Friday with Means - February 5th, 2010 - Epeen Epreserved

[Mikenche]

I get the feeling Means didn't even look at the threads I linked, and only replied about the pvm-part.
Or he's an extremly fast reader.

Or perhaps he had seen those threads before and only needed a quick glance to be reminded what they were about.

[SoapTarder]

thank you for the thorough responses means, nice work.

*edit* removed "stupid question"



how much gas could an old fart fart, if an old fart could fart gas?

[mawu]

I'm not sure...but there might be a reason for the "Not stacking" thing. I suspect you could use entire stacks at once by mistake...but I might be wrong on that one. Either way we should try and look into it at some point.

The reason it was removed was that some guys used those stacks in 'interesting' ways which resulted in them leveling really fast which was not intended. Same reason we cant ding off tradeskills anymore.

[Entventurer]

Your mind is a "special place". I think it might be playing tricks on you on that one.

Damn. I won't tell you what my dirty thoughts are like just yet, then.

PS You're in them.

[Suicidal]

I'd also like some info or a link to already posted info about the collector instance. I can't remember having read anything about it previously. I remember having seen the name from somewhere so it has been mentioned before but I can't remember any specific info about it.

The team has been working very hard on the game and during the next month you can look forward to the introduction of:

A new (and long awaited) in-game mail system!
Try your best to defeat "The Collector" in a new challenging single-team instance!
The new "Daily Mission" system that offers up many new XP-Rich activities at all level ranges!
Profession balancing, Perk adjustments and MORE!

This mail was sent in november last year
When I asked a DEV about it I got no info.. spoiler and stuff, you know.
I sure hope there will be another special offer when "during the next month" actually arrives

[IT_Ninja]

Someone mentioned bringing back in-game events. I think that's a good idea. I remember when I first started playing aliens would invade the major cities from time to time a lot more frequently than they do now (I can't remember the last one).

I also recall the giant Rollerrat that we killed outside Rome at one time, Leetzilla, mutants etc.

More spontaneous "screenshot" material like that would be great just to shake people out of the daily grind

[Lheann]

We are opening things up more now than they were before...I completely disagree with your opinion concerning the direction the game is taking. The "free to use all weapons" thing went out with SL and AI years and years ago as all professions do not have perk support for all weapon types....so let's not pretend this is something "new". We are adding new lines that add support for more weapon types...is there something more we should be doing?

Means,

I think you missed the point on this one. While you may feel that opening up more option as weapon lines is a good thing I believe I understand the point that was being made and will try to relate it differently. Appearance matters is a good summary.

Take Soldiers (Sloobs and Paid) as a prime example.
Level 1 to Level 24ish they can get by with the newbie island gun and a nova flow from the jobe weapons vendor. At level 24 till level 210 it will be some form of a PB/SPB that they use. Using anything else would really gimp the soldier for the most part. Ok there are some pistol setups that work at 150+ but that really is the only realy option they have. At 210 it is DShark time and at some point the Xan gun. That is a progession and not options.

Choose a class any class and the "default" weapon is pretty consistent. from low levels to end levels. What I think is desired (at least by me) as a option.... We will take soldier again as the example. We have PB/SPB and it would be nice there were 7 or 8 different looking weapons that did similar damage. I am talking within 4 to 6% damage range at any given level. Maybe different damage types as well. I personnel love the look of the Serubo C99 solider gun and would have loved for it to be competitive with a PB/SPB.

In another question it was asked about the -000 upgrade weapons. Here was an attempt to solve this the cookie cutter look with a nice idea but that has been poorly received because the implemention was lacking.

My suggestions are this. Look at the -000 weapons again and address these issues:
1. The price is stupid for low levels.
2. The quest to get the upgrade items is not low level friendly.
3. Hunting mobs for random drops can take days to find the parts for a specifc weapon and in the process render the hunt a waste of time.
4. Stats versus damage versus exisitng RK weapons (some the very base weapon) is out of line. Take the Advy pistol Joint Clans Scout Pistol which can be upgraded. At all levels the upgraded weapon is a worse weapon than the base weapon. do it really is a downgrade. Adjust the stats and damage so they are competitive.
5. All the -000 weapons did nothing to give players a valid choice that could compete with any of the first or second tier weapons already there. Adjusting them to be second tier weapons (good second tier weapons) would be welcome.

[Suicidal]

Take the Advy pistol Joint Clans Scout Pistol which can be upgraded. At all levels the upgraded weapon is a worse weapon than the base weapon. do it really is a downgrade. Adjust the stats and damage so they are competitive.

That is because (in case you haven't noticed) all -000 weapons are copypasta.. some have different damage types, but damage range at all quality levels is copypasta.. you can upgrade whatever weapon you want, it will do same damage as any other -000 in same QL.
What I find most annoying is that -000 weapons scale like AI weapons.

[Warhead]

Nah you are thinking about it wrong, that would be like saying Year 1 was the end of the 9-1BC+ Year 0 decade. Decades end on the last day of the 9th year, otherwise you would start at 1, rather than .000001.

Wrong, because the common calendar does start at january 1st, year 1, meaning the first decade ends in the year 10, december 31st. The next decade starts at year 11 and ends in year 20. Subsequently, the first decade of the 21st century started on january 1st 2001 and ends on december 31st 2010.

Dont confuse this with terms like "the 90's" which spans from 1990-1999. Thats something different.

He was perfectly right and Means thus owes us some results by the end of this year.

[meatybtz]

The reason it was removed was that some guys used those stacks in 'interesting' ways which resulted in them leveling really fast which was not intended. Same reason we cant ding off tradeskills anymore.

You CAN ding off tradeskill, it is a trade secret though

[Drakeep]

A question about the rebalancing :

- Do you have some "expert pvper" that spend time in game (a lot of time) so as to master all the profession of the game, at various level and setup, from the most twinked to the less twinked ? If so, why not ? If yes, could you fire him and take a new one ? Wouldn t that be a valid method to get an unbiased overview of what *really* needs to be done without having to rely on player's whines ?

I think the creative part of the rebalancing (re-inventing each profession's toolset, creating new game mechanism, etc etc) is rather well handed, exciting and entertaining, but i don't think i am alone thinking that concerning (un)balance, you ll just create a new era where prof X that is at the bottom of the pvp food chain today will be top tomorrow, etc.

I don't see how you can change/create so many core game mechanics without a perfect knowledge of how they affect the possibilities of each professions in-game, and unless the devs are playing anonymly among us, i don't see how they would have this knowledge. And i do mean precise knowledge of it because as far as i am concerned, i could tell exactly (5% close) what kind of performance improvment/loss a given prof would need to beat me or to put the fight in my favor. While i couldn't say what that same given prof needs to be able to have a tight fight versus any of the other profession that i don't play.

If devs are allrdy hanging with us, tag em with a green name or something, it willl build some trust

Edit : i really hope you answer that one :/

[killercat7]

That sounds awesome. WTB more of that.

Yep that was it, i grabbed the thread out again.

http://forums-de.anarchy-online.com/...ad.php?t=39338

24 vs 24
tl7
about 3h time

but it happend just 1 time with gamigo yet.

[Tyfowler]

aweeeee, my question didnt get answered

[PhoenixOfAges]

1. XP, SK and AXP (in that order) are the main focus of the first missions included in the daily mission system. PvP missions included in the first update will also offer bonus VP.

Nice to know it's more than just XP.

2. The change of the clumps to be not "No-drop" and tightening up the ql of the tradeskill process (smaller compatible level range) should make it so this kind of mission is done at higher levels rather than done at level 160 by 220's. We should see some small adjustmet of the VP rate within those dungeons at some point soon-ish. I did say "small" so don't expect these missions to be a better source of VP than BS or other PvP missions...any increase is going make sure that the gap between LE missions and the BS in terms of VP/hour does not grow...but should shrink slightly.

3. With the exception of adding the "bonus" items on the BS when your opponent dies there has not been much of an addition of "Different ways to gain VP" in the game this year. There are a great many things I'd hoped to get to..but hasn't quite been done. Almost too numerous to mention...it doesn't mean we will stop trying. I am hoping to get an "open" pvp area to gain VP in without a queue system at some point this spring.

Regarding the type clumps if LE missions are seen as the main source of them then you really can't tighten the QL requirements too much. With a mission lvl cap of 250 which would have lvl 260 something or so bosses the types they drop would be more in that QL range.

Also unless you gimp the LE aliens and bosses a good bit missions too far above lvl 200 would prove quite difficult to near impossible for chars not in or around the endgame range. Those LE aliens can have lots of health and can dish out a great deal of damage. Plus the bosses can have stuns and other tricks aside from high damage and AR.

One note regarding mission levels is that the mission difficulties give a mission lvl equal to the roller for an easy, 10% higher for a medium and 50% higher for a hard. That means a lvl 167+ will roll a lvl 250 mission (LE mission lvl cap) on a hard. A team around lvl 167 would have no chance in hell of surviving that. So perhaps adjusting the ranges each difficulty pulls would be wise to avoid that large lvl spike. Adding some extra difficulty options wouldn't hurt either.



As for VP why is there so much focus on PvP VP gains when only a handful of what VP buys has PvP only tags? All the weapons, armour and most other things are just general use items and in most cases of little to no interest to those that PvP. The PvPers that spend all their time in BSs tend to complain about having tons of VP and nothing to spend it on while those that want to get VP to buy stuff at most lvls either have the minimal VP from LE missions or are forced to be clay pigeons for twinked lvl locked PvPers. Yet anytime there's talk of more VP gains being adding it's really always just PvP methods, it makes no sense.

PvP is just not fun if you don't stand a chance in the fight. Then due to how things work in AO you really need to be a specific lvl locked twink that spent perhaps months and a great deal of creds building your char up and getting all it needs. The average leveling char will not spend anywhere near that much timer or as much on gear as they will be out leveling what gear they put on in no time. All your efforts to expedite the leveling process will only make that worse. For a lvl locked PvP twink they can spend billions on gear of just the right QL to get the full effect at their lvl. The result is that in BSs most fights are grossly one sided as some three or more leveling chars trying to get VP will get wasted by a single PvP twink there to rack up easy kills.

Currently just one VP reward item from a BS could be greater or equal to all the VP dropped in a mission at about any lvl. If mission VP is being shared as it's suppose to be that single VP reward item from a BS would always be far more than you'd get in a LE mission. The gap between the two is astronomical so you could increase LE mission VP by leaps and bounds yet BSs could still give more.

Then BSs have real problems getting going. As I said in posts here before it was locked through BSs it really is only 36 out of 220 lvls with access to VP. Even those two BSs have problems so once another PvP arena opens that has no queues so there's no waiting like BSs have it is almost certain that would shut those two BSs down as well.

While there is a lot of chatter about all things PvP on the forums it is mainly from the same small group of people. The forums don't really matter though, what matters is what's going on in game. In game all PvP content more than anything else has population problems and a general lack of interest that cause it not work too well or just not work at all since PvP more than anything else needs numbers. This is especially true if you're still aiming for group vs group PvP balance as FC always said they were for AO.

4. All of the cities will fit a large HQ.

Wow, nice.

5. The player shops inside instanced cities will not work. When the instance shuts down...functionally that playfield/city ceases to exist. (oversimplifying a bit). At some point it is possible we might cave in and move to a auction house type system...but this won't be happening soon.

Oh well, that's that then. Still leaves the question of what those other things the mail system was suppose to allow for unanswered though.

6. Probably a very good idea...though I guess the actions you already have for this function have too long cooldown or the price you pay for them is too high. We should look into this as there isn't much point/fun un running though an empty dungeon only to get to the exit. I'll think about it. This would also be kind of "Giving away Fixer stuff" as well...something to keep in mind...if you included Fixers in your teams you wouldn't really need this. Anyways..further thought and input needed...easy to implement-ish...but possibly not a perfect idea.

As noted by others if the portal just sent you to the entrance of the dungeon/mission area (just inside or outside) it really wouldn't take away from the warp to the grid/garden profs. Those would still get you all the way back, the back to the front door portal just saves you the run out of the empty zone if it's a mission and training if it's not. I always really like the Biomare/Foreman's RK dungeon due to the various exit buttons it has and how the warps to the next/prior area only worked if you weren't under attack so for the most part there was no training all over the place.

[PhoenixOfAges]

Actually I have to backpedal on that one a leeetle....

There won't be an option to keep the old heads. The old heads won't fit the new bodies...

Our heads not fitting our bodies would actually be amusing, at least for a while.

You are posting more in this thread than me :P

I did say I liked these Q&A threads. Although by the time you posted this one you had me beat by about 50 posts. Of course you did cheat by locking the thread.

Regarding fixing lowbie VP.
1. Not really possible. Some changes we are looking at will affect all levels of play...some won't. With some of the low level builds that are possible I don't think reasonable balance is possible. That wouldn't be fun anyways.

The problem with lowbie VP is they have no real access to VP outside of LE missions which give poor and very erratic amounts of VP before long (it is possible for a lvl 20 mission to give as much VP as a lvl 140 one). BSs don't run prior to the 150-174 one daily if at all. With all your focus for VP being through PvP short of a "small" increase from missions nothing you've said is coming will help much if at all.

Regarding access to better XP
We always need more.

Even the most beneficial medicine if taken to an excess becomes poison. It seems you guys are trying to zip everyone to 220 as quickly as possible and are focusing the bulk of your content to 220s. Lowbie VP for instance can't be fixed as darn it, we want people at 220, not any other lvl. If you want to move people along so much just remove the other 219 lvls and be done with it.

[Kingbling]

Another thought about the GUI, Can you make all the windows (Trade, NCU, Program, Bags, ect..) have a windowed option?

I have a 2nd monitor not being used at the moment and if I could drag all that stuff out of my game playing / viewing area to the 2nd monitor it would be great.

[PhoenixOfAges]

Someone mentioned bringing back in-game events. I think that's a good idea. I remember when I first started playing aliens would invade the major cities from time to time a lot more frequently than they do now (I can't remember the last one).

I also recall the giant Rollerrat that we killed outside Rome at one time, Leetzilla, mutants etc.

More spontaneous "screenshot" material like that would be great just to shake people out of the daily grind

Game events make the game seem more alive and break up the routine of it all. Leet attacks were always my favourite.

[Sidana]

It is also fun to have a couple "everyone" experiences. I wish we had more.

Means, you skipped my question whether we are going to see more instances or more "'everyone' experiences", or a combination. Could you please elaborate on the issue a bit?

Re: #1, I think the question was "Do you plan on fixing lowbie VICTORY POINTS" not PVP.

Absolutely right, lowbie vp gain options, not pvp. Who cares about pvp anyway?

[Sidana]

Ohh, and by the way... I probably made the single most important discovery in the history of AO: I found out where Uncle Pumpkinhead hides between the Halloween seasons!

He's in the MOMA in New York! I have a photo to prove it!

http://img43.imageshack.us/img43/578...umpkinhead.jpg


Now, about them rewards for this ground breaking discovery...

[Essessceeaych]

When will MPs be fun to play at PvP again? I remember this one year we had...

2001?

MPs have team warps, but it's almost faster to run out of the dungeon, than wait for everyone to find their keys, equip them, and tell the MP it's all equipped, *and* for the MP to cast the nano in question. Keep in mind the MP team warps stop at ado.

I always start casting, then put my key on before it finishes. So if an MP just starts casting right away, they can say "put on your ely/scheol/ado key" and as long as you do before the (outrageous) cast time is up, you get ported.