Discussion about grinds

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14th reference on this page says that it was Jeff who pushed for SWG's crafting mechanics for Ashes.

Outside of that, Ashes will have personal shops that will most likely be used to advertise crafting/processing - L2 had people sitting in towns, with small "billboards" over their heads, selling their crafting services directly.

Ashes will use all tiers of materials in the crafting process of all tiers of items (or at least close to that). L2 had this exact design.

Ashes will use recipes to craft items. They'll be rare and can be learned and traded. L2 had this exact design.

Ashes will have BiS be craftable, with mats for those items dropping from bosses together with full gear (iirc). L2 had this exact design.

All of those things are at the core of Ashes crafting system. And on top of that we have Jeff's great contributions of SWG's systems of dials and material-quality-based stats (if I understood it correctly).

So as I said in my previous comment, Ashes takes some great concepts from their "previous games" (those being L2 and AA) and then adds some good shit on top of it. The only variable between my example of EQ2 doing this is that Ashes is getting developed by a completely different team. So A LOT will depend on how well they can realize their design goals and inspirations.

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Yeah, that means that they added a ton of stuff to make the system even better. And I'm glad about that because I loved L2's crafting system already and AoC's seems even better.

Decay definitely relates to economy though. Decay is a material sink which is a gold sink in a free market game. If you don't have a material sink, all your materials become super cheap because they're endless, and your gold inflates to all hell because everything is cheap. Decay influencing economy.

L2 had "decay" in the form of 60% chance to craft a piece of gear and then even lower chances when OEing it. That was their material/gold sink. On top of the materials themselves being super rare, but that's more of a speed-controlling tool rather than a preventive one.

But even with both of those tools, bots would outpace them in material production because the game wasn't balanced around 24/7 farming at industrial scale. Which is why Intrepid gotta do their best to ban any and all bots, cause they'll ruin the economy for sure.

NiKr wrote: »

Decay definitely relates to economy though. Decay is a material sink which is a gold sink in a free market game. If you don't have a material sink, all your materials become super cheap because they're endless, and your gold inflates to all hell because everything is cheap. Decay influencing economy.

L2 had "decay" in the form of 60% chance to craft a piece of gear and then even lower chances when OEing it. That was their material/gold sink. On top of the materials themselves being super rare, but that's more of a speed-controlling tool rather than a preventive one.

But even with both of those tools, bots would outpace them in material production because the game wasn't balanced around 24/7 farming at industrial scale. Which is why Intrepid gotta do their best to ban any and all bots, cause they'll ruin the economy for sure.

I'm not sure this is exactly true, though.

A Material Sink is not in any way directly equivalent to a Gold Sink, and it's BECAUSE they aren't equivalent that the problems arise. It's a common mistake to make, but you may be thinking of deflationary pressures which are a big problem in MMOs due to the oversupply of materials.

If you are used to games where NPCs buy materials, for 'reasonable prices' and not 'floor prices set equalized to the gold sinks' it can be this way, but in games where NPC prices for materials are much lower than standard player market price (related to time spent, not actual value) the only reason a Material sink appears to be a Gold sink is because people like me who hoard the materials also hoard the gold.

So the gold disappears from the economy at LARGE until that type of person needs something, then they spend it and it bursts back into the economy. After that, just wait 3-6 business days and start all the mechanisms to return the gold back to you, a-grindin'.

In short, decay may relate to the gold economy, but there's at least one, if not two, intermediate steps in there, and if the Econ designer doesn't tune or notice these, other things break instead.

Azherae wrote: »

word.

Right, I mistook personal money spending for server-wide gold sinks. Main gold sink would be taxes in city shops and I thiiiink player stalls too but don't remember for sure now.

So in a way L2's mat sink was more of a dispersal of wealth that would then be sunk by the taxes, rather than a direct gold sink, right.

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I think the game should have party grinding quests that have rng for the mob sub-types.

If the quests asks your party to get 10k boar hides, there should be boars that counter ranged classes, melee classes, mage classes, anti-debuff boars, buff boars that make other boars stronger, etc. Each of them gives the whole party a hide, if we go with a quest-based item drops, or some sub-types should just drop more hides (cause the boar is thicker or smth), if we go with a regular mob drops being a part of quests requirement.

And solo quests should never make you grind, because solo quests will mostly be done by casuals (and off-primetime hardcores) so imo they shouldn't see the spooky numbers in the quest requirements.

NiKr wrote: »

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I think the game should have party grinding quests that have rng for the mob sub-types.

If the quests asks your party to get 10k boar hides, there should be boars that counter ranged classes, melee classes, mage classes, anti-debuff boars, buff boars that make other boars stronger, etc. Each of them gives the whole party a hide, if we go with a quest-based item drops, or some sub-types should just drop more hides (cause the boar is thicker or smth), if we go with a regular mob drops being a part of quests requirement.

And solo quests should never make you grind, because solo quests will mostly be done by casuals (and off-primetime hardcores) so imo they shouldn't see the spooky numbers in the quest requirements.

I would second this, but I already play with the 'superior system'.

So I'm going to 'plug' Tactical Points once again .

Give all boars five or six abilities, each countering a different situation or enemy type. They don't even need to properly react to who is attacking them. Just 'when being attacked by a full party, build up the Gauge faster for their special attacks'.

They then randomly 'become' a boar that 'counters Ranged', 'cleanses debuffs', etc.

Similarly, a related 'proc' system where the boar that uses 'Ironhide' ability drops more hide. The player doesn't control this, but they can at least observe it. Then you don't even have to do as much work with drop tables, you can tweak the AI.

"Boars in this area use one less ability, raising the overall chance that they will use Ironhide, therefore raising the hide droprates in this area slightly."

Azherae wrote: »

Give all boars five or six abilities, each countering a different situation or enemy type. They don't even need to properly react to who is attacking them. Just 'when being attacked by a full party, build up the Gauge faster for their special attacks'.

Eh, I personally like seeing a "community" of mobs of different kinds. And that lets the devs to make some small type-based animations that add an "alive" feeling to the world. I also prefer parties for fight several mobs which requires more teamplay, than playing a semi-boss-like mob that does a ton of dmg on each hit.

But whatever Intrepid goes with, I can get used to it.

NiKr wrote: »

Azherae wrote: »

Give all boars five or six abilities, each countering a different situation or enemy type. They don't even need to properly react to who is attacking them. Just 'when being attacked by a full party, build up the Gauge faster for their special attacks'.

Eh, I personally like seeing a "community" of mobs of different kinds. And that lets the devs to make some small type-based animations that add an "alive" feeling to the world. I also prefer parties for fight several mobs which requires more teamplay, than playing a semi-boss-like mob that does a ton of dmg on each hit.

But whatever Intrepid goes with, I can get used to it.

I don't see these things as exclusive? Perhaps I was unclear about that? Though now that you mention it, Alpha-1 did not do a particularly good job of matching what I'm used to in that regard, so I can't be sure that they intend to actually have enemy diversity around.

I continue to be surprised and amazed that the default experiences of others vary so massively, but I have been focused on one game for many years, so I definitely have some tunnel vision. I too easily 'discount' BDO style design as 'this can't possibly be the norm', when it probably is...

Azherae wrote: »

I continue to be surprised and amazed that the default experiences of others vary so massively, but I have been focused on one game for many years, so I definitely have some tunnel vision. I too easily 'discount' BDO style design as 'this can't possibly be the norm', when it probably is...

I mean, pretty much the only mmo I've played is L2 I've played BDO to maybe lvl 20? WoW classic to 30. B&S to somewhere around 40. Up to 30 in FF14. And maybe under an hour of gameplay in a few other mmos.

So I am insanely biased towards all the things I loved in L2. And there you'd have mobs with different subtypes and each type had their own abilities and when your group fought all of them you'd have to properly move around and control mobs. Get a silence on the mage, try to hold stun mobs away from healers/range players, put dagger classes on ranged mobs, try to nuke the debuffer mob first just so it's easier to fight everyone else.

NiKr wrote: »

Azherae wrote: »

I continue to be surprised and amazed that the default experiences of others vary so massively, but I have been focused on one game for many years, so I definitely have some tunnel vision. I too easily 'discount' BDO style design as 'this can't possibly be the norm', when it probably is...

I mean, pretty much the only mmo I've played is L2 I've played BDO to maybe lvl 20? WoW classic to 30. B&S to somewhere around 40. Up to 30 in FF14. And maybe under an hour of gameplay in a few other mmos.

So I am insanely biased towards all the things I loved in L2. And there you'd have mobs with different subtypes and each type had their own abilities and when your group fought all of them you'd have to properly move around and control mobs. Get a silence on the mage, try to hold stun mobs away from healers/range players, put dagger classes on ranged mobs, try to nuke the debuffer mob first just so it's easier to fight everyone else.

Well, I'll give you some data since it's relevant to the thread, always good to share, since you've given yours.

FFXI, desert biome style zone. Most populous enemy, medium sized birds that flap around. Then some big lizards interspersed. More rarely, some Goblins, which have approx 4 different classes (don't usually spawn with the class itself randomized), and rarer, amongst all this, giant scorpions.

If you choose to fight the Scorpion, and you hit it physically about 7-10 times (or it hits you that much, but if it's at-level you might die by then if you do absolutely nothing about it), it now has the ability to do one of the following, randomly.

Death Scissors: Very high damage, single target attack.
Mandible Bite: Single target damage + Knockback.
Poison Sting: Single target damage and Poison. (1 HP/tick)
Cold Breath: Cone Attack Ice damage and Bind.
Numbing Breath: Cone Attack Damage and Paralysis.
Earth Pounder: 15' AoE Dexterity Down, earth damage, wipes shadow images.
Wild Rage: 15' AoE physical damage, absorbed by 2 shadow images
Sharp Strike: 50% Attack Boost. 4 minute 15 second duration.

This means that most of the time, the Scorpion gets at least one chance to 'randomly' counter whatever your class is. If you are very defensive, it may overpower you with Sharp Strike. If you are very mobile, you may have to worry about Cold Breath. If your spells take a while to cast, Mandible Bite is guaranteed interruption of the cast. If you are squishy, you better have your health up in case of Death Scissors or some instant defensive ability.

This is what I'm used to relative to 'it not feeling as much like a grind'. Sure, you can get to the point where even this is no issue, or you're overleveled, but the general case is 'I need Scorpion Claws, but I have to worry that the special attack any given Scorpion uses will be a counter to my class and be ready to adapt'.

And of course, watch out that you don't get randomly aggroed by a nearby Goblin while you're fighting it and have two problems instead of one.

There's a whole subsystem for 'recognizing which types of enemy you are basically strong against in almost all situations' but for the strongest enemies in an area, their type normally prevents this, there aren't as many 'full counters to Scorpions'.

Given the way that Intrepid describes their design, this level of thing is the bare minimum I'm expecting, so it's hard to think about 'grinding' on the level of 'individual boars being just a point-and-click-rotation source of materials', even for the simplest enemies, unless you're just one-or-two-shotting most things.

Azherae wrote: »

Given the way that Intrepid describes their design, this level of thing is the bare minimum I'm expecting, so it's hard to think about 'grinding' on the level of 'individual boars being just a point-and-click-rotation source of materials', even for the simplest enemies, unless you're just one-or-two-shotting most things.

Yeah, Intrepid do claim that they want to get away from the idea of "grinding through repetition", so most likely it'll be lone strong mobs that give the required reward. But we'll have to see how it plays out, cause due to my own bias I find it hard to believe that an mmo can exist w/o some kind of grind, be it mobs or gathering or questing.

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Yes, we totally agree on that point. I'm just used to mobs always agroing in a group (cause L2 loved mob trains and aoes), so for me "having a group of mob sub-types" means "my party will have to fight all of them at once and find a way to win because fighting a group of mobs that have a counter to pretty much my whole party is difficult".

So like I said, whichever way Intrepid goes, I'll get used to it. It just needs to be fun for all the other people that would leave a game over some mobs not being to their liking. Though obviously you can't appeal to all.