Developer Diarys - SoM Related

[Mrbloodworth]

Developer Diary: SoM Skirmishes: Overview

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Hi there! Zombie Columbus here. In the past, I've tried to give insight into how the design and implementation process works, and I hope these diaries about Skirmishes are no exception. The Skirmish system represents a significant addition to LOTRO; it’s a big feature, so this dev diary will be broken into smaller components over the next few weeks. This first installment will focus on what our high level goals are, the initial design of the system and the process of re-design it went through to get there.

To cut right to the chase: Skirmishes are short, accessible, randomized, scalable, story instances with incremental rewards. Why Skirmishes became this can best be explained by discussing what the designer’s goals for the system are. Everything we added to Skirmishes was done with a high level “vision” in mind. By sharing this vision with you, I hope that you will see why we made the choices we did, and how we ended up where we are now. Our goals were to:

    * Create finely crafted instance content that can be played by different group sizes and levels.
    * Keep play-time short, allowing Skirmishes to fit into other activity cycles. Internally we've called them- "Pop-corn" experiences. If one is short and good, why not try another?
    * Add randomized elements into Skirmishes to keep replays interesting.
    * Encourage a rotational play of Skirmishes, to keep them fresh and prevent them from overshadowing existing playstyles. Skirmishes should complement the game, not alter it!
    * Set up an incremental reward structure, like the instance barter systems.
    * Allow players to feel that any amount of play time was a step closer to a desired reward.
    * Give players a feeling of participating in epic struggles, and of being leaders of small armies.

Lofty goals to say the least; we aren’t the first to try randomized, scaling gameplay. The benefit to players can be great, though, which is why it is attempted as often as it is. We've been working on Skirmishes for nearly a year now, doing significant amounts of iteration, re-design, testing, and feedback collection from both developers and our Isengard players. Each sub-system was designed to work toward the above high-level goals.

The initial design that eventually became Skirmishes began during a walk I went on with fellow designer Rhidden, not long after Moria's release. We mused about how we could put a fun sub-game inside LOTRO, using mostly existing tools, tech and art. I was playing a lot of Tower Defense inspired games at the time and Rhidden was interested in riffing on the popular Battle Instances. Mixing those and other inspirations together, we came up with the idea for LOTRO instances where the player would set up soldiers and siege weapons and use them against waves of incoming enemies. Some clunky ways to upgrade the soldiers and siege weapons were discussed, and we decided that putting the ideas together in a formal pitch might get them into the game. We put together a design document, circled it around the team a bit, got some feedback, and waited.

As I mentioned, Turbine had just launched Moria, so there was still some room in the next expansion for original ideas like ours. It was our hope that our pet project could get into the mix and become a small addition to the game. Other designers put forward ideas for the extra room in the expansion, extending existing systems, or creating other new ones. All of these ideas were about to enter a Battle Royale. What followed was a text-book example of the saying: "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made." I think it's safe to add game design to that list...

Our lives for the next few weeks consisted of many meetings, discussions, proposals, counter-proposals, committees, sub-committees, e-mails and hallway discussions. Our little pet project expanded and changed in many ways, integrating ideas from all around the company, and eventually took shape as a marquee feature of the next expansion. Two of the bigger changes were Rhidden cycling off onto other projects, and jwbarry joining the team. He brought in some fresh perspective, a knack for making things work, and an emphasis on more story-oriented content. As the project gained momentum, we were allocated additional resources and people from inside the company, and soon the newly named Skirmish system was on track to be a significant addition to LOTRO’s next expansion.

So, with all that out of the way, we’re ready to discuss the real nitty-gritty guts of the Skirmish system. We can say we want to keep Skirmishes from overshadowing other gameplay styles, but how can we work to that goal? As we publish more installments to this diary, various aspects of the Skirmish system will be elaborated on. As with all MMO development, we expect to change the systems and content we have in place based on player feedback – systems that work perfectly on one scale can behave very differently once released onto the live servers, with many players bringing their unique playstyles to the mix. We may even decide some of our high level goals are no longer valid. To me, this is a large amount of the fun and challenge of working on MMO’s -- change is just part of the game. We hope that you enjoy the change that Skirmishes represent!

[Mrbloodworth]

Developer Diary: Mounts 2.0

You Can Lead a Horse to Water…

…But you cannot make it drink. Until Volume II Book 9: Siege of Mirkwood, that old proverb applied very well to the mounts of Middle-earth. Every rider knew it was all fun and games until you wanted to interact with your environment; every door in Middle-earth was closed to you, every NPC uninterested in your business, and every skill you learned completely blocked while riding. It didn’t take long after buying your first mount to feel just how unforgiving and restrictive the system could be.

To understand why the system was so restrictive, you have to look at the technology behind it; the channeling system. It’s the same system originally developed to deliver pies across the Shire and pour buckets of water on fiery blazes, and it was later leveraged to saddle players onto mounts. The channeling system was an adequate solution during a time when developing a new system was out of the question, as development was coming to a close for the launch of Shadows of Angmar.

No More Horsing Around

Following the launch of Mines of Moria, we started discussing the prospect of giving mounts their own system and embarked on some basic investigation to understand the scope of what it might take. There was really no safe method of tacking on more features or special conditions to the channeling system to get everything we wanted from mounts. In fact, doing so would likely contradict the original intent of the channeling system and still not guarantee a satisfactory outcome. The decision we made was to give mounts a system of their own with two main goals to guide its development:

Restrictive, then Flexible

One of the first things we decided to do when developing the system was to maintain all of the restrictions of the original system. The day we flipped the switch there was literally no difference between the two. Little by little, we eased the restrictions to test usability, file bugs, and polish the experience. This worked out fairly well as we were able to separate the design into components and concentrate work on one feature at a time. If we ran out of time then we could simply keep some restrictions in place and polish the features we had completed in time to ship.

Lastly, to save development time, we wanted to re-use as many of the previous assets and scripts as possible without having to reinvent the wheel. We were able to re-use items, icons, animations, sounds, content, and underlying scripts, again allowing us to focus almost entirely on usability. In the end we were able to provide a system that allows you to live life fairly comfortably while saddled to your favorite mount.

Extendable

One never knows what the future will bring, so the system should support incremental changes without risking stability or the original design intent (as we undoubtedly risked if we augmented the channeling system further).

A Horse of a Different Colour

Getting down to the brass tacks, here is the list of new features and improvements thanks to the new mount system:

Mounts as Skills

Mounts are now toggle skills! They can be quick-slotted like other skills or executed directly from the new Mount panel (Character Journal -> Skills -> Mount). A new keyboard shortcut can be set to promptly access your mounts panel (using Key Mapping Options). Since mounts are now skills, you can feel free to collect all of the available varieties without having your packs fill up – no more having to choose between festival horses or exchanging them at a vendor!

One Less Item

Even though we still rely on a mount-item in your pack, it’s a temporary item used to grant the appropriate mount skill to you. Once used, the item will grant a skill to you and be deleted. If the item is quick-slotted, it will be replaced by the new skill. Regardless of what mount item you purchase you will receive the correct mount type for your race. Gone are the days of mistakenly purchasing the wrong mount for your race (“But I wanted a pony!).

Item Usage

Some items can be used while riding, such as food, potions, and other miscellaneous items. Even your Map Home item can be used while mounted and you will appear at your destination still riding your mount.

NPC Interaction

Almost every NPC can be interacted with while you are mounted. There are two exceptions to this:
Stable-masters will still require you to dismount before purchasing a ride. You can still talk to stable-masters while mounted to view the list of destinations. Bards will automatically dismount you when managing your traits.

Door Usage

Every door can be opened and passed through while mounted. If the door leads to a place that does not allow riding, you will appear inside dismounted from your horse. Some special types of ”doors” may not be usable while mounted, such as ladders.

Skill Usage

Depending on your class and level, you may have skills that can be used while riding. Hunters and other classes that enjoy swift travelling can use these skills while mounted. In fact, almost every class has at least one skill that can be used on a mount. No combat skills can be executed while mounted, as that would constitute mounted combat and that’s a horse of a different colour!

Crafters will be particularly happy to hear that tracking skills can be toggled on/off while riding (although gathering resources while riding is not allowed).

As a side-note, some skills may become unusable while mounted in the Ettenmoors to help preserve a level playing field. Currently, only the Hunter’s tracking skills have this restriction. Hunters can still enjoy tracking on horseback while riding outside of the Ettenmoors.

Player Emotes

Several popular emotes will now animate you while mounted, and even more, while not animated, are now allowed while mounted. The following emotes have animations for when you are mounted*: Bother, Bye, Calm, Cheer, Drink, Eat, Munch, Fidget, Followme, Hail, Look, Lookaround, Salute, Think, Wave, Cry, Roar, laugh (lol), SwordSalute, Shakefist *Some of the animations are reused with the hope that unique animations can be made over time.

A majority of the other emotes do not animate, but are allowed while mounted. In these cases the player does not animate but the emoted text is broadcast to those nearby.

Horse Emotes

While sitting idle you can make your horse/pony/goat randomly play one of three different animations. Simply hit the spacebar.

Mount Health

Your mount’s health will now regenerate over time. Just as in the old system, getting hit will reduce your mount’s health and critical hits will knock you off your mount. Unlike the old system, you can stay mounted as long as you don’t get knocked off, or fall into a deep body of water.

Mount Display Panel

A new mount display panel will now appear after summoning your mount. The panel displays the mount’s name and health.

Renaming Your Mount

Every mount arrives with a personal name that can be changed by right-clicking the Mount Display Panel and selecting the “Rename” option. Unlike pets, your mount’s name is not visible to those around you.

Mount Discount

Along with your first level 35 mount comes a new trait granting you a discount on all other common mounts. The trait is granted to you even if your first mount happens to be a reputation mount or pre-existing festival mount (new festival mounts will not grant this trait). The discount itself only applies to the common mounts sold by Eogar, Son of Hadorgar.

My Little Pony (or horse)

Players can now gain access to their first horse or pony at level 20. This is a slower version of a normal mount and has less health, but gets you saddled up sooner in the game. The cost of this mount is 220 silver and looks the same as the Founder’s Bree-horse. As a result of this change, Founders can start riding their mounts at level 15!

Grey Horse/Pony

If you deleted your Grey Horse/Pony to make space in your pack you can purchase a replacement from Eogar.

Mustering & Summoning While Mounted

Tired of telling your fellowship to dismount before mustering them? Never fear, they can now accept your request without dismounting.

If Wishes Were Horses, Beggars Would Ride

This update focused on making mounts more enjoyable to use rather than adding all new functionality. Before you ask if you can lop off orc heads from atop your favorite ride, remember that was never a goal of this update. File this one under “Quality of Life” improvements.

Enjoy the new mount system!

[Mrbloodworth]

Developer Diary: Shared Storage

Shared Storage is a new storage system designed to enable sharing between all characters on a given account!.Until now, your only options to share items between characters were to mail them individually, deposit them into a personal chest at your home, or have a friend hold them while you switched characters.



Shared Storage can be accessed by visiting any Vault-keeper and opening the standard Vault interface you are already familiar with. A new button, “Open Shared Storage”, will be available on the Vault interface:



Any items currently in your standard Vault can be easily transferred to Shared Storage and vice-versa, simplifying the process of sharing items with your other characters.

Shared Storage Interface


The Shared Storage interface has new features to help you manage your shared items. You can sort items alphabetically by name (A-Z, Z-A) and filter by item type. The list is populated dynamically from the items in your shared storage space.

Filtering items is as easy as selecting the Filter drop-down menu and picking the item-type to display:



For your convenience, bound items can be stored in Shared Storage -- but only the character they belong to can retrieve them. The Filter Bound Items option will hide items that don’t belong to your current character. Unique items cannot be stored in the Shared Storage.

This new feature should make managing items across multiple characters much easier!

[Tarami]

Funny choice of shared storage interface. A shop? I get that it's probably to allow for filtering, but still.

[Gorky]

You know what would rock? shared storage for creeps. Forget about per creep storage, just shared storage alone would add so much to the creep player experience.

[Yegolev]

OK.  Another place to store bound items is probably worth $20.

[Stormwaltz]

Yeah, I'm looking at this as $20 for optional features -- shared storage and two extra character slots (which, admittedly, I don't need). I have no problem with paying for optional features.

Now if only I could convince them to offer more housing chests or cosmetic outfit tabs for $20...

[Mrbloodworth]

Part two of the skirmish system diary.

[Sky]

OK.  Another place to store bound items is probably worth $20.

I've been playing for a week and need shared storage. I'm not real damn happy that something I'm used to from EQ2 will cost me $20, because I'm continually too broke to mail all the crap to my alts for crafting, too broke to buy extra storage on my main, are there eventually bags in the game? The tiny amount of storage is kinda bumming me out, I have massive boxes of crafting crap in EQ2 and love sharing stuff with my alts.

[Mrbloodworth]

OK.  Another place to store bound items is probably worth $20.

I've been playing for a week and need shared storage. I'm not real damn happy that something I'm used to from EQ2 will cost me $20, because I'm continually too broke to mail all the crap to my alts for crafting, too broke to buy extra storage on my main, are there eventually bags in the game? The tiny amount of storage is kinda bumming me out, I have massive boxes of crafting crap in EQ2 and love sharing stuff with my alts.

You have all the bags you will ever have. If you are on Brandywine, ill give you some coin for bank space.

Storage in game comes in the forum of Bags, bank, house, guild hall. and soon, account level.

[Mrbloodworth]

Rather interesting, somewhat off topic quote.

That would be fine with me, too. I think work on an XP switch would still fall behind other things we'd love to get to, though. Cosmetic weapons tops my list for "things I really want to get in, but we can't see where the time comes from to do it".

And we've been bitten before with doing the lame hacky version of something, rather than spending the time to do the Real System. All it does is blow up into more work later. I'd rather get a mentoring system on the schedule than hack a poor substitute in just because it's faster.

Looks like a hint.

[Sky]

Here's an idea. Have the devs go play EQ2 for a while. Cosmetic weapons and armor (not sure how lotro's cosmetic armor works yet since I'm only 17...Kip Winger anyone?), shared inventory (expanded a while ago to cross good/evil bounds), bags and boxes (player and quested), mentoring and now chronomancy to set your level lower and do grey quests and dungeons, etc.

One of the reasons I've been so loyal to EQ2 is they really shine when it comes to improving the experience and reducing needless annoyances, like when they expanded bell travel to include a lot more destinations.

I do like LotRO quite a bit, great world feel to it and nice questing. But the years of polish EQ2 has received does spoil one when playing other games.

Also, I'd be up for charity :) I'm playing four character now to see which I like best but mostly playing Cerr the champ or Liali the huntress.

[Sky]

Armor sitting in my backpack takes durability hits the same as armor I'm wearing in combat?

 

[Mrbloodworth]

Armor sitting in my backpack takes durability hits the same as armor I'm wearing in combat?

 

When you die, yes.

[Sky]

Blah! Not that I ever die!   Are you on now? I'm in the game for a little bit, got to get up early tomorrow to wait in line for Skynyrd tickets...

[Mrbloodworth]

Blah! Not that I ever die!   Are you on now? I'm in the game for a little bit, got to get up early tomorrow to wait in line for Skynyrd tickets...

Becouse of your post, i am about to be.

[Cheddar]

There is a damn UO project going on.  Priorities, Bloodworth.  I am disapointed with your lack of interaction there!

[sigil]

Developer Diary: SoM Skirmishes: Story Instances

Brian “Zombie Columbus” continues his series of developer diaries about the new Skirmish system coming in The Lord of the Rings Online™: Siege of Mirkwood™ with Part 2: Story Instances. To read Part 1: Overview, click here!

Story Instances:

Now that you’ve read the overview of the Skirmish system, let’s start next with what Skirmishes are at their very core: instances. We believe instanced spaces are some of the best content in LOTRO. Instances allow us to create a directed experience, set up interesting interactions with NPC's, and fine tune battles. Almost more importantly, instances allow us to tell stories. You can't set the Prancing Pony on fire in public Bree, or have Elrond’s sons join the battle against invaders in the public portions of the game. Instead, as instances, you can expect Skirmishes to contain all of the things you've seen in other instances: monsters, quests, NPC interaction, bosses and interesting locals. Because they are Skirmishes, each of these things will have a twist that we'll talk about now, and in future weeks.

Location, Location, Location:

Beyond dialogue, there are many tools to telling a story. Location, weather and scenery all add to a storytelling experience. Because of this, we chose pre-existing locations from around Middle-earth for Skirmishes to take place in. As instances, the return to these locations will take place separate from other players, allowing us to add any number of special changes. The Defence of The Prancing Pony is one that we are especially proud of. For the first time, you will be able to fight bandits in the familiar streets and alleys of Bree, a Bree covered in deep snow-drifts! We've taken this opportunity to utilize and re-imagine a number of popular or underused locales from around Middle-earth.

War Comes to Middle-earth!

Skirmishes represent the increasing military action spreading around Middle-earth. The Free Peoples have begun to mobilize and have set up Skirmish Camps near most major cities. There, commoners band together to defend of their homes. You, the LOTRO players, have always represented the more heroic citizens of Middle-earth, and it's time you helped down on the front lines. Players will be able to bring their considerable power into the midst of battles for strategic locations, and to defend against the advances of the Enemy. You will not be alone; each player will be able to bring a personally trained Soldier into battle. More on that in the "Soldier" section later!

Strategic Combat:

The skirmishes and battles for Middle-earth will often take place around “Control Points.” These points represent important locations of strategic importance in the particular Skirmish. In some Skirmishes you will be tasked with taking each point back from the enemy; in others they will indicate from where enemy attacks will come. They will all be recognizable by the Skirmish Banner that flies over them. Red indicates the control point is in the hands of the enemy. Banners will turn green once the control point is re-taken by the Free Peoples.

Repeatable Adventure:

Much like our other story instances, Skirmishes can be replayed if you are so inclined. With Skirmishes though, the Reflecting Pool is not needed; the new Skirmish-join UI will be all you need. We’ll talk more about that system later, but for now it’s important to understand that this repeatability has been a fundamental part of the design of Skirmishes from the start. To further this goal, we decided to keep Skirmishes on the shorter side. While LOTRO has many enjoyable large instances, the time commitment for these is sometimes too much for players. Skirmishes are designed to take between 20 and 40 minutes, longer for larger group sizes. We hope that they will feel like “Popcorn” experiences -- fun and enjoyable, so why not have some more? Our intent is that players will find the time to do a quick Skirmish before logging off, or as their kinmates gather for an event, or log on for just a half hour and have a complete adventure.

Epic Story:

Lastly, Skirmishes will not just be a series of disconnected adventures. A number of them are parts of the Epic book, tying in the battles of the Free Peoples with the larger War of the Ring. Once they have been played, they can be replayed just like any other Skirmish.

[Mrbloodworth]

Developer Diary: SoM Skirmishes: Randomization and Scaling

Brian “Zombie Columbus” continues his series of developer diaries about the new Skirmish system coming in The Lord of the Rings Online™: Siege of Mirkwood™ with Part 3: Randomization and Scaling. If you’ve missed previous installments you can catch up with Part 1: Overview and Part 2: Story Instances.

Randomization

I mentioned earlier that one of our design goals was: Add randomized elements into Skirmishes to keep replays interesting. We are well aware that any bit of content that you replay runs the risk of becoming boring and repetitive. By making Skirmishes both short and repeatable, we are potentially setting ourselves up for a problem. We’ve all played games where such repetition becomes frustrating. Games often tackle this problem by including enough randomized elements to keep it interesting (Rogue-like games come to mind). With Skirmishes we have put a number of systems in place to keep the variety high and each playthrough varied.

Monster Spawns

Each Skirmish has a set of monsters that are thematically linked to the story of that Skirmish. In Tuckborough Troubles, brigands, wolves and Orcs have invaded. These will be the monsters you see each time in that space. Where and when you see them will change with each playthrough, as well as what they are doing, what variety, and how difficult they are. For instance, during your first foray into Tuckborough you might find 3 swarm melee Orcs patrolling around a campfire while a normal archer Orc sits near the fire. The next time through, there may be a pair of elite wolves who lurk behind the tents! Spawns of monsters will usually be in the same general places to keep playthroughs moderately consistent, but each time through will have its own variety.

Encounters

An Encounter is a purely optional objective, a side quest you can participate in if you find it. Each time you begin a Skirmish, we secretly select two Encounters from a list designed for the Skirmish. These Encounters will appear during your playthrough if you do what is necessary to trigger it. I'm being intentionally vague here because finding out what all the Encounters in a Skirmish are, and how to complete them, is part of the fun! Basically, keep your eyes and ears open, and you will find that a clearing that was empty during your last playthrough has an NPC that needs help, or a campsite that was abandoned previously has a brigand leader ready to fight. We've set up Deeds to track how many of these Encounters you've discovered in each Skirmish. Finding them all will grant special rewards, and each time you complete the Encounter you will have a chance of finding various Skirmish-specific rewards. More on rewards in future installments!

Lieutenants

Last, and most exciting, are Lieutenants. As I explained, the monster spawns vary by what, where and when they spawn. Lieutenants take that variety and dial it up to "11". A Lieutenant is like a mini-boss that makes a normal fight more interesting (i.e. deadly!). Each has a unique look and a halo effect to indicate that they are special. Each one has a special skill or gimmick they will use while fighting you. We've designed Lieutenants to be beatable by "normal" combat tactics, but to be easier once their tricks are understood by experienced or observant players. In short, the more you play Skirmishes, the more Lieutenants you will learn how to recognize and how to alter your gameplay to counter them.

My favorite example is of the Zealot of Pain. He acts like a standard melee monster, perhaps just hitting a little bit harder. However, as you damage him he will put potent damage buffs on the other monsters you are fighting! The first few times you fight him you may not notice this is happening, only that fights with him in it quickly become deadly. Eventually, you will realize that when you kill him last the fight is much easier. Congratulations, you solved him! We've tried to design all Lieutenants with this idea in mind. They are beatable, but once the trick is figured out they are much easier to deal with.

Lieutenants have a chance to show up with any group of monsters in any Skirmish. It is important to fully understand how this will affect your playthrough of Skirmishes. An easy fight one time through might suddenly have more monsters than last time, including a Lieutenant. Additionally, all Skirmishes share the same pool of Lieutenants (with a few lore-inspired exceptions). This means that once you learn how to beat the Zealot of Pain in one Skirmish, you will know how to deal with him in any Skirmish.

Not all Lieutenants are made equal. There are some whose combat tricks can only realistically be dealt with by a group. We've made it so these guys only show up in the appropriate group-size scaled Skirmishes. Additionally, some Lieutenants will gain new twists to their skills in larger group sizes, though the basic tricks you learned for them should still apply. I guess I kinda hinted at scaling there, so without more beating around the bush....

Scaling

My favorite part of the entire system! No joke. Skirmishes can be scaled to the group size and level of the group playing them, as well as having a difficulty toggle which will increase the rewards from the Skirmish. If this sounds great, it's because it is! However, allow me to fill in some of the details.

First, each scaling axis (level, size, difficulty) is set only when the Skirmish is created. They will not change during playthrough. For groups, the leader of the fellowship will decide what values to select.

Second, in the interests of balance we have only implemented solo, small fellowship, fellowship, and 12 man raid  sizes for Skirmishes. This means when you select size, you can only select 1, 3, 6 or 12. At launch, all skirmishes can be played as 1, 3 and 6 man versions. Roughly half of them can also be run as 12-man raids. We will be unlocking the remaining 12-man versions in the future.

Third, a combination of the two above limitations means that if you set up a small fellowship (3 player) Skirmish and try to invite a 4th member, they will be unable to join. Simply exit the Skirmish, and re-create a fellowship (6 player) Skirmish. Playing with less than the maximum number of players is possible, though a bit more difficult.

So there are some restrictions, but we allow a significant amount of customization to create the kind of experience you want. My favorite part of all this is the difficulty scale. If a particular Skirmish seems too easy, simply step up the difficulty and you will find yourself challenged again, and receive more rewards!

Summary

I think that covers scaling and randomization. It's our hope that we have created story instances with a number of randomized factors to keep replays fun and interesting. On top of that, we allow you to play those instances with as many, or as few, other players as you'd like and at whatever level you'd like. To top it off we even let you adjust the difficulty of the instances up if you are in the mood for a challenge.

Next time, we will talk about Soldiers. As a refresher, they are recruits from the free peoples you will be able to personally train and customize to assist you in Skirmishes. See you then!

Bonus:

Faction/Reputation

Faction/Reputation, whichever moniker you choose the result is the same: a standing with a group of people with which you have or have no previous interactions. We have several of these in the game right now and all indications point to their inclusion in the future. We added this system a little later than usual and as a result it suffered from a little less love than it possibly could have received.

As many of you know, I have been working on revisions to the game for the better part of a year now. The latest effort, the Lone-lands (full pass including the Epic Story and Garth Agarwen brings the area to level 22-32 and I threw in a dash of level 55+ for good measure), showed me that there was something missing in the game and through the assistance of beta testers I was able to cobble together the early stages of another undertaking - growing the Reputation system.

I have been spending some cycles working out ways that we can make our Reputation/Faction system a little more robust and also finding ways to make the goal of kindred more appealing. To that end there are some minor additions coming to the Lone-lands’ new faction The Eglain, when the Siege of Mirkwood drop happens. Rather than holding this back, I figured I would get this out there now and get some feedback, figure out if this direction scratches an itch and explain how I arrived at this destination. Like all issues that come up for designers this one was laden with some red herrings and murky waters.

The Issue…

There is no incentive to grind through reputation. - paraphrased statement from LotRO players.

Okay, we get that, the perception clearly is that the reputation system is light. The reality is…the reputation system is light. It started out rather fluffy and kind and grew into a system that is now used heavily in new areas and as a result, the inconsistencies and shortcomings are more apparent. We are aware of that fact. We dislike that fact and it is now a personal crusade to alleviate that issue and address concerns by providing something more with the reputation system.

Now, to accomplish this goal I needed to establish a benchmark. Something that would serve as the new template upon which all future reputation will be built or revised. That began with The Eglain in the Lone-lands.

The average player moving through the Lone-lands and following the quests there will find that they achieve acquaintance level with the Eglain quickly - the same is also true of any player who previously completed all quests in the Lone-lands. This design was important as the Eglain rep, story-wise, is now a gate for Book 2. (Don’t freak out! Really, it is easy to get to Acquaintance.) At each stage thereafter, I wanted to properly incentivize folks to stick with the reputation and continue growing. At acquaintance, players can see that there are rewards just out of reach, rewards that are relevant to their level and will have an impact moving forward. I also wanted to provide players with a different way of handling the advancement other than specialized recipes only used by the rep faction and so I developed a quest for every production crafting skill. These quests are available at acquaintance level and though they are not the simplest way to get to Kindred, they should help alleviate the issues of that grind and have an avenue that does not involve hunting, instances, etc…

Average players completing the remainder of the quests tied to the Eglain will reach friend - or thereabouts, those who previously completed the Lone-lands will be very close to friend when they log in on the update day. This puts folks at the first reward tier. An initial piece of a jewelry set. This is a specialized set to one of three stances - tactical, defensive and offensive melee. They are somewhat costly - but likely worth the expenditure.

At Kindred, players can purchase a tailored pocket item. I say tailored because it is built specifically for your class and usable only by your class. All items are rare and usable at 28, 30 and 32 (subject to change). The set bonus is a pretty nice and focuses on morale and class functionality over more stats. Those are reserved for the items.

Placing this up on the test realm for the Beta received some interesting feedback; immediately a level 60 stated that they could only reach ally through questing and I responded with the following:

“At level 60, is there really a reason to grind for this faction? There is no way to rocket players into the ally tier without also increasing the faction for players going through this area fresh. At the moment, I like the progression. I just need to make the items in there go from friend to kindred.” - Orion <- That’s me.

Now, I admit, the timbre of that statement makes me sound like I was being dimwitted or narrow-minded; but, my intention was not to provide a level 60 with a reputation that they could use. My intent was to create the template for future reputation implementation. A few more posts transpired and player’s dug in and then I dug in getting so adamant and uncommunicative as to say:

“Lastly, an area meant for levels 22-32 is not going to have a reward schema implemented to support level 60-65 players.” - Orion

Wow, really? Did I say that? You bet I did, I had my underlying goal of building that template and was hyper-focused on that and that alone; then something cool happened. A follow-up post came in:

“I wasn’t expecting to see rep items available that would be of any use to level-capped players. I guess what I meant was something - a title, a cosmetic, something “fluff” like that - that would stay with the player past level 32. I know it’s not realistic to expect something like this for book 9, just a thought for down the road as to how the lower level faction grinds can provide something that stays with the character.” - Beta player who knows who they are but needs to remain nameless for the moment because of NDA.

Suddenly, there was an epiphany - not really a huge one mind you, but an epiphany nonetheless. From that, I cobbled together a new document highlighting all the changes that I wanted to make to the reputation system in an effort to make it fully realized and complimentary to the game. By the end of that day I had the new doc hammered out with a list of things that I could do in the short-term. When I came home that night I wrote up a bundle of ideas for the long-term.

This is a snapshot of the process. We started this a long time ago and there have been some clear posts on what people wanted to see the reputation system be - but, honestly, many posts are filled with requests that, in the interest of balance, are just not feasible. We overlook some of the gems sometimes, we sometimes sweep the complaints into a pile and say that we will look at them later. Sometimes later never happens. In this case, it did.

The Solution…

From this conversation, where we cut out telephone, we were able to discern a legitimate gripe that was easily handled, something that should go a long way in realizing the potential of the reputation system. Like all things in LotRO development, this will happen in tiers and begins in only one area with only one Rep Faction - The Eglain. Though it will only happen here for Book 9, the hope is to carry this through as the new template of the future:

   1. At Acquaintance players will earn a title indicative of their standing with the group and gain access to items to improve standing or relevant level rewards.
   2. At Friend players will earn a title indicative of their standing with the group, gain access to further rewards and receive a 10% discount on all stable-masters associated with the rep faction (Ost-guruth has one stable-master), this bonus will stack with the travel reward given out earlier this year to “elder” players.
   3. At Ally players will earn a title indicative of their standing with the group, gain access to further rewards and receive a 5% discount on all vendors associated with the group. This bonus should extend to repair costs as well.
   4. At Kindred players will earn the last title for the group, gain access to further rewards and receive a travel skill - sharing a cool down with all racial-based travel in the game that will take the player to the group’s chosen home. This travel skill will require the use of a travel ration. We are aware that this will likely cause crossover into player skills, but the time investiture into these reputations is significant and we feel that this is a legitimate reward to offer.

Again all these are implemented for The Eglain faction and The Eglain reputation faction only. As time allows and as I move forward with revisions, other reputations will see inclusion and the same enhancements. These were the low-hanging fruit bits.

Now for something that we rarely do - a glimpse of the future. The earliest that any of this will be seen is in 2010, likely later spring or early summer and could get pushed out further than that timetable. My primary reason for offering these up is for feedback and to inform you of where my head is at this time.

    * Deeds for completing multiple reputations - with titles and possibly specialized rewards.
    * Kindred cosmetic rewards to display individual factions as cloaks.
    * Kindred mount rewards (yes, we have some of these already - this would be revisiting those that do not)
    * Ally and Kindred recipes for production crafting skills that are unique and have broader appeal: These might include; cosmetic items, food recipes serving multiple people at once, bind on acquire gear, class specific gear (rep clothes for your banner-bearers, unique looks for your summoned pets, special instruments, etc…), housing items (functional and non-functional) - all recipes would be and produce level appropriate on all accounts where the item would have gameplay impact.
    * Swift travel routes to areas of importance to the group or relevant relation.

There are other ideas percolating, but they require more explanation than I can give at the moment, so I must cut myself short here.

Ultimately, reputation is another crusade being undertaken and one that I believe will be improved significantly.

Closing this blog out, I want to invite people to ask questions here. If I can answer them, I will. After all, we are in this together.

O

[Sky]

That sounds pretty nifty.

[Ard]

Heh, so they're finally doing in lotro what they needed to do to DDO years ago.  Here's to hoping this concept gets ported to damn near every dungeon they've ever made in any game, if it works out.

[Mrbloodworth]

I added more from Orion, the LOTRO revamp and edge smother.

[Mrbloodworth]

Extra tidbit on skirmishes:

They system opens at level 30, with the tutorials and a few skirmishes being available. New skirmishes open up every 5 or so levels.

Currently all skirmishes scale to cap.

I foresee more kinship group events if this system will accept a decent range of levels.

[Ard]

   4. At Kindred players will earn the last title for the group, gain access to further rewards and receive a travel skill - sharing a cool down with all racial-based travel in the game that will take the player to the group’s chosen home. This travel skill will require the use of a travel ration. We are aware that this will likely cause crossover into player skills, but the time investiture into these reputations is significant and we feel that this is a legitimate reward to offer.

Holy crap.  That alone is worth it for some of the factions.

[rattran]

Yeah, I spend a whole lot more time bouncing around the world helping folks on my hunter than on other toons. Getting a bit of that functionality on a 30 minute timer would still be sweet.

[Soln]

   4. At Kindred players will earn the last title for the group, gain access to further rewards and receive a travel skill - sharing a cool down with all racial-based travel in the game that will take the player to the group’s chosen home. This travel skill will require the use of a travel ration. We are aware that this will likely cause crossover into player skills, but the time investiture into these reputations is significant and we feel that this is a legitimate reward to offer.

Holy crap.  That alone is worth it for some of the factions.

agreed, great stuff particularly when you've already grinded out that faction

[Sky]

ground

[Draegan]

So whats going on with the combat changes?

[Yegolev]

Oddly, I had forgotten about them.  I expected more controversy, but then it does seem to be a rather minor change.  The change of the interruption, I mean.  Maybe there is something else?

[Draegan]

Hmm maybe not.  Have they released anything showing this, or has anyone written about impressions yet or is the expansion and it's content still behind closed doors?

[Yegolev]

Testers still under NDA, I am sure.

[Jamiko]

Developer Diary: SoM Skirmishes: Skirmish Soldiers

Brian “Zombie Columbus” continues his series of developer diaries about the new Skirmish system coming in The Lord of the Rings Online™: Siege of Mirkwood™ with Part 4: Soldiers in Middle Earth. If you’ve missed previous installments you can catch up with Part 1: Overview, Part 2: Story Instances, and Part 3: Randomization and Scaling.

Soldiers in Middle-earth

Why Soldiers?

Skirmishes represent the Free Peoples’ response to the increasing hostility across Middle-earth. All across Eriador, Skirmish Camps have sprung up to serve as mustering places for those willing to fight. Most of these people are not formally trained combatants; they are simple folk who have taken up arms to defend their homes and lands against the growing threat of the Enemy. Most of the formally trained warriors have been called away by their respective lords and masters to assist in the larger scale battles that are brewing. This leaves an opening for you, the LOTRO players, to help lead the way to victory!

You’re a hero, act like it!

LOTRO players represent someone a cut above average; a hero, whether by accident (like some Hobbits we all know) or intention. With this power comes responsibility -- not only to assist in these skirmishes, but to take some commoners under your wing and train them. In return, you will be able to bring these new Soldiers into battle with you. Unfortunately, they are not as well trained as the Captain’s Herald or Lore-master’s companions. In battle, they will act without your orders, engaging the enemy as they see fit. You can give them occasional orders, but they are not well-disciplined enough to be managed as much as seasoned soldiers.

Train your personalized troops!

There are many aspects of your Soldiers that you can specialize as you see fit. Since there are many eager recruits to choose from, you are in a position to decide what you would like your Soldiers to look like. You may select what race your Soldier is, as well as their clothing, hair styles and even hair colour! In addition to these cosmetic changes, you also choose specialized training in various arts of war. These "Roles" allow you to train a Soldier that complements your abilities. As an example, if you are fragile in direct combat, train your Soldier in the Protector Role. Soldiers who become Protectors will attempt to draw enemy attacks to themselves, keeping the attacks from you.

Soldiers and Design

Art imitates life

One of the most interesting things about working on LOTRO is balancing between the rich lore of the world and gameplay mechanics. I experienced this firsthand during Moria while working on the Rune-keeper. I find that lore informs gameplay as much as gameplay informs the lore. The design we settled on for Soldiers is as much a series of gameplay decisions as it is lore decisions. Some of the lore described above led to how the game functions, and some of the gameplay below led to how we presented the lore. I find the dichotomy to be interesting, like the old saying: Life imitates art. Art imitates life.

Soldier interaction and availability

After completing the Skirmish tutorials, you will gain the Summon Soldier skill that calls your Soldier. It's important to point out that your Soldier may only be used while inside a Skirmish. We have designed the Skirmish instances with Soldiers in mind, but the rest of the game would be made trivial if you could bring your troops around with you! In light of the Soldier’s minimal formal training and that we already had two "pet" classes, we decided to have the Soldier mostly controlled by AI. He will fight to the best of his ability, but you will have only minimal ability to direct his targets and no ability to choose when he uses his skills. This minimal control comes through the Direct Soldier skill which will force your Soldier to attack the indicated target. This skill has a longer cooldown time, representing the Soldier’s inability to follow constant orders. This all serves a minor design goal that I didn't mention in the overview; keep the UI impact of Skirmish low. That is to say, we didn't want to add dozens of new skills and barter items to already full shortcut bars and backpacks!

Customization details

The specialized training and customization available for your Soldier will be done through special Skirmish Traits. I'll go into a lot more details about them in the upcoming developer diary about Skirmish rewards. For now, you just need to know they act much like existing traits, though in a separate pool. They are managed separately from existing traits, so they won't interfere with your Virtue/Race/Class/Legendary traits, and they’ll allow you to choose from a wide variety of cosmetic changes to your Soldier. The race and gender of the Soldier can be designated through a trait, as well as what hairstyle and color you wish them to have. Next, you will be able to pick a "Role" trait. This is the most important trait for your Soldier, as it will essentially define what class the Soldier is. For instance, the Protector Role is focused on keeping threat on himself, and outfits your Soldier in heavy armour and a shield. Each Role will then allow you to pick what Skill traits you want. These Skills each add new abilities to your Soldier’s repertoire. The Protector can purchase skills to increase threat, trigger an AOE attack, or heal himself. Finally, there are Training traits which grant generic bonuses like critical rating or morale. There are more traits for each of these options than there are slots to equip them, allowing each player to customize their Soldier in ways that complement their playstyle.

Your fellowship of two

I'd like to talk about that last sentence a bit more. The number one reason we added Soldiers into Skirmishes was so each player could customize that Soldier to complement their own characters. In fact, the purpose of Soldiers is mainly aimed at letting solo players participate in more challenging Skirmishes. As a healer, you can add a tank or a DPS Soldier to your group. As a DPS class, perhaps you would like your Soldier to be a healer or a buffer. The choices are up to you, and they add a nice layer to the game. In addition to the combat effectiveness bump, they allow us to make Skirmishes more "epic." Instances tend to have more monsters and more allied NPCs, to give them a feeling of scope.

Overview:

So, Soldiers allow for an extra axis of customization, represent the commoners of Middle-earth fighting at your side, and allow us to throw more monsters at you! Next time we will be talking about everyone’s favorite thing in the universe, Rewards, so check back soon!

[Yegolev]

Can I name him?  Because...
...
Patsy.

[Ard]

But how did coconuts make it into the Shire?

[Stormwaltz]

But how did coconuts make it into the Shire?

Giant Eagles.