Crowfall aka Play2Crush aka Shadowbane II aka Nostalgia Online

[Xanthippe]

How to solve the problem that it is usually easier to gank someone for their resources than gather your own?

No inventory drop upon death solves that.

[Malakili]

How to solve the problem that it is usually easier to gank someone for their resources than gather your own?

No inventory drop upon death solves that.

What is this some kind of casual bullshit game already? 

[Viin]

How to solve the problem that it is usually easier to gank someone for their resources than gather your own?

No inventory drop upon death solves that.

And .. don't be a little bitch?                                              

[WayAbvPar]

Interesting server hierarchy. I wonder if there will be any bonuses for playing on the FFA server. And I still really, really, REALLY hate the art style. God it is fucking hideous.

[Speedy Cerviche]

Darkfall fixed a lot SB's "crush" issues by making city locations fixed, and not completely destroyable. People could easily re-bind in chaos cities or in allies territory and then re-build damaged buildings later unless the enemy won it.

Darkfall had a lot of other issues, such as a heavy, korean-like grind, no skill caps which made "battle-mage" with every skill maxed basically the best class. Lack of flavour, lore, and commerce systems, meant the only thing to do was arena style fights. Then the devs had financial issues so updates to fix this were/are very slow.

But they did manage to make one hell of an engine, really great physics, the kind of stuff you could do with levitate style spells and other movement ones was ridiculous, tribes style skiing, or slingshoting/boosting yourself up thousands of feet of sheer cliff.

The grind really wrecked it though, people were macroing all night to boost a single spell 10-20 points (of 100), etc. All to get your perfect battle-mage character to fully enjoy the fast paced, very twitchy combat.  Why not just play games like quake live, war thunder, or warband instead? Lots gave up and did just that.

If you could combine the best elements of both games, that cut out the grind, prevented the unrecoverable 'crush' defeat, had a solid stable engine, and the game was balanced properly, rich in lore and non-combat things to do, it could be really successful. There's a lot of gamers all throughout the more twitch gaming world who would sign on for something like that, like they did on Darkfall/Shadowbane launches before the flawed games chased them off.

[WayAbvPar]

Agree with most of that. Lots to like in Darkfall, but it definitely needed some help. I loved the use-based skill gain and the multiple schools of magic, and the twitchy combat. Needed A LOT more players and some sort of economy for sure. Decent sized world with lots to explore, and a feeling of danger. But it was indeed hellishly grindy, especially for a new player vs vets.

[Falconeer]

How to solve the problem that it is usually easier to gank someone for their resources than gather your own?

That is not a problem at all. That is one of the main points of a game of this kind. It is obviously not for everyone, which is fine isn't it?

[Threash]

Yeah, that is sorta the reason for people to kill each other.

[Malakili]

 

[Goreschach]

Yeah, that is sorta the reason for people to kill each other.

Obviously, the lack of hat looting is why TF2 failed to catch on.

[Teleku]

Yeah, that is sorta the reason for people to kill each other.

Obviously, the lack of hat looting is why TF2 failed to catch on.

......

Did you actually just try to make that comparison?

[Malakili]

I think it's more fair than it seems because the reality is that fun combat sells itself.  That is true regardless of the genre.  What you want is to START with great, fun, engaging combat.  You should never feel like you're putting up with a garbage combat system because the full loot gameplay gives it "meaning."  If you want to add full loot on to a great combat system, then fine have that discussion.  But the fact remains that people will PvP for its own sake if you make it actually GOOD.  That should be the first order of business.

[Draegan]

What does that have anything to do with anything? You just said "make sure you make your game fun at it's core". Bravo. That can be applied to any single conversation about a game. His argument was "we don't need full loot pvp because this shooter fps game over here doesn't have it." Which is stupid.

[Gimfain]

Reading their comments on healing killed my interest for this title.

[Malakili]

What does that have anything to do with anything? You just said "make sure you make your game fun at it's core". Bravo. That can be applied to any single conversation about a game. His argument was "we don't need full loot pvp because this shooter fps game over here doesn't have it." Which is stupid.

No, his argument wasn't that.  His argument was that people will PvP even when full loot isn't involved if the combat is good.

[Falconeer]

Do people stick around in PvE MMOs when the combat is good and the loot isn't?

EDIT to clarify. A good combat is always very important. But it has been proven before that it is not enough in MMOs, not to mention it's very hard to do in massively multiplayer games for obvious technical reasons. Comparing a 16v16 arena combat game like TF to an MMO makes no sense whatsoever. Even with good combat, the majority of people leave MMOs and start calling it "grindy" if they don't get rewarded for their performances. This is equally true in PvE and PvP. Unless you want to bring into the bogus comparison game stuff like Soul Calibur or Street Fighter. In that case, I give up and you win. This game should clearly ditch the resource looting and make combat a hybrid of Battlefield and Tekken. Moneyhats!  

And his argument is still stupid because sure people have been killing each other in PvP over the past 10 years of "meaningless" MMOs anyway, MMOs where killing a player doesn't give you anything, or they do it in arena games since Doom and before. But clearly, this one game here is being made for those who prefer to have (game)reasons to kill each other in order to create diplomatic and social layers which have been missing since Shadowbane and EVE. So yes, resource and corpse looting will be the engine of this one M M O because that's a requested feature.  What does Team Fotress have to do with this? It's just nitpicking what Threash wrote and trying to pull it out of context for no good reason.

[Paelos]

Do people stick around in PvE MMOs when the combat is good and the loot isn't?

Has there ever been a PvE MMO with good combat?

[Malakili]

Even with good combat, the majority of people leave MMOs and start calling it "grindy" if they don't get rewarded for their performances.

That's because fighting AI over and over again is boring compared to fighting real people.  But I'll just make it simple and relate it back to this game.  Whether or not I play this game has exactly nothing to do with whether or not they choose to make it full loot.   The combat isn't the only consideration either, but it's way more important than whether I can take a guy's stuff.

[Paelos]

I only care about combat and crafting.

[Trippy]

Do people stick around in PvE MMOs when the combat is good and the loot isn't?

Has there ever been a PvE MMO with good combat?

Yes.

[Paelos]

Which one(s)?

[Falconeer]

TERA.

[Nija]

TERA was PVE? I certainly never played it that way.

And I quit because there wasn't an endgame, and there still isn't an endgame. It doesn't matter how fun the combat is if there's nothing to do.

See TERA, GW2, etc.

[Trippy]

TERA.

Yup.

[Falconeer]

TERA was PVE? I certainly never played it that way.

And I quit because there wasn't an endgame, and there still isn't an endgame. It doesn't matter how fun the combat is if there's nothing to do.

See TERA, GW2, etc.

TERA, sadly, had more PvE content than PvP, despite what they advertised. It took them more than two years to release some meaningful PvP expansion. In the meantime, it was PvE with random ganking, like pretty much every other MMO out there if you roll on a PvP server. And the prsence of optional and meaningless guild vs guild wars isn't enough to describe it as a PvP game.

And yes, your last line better clarifies the point I tried to make a few posts above: good combat doesn't save MMOs but it totally makes Arena games like Team Fortress where it doesn't matter if there's an endgame or not. They are for different crowds and imply different goals.

[Paelos]

See I knew people would say that one. Which is a damn shame because while I've never played it, that game proved that you can have decent combat, but if you wrap it in completely unappealing package people will not play it.

[Falconeer]

Blade & Soul might have good combat. I am trying it right now and I'll report about it. But I have to say: it probably falls in the same identical package TERA did. In fact, NC sued Bluehole because as far as I know an ex NC soft employee made TERA out of stuff that was supposed to go into NC's next project, originally Lineage 3, then morphed into Blade & Soul. It shouldn't be surprising they are similar.

But since we are on topic, it's important to underline that the best combat in MMOs have been made in South Korea for the last 5 years. See also the upcoming Black Desert. One big difference with Western releases though could be tracked back to the fact that Korean MMOs seem to be mostly client-sided, which leaves lots of holes to hacking but allows to do beautiful responsive combat, while Western releases try to prevent hacking by doing running most of the stuff on the server, which of course slows things down.

I am not a technician though so I might be talking out of my ass. So far, I'd say the most impressive Western released combat in a MMORPG is Guild Wars 2 without a doubt. Neverwinter was too instanced to matter, and I don't think it was better than GW2 combat anyway.

[Malakili]

Yeah, bringing up Neverwinter is interesting.  I think the Cryptic MMOs (Champions Online, Star Trek Online, and Neverwinter) all have underrated combat systems.  It isn't the best ever, but it definitely is above average.  It kept me playing Champions a lot longer than I otherwise would have, that is for sure.  Particularly because I could turn off targeting and map my main abilities to the mouse to make it feel a bit like a third person shooter.

I found Guild Wars 2 combat to be pretty boring, but maybe I am an outlier in that regard.  But at base, hotkey style abilities/combat just isn't my favorite and even well done combat like that isn't going to ever feel great to me.

[sam, an eggplant]

Neverwinter combat really is great fun. I loved my ranger, that ability where the longer you channel the cone of attack narrows, allowing you to hit a bunch of enemies or focus all your damage on one... good stuff, man.

Anyone that hasn't tried Neverwinter really should give it a shot. It's not a long term MMO-- I played for a couple weeks then quit. But I had actual fun in those weeks. And of course it's completely free and you really, really don't have to pay anything.

I should try Star Trek sometime soon. I hear good things.

[Nija]

See also the upcoming Black Desert.

You should forget about Black Desert right now. I just looks good in videos.

http://black-desert.com/articles/the-naked-truth-about-black-desert-onlines-current-state-of-affairs-open-beta/

[Triforcer]

Random thoughts on last reveal:

- Mixed feelings about no tab target combat.  I really, really don't want to have to bunny hop and jump-spin in a circle constantly to do pvp.

- The seem to be going with a 1.0-0.0 EVE model for their tiers of worlds (although it isn't 100% clear to me that the "Eternal Kingdoms" will be completely safe, PvE strongholds).  If that is really what they are doing, I hope all the best crafting resources are in the FFA tier and the other low tiers- otherwise we really do have overpopulated Trammel and deserted Felucca all over again.

Also, the rate of armor decay (for the two example world tiers) seems high (20% and 30% decay on death).   I'm betting that you can repair to an extent, but not permanently.  This fits with the decision to not have "magic armor" loot drops- you don't have to be terrified of losing your armor, because you can always go buy basically the same type again.  

- Will each race be limited to one archetype?  If Dwarves can only be Forgemasters, Centaurs only Legionnaires, etc. that seems fairly limiting.  I know each archetype goes into "Promotion Classes"- maybe Promotion classes are shared between races even if base archetypes are not?

- Love the "light on in-combat healing" decision, but I hope "light" doesn't mean "none."  

[sam, an eggplant]

- Love the "light on in-combat healing" decision, but I hope "light" doesn't mean "none."  

I would have agreed before playing dragon age 3, but that game proved that limited healing (in favor of proactive damage shields) could force some compelling tactical gameplay choices. Reactive healing is boring; every MMO is saddled with that whack-a-mole crap.

[Paelos]

I also thought the Dragon Age model would suck, but it doesn't. Instead it makes you actually think about fights and use positioning that makes a difference.

[tazelbain]

Ya, combat should be fun, but by how's standards? Twitching McRedbull and Mr. EmpireBuilder probably have different views of what is fun.

So play2crush isn't actually a thing with Crowfall. 100% consensual PvP isn't the answer anymore than 0% is. But at this game won't be DoA.

[Draegan]

What does that have anything to do with anything? You just said "make sure you make your game fun at it's core". Bravo. That can be applied to any single conversation about a game. His argument was "we don't need full loot pvp because this shooter fps game over here doesn't have it." Which is stupid.

No, his argument wasn't that.  His argument was that people will PvP even when full loot isn't involved if the combat is good.

So what? I don't see the point. People play games for different reasons and incentives. People play multiple games for different reasons. Some people play both Hearthstone and MTG. Some people play HOTS and LOL. What the fuck does that argument even mean.