Friday with Means - April 30th, 2010 - About the Future

[Gatess]

Heya Means



I'd really like to see a new endgame raidzone, along the lines on Pande.
We've raided Pande for what 7 years now? Yes there is a lot of new stuff for us to do: APF + Sector 42, LoX, DB.
However all these "new" additions are either instances, or takes a lot of planing (s42)


I think the instancing of Pande was the right thing to do, people need a kick in the ass, and I salute you for doing so.

The instancing of Pande was not a WIN/WIN situation, we gained freedom from the bots but lost one of the most important aspects of endgame PvM raiding, the Kill Team wars @ Beast.
I know I'm not speaking only for my own Org here, but the loss of that competitive aspect made many people leave the game.

I suggest doing a open raidzone like Pande, but when it comes to the endboss make is so that only Team 1 from the Raid Interface gets warped into the Lair.
Open it up for multiple RIs and we again have a KT situation.
You can also give the forces outside tasks that needs to be done, to keep the boss kill team alive.
Makes it more interactive, ofc it must be scalable to the raid force(s)


Also how about some new outdoors RK boss encounters, along the lines of Mercs.
Come on Means I know your spidersenses tingle when you think of 30ft pink Mercs walking over RK!




Viz

Zomg i miss DD war with Spartans!

Bamp!


Cheers!

Gatess
CoN

[MstrBstrd]

The Bahamas.

I disagree. The obvious choice would be Greenland.

[AdriaanBlackwind]

1. New start-up experience, for sure.
2. Revamp old items, make them liable instead of having to use that one weapon or armor, because everything else sucks. Make more "best" weapons/armors, I guess I mean. More liable choices instead of the option. And also make them easier to obtain, for newer players.

Tip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlOXAtPvMDk

[Melcom]

we need new content like SL and i know we don´t get it but this is we need

[nanoforcer]

About this:

New open PvP content + new BS maps.

Yes, however about making several alternative bs would be a bad idea as it's looking today, i mean it's ususually hard enough to start bs at lower levels, giving ppl even more options to scatter the crowd would make this even worse, perhaps make a few different bs layout that rotare or something like that so there is ONE place at all times where all ppl come to.

And why not make it random sided fights, as in putting ppl in different sides no matter what "real" side they belong to, and make some alternative place to really fight each other in, etc etc.
Would take away the i-won't-go-to-bs-coz.faction-x-always-wins wines

Revamping old encounters + loot to today's standards. ie: Hollow Island

Yes yes, and make HI a lot faster to finish, as it is today not many want to spend 3-4h+ in hi to finish it, make the waves spawn faster or add some option to start the encounter at a much harder difficulty from start, i'm sure you already got ideas on this.


More new content (as much as was released when sl launched) sounds awsome, but that's a full-blown megaexpansion, not sure how much more FC plans to develop this game, but new professions/a lot of new nanos would certainly be fun

Call me strange if you wish, but looking back the past 5+ years the pande megazerg had it's fun sides, add another one of those that takes less planning than s42 maybe

[Ashram]

There are three things I can think of.

The first is like other people said, Revamp the newbie experience. They have already brought up all the points I'd make, so I won't repeat them.


The second: I'd like to see some more uses for mechs. Perhaps have an instance where there are both mechanized AND infantry mobs you must kill. I think a 6 man instance where it's intended for three people to be meched up, and 3 on foot would be fun.



The last: Break the catch 22 with battlestation. As of right now, people think "Why should I sign up for the queue? It's not like there are enough other people to start a BS." Well, the problem is self propigating. So what I propose, is change the queue, so that being in the queue gives VP. Further, with that last change, you will need to make the penalty for skipping out on BS much harsher than it is currently.

[Phyxr]

If only real life had a G_D who would canvass opinions and act upon them like this...



Anyway.

New AI playfield for below S10

This is without any doubt in my mind the most important thing that is missing, both from an existing player and new player perspective. The dearth of up close and personal alien action upon leaving N00b Island is a major componant of player dissatisfaction.
And you know I'm talking solo content here, don't you? :-)

[Ginier]

All your time, efforts and resources needs to be put towards the game engine and fixing the old bugs.

/thread

[Warhead]

Finish that engine update ASAP and at the same time revamp the startup experience so you can start advertising for AO the day the engine update goes live and thus bring fresh blood in and old blood back to the game.

Everything else can come after that.

[mozaix]

We're missing a cafe / bar inside the s10 playfield.
I'd like to have one where mid boss used to be!
Yea, and sometimes a small group of alien mafia patrollers should run up to the cafe/bar and kill the waitress. ;P

Seriously, just for the fun!

And some green alien cake!

[Demoder]

Startup area:
As many others, I think both the SL and AI startup areas need a revamp to explain more of the game basics (like implants, perks and information about the expansions).

Subway:
Next, I would like to see more quests explaining the story behind the Subway system. (I *think* that was to be added with the daily missions? Not sure..) It would also be nice if entering the subway from Rome would have you enter the subway in one place, while entering it in Tir would place you at another entry point - and have these entrances & exits linked inside the subway itself. Have clear signs pointing to where the various exits are inside the subway, so that people don't get lost.

Tokens:
With the changes to the token gun quest, this is a slightly less pressing issue; But I still think that doing expansion content (read: missions in Shadowlands, fighting for the side aligned to yours) should give you some form of token rewards. Maybe something along the lines of receiving (un)redeemed tokens, and having to exchange these for either credits or tokens. Maybe something along the lines of 3x (un)redeemed tokens for one sided token.

Ofab armor & weapons:
Currently, it's very common to not bother with OFAB gear pre-tl7, because the time it takes to collect it is way out of proportion to how fast you outlevel the said gear on a leveling toon.
Therefore, it would make sense being able to give your old OFAB gear to a NPC, getting back some (50%? 75%?) of the VP value.
For armors, it should give you back 1 less upgrade clump than was spent on the item you hand in.
For weapons, it should give you back half the upgrade clumps spent on the item.

Implementing this would make it more viable to actually spend VP on gear along the way.
Since more people will spend VP on gear along the way, they'll end up spending more VP in total, thus spending more time on expansion content to farm VP. Since this can be done during the entire leveling process, and the fact you get something back for it along the way, it will feel like less of a grind.

LE missions: Dissolve the "loot VP" system (it's a PITA), and rather add a VP reward for completing the mission. (maybe a special VP item which adds X number of VP per QL, where QL is the same as the mission level)
Totw: More quests encouraging players to explore the entire ToTW area.
Rubika Encounters: I think the various RK dynas need to have their loot tables adjusted into dropping weapons & armors that ain't mostly junk by todays stanards.
Heal/Nano delta: This is a useless skill at lower levels, due to the combination of an incredibly slow tickrate, and low delta ammounts. Should find some way of fixing this. (I do have a general suggestion in the balancing forums, but the exact numbers are a little sketchy.)

That was a whole lot more ideas than I initially thought I'd write out.

[DePreach]

I like the consultation thing I hope we see some of the thought processes that emerge from all this.

Personally I wouldn't worry too much about the start zone, I know it is getting vilified left right and centre but we all survived it. An active population + the player led initiatives to improve the area will go a long way to fixing this, maybe some simple quests to maybe get a brain implant in.

The problem in my opinion is the endgame, how about 30 more levels and a new Anarchy zone after Pande with 0% gas and roaming social mobs, and a reason for going there such as disabling the enemies orbitals. Make NW a little more interesting than blob wars where we are fighting the mechanics as much as the other side.

Add a base armour set which takes other armour sets as tradeskill and alters the stats, making a practically unlimited variable armour set.

But most of all, people are leaving until the graphics engine OR the PvP patch, the playerbase needs to see some movement on these quickly because every twink in game is waiting to see what is happening.

You need to firstly find a way of running the new mechanics concurrently with the old mechanics and also implement an effective method of communication and voting on issues that weights for the fact that for any improvement 13/14ths of the playerbase shout nerf. I would suggest a public issue tracking system (like Gemini) along with another test server primarily dedicated to balancing and then dedicated to hunt down the graphical bugs. Also, a Gemini type system will let us all see that yes, you nerfed (caughs) stuns this patch but next patch AS gets nerfed and in 5 patches you will be removing Free Movement Stims.

In my opinion all new content pales in comparison to the two major incoming patches. The first patch that hits live with even the smallest amount of change will cause a massive rush of returning players who all left the game because there was no point changing their setup because they were under the impression a PvP balance was imminent and quickly became disillusioned when they realised it could be next month or it could be next year.

Diatribe much?

Oh and if you wish to discuss these matters in any greater detail book me onto the flight next to Kintaii.

[Leileena]

Arrival Hall

Storyline



That's all I have to say.

[Darkirbiska1]

Can you remove limit for character transfer to test server or lock it to max. 2 transfers per 1 day?
Rejected
Waiting 14 days after 2-3 transfers isn't fun.

[Crat360]

Heya Means

I suggest doing a open raidzone like Pande, but when it comes to the endboss make is so that only Team 1 from the Raid Interface gets warped into the Lair.

Also how about some new outdoors RK boss encounters, along the lines of Mercs.
Come on Means I know your spidersenses tingle when you think of 30ft pink Mercs walking over RK!

1 Random team from the RI Make it fun, spread out the DD/heals make each team have a function..

Again random, have (boss) mobs on a random walk around RK Entering cities and destroying!

[Plante]

Hello guys,

This is my first FwM reply, so I'll try to say something... intelligent!

First,
New player start-up could be very nice.
That should include a way to get more credits.
I remember when i started, i had difficulty buying a single nano.
(Maybe the daily mission will solve that)

Secondly, something that manage alts could be nice.
Here is a little exemple:
Player Talkalot is online and want to talk to Player Notthere who is offline. He opens the chat window with Notthere and start talking to him. Normally, we receive an Offline message, but it could be nice that the message is redirected to an online alt of Notthere. So, people wont have to know your WHOLE alt list to talk to you.
It might not be possible but it is just an idea.

AI TL2-3
Similar to S10 but with 500k-1m bounty?
Without GA XXXVIII kick-ass fix (like LoX / SL-playfield)
Little pocketboss system?
And no Ensign Grade II - Cha'Sinuh plz!

That was my ideas

[Wulf-GTI]

More info for neutral.
No change back or put change back.

|------> This. <------|
Full thread here

One way or other way need remove grind. Low and medium level are empty for Heck and Inf teams.

PLEASE -> balance -> ignore veterans and 220 -> focus on low level (more option) -> continue for medium level. -> release new engine.

Must fix low level BEFORE new engine!

Why? Need new people. Need hold people. New engine are big shiny for pull people. MUST have better game play for first sniff for drug so hold new people.

-------Support-----------

This game is now a rush to 220 so people can "start" playing their toons.

Theres the problem.

Everyone is in a rush to get somewhere theyre not prepared for.

The "better" solution is to slow everyone down..

The BIGGESTEST problem. No people for team with new person. Game look empty!

[Jarez]

I would prioritize like this:

New startup experience
Alien Playfield below and above S10
Revamping old encounters
Professional Bug fixing
Sending Kintaii to the Bahamas

+1

(The message you have entered is too short. Please lengthen your message to at least 3 characters.)

[Klodovik]

What should we make next? Where should we spend our time that it would make the most difference/be the most fun?

How about fixing the step issue on BS, for pet users? For starters.

[Hotsy]

I would love a revamp of the Shop items
There are like tons and tons of useless items in the shop
And even more tradeskill items that are never needed in the shops.

Also please, more storyline!