Another lead designer leaves sigil.

[Rythonn]

I would just like to add that not all Beta NDA's disallow you to say if you are in beta. Take the DDO Beta NDA, I read the entire thing and nothing about not saying you are in beta. Can't remember which beta I was in but it had a FAQ and one of the questions was Can I tell people I am in Beta? and the answer was yes. Maybe SWG can't remember.

[Papillon]

Owning a fansite myself, I've seen lots of people getting into beta. First I heard from them was, they don't see Vanguard to become a fun game. Next to that, they vanished from the Vanguard community completely to join other upcoming game forums or went back to whatever they played before.

I've seen quite a lot poeple doing that - not just people that didn't know what to expect from Vanguard or WoW kiddies or whatever. A mix through all kinds of people signing up for a beta and getting accepted by Sigil to join.

From what I see about the numbers of Beta invites and actual players logging in, I have no doubt that my observations fit in. I'm with fansites for quite a while now, and I know what to think of a game when this happens.

Do I put Vanguard to a rest because of that? No, not before at least the last phase of beta. Am I worried? Yes, absolutely. Sorry that I have to say that, but what Brad posts lately doesn't rise my hopes either.

With all these posts about mechanics and features, I wonder if anyone still cares for adventure, fun, immersion and content? I simply don't care for sailing ships, player based cities, riding flying dragons, diplomacy systems while talking to NPCs, Advanced Encounter Systems, clicking around on the UI to make special moves or chopping wood in groups anyway.

What I realy care for is fun and adventures in a virtual world (read: not in virtual instances). Strangely though, to me it seems as Sigil did not even start to add that to the game so far. At least, nobody is ever talking about that. Not even Brad "Content is King" McQuaid anymore, who became more of a Brad "I'm managing expectations" McQuaid.

Is it just me slowly thinking we will get a lifeless world, feeling (and looking) everywhere the same and just play around with numbers and icons on the UI?

[Creediki]

Why Wodin.. WHY?
Such folly, injecting reason into this thread.

[redav]

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

Boats, player owned ships, pirates, ever increasing AI complexity, etc. are all going in right now or have been in. I demo'd player owned ships to testers and at Fanguards (read: the public) MONTHS ago -- who pray tell are you to come here and post that they are likely going to be cut when they're already in-game? Did I nerf your class or an item back in the early EQ days or something? Enough already.

Right now we're adjusting wind speeds, tweaking travel time between Thestra and Qalia, fixing a few bugs when ships travel between server regions, etc. Tweaking and smashing bugs, not implementing core systems.

I've watched beta testers sail up and down the river outside of Tursh. I've seen the AI using water pathing to move an NPC driven boat (e.g. pirates) displayed to me by the programmer working on it. Under no circumstances are they going anywhere but into this game by launch (and not just by launch, but people will be sailing them between continents and through archipelagos in the next phase of beta).

Lastly, flying mounts are something we plan to do for sure after launch, but may possibly get in before launch, but no promises. I have been crystal clear about managing these expectations on our message boards and elsewhere. To what end would you lump in a possible feature with something we’ve committed to, like player owned ships?



Player controlled flying mounts is a great example. We already have them in from a technology standpoint – I can enter beta right now, mount a drake, and fly several km into the air and look down at our largest city with negligible fps impact. I can fly around, traverse the entire world, swoop up and down, etc.

Why won’t I commit to launching with player flying mounts then? Because such a feature requires more then the tech that is its foundation, but also justifies some cool game mechanics to accompany being able to fly about where you will, as well as some logical restrictions. And so that may be added post launch as a freebie or part of an expansion or any number of ways. So yes, under that scenario, we would be using subscription revenue to finish player driven flying mounts.

The key, however, is that we never promised player driven flying mounts as a component of Vanguard that would be available by launch. So an MMOG is not only done when there is enough content and features and balance to make a compelling and fun game for your target audience at launch, but also when you’ve done your best to manage expectations… have done your best to make sure the features you felt were truly necessary are indeed there at launch and that while you’ve talked about future features or content, that if you are unsure as to when they’ll realistically be ready, that you are up front with your future playerbase about those items well before launching the game.

E3 should be exciting then.

..should be

[Vorph]

Originally Posted by Malvesti

I'm not rallying behind anyone. I loved EQ (though it had its flaws) and I love WOW (though it has its flaws). I'll check out Vanguard when it comes out.


I just thought this board was supposed to be a little above the fan-boy mentality. Someone who comes in here with a religious attachment to Vanguard (or anything else) can't really be trusted, can they? They're not going to change their minds, and they'll twist every fact they know to make their game of choice look better.

You're right, fanbois cannot be trusted. I've been in betas where they flood the official boards, replying to any thread which even remotely dares to criticize the current state of a game in an attempt to discredit the opinions of players who don't have an emotional investment in the game and simply want to make it more fun.

The same goes for fuckwits like Utnayan and Neric too. They are just the opposite end of the retard spectrum. They're just worse because they infest this board which I actually read, as opposed to the beta forums which I do not. Even with the faggots on ignore, I still have to read their worthless shit because other people can't seem to stop replying to their trolling.

[Khorum]

Originally Posted by Vorph

You're right, fanbois cannot be trusted. I've been in betas where they flood the official boards, replying to any thread which even remotely dares to criticize the current state of a game in an attempt to discredit the opinions of players who don't have an emotional investment in the game and simply want to make it more fun.

The same goes for fuckwits like Utnayan and Neric too. They are just the opposite end of the retard spectrum. They're just worse because they infest this board which I actually read, as opposed to the beta forums which I do not. Even with the faggots on ignore, I still have to read their worthless shit because other people can't seem to stop replying to their trolling.

I agree, but it's even worse than that. That sort of advocacy might be appropriate for release (I doubt it though), but it's practically harmful in beta. I really wish there was a way to filter through the self-righteous armchair designers who managed to squirrel their way into betas just so they can REVIEW an unfinished work instead of helping to polish it. Because that's what they signed up for, that's the legally actionable contract they agreed to---to help refine and finish a work in progress. But instead of helping patch up the carpet or work on the decor, they're out telling their friends how this new building sucks because there's unused drywall in the pool and how the phone system doesn't seem to work right.

Now, I'm as eager to slurp up whatever leet beta infoz I can find, so indirectly I'm part of the problem. I'll admit to a basic level of fanboi-ism if only because EQ consumed 4 years of my life. But even I know that permitting inveterate forum princesses into your development process is a senseless gamble. Especially in a community where petty, immature viciousness has been perceived to lend traction to industry agendas.

The worst part is that this whole thing will come back as ammunition against the "not enough testing" sentiment that keeps happening after every release. The irony is that the very same paste eaters that converted their beta invitations into forum e-peen capital will be shrieking about "insufficient testing" down the line---when in truth it's hard to blame Sigil, Blizz or SOE (anyone else who's observing) for scaling back their community participation beta programs because of a few very bad apples.

I can't imagine a lot of effective solutions that would work best to keep community participation and feedback in closed betas whilst maintaining the developer's interests. They should prolly do something about discouraging "leaks" like this, and it would make fiscal sense too. Companies spend real resources to manage expectations and when some brat comes along and (willfully or otherwise) harms and diminishes those investments, that's a good reason. Maybe Oloh and company SHOULD take legal action. As aggressively and publically as possible. There hasn't been a visible deterrent to breaching an NDA contract in this community, if that's what it takes to keep people from poisoning community/developer relationships, it's due.

[Tuco]

Debate and dialogue is meaningless in this arena. No amount of rhetoric about the game's state will change the game's state on release.

Vanguard has issues, serious and minor ones. Ones that can be fixed in beta, though. There's no need to disclose what exactly those issues are, as Vanguard knows of them from at least one player.

When Vanguard is released, or even a stress test/gold copy beta is out, we'll see if those issues are resolved, and if the game is as 'next-gen' as Sigil promises it to be.

[Magnum PI]

This whole thread is stupid.

Here's what ya do (insert know-it-all attitude here):

1. The devs have NO PUBLIC forums; none, nil, zip. Gets rid of nonsense and raping of bandwidth.

2. They look at the top 50 players on both the Test Server and 50 from a combination of the other servers, and based on the time these players have invested and difficult areas they have gotten too they give them invites.

3. Those players chosen will have access to the dev forum, IM devs, and the devs can call them on the phone if necessary to get more info on what the player is seeing vs. what the dev sees.

This gives the devs a first hand view of their game from worthwhile players. And as players leave the game they can notify the devs of this and they can remove their access and recruit a new top end player to fill the spot. Or if a poster/player turns out to have become stupid or the account given to someone else, they can remove the access as well. Overall I think that with this kind of daily interaction with the FoH Afterlife caliber players will keep Vanguard at the forefront of the industry.

[Creediki]

Ut and Neric generally hit above the mark but their posts are well thought out and they make their points. There is a lot of just complete bullshit in making a MMO.

Take your NDA's. Sigil's Lawyer.. who we would expect to be competent, said that part of a NDA is to protect trade secrets. That's bullshit, and we all know it. Every MMO company has someone w/ a Vanguard account at this very minute. I would expect we could go talk to Tigole about Vanguard. I'm sure we could talk to the Bioware guys.. etc.

Yet this keeps getting repeated.

Another point I would make is the constantly-occuring phenomenon of people 'Breaking the NDA'. Why does this invoke such vitrol every time it happens? It happened to EQ. It happened to EQ2, Shadowbane, Blizzard.. etc. Same shit gets thrown up.. And we have these heated exchanges between the defenders of the MMO and the 'truthbringers'. More often than not, the prophets are complete bonkers.. but not allways. How many people here said Blizzard would have 'The game begins at 60' content in place.. and damn the doubters on release??? Given what I know now, I would probably have waited to purchase WoW for a substantial amount of time.... and SURPRISE SURPRISE.. we were told that the "raid content" was the part that they were "holding back".

Sure.. buyer beware. Sure NDA your shit. But in this day and age, I'm on the side of complete disclosure. Will it be harder for your company? Yes. But I think it will be better in the end. I don't have anything to support it, but I sure as hell won't buy another MMO at release ever EVER again without it.

[Cad]

Originally Posted by Doc

Overall I think that with this kind of daily interaction with the FoH Afterlife caliber players will keep Vanguard at the forefront of the industry.

If you recruit only those types of players for your player feedback, your game will end up tuned to suit those types of players. Those players are .1% of your customer base. I'm sure you can see where this is going.

[Creediki]

I'm not sure that is a great argument Cad.
FoH/AL players will at least make sure shit works.
And you can allways make things easier.

[Cad]

Originally Posted by Creediki

I'm not sure that is a great argument Cad.
FoH/AL players will at least make sure shit works.
And you can allways make things easier.

I'm just saying having people who are obviously very hardcore will tend to shift the game towards that mentality. You always need to keep your game in the middle somewhere...kinda like how ZG was a bit mistuned from the start because they apparently tested it with BWL gear and hardcores tested it on the public test realm.

Edit: and yes, absolutely, hardcores would at least make sure shit works. That'd be a plus If their internal testing can't even do that though there's going to be problems. Check out the 1.10 threads for evidence of that..

[Magnum PI]

Originally Posted by Cad

If you recruit only those types of players for your player feedback, your game will end up tuned to suit those types of players. Those players are .1% of your customer base. I'm sure you can see where this is going.

Not if it's Vanguard, which is what this thread is addressing. Vanguard is for FoH types, not WoW types.

[Cad]

Originally Posted by Doc

Not if it's Vanguard, which is what this thread is addressing. Vanguard is for FoH types, not WoW types.

Admittedly I've read most of what I know about the game on this board, but it doesn't seem like the target audience is that far off from a normal WoW player. I thought Vanguard was going to have mostly single-group content even at endgame but less super-casual content, so the super-hardcore raiders would be "too hardcore" and the WoW-Bneters would be "too-casual", and they're going for the "core".

There's alot of "terms" in there though so whatever.

[Laerazi]

From my understanding (and I believe Brad has posted on this previously), Sigil is taking a layered approach to building Vanguard. They lay down the basic groundwork of a gameplay system, then build more complex layers onto it as time goes on. Each gameplay system in the game is at a different stage of development, and that will continue on even after release (like player housing turning into player cities, and so on).

With combat, my guess is that the more complex aspects of it, the parts that really make it challenging and different, haven't all been implemented and tweaked to work in unison with another. From the released Beta Newsletter they are clearly going through the classes and revamping them to better align with the combat system for a more interesting and fun game, without being severely complicated.

Having only 100, more or less, people online at peak hours, in such a giant world, is going to make the game feel more like a single player game (solo) than an MMO. Considering Vanguard is aimed at group gameplay, and solo and raid are probably not a priority right now, then the issue is probably getting worse and worse as more and more people leave. I know for many people, their main enjoyment from a MMO came from the community, and the social networks they built throughout their time in the game. Without a guild, I know I wouldn't have played EverQuest for nearly as long as I did; and if only 100 people were on I'd likely not have played the game at all. I don't think I'd enjoy any game where there were only 100 people on at a time, especially when my online buddies have stopped playing. World of Warcraft is a different beast altogether; not only is the game very solo friendly, but the Beta stages began with a much more complete stage of the game, from what I gather. Vanguard's Beta 3 stage is most likely equivalent to WoW's Beta 1 stage (Blizzard obviously having a much longer development/Beta phase).

Why are so many people not playing? Your guess is as good as mine, but it can't all be technical/personal issues. Obviously, many people don't enjoy 'playing' the current stage of the game, and Brad said in a recent post that it will be that way in such an early stage of development (I believe he said the current stage is akin to EQ1's Beta 1). Beta testing is going to be tedious and annoying at times, it won't all be fun, and there is a lot that needs tweaking and altering to make the game "click".

Many people aren't willing to sacrifice their free time to do something they aren't thoroughly enjoying, because it's going to feel like work, not play. Brad has clearly stated that Vanguard Beta is going to be a long one, and it's not the kind of Beta where the game is done after Alpha, and only needs bug fixing and polish in the Beta stages. Player input is likely a very critical part of the development of the game, in Vanguard's Beta, and I'm happy to know that. I'd rather they completely throw out a terrible system and redo it, if need be, than just stick with it and hope for the best. Yeah, it sucks that they didn't get it right the first time, but I'm sure most of you know that something on paper doesn't necessarily translate well into a game, especially an MMO where many systems support and play off of another.

In regards to combat, I highly doubt they've completely scrapped what they were planning. I'm sure some work is being redone, though I would think that's the nature of creating a game and testing it. If it is boring, as some people are saying, then I'm sure the development team is aware of the issue and is working to correct it. You can't really gauge how fun a system is going to be in a pure concept phase, until you put it to the test. While it's understandable to be disappointed that they didn't hit combat on the head right away, I don't think you can blame them for not being able to predict the outcome in the concept stage.

It seems the core problem with the game, from what I'm hearing, is that it isn't fun. Not that there isn't enough content, or that it's not complex enough, or that it's not technically better than any MMO ever, but that it isn't fun. Obviously being fun is the most important part of a game, however, and hopefully the devs have realized what's causing this and what needs to be done to make the game more sticky and enjoyable.

That said, is the lack of fun an issue with the core concepts, or does it lie in the tweaking of the gameplay systems, or the lack of an adequate population, or the fact that the game is still very incomplete and shattered? It seems that most people who have given up on Vanguard, think that it's the core concepts that are flawed, and that will likely remain unfun, whereas Brad is saying it's the lack of population, the need for all of the gameplay systems to be in place and tweaked, and the fact that the game is still in a very incomplete and buggy stage. Not to sound like an optimistic fanboi, but I'm going to give Sigil the benefit of my doubt and say that the game will likely be alot better come release, and won't have the same issues as it currently does. That's not to say that I think the game will be better than EverQuest or World of Warcraft, but I think it will at least be decent and worth trying when it's released.

/book off