Search Results
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-04-27 23:33:14
Will a larger enemy creatures in the open world, such as a buffalo, have a longer time-to-kill and more rewards, or will it be more efficient to defeat multiple smaller enemies, and can you give an idea of the time-to-kill you have for a large creature like that?
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-06-12 02:59:05
A couple of key factors contribute to games feeling realistic and immersive, for me. Clear art direction I find games with a distinct, consistent visual style to be more interesting and "alive", regardless of whether their chosen art style is a "realistic" one. AoC's environment art team have done a great job on this so far - the environments I've seen in the alpha are well-executed and visually striking. The biomes seem to have a clear visual identity, with restrained and deliberately chosen dominant colors. I particularly like the assets in use in the jungle areas - the trees ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-02 00:22:48
Hi all, to follow up on what @Azherae said, while procedural generation of content in the context of an MMO is within the realm of technical feasibility, there are a lot of non-obvious challenges which make it difficult in practice. 1. How procedural terrain generation works In order for this to make sense, I need to give a brief explanation of how terrain is normally generated in procedurally-driven games. The most common technique for dynamic generation of terrain in video games utilizes computational tools call noise functions, most commonly Simplex noise . These generate continuously-changing 2D or 3D fields ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-03 06:55:56
Looks like the forum software added some extra characters in front of my links, sorry about that. I've edited the original post, and it looks like the links in it are working now. @neuroguy Yes, to elaborate a bit on the points you brought up, I don't mean to imply that Intrepid's level designers couldn't use procedural generation as a base to start from - I think modifying an algorithmically-generated terrain would make for a fairly good workflow, with some advantages over a more manual workflow. Rather, the point I want to get at is that quite a few ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-09 07:32:34
What I'm interested in playing The archetype of character I'm most interested in playing is something like an Arcane Berserker - a heavy-hitting powerhouse who can boost their single-target damage, and who has the mobility to get back out of range after inevitably pulling hate. This seems to match up pretty well with Spellsword (Fighter/Mage), at least within the concept of Mage augments @Azherae predicts Intrepid will use. I'd apply Lingering Element to whatever Fighter's big single-hit ability ends up being called, to boost my damage higher and enable me to quickly take out enemies that aggro, or land ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-13 18:01:50
In short, yes, but there's a fairly good reason for it to be that way. Third-person games have some unique design constraints which necessitate a larger scale than is strictly "realistic", since characters need a lot of room to move around comfortably, and the camera needs to be able to zoom out without getting stuck on anything. This is a larger problem in MMOs, where dozens of characters might need to occupy the same room for an event like a siege or raid, while still having enough room to reposition freely. At a "normal" scale, environments would feel cramped ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-27 20:01:51
So your assertion is that you wish for proximity chat because you want Ashes to work as a social game, but the primary thing you intend to actually use it for is relentlessly taunting the people you plan to grief? You understand that "the social aspect of the game" disintegrates pretty quickly when people are bombarded with constant toxicity, right? I just can't fathom how you're expecting to get what you want here. Players will have a few run-ins with people like you, conclude proximity chat to be a worthless toxic cesspit, then quietly disable it and forget it ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-28 17:15:53
I dislike the tendency a lot of people in design roles have towards devaluing user feedback. People aren't always good at articulating what they want, and not all their suggestions will be applicable or actionable, but this doesn't mean that designers should just disregard it completely. Interpreting and critically analyzing what users are saying is one of the core skills a designer needs to build if they want to make products which people can actually use. In the projects I've worked on, even suggestions which seemed to be based on a fundamental misunderstanding of how a product worked, or ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-29 03:12:28
@Noaani I don't think that I misunderstand you, I just vehemently disagree with your core premise. I can't grasp believing that, in a user-centric field, the opinions of users are valueless. Are you familiar with the concept of a focus group? Understanding the relative priorities of your players is going to be pretty essential when you're prioritizing what to implement. When I'm building websites, I don't wait until I've finished implementing everything to start discussing my designs with the client, or testing it with users. If you're worked in a design-centric field, then you must understand that when you're ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-29 19:54:48
I agree, passives that foster gameplay decisions are definitely more interesting. I mentioned this on Twitter, but to elaborate a bit, I think that passive abilities can really encourage players to use more unconventional playstyles, when they have conditional effects, or when they involve a tradeoff between attributes. The example I used was a tank ability which would add a damage and accuracy bonus when the player was below 1/3rd HP, to incentivize a riskier high-commitment playstyle. Another example might be increasing the activation time of an attack, in exchange for greater ultimate damage. This would make the attack ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-29 21:07:55
I have a pretty different opinion on this. So far, I've found the lighting in the alpha to be very good, and the high amount of ambient light helpful for making environments easy to visually interpret. MMOs have different design requirements from a lot of other types of games, so while strongly contrasted shadows and large areas of darkness might work well in something like a single-player FPS, they don't work as well here, where high visibility is necessary. I haven't seen all the interior spaces in the alpha, so it's possible that Intrepid haven't yet done a lighting ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2021-07-30 21:23:58
That was a great stream, thanks to Intrepid for keeping us up to date on development! I have some thoughts on the new melee combat system. A few other people in the thread have already touched on this, but I feel that there are some advantages to the root motion system which may be lost by switching to a full split body model. While the forward-lunging attack strings currently in the alpha might not be ideal, I liked the idea of attacks having a deliberate, committed motion. Part of what I like about using heavy weapons in RPGs is ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-03-29 21:06:12
I have a similar perspective. For me, a lot of the fun of an exploration and combat-heavy RPG is not knowing for sure whether you'll be able to take on any given enemy, and needing to experiment and take risks to work out what you can handle. However, it's still probably good to give players at least a general idea of where they stand relative to a given enemy. Some guesswork and uncertainty are interesting, but having no idea at all the strength of a monster might be frustrating in practice. I think that the color-coded enemy names in ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-03-31 21:13:19
I've just watched the most recent dev stream, and the new character creator looks fantastic. I was really impressed with both the base character models, and the range of customization options available. The base models looks great, and strike a good balance between realism and stylization, with well-defined silhouettes and nice crisp edges around facial features. While I have a decent idea of how the dev team might have implemented some of the more conventional character creator features (customizing height, bulk, skin tone, etc), I'm curious how they approached things like the hair and facial feature customization from a ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-05-23 11:10:26
Will all cooking fall within the Crafting artisan path, or will some aspects of it fall under Processing instead?
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-05-24 16:36:27
Yes, this is all more or less correct. If character models have relatively similar overall proportions, armor created for one race can be deformed to fit another without the artist needing to do anything beyond tweaking the asset to prevent clipping or visible distortion due to differences in proportions. All the pieces of a single set of armor would also probably be designed and modeled at once, then split up into separate files. So, it's probably more accurate to think of a full set of armor, rather than a gear piece like "Mithril Boots" or "Leather Tunic", as an ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-05-27 20:12:38
What aspects of weather in-game are important to you? Pretty much everything mentioned on the stream. The only point which wasn't specifically noted was weather and wind direction affecting the steering and speed of ships, as this seems like it would result in interesting gameplay. Do you feel anything is missing from the weather system that we’ve shared so far? This looks phenomenal so far, the weather tech is impressive, and the art direction and environment assets shown off on stream are, as always, fantastic. Looking forward to seeing more. Are there types of weather in other games that ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-05-28 14:12:43
I haven't personally used SpeedTree, but based on my experience with similar software and a quick skim through their documentation, I believe Azherae is sort of right, but might be missing some context. Specifically, SpeedTree is software for parametric modeling, where an artist defines the base structure of a piece of foliage, then uses randomization to fill in details which would be tedious or difficult to model by hand. This means it's relatively easy to create multiple variations of any given asset, within a range of parameters. Here's an example from SpeedTree's docs. However, these variants are generally exported ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-06-19 22:09:14
Are the "waterfall stats" seen in Alpha 1 and referenced on the wiki (Power, Wisdom, Mentality) set in stone, or are these still subject to change going forward?
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-08-24 16:46:14
So your argument is really just that the people on your side are the ones who are ignorant of the situation and don't want to learn about it?
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-09-29 18:40:47
I am the Greataxe-wielding fighting in this situation, so that's my answer.
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-11-17 19:15:54
Since Azherae's my group's economist, I basically agree with her on all of the above. Item variety is good in principle, but if there are too many things which are basically just interchangeable and don't have different uses, it's irritating. One thing which I'd want to make sure is taken into account is the balance between the number of different crafting items in the game vs available inventory space. If there are a ton of different items needed for a particular profession, but inventory space is too constrained, high-level crafting becomes tedious and frustrating quickly, since you're constantly trying ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2022-12-03 00:27:13
Yet oddly, none of the clerics have asked for any information on the skills.
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-01-04 22:23:14
I'm also pretty uninterested in a combat system where threat/hate mechanics are determined primarily by who engages first. In all the MMOs I've previously enjoyed, management of threat was an active process which everyone in the party needed to be aware of. Stuff like "the DPS needing to decide whether to commit to burst damage, based on how confident they are that the tank has control of the situation", or "quickly cycling aggro away from the healer when they need to save someone" for instance, is important to me feeling engaged, and feeling like my party has the potential ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-02-08 18:56:36
I don't really understand the question because, in a mechanically challenging game, I don't see how a player could do this without dying the process. Kiting strong enemies around without actually fighting them seems like it should just result in you getting killed.
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-02-21 20:36:58
For the Mage's elemental augment school, is the intention that players have any choice between elements for a given ability, or for example, would my spinning slash always be lightning?
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-03-21 17:34:49
<GM> 1d64 <&Dice> GM, 1d64: 21 "npcs have no life, they never go visit their family elsewhere, they have nothing to do except stand there and wait for you" The problem with this one is that players often find needing to track down an NPC who's wandered off somewhere to be frustrating and tedious. Imagine not being able to complete a quest because the NPC you need to talk to is in another city, or needing to wait an hour to buy an item you need because a merchant is asleep. Having said that, FFXI did do something like ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-03-21 17:50:59
<GM> 1d64 <&Dice> GM, 1d64: 40 "no weather cycles" FFXI has weather, which affects, in no particular order, mob spawns, item drops, the damage of elemental spells and weaponskills, and sometimes what routes are available through an area (e.g. an entrance into a cave being frozen over during a blizzard). There are NPC weather forecasters, who will give you an idea of the weather over the next few in-game days, so you can plan what you're doing. There are also seasons, which affect the likelihood of different types of weather in different areas.
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-03-21 18:05:35
<GM> 1d64 <&Dice> GM, 1d64: 43 "no company monitors player vs mob performance in dungeons and areas and adapt the challenge, if you bring a party that can overkill the dungeon, then the mobs will never adapt their strategy in any way" In Abyssea (a series of endgame zones with strong bosses in FFXI) if you repeatedly kill enemies in an area, when they respawn, they'll be at a higher level. This can ramp up the danger they represent to a group significantly. Similarly in Aht Urhgan (an area from an earlier expansion), there's a mechanic where a structure ...
Post by GrandSerpent on 2023-03-21 18:39:41
<GM> 1d64 <&Dice> GM, 1d64: 4 "mini-bosses are always in the same area" In FFXI, there's a wandering Sandworm boss, which moves around between different zones. It can be basically anywhere within seven different zones, and tracking it down after it respawns is part of the challenge. There are also a ton of bosses with weird, somewhat unpredictable spawn conditions. Some spawn within a general area some amount of time (hours or days) after they were last killed, others spawn in place of another similar mob somewhere in a zone, meaning that where they are can be unpredictable.