Vanguard: Making the game as they go?

[Lleauaric~EW]

Well, at least they admit it. To bad they aren't telling the people that are buying the game. What is going to be unfinished? Where in the world? Just how much content missing is acceptable to you? Going to be finished on subscription revenue I am guessing? Either way, they do not have the ideas on how to do it. And this isn't touching the fact that is world content isn't going to be finished on an overland level, just how much high end content will you actually have finished before you ship. A long leveling curve basically means you will be dedicating your resources to finishing a high end raiding design doc. Hap hazardly in most cases as we have all seen before with EQ expansions. Bugs will again get thrown to the way side, and subscription revenue to finish what should have already came with the game. How much are you going to ship incomplete with regards to the end game?

This is an unfair statement by you.
WOW shipped with massive part of its world unfinished. Silithus, Hyjal, parts of various zones, unfinished dungeon areas. Id estimate a good 5% (prolly alot more, but Im being conservative) had nothing, some of it still has nothing.
That doesnt mean that the game was unfinished when it shipped. It just means they felt the game was ready to ship without filling every square inch of the landscape.

[Simas]

I didnt read the thread so I could be rehashing some stuff but its a chance Im willing to take.

I actually dont look at this sort of thing as bad but I understand how it could be seen that way, esp depending on who you ask. For me though, its refreshing.

You can subdivide MMO gamers into all sorts of different groups and dichotomies but I'll stick with the one pertinent one to illustrate my feelings. For MMO players you have those who simply want to play and those that want to get at the nuts and bolts. It hasnt happened as much with WoW but in EQ's hay-day you could find all sorts of posts parsing weapon DPS, going over Luci spell data, etc. Along with these posts there were also various essays about fixing PvP or taunt or items or whatever. Check out some of Qhue's posts for examples.

I enjoy doing that sort of thing as I know some others do. As such I've thought about crap like how many mobs one should be able to kill or why should you visit such and such place (yeah I'm a nerd sue me).

With that in mind I dont think of the questions as "oh shit!! players have to kill mobs when theyre lvl 1-5?!?! WTF?! ummm...lets batphone the players b/c we have no idea what were doing lol". I think of it more as a "well we can tinker with exp values and mob HP at the lower levels, lets ask our players what they expect/want/hope for"

The same thing with destinations in far off lands, I highly doubt they cant think of anything to get players to visit far off lands, hell its not that hard to create a fetch quest. But when you have a pool that big that loves to play arm chair dev why not ask em and see if any cool ideas turn up to add in?

I think the biggest problem is the players that write those essays and love to armchair dev are not exactly what Brad got in the beta. Granted I'm not in the beta but from whats trickled out on these boards the beta forums arent the sorta old style FoH "fuck you fix it and by god I could do it better" its more of a "Brad can do no wrong if you dont like it go play WoW", which is retarded.

Not to say I agree with everyone on these boards b/c I dont but if there were two games, both lead by capable developers and one had asked the denizens of this board their ideas on the items in question and one had not, I think the one that did ask would turn out to be the better game.

[gilbertgbert]

Fact is... this is just going to be another 'mushy' MMO ... ie just another game that promises a lot, delivers on some and then promises some more!

I would warn : 'Don't get too dragged in' but I don't think there will be any to heed my call. There are too many competitors right now and this game will likely fall by the wayside....IT'S MAIN FAULTS? I'M GLAD YOU ASKED....TRYING TO BE EVERYTHING TO NOONE. nice one

[Lyenae]

Originally Posted by gilbertgbert

just another game that promises a lot, delivers on some and then promises some more!

Most games follow that mantra, it's not just an MMO thing...

[Havelock]

Originally Posted by Rayne

Many see Vanguard as thier last hope for an opportunity to "relive" thier glory days from EQ. The mere suggestion that it "might not" be exactly what they expect sends them into defensive mode, and brings out rants against WoW, EQ2, or whatever other game they consider "easier than EQ".

They ONLY see this ONE game. They CAN'T see the dozens on the horizon.

Eh, I think that's understandable. Every other game is aimed squarely at either the casual or PvP-centric community. Sigil wants to give depth and complexity; nobody else is talking that language. There are other games that look good on the horizon, but none of them are talking the same language.

[Araxen]

It's amazing how many people on this board fuel this troll and his posts.

[DJk_zero]

What's amazing is people even care about this project anymore. 200 primetime beta testers out of the pools, even if those pools were as small as 2000 players, is HORRIBLE for a supposed 'next gen, highly anticipated' mmorpg.

People 'play' Vanguard in it's current state, which while functional is nothing that you couldn't have experienced 7 years ago with eq's beta. The only difference is a graphics engine that a snail could outpace if you want the game to be 'beautiful' like it's always touted.

[Anyen]

Yes. Vanguard is exactly like Everquest with a better graphics engine. You've couldn't have pegged it better DJk.

.....

[Vorph]

Originally Posted by Utnayan

Understandable for the ideas and feedback, but some of that shouldn't have to be asked. Low level combat design, what types of resources to be used in combat, death penalties, community building and high/low level interdependence - these are things that should have been thought out a long time ago to be used in skill sets for their perspective classes. I can see if you were 1 year in or still think tanking, but four and a half years later you should be tweaking those very skill sets given to classes that create that interdependence, not get ideas on how to create it from beta testers.

The purpose of the threads is to let people just state their opinions on the topics at hand (that would be/are being discussed anyway) with an explicit rule that there is no discussion of what other posters have said. You can say you want a death penalty like WoW's without some faggot who won't be happy until Brad drops by his house and bashes him in the nuts with a meat tenderizer after every in-game death chiming in with "omg ur not HARDKORE enuff, go back to wow nub". With any luck Sigil devs are marking people who post things like "I think you should have to kill 10-20 mobs to level from 1 to 2 and rest after each one!" in the 'fucking retard' category so that their advice can safely be ignored from that point on.

But the problem is, interdependence brings inaccessibility if it is done to the extreme. For example, in EQ when you couldn't find a bind for half an hour due to no casters being about, that half hour of that person's gametime is sometimes limited. They logged in, finally got a bind, and logged out. They didn't get to really enjoy the game at all. The trick is creating interdependence that can give players an easier path, but not deter them from playing the game until it is accomplished.

I despise the idea of vertical interdependence. Fuck being a high level and needing something only a newb can provide. It's annoying enough to be a tradeskiller who needs stuff from other professions in order to make stuff (EQ2 reference, I haven't even bothered to look at VG tradeskills) let alone having to deal with newbs for anything at all.

As it stands, hardly anyone is logging in to play the game. Accessibility, solo content, and fun ways to progress WITHOUT depending on another is just as important as it is to create reasons to group/raid/etc. You need to get that type of gameplay into the game before it ships - or quite simply, Vanguard will not live up to your expectations.

Word is, a lot more people are logging in since Necro was put in. The question -- is it because of the novelty, or is it because it's a class that excels at soloing compared to the rest?

[Rayne]

Originally Posted by Havelock

Eh, I think that's understandable. Every other game is aimed squarely at either the casual or PvP-centric community. Sigil wants to give depth and complexity; nobody else is talking that language. There are other games that look good on the horizon, but none of them are talking the same language.

To expect a game of a "similar to EQ" level of challenge is one thing. To expect "EQ retextured" is totally off the wall man. And using "blind expectations" as an excuse to flame off ideas from other games is bullshit. Especially when they've never tried the implementations that are already in place in "this" game, and have no idea how they work and relate to other systems in play.

The bottom line is, a huge chunk of the tester base thought some of them sucked, and weren't any fun. Especially at the lower levels, where its extremely important to make sure the player stays interested.

[karisa]

Originally Posted by xilsharn

I guess my big question is this: Who cares? Why does this bother you so much? You don't want to play Vanguard, awesome. You think it's going to suck, Brad sucks, Sigil sucks, development cycle sucks, game philosophy sucks. Fine, awesome.

Quit making posts about it. No one cares.

I care!

[WarderX]

I care, too.

I just picture you guys sitting at your little desks posting about Vanguard... your face is red and the veins on your forehead are throbbing while you slam the keyboard in anger. And then, steam blows out of your ears.

I get a warm feeling in my pants about it.

Oh god, brb in 15 mins.

[karisa]

Originally Posted by WarderX

I care, too.

I just picture you guys sitting at your little desks posting about Vanguard... your face is red and the veins on your forehead are throbbing while you slam the keyboard in anger. And then, steam blows out of your ears.

I get a warm feeling in my pants about it.

Oh god, brb in 15 mins.

I'm a designer and as such I always listen and reflect on postmortums of other design work. I care about Vanguard because I played EQ and I'm interested to see how they made their design decisions from that point in time.

[Ronne]

AA for president

[FanBuss]

Ut reminds me of the goth kids from South Park

*flips hair*
Sigil conformists!