New professionals

[Esssch]

Keep our old ones. There aren't any MPs that match the "active in-game" requirement.

[lainbr]

>.> I'm active in-game (a lil)

[Lackofgravy]

Lain is not a MP.. she gets top 5 DD in 36 zerg raids.

[Garremp]

Keep our old ones. There aren't any MPs that match the "active in-game" requirement.

Best chance to become a professional! Pretty much everyone left in the game will become one with 2 new shade professionals, one for shade profession and one for trader.

[Venachar]

I've had several applications or mentions of interest in the MP role. I do not forsee massive issues with a lack of candidates for this profession. Don't forget the unknowns out there - like Shadowgod, who nobody expected and who turned out to be a half-decent Professional even at level 150. You don't need someone who can write the book on your profession. They don't even need to be all that good at the profession, actually, just able to understand it and the mechanics so they can communicate issues that are raised by the community at large. It's something of a misnomer with the naming of the system in that the 'professionals' don't actually need to be, they're spokespeople by and large.

[Gatester]

Don't forget the unknowns out there - like Shadowgod, who nobody expected and who turned out to be a half-decent Professional even at level 150.

Considering a 150 MP and a 220 MP are about the same, you are practically an MP professional once you hit TL5.



Shadowgod is a good prof though If I was active I would almost go for MP prof myself, although my 220 is not as good in PVP as others I have had 6 MP's now I think and still enjoy the profession until 215+ I just doubt I could handle knowing myself and others had so many great ideas that we could not see introduced, at least not anytime recent. It has been like this for a while so I do not forsee a sudden change in implementation of improvements.

[Garremp]

They don't even need to be all that good at the profession

My english is far from good but doesn't that conflict a bit with the meaning of the word professional?
Well expectations getting lower and lower each year. Funcom is becomming known for that attitude by its current and former players. I am sure that Shadowguy was a good MP and a

half-decent

PvPer but without a

half-decent

profession rebalance he will just try to find excuses why MPs still suck compared to other professions at 220 and as a "pretty decent" 150ish MP he still will have only a

half-decent

clue what is fubar with MPs at level 220.

I really do not want to bash that Shadowknightwarrior-dude but i am tired of people making promises and pretending that nothing happened to the company and everything will be done as promised. It will, i am sure, but it will just be

half-decent

if anything.

[Lazy]

i nominate sarahvix for mp pro

[Esssch]

>.> I'm active in-game (a lil)

You rerolled enf, you don't count.

Don't forget the unknowns out there - like Shadowgod, who nobody expected and who turned out to be a half-decent Professional even at level 150. You don't need someone who can write the book on your profession. They don't even need to be all that good at the profession, actually, just able to understand it and the mechanics so they can communicate issues that are raised by the community at large.

I'd have also mentioned Justinsane, he was 150 when I first noticed him. Though I suppose he might have hit 220 before becoming professional, my memory is hazy.

Your 2nd sentence has me worried though. Well I mean, as worried as I can be about a game I still like but don't actively play. The professional should be someone who is good at the profession. They should be able to write at least several paragraphs about the profession. I wouldn't expect them to match or exceed Xtrem's or DR's guides, but they should still know how to play.

My english is far from good but doesn't that conflict a bit with the meaning of the word professional?
Well expectations getting lower and lower each year. Funcom is becomming known for that attitude by its current and former players. I am sure that Shadowguy was a good MP and a PvPer but without a profession rebalance he will just try to find excuses why MPs still suck compared to other professions at 220 and as a "pretty decent" 150ish MP he still will have only a clue what is fubar with MPs at level 220.

I really do not want to bash that Shadowknightwarrior-dude but i am tired of people making promises and pretending that nothing happened to the company and everything will be done as promised. It will, i am sure, but it will just be if anything.

Not sure if you're being facetious or what, but Shadowgod was already a professional and is now a developer. We basically have him to thank for Tigress and SoZ and SS, even though they ended up hurting us more than helping in the long run.

i nominate sarahvix for mp pro

Seconded.

[Venachar]

My english is far from good but doesn't that conflict a bit with the meaning of the word professional?
Well expectations getting lower and lower each year. Funcom is becomming known for that attitude by its current and former players. I am sure that Shadowguy was a good MP and a PvPer but without a profession rebalance he will just try to find excuses why MPs still suck compared to other professions at 220 and as a "pretty decent" 150ish MP he still will have only a clue what is fubar with MPs at level 220.

I really do not want to bash that Shadowknightwarrior-dude but i am tired of people making promises and pretending that nothing happened to the company and everything will be done as promised. It will, i am sure, but it will just be if anything.

What?

Yes - the meaning of the word professional is a bit weird, in my opinion. This is why -

It's something of a misnomer with the naming of the system in that the 'professionals' don't actually need to be, they're spokespeople by and large.

'Misnomer' meaning mis-named.

I'm not sure what your point is about Shadowgod. He wasn't really around for professional rebalance, unless you count the fact he was a Funcom GM at the time. I'm fairly sure he did eventually level to 220 though, before he got hired, so I imagine he did also have a clue about what was fubar about 220.

Regardless, my reason for mentioning him is to illustrate the point that it is more important to be a spokesperson and a communicator, than it is to be able to do whatever difficult stuff you guys do at 220 (sorry, I don't play MP)

I'm afraid it's difficult to give your post the attention you'd like, when you've made a rant about a topic you're clearly unfamiliar with and haven't given much research either. I'm also not sure what promises you're concerned about, as the Professionals aren't much in the habit of making promises.

I look forward to your reply

Regards,

[Venachar]

Esssch: Yeah, sorry, I could have been clearer. The person does need to be able to play the game, sure, but it is more important to understand it too. I'd make the metaphor of a Doctor in a wheelchair still being able to look after your legs. Just because he struggles to do it himself doesn't necessarily mean he lacks the expertise to look after other peoples.

[Xtremtech]

i nominate sarahvix for mp pro

Don't even joke.... you just never know...

X

[Lazy]

would be funny tho

[lainbr]

You rerolled enf, you don't count.

But now org have to many enfos! So I'm back on MP (and a lil fix0r)

[Esssch]

I'm not sure what your point is about Shadowgod. He wasn't really around for professional rebalance, unless you count the fact he was a Funcom GM at the time. I'm fairly sure he did eventually level to 220 though, before he got hired, so I imagine he did also have a clue about what was fubar about 220.

Vhab was 218 or something before he got hired too. Unfortunately the only MP-turned-dev (of the 2 I'm aware of) that has remotely helped us has been Shadowgod, but that's still turned around to bite us, even though the help hasn't been maintained.

Esssch: Yeah, sorry, I could have been clearer. The person does need to be able to play the game, sure, but it is more important to understand it too. I'd make the metaphor of a Doctor in a wheelchair still being able to look after your legs. Just because he struggles to do it himself doesn't necessarily mean he lacks the expertise to look after other peoples.

The problem with looking for just any old person that knows the profession and can kinda sorta play it is that we've had people before who have been flat out amazing at both knowledge and practice, but our concerns still weren't heard. We're not fixed now post-TL5 and we won't be fixed with current rebalance docs either. We'll actually be getting worse compared to everyone else post-rebalance, if it ever comes.

Actually, I suppose that's just the problem with looking for professionals at all. They hear our concerns but somewhere between professionals and developers the communication breaks down. We might as well just keep our old ones, at least they're familiar faces, even if they're hardly around. Though I can't blame them for being inactive. There's not a whole lot of content for us veterans until some of these large projects get completed.

[Ilaliya]

Actually, I suppose that's just the problem with looking for professionals at all. They hear our concerns but somewhere between professionals and developers the communication breaks down. We might as well just keep our old ones, at least they're familiar faces, even if they're hardly around. Though I can't blame them for being inactive. There's not a whole lot of content for us veterans until some of these large projects get completed.

Community is a huge personal mission for me. And you can ask around, but when I was Lead System Designer on Conan we did the massive wave of class revamps where we literally went through and improved a lot of classes from the ground up. And I was in very frequent contact with the Advocates (same thing as Professionals). Which is not to say we always saw eye-to-eye on every issue... because developers have to be the "advocate" for the entire game and not just a particular piece of it. But we did our best to make sure that the top concerns were always carefully considered and treated the players as the experts on how the class played, and felt at the moment (whereas developers are generally the experts on what changes will cause a given effect... although obviously player suggestions can be very helpful/insightful). And that we utilized the Advocate resource in the most efficient manner possible.

For the professionals, and ARK organization in general... it won't be long before Genele can switch focus to the profession changes almost full-time. And this is when the NPE is in the test/fix cycle because there will be a lot of "free time" as bugs are being reported. But we need a functional and active Professional program in place before this happens, because there's going to be ramp-up time, and getting things set up and organized.

[Esssch]

I really hope that's true, and I really hope your team can churn out all these projects in a reasonable timeframe. Profession rebalance and new engine would both bring me back for at least a month or 2 each. And it's all severely needed to bring AO out of the decline it's been in for several years now.

I know this isn't necessarily the place for it, but I always get to the monthly posts after several pages and there seems to be no more questions being answered, so I'm curious on how you're planning additional content, after the NPE and rebalance and engine (or even during, I suppose, but I imagine you need the manhours). I'm mostly interested in endgame PvE. We haven't had a real raid added since S42. Are we ever going to get more raids like that and Beast? We've got lots of single-team instances like Collector, Mitaar Hero and DB 1/2/3, some small raid instances like Vort, 12man, but I'm interested in the high end stuff.

I know a big concern is power creep, we're a lot more powerful now than we were when S42 first came out, people wearing full sets of combined when it was intended to be 1 or 2 pieces per character. Any ideas on combating that? It's likely not viable for AO to change this system due to how old it's spaghetti code is, but have you thought about going into a ratings/percentage based system like WoW has? Say for Armor. Right now its something like 1 damage reduced for every 10 AC. You could go into a system where you get, say, 200 AC at level 10 and at level 20. At level 10 it would reduce damage taken from equal-level enemies by 20. At level 20 it would reduce damage taken from equal-level or lower enemies by 10. So as you got higher level, you'd need more of the stat to maintain the same power relative to your level. For endgame you could add some more levels, then add the content. People would get more levels to satisfy their leveling urges, more content to do with friends, and you wouldn't have as much power creep.

[Xtremtech]

I know a big concern is power creep, we're a lot more powerful now than we were when S42 first came out, people wearing full sets of combined when it was intended to be 1 or 2 pieces per character. Any ideas on combating that?

I remember back when I was a professional, there were huge discussions around this kind of thing. But it's a very difficult thing to get right without mucking up the fairness or mucking up the benefits from tweaking... because, after all, AO is a game where a lot of the fun is found in optimising your character. If optimisation doesn't really bring the rewarded performance increases, then you're messing with one of the prime motivators for continuing to play the game.

X

[Esssch]

I remember back when I was a professional, there were huge discussions around this kind of thing. But it's a very difficult thing to get right without mucking up the fairness or mucking up the benefits from tweaking... because, after all, AO is a game where a lot of the fun is found in optimising your character. If optimisation doesn't really bring the rewarded performance increases, then you're messing with one of the prime motivators for continuing to play the game.

X

I think WoW really got this close to perfect. Not entirely perfect, cause you still feel like you lose power each expansion due to higher ratings needed, but it's needed to be that way so they can have tiers of content and keep adding more. A major issue with AO is that you provide new content and the rewards are either not good enough and no one ever goes there, or the rewards have to be better than current items in which case it's even more power creep.

[Hardcore]

I think Styx would fit very well as a professional and representive for us MP's!