Best MMO for explorers

[raydeen]

I beta tested DAoC back in the day and I thought it had a nice bit of explorability to it.  I mainly played in the viking area and always seemed to find some little settlement or abandoned fort tucked away in a little nook of landscape. DAoC felt like a real world at the time more so than EQ or AC1 did. I never went on to retail due to monetary restrictions but always sort've missed not experiencing it more. AC1 had some nice surprises as well but after 6 months I just couldn't stay with it. EQ was more fun at the time. And EQ was huge as well. There were and probably still are little nooks and crannies I haven't seen. I remember rolling up a rogue in Freeport and finding an area I never knew existed even after 4 years or so of gameplay.  The new Freeport sucks so much I don't know how SOE hasn't collapsed in on itself. It pains me to see what they've done to that game. They've broken more than they'll ever fix.

[Azazel]

As much as it pains me to recommend it, Vanguard, from what Falconeer is saying may be a good MMO for people who want to explore a huge virtual world, what with the size and draw distance. As an added bonus, you may well find yourself very far from other player characters ;) while tamping around the bush.

That is, unless VG punishes you in the traditional EQ style for exploring, by killing you dead with wandering deathmobs.

[Soln]

As much as it pains me to recommend it, Vanguard, from what Falconeer is saying may be a good MMO for people who want to explore a huge virtual world, what with the size and draw distance. As an added bonus, you may well find yourself very far from other player characters ;) while tamping around the bush.

That is, unless VG punishes you in the traditional EQ style for exploring, by killing you dead with wandering deathmobs.

that actually is the only main draw for me for VG, but I'm worried about polish or population (world bldg in progress).

[Xuri]

That is, unless VG punishes you in the traditional EQ style for exploring, by killing you dead with wandering deathmobs.

It does. Random insane-level mobs killed me when I climbed mountains near the starting area.

[Sky]

Originally, EQ was very good for explorers because invisibility worked (except for the random timer...) and followed consistent rules (invis for live mobs, invis to undead for undead), and a mob's con let you know if it saw you. You could head down to meet your friends in Guk (don't forget to change over invis types!) and skip all the mobs along the way, even if they'd normally aggro.

Not the case in EQ2 where invis is almost laughably ineffective. How is VG about that, since it seems very EQ2ish in a lot of (negative) ways to this sideline observer.

[Pendan]

Vanguard has the wandering deathmobs 20 times harder than anything else in an area with huge agro radius. They also transition from one range level of MOBs to twice the range level of MOBs without any visual clue that you are entering a harder area of the world. It is just abrupt. They of course have the exp penality and take a much bigger hit when you explored yourself into an area can not go back to your grave so have to summon your belongings. Lastly they don’t have the little rewards for exploring like WoW gives a bit of exp for going to areas new to you and I think EQ2 does something similar. They do have a message if you are the very first on the server to have gone to a particular place they have flagged but message flashes on the screen and does not show up in text window. Likely flashes to fast for you to even get a screen shot unless you were really prepared.

[Nija]

It does. Random insane-level mobs killed me when I climbed mountains near the starting area.

Last time I tried Vanguard, the lag was so bad that monsters would actually appear on your screen behind you, after you'd already ran past them and you'd already aggroed them a couple seconds before that.

Made exploring a real bitch.

[Falconeer]

I'd say lag has been fixed in Vanguard. I keep playing the whole game at 30fps with high visual settings.
Still, today something weird happened: I created a barbarian alt to see the starting zone and logged into the game with a bedazzling 5 fps. I was so scared that I rebooted my system, but the the 5 fps were still there when I logged back in. After a little investigation it turned out that there was a pile of gravestones (player corpses) all in the same exact place. Apparently someone got killed by PKs over and over on the (only) respawn point and that generated millions of gravestones in the same identical place, to the point that actually looked like... one (except for the garbled names one over each other). That, of course, need a fix as it was impossible to loot any corpse (including your own) as they were un-selectable. Still, the monstrous hyper-gravestone was the cause for the lag. As soon as I kept it out of my viewing range, the engine revved back up to 30fps, while just a little inch of that horrendous graveston in my field of view killed the FPS to death.

Once again, the road to optimization is a long one. But my point is that any new player/betatester logging today for the first time in that place, has probably fled already and erased the game for good, thinking that 5 is the standard framerate for Vanguard.

Maybe this should be in the Vanguard thread, but Nija's post summoned it here. Lag doesn't seem to be an issue, especially in open spaces and uncharted lands, and any solid computer should be able to handle exploration out of the cities and main hubs pretty well.

[Nija]

I mean network lag. I cruise along at 30fps as well (and 30fps isn't a good framerate - it's just the best that Vanguard offers) - but the NPCs wouldn't load until I was literally on top of them. They need basic shapes loading at 500 meters, or a decent visual distance away. Tiny specs off in the distance so you can approach and see what they actually are.

It's been a few months since I've played so maybe it's better now. But from watching a year's worth of content patches and "fixes" I really doubt it.

[Lantyssa]

It was SWG for me.  With my camps able to take care of my wounds, I would stay out in the field for weeks at a time.  I remember roaming Dathomir, on foot, when people were scared to go anywhere near the place.

For those that enjoyed exploring game systems, it was also a wonderous thing.  Convoluted formulas, experimentation, and random resource spawns.  Cracking the BE Tissue formula was one of the greatest bits of fun I've ever had in a game.

[Strazos]

Originally, EQ was very good for explorers because invisibility worked (except for the random timer...) and followed consistent rules (invis for live mobs, invis to undead for undead), and a mob's con let you know if it saw you. You could head down to meet your friends in Guk (don't forget to change over invis types!) and skip all the mobs along the way, even if they'd normally aggro.

Not the case in EQ2 where invis is almost laughably ineffective. How is VG about that, since it seems very EQ2ish in a lot of (negative) ways to this sideline observer.

Rogue Stealth ftw.

[Yegolev]

For that "no one has ever been here" or "where the fuck am I" feeling, ATITD is the top.  Too bad it's like being in a university architect program.

[Mantees]

I have to agree with ATITD landscape being dull.
Even if I don't like World of Warcraft too much I think it is an ok game for explorers. Nice but not perfect since there is so much to see and so many interest points but sometimes there are spawns which doesn't seem to fit at all in the landscape.

For example you can go in zone A and find centaurs level 5. Then you go in zone F and find centaurs level 15, and in zone K there are big centaurs level 50.
Basically you can't say "centaurs are strong" and "murlocs are green meatballs", they are simply mobs with some stats and whose shape and color are random selected from a pool of possibility.

EQ1 and 2 do a great job in keeping an alive and "realistic" environment. So yes, if I had to choose I would say EQ2. Sadly levels will be a restriction to how much you can explore, but anyway you have a lot of things to see and a lot of fun NPCs to speak with at every level.

[MournelitheCalix]

I'll agree with the AC1 thing.  UO was pretty close, but I played pre-UO:R but post-everyone-figured-out-it-was-cool, so it seemed that even the most remote places had occasional traffic.  And certainly every spot remotely capable of containing a house had been explored to death.

I think AC struck a good balance between a huge, mostly computer generated world, but with enough human design to have myriad small places you could level and never see another soul for days, months even.  I played on the PvP server too, and my guild controlled a lifestone in the middle of what was effectively a huge meadow.  It took 10-15 minutes to run there from any town, but once there, you could be assured that you could level in relative peace because no one could be arsed to travel that long just to gank one noob.

Everquest felt huge for the 13 levels I played, but that was probably just the honeymoon not having worn off.

Another reason IMHO that AC1 succeeded as being a great MMO for exploration was that a lot of the top items of the day could be gotten chiefly through exploration.  With the Dark Majesty they improved upon this.  To name a few:

1.  Siraluun feathers...
2.  Olthoi Spawns for high end currency drops
3.  Golems for both pyreal motes and the diamond golem drops (forgot what exactly they dropped for the diamond shield)
4.  Frankenstein Bow,  This was a really impressive quest IMHO because of the three grades of bow that could be produced based on tradeskill and materials.
5.  The chests that were everywhere that dropped really nice loot in the Dire lands and the Obsidian Plains.
6.  The masks were cool =), I loved the idea of the Virindi
7.  Shadow Armor
8.  Mattekar Armor....


I guess the point I am trying to make is that AC succeeded in exploration because there were very tangible rewards for exploration. 

[Akkori]

SWG isn't bad since the population is so low, you realy can be all alone. You won't be the first to see it, but you can get "lost" on Endor or Dath or Yavin 4 pretty easily. By lost I mean no one else around.

I was sure someone would mention Dark & Light. Their game world is touted as larger than any other ground based game in existence. And since the game basically sucks, the population should be low enough to get you the same result. To top it off, and unless I am mistaken about the details of how it works, you can "explore" the world for free with one of their membership plan options. If that is indeed true, and you have full access to explore the whole game world for free, then it seems to be risk-free to do. And you can take hot air balloon rides if you want, lol. 3D flight rocks.

[Simond]

Tip for anyone who wants to try exploring in EQ: Pick the Test server.
You get all expansions for free. doubled XP gain (in case you want to do any levelling), and /testbuff buffs you to L25 + what used to be reasonable newbie gear, five years ago.

Plus the community is better than on most live servers (provided that you don't act like a moron).

[Tale]

SWG wasn't bad for exploring, at least when I started out.  The landscape was huge and randomly generated (but static), so you could have fun going and looking for scenic areas to plant a house or what have you.  There were also the POIs, which were pretty cool until they put the locations in everyone's data pad.  After a certain point, though, the entire landscape got cluttered with dead buildings, the POIs that spawned mobs were being camped constantly, and that was pretty much that.

Yeah, I think the best exploration time I ever had was in SWG beta. The first master doctor (Timzai) invited me (Tale, near-master doc) and two master combat medics (Kalyn and Mycroft) to see what we could find on Yavin IV.



Three things you have to understand about SWG at that time: 1. There was no transport other than walking/running. 2. When you died, you left a corpse with all your gear on it, and had to run back. 3. We travelled east on foot for two hours of real time, so we really stuck our necks out. But we always managed to keep alive a doctor with a rez kit. (Edit: this was also without buffs.)

With a little help from the beta boards and some luck, we were probably among the first to see some of the PoIs. The furthest point we reached was the death star debris crater in the far east, then ran for two hours back along the beach, with the planet Yavin above us. It became a legendary trip that we still talked about on the live boards, even though we were on different servers.

[geldonyetich]

It's sort of like looking at pictures of that likable dead uncle that never got anywhere but you miss him anyway.

[Khaldun]

So far for me I would say Asheron's Call 1 offered the best pure exploring experiences. The map was very very big in relationship to player population. There was interesting landscape and some cool little discoveries here and there. There was a tower with a chest in it that I remember finding way down along a difficult-to-navigate coastal area in the Direlands where the chest had nothing but a message from the devs to whomever found it in it, for example. Tons of spawns in areas where no one was really hunting, some fun areas where you had to handle aggro very caerfully. I remember with a relative lowbie deciding I wanted to see this "Teth" place that everyone was spamming for portals to in Arwic. So I decided to run overland to it rather than take the portal. I had a big aggro radius, so it was a very scary run where I almost died a bunch of times. I think that was about the best explorer experience I've ever had.

SWG is a close second: in the Beta, I went all over the place, and the sense of size and scope was very attractive, along with finding many POIs (though many of those turned out to be much less than they appeared to be, or were unfinished until well after the game went live.)

[Surlyboi]

It was SWG for me.  With my camps able to take care of my wounds, I would stay out in the field for weeks at a time.  I remember roaming Dathomir, on foot, when people were scared to go anywhere near the place.

For those that enjoyed exploring game systems, it was also a wonderous thing.  Convoluted formulas, experimentation, and random resource spawns.  Cracking the BE Tissue formula was one of the greatest bits of fun I've ever had in a game.

God, yes, I miss my ranger days out on Dath and Yavin, not a soul around but the Rancors and Woolamanders. And later as a jedi, looking for safe places to hide out and work on my skills.

[Akkori]

You know, I still kinda miss the simple gui of the original SWG. It doesn't draw as much focus.

[Surlyboi]

And that's what it should have done. The, "let's copy WoW's interface and draw all the ADD kiddies" interface was just plain stupid.

[Riggswolfe]

Damn, this thread is giving me nostalgia for SWG and AC1.

[Signe]

Be strong, Riggsy.

[Nebu]

Damn, this thread is giving me nostalgia for SWG and AC1.

I'm pretty sure $14.99 could cure that in a hurry.

[Jayce]

I remember with a relative lowbie deciding I wanted to see this "Teth" place that everyone was spamming for portals to in Arwic. So I decided to run overland to it rather than take the portal.

Someone in my monarchy found a leveling spot way out in the dires where you could base yourself in a cave and hunt golems all day long, and no one would ever come bother you.   The mobs at this cave were much lower level than the ones surrounding it.  Getting there was a skill in itself; not only avoiding the mobs but also remembering the route. 

It was a huge timesink but I didn't mind so much.  I could tell no one went there often because I died once, and returned a week later and my body was still there. Apparently no one had entered the landblock since I was there last, so the corpse did not decay.

[Vehementi]

Adding another vote for AC1.  The game world was BIG and continuous.  You could get anywhere on the map you wanted, if you tried hard enough (glitching up mountains, etc.)  As said above, you were "rewarded" because you could find random golem spawns in the middle of nowhere and collect motes, or run into a mattekar and get a hide for some cool armor.  Or you could find a lifestone in fuckoffville nowhereland and live there by yourself or with your few buddies and have your own space in the game that nobody would find, even/especially on DT.

There was also the fact that mobs didn't insta kill you if they were N levels above you.  You always "sorta" had a chance, and you could almost certainly run away (while strafing quickly so they didn't nuke your ass), and at the very least, you knew that the area was scary (but not unexplorable) and it gave you something to come back to later to fight.  But you won later by the same mechanics, and not because the mobs no longer destroyed you immediately with the help of a compare_level() function.

I remember in beta at like level 20 being run through the dires by Amose from the portal exiting Mayoi.  Avoiding shreths and ash gromnies left and right, dodging war spells from undead and shit, finally making it to the bastion of Fort Tethana and being safe!

All of this is contrasted with WoW where you get insta gibbed by shit higher level than you, zones are all very obviously contrived with exactly two exits and your leveling path through the game is a guided tour, and you have quests to go everywhere.  You can't explore in WoW beacuse not only is everything extremely small and local, there's really nowhere to go.  The best exploration experience I had in WoW was when I used the totem bug to give myself 5000 agility/strength permanently and ran through a series of elite zones in the north of the eastern continent, then bugged through an impassible barrier and explored an unfinished zone.  I found the giant tree of life or whatever from WC3 and archimonde's giant, dead husk wrapped around it.  Plus the zone was really beautiful, and devoid of trash mobs that litter the landscape everywhere else in the game.