Why all the nerd rage against Vanguard?

[Phlean]

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

stuff

This is why all the nerd rage against vanguard, this post. I know its all the rage to bag against vanguard, and Brad himself and I'll say I dont play VG or any MMORPG atm.

But these type of fluff posts piss me off because they dont say anything. Whats the point of this? Its all a shill speak, while it might be interesting to read for some people but most people will tune it out and say eff you. I, and I would assume most people would rather read a post by Nino or Tagad because they get to the point and have substance in what they say without a lot of fluff.

You knew the world was going to be huge, and people level up and move on and unless you're adding 100k+ players a month the newbie levels area's will always be under populated. Yes it sucks to have overcrowded newbie area's but those people will move on and then you have alot of space without alot of players and then it is discouraging to not find any new friends to level up with. You should have few newbie area's(very polished and fun), tons of mid level to upper level content because thats where most players traditionally end up, and then alot but maybe not as much of max level and high end raiding content.

You need portals with a huge world, even something as simple as the 4 Luclin spires with maybe a little quest to activate each one or something. Mounts and flying mounts shouldnt be 'this is how you're gonna travel from one end to another' as mounts should be used for small distance travel imo. As for the altars maybe you should have newbie quests that revolve around an altar in that area to explain (even if it is somewhat vague to protect "the mystery") what they do like some single player games do.

You need to drop your expansion team for the moment and fix all the bugs that piss people off. That should be your absolute first priority, not class balance, not adding city building and that other stuff. Get your game as bug free as its going to get now and then worry about the other stuff. As other people have said, they could deal with their class getting nerfed if they didnt have to deal with CTD's or other annoying bugs. I understand that you can only put so many people on a project but this should be your absolute #1 priority and the more people you have working on finding, classifying, and fixing bugs the better.

We also need to change our messaging in ads, both online and in print, and attempt to dispel the assumption some people are making that Vanguard is only hardcore. In reality we very much understand that the gamespace has grown and evolved. People who had a lot of time on their hands and played a ton of EQ have grown up, got jobs, families, etc. Even those who played EQ a ton of hours and had a blast for years playing that game now are in situations where while they had fun with EQ want a different game that requires less overall time invested and especially less amounts of contiguous time and the ability to play more casually. Like I said, I think we need to make some changes to the game (nothing fundamental, but some tweaks here and there), but the even bigger problem is that many people aren't even trying the game out because they've already made up their minds that Vanguard = EQ 1.

That quote has always bothered me and I see it on occasion but there are always going to be new players to a genre that do not have those time constraints. This board started out along time ago and its members have aged and come across new responsibilities that do not include camping 30 hours for Raster or Quillmane, but there are tons of new players that are HS/younger college age that dont have those time constraints. If companies are only courting those older EQ generation type of players then this industry will fizzle out in time. As a company you can not count on recycling the 'old guard' without courting a new generation of gamers, they are out there as we all where back in 99-2000. This is one thing that Blizzard understands and is one of the reasons for their success.

[Eomer]

Originally Posted by Gnome Eater

Hindsight is of course 20/20, but don't you feel that a lot of the problems that you faced with the image that Vanguard portrarys were due to the way you portrayed yourself in the beginning?

I second this. Aradune was quite emphatic in the beginning that Vanguard would be a "deeper" game than WoW, and that their main target audience would be "core" gamers (but that the game would also have content for casuals and hardcores) and so on. The perceptions about Vanguard right now are exactly what SGO cultivated from the start, and those perceptions have a lot of momentum.

[...]

biiig post! I don't have time to read it, but it's awesome that he'd post here.

[Twobit Whore]

Originally Posted by Eomer

I second this.

And I'll third it. Expectations were not managed one iota during development and beta. People sat on the general forums dreaming of candy canes and gumdrops, speaking with 'authority' about exactly how the game would be based on the FAQ.. and Sigil let it run rampant. When the game turned out to be absolutely nothing like people envisioned, we got nothing but spin and double-speak.

Sigil could have nipped it in the bud by addressing the posts, thoughts and opinions that were extremely widespread, but instead they let people think whatever was popular and generating buzz on the forums. It was all under the guise of 'sekrit sauce' and not wanting to spill the beans, but in reality I think it was due to not having a clue on what to do next and everything that was tried was a bust.

[keflex]

Perhaps VG isn't for you...

uh, or maybe it is now...

Who knows!

[Fury]

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

In the meantime we'll continue to make the game better, fix bugs, make tweaks, add some very cool features. And we'll make sure people know that you don't have to grind unless you want to, that you can play casually, that you have multiple advancement paths and don't have to fight all of the time. We'll make sure people know that you don't have to CR -- that you can summon your corpse at the altar. We'll make sure that skipping CRs isn't as painful as it is. We'll add some teleporters. We'll make sure that while grouping remains the focus, that we make better LFG and even matchmaking functionality.

Tell, you what. When you get all that in game and fixed, and kick in some fun, maybe I'll give it a retry. When you can take the tedium out of having to travel for 45 minutes to meet up with your group, maybe I'll give it a retry. Actually, when you take the tedium out, period, maybe I'll retry. As a beta 2 tester, I tried to get that message to you and the rest of the Dev's, and what I got back was, "Maybe this game isn't for you." And now you're trying to tell me, "whoops, uh, actually it is..."? Which is it?

You want to cover solo and grouping play? Take a look at EQ2 today and see how they do it. Make it so the goal of the game is to have fun, not work and be punished for failing.

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

The word about how fun harvesting and crafting is will spread.

Good luck with that one.

And while you're rethinking some decisions, you might want to rethink that not having official boards one. You're a big proponent of building a community, and yet the first thing you do is cut off access to those that play the game and want to give back feedback. Not to mention that it makes it frustrating to those who might be interest in buying the game and checking it out.

[Gnome Eater]

Actually, cutting the community forums was a great idea, since it became pretty much an echo chamber of people frustrated that Vanguard didn't conform to their vision, and you seem to be unhappy you cannot be on their boards bitching up a storm.

Negativity breeds negativity, and loudmouthed whiners will squash out any positive discussions.

One of my biggest complaints was that the only way of getting feedbacks to the developers during beta was through batphone usage, since any constructive thread about a specific aspect of the game got hijacked by whiners who tried to use it as a soapbox to whine about general unhappyness.

I don't think the problem at any point was the game, I think that just due to the initial early advertisement and a poor choice of selection of beta-players, the people who were the loudest fanboys of Vanguard were absolutely atrocious at giving out useful feedback.

[Mithrull]

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

Some of this will be addressed through viral marketing. As those who are playing the game enjoy Vanguard, they will tell their friends that this game is not as hard core and nearly as tedious as EQ 1. This will help, but I also think we need to be more proactive in spreading the word about what Vanguard is really like. Heck, even people who are giving the game a chance have misconceptions. I was grouped around level 10 and we got into a situation where we were in the floating cities above Jalen's Crossing and died a few times and just couldn't get back to our corpses to do a CR. We ending up dying several times. I said forget it, and went to the altar and just summoned my corpse to me (something you could NOT do in EQ 1). I advised the others in my pick-up group to do the same and they didn't know you could do that! They thought you HAD to CR, just like EQ 1. Man, that was an eye-opener. I think there are people who truly believe you either have to CR or that the penalties for summoning your corpse to the altar are so bad that you never want to do it. And it some cases, at higher levels, and depending on what mob you die to, the penalties *are* too severe, and we need to make some changes. But just as importantly, perhaps even more importantly, we need to get the word out that you don't have to CR in the vast majority of cases, and that also in the vast majority of cases summoning your corpse to the altar where you pop up when you die does NOT include a heinous penalty; rather, that's why we put that functionality in there. Having to CR in Vanguard is the exception, not the rule -- only in fighting extremely difficult mobs where you and your party knowingly accept the risk vs. reward of fighting specific boss mobs likely in the depths of dungeons do you take the risk of having to CR (or get your corpse dragged out) assuming you totally wipe and don't have someone who survives on hand to resurrect you. And I think that's just one powerful example of false assumptions that are being made about the game, either by people playing it (who may get frustrated when they actually don't have to) or by people who have heard about the game and figure, again, that it's hardcore and an old school MMOG with updated graphics. Ah! This is frustrating, but we will get the message out.

One TINY suggestion here as well. Change the location of the point on the altar that needs to be clicked to summon. In some cases its rather hard to reach and also contributes in a small way to people not realizing its even there.

[Samflam]

That article is good stuff;P

[holymight]

Originally Posted by Fury

And while you're rethinking some decisions, you might want to rethink that not having official boards one. You're a big proponent of building a community, and yet the first thing you do is cut off access to those that play the game and want to give back feedback. Not to mention that it makes it frustrating to those who might be interest in buying the game and checking it out.

Hell no. I love the lack of an official forum. They just need to impliment a central tracker that shows all the dev posts across all the community sites.

[Aradune Mithara]

Originally Posted by Mithrull

One TINY suggestion here as well. Change the location of the point on the altar that needs to be clicked to summon. In some cases its rather hard to reach and also contributes in a small way to people not realizing its even there.

Totally agreed -- this is in the works.

[Erronius]

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

STUFF

Well I was wondering why this thread was back up again, but I was expecting a nerd fight or flamewar.

Brad, you must have thick skin and brass testicles; I didn't expect you to come into this thread.

I didn't see you mention probably one of the biggest concerns, and that is the station pass (assuming I didn't miss some announcement and the hike has been rescinded). I have several RL friends that were willing to look past whatever flaws VG might have at release, even when I wouldn't. But with the announcement of yet another AAP price hike, every single one said to me that they would be dropping the pass and might possibly drop VG as well. Maybe things will die down after awhile, but I can't imagine this being a good thing for VG. IMO all the bugs and the things needing to be finished are almost a non-issue at the moment, in comparison. Those people who couldn't accept them aren't playing, and those who can are indeed in VG, though they may be bitching a little.

I could be wrong, but I wonder how much good will come out of an advertising blitz at this late of date. A lot has been said already about VG, opinions have been formed and cemented, and people have already chosen what side they would come down on around release. Maybe this is only valid with respect to the hardcore players or those 'in the know', maybe the advertising you are planning will work with people that are simply ignorant of VG, and perhaps MMOs in particular. It could just be me, but I can't imagine myself being swayed by any amount of advertising that is put out. For many, it will be too late, imho.

And I do agree wholeheartedly on the topic of managed expectations and addressing of issues pre-release. But, that horse has already been beaten into the dirt so I'll say no more, even though thats what did in VG for me personally, before release was even announced.

Oh, and Brad, if you read this let me just say: For the Love of God and all that is holy, please change your love-fest that is Brad McQuaid's Website . I don't even know if it's just me or what, but it seriously hit a nerve with me. It's so sickenly pro-VG that I seriously felt ill the first time I read the text portion. I know it's old at this point, but still...

...To many MMOG players, you may already know about Vanguard and are either looking forward to it, or at least looking forward to getting into beta or checking out the game being played by someone else in beta, or perhaps even waiting to see how launch goes. To many other MMOG gamers, especially long time gamers, you're already active on our boards and avidly looking forward to the game. But then for many other MMOG gamers, there's a lot of about Vanguard you might not know about. Or, worse yet, you might have heard some rumors floating about that simply aren’t true. Perhaps you might have heard that it's yesterday’s game with nothing revolutionary or exciting, or only for hard core players with no lives, or that it's more about challenge and tedium than fun. Or, on the other hand, you may be playing in one of the current MMOGs and are looking for something new on the horizon. Well, if any of that’s true, our message and our efforts, whether interacting with people on our message boards, or releasing a series of screenshots or in-game videos, or doing interviews in magazines or on the web, may come as a bit of a surprise: yep, that’s right, this game was likely made for someone just like you.

No, no, of course you can’t make a game that’s everything for everybody (and, really, who’d want to?). And neither do we want to make a game that’s a copy or clone of a popular game that’s already out there – players want choices, and meaningful ones at that. But with our experience and the efforts and design we’ve put into the game, I bet there’s a very good chance Vanguard has something in it for you. Yep. Even if you’ve never heard of it, and especially if you have heard about it but the rumors sounded, well, ‘un-fun’. And so while we love the Internet and would hate to see rumors and stories and conspiracy theories go away completely, it is our job, especially with release closing in on us fast, to get the right messaging out… to let you know about this game, why it’s the next big thing, and just as importantly, to dispel some of those rumors so you can make an informed choice about what massively multiplayer game you’ll be spending your time playing early next year. Because spending your time is important, especially in a virtual world. You’re not just spending time, you’re investing time, both in your characters and in the relationships you form in these games. Some people may not understand online interactive entertainment yet and still think of them as just games, but while those guys play catch-up, we know they’re really so much more – they’re online communities – these people are real whether they live across the street or in another country and they’re our friends. And these ‘games’, the good ones anyway, aren’t just games, they’re homes.

The last 2 underlined sentences stick in my craw. IMO you guys didn't get the right message out, the rumors were not dispelled, and the whole 'we have to release due to funding' issue didn't help any either. Had some of the rumors been dispelled or addressed pre-release, or even before the NDA had been lifted, I might be playing atm.

EDIT: Let me be more constructive and say I would change/edit it now that it's post release, rather than me segueing into a rant about pre-release rumors =/

[Slick Willey]

Am I the only one experiencing deja vu after reading this?

Hey Brad....thx for stopping by /wave. - Silky Venom

Brad = Tigole; Vanguard = WoW???

[Aphextwin]

Originally Posted by holymight

Hell no. I love the lack of an official forum. They just need to impliment a central tracker that shows all the dev posts across all the community sites.

Silky Venom - Sigil Developer Tracker

[Eomer]

Am I the only one experiencing deja vu after reading this?

What I love is the misconception that even 2% of the posters here are actually FOH members. Right there on the first page they mention "thousands of FOH members" which is hilarious.

hay guyz, I'm in FOH! I'm uber!