining speeds, crafting costs, and other thing need to be flushed out.

PLus if you want to watch a cluster F. this games launch is going to be comical sadly. Hopefullyn this will drive the people away who do not know what they are getting into.

As for eve comparison. Yeh eve does really have the best setup for hardcoreness vs safety. You get all the basics and fun in the secure areas. But the great stuff, best npcs, highest paying missions, ability to mass produce and make items is all done in the 0.0 areas

By: Vetarnias

Vetarnias — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 15:30:02 +0000

@EpicSquirt I can't wait to see how Aventurine will tackle the macroing and tricking-the-other-guy-into-striking-first issues, which are gearing up to be very problematic if the forum chitchat is accurate. I mean, beta players are almost unanimous in saying that it's being done openly.

By: IainC

IainC — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:56:34 +0000

@EpicSquirt That's not a problem of levels. That's a problem of combat balance. The same thing can (and does) happen in systems without levels.

By: EpicSquirt

EpicSquirt — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:52:13 +0000

@J.
“The Mordred Problem” is a problem of levels and not a problem of free for all PvP. I have quit two PBAoE groups which were leveling on the European DAoC PvP server, one between level 40-45 and the other between 20-30. Reason? One level 50 Shaman ganking the shit out of us.

So Scott promotes levels, but levels just fail ultra hard in some cases. I recently resubscribed Age of Conan, to have a first-hand look of what changed: my level 21 Guardian didn’t scratch a level 22 Bearshaman, my level 46 Conqueror didn’t scratch a level 50 Barbarian. I stopped playing again.

You have to realize that some people are tired of all this. Darkfall isn’t for everyone, the developers’ expectations have been already surpassed. And even if some several hundreds of thousands of players subscribe to Darkfall because it got hyped beyond recognition like all the other recently released games, and even if the bubble collapses after 3 months, I am quite sure, that at the end of the day they’re will be enough players left to keep the developer’s expectations still surpassed.

Aventurine seems much more less naive than Mythic was with when it comes to determination of what to develop and for what audience.

By: JuJutsu

JuJutsu — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:16:51 +0000

“Its fun to relive the dangerous old days of UO, before the industry realized that people will pay more to pretend that they are heroes or villains instead of actually being one.”

I’m shocked that anyone is deluded enough to think PvP offers the opportunity for actual heroics and PvE does not. If you want to be a real hero turn off the computer and go help someone in the real world. It’s tough out there now, you’ll have lots of opportunity.