@finland said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)This way you will not stop players selling golds or items/gear for real money.
Certainly not and I would never claim so! You can drastically reduce the amount of traded goods though and provide a better experience for the people who are annoyed by trying to compete with bots on gathering.
I've pondered if I should respond to the thread again, since the decision has already been taken when the developers wrote the spotlight, so the argument is moot, but given that people happily keep beating the already buried horse, I'm just going to shrug and try to explain my points.
@vengu said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)There are plenty of PvE MMOs where botters get punished(...)
@prometheus said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)By "not being gentle" I meant we'll run both scripted and manual controls, systematically. We'll get as sophisticated as we can(...)
My point was not that the botting accounts wouldn't receive a punishment, but that the benefit of botting would be far more valuable than the drawback of potentially loosing the account at a point in time where there is a net gain. That's the reason you have 'gold sellers' in that kind of games after all, they make a profit (else they wouldn't be taking that business venture), because it takes a considerable amount of time till the limited resources of the game development company can detect and act on the bot (it's a simple 'brute force'-problem, that can only be tackled through applying an equally high amount of resources and there is only one such amount of cheap resources in an MMORPG, players). The idea I was 'promoting' is not that of punishing bot accounts for the sake of punishment or justice, but to prevent them from turning in profit, because that is the only way to stop a business, making it unprofitable.
@prometheus said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)It has a better grasp of Arboreus-specific resources, which are different from the ones of Syndesia and Tartaros :slight_smile: Since there's no hostile PvP on Arboreus, I don't get what you mean by "easy retreat" - if you're doing PvP on Syndesia with a Beastman you have no advantage compared to Demons and Humans. If you're doing it on Tartaros, you're heavily penalized compared to Demons and quite penalized compared to Humans. Last but not least, you're cut off town conquest. I'd definitely say Beastman is the worst race if you want to PvP, as it's meant to be :slight_smile:
@finland said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)Why should Tartaros be empty? to me looks silly to say that. Tartaros should be like an giant Open Wolrd Arena. All PvPers should play there(...)
That's a very complex topic, I'm going to try and tackle it in little steps.
First assumption, PvP players are likely to be competitive.
Second assumption, competitive players usually prefer to be at an advantage (or equal), but try to avoid being at a disadvantage when it comes to meta-gaming.
Third assumption, there's plenty of games on the market that specifically carter to and design for the competitive PvP player (MOBAs, FPS, RTS), so you have to provide unique incentive if you want them to play your game. Just telling them 'PvP for the sake of PvP' ain't going to convince them to pay for your product, why should it?
Forth assumption, playing at a constant risk of being killed and looted is a lot more 'difficult' then playing without that risk, both because you can specifically target a specific set of counter-abilities/equipment in PvE and you never have to worry about overextending, so you can easily generate a better productivity for your invested time by reducing the traveling back and forth overhead. (If that would not be the case, the 'PvE only people' wouldn't complain about PvP to begin with)
Congratulations to all winners, especially in this amusing constellation!
Epic ambassador battle between @Phaethonas and @Finland! 
@jetah said in Cosmetic cash shop, RMT and p2w.:
(...)Catching up means they are equal to everyone(...)
No, you are equal to the one you are catching up with, because those who aren't paying to 'catch up' (, read the majority,) are staying behind. You are 'catching up' to the top, when you were at the lower end before, or in other terms, you bought your place in the top.
@vengu said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)Because Phaethonas wants to kill Fractured. That's the sole reason he's here.
Isn't that a rather harsh personal attack? He even provided suggestions on how to improve the system against players trying to circumvent it. If destruction would be his whole purpose, why would he do that?
@finland said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)players who will defend the land (like me)(...)
Gosh! I really, really want to play a Beastman, but now you're tempting me to try my luck as Demon... Would you happen to have a free spot for me in your army @Phaethonas and @Jetah if I'd play 'part time demon'?
@finland said in Cosmetic cash shop, RMT and p2w.:
@logain wins the guild that nerds more (h24) to grind more money(...)
True, but that's called 'play to win', which I know you dislike, but I consider entirely fine. The question was about the definition on pay to win though.
@dybuk said in Cosmetic cash shop, RMT and p2w.:
(...)If what you wrote is about normal potions, that can be bought for in-game currency or even be crafted by yourself, then I wouldn't consider it p2w(...)
It's all about what you consider 'win'. Concrete example, this one guy and his league/guild A are playing Albion Online, they are fighting with another league/guild B for a respawn or territory. Both have 10 members online, both are roughly equal in skill and equipment, it's a fair fight and 5 of the members of A drop (being looted), 5 of B drop (being looted). Now the 5 members from league/guild A do not have spare equipment and hence can no longer return to the battlefield. Whereas the 5 members of B have a next to unlimited stockpile of spare equipment and instantly return on the field. At this point, the fight is 5 vs 10.
Who 'wins'?
@finland said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)What about to add an option for guilds like: When kicking some one for a good reason like an "exploit" to flag and restrict that player as:
- Spy. You get this when sabotagins a Good or Neutral guild. It leasts for X real-world hours, and forces you to pick an Evil alignment(...)
Since there is no way to mechanically validate 'good reason' (spying), that would be prone to heavy abuse (people luring 'beginners' into their Guild just to mark them as spy and then kill them).
@esher said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)When you talk about real-world hours, does it count hours offline ? Or the countdown stop when we disconnect ?(...)
@morridin said in Feature Spotlight #6 - PvP, Alignment & Crime:
(...)Also, the timers for the flags could use sone clarification. If a person is flagged as a theif then goes out and steals again does the timer just reset or does it add on to the time left over on the first theft? I could see players getting very long flags if it just adds on time, whereas if it just resets a player would be more likely to go on a crime spree since the relative additional punishment is less.
+1 on that! If people can just sit out a penalty while playing another character, that kind of defies the intention, doesn't it?
I'm going to start with what I liked about the information. The idea of Divine quests / champions really appeals to me and the trade off for being a follower of Tyros on Tartaros is really ingenious.
That said, I would have preferred you giving a rough figure on what 'large area' means in context of PvE only. I'm sorry, but I don't see what you said here in any shape or form:
@prometheus said in [Major Milestones Approaching! (Or: Why We've Been So Silent)]
(...)That being said, won't be gentle with botters.
People can flat out state that they are going to bot in the game on this forum, or even state that they have hacked and stolen items from people on other games (a real life crime) with no consequences to them. And there's going to be 'large areas' of a botters dream. That's kind of... the opposite of 'not being gentle'?
There's still some important answers missing from your spotlight as well, most notably 'you are quickly drained of all vital energies if you step into a Good-only area'. Which would imply that you can enter these areas and can initiate a fight in them as evil character (which I'd appreciate)? But what is 'quickly' in this context?
And you haven't explained the 'in game mechanical benefit' to being a Demon. Actually, it seems to be far more enticing to choose a Beastman for a competitive PvP player, since the Beastman has a better grasp on resources, can decide when and where to initiate combat and have an easier time to retreat.
@finland said in Cosmetic cash shop, RMT and p2w.:
@logain rts is a different game based on match. All players joining that match will play the same time. You can't compare it to a mmo.
a) I'm not talking about RTS, there's plenty of games like that. I'm going to provide you a quick example: Tribal Wars 2
b) You are only partly correct, if you play an MMO as PvE only, yes, you can only compare that to an extent, but even then. Trivial example, it takes time to regenerate mana and health in a game, but you can purchase 'potions' to fill up either/both. Now the person who doesn't invest money has to wait for regeneration, whereas the person spending cash can simply swallow potion after potion, killing creatures at a much faster pace. If there's progression, that person has a considerable edge over you, or else why would people consider 'botting'/buying progress?
Now, if we're talking PvP, that is even more of an incredible advantage. You expressed and experienced it yourself, the more warriors you can keep constantly on the battlefield, the better your odds.
@dybuk said in Cosmetic cash shop, RMT and p2w.:
@evolgrinz said in Cosmetic cash shop, RMT and p2w.:
P2W means that there are items in the cash shop that are better than you can find in-game and the only way to get them is to pay real money.
I totally agree - this is the definition of p2w.
Ok, now you've got me curious!
If you can purchase 'units' in a strategy game, but these units can be 'created' over time as well, that means it wouldn't be 'pay to win' according to your definition, right?
Despite the fact that the person who bought 1000 offensive troops could likely raid me into the ground on day 1, where I had zero chance to have a comparable army to defend myself, unless I spent real life cash as well?
Greetings!
Damn, I've got to be a nerd, when reading your forum name, I automatically thought of Fuzzy Logic!
@jetah said in Instanced Dungeons/Raids:
(...)And it was said that the resources on other planets would give more power(...)
Where did they state that?
@jetah said in Instanced Dungeons/Raids:
(...)Again it’s pointless to travel if there isn’t a use for those resources(...)
The 'use' is the same as the 'use' for acquiring new knowledge, being able to extend into regions where your equipment can 'counter' some of the difficulties there, like @Miffi already explained.
If you think about it from a different perspective, you could ask yourself, why do you want to reach 'max level' in a level-progression based game? I'd argue it is because it allows you to consume the 'end game content', be it PvP or PvE.
The motivation is no different in Fractured, you can now consume more content, both PvP and PvE wise, only the way you reach that goal differs.
@jetah said in Instanced Dungeons/Raids:
(...)I do believe the worlds will be setup with resources in tiers. I doubt the developers would put tier 10 (or whatever the highest tier will be) resources in the spawn areas. Generally you do want to persuade the population to venture out and to do that you have higher tiered resources further away.
I'm going to provide you with some quotes here:
'The item system of Fractured strongly empathizes equipment replaceability (...) The geographic distribution of resources will play a big role in this (...) there will be bosses, rare resources and rare items, but they are not the core of progression in Fractured. You aim will be to learn as many things as you can so you can vary your build as much as possible, and to have a steady supply of materials (not only for crafting - food as well!) for your everyday life (...) your character will be already competitive on day one.' ¹
'Different gear is suggested according to the region you want to explore - that's mostly related to the weather system and temperature (...)
Different gear is also suggested according to your role in battle and the foes you expect to face.
In a nutshell, gear is situational - higher availability makes you stronger. As with the Knowledge System, progression is horizontal rather than vertical.' ²
'One thing we're very set on is that floods of hostile creatures and senseless attack spamming are not our thing. In general, our orientation is to have a more "strategic" combat than the average ARPG - mixing the hectic fun of the genre with the tactical depth of the MOBA genre. This on course means fewer enemies and an overall slower pace (...)' ³
And for the thread in general:
'(...)Dungeons, like the rest of the world, are going to be accessible by any player at any time. There are going to be no "private instances" of any kind.(...)' ¹
'(...)Moreover, open world hotspots and events will play a very important role in your everyday gameplay, often more than dungeons.(...)' ²
@fibs said in Instanced Dungeons/Raids:
Oh man, the idea that non-instanced dungeons "help players be more social" has me dying.(...)
Nobody said it would help players be more social. What people said is that it would increase the amount of player interaction. That interaction doesn't have to be social, or in the form of an enjoyable conversation, just like interaction in our world comes at largely varying levels.
The alternative is a 'X player coop game' where you simply go looking for a group to raid the dungeon a hundred more times though, not exactly a massively multiplayer game.
@finland said in Instanced Dungeons/Raids:
(...)Second thing CCU is fake tho(...)
At that point a discussion is mute. If you flat out call statistics provided by developers fake and claim to know better, despite not having access to server logs, there's not much ground for a reasonable exchange.
@finland said in Instanced Dungeons/Raids:
(...)but how many in the whole day?(...)
That does not influence a heat map in the slightest bit. Are you even aware of what a heat map is in the context of player conglomeration around specific hot spots?
People keep forgetting that Fractured is intended not to provide vertical, but horizontal progression, which means, you can not compare the map design with other game that design around level/power progression.
You won't start in a 'beginner area', where you get your first few levels, your tier 1-A gear, then head onward to mid level areas, where you grind your next few levels and your tier B-C gear, then finally get to the high end areas where you keep grinding your top gear equipment through rinse and repeat dungeon raiding of a boss after you reached maximum level/skills.
In a game without power progression, the creature you encounter in the beginning is equally strong as the creature you fight later down the road, which means, there's no division in areas, so everything you design is 'end game content' and hence there's less of a hot spot in the end.