Let's separate MMORPG Gamers....

Gleamor

Cadet
I would like to see an MMORPG take the game to the next level. I mean, think of the numerous things in all the current MMORPG's that are based around the "average" public gamers that really aren't as hard core as most of us. They are new and have to be hand-fed their information or they threaten to leave the game.

I would like to see a game be Hard Core. By that I mean that nothing is "given" to you. You start in the world naked and devoid of anything. You have to literally beat the local wildlife to death to use their bones as weapons to kill the next higher creature to finally have something to sell or trade that will get you some clothing. I would like to see small villages with hostile people and you have to make them trust you over time and only then could you use stores within the local towns devoid of anything for sale but basic random items. Mapping information is left up to you only if you have a quill and paper available. You should not be able to read until you have learned to do so. Reading and writing is what separated the noble-born from the peasants and rogues back in the day. There should be different levels of social interaction with NPC's as well. Since when does anyone become fully trusted by everyone in the world and given things? Once you have acquired the local peasants in a town to befriend you, the guards and regional province in other towns should still find you questionable. Let us catch our mounts or be killed by them, let us learn to make our clothing if we choose. Let us learn everything!

I would like to see skills be based upon their usage only. If I swim allot, then I should slowly become a proficient swimmer. Everything like running, climbing, agility, endurance and even hit points can be based somewhat off of a system of this type. Some may call these more attributes than skills, indeed they have been in most games but these are skills that humans learn to achieve as they progress into adulthood. Agility is learned through extensive forms of agility training, it is understandable that any healthy child brought up to practice forms of agility exercises will be an agile adult, same with strength or endurance. If you acquire too much strength, then how can you possible be very agile and vice-versa. Different humans sizes upon your given pick of lifestyle as is reality and of course random height upon character creation can be left to the player to decide and based upon race type.

The skills will be very hard to level up and certain skills contrary to others. For instance, learning the crossbow skill would reduce somewhat the Longbow skill once it reached above average levels. Hammer skills reduce Dagger skills or Sword skills once they reach above average level. I mean no one that is human is proficient with all weapons and certainly if you start to train in a different weapon, your previous weapon skills do start to deteriorate. Armor is another thing, if a rogue wants to wear heavy armor, let him. I am sure he will suddenly notice that his rogue skills will be reduced but if he should want to become a knight or paladin or warrior instead, let him change his occupation. It should be as painful as it would be in real life though and certainly not a free ride based on the amount of gold you are willing to pay.

Money sinks are far too common in our current MMORPG's. Who needs huge money sinks if it isn't gained off of every jack-rabbit that happens to run by that we decide to put a fireball into? There should be delineation between the loot drops and crafting. I form of a trade process that requires common trade goods to be gained but not outright sold to a vast amount of NPC vendors that just hang around all day long waiting to give us gold. We certainly need common resources from mother nature but what about instead of just crafters and fighters we also have harvesters, trappers and miners i.e. "care bears" to do these type jobs. I am certain if you place real people in charge of the buying-trade market that prices will vary and depend on the balance of play. They become will to pay or not pay for certain materials at certain times and then turn them into crafting materials that the "crafting" class can use to craft with. Crafting can still be done by the classes that choose to do them, but like skills their adequacy at these crafting choices will depend on what they learn and how many crafts they wish to spend their time in, with contrast-lowering, in mind of course. Crafting should be far more complicated, someone that makes armors should have many other skills that they must first become acquainted with before they are proficient in their craft. Crafting needs to accompany many, many fields. Furniture for homes, different classes of clothing, homes, boats and ships, fencing, store-fronts and weapon types, etc....

Chat is limited to local area only. Guild chat should be incorporated if you want, but also limited to a small range of the play. I doubt encrypted communications was invented 1,000 years ago. If no one in your guild is close to you, then you are left with a range of local chat only. This encourages player interaction. Guilds should have the option to setup a serious of "horns" as a communication device for their own territory. These horns can give off coded messages to the members that are within the territory for rally and support purposes, i.e. an invasion has occurred and gets your ass here fast! Doing this allows guild members to own a piece of their guild by creating and learning a code or new language only they know and then they have to safe guard this information which will require loyalty and begot a sense of responsibility before asking every Tom-Dick and Harry to join them. This will create a sense of secrecy between the different guilds and create stereotype-conflict between them that will make hostilities much more enhanced.

Of course we need guild houses, guild banks within these houses and player housing in the real world that players like to play. These lands should be expensive at either a one time price or a monthly lease that is extremely expensive. "Care bear" bankers can give loans to players and if they default, be able to reposes, destroy the home, and resale the land to another player. Storage should be limited to realistic pack animals, backpacks, home and shed storage and a rentable small storage.

A person should not be able to tell but a small amount about a found object unless their skill in that object is up to par. For example a wizard should not be able to distinguish the quality level of a 2-handed sword beyond the physical appearance. He should have to take it to someone that can give him this information or try to sell it to a local sword smith player that may or may not give him accurate information, depending upon their relationship and his reputation. Same for all items.

Players should not have their names and guild names splashed above their heads, be examined without permission or be distinguishable by any means unless they are in a guild war with opposing guilds. Guilds should simply have a guild unique color coded item on their person that will identify them to opposing factions if they are familiar with their enemies. Otherwise you simply know their name or you don't. They can tell you their name or they cannot. You can ask other players who that is and learn it or you can choose not too. People should be able to see the quality of items you are wearing only if they have adequate skill to do so in that area of objects. The chat that is displayed should also not have the players name on it. The whole idea of having avatar-like characters is to be recognized by your unique look of your character in the game. If I want to lie to people about my identification, I should be able to do so. If I choose to glorify my name to the people around me, then I can do that as well.

Guild halls should be upgradeable to castles over times; there should be a limit to 3-5 guilds per territory and the one that can hold that territory the best controls that territory. If others outside of that guild do not like it, they can simply run to another region where another guild may be fairer to them. Of course the more people in your territory daily are giving you more of a chance to recruit good players. Beyond territory ownership guilds will then strive to have regional ownerships, this would be something like a city center between these territories that will have a rentable plot of land for the guild that can afford to purchase it, then they will have to slowly build their fortress over time, keep control of their territory from other guilds and also compete against other territory guild lords who are in control of their lands. This process requires a guild membership limitation that will grow with each ascension of power, i.e. once they own the city center they can double their recruiting efforts to maintain their stay, but they have to defend the city and their territory front as well as pay for each. They will acquire more gold through ownership as well though. This amount is based on the rules they setup for the territory and city. Once they have city ownership and can mange any further chaos, lol, they can then compete with other city owners for continent ownership at the capitol city, like above the first guild that can manage all of this and still save funds and meet goals to buy a capitol city center can start to built a capitol fortress there. This of course ends with a global fight between capitol city-continent owners from around the world of 4-5 continents. At that point the continent can ban together and guilds can stop their inner squabble and unite to beat other continents or simply try to ignore the world changing around them and be eventually wtfpwned by more organized players!

Each continent of players will be of a different race or two, giving instant knowledge of their outsider status. A player will always be able to kill another player from a different race. Gone should be the days of only certain races being able to play certain classes. Balance should be obtainable through different programming techniques that will let different races be able to perform all functions. There is no reason a single race or two cannot makeup all classes of functionality.

Splitting up the races by two for each continent will make exploration and trade more interesting. Different items from other continents will be more valuable for trade but you must travel by boat to them and somehow by pass the locals in order to obtain that particular material. Exploration of foreign continents will give the players the best rewards, but will be very hazardous. Inner continental trade can be accomplished via sea faring ventures with foreign folk, but trade could be very costly as ships are expensive and deals can be broken. Reputation of the trader and his/her willingness to protect your goods in transport will always be in question until you receive your profits from the deal. This will setup the sea faring campaigns that will be a must of the capitol city to protect fleet shipments for profit of local traders and the government and also setup the ability to play a captain of a pirate ship and create a floating guild that attacks fleet and trade ships on the ocean and river ways. Of course skill at sea-faring combat will have to be acquired slowly as well.

Wow, I do go on. Look at the time... Well, these are all ideas that I have some in play here and there and the others are straight from what I would like to see. I have a ton more on the idea of classes and how they can be balanced, but it is getting late and I have to get some things done around here.

Anyone that reads this, you have my sympathy. It is the ramblings of a veteran gamer, in severe need of some fun times. I have one other idea that would challenge everything in our gaming history. So if you have stuck with me thus far, good for you!

How about a chance, once you have reached an ultimate goal within the game to become established "BoSS MOBS"; you would obtain a form of game master and upon login you can pick a Boss Mob from a selection of many and head out to a local land once per day and raise some hell. With this would come responsibility to act responsibly and the privilidge can certainly be revoked by the real GM's by wouldn't that be a blast. You can ravage the lands, farms, towns and even houses if you so choose of foreign continents and once per day be a nuassance to your enemies until you meet you demise. You would have your name on the Boss Mob and other players from foreign lands would get to finally hear of your name. You could become a part of ancient lore in the history of their lands and spoke of for eternity? For this to work, many things will have to be regulated, such as how many Boss Mob players can be released at once, their actions and the coupling of too many together cuasing them to do too much destruction. Caution will also have to be taken to ensure that too much focus is not placed on one continent versus another.

Think of the great excitement that this would make in the game as 5-10 creatures per day, per continent are released with the ultimate loot to those that oppose it. Imagine the havok one or two Boss Mobs can bring to a guild fight that happened to be going on at the same time?

WOOO HOOOO
 
I have a very good reason that you will be hard pressed to get everything you just listed off in a single game... money.

Placing that many hard core parameters on a single game (especially the "no-npc market" economy would paint your perfect ideal game into a seriously small niche market that would make the game a high-priced, low player count game.

Im not saying no one would want to play it, I am saying that few enough people would play it, given the market alternatives out there allready, to make it a viable business service that would make a company competitive enough to survive in the long run.

On a more specific note, NPCs arent there to compete with player characters for buying goods. Yes, NPCs seem to just stand around waiting to "give out gold", but in their own sense, they run their own business, just as any player vendor would. They buy items at a (very) low price, lower than a PC would, and sell Items PCs can use, normally at higher prices than a PC vendor would. If you dont like using NPC vendors, dont use them.

On the flip side, I happen to agree with some of what you said, and wouldnt mind being in a game that has most of these properties. But a game with ALL those properties, IMHO, would be construed as the ultimate "grind" game by most of the players out there. It seems most of the game would be trying like hell to get mats and equipment instead of enjoying the environment.

Respectfully submitted

Xhar

P.S. And yes, Seera, it sounds like the beta days of EQ1, where no one had a damned thing but we had fun anyways, but that was when EQ1 was the only game around (besides UO, which didnt have a 1st person viewpoint). But now the market is too flooded to be able to do that again.
 
Originally posted by Xhar@May 8 2006, 12:50 PM
I have a very good reason that you will be hard pressed to get everything you just listed off in a single game... money.

Placing that many hard core parameters on a single game (especially the "no-npc market" economy would paint your perfect ideal game into a seriously small niche market that would make the game a high-priced, low player count game.

Im not saying no one would want to play it, I am saying that few enough people would play it, given the market alternatives out there allready, to make it a viable business service that would make a company competitive enough to survive in the long run.

On a more specific note, NPCs arent there to compete with player characters for buying goods. Yes, NPCs seem to just stand around waiting to "give out gold", but in their own sense, they run their own business, just as any player vendor would. They buy items at a (very) low price, lower than a PC would, and sell Items PCs can use, normally at higher prices than a PC vendor would. If you dont like using NPC vendors, dont use them.

On the flip side, I happen to agree with some of what you said, and wouldnt mind being in a game that has most of these properties. But a game with ALL those properties, IMHO, would be construed as the ultimate "grind" game by most of the players out there. It seems most of the game would be trying like hell to get mats and equipment instead of enjoying the environment.

Respectfully submitted

Xhar

P.S. And yes, Seera, it sounds like the beta days of EQ1, where no one had a damned thing but we had fun anyways, but that was when EQ1 was the only game around (besides UO, which didnt have a 1st person viewpoint). But now the market is too flooded to be able to do that again.
I know several ideas I have posted there would have to be ironed out, especially thing regarding balance and economics. You are very right and I appreciate you taking the time to read it in detail. I got too involved writing that, lol...

Yea UO and EQ i believe were closer to an ultimate MMORPG than some of the game companys of late.

I am sure Hero's Journey will not cover all of these ideas in the upcoming game, but I am positive that they will surprise me in new ways. Hopeful they will put as much of their DR content into Hero's Journey as possible.

Simu certainly have enough experience to kow what works and what doesn't. They, unlike other companies, know that players like choice, uniqueness and different forms of socialization for a their world to work well.

:P
 
Us veteran gamers have seen it all and want it all in one vastly complex game, I know what you mean and I'd most certainly join you in that game :smiley: But as said, it would serve a very small niche and wouldn't make a profitable game for the creators, sadly.

Yes, UO on some of the RP-Freeshards was something like that, but the engine was too limited to do all the wonderful stuff you want. Still UO was imho the only MMORPG (MUDs excluded) that really allowed roleplaying within the engine.


Eve Online has an entirely player-based economy, and it works quite well. But Eve is also very grind-heavy to supply that market.
 
Originally posted by Javewa@May 8 2006, 02:53 PM
Still UO was imho the only MMORPG (MUDs excluded) that really allowed roleplaying within the engine.
Wait, are you serious? I played UO right after its release, and I never saw ANY RP on the server I was on... perhaps a bad choice in servers on my choice? but still...

Did you ever play EQ1? that game was at least 90% RPers from the start!
 
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