The best stuff is off screen

[tazelbain]

Rather than sully up the EvE thread...

The events that are changing EvE while the servers are offline for a patch are causing the same thoughts I have when I read the EQ/2 lore.  The best stuff is happening off screen.  That's the stuff I want to be apart of.  It's like we are forced to live in the boring times in between all the exciting times in the lore.  Even if we can't be apart of them at least we should be privy to watching them unfold in the game, say over a week.

EDIT: makes more sense?

[Viin]

Here's a link to the news alerts during the expansion downtime:

http://www.eve-online.com/news/downtimenews.asp

[bhodi]

Because coding stuff like that is hard(tm).

Even blizzard only had a collect-em-all quest.

I do think there's huge room for growth here, though.

[Fordel]

Well the coolest stuff often causes the servers to implode. See AQ gate openings.

[K9]

nod

[Endie]

I dunno.  One of the most important systems in the game just changed hands between major NPC alliances, and the players were fighting on each side to either try and stop it or to help it happen.  Plus loads of pubbies got DD'ed and can start whining about "nerf titans" 

Edit nobody got DD'ed I was lied to    But the rest is still true.

[Stormwaltz]

The best solution is to plot within your means, padawan.

[Endie]

Jessica Mulligan will be here any moment to say "the dev team told me they could do it!!!"

[NiX]

Well the coolest stuff often causes the servers to implode. See AQ gate openings.

The problem is that these events are typically have set steps to being completed and are few and far between. Since this is the case large groups tend to form whenever someone knows they're on the final step to triggering the event. If they designed MMOs to have dynamic quests and events that didn't require a grind it wouldn't be as much of a problem.

[Merusk]

Well the coolest stuff often causes the servers to implode. See AQ gate openings.

The problem is that these events are typically have set steps to being completed and are few and far between. Since this is the case large groups tend to form whenever someone knows they're on the final step to triggering the event. If they designed MMOs to have dynamic quests and events that didn't require a grind it wouldn't be as much of a problem.

The opening to Naxx was pretty good.  Most folks forget it, though, as it was far too spread-out.  All the undead invasions around the map and in the major cities and several quests with a few blue-level rewards.   The opening to Sunwell was better, but suffered from being too drawn-out in order to make it feel more epic AND prevent the largest of servers blowing through all the stages in a week.  Plus it lacked a finale of any sort.  The NPCs spawned at the end of each phase, and began the quests for the next phase.  Ta da.. that's it.

[Fordel]

I think it's really as simple as "cool shit is happening, I want to see it, so do my 500 friends".


You'll probably see the cool stuff more often once they solve the 500 friends part.

[NiX]

Most times it isn't friends though. It's the grapevine in the form of some global channel.

[apocrypha]

I always miss these things though.

Dunno if I'm just unlucky or if the timing of major in-game events just never matches my timings or what, but in every MMORPG I've ever played that's had big events like these I've felt pissed off because they happen once and I'm not there and well, that's it.

May be great for those that get to be there and see it but for everyone else it feels like a ripoff :/

[Fordel]

The real trick is to make it an annual thing. Everytime there is a Lunar eclipse, the Emerald Dream spills over into the real world and everyone must beat the Nightmare back into the dream realm.


Or something 

[Sunbury]

The problem is the MMORPGs are all designed around static content - then they throw in rare 'events' where everyone shows up or misses it.

Why doesn't someone design a game where the 'events' are the norm, and scrap all that static content - which makes no sense anyway for a MMOG? 

[Yoru]

The problem is the MMORPGs are all designed around static content - then they throw in rare 'events' where everyone shows up or misses it.

Why doesn't someone design a game where the 'events' are the norm, and scrap all that static content - which makes no sense anyway for a MMOG? 

Because it takes hundreds of man-hours to come up with unique content, if not more, varying by how complex and crazy the designers got with their ideas and how poorly it fits into the existing system?

The best you can do right now (without substantial improvements in tools) is to stamp out some semi-generic content, fill in the details dynamically and spawn it in the world either on-demand or on a schedule. At which point the players eventually notice it's templated, term it "static content" and write about it on forums.

Truly unique stuff, you want a human GM; think Neal Stephenson's "Ractors" from The Diamond Age.

[Jayce]

The other thing is that you can do a lot more death & destruction in news than you can do in game. 

If players had been involved with the events in EVE many of them would have lost billions because they were locked up in the destroyed station, Empire would have been chaos as CONCORD was offline, and basically many of the assumptions that characterize the game would have been invalid.  Then everyone who doesn't read the news would have been after CCP with pitchforks and it would be a huge fiasco.

To get around this, they just wrote a story.  Radically simple concept.

Now one thing they CAN do is monthly content with world-changing consequences, a la AC1.  After a downtime a station is destroyed, a wing of Imperial Navy is in orbit of a planet, etc.  In AC1 it was destroyed towns.  Now that was cool, and let you into the story without allowing your entire livelihood to become collateral damage, a fate that should mostly be reseved for NPCs.

[Phred]

The other thing is that you can do a lot more death & destruction in news than you can do in game. 

As well, mmog's are victims of their own success. I was at almost every major event in the first few years of EQ and each one was laggier and spammier than the previous one. It seriously wouldn't surprise me if one of the reasons for them ending live volunteers doing events was that the volunteers refused to do any more.

[Sunbury]

The problem is the MMORPGs are all designed around static content - then they throw in rare 'events' where everyone shows up or misses it.

Why doesn't someone design a game where the 'events' are the norm, and scrap all that static content - which makes no sense anyway for a MMOG? 

Because it takes hundreds of man-hours to come up with unique content, if not more, varying by how complex and crazy the designers got with their ideas and how poorly it fits into the existing system?

The best you can do right now (without substantial improvements in tools) is to stamp out some semi-generic content, fill in the details dynamically and spawn it in the world either on-demand or on a schedule. At which point the players eventually notice it's templated, term it "static content" and write about it on forums.

Truly unique stuff, you want a human GM; think Neal Stephenson's "Ractors" from The Diamond Age.

I'm more talking about building MMORPGs along the lines of wargames.  There are no 'quests' per se, just 2 sides, rules, and - go fight.

Devs build systems and worlds and new features over time, not quests.  Again, I'm not saying ALL MMOGS MUST BE LIKE THIS, but about about ONE?   Eve, Planetside, WW2OL are closest right now, and Shadowbane I guess, but I don't think there is a single PvE-type that works like that.  Where the world is 'alive' and does it own thing, and players just join in.

[Merusk]

So what do you do in a PvE game where both sides play by the same rules, but only one side has creativity.  Even in single player games, the "AI" algorithms have to cheat (faster builds/ abilities, more HPs, abilities the human player can't use) to win as the human player gets more skilled.

 In an MMO where there's tens of thousands of man hours per day building skill/ ability against the computer algorithm, the computer will get "gamed" into nothing within the first week of beta testing.

What happens after that?  A server reset? The game would flip to reset faster and faster each reset.  Far faster than the devs could tweak the AI without introducing new bugs for the players to exploit.

Open 'worlds' like that are only good for PvP-centered experiences.  I don't even call them games as they're more like e-sports due to the highly competitive nature and the time commitment required. 

[Sunbury]

Yes, that is a problem, but I'd like to see someone work that, rather than just develop fancier graphics, or 2000 more fed-ex or kill quests, and 'fake' stories/lore.  ('Fake' meaning it didn't really happen in game terms, someone just wrote text and dropped items/mobs on the landscape).

I'm not against PvP, but there a zillions of outlets for that (across genres), and the basic problem that your sworn enemies have to cooperate to make it fun, so sport-PvP comes into existance.   

But if I want a game I can log into for 30 min at 5am EST, PvP doesn't work, either there is nobody around, or you get zerged by groups.  I'm not interested in sport/arena PvP which helps that, it feels 'fake' and doesn't change the world. 

Nothing currently in PvE changes the simulated world, just your character, but why can't a game be made that tries at least?

[Goumindong]

Nothing currently in PvE changes the simulated world, just your character, but why can't a game be made that tries at least?

Who says no ones tried?

You simply cannot have an ongoing dynamic PvE only world. It doesn't work. Not even getting into the ridiculousness of trying to justify a dynamic world where you can't shoot other players you run into two problems which have no solution

1. The game does not end: Your ongoing dynamic PvE only world has no end condition. At some point, one "side" is going to win. If that is the players then either the game stops being dynamic because the environment has been modified to its limit and reached equilibrium there.

2. Each and every "dynamic element" has to be hard coded and designed by the design team OR it needs a massive A.I.  One requires massive time sink by the developers in order to make the game feel right(and requires massive continuation in order to get around problem 1). And A.I. simply isn't that smart. A good example being Chess A.I. which can be quite good but all require long deliberation times in order to sort through complex heuristics. Human brains do that fast and instinctively and once the human catches on, no immediate(or near enough) acting computer will be able to compete.

[Sunbury]

1. The game does not end: Your ongoing dynamic PvE only world has no end condition. At some point, one "side" is going to win. If that is the players then either the game stops being dynamic because the environment has been modified to its limit and reached equilibrium there.

I don't see it as a bad thing to 'reset'.   There are alternatives.  Say a the starting large island is first unexplored and undeveloped.  It then is explored and developed by players.  While that is happening, devs are painting a new 'island'.   Also if areas of the island become less populated, nature starts to take over, or gets invaded.  Like barbarian invasions in Civ.

2. Each and every "dynamic element" has to be hard coded and designed by the design team OR it needs a massive A.I.  One requires massive time sink by the developers in order to make the game feel right(and requires massive continuation in order to get around problem 1). And A.I. simply isn't that smart. A good example being Chess A.I. which can be quite good but all require long deliberation times in order to sort through complex heuristics. Human brains do that fast and instinctively and once the human catches on, no immediate(or near enough) acting computer will be able to compete.

I see a combination.  The dev sets up various systems.  Live GMs can look at whats happening and 'activate' things happening at a high level.  Like have a flood / storm wreck an area, trigger invasions, etc.   Basically set up an ebb and flow.   Each character tracks personal achievments (cleared mine X, defended town Y, built bridge Z) so even if bridge Z is wrecked by a flood, its still on your personal / guild public achievment list.

The one thing that would spoil this setup - public web sites.  People would map everything, show status of everything, grok how all the systems works and tell everyone.  Sure I as a individual could not read them, but then I wouldn't know that mine Z is now re-infested with mob K, or had a collapsed, instead of checking it out, or learning of it via in-game mechanisms.

[5150]

Anarchy Online had a huge problem (IMO) with all the cool stuff occuring on the web site and none of it in game.

[Adam Tiler]

The new trailer shows the unknown superweapon that was used above Mekhios. It looks like it uses a building chain reaction to own a whole fleet. I am intrigued...