In EQ1 there were none...
In Vanguard there were little dots that represented the intended difficulty of the mob.
One dot meant it was a solo mob, Two was for a small group if I remember, Three was a 4-5man group, Four dots was a full group dungeon mob, and Five dots was a boss I think.
I liked it better in EQ1 I think where soloable mobs were just in easier areas like next to starter zones. This keeps a bit of the mystery around about how strong mobs are. One thing to note about this is the name of the mob itself can go a long way to describing the difficulty of it.
Soloable: a weak kobold
Duo: a kobold yearling
4-5: an adult kobold
6: a kobold warrior
Boss: The Kobold King
This is what I would like to see a lot of instead of just a dot based system.
Thanks for reading,
Kiz~
I agree, I liked the /con method as well.
It was the same color red, But I swear, some considered mobs were red, and some were deep red.
First time a wizard and I were pal-ing around in a duo and arguing over who was better, I asked if I could see all the places he cold go to. So we bopped around and landed in cazic-thule. Everything there was deep red to both of us. The chat was littered with frantic imploring (GET US OUT GET US OUT) and (I HAVE TO WAIT- DONT MOVE- I'M NOT!)
I would agree that I liked the con system much better than the different pictures. Though I don't know if I fully agree with the weak to boss naming convention. I thought it was unique that one mob could con dark blue and kick your butt like a red. It always left a little chance in there that you might pull a little higher level blue and barely escape with your life... or you might even be on the corpse run as we speak lol.
Ya the naming convention wouldn't be dead set across the board just a way to add some flavor..
As far as /con is concerned (lol) this is totally different than what I'm talking about and just refers to the level of the mob in relation to your level.
What I'm saying is that I don't want group mobs to be specifically labelled with dots or arrows.
Kiz~
Mob labels with symbols, notations, or a icon for elites etc, are just immersion breaking and fall into the hand-holding issue imo.
I agree with the others above that the /consider system was best. And that wasn't fool proof in itself since you had under-con's and almost every mob that was a "caster" was stronger than it's melee brethren of the same con. You exp'd off of a roaming desert madman only if you felt lucky or really needed some water :P
Uncertainty adds a flavor to the game that is necessary. Think how much people are told specifically what to do these days in a game. You are given a quest,AND it tells you how difficult it is for your level, AND pointed in the direction needed for it, AND it keeps track of your progress, AND it tells you who to return to. So just from that one quest you are told where to go to level, what to kill, and as long as there are quests to do, you will be corralled (sp?) down a specific path that 99% of the players will follow.
IMO the game needs to put us into the game and let us choose where to go. Not only let us explore by giving more options, but encourage it. Make us want to try those bandit camps for the first time instead of orcs, and let us be rewarded with mithril earring drops and bronze weapons, and our FIRST RINGS WOOT! Let us decide to wander the large water zones line ocean of tears, come across gargoyles on an island and decide to try them... let us then decide they hit way too hard to grind for exp... then let us run back out to that same deserted island after vendoring a gargoyle eye - and secretly covet it for how rich those gargoyle eyes are gonna make us $$$.
Risk vs Reward, please for the love of MMO's bring it back!
I have to say i agree i much rather a con system myself nothing like seeing a mob and going hmmm then you con it and go **** run away its pathing over here lol. Ok this a little off subject but i believe quest such as collect or what ever shouldnt be hand held as saying kill so much of x mob to collect x piece. I feel it would be more immersive if the zone/area you are anything could drop said piece and it would be random and rare. You actually have to look and search for these items. One of my favorite times in eq was doing and completing the quest for my favorite EQ raid zone of all time that yes most people hate Vex Thal. Just the since of accomplishment and do be able to say i did it and can enter was well worth the time and head ache. Plus you needed to pull together as guild to get everyone keyed and ready. Now thats my idea of a MMORPG not todays WoW or Rift or whatever else is out there now.
there was avery long thread at one point about this very topic. I feel EQ had it right, just a little bit of information to let you know its name and if it was rare or "named" those up/down arrows to me is to much hand holding. The point on the world is to explore and learn. Not wlak into an area for the first time and be like, "Hey that mob is something I can beat because those magical symbols about his head tell me so"...
I am assuming that the "/con" system is basically the same as what ffxi used (my experience) where its a text command that gives you a small bit of info back about the monster.
In ffxi (final fantasy xi) it was called /check (also a text function) and it would return a basic difficulty rating and then a couple of additional details.
Too weak (basically anything that would not grant you exp anymore), Easy prey (good few levels below you), decent challenge (lower level than you but only by a little), Even match (roughly the same level as you), Tough (a handfull of levels higher than you), Very tough (5-7 or so levels higher than you), incredibly tough (everything higher level very tough) and lastly Impossible to gauge (basically it returns no information but was only used for Notorious monsters, boss monsters in the game).
In addition to that you would sometimes get feedback in the form of high or low defense or high or low evasion (if you were in between it gave no information on that).
Am I correct in assuming that the /con system worked similarly? If so then that is what I would rather have. If not, let me know.
yes similar with the difficulty, (the con system also had faction information) through the use of colors, but simply a level below, same level, a level above, and then too far below/above to gage; but naturally as you get to higher levels the spread had to expand some.
Soandso regards you as an ally, friendly, indifferently, threateningly, ready to attack - I think I am missing two =/ - for the faction info, it let you know how the mob would react to you without provocation, and this also gave a gage for faction work.
Even with that information, there were surprises out there with under-con mobs, rare spawns being stronger, typically if a mob was stupid strong then it wasn't intended to be killed.... But being EQ - a game where people constantly saw "No" as a challenge, people tended to try those things anyways, for little rewards. I know the roaming monk masters (Brother Quinn and ....? ) were a pain, did they always drop the monk quest robe/sash or was that added only for the epic line as a short cut.
Angrykiz said:
In EQ1 there were none...
In Vanguard there were little dots that represented the intended difficulty of the mob.
One dot meant it was a solo mob, Two was for a small group if I remember, Three was a 4-5man group, Four dots was a full group dungeon mob, and Five dots was a boss I think.
I liked it better in EQ1 I think where soloable mobs were just in easier areas like next to starter zones. This keeps a bit of the mystery around about how strong mobs are. One thing to note about this is the name of the mob itself can go a long way to describing the difficulty of it.
Soloable: a weak kobold
Duo: a kobold yearling
4-5: an adult kobold
6: a kobold warrior
Boss: The Kobold King
This is what I would like to see a lot of instead of just a dot based system.
Thanks for reading,
Kiz~
Very much agree with yiou, however just in case you were unaware the VG dot system was a toggle in the UI. I simply turned it off.
I personally hate the dot system VG had, but I didn't care either way since I was given the choice to toggle them on or off. Same for Pantheon, if they feel they must have something like this, then please make it a toggle.
Might be more fun to go with the idea that there is no way to tell unless you pull it *laughs
...just place mobs in a appropriate place and let players use common sense.
I never understood the dot system. It created this matrix of level and dot that seems two dimensional when in reality a mob is either evenly matched to the player, more difficult or less difficult. If VG wanted to go that route why not preserve the /con system but make it change as you add members to a group, so that what /considers as an even match solo would become an easier target once you grouped.
ImmerseMe said:
I might be on the different side here. The only real time I've been annoyed in EQ, and WoW actually, was when the "displayed" difficulty of the mob was totally at odds with its actual difficulty. I'm currently angry with WoW for implementing a difficulty display system... then totally violating it. I'm open to the arguments of course, but it does annoy me pretty consistently.
I actually thought EQ was pretty good, in that respect. I learned early on that if something /coned white, and the text says it was a gamble, that it meant I probably wasn't going to consistently beat it. So maybe I just didn't try write /con mobs that much because I had learned killing whites consistently meant sooner or later you'd get too many resists and run out of mana and thus earn more experience penalties.
Kayd said:ImmerseMe said:
I might be on the different side here. The only real time I've been annoyed in EQ, and WoW actually, was when the "displayed" difficulty of the mob was totally at odds with its actual difficulty. I'm currently angry with WoW for implementing a difficulty display system... then totally violating it. I'm open to the arguments of course, but it does annoy me pretty consistently.I actually thought EQ was pretty good, in that respect. I learned early on that if something /coned white, and the text says it was a gamble, that it meant I probably wasn't going to consistently beat it. So maybe I just didn't try write /con mobs that much because I had learned killing whites consistently meant sooner or later you'd get too many resists and run out of mana and thus earn more experience penalties.
I feel that a conning system is sufficient to tell the relative level of the mob to the player but then beyond that there should be visual cues to let the player know the relative power of the mob at that particular level range (solo/group/boss). These visual cues can be things such as the physical size of the mob, how elaborate the armor/weapons, the name of the mob, the setting (throne room vs. open field), or any number of other visual/contextual cues. These types of cues would be non immersion breaking and still accomplish the same thing that a UI feature would that requires no observation of one's environment.
I liked the EQ consider system. I want to know my reputation or faction with an NPC, and a little info about how powerful I think the NPC may be.
I actually think it would be cool if there was a stat or skill that improved your ability to size up an NPC and better determine just how weak or powerful it may be.
Dullahan said: I actually think it would be cool if there was a stat or skill that improved your ability to size up an NPC and better determine just how weak or powerful it may be.
The more game mechanics that are skills related, the happier I'll be. One of the things I loved about EQ was building up secondary skills like sense heading, tracking and swimming. Getting new skills as you ding/level doesn't seem as organic as skills that raise from repeated use.
soulkaban said:
I feel that a conning system is sufficient to tell the relative level of the mob to the player but then beyond that there should be visual cues to let the player know the relative power of the mob at that particular level range (solo/group/boss). These visual cues can be things such as the physical size of the mob, how elaborate the armor/weapons, the name of the mob, the setting (throne room vs. open field), or any number of other visual/contextual cues. These types of cues would be non immersion breaking and still accomplish the same thing that a UI feature would that requires no observation of one's environment.
I see what you mean, like in a dungeon the closer you get to a certain high level mini-boss, the tougher the surrounding retinue should be- an elite guard, so to speak. And yes, the appearance of less or more armor or weapons would be a good indicator, even if the /con is within your range. this would be different in the field where animals or insects if bigger, or appeared rabid, would be another kind of alertness that would be needed. Anyone remember the terrotantula?- that venom was a doozy and it makes sense that it would be.
Kayd said:
I never understood the dot system. It created this matrix of level and dot that seems two dimensional when in reality a mob is either evenly matched to the player, more difficult or less difficult. If VG wanted to go that route why not preserve the /con system but make it change as you add members to a group, so that what /considers as an even match solo would become an easier target once you grouped.
I absolutely despise con changes because you're in a group. I could be doing an area in a group and thinking man I could solo this area after if this group breaks up, then afterwards I try and the mobs changed con on me and were unsolo-able. On top of that I hope we can't effectively solo in Pantheon without a high skill level AND full gear matching or exceeding your level.
In Everquest mob cons reflected hit ratio and spell effectiveness, there was a 6 level threshold on spells landing, and melee attacks would require a ton more ATK to penetrate the level difference. In other games that changed the con for groups, they did it with the purpose of allowing a lower level person to join a higher level group and not be gimped by the threshold, but I think if you don't belong in the area because your spells won't land and your attacks miss, you just shouldn't be there.
Changing cons for group play serves no purpose in a game like Pantheon, which seeks to bring us back to a time where hand-holding wasn't a thing.
Just to be clear I wasn't suggesting changing the mobs difficulty at all. I was only discussing how that difficulty is communicated to a player. To me it's always less is more. I think the game should give you a general idea and be consistent enough that you know how difficult a specific /con is to you. Beyond that I think minimal information is best, so I liked the EQ system where it's just "how difficult is this mob to me"