It's always a tough call to make, but the top two immediate priorities (and this is reaffirmed constantly on the forums) are the Engine Upgrade and the Server Migration. Serious improvements to the PvP system is something we would like to do, but the more things you work on at the same time the slower everything takes. So awhile back we made the decision to really narrow our focus in order to get those two out the door as soon as we can. The two subsequent priorities are the New Player Experience, and the Profession Changes and again, these are something that players ask about a lot. PvP is probably after that, and we've talked about seriously tackling it in the next expansion which would come afterwards. Because it would really take that level of effort to do properly.
Last edited by Ilaliya; Sep 8th, 2012 at 02:45:41.
You know I find it funny that the team is having to come up with rules for player names for the server merge consider at release players names were unique across servers for the very reason FC is moving toward. It was around 12.2 or 12.3 that complaints on RK2 about toon names taken on RK1 causing them to start using 1 2 3 and such on the end the names that FC did a reversal and split the databases so that names were only unique to a server.
And you have to ask yourself if during the deployment of towers or cities did anyone ask if the locations should be server specific in the event that a merge ever have to occur. I doubt it but boy would that not have saved some trouble latter.
I think once it does get released the resulting issues and such are just going to be a blast to watch unfold.
Lheann
President of When I Grow Up
Lhisa - MA - RK1
MaxKillz - Enf - RK1
Namaru - Enf - RK1
"If you find yourself loosing a fight, your tatics suck."
Two main reasons:
1) Everyone would have to do it. And to get everyone to do it, there would have to be some attractive perks, nanos or gear availible at that lvl. (See my post on page 5 for specifics)
2) Right now, the only prof that can compete at lvl 150 with other TL5 (read; 165-170) twinks, are doctors.
You need PVP Stuff? PVP sucks in AO... One Thing that could be Patched out with the Tower Fields that the most People has no interessed on these
Give us a new PVM Playfield like the new WOW Add on... With a lot of Quests, Dungeons, Leveloptions... :P
I'm not trolling and I do have a clue what I'm talking about. While I haven't done any hardcore lvl 1 twinking, I've got a 165 enfo (tankstratege) who's got tl-capped cm, lvl capped symbs, 260/255 1he alien axes and Improved Black Clan Heavy Tank Armor equipped. Getting that stuff took time. But actually twinking it on? That was mostly spent with doing math outside the game, I avoided all the expensive twink items, except perhaps a few I was able to borrow from friends. Also I do not have any chars to log for buffing myself. Higher ql stuff than what I've got equipped was either pointless because of OE (weapons) or impossible because of levelcaps.
I'd say that's enough experience with non-lvl220-twinking to know what I'm talking about. Oh and in the end it turned out that I had forgotten some minor things and a result could have used even less twinking items than I did.
Last edited by Nanostratege; Sep 8th, 2012 at 16:11:34.
Shhhsss. Careful. Behind all the colours, there are ears, ears who listen.
sorry lazy
... on a not quite unrelated note: is there any way to be notified when a specific user posts a new post? (as in some kind of follow/watch function?)
oh and @lindelu's original post - thanks for reenabling dnw transfer, feared a few of my chars there would be lost forever.
Shhhsss. Careful. Behind all the colours, there are ears, ears who listen.
Some hardcore twinking requires towers, building and laddering proper imps, figuring how to raise your TS skill to create a nodrop item, obtaining half-forgotten items etc. You don't need to have master's degree but it very requires some heavy knowledge of the game. I also speak from my personal experience as I would hardly acomplish the same level of twinking after just couple of months in the game as I would do now. What you don't realize is that you have been playing for years (according to your forum join date) so things like that seems to be easy. But they are not. There have been a lot of players asking me for help with their twinks, while good portion of them failed to understand the basics even when I provided them with link to guides on forums. Also show me a game that has at least similar level of twinking as AO. I haven't seen one yet.
Last edited by Scottik; Sep 8th, 2012 at 17:13:10.
jup. That's true and that's what auno/xyphos are great for. Baring the tower stuff, most of it is actually pretty cheap and easy (laddering imps is one of the first things I do, since it's effective & cheap).
true that. The longer one plays the more items one has and the more knowledge of how to twink. Both make it easier to twink, but both can be compensated for by having friends and auno (and well, more time)
I do realize that it's more difficult when one is new (my first character is an irrecoverable mess ... 120mp in medsuit pretty much. Still able to cast highest non-locked pets so I cba anyway.), it's something that just requires a bit familiarity with the concept and some practice. (one doesn't have to start out with the most insane highend twinking and could just go for some 200 imps on lvl 90 char stuff or such, for practice).
It sounds a bit ... troublesome ... that even with a guide (well depending on the quality) and outside help, people would have trouble with twinking (I'm going to assume it's normal-ish twinking, since you talked about failing to understand the basics). What exactly went wrong? Did they fail to do the math properly? Did they not understand that raising the stats with buff items allows you to equip a higher quality of the item you wish to equip?
I don't know any. That's one of the main reasons why I'm playing AO.
Shhhsss. Careful. Behind all the colours, there are ears, ears who listen.
I haven't logged in the game since the middle of July, I read the forums for about 15 minutes once per week, and looked at (I think) two of the screenshots that Wind posted. Having said that, I dreamt about the NPE last night, and I recall I was very frustrated the whole time.
Ghosts of Rimor
Gorastopr 220 MA Doctor :: No pew pew. Thwack thwack.
Goratinkr TL5 OT Hurler Factotum Engineer :: Bringin' the thunder since 2008.
Scrubup 100 Bow Doctor :: Will she ever get out of perk reset? Stay tuned!
Ghosts of Atlantean
Unda TL7 MA Engineer :: Crying for more crit.
Measles LVL1 Pistol Doctor :: It takes 2 stims to self the Expertises.
They usually stopped me after I tried to explain how to raise treatment via implants. Perhaps it was their lack of dedication rather than lack of ability to understand it. But most probably it was their lack of experience and knowledge of the game. But even long-time players can't twink. There are few of those in my org. They have been playing for years but they couldn't do proper twink if you asked them to.
To be fair, I am actually aware that balancing PVP would actually take more effort to do correctly than any other project currently in progress, and I believe anyone serious about improving PVP is aware of that also. Finally deciding on changes, testing those changes, implementing those changes, finding more problems with those changes in actual use, deciding on more changes, testing those changes, etc.
If this was a game like WoW or ToR, fixing and balancing PVP would be easy. Unfortunately AO "suffers" from incredible diversity in skills, perks, setups, and how much player experience actually influences profession capabilities. In addition you have duels, small group fights, individuals against groups, teams vs teams, and raids vs raids.
In summary, AO's PVP is impossible to balance. At best you can make professions functional in some areas and at some levels, but deficiencies and advantages will always exist given AO's design. However, there are some changes that should be made sooner than later, and that only improve the overall situation of PVP as a whole. I would hope PVP not being a priority does not mean trader drains will remain unbalanced at lower levels until years from now, AS needs to be fixed, and possibly the way buffs work to prevent stacking massive amounts of OSB's at lower levels.
I believe some changes are suppose to take place over time, so hopefully the most obvious can be taken care of before the end of the year.
I see why twinking to you seems easy. Twinking at lower levels is a completly different game where you can achieve significant twinking only if you get some stuff that is very rare, expensive or possible to acquire only with much higher level toons. For example high ql platinum rings, polychromatic pillows or the newly introduced Docaholic treatment rings. And lets not speak of what can be twinked on and how much it costs. High ql alien weapons are easy to acquire compared with most of the really good stuff that is almost impossible to come by for some professions and needs to be farmed with much higher toons. Nippy stilletos come to mind as a good example.