f13.net

I keep seeing Vanguard in SPT's posts, and a friend of mine kept mentioning it.  I went poking around for info, and found there really isn't a whole lot out there.  The one thing I did find, was a collection of posts by an accountant working for Sigil, who has permission to talk about his beta experiences.  You can find his collected posts here: The Book of Oloh (http://www.silkyvenom.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1893).

After reading that, I'm much more interested in the game.  Looks to be the most interesting combat system in an MMO yet... Some similarities to DDO's, but less twitchy, more strategery.  Most of the stuff is about a warrior, as that's the author's primary character, tho there is some info on magic-users in there too.  It all looks very good.

I still have some concerns about the game;  namely, is the combat engine enough to avoid The Grind.  Does Character development occur at a frequent enough rate to prevent boredom.  Is soloing seriously an option for all characters, both numbers-wise and content-wise.  What about the other parts of the game, crafting, the 'diplomacy' thing, quests and whatnot.  Oloh's stuff doesn't really answer these questions.

Alkiera

Someone with more time than I have to spare right now please Educate Alkeria for his own good. Thanks.

Read and learn. (http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=3457.0)

Some short answers:


It's McQuaid's baby. The Grind IS the game. Remember EQ1? That wasn't hardcore enough.


See above.


Remember EQ1? Yeah, that's it.


Crafting will be useless and shiney upon release, or broken yet working as intended. Diplomacy? Either it won't work, or think of something like EQ2's crafting mini-game. Quests? I'm sure they'll have a lot of them, many of which will involve killing a bazillion of one thing, or waiting for the uber rare spawn to pop up once every 3rd new moon, only to be killed by the meth-addicted monkey whose been sitting waiting for that spawn since its last appearance before you ever get a swing off.

Actually HRose has written some things about Vanguard. I didn't really read them because that would mean reading HRose's site, but you're more than welcome to poke around.

The cesspit (http://www.cesspit.net/)

Now why you want to go and do a thing like link to that site?

Some of hrose's ideas are good, but you don't get the essence of them unless you read them in the original Klingon.

Well, I haven't written much about Vanguard if not to repeat that all we know about it is just fluff and hype.

In particular the combat system (http://www.cesspit.net/drupal/node/974) described by that Oloh.

It's Christmas.

You're starting the Festivus Airing of Grievances early then.

HRose says lovely things about f13 on his site.  Don't be mean... he just want's to play! 

I'll give Vanguard a go in much the same way I give everything a go.  From McQuaid's own words in several interviews, however, it might be just a bit too group-centric for me.  I like playing in a group but I don't always have the time or inclination to spend an hour or so finding one, figuring what we're going to do and making plans.  Most times I just want to get in, play for an hour or so and log off.  If I'm in a nice, big active guild it doesn't matter so much as there's usually a group to be had. 

The rocks in that game still frighten me, too.

Vanguard, Festivus, Feats of Strength

discuss

You'll get your Festivus celebration stuff soon enough. Now if you don't mind, I need to go debuff a tree.

I dig chicks with low standards.  That's my bag, baby.

I actually have a prediction about Vanguard, assuming it isn't vapor.  I predict that the raiding will start very early: after hitting level three, you will be required to form a pickup raid with thirty other newbs to take down a boss rat.

Don't Forget This (http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=5255.0), where Brad holds forth on some of his personal design philosphies...

Xilren

Alright, so... nothing new, and no one knows any more than I do.  That's pretty much what I wanted to know.

Yeah, Haemish, I played EQ for 5 years, and I know who Brad is.  Given the state of EQ2, it's obvious those left at SOE were not the reason EQ did so well.  In fact, most of my problems with EQ started right around the time he left.  Admittedly, I liked a few changes that occured after he left, but for the most part, expansions after that point were terrible from my standpoint.  So much designed around pleasing the FoH crowd, widening the gap between the uberguild and the casual.  I'm curious what he'll design, given the chance to do it all again.  The FAQ for the game seems to have some pretty nice ideas for dealing with some of the issues we all hate in MMOs, the grind, etc.  I left EQ because I'd finished it, gotten as far as I could without huge time consuming raids.  heck, I even did some raiding...  I just got bored of it.  Unlike you, I didn't leave angry, just bored.  I'm willing to give him another chance.


Also, having visited cesspit.net,  I feel that HRose is not terribly familiar with PnP D&D.  The whole point of DDO is to transition the PnP experience to online.  IMO, it's a faithful transition... and also, a blast.

If you're trying to play it single player... that's probably part of the problem.  The game is designed as a party experience.  From it's origins as a ruleset for miniatures combat, it's the collection of different classes that provide interesting situations.  Like running thru a warehouse with 3 subtle thieves sneaking around... followed by a loud, metal-armor clad, entirely non-subtle cleric.  Things would hear me coming, miss the rogues entirely... until they felt the dagger in the back.  Good times.

Alkiera

Therein lies the rub. If a game is not at all fun alone, then it will have a narrower appeal than one that is. That's fine, of course, as long as your budget can support 100k-200k consistent subscriptions. It's not fine if you want to expand the market though. It's also of questionable validity with Microsoft publishing it. Does anyone think they really want another AC1 in a genre of EQs and WoWs?

I like Brad's thinking, having read his stuff for years. But it's mostly because he knows the exact demographic he wants to attract. Success comes from giving your players what they want, particularly when they didn't know they wanted it. It doesn't matter to me that I'm not in that demographic in the least. I only question whether it's big enough.

And I'd love to know how he knows WoW cost $75mil to make. I've heard that, and $84mil. I can also imagine why the game cost that much. But I haven't yet seen any valid source for the numbers, so its hard to know if WoW really cost three times as much as EQ2 to make (which SOE themselves reported as costing around $25mil).

I wouldn't give you a go, you know.

I'll try Vanguard.

I probably will not play it long after I try it.

I am getting more and more tired of gaming as the days go on. I lose hope and the recommendations of fanboi01's do nothing for me.

P.S.:

For the most part, Alkiera, I have given up on Vanguard being anything then what it is appearing to be. EQ the Sequel. Although once a fan of what it could be, I have put down the torch. I currently have reinstalled DAoC and am playing that again on a 14 day trial.

I am fairly sympathetic to McQuaid.  I think SWG and EQ2 demonstrate that he was the person in SoE with real talent and vision.  I think he does a great job at creating atmosphere -- WoW is the only game close to EQ in this department, and that's a big part of why they are the two dominant games in the genre.  I look forward to seeing what kind of atmosphere he can create with the tools and money now at his disposal.

I also am more sympathetic to PvE and PvE-raid oriented content than most people here.  I like raiding if the raids are fun, don't require obscene amounts of time, and I am not guilded with assholes. What I won't ever put up with again, however, is standing in line with my dick in my hand because there isn't anything worthwhile to fight, everything having been killed by people who play earlier in the day or more advanced guilds or whatever.  Never.  Again.  Will.  I.  Pay.  Money.  For.  That.

McQuaid's irrational fear of instancing will probably lead to exactly that.  He says that they'll have so much content that it won't matter.  But that would take more than 10x the content WoW has, and VG is projected (by McQuaid) to have less than 1/10th the subscription income WoW has.  Even taking Blizzard's slowness into account, the math just doesn't add up.  So I imagine we'll see lines, or lots of SWG/LDoN-style modular crap content.  Neither of which I'll pay for. 

The third option is that they'll just use their "Advanced Encounter System" (read: instancing but inferior in every respect) to institute de facto instancing for most/all raid targets.  That might be enough to make the endgame work for me.

The other thing that scares me is that the combat mechanics positively reek of Everquest II.

EQ2?  Hrm.  If anything, I'd most compare them to maybe WoW.  WoW is the only live game I know of that treats certain specials as 'part of your next swing' instead of making it a completely seperate thing from autoattack(like a WoW rogue's instants), or having it's own damage/delay and having it interrupt autoattack (like other WoW melee specials, and all EQ2 specials).

The only thing they have that is anything like EQ2 is the chain/group chain system...  and DAoC has had chains forever, FFXI has renraku or whatever... Apparently the EQ2 Heroic opportunity system came from some notes Brad left behind, or the memory of another dev after he left;  they took what they had and the result was Heroic Opportunities, which started out only semi useful, and haven't really gotten any better since, only easier to perform.  They didn't really make any sense, half of them, anyway.

Really, in my own thoughts, I've always thought combat needed to be slowed down to be made more interesting.  We complain about lack of active defenses in MMO combat, but with all the issues regarding 'twitch'(both technical and personal), to do that you have to slow down combat some.  Give the player time to see what their opponent is going to do, and some way to counter that.  Then, combat between two skilled players looks like combat between two skilled fighters... swing, parry, swing, parry, swing, parry, etc, with increasingly impressive attacks and parries.  Not the current system of have all defenses be automagical, and anything that doesn't work for, I just suck up and drink a potion to cure.  It's one way out of the competeing bags of hitpoints model.  It allows things to be more like Bushido Blade, and less like a dikumud.

Alkiera

Agreed. Something like and enhanced version of Mount & Blade's combat system would get my money in a big fat fucking hurry.

I was eating yoghurt. I now have a yoghurt flavoured monitor. Thank you.

What the fuck is yoghurt?

Wimin-only aliment.

Ok, someone's playing a joke on me.

Bah, no fair to pick on only the last, throwaway line!  Anyway, there are two main things that reminded me of EQ2.  First are the HOs, which are close to the stupidest, least immersive thing I've ever seen.  But even aside from the HOs themselves, VG combat from that writeup sounds a lot like EQ2's HO system and exactly like EQ2's tradeskill system.  Icons flash up and you click the button of the corresponding counter-icon.  I'm not paying $15/mo to play Simon.  More precisely, I am aware of the fact that all games ultimately reduce to this, but you need to do a much, much better job of hiding it than VG's system sounds like it will do.  EQ and WoW are all about hiding the "gamey" mechanics in a way that makes you feel like you are in a world.  This is too nakedly "gamey".

There is also the "we'll have a ton of classes that fulfill the same role with identical efficiency but they'll be different I promise" which either leads to sameness (no actual difference) or stupidity (they struggle to add 4 ways of healing that feel different that standard healing, 3 of which feel really really stupid) and (because of the Simon combat system) everyone will have a quadrillion abilities with stupid names that do the same damn thing for icon-matching purposes rather than a much smaller number more interesting abilities.

Anyway, I obviously haven't played the game and I am very eager to try it out.  I hope I'm wrong about the things I fear, or at least that the goodies will make up for them.


Totally agree, but I fear VG will be a step towards the consolization of MMO combat rather than a step in that direction.

I would have no problem with the consolization of MMOG combat if it were more like Zelda, Soul Caliber, or even ICO. Hell, I'm trying to invision a way in which the consolization would be bad. And I can't. MMOG combat is just that weak.

You should love DDO then.

Alkiera

I should not have used the c-word, it will derail this thread into threads we've had before.  Replace it with "mindless button mashing."

:nda:


Wait, there's something new to say about MMOGs? Damn, I've lost the pulse of online gaming.

They always quote your typos.  Remember kids, use spell check!

/agree

Is everyone forgetting about:
  Server Lag
  Client Lag
  Internet Lag
  Packet Loss
  Client/Server getting out of sync due to above?

Magically developers can 'code around' these problems?

The more twich added to MMOGs the more the above makes the game 'unplayable'  on 'bad' days.

That's one reason I'm a wand addict in WoW with my priest, warlock, (and somewhat less) mage.   The auto-attack wand works fine even when all the above problems are happening on a bad day.   If my character 'lags' (all above) for 15 secs, the system remembers I was wanding, and bam, when lag clears the mob is dead.   If I was casting one at a time, when lag clears, it discarded all my casts (I couldn't even initiate them) and bam, my char is dead.

Same reason I didn't like playing a caster in AC1, it was way too lag sensitive.   Melee wasn't.

DDO plays great when everything is smooth, as soon as 'lag' hits, someone normaly ends up dead.

That's all the reasons why people are focusing on 5-6 person experiences. Contrived linear consumable adventures can feature realtime combat though. Maybe Raiding too. On a good day. But this is just about PvE. It works because all of the targets are programmed against a lower common denominator.

PvP is different because both targets are reliant on duplicate technical issues. With PvE, it's all one sided.

DAoC had specials queued up for your next attack back when I played, as I remember my warrior getting frustrated weilding a slow 2h sword and not being able to use responce attacks the weapon was so slow the mob would attack again before the responce to it's previous attack went off.

WoW instants no longer interrupt the auto attack btw, but happen between the swings and don't interupt the timer for the next attack. Unless that fix only applied to hunters.

Yea, DAoC's Combat Styles were actually a pretty innovative system for the time, and would be as relevant today in my opinion. I loved playing my Friar for awhile for this alone. It wasn't twitch, but it wasn't casting bars all the time either. You could just hit auto-attack and watch, and if I recalll, the balance was set up for just that much effort. But it was just more fun to be more engaged.

Yeah, that system is pretty much broken. On my minstrel, at level 50 and with a Champion weapon I tested thoroughly a reactive style on evade with low level PvE mobs. It's just IMPOSSIBLE to have it working. The swing speed was slower than the timeframe available for the reactive to happen.

But, then, it's not just DAoC. WoW has reactives as well (and not stupidly timed like DAoC) and there are also other examples.

Reacting to icons in this way does sound like EQ2 crafting.  I expect that many people will respond to that system in the same way they dealt with EQ2 - macros.  I can see the first must-have mod for Vanguard being the one that automatically counters the attack-of-doom no matter what else you may have queued up.  Then the next mod would be the one to queue up your big damage combo.  The game sounds like a multi-boxers dream come true.

I also imagine that certain monsters will have powerful attacks that can only be countered by certain classes.  What better way to FORCE grouping than to make a particular class absolutely needed for certain encounters?

In addition, I'm not sure if they are planning on any PvP in the game, but this type of combat system doesn't sound like it would function well in that regard.

You mean like EQ1?

Well, i won't say the system isn't broken, but i will say you missed out on how to make it work. The thing with DAoC is you have to have queued your evade style up *before* you could even know if you'd evaded or not. Fortunatley the engine allowed you to do this. On my pierce specc'ed nightshade this was key to winning fights (nightshades evade a lot and hib pierce has a 6 sec stun based on evade.)

Anyway here's how you make it work (roughly, been awhile since i played DAoC):

Let's say you have 4 styles set up on keys 1-4.

1 -  is a follow up style for style 3
2  - is your evade style
3 - anytime style is first in chain before style 1
4 - second evade based style (assassins had a high damage evade style called hamstring i think)

So basically in every fight you mash buttons 1,2,3 in rapid succession. Because DAoC won't fire a style that hasn't met it's pre-req (chain or reaction) what will happen is when you hit 1 it won't fire the chain style unless you've already pressed 3, when you hit 2 it won't fire the evade unless you've evaded so when you hit 3 it will fire the opening anytime style. Next round it will fire 1 because the chain has started and will ignore 2, 3 as you've already queued a style. At any time if you evade it will almost certainly fire your evade style because it comes before your anytime. Often i'd just hit 2,3 if i wanted to ensure the stun would fire. Once you hit the stun just pound 4 as it will keep firing until you're attacked again. (this sucked for the opponent because it meant you could be hit by the high damage evade attack 2 or 3 times while stunnes as the game registered the evade of the last attack.)

Anyway, there might be some small errors above, been awhile, but that's the gist of it.

Is there a game out there that any of you actually like?   :-o

You really don't have a clue where you are, do you ? :(

Resident Evil 4.

I like UFO:Enemy Unknown.  Everything since then has been a let down.

Chip & Dales: Rescue Rangers

I like WoW, I just don't pay for it right now.

I like The Movies (despite its flaws), I like Jade Empire and NHL 2k6 and X-Men Legends and Need for Speed Underground and ESPN MLB 2k5. This year I've enjoyed Destroy all Humans, Resident Evil 4, Obscure, Freedom Force vs. the 3rd Reich, Guild Wars, KOTOR1, and a few others.

But Vanguard? Fuck no.

I think it looks promising and will keep an open mind on this one for sure.  And most of the games I see listed are not MMOs.  You really dont like people do you?

No, I really don't.

Is there anyone who actually likes people? I mean i can tolerate persons, but people....?... )

I am looking forward to this (http://www.hellgatelondon.com/sshot-images/screenshot2_005.jpg).

Diablo 3: The FUTURE? Shocking. So am I.

Tons. Just not mmo.

Well, I like Planetside. Gothic 2 is rpg love, it's what Ultima wishes it had become instead of UO or U9. GTA:SA is pure gaming goodness. SimGolf is one of the greatest little games ever made. HoMaM, Civ, SMAC, there's tons of great games out there...but many more of various levels of shit.
Go stand in walmart parking lot and try to get 5 other people to go help you move furniture for a few hours. That's mmo grouping to me.

You're not offering enough 40s and clean socks. That description, btw, is the best description of MMOGs I've ever read.

I would rather play Horizons for a month than even enter a Walmart parking lot. I call our local one 'a wretched hive of scum and villainy'.

Meh my local walmart isnt that bad until what i like to call "poverty week" hits.

If your ever feeling down go to a walmart the week that welfare checks are given out and you will instantly feel better about your self.

In general, I believe vangaurd looks very promising for an MMO.  From what I heard about and saw at E3 it looks like it might do very well.

It's a high profile title that'll be well advertised. It'll do well based simply on that. It helps that it's probably coming out for the 360 as well. Maybe they'll implement keyboard/mouse gameplay. Then it would at least get a look from me. But will it be a good mmog? No, probably not. I don't think McQuaid can make a good MMOG. He doesn't have the vision or mojo to do it.

While I know of what you speak, it's always 'poverty week' in Kentucky.

derail
It's only 15 miles and a short jaunt across the river, but the Wal*Mart here attracts an everyday crowd as pitiful and wretched as the 'poverty week' crowd I had the misfortune of hitting one time because I needed a car battery for my sister at 5pm on a Sunday.  I haven't been back since that day because I fear the Kentucky poverty weekers.  If I can't get it at Target or Meijer, it can wait.

I currently reside in bum f*ck Oklahoma, thank god I am moving soon, so its not much better.  Working in retail has trained me to be able to block out most of these people.

Man, quite a few stuck up people here. There's a range of stuff I have no problem grabbing from WalMart since they typically beat everyone in town on the prices. Dear god, I had to rub elbows with THE UNCLEAN. I mean, can you believe that they even let minorities in there?

(edited for people who may fail at internet sarcasm)

I'll pay extra to not watch dad beat junior in the vitamin aisle and then wait 30 minutes in line because Peggy Sue Johnson got her credit card declined and is now being dragged away because she can't stop crying.

You see, I'd find that all pretty funny actually.

I have still never been to a Walmart.  I'll have to go sometime... it sounds scary.

As for the topic... I'm sure Vanguard will be ass like every other MMO.  I don't mind, though... I've been playing assy games for years now.

That's the spirit!

This is all make believe.. Dont you get it?  Click your heals together and say, "there's no place like assness." 

To rephrase (framed by my own opinions and biases) - it'll do well based on the old EQ MMOG scale (i.e. 300K tops) for about six months. Then it'll either crash, or Microsoft will take over and drag it - kicking and screaming - towards WoW-style gameplay.

ditto on UFO. I also like Seven Kingdoms and -god help me- Madden '06 (in my defense though, this is the first one I've played in over a decade, so there).

I'll probably at least try out any open betas, but at the moment the only one I think I'd actually pay to play would be Seed:

http://208.64.64.65/news.php

I've been watching Seed for a while now. Who knows when anyone'll get to play it though.

WalMart makes me nauseous.

Now that game truly looks like ass!

Good Lord!  It's made by Scandies!

Isn't that one better: You know - you think to yourself - sex with someone is pretty good. Sex with lots of people at the same time should be more fun right? But somehow you always end up being the bukake target. That's online gaming.

I'm sure I saw it on these forums, don't remember who said it though  :|

My problem is Wal-Mart itself, actually. The worst thing about the people who shop there is that they'll sacrifice everything for low prices. Downtown turns into a ghostland, more national retailers slip in and kill off the rest of local businesses, millions of dollars a week flow out of our community and into Bentonville, not to mention the ridiculous trade defecit with China or the human injustices.

Shit, the welfare crowd just can't compete with that.

I still flip products over to see where they're made and try to buy things responsibly, but it's damned hard in this day of reckless and irresponsible capitalism.

Try working at a Kmart for 3 years as your first job and then tell me how you feel.

Target is better than Walmart, no?  Isn't Walmart supposed to be like the bargain basement Target?  I don't know what the hell I'm talking about.

It's not our fault the Chinese can't afford America-produced goods.  The cost to get an American to do work is just so much higher than what it takes a Chinese person to work, that goods produced there are more affordable for them than goods produced here... And unlike Japan, China doesn't have an underground 'OMG, America is Cool' movement to push purchase of imported stuff.  Economics.

IMO, 'trade deficit' is one of the most frequently abused phrases in America political/economic discussions.  Some people seem to think it's an inherently bad thing, and I can't figure out why.

Alkiera

Billions of dollars leaving our country and not coming back.

You'll see why when China cashes in on those billions of dollars of US Gov't bonds they keep buying from us. A few more years and they could technically own us.

Communism and labor camps help...

I ran into one of my fraternity brothers at a wedding over the holidays and he's now making regular trips to China to check up on one of their manufacturing plants. From the descriptions it sounded more like visiting a prison than it did visiting a factory. "Employees" live on site and are provided with everything they need so they never have to leave down to the point where the factory was fenced with guarded gates. When we asked him whether the gates were to keep people in our out he said he honestly wasn't sure.

Because Americans like to have jobs that pay in their country, and not have their job shipped to a person in another country who works for slave wages.

China uses the US dollar as the backing for thier own currency.  They aren't going to do anything with those bonds except quietly renew them when they come due.

But they do, in the form of goods.  A 'trade deficit' means that we buy more stuff from them, than they buy from us.  We're not giving them money for nothing, we're giving them money for goods they produce.  We do this because it is cheaper to produce the goods there and ship them here, than it is to hire someone here to produce the goods.

That has nothing to do with trade deficit, and everything to do with government borrowing, which I agree IS a problem.  Especially borrowing from other countries.  Again, absolutely unrelated to trade deficit.


Of course they do.  And China is not the best example, but in at least some of these cases, the people who work producing goods for America in other coutries, are much better off than the average person in their county, because what we would call slave wages is middle-class income in their country... Very very low cost of living 4twin.  Indian call center workers, for example.  They might make half what an American would make to do that job, but there is so little work that pays that much there, that it's a great deal.  India also apparently has a different cultural view of call center jobs, they don't see it as a 'scum of the earth' kind of employment.

The real reason for these problems (IMO) is the relatively recent push for 'free trade', and 'globalization'.  The idea being that we can spend money in piddly third world countries so they develop, and eventually become 2nd or even 1st world countries.  Once everyone has reached our level of economic development, they will all be happier, thusly be happier with us and not want to blow us up, poison us, or cause general mayhem in other ways.  Unfortunately, this takes a long time, and the job losses locally make people unhappy.  It's a lot faster and cheaper to just blow up the people who want to blow you up...  But not everyone agrees with the ethics of that.

I tried to write this in such a way that it's not very political.  I'm not sure I succeeded.

Alkiera

Alkiera you bring up some fine points, but I dont think a company views going to india for outsourcing as a way to help that culture.  They do it because they get to spend less while getting sub-par quality in return.  They could careless if they are screwing over the american worker as long as they are making their cash.

What I find amusing is also that the majority of so called "American Made" cars normally made, or majority of parts are made, outside of the US.

I thought they were talking about switching over to the Euro a few months back.  Or was that just them stirring the pot because we weren't doing something they wanted?   Either way, China plays econonomics like it's PKs play MMOs and America is turning into a nation of carebears.  We're going to be pwned sooner or later.

I worked at a Movie Gallery right next to a WalMart for 2 and a half years, and we were the only chain in town that rented porn outside of overpriced "fantasy" shops. I win.

Trade def. is where you import more than you export - ie you sacrifice consuming tomorrow for consuming today - in most aspects directly comparable to a regular loan - which must be payed back at some point

Chine is keeping a lid on their overheated economy, to be able to produce cheap items to hawk off to you guys for as long as possible go scew their balance... kinda like the windup phase of a punch...windup more, and you can punch harder..)

No.

It's not that anyone owes anyone anything.  It's CONSTRUED that way.... but It's not like China is giving us lots of goods, and were giving them relatively few goods, and in 30 years China is gonna force us to pay up.  We're paying for all the goods we get from China.  Just as China is paying for the few goods they buy from us.  The 'trade deficit' is due to the total dollar amount that we buy from them is greater than the amount they buy from us.  We don't owe China anything(related to the trade deficit anyway.  US Bonds, etc, are a whole different thing). 

from the Wikipedia link:

Country	GDP	GDP per capita
USA	$ 11,750,000,000,000	$ 40,100
China	$ 7,262,000,000,000	$ 5,600
India	$ 3,319,000,000,000	$ 3,100

As you can see, the US has something like a 50% difference in economic output, in raw numbers, between the USA and China.  The per-capita numbers are even more interesting, IMO.  Median Income in the US is something like $28,000/yr.  GDP per capita is $40,000.  If you assume similar ratio for India...  It should be obvious how we can afford to pay call center people there peanuts.  We could pay them $10,000 a year, like $5/hour, and they'd live like KINGS.

The US trade deficit doesn't mean we are in debt to anyone.  Just means there is a lack of certain kinds of jobs, due to the ease of shipping those jobs overseas.

As to the wisdom or lack of wisdom in doing that, I choose not to share my opinion.  Just trying to dispel the myth that a 'trade deficit' is inherently bad.  It's basically a useless statistic the majority of times it is used.  We produce more money than any other country on Earth.  We produce more money than the entire European Union combined.  It makes sense that we spend some of that outside of our own borders.

Alkiera

Also, (though one of the above definitions referred to it) Trade Deficit/Balence of Trade does not usually include references to Services.

As a post-Industrial nation, we have moved our emphasis away from raw production and more towards providing services, such as financial management, etc. Just because we import more money in the form of goods than we export, does not mean the country is bleeding money. It also doesn't mean I know what the fuck I'm talking about.

EDIT: Nice stealth edit, jerk.

Check your balance sheet ...USA has a dept of 8,160,320,491,591.57 dollars

If you buy more than you produce (import more than you export) you have to pay for it sooner or later. I didnt mention the possibility of paying with already saved dollars since I took for granted that everyone knew that to be able to afford chineese goods you borrowed  money from them.

A "debt" is the total sum of all "deficits"

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm for the numbers.

Back to Vanguard.....


I have a few questions about this game, because it seems to be the only fantasy MMO being released this year and I need a new game.  Anyone know if it is still slated to be on the 360 and PC?  Any news on the beta?  I heard they only let people in beta with 2GB because they haven't optimized the code yet (that would explain why I haven't heard anything after registering in Oct)?  Anyone have an indication of how close is this getting?  I checked their site and found the last press release was May 2004, last interview in Oct 2005, and a few recent screenies.  Trying to keep an open mind, but still amazed this isn't vapor yet and was picked over Mythica......


Where have I been?  Props for the spell check option - I love it!!!! (not that I am a shitty speller or anything) ;)

You must have been looking at their corporate site http://www.sigilgames.com - the official site for the game is http://www.vanguardsoh.com or http://www.vanguardsaga.com, whichever you want to call it. One of the main fansites is http://www.silkyvenom.com

Actually, I had clicked on http://www.vanguardsaga.com/news.php#pr for the press releases and didn't see anything newer in the way of press releases (just announcing the game and using the unreal engine in 2004). 

Did a little more looking and found in the news for the last few months http://www.vanguardsaga.com/news.php, the fanguard registration, announcing affiliated sites, several people visiting Sigil, and some art contests.  I did see a reference in silkyvenom that Vanguard would be live in 2006, so at least I have one answer.  Still, it doesn't seem like a lot of information for a game scheduled out this year.  In the past, this lack of information has been an indication that the release date is being pushed back or it is getting closer to vapor.  I guess we will see!

All you could ever want to know about Vanguard you can find by reading its forums. Specifically here. (http://www.vanguardsaga.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?forumid=21) They communicate to their players through there rather than issuing press releases, it would seem.

  If you enjoyed WoW, chances are you'll hate Vanguard. It's a return to oldschool EQ, and the fanbase is fighting to make it more h4rdc0r3. Corpse Runs, Long Grinds, Long, long Raids, Rare Spawns, long runs with only a few classes able to shorten travel times.  All of it are lauded as the zenith of game design, argue otherwise and you're simply whining for an 'easy carebear game'.

The whole thing stinks of catass, and I wouldn't touch it with Bruce's e-peen.

Oddly enough on the Vanguard forums the devs, people persons and what have you are very active in the community, constantly checking and seemingly balancing a decent human relations front. I naturally expect this to stop upon release of said game. I also have to agree that this is essentially going to be Everquest for those whom no longer play Everquest and miss the grind of it. Oddly enough, myself included, not that I have any intention of playing it but I do intend on at least trying it out. 

It could be because I just like putting myself in lots and lots of pain. We'll see.

On the way of beta, I also have not heard much in the way of invitations and it was my understanding the the only people being invited thus far were off the message board.

I may or may not have a friend who may or may not look like this:  :nda: I believe that  :nda: may look like  :-) underneath, but must remain  :nda: or become  :evil: and  :heartbreak:

It's definitely not vaporware. It is in a closed beta (beyond friends & family, but only just), very high spec clients only due to being developed for future hardware (just as EQ1 beta needed Voodoo or D3D omg), and the release date is still quite far away. I'm thinking late 2006 or early 2007.

This prhase always makes me hesitant.  You can't forsee 'future' hardware.  You can develop for the bleeding edge hardware you think will be mainstream by the time you release, but developing for 'future' hardware just causes buggy/ laggy engines that need lots of optimization. See EQ2, SWG.  Also, what if you predict wrong and instead of what you coded for, a new, easier standard pops into place in the middle of development?

It was my phrase, not Sigil's. They may be developing for bleeding edge, I just happened to use the word 'future' to describe what I thought they were doing. But they did target the right technology with their previous game, so who knows.

Yeah, I was just complaiing about companies that do that in general, not specifically Sigil.

I finally figured out what most of the posters there reminded me of. They're like an odd PvE-version of the 'Dreadlord-era UO was the greatest game ever' who think launch-era EQ was the best any MMOG could ever hope to be.

I'm looking forward to Vanguard's launch just to see their dreams shatter like spun crystal ground underfoot.

I don't ever want to game with people who thought the Rubicite camp/queue was fun.

Hey, that's the reason I sold my first EQ account! Ah...good times. The game was actually fun up until everyone swamped Cazic, disillurionment set in.

Bought a new account when Kunark launched, but it was never the same again. Damage was done.

It was fun. A long, long, long, long, long, long, long time ago.

Then.things.turned.bad.

I think people tend to romanticize the past.  Sample of early EQ include:

a) Waiting in long lines to sit at a static camp for hours... even to complete a quest.
b) Waiting 20 mins between a spawn at a camp for a miniscule chance of some rare mob spawning only to have a leet kiddie kill it out of turn.
c) Long waits between fights due to slow health/power regen rates.  If you were a caster, you had the added bonus of staring at a spell book until level 32 or 34 or something.
d) Dying only to find that the next 6h of your life were wasted attempting to get the loot you had farmed for weeks back. 
e) Who can forget losing a level due to the death penalty?  Fun fun fun!
f) More bad memories that I've repressed... like waiting 10 mins to take a 10 min boat ride only to get killed by bugged sharks, etc.

How on Earth can anyone look back on this and think it was "fun"?  Evolution happens by learning from mistakes... BAD mistakes.

See, that's why I said I'm lokoing forward to Vanguard launch: Either Verant Sigil learnt enough from EQ to make Vanguard not-quite brainmeltingly awful (and the vanbois will whine about how it's easier than early EQ was), or Vanguard turns out to be just as much a grindtastic catassfest as early EQ was (and the vanbois will suddenly remember why they spent so much time whining about how unfair/slow/etc. EQ was).

Win-win, as my manager would no doubt say.  :thumbs_up:

That was quick!
Reason I quit EQ the second time (well, one of many, but a primary). Gaining exp was so slow in level 54 that I was basically starting to move in reverse and I didn't feel like playing as level 53 without a couple critical spells.

Who remembers early, early EQ?  When the death penalty increased with level and that by mid 20's you lost an ENTIRE LEVEL worth of exp on a single death?  Yeah, that was fun.  I think I recall that got patched into submission by the third month of retail.

I remember people going from level 22 to level 19 in an afternoon.  Don't forget it probably took three weeks to get from level 19 to level 22 in the first place.

I didn't start until after that, the game had been out a few months before I got into it.  I do remember Rubicite and the Box of Abu'Kar(100% weight reduction container), but only as those thing were being discussed, I was far too low level.  I hit 30 right around the time Kunark was released.

Alkiera

Remeber when J-Boots dropped from one random spawn mob in that little tiny room in Najena?  Every 20 minutes there was a chance she would pop.  I spent something like 20 hours in that little room once without luck.  I think the whole time I was there she dropped the J-Boots twice.

Yeah, that was fun.  I don't think I logged in for a month after that.

I got fucked out of jboots by guild assholes so many times I can't even recall. Constested rare item drops is fucking retarded. Took me years to get them, and that was solo. I quit a couple months later.

Was totally worth it, wasn't it? ;)

I know the feeling. I was screwed out of items time and again by ubercamping, no-lifes in my guild (there were not that many, but man did they get the gear) because they were the ones that were on every raid and every event. I kinda stopped giving a shit after a while and took hand-me-downs instead. Ended up fairly well pimped out thanks to that tactic. In any case, the early days were definitely rough. I started from release day and I still have no idea why I stayed as long as I did. I think I was just a huge Diku whore at the time and was in sheer awe at the graphics and the concept. Add to that the fact that I was a sucker for ridiculous challenges having come from a MUD that was just as bitchy and unforgiving.

Although the death penalty was horrid, I don't remember ever losing an entire level.  I've played since release too.  Maybe I just blocked that out...

What I do remember though is the stupid bug that caused you to lose half a level upon death at levels 31, 36, 41, and 46.  What made this suck SO bad was that 30, 35, 40, and 45 were total hell levels.  Hell levels = twice the amount of experience needed to advance when compared to normal levels.  So if you died at say level 46, it knocked you back to 1/2 through 45 which was seriously a good 12 - 20 hours of grinding.  They patched that shit out sometime during Velious I believe.

I remember very vividly dying in a bind death loop 32 times. I went from 20 to I think it was something like 14/15 because I bound myself in the Undead Barkeep room. And I am not sure if any of you remember hell levels. It went like this:

Take a hell level that was rumoured to be 20th for example was really 19, 20 and 21, then from 23-24 it was fine, then 25 a nightmare, 26-28 fine, 29-30 a nightmare.. so on and so forth.

How did this become a reminisce-over-EQ thread?

Oh wait, that's what it started as.

Carry on.

From Vanguard -> punitive, early EQ rules?  Yeah, not a real long way.

And who doesn't like a good nostalgic thread every now and then. If you don't, then you aren't human. ;)

But seriously, early EQ was some good times. From falling to your death from the platforms of Kelethin to hitting A for autoattack when trying to hail a guard or NPC, deluded though we may have been, we were all there suffering and laughing about it... together.

One of my friends finally convinced his GF to pick up the game, she creates her first character, a woodelf rogue.  The first thing she sees is 'An orc hatchetman' who promptly knocks her off of Kelethin, she dies, and her corpse decays before she can find it, with her newbie note on it.  It took her to level 25 or so before she could get some of the newbie quests from her guildmaster due to her faction being too low(the faction adjustment with rogues was hard to get, she should have gotten it from the note turn-in.)  She got up to where she needed to be by turning in rusty daggers and a few copper to get them sharpened by the rogue guy, which gained you a bit of faction and a slightly higher damage newb weapon.  Hundreds of rusty daggers later...

Alkiera

Nope. I think we have a bit of an exageration for effect here. I played at release and due to unemployment and latent catassery I was 35 or so when they lowered the experience penatly and ever as a half-elf bard (huge exp penalty, close to a troll warrior) I only remember losing a bit over a bubble on deaths. I was lucky enough to be so far ahead of the leveling curve I remember a friend wanted jboots and we walked into najena and camped them with no other people in there except for L20's experiencing. I also remember being in a group that found the first rubicite on our server. Back then no one told where things were so we were pretty excited about finding where it dropped. I was lucky enough to have most of the pieces and be gone before the madness happened in there, was already exploring lower guk by then, again alone other than a group camping the bedroom.

The biggest flaw in early EQ, IMO, was it was designed for the front runners and far too successful to sustain the fun of being alone  exploring the dungeons. By alone of course I mean with a single group. Later on as more people hit the levels to use the dungeons it turned into a line at the local butcher shop; take a number and wait your turn, but I have fond memories of the early times before the crowds arrived.

At level 20, if you were within a full yellow bubble of experience and died, you lost your level.

Seeing as its much the same gang, I fear Vanguard might inherit the broken quest syndrome so common in early EQ. A tough death penalty can add to the challenge. But when you die three times getting the quest object to its destination, then the NPC swallows it with just a "Thankyou", tough penalties become really annoying. Not to mention the vets laughing it newbies that tried to quest in EverQuest without first checking an external website to see if the quest was broken.

I don't know how hard it would be to insert a bit of QA code to check that quests are completing at the expected rate. But the idea of checking that your production servers are working as intended always seemed foreign to Verant. Will Sigil be any different?

But that's not an entire level of experience, in that you weren't knocked back to bubble 1 of level 19.

I, too, through fortunate (?) circumstance was on the leading edge of my server, and had good beta knowledge. That was really the best, I already knew a bunch of cool people from the beta and we could camp in zones without a gazillion fucktards wandering around training things and spamming the zone with ooc crap. It was always our group and a "rival" group, and that was it.

Alkiera...that's a sad story. What kind of person goes through all that shit rather than reroll her newbie?

I have no idea why she didn't just restart at the time it happened.  I think part of it was she didn't realize all the effects it had until she'd gotten to pretty decent level. She may have also been worried about deleting the character and being able to get the same name again.  I know I had issues with that from time to time, but that was usually with really lame names like 'Rejectme'.(had a human necro named that once... decided to reroll him in the other human city, and it failed.  I believe he was my holy fish killer in Qeynos for awhile.)

Alkiera

After level 20, I don't think I ever gained a level that wasn't immediately followed by a death that subsequently lost me the recently-gained level.

My favorites were the multiple ping-pongs.  The ones where your level made what you were killing Green, but the next blue mob was still enough to kick your ass.   I think I was 56-57 about 5 different times.  I know I did the same somewhere around 54-55.

That's one reason I quit at 54. Levelling took forever and you were so much weaker than when you were a newbler. Always seemed kinda stupid.

My first character was a druid.  I hit the level where I got some of my first good ports (I think it was 19 or 24).  So, I excitedly ran all the way back from the Oasis of Marr to Riverrun (that was the halfing town, right?) to train up.  I get to my trainer, my finger slips and I hadn't re-bound my autoattack from 'a'.  Dead.  Much swearing and throwing of nearby objects commenced as my trainer tore through me like a wet paper bag.  Ran back to the Oasis since it was the only nearby place where I could get exp, re-dinged, then came back. 

/aneurism

BINGO.  Thats a huge problem for me with a lot (all?) of these games, it seems like you actually decrease in effectiveness the higher you go.

Thats only because you are, of coarse. I see someone didn't get into Raph's Levels Suck blog much.

On reflection now, I can see why I rarely rose above lowbie level in any of the dikus and a lot of the others a well. Bottom levels are faster and more fun. The higher you go, the more suck that keeps getting ladled on.

WoW was very good about this.  A Level 60 will be as effective against a level 60 mob as they were at level 1 against a level 1 mob.  Levels are actual ways of telling your power vs the environment, unlike previous Dikus where the environment was on a completely different scale. This is great because it elminates the problem that always ran through my head, "well if I'm level xyz, why's the mob that's 20 levels lower than me kicking my ass?"  Fucking broken system.

If by "effectiveness" you mean what mobs you can kill at your level that's more a function of "solo friendliness" than what level you are. For games that have levels but are solo friendly such as CoH or WoW you do not feel that decrease in effectiveness like you did in a game like EQ where for most classes once you got out of your teens you had to group to advance at all. "Grindiness" is a separate issue. There's nothing inherent about levels or a skill-based system that makes one system more grindy than the other.

(nods)

I pointed this out in a reply to that blog entry, but I'll say it here too.

Most current gen games that have implemented a creature tiering system have evolved past this 0th and 1st gen artifact.  EQ2, WoW, CoH, etc. 

For us, at least, the solo-strength NPCs stay right around the same.  The group-strength NPCs do scale higher proportionally to the solo NPCs, but not disproportionately to a group of people. 

- Scott