Tabu..wait... Richard Garriott back from the dead

[HRose]

OT: From when Grimwell is at SOE, and what is he doing?

[schild]

OT: From when Grimwell is at SOE, and what is he doing?

Browse the forums. Grimwell made an announcement about this.

And why are all your english mistakes so goddamn the same thing. You've been them making for years.

[HRose]

Since when?

[Venkman]

Grimwell's announcement, in the EQ2 thread. Because.

And the English thing: We all post hastely sometimes, missing grammar, syntax and spelling sometimes so much the post is near unintelligible. Some are just more obvious about it than others.

[schild]

And the English thing: We all post hastely sometimes, missing grammar, syntax and spelling sometimes so much the post is near unintelligible. Some are just more obvious about it than others.

Hastily (lololol :D). And not really. Even Morphiend can spell now (spellchecker?).

[damijin]

Mozilla with built in spell checker is pretty much the greatest tool in the board warrior's arsenal.

[UnSub]

I've signed up for beta. In fact, I've become a regular NCsoft beta groupie.

Didn't see this posted when I skimmed - CuppaJo has announced TR beta won't be starting for a month or so.

[SnakeCharmer]

For whatever reason, I am mildly geeked up and ready to play this game, beta or not.  Don't know why either.  No PvP, which sucks.

[Nonentity]

Hm.

January 08, 2007
Benefactor Stone Project Participants

Benefactor Stone Project Participants who registered their disk via the www.playtr.com website were sent an email today. Please check the email account you registered with for enlistment information from CCO CuppaJo.

They were passing these out like, E3 2005, I believe. Or 2004. I think it was 2004. I had my 'Benefactor Stone'. Anyone else remember these?

[slog]

Help me out understanding this game in it's current form.  This is my perception, tell me how far off I am:

It's a MMORPG that pretends to be a FPS but once you put your crosshairs somewhere over the target the computer "rolls the dice" to determine if you hit and there is no player (as opposed to avatar) skill involved, and there is no PvP.  Levels, item gathering, catassing and all the other crap that 95%~ FPS players hate is included.

[Nonentity]

Help me out understanding this game in it's current form.  This is my perception, tell me how far off I am:

It's a MMORPG that pretends to be a FPS but once you put your crosshairs somewhere over the target the computer "rolls the dice" to determine if you hit and there is no player (as opposed to avatar) skill involved, and there is no PvP.  Levels, item gathering, catassing and all the other crap that 95%~ FPS players hate is included.

I think they've taken specific care not to actually call it an FPS anywhere, it's a "massively multiplayer online action game".

It works on a system where you have a cone or a firing arc the target has to be in when you click the mouse for the dice to start a-rollin'.

[Sky]

What you fail to realize is that all FPS PvE games are SINGLE PLAYER , they work because there are things in a single player games that you can't hope to do in a mmorpg.

First, you're wrong. Folks have already mentioned co-op games.

Second, it's about the mechanics. If one enjoys PvE mmo, but is tired of diku combat, why not use fps?

I think it sounds interesting, but I doubt I'll play it (time constraints). If you don't like it, don't play it, eh?

Rage on, tiny dancer. Rage on.

[Nonentity]

I was reading IGN's preview from E3 2006 (I didn't have much time to look at it when I was there), and they mentioned clan-based PvP, but they haven't revealed their hand for PvP yet.

So, it's not COMPLETELY PvE. There is SOME form of PvP to it.

[Venkman]

Hm.

January 08, 2007
Benefactor Stone Project Participants

Benefactor Stone Project Participants who registered their disk via the www.playtr.com website were sent an email today. Please check the email account you registered with for enlistment information from CCO CuppaJo.

They were passing these out like, E3 2005, I believe. Or 2004. I think it was 2004. I had my 'Benefactor Stone'. Anyone else remember these?

Yep. Still have the soundtrack too (and was hosting the five songs they permitted me to for a time). They changed the game but kept the language they created for it.

And slog, you're not far off from what was at E3 2006. It worked a bit faster than you implied, but the foundation is the same.

[Viin]

Maybe I'm wrong, but doesn't Planetside use the same 'cone of fire' thingy with a dice roll to see if you actually hit? How is TR different than that?

[Falconeer]

There's no dice roll in Planetside, is it?
It's the same mechanic of Auto Assault instead. Without wheels.

[shiznitz]

There's no dice roll in Planetside, is it?
It's the same mechanic of Auto Assault instead. Without wheels.

Both are correct. TR's system sounds like AA which could be fine. I didn't have a gripe with AA's combat mechanics specifically. It was fun driving around spraying bullets. The rest of the game around that part didn't look good or make much sense to me, though.

[SnakeCharmer]

I was reading IGN's preview from E3 2006 (I didn't have much time to look at it when I was there), and they mentioned clan-based PvP, but they haven't revealed their hand for PvP yet.

So, it's not COMPLETELY PvE. There is SOME form of PvP to it.

Hm. Well, that's encouraging.

Thanks for the info.

[Venkman]

There's no dice roll in Planetside, is it?
It's the same mechanic of Auto Assault instead. Without wheels.

Both are correct. TR's system sounds like AA which could be fine. I didn't have a gripe with AA's combat mechanics specifically. It was fun driving around spraying bullets. The rest of the game around that part didn't look good or make much sense to me, though.

Just so I can learn: I thought PS used the cone of fire thing as a variable target reticle. Stuff instead was then "hit" based on some light collision detection and dice rolls, with numbers adjusted by the size of that reticle. No?

[shiznitz]

No dice rolls. Your client shows the cone expanding and contracting. If your client shows a hit, then you hit. Your first bullet fired should go exactly where the reticle is pointed (except for spread and arc weapons, of course).

[geldonyetich]

Of course, with Planetside you have the issue where the guy you're shooting at 80m randomly warps from side to side.  Thanks to latency, Planetside is more a dice game than the cone of fire allows.

[geldonyetich]

You know, I'm going to flame Planetside.  I'm sorry, because it is one of the more fun games to have "MMO" stuck in front of it.

Planetside might have been a failed experiment.  It doesn't have very many players right now, and I've often attributed it to not patching in enough content quickly enough.  But maybe the problem was really this: latency prevents a true massively multiplayer shooter from really working.  It's the problem of multiple clients on a server architecture increasing the packet size by <base packet>^<involved clients> - there's a definite upper limit of playable twitch gameplay.  That's why, in the middle of a pitched firefight, I encounter the 80m away player who jumps side to side from packet upsides too often to easily kill.  That's really frustrating, and I can see that being a foremost reason so many players were driven off.  It's no wonder Huxley sounds like it's going to have instanced fighting areas.

There's a solution, and it's to develop the gameplay so players don't need to move around so often.  Planetside, as it was balanced in beta, did have a working solution here.  It had a cone of fire that players had to move slowly or crouch in order to get anything resembling accuracy out of it at all.  When the developers decided, "hey, lets balance the game to be more twitchy", they did so with blind ignorance to the knowledge that massively multiplayer latency cannot support twitch.  Had they kept the cones big and the weapons unusable beyond point blank at running speed, that would have worked just fine.

Tabula Rasa, if it works like Neocron or Auto-Assault, has a different approach in that player only needs to roughly aim and let the character skill do the rest.  That would allow for massively multiplayer firefights.

[Mi_Tes]

Hm.

January 08, 2007
Benefactor Stone Project Participants

Benefactor Stone Project Participants who registered their disk via the www.playtr.com website were sent an email today. Please check the email account you registered with for enlistment information from CCO CuppaJo.

They were passing these out like, E3 2005, I believe. Or 2004. I think it was 2004. I had my 'Benefactor Stone'. Anyone else remember these?

Yep. Still have the soundtrack too (and was hosting the five songs they permitted me to for a time). They changed the game but kept the language they created for it.

And slog, you're not far off from what was at E3 2006. It worked a bit faster than you implied, but the foundation is the same.

I have one of these disks from E3 and signed up as well.  Guess I will check my email.  Too bad I still like the first version. 

[shiznitz]

You know, I'm going to flame Planetside.  I'm sorry, because it is one of the more fun games to have "MMO" stuck in front of it.

Planetside might have been a failed experiment.  It doesn't have very many players right now, and I've often attributed it to not patching in enough content quickly enough.  But maybe the problem was really this: latency prevents a true massively multiplayer shooter from really working.  It's the problem of multiple clients on a server architecture increasing the packet size by <base packet>^<involved clients> - there's a definite upper limit of playable twitch gameplay.  That's why, in the middle of a pitched firefight, I encounter the 80m away player who jumps side to side from packet upsides too often to easily kill.  That's really frustrating, and I can see that being a foremost reason so many players were driven off.  It's no wonder Huxley sounds like it's going to have instanced fighting areas.

Latency has nothing to do with why PS remained a niche game m(aybe that is "survivor bias" because I never hear anyone complain about it but only those playing ever really talked. I was also never into the FPS subculture so whatever criticisms that contingent had I never heard them). Planetside blew it by not offering changes. Instead of redesigning the bases so that they actually make sense for the way the game evolved, they added the annoying caves. Instead of adding more specialized vehicles, they added the BFRs. If you played PS the first 6 months, quit, and came back tomorrow, there would so little different it would shock you given how other MMOs change over a year or two. There are people playing PS that know every goddamn -nook, cranny, tree, boulder and mountain by heart. That game should have continent-altering earthquakes every 6 months.

[schild]

I'll be honest, I still want to play TR.

I wanted to play the original version more though. It's funny, I finally get a post-apocalyptic gunny MMOG and that flagrantly ... happy, colorful version was more desireable. But then, it's no secret that I'm broken. Maybe I should get off my ass and ask when I can play.

[Nonentity]

I'll be honest, I still want to play TR.

I wanted to play the original version more though. It's funny, I finally get a post-apocalyptic gunny MMOG and that flagrantly ... happy, colorful version was more desireable. But then, it's no secret that I'm broken. Maybe I should get off my ass and ask when I can play.

I'm with schild here - I want to play the original version too. I remember playing it at E3 - me and my buddy got in, and we were guided by an NCSoft employee (who was playing some max level GM healer type, so we didn't die), and we ran around and flipped and hit people with books and weird fan-knives.

It was fun, flippy, and happy! And it had lazer unicorns!

DAMN YOU, TABULA RASA!

[geldonyetich]

Planetside blew it by not offering changes. Instead of redesigning the bases so that they actually make sense for the way the game evolved, they added the annoying caves. Instead of adding more specialized vehicles, they added the BFRs.

I'm in agreement that this is a whole other level in which Planetside was buried.  Not only lack of changes, but the wrong changes, for example tweaking the game to play twitchy when it couldn't handle it.

Another level in which Planetside went splat was the lack of meaningful use of the persistent world.  There's a fundamental lack of respect involved in working for 8 hours to take a continent only to log in the next morning and find that a lone hacker took the whole thing back without resistance.

[Hoax]

I thought thy blew it by charging a sub, thats why I never played it during release till the boot camp or w/e came out.

[Stephen Zepp]

Planetside blew it by not offering changes. Instead of redesigning the bases so that they actually make sense for the way the game evolved, they added the annoying caves. Instead of adding more specialized vehicles, they added the BFRs.

I'm in agreement that this is a whole other level in which Planetside was buried.  Not only lack of changes, but the wrong changes, for example tweaking the game to play twitchy when it couldn't handle it.

Another level in which Planetside went splat was the lack of meaningful use of the persistent world.  There's a fundamental lack of respect involved in working for 8 hours to take a continent only to log in the next morning and find that a lone hacker took the whole thing back without resistance.

I've thought long and hard about how PS could have been made more persistent given the technical challenges they have as a genre, and it's really a difficult problem when you look at the big picture. Many of the same issues existed in Shadowbane (3 am ninja sieges, 3 barbarian siege groups, specifically there), and it all comes down to trying to allow for some way to handle players making investments and then being unable to protect those investments when not online.

Without some huge AI, PS as it stands would have shot itself in the foot trying to make things more "persistent". You'd have to come up with some sort of system for spending outfit points for additional defenses--and then you'd have to have a robust AI mechanism for those defenses to be able to withstand a small attack reliably. Otherwise the arguments would just raise to the next level: "I/we/our outfit put all this effort/farming into spending our outfit points for base XXX/contintent YYY, and it was taken down by a single squad in 2 hours!".

Ironically for all those that complain about "too large worlds for the population", the only real way to do this type of persistence is to make it take a long time to make successive captures over geography. Original PS (pre-broadcast warpgates) had this built in, because to get to continent X you needed to take continent y (or at least key bases to get a link established), and it also took time to move forces cross continent. Players bitched about travel time/"time to fight", so they took out that built in "persistence" and gave the players what they wanted...which is like letting the masses vote for bread and circuses.

For this type of persistence to work in an MMO, travel times really must matter, or your AI has to be so good that defenses can hold off a siege for 6+ hours to give the defenders a chance to respond "irl"...and if the AI can do that, then the base/fort/city/whatever is so defended as to make it literally impossible for it to be taken if players defend it. Since the f13 community at least absolutely detests anything that takes time, especially travel time (and for good, logical reasons, I'm not debating that), you face the developers with two very mutually exclusive meta-game mechanics that are really hard to mix.

The only thing that I personally could come up with for the concept (shadowbane, PS, whatever game genre that's MMO and has player created persistent content), requires that you must either make sieges take a long time for build up (talking days here, not drop a bane and show up an hour prior), have massive constraints on territory capture and hold to capture the next territory, or have the robot jesus of AI.

I do believe there is a mix of all of the above that will "work", but I'm not sure it will ever be "accepted".

[shiznitz]

You explained the issue well. One idea I would consider for PS is that a locked continent could not have a base hacked until X uniques of another empire had died there. Let the ninjas hack all the towers, but keep the bases locked from solo hackers until there is some fighting.  Hacking all the towers would mean losing the continent benefit so the defenders would have a reason to come an try and retake the continent. Right now, if the NC hold have locked Hossin, it just takes a single cloaker to hack the warpgate linked base to open the whole continent to the hordes.

[Stephen Zepp]

You explained the issue well. One idea I would consider for PS is that a locked continent could not have a base hacked until X uniques of another empire had died there. Let the ninjas hack all the towers, but keep the bases locked from solo hackers until there is some fighting.  Hacking all the towers would mean losing the continent benefit so the defenders would have a reason to come an try and retake the continent. Right now, if the NC hold have locked Hossin, it just takes a single cloaker to hack the warpgate linked base to open the whole continent to the hordes.

Capitals in PS were another attempt at "persistance" in a way, but again didn't really work out as hoped (imo at least). The idea being a protected area that would take a long time (in PS terms at least) to disable, so that the "total capture of a continent" was even further delayed to give defenders a time and place to regroup.

Personally, I think (non-PS at least) a system of real territorial control that progresses over time is an approach that may work given enough design and play testing.

Think about what shadowbane would have been like if you could only place a bane if you had a frontier city under your control within xx distance of the target city. You'd have to progressively push your territory out towards your target opponent, stretching the period of time of perceived threat to destruction of capital city out enough to really have the politics game play better. The only real political strategy in SB that worked was the whole NATO style--one is attacked, all defend, attacks have to be approved by all type of bs.

SB could have had much more intrigue and backstabbing style diplomacy with IMO much less "my city's dead, I quit the game" if you could see the enemy coming over a period of days to weeks, and attempt to shore up a response force, or even make pre-emptive strikes at outlier cities...or even build up frontier defensive cities to give you breathing room.

Mod request: Any chance of pruning the last couple of posts off to a different topic, say in the Game Design forums? It's a good convo, but has nothing to do at all with TR!

[Falconeer]

Anyone remember WWII Online? How did that worked? (Actually, the game is still going...).

I bought it and played the day it came out. Sadly, ugh, I couldn't bear it. Anyway, didn't endure it long enough to understand the war/capture mechanic, but I heard it was pretty good. Anyone have a clue?

[Arthur_Parker]

Why isn't it going to have pvp?

[Venkman]

Why isn't it going to have pvp?

They didn't want to do that yet.

It probably is due to them wanting to sell the RPG side of things first. In that form they may think there's more potential success. MMORPG = RPG = soloability = numbers. PvP is still generally a sideline activity on the Western side of things, even in WoW, which really just uses PvP as way to climb a different ladder of gear. But then, them not bothering with PvP is an assumption they'll successfully capture a lot of people with the PvE focus, different combat system, and so-far-not-that-successful sci-fi theme.

It's why I don't think this'll launch. Unless Blizzard takes another two years for an expansion, there's just too many higher-profile (relatively-speaking) titles coming and NC may just not want another AA.

[geldonyetich]

I think I prefer a totally PvE game to a PvE game with tacked on PvP mechanics.