The Unique Mob/Rare item system is...

[Blackwing]

time sinks.

they are there to keep you in for a lengthy period of time.

to do that you need goals of archievement.

one goal would be to hold a nice/class defining item.

now lets take a look at how ao is designed:


we have shops that are basically useless forcing you into spending hours camping the damn terminal until clicksaver came out.

you have "uniques" that help keeping the annual income of mmrpgs higher then some countries (hello ebay).

you have the saving grace of rifles, pistols and assault rifles on random boss mobs in team missions only.


it is just a lazy way to keep people going.

what annoys me about this is that the average player has about zero chance of aquiring sexy items unless he joins an über guild routinely camping the spawns.

[Tetra]

A friend of mine summed up the problem during a rather unrelated conversation in ICQ to a T I think

I think one problem with FC is that the game is run by people who still consider themselves players. But they aren't players, they are producers and developers. So rather than think about what most people would like, they think about what they would like. Now, this means they all have to agree, since they are all interested, so they end up doing 1 thing at a time (statics, quests, and now this camping mining thing). If they could just stop caring so much about what they like and just look at the big picture. in everyone one of those articles, those devs say: I played a lot of EQ. That's the ****ing problem!!!

[Cambist]

I understand where you're coming from on that aspect now Jynne. Still, until the devs come out and say they're trying to apply Everquest's game design to their static mobs and dungeons I can't take it as more than speculation.

They've said repeatedly they don't like camping and wanted to avoid making the game into Everquest style camp fest. Everything they've said unfortunately contradicts the game mechanics they've set up for static quests, static mobs, and dungeon bosses. It seems like Tetra suggests they can't come up with something better, so they follow what EQ did.

They did a good job with Neleb, Dodga, and the Trash King (other than nerfing his entire loot table instead of just the friggin' bracers). Adjusting the spawn time more to what players wanted. I don't understand why they don't apply the same philosophy to some of the others like Jack Legchopper, Torrith the Ancient, Daria, the Poet, Nugget, VanHorn, etc.

Wish they played UO or Asheron's Call...

[Myga]

Actually everquest is way better than AO for several reasons.

In EQ rare items arent that rare. Take prof jones vest for instance. In 30 kills I have seen 2 drop. In EQ we would usually see all drops from a mob in maybe 5 kills. Now consider the fact that maybe 70% of the nanocasting advantage nanomages have is that vest, without it they hardly better than solitus who has 1000 more hp, yet maybe one vest drops each week avg from an 18hour spawn? Why on earth is such an item so damn rare? Its the only thing balancing an entire breed. Madness.

In EQ mobs have somewhat random spawntime. In AO they seem 100% predictable. If you know when Professor van Horn died last time you know he'll spawn again almost exactly 18hour 13min later. So what happens? Ppl get there with teams 10-15min before he spawns and gun him down in 10seconds. Again and again, only thing interrupting it is playfield crashes in which case the timer is reset. Its ridiculous. He shouldnt spawn in exact same location in exact same intervals every time. Then ppl who invested some effort into trying to find him would actually have an advantage.

Also in EQ there are so many bosses to kill that everyone in a active guild can find something up they can attempt after a patch. Also EQ has a play nice policy which give more guilds a fair shot at mobs instead of this whoever does most dmg crap we have in AO. Another example of this total camping crap in ao is tri plumbo, a lvl 80 or something mob dropping best ring in game. He spawns every 3 hours but drop ring like 1 in 50 times. I have never seen anything even half as lame in EQ as that particular spawn.

And Jynne, every time a new expansion was came to EQ you would also get alot of new easy to acquire items that often was better than the previous state of the art items.

[Jynne]

And Jynne, every time a new expansion was came to EQ you would also get alot of new easy to acquire items that often was better than the previous state of the art items.

Yes I said that... it's the point I was making about the game's balance "midpoint" or "what's considered average equipment" shifting upward in power every time new items are added.

[Tetra]

Originally posted by Jynne

Yes I said that... it's the point I was making about the game's balance "midpoint" or "what's considered average equipment" shifting upward in power every time new items are added.

Then there is the game that people don't walk away from and say it's one big campfest where they added more and more nocamp/30-60min camp quest/items and on multiple occasions retooled old quests that were deemed to be too slow spawn to keep up with demand all the way down to 30 secondish spawns of items and a dozen or so drops of an item from a mob that previously dropped 1.


your right, it has nothing to do with the fact that the dev's do nothing but look at EQ and try to say "how can we be not as bad as early everquest was?"

[Nursedaou]

To help illustrate Jynne's point:

I have an Aura Magnifier. I was "OMFG!!!!!!!!" when I got it, and you know what?

I'd rather wear my Turquoise Combat Suit.



Ueber loot, isn't ueber any longer. AO will now add a new dungeon to better their previous kick *** items. However, instead of 18 hours, it will now be 24 that the mob pops in, and only dropping it every 20th time instead of 10th.


I am so glad I never played EQ...that way I only hear second hand how we're travelling the same path.

[Mangoslurpy]

anyone remembers Diablo 2?

really cool and really rare items, dropable by every single enemy in the game.

way to go imho

[____________Hitokage]

Originally posted by Ino
anyone remembers Diablo 2?

really cool and really rare items, dropable by every single enemy in the game.

way to go imho

I somewhat agree.

IMO the main problem in AO is the chosen "method of distribution", the type of rare items in regards to the game and the consept of rarity presented in the game.

1. Remove any rare/unique items or weapons that presents a shift in player power (skill enhacements, exceptional weapons etc) from boss mobs and put them on random roaming mobs outdoors and mission mobs (randomizing within all mob types in every playfield).

2. Put rare/unique items with some function but no power altering effect on the boss mobs. (A gold Yalm, a silver hammer, a rifle with different skin but no exceptional stats, etc.)

3. Make rare items rare and unique items unique. Might be I'm totally off here, but doesn't unique mean there is only one item of that particular type at any given time? A rare/unique item sure isn't something you can go get off a set mob at a set place at a set time.

Anyways... just my 2 abbreviated $0.01 (no time for extended argumentation/reasoning)

[____________Isembard]

Agree with Hitokage - I remember when you could get the 'Yalm in a box' - rare as hell, but it made opening every chest an anticipated event......

Put the uber/rare loot even semi-randomly and put the anticipation back into the game!

(Oi! You nicked my sig! Or stole it from the same place I did ).

[engelstein]

Originally posted by Ino
anyone remembers Diablo 2?

really cool and really rare items, dropable by every single enemy in the game.

way to go imho

You're leaving one part out. The part where superuniques drop more/better loot than normal mobs. So people load up with 1000% or more in Magic Find and run superuniques. It's more boring than missions, and no one complains...odd.

Don't get me started on Cow runs.

[Bionitrous]

No one complains because there is not some other guild there to either kill you or grief you. No one complains because when you go to kill Diablo, he is always there and he always drops something interesting. Maybe you sell it to the vendor, maybe you keep it and use it.

People don't complain because despite the Monty Haul aspects of it all, there isn't the distasteful aspects of AO's unique system with 18 hour spawns and inter-player squabbles over 1's and 0's.

People don't complain because killing the big bad guy in Diablo is 'fun'. Killing Professor Van Horn in AO is neither fun nor likely to be rewarding. Hence, the complaining.

Imagine how much fun Diablo 2 would be if you were to fight to Diablo's lair and he was not there and you had to sit for 18 hours till he showed up and then he dropped nothing.

[engelstein]

I was talking more about missions versus unique running. Seem to be more parallels to me. Instead of exp, you get items.

And cow runs are just like missions.

[Cambist]

Missions were a good system. That's why everyone does them. Sure they could use a few tweaks and people complain about the tedium. But you can tell they're good because people continue to do them nonetheless. No matter how vehemently they complain people still enjoy missions on some level or they wouldn't do them.

• You get to invite however many friends into your own private area and have a non-griefable adventure.
• It's instant gratification.
• Very little camping involved.
• Can cater to different time involvement depending on missions location, size, and team vs. single.
• Customizeable difficulty

The Unique Mob/Rare item system is where you see how removing all of those good ideas makes for a miserable time.

• 18 hour wait
• Very griefable
• Requires high level group of 6 (preferably soldiers and/or MAs)
• Some mobs taken over by one guild/group for months when they get the timers down as no one else sees the kill happen and can figure out when to go.
• Promotes Ebaying through rarity
• Easy and boring, but requires the absolute pinnacle of powerful teams to kill steal better than the multiple other teams

[Bionitrous]

Was going to make that point exactly, Cambist. People still love getting together with a couple buds and running the gauntlet to get to Diablo.

It's almost exactly like doing a mission. And as you've stated, people still do missions. And they will continue to do missions even after the over-hyped 14.5 'outdoor hunting' patch comes along:

"Hey, let's go to East Stret and hunt that big spider spawn"

"OK, sounds cool"

<15 minutes later>

1.) No boss
2.) 20 other people there telling you to leave because it's 'their' spawn.
3.) People from the other team (either clan or omni or both) come and kill your group.
4.) You respawn 15 minutes away.

You end up with nothing but a suntan.

That's why people do missions. Cambist pointed out all the reasons.

How could you get outdoor hunting to work? Easy:

1. Do exactly everything they plan to do in 14.5
2. Issue mission keys for entire outdoor playfields so that your team gets an entire Andromeda, for example where critters don't respawn once you kill them.

That's the only way they can get outdoor hunting to be palatable. What they are heading for, Im afraid, is more crap like the Tarasque or Smuggler's. Where players are going to be causing other players to not have fun. I could be wrong.

Players only want interaction in the cities. They want to show off their loot and RP and socialize. When they go off on a hunt, they would be happier players if they never see another player until they decide to head back to town. For 95% to probably 98% of the playerbase, if they could put together a guild group and head to the Tarasque without having to deal with the crap we see posted on these forums, I think a lot of players would be having more fun than they are now.

If you are sitting in a field waiting for Professor Van Horn or Daria to pop up and suddenly another player shows up, how do you feel? You hate that person all of a sudden. You wish for their internet connection to spontaneously disconnect. You cross fingers that they have to take a nature break just before the mob 'pops'. That is the kind of feelings this game breeds.

What did DAoC do? When you were waiting to kill the monkey man another guy shows up. You ask him to join you. You group up and now you both kill the monkey man. When he's dead you both get the monkey pants in your inventory. You were glad to see that person because you knew he could help you. You both got the monkey pants and you both parted ways as friends.

AO makes people hate other players in general. Every mode of advancing is based on hurting another player or at a minimum keeping them down. Competition is fostered even within the two teams. Omni hates omni and clan hates clan as seen in the various Tarasque threads. The whole game continues to evolve towards more use of the negative reinforcement model. Non-stop Nerfs are just a symptom.

I suggest they look at why people had and continue to have so much fun playing D2. You and your friends having fun. Also think a bit about how D2 would be less fun if all the players were in a single world. 200 people standing around waiting for Diablo to 'pop' and then everybody griefing and trying to kill-steal for his fat loot.

Those people who have been calling for dungeon keys for Camelot, Smuggler's, Nelebs, etc. know what they are talking about. They are calling for a game that is actually 'fun' and you rarely sign off disgusted or disappointed or feeling like you just wasted 4 hours of your real life.

[Obit]

Well said biotronicus, I couldn't agree more.

[_______________Creep]

Hehe - didn't know DAoC did that - that's neat.

FC have said categorically that the spawn timers and all of that ain't gonan change. Sad but true. Whoever said that these are "time sinks" designed to keep us in the game is correct. At least, keep those in the game that have a cat in hell's chance of getting these items.

There is one sneaky think you can do with the Camelot dungeon - force a second one to spawn. This happened a few days ago on RK2 (!). A stack load of omnis were hanging around the Tara room. A stack load of clanners arrive. Some end up in a 2nd dungeon because the 1st had too many players. The 2nd dungeon had a Tara in it and the clanners proceeded to kill it. I expect 2 dragons went down that day.

Of course it's bad. The emnity created between players and guilds is bad news. I'm a member of Quiz on RK2 and we are generally disliked over the Tara spawn. The stupid thing is is that if everyone over level 120 had a Gaily Painted Hood DAoC style, then it wouldn't be a problem. Coats wouldn't be worth ridiculous amounts of money etc...

Anyway, it ain't gonna change. They've said it ain't gonna change - even after the million post "we hate camping" official thread.

Creala.

[engelstein]

Heh, I totally forgot about DAoC quests and epics...I'm not totally sure, but I think the stuff you get from your epic quests is best you can ever wear. No Tarasque to camp, either.

[thresholdrpg]

Originally posted by Cambist
The Unique Mob/Rare item system is one of the most worthless frustrating piece of crap systems ever designed by ANY game company EVER!

Agreed!

Camping = LAME

Forced to do team missions = LAME

Level Limits on Nanos = LAME

Lack of a Reload Button = LAME.

ok I better stop before this post breaks the message board server.

[____________Hitokage]

Originally posted by Bionitrous

How could you get outdoor hunting to work? Easy:

1. Do exactly everything they plan to do in 14.5
2. Issue mission keys for entire outdoor playfields so that your team gets an entire Andromeda, for example where critters don't respawn once you kill them.

How about "roaming spawns" or spawns that spew out roaming monsters. Totally random covering large portions of the zones. This could be done instead of or in addition to the "hive spawns" currently in use. No way of knowing if, when or where a "boss" would show up.
Would make hunting more like hunting and less like slaughtering. Granted it would be somewhat slower XP, but, IMO, a helluva lot more entertaining.