Chat: Scape

First topic message reminder :

I'm still around a mates and her Internet has just been cut off... So we can't discuss this in game until tonight/tomorrow.

Redid skills section in light of our discussion.

Quicklink: Scape

3mpty: I meant in no way to "stop" the disaster, what I meant is, for example, if you are in a town, and there is a storm, you could reinforce doors, or in floods you could help stranded people. But I still like your idea.

By the way, regarding if years should change, well, that'd make questin complicated, I mean, let's say that a quest happens in year A, but a play gets the requeriment to do it in year C, akward, eh?

Just don't mention what year the quest was set in. Honestly, how many of RuneScape's quests would need changing at all if JaGex suddenly said "the year in RuneScape has now advanced to 170"?

A few would need really minor changes (ie, changing any references to the current year being 169 to it being 170) and even then, if it's planned from the start, it could be written into the coding for these references to automatically change as the year changes. Isn't that fairly easy to do, 3mpty?

As far as the story in Arzonus goes, RuneScape will still exist in the Year 171; politcally, it's on the margins (as usual) but geographically, it's stable. By the year 171, Giovanni has returned.

Hmm, well, I think it could be like a scripted event, and quests could be divided by years, thus, when an amount of X players had done all the quests of said year, it would go on to the next year, or it could be different for each player. By the way, we could include more phasing technology in the game

Ok, Morbius, I don't really see what that has to do with Scape, but thanks for sharing.

And Dusk, me and 3mpty already suggested just having years pass in real time, coinciding with the seasons etc. What's wrong with that? Your idea seems unnecessarily complex.

I am seeing it more from a technical point of view, as I said, it would cause confusion, because no matter what, you'd have to make soem reference to hte point of time in wich you are, and over time, it'd be confusing

I dislike the idea of fortifying for weather, beyond maybe sandbags which the NPCs can do by themselves. There comes a point babysitting the NPCs becomes over the top, they should feel self-sufficient.

As for quests, if the completion of them isn't time dependant it makes no difference. As with RuneScape, multiple quests in the series can exist at the same time for players to complete when they're ready. For any quest whose impact affects the game for all players, then previous quests can be accessed as "memories" - similar to the NPQs already in RuneScape.

If I'm honest, Dusk, I struggle to see why you have such a problem with the concept. There really isn't anything confusing. Any problems with the system would be so minor that basic storywriting could work around them.

Hmm ok, and 3mpty, who said babysitting the NPCs, I meant becasue on how I see htem, floods, blizzards, torments, etc, should damage players, so it'd make sense to fortify for bad weather, plus, NPCs could give you rewards for helping.

Slayer: I am seeing it from more single-minded players point of view, plus, it'd be confusing for player's who don't speak english as a native tounge

Sorry, 3mpty, help me out here. Do you get how the years passing in Scape could be confusing? I just don't see it causing any trouble. It's not like it's an alien concept - it happens in the real world...

Yes, in real life it's not confusing, but in games, with stationary quests, it gets confusing. Plus, I am sure there wil be someone appart from me that finds it confusing

But enought of tht, you were right and I was wrong

I think I missed something.

WHat do you mean?

As to what you were claiming to be wrong about.

I still don't understand, I meant that, you were right regarding the passing of years, and I was wrong, as simple as that

Yeah, that's the bit I missed. I don't recall you saying anything regarding that. O_O

Oh, check a few pages back

Just some cool maps I found on the interwebs.

What games are those from?

None, or, I think they're just fantasy world maps.

I really like the style of the top one.

SO, anyone ogt something new to share?

Just been playing Guild Wars 2, and I've been inspired in certain aspects and come up with features that I feel I would like from a game like Guild Wars 2.

Level-caps on areas is nice. In the starter area you are capped at level 4. You still gain experience and can level up beyond level 4, but you are modulated. This affects your base stats (health, damage, etc). This means you can play with low levels and feel the same strength as them, rather than one-hitting everything.

Your level is relative to mob levels. If you're level 10 and the monster is level 10, you are a fair fight. Completely. You have to dodge their skills to avoid damage. I'm finding it really fun having every fight be a challenge. When I played World of Warcraft, it still felt like RuneScape in the respect that they're level didn't really mean anything relative to yours.

I'd like to add a personal bestiary, that populates as you kill things. This allows you to look up things that drop specific loot, or known locations for specific monsters. Unless I haven't yet found the feature that actually provides this, I'm finding it really annoying being told I need "vial of weak blood" in crafting and I can't remember where I got it.

A personal bestiary sounds great. It very much reminds me of a pokedex. Thus, like in pokemon, there could be rewards for filling it up to certain levels.

As for the whole level thing, I could see how it would confuse players, and I'm unsure if it would be beneficial even if everyone did understand it. I think I'd feel as though levelling up wasn't rewarding enough. I'm keeping an open mind, so please debate this with me, but I think it would be better to just give incentives for people to seek out challenges, rather than making everything a challenge.

Which level thing? I mentioned two unrelated points, but you see to have combined them into one concern.

Level-caps only modulate your base stats, and stats from equipment don't seem to be affected. As such, a level 12 who is reduced to level 4 would still exceed level 4 damage and would be hard pressed to actually die.

In terms of mobs having the same relative damage/health as a player, this is only statistical. Mobs wouldn't dodge skills; don't possess shields or healing abilities (in most cases); etc. In an auto-attack fight the fight would be even, but a lot of a player's damage comes from abilities and most mobs have maybe one ability at best. You rapidly heal once out of combat, just btw.

To say everything is a challenge was perhaps a poor choice of words, but everything isn't just a boxing-dumby.

In Guild Wars 2 generic combat isn't actually worth that much experience, so there isn't a case of "grinding requires too much interactivity". Most of the experience comes from events; so the Centaurs are attacking a human settlement and you have to defend against waves of enemies. The Centaurs are only worth maybe 10xp, but participating in the event earns 300-600 experience (and this is a low levelled event in a low levelled area).

I've found it a very interesting means to train that doesn't feel at all like grinding and you feel like really immersed. The capping on levels also means that high levels can join in without feeling like they're wasting their time.

Hmm...

I do rather like the whole events XP thing. Definitely have that.

I think I'm unsure exactly what a "mob" is in this context. Knowing that may help a little.

Perhaps we need to be more certain about how combat works in Scape before we can fully have this debate. We've criticised RuneScape in the past for being too much about what equipment you have, so when you say stats from equipment don't seem to be affected, I fear we're going down that road - but then I'm not 100% certain how active the player has to be when fighting in Scape (or indeed in Guild Wars), and my point could be voided by such information.

Using a RuneScape example, I'd be rather upset if say, training my combat stats beyond what they are now didn't help me kill Frost Dragons any quicker. It would be frustrating and I might not bother training further, as a major incentive to do so would've been taken away. Then again, if I don't want to run around one-hitting everything, I just don't fight things that I can one-hit. And that's fine, most things I can kill like that aren't worth killing anyway.
Is there some fundamental difference between Runescape Guild Wars that makes the system work?