My notes. The text equivalent of verbal diarrhoea.
tl;dr ? I don't blame you.
Still reading? This is basically a lot of rambling notes. You have been warned.
Apologies to anyone I quoted without credit. This is a copy/paste from a text file.
***
Please read this:
http://mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm
Why? MUD developers figured out almost all the major issues modern MMOs face, with solutions. Decades ago.
It covers the balance between players and how to moderate the reactions with precision.
Various large MMO companies have spent millions to learn a fraction of what is in here.
***
Shortlist of additional features, suggestions, or changes:
Disclaimer: This is not a demand to implement any features immediately, or a requirements list of features that must be in place before release, or anything bad like that. These are all random notes, suggestions, and "It'd be nice to have this"
- Some of these may be major features to implement, too. Neither are any of these intended to be "I refuse to play without X!" - please do not misunderstand. Some things written without knowing whether there was a better system in the works, ignore if so.
---
Thirst bar - like hunger bar, for liquids.
Alcohol - alcohol, because Life is Feudal.
Spawn animals like herbs - no need to have animals spawn wild, they can be spawned around the character when they use a 'search for animals' command like the search for herbs command from the video. This could involve tracking, too. *More notes in notes section below. (if another spawn system is in the works, ignore this)
Character relationships - being able to set someone as husband, wife, father, mother, brother, sister, child, other extended family, etc, with the other character's permission, and of course automatic creation of reciprocal relationship links including extended family.
Skill unlock - Additional to up/down/locked would be unlocked - the skill can go up or down freely. Lower priority to decrease than any "down" skill when at the skill cap.
Global chat - I would recommend to rename the currently described global (regional) chat to regional, and add a truly global chat channel, to avoid confusion and to allow testers and players to communicate. This may have already been implemented.
Offline activity - the ability for a character to perform basic actions offline. I know about the schools and offline training/teaching and the web minigames. There's other stuff too, trading, simple guard duty. This doesn't necessarily have to mean the character is rendered in-world with all the pathfinding server load and etc, this could just mean +1 to a nearby guard tower or trading post or whatever. But more options would be nice, even if it's just banking sleep. Speaking of which:
Sleep - characters should have to rest once in a while, like, actually rest/sleep or at least lay down for a little. This could be banked while offline. Many games include a minor reason for the real-life player to take a break once an RL hour, some even remind players to eat and drink and maybe make sure the baby is ok.
It seems like stamina might fill this role already but I wanted to make sure I wrote it down before I forgot again.Minor skill: Musical Ability - assuming there isn't such a skill already, some form of musician skill and the ability to play instruments, and of course, in-game instruments to be played - ideally, support letting the players play a midi or ABC file on their instrument, and other players nearby can hear.
Are there any other instrument only music formats? I wouldn't recommend to support mp3, but any other small instrument-only file might work. LOTRO does something similar with ABCs and maybe midis I believe, plus has some kind of other music support, I think keypress-based.Removal of skill limitations on equipping an item - probably the only gameplay decision I outright disagree with is having a skill limit to wear a physical object. I think any limitations on physically equipping an item should be removed. I just don't see why my character couldn't physically wear an item, even without proper training. I'm not saying they should be anywhere near as effective as a trained user. Just change the required skill level to a recommended skill level and apply a penalty to it's effectiveness and maybe increase the rate at which it wears out or suffers item decay.
Nudity - moderated with underclothes which respawn a new set with you on death, reinforced through 'cold' status which saps hunger and thirst faster, and with a client-side toggle for both nudity in general and allowing your character to appear nude in other clients, both defaulting to "off". -- not in game (confirmed?)
Weight gain/loss - Characters gain or lose size depending on how well fed they are, over long periods of time.
notes on various posts and things and stuff
Disclaimer: Lots of rambling here. Some replies may just be an especially verbose version of "me too" - read at your own peril.
-- 63) That nation will have more rights on your land. It can politely ask you to move somewhere else, join their nation and stay where you are, or simply force you to move by destroying your stuff, since it won't be protected, since it will be on their land.
Some additional choices: (meant as additional options, not as replacements, to give landowners more control)
Ignore - acts like joining nation in terms of tresspass and similar things not being a crime, but acts like neutral in terms of initiating combat and other stuff like that still being a crime
Taxed nonresident - acts like ignore, but requires a tax and/or rent payment to maintain status - I'm still not quite sure how feudal life will work for roaming traders who need to be able to approach and enter an area without committing or being accused of committing a tresspassing crime, but maybe this would help enable that gameplay style.
Taxed resident - acts like join nation but requires tax and/or rent, if join nation doesn't support taxing or renting land - or requires it by default - I think it does, then ignore this if that is the case and see this next one:
Untaxed resident - acts like join nation, no tax/upkeep. Useful for granting the nearby peaceful but unproductive hermit resident permissions.
Additionally, some way to grant one, multiple, or all unhoused individuals who are unable to join the guild, like traders, performers, etc, tresspass rights on land would be nice.
unknown answer from faq
Skill locks:
Right now I see up, down, and locked. I'd also recommend one more option, for further control of skill loss and gain:
Unlocked - skill can go up or down freely. Decreases at a lower priority than any "down" skill if the player is at the skill cap. This allows a bit more control over how skills increase or decrease. Recommended: dark green unlock symbol, and making the lock symbol dark red, and shifting the up arrow towards blue, and the down arrow towards orange.
52) Nope, i think i won't have time or moral rights to (play the game). But i will observe it for sure."
response from a fellow player:
- Please do play your game, it seems when people don't play it they lose understanding of the balance of mechanics.While I understand you want to prevent your bias; it'll probably create more, as vocal minorities might mislead you, or you might not experience the severity of glitches and see how they affect you. I recommend playing your game solo and disguised, so you can understand your community & game better.
My addition:
I agree, plus in addition to everything above, this is incentive for players and groups to be kind to lone solo players. It might be GOD walking the earth in disguise.
I think you should do it as an all out RP thing with in-game rewards and several different characters with different personalities and such. Could even have several such people playing like that. It would make great events and add to the in-game lore. Tho don't join any groups or guilds of course.212) Will there be tabards/etc, capes, customizable symbols etc? If I conquer someones keep can I place my logo around it etc.. Can I design a logo for myself/clan?
response:
Yes, we plan such functionality, but maybe closer to release or shortly after release.
my suggestion:
A great additional use for the item-store currency is an upload fee to review a custom heraldry image.
Also there's an extra proven income method: "No refunds if we reject your image of a giant dong, even if it is 'Sejant Erect'" (Actual heraldric term please don't ban me please ) Of course you can include quite a few heraldry symbols by default, there are a ton which are copyright-free or free to use for any purpose.Spawning notes: (spawning notes note: If there is no tracking skill, ignore the part that talks about the tracking skill, and pretend it says tracking command.)
The animals should spawn some distance away, outside aggro range of any nearby player at least, to give the players a chance to react
- animals should be visible to all players within visual range, and despawn if not interacted with over time if no one is within range nearby even if they are not looking at the animal or the animal is not in a far player's visual range. I'm worried about critters despawning when a player is hunting them or approaching them from a distance because that is so immersion-breaking, but still allowing for cleanup of the majority of unwanted critters.Spawning methods:
Animal lottery, instant win popup:
Animals spawn into existance around player when the command is used. Not very realistic but could be good for small animals.
(If there is already a tracking system, ignore this. This is a suggestion for how such a thing could work if it was not already implemented.)
Tracking:
Search for animals, and animal tracks appear, leading some number of cells away, and then seem to fade. Use the tracking skill again at the end where you think they went, and more tracks appear. The animal can be spawned at this time some distance away out of view of the player, and further use of the tracking skill will lead to the animal. If there is a tracking skill, higher skill = longer path of tracks revealed and easier identification of the type of track.
Mix of the two:
Small relatively harmless critters pop nearby with the searching skill/command, and tracks may appear for larger, more dangerous, and/or more valuable animals.
With this, animals don't have to be spawned in-world, just as needed, but will be around and visible to players nearby if they are spawned.
Cons: The downside is forests and grasslands will feel kind of empty with no wildlife. Might want to add a tiny chance for a small and/or harmless critter to spawn near a player while they are wandering around just to add a bit of life to the world. They could despawn quickly if not interacted with.
Pathfinding:
for any non-dev reading this who doesn't already know, pathfinding is expensive in 3d games where the terrain can be edited. I mean 'expensive' in terms of CPU and memory usage, since paths have to be re-calculated constantly. You don't notice this in regular games because the devs of those games use all kinds of cheats and hacks (programming hacks not haxing teh megahutz) to work around the pathfinding issue. Anyone who has walked on an unpaved nature trail knows that pathfinding is expensive for human beings to do mentally too, even when the ground isn't constantly changing.
ANYWAY (lol I warned you)
My suggestion for the pathfinding issue is that terrain is likely to be changed very rapidly in very short bursts, relatively speaking, and then remain static for long periods of time. I would recommend implementing some background pathfinding caching system which reviews the map and updates pathfinding nodes/waypoints/however you want to handle it. Maybe make it stop running until the terrain is unchanged for an hour in that region or area. It doesn't have to be perfect. And again none of these suggestions are "omg do this now!"
I understand some things may have to wait until after release, or even never be implemented the way devs and players would fully like.(This one is obscure out of context: trading posts 'print' money and buy some goods from players, at least at the start, to help stimulate the economy)
368) If the Trader Building sells items are they going to cost more than the Central City?
Not decided yet if trading posts will be selling those goods they have just bought from players or just "destroy" them. Anyway, main idea of trading posts is a provision of suitable player to player trading. The fact that server takes his part in it is only just to provide an emission of gold into game to minimize the barter.
my response:
I think the trading post should post the purchased items for sale at either exactly the price it paid for them, or for a slight markup. Let other players then be able to buy the item from that trading post. Give the gold back into the trading post's personal coffer for those kind of sales. The server should only need to top off the wallet if it's below whatever minimum balance. This also lets some starting players "sell and forget" if they want. The price for printed money purchases should be lower than the starting city, and definitely lower than what they could likely get from other players, but not so bad that it's unreasonable to use the feature. Storing the goods in inventory also prevents over-accumulation of a specific type of good, or needless destruction of a nonrenewable resource, as well as encouraging more player interaction with the economy.
370) How often will the coin be distributed?
Once a real life day.
my response:
This may create a rush on the bank at that time, as well as making it useless for players who cannot be on at the right time. You might want to have it add a fractional amount to the trading post's personal coffer once an hour or once every 15 minutes.
Decay notes:
Players churn. It happens. They come and go, so anything needs to be cleaned up. Newbie island is a terrific idea. The problem happens when players have unexpected reality kick in. I had this happen in Ultima Online and DF. I can see the map from the UO collector's edition from where I am sitting. Due to various RL issues, I only got to play a few months when it first came out. I clocked in some serious hours later, but by that time, Trammel, and you know the rest most likely. Siege Perilous was nice but the problem was all the best and worst were both concentrated in one server. Same thing happened with DF, RL interrupted me. Anyway... (totally not drunk) Please allow for some way for players to go away from the game for a period of time without losing everything. I realize this is mitigated in groups but some folks just do want to play alone.
I would recommend giving every player who signs up a 1 month (or 1 week, whatever) "no-decay" pass, to be used whenever that player wishes to temporarily halt decay on their claim. Allow it to be used even from the web site or a mobile device. You can also do things like send an email and/or a text message when the player's house/whatever is starting to decay, half-decayed, things like that. Now comes the Money$: sell no-decay passes in the store.
You can put a max usage and minimum time between uses, whatever the community thinks of as reasonable. Properties on hold should still be subject to territory-related issues, but maybe offer more of a grace period to give the away player time to react. Maybe even allow them to do that on the website or mobile device, too, being able to accept an offer to join or decline or whatever. Modern MMOs may run on a computer but they shouldn't ignore mobile/tablet/web, I think what is being done so far along those lines is great, and even more could be done that way.Economy notes:
Use the churn to your advantage. A naked newbie with 0 skills should be able to meaningfully contribute to the game economy from the moment they log in. There's plenty of sticks, plant fiber, wood, slate, etc that need gathering, after all.
It seems like the economy is already set up to do this and I just wanted to say bravo! Encourage it as much as possible. The few NPCs there are should not destroy goods or print unnecessary money, but rather re-sell items and stash their profit, use it for more speculative purchases. It doesn't have to be overly complex logic, just a few simple rules.Don't be startled at weird economy things. It'll happen. Chances are you know this already since you're a gamer. It's always funny to see economists who aren't gamers talk about parts of in-game economy they don't understand. Like, for example, the price of Ore vs Bars in WOW, they always ask "Why are bars worth less?" and then proceed to mock game economies, without realizing the bars are worth less because a resource has been extracted.
If you made it all the way to the end, congrats, enjoy a funny webcomic:
http://thenoobcomic.com/index.php?pos=1
