I apologize in advance for the length of this novel, but I felt like this was a pretty cool way to share ideas on how some of the tenets of this game can be implemented. I've been an MMO gamer for quite a long time and have much fonder memories of some games than others. I have a deep appreciation for what the developers at VR are trying to do with Pantheon, and hope that my input may have a gem or two buried in these walls of text, or even better yet, some of these ideas were already thought of and maybe the work/thought process that went into creating the tenets are reinforced. Enjoy.
As much as I anticipate the release (or even alpha/beta stages) of this game, I'm willing to wait it out (1.5-2 Years) so that the development team has enough time to deliver on the very first tenet. Content is king. This should include unique storyline experiences (FFXI did a pretty good job with this), vibrant zones, engaging quest series (consider tiered rewards so that depending on a player's choices/skill, they can be rewarded for their accuracy/speed and attention to detail), strong end-game focused on progression (gear/acclimation/spells/encounter mechanics), and great "replay value." This should be for all facets of the game whether it's more questing, more crafting, more grinding, more raiding, more roleplaying, more adventuring, more ... you get the point.
And ... epic quests. Make them epic. The replay value here lies in not only doing your own epic quest, but also with helping others. And think about adding a legendary dungeon crawl. I made a separate post on the idea that was inspired by my experience playing Lufia 2 on SNES. I had no idea that something similar to this was already implemented in FFXIV recently (which made me feel really awesome because the concept was obviously cool enough to get published in a major MMO) but I feel that something like this could offer an amazing replay value. Here is a link to that post: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/4986/ideas
No single player should be able to do everything on their own, just as every single player should be able to bring something unique and desirable to their group. Certain buffs like movement speed or mana regen can be shared by multiple classes, but beyond that, each class should be capable of making a contribution that is unique to their identity. Here are a few ideas, some using classic iconic abilities we have grown to love (Monk, Druid) and others that are newer concepts (wizard fatigue gauge):
Deliver a complete game at launch that has a huge world loot table. Minimize soulbound gear and have a wide array of really rare drops that are BoE (Bind on Equip). Include plenty of awesome twink gear for every tier so that regardless of level, every zone/tier has loot that is highly desirable. This might encourage farming ... and that's okay! Some people enjoy making their money this way while others would rather quest, level alts, craft, or do a bazillion other things. It goes great with Risk vs Reward because you're never guaranteed to tag a contested mob! There are plenty of ideas for gold sinks. An entry fee into the Legendary Dungeon Crawl is just one of the more exotic ones.
Take all of the meaningful and unique class contributions outlined in tenet#2 and present in-game challenges where they can be utilized at varying degrees of success. There should be plenty of moments in the game where someone should think "if only we had a {insert ranger, druid, rogue, cleric, etc} with us this would be so much better! (or possible)" ... And beyond just group mechanics, it should extend even moreso into raid mechanics. Certain fights should be so hard that they're only possible with well-timed shaman debuffs or a cleric group CC immunity. Encounters with mana drain where an enchanter needs to decide whether he will channel mana to the OOM tank or healer, all while simultaneously locking down an untimely set of adds. Bosses with aggro wipe where the healers are guaranteed to be annihilated unless the warrior is able to cast his aggro rage to regain aggro or group intercept to prevent their demise. Dungeons that have a combination of encounter types where AE magic blasters have their time to shine on one given fight but the next could could have strong magic resist and be all about single target DPS from backstabbing rogues or a well positioned ranger. The key to engaging is challenge. Not just avoiding the lava on the ground, but real kiting and a sense of urgency on how fast adds can be burned down lest the raid become overwhelmed.
Make the journey to max level a long one, but with various challenges along the way that can boost your experience. XP Chain bonuses (FFXI) is one idea but the mobs have to be difficult and their placement in the zones far enough away from eachother that only the most experienced pullers and sustainable group comps are able to pull off the big chains. When it comes to questing, consider implementing tiered rewards based on the groups speed, accuracy, and attention to detail. Let's say the quest giver is a monk that wants you to clear out 100 NPC's, all while only using certain damage types on certain mobs, the healers taking no damage, and the tank staying above a certain % of HP. The quest can be completed just by killing all 100 NPC's, but if you had the ultimate attention to detail and used physical damage on the red guards and magic on the blue, all while keeping the tank topped off and healers out of damage range, "bonuses" could be unlocked in the quest reward. Quests like these should be repeatable so that groups can make additional attempts to get it right. You wouldn't be able to get any of the tiered rewards more than once but making them repeatable allows groups to continue with the challenge to unlock the best tier. It shouldn't happen on the first or second time.
When it comes to harvesting nodes, make them difficult to acquire! I shouldn't be able to pay my 6 year old daughter 5 bucks to have her farm easily harvestable materials for me. The less solo content, the better. And when it comes to harvesting nodes, once you get to T3, they should be increasingly difficult to obtain. Make it so that people have to stock up on invis pots, acclimation consumables, (hopefully there will be more mob detection methods than just sight such as sound and smell, so that people have to stock up on multiple types of items that help them sneak around)
Implement sound progression where gear, spell mastery, adaptation /clever ability utilization, and resist thresholds are necessary to overcome the toughest of obstacles. Don't focus on time-locked progression where you need 100 updates but only 10 of them are attainable per week. Introduce a sense of adventure so that completing quests requires more than following waypoints toward a predetermined destination on your map. Force people to explore in order to uncover secrets, and have them fail way more often than they succeed.
Make certain named bosses really rare but give them awesome drops, and make it so this scales for every tier. There should be contested low level content that drops amazing gear for our future alts. The reward lies in the fact that because they are contested, no matter how hardcore you farm them, you're never guaranteed to tag a mob. Or if tagging isn't implemented, make it so that a low level group can out-damage a higher level character to have a chance at claiming the drops.
Make epic weapons epic. The final bosses required to obtain these weapons shouldn't be killable with sloppily thrown together pick up raids. They should require coordination, great raid compositions, and a fair time commitment.
Implement the legendary dungeon crawl that I mentioned earlier in my post. 100 floors of hell that has the ultimate death penalty ... you have to start over at level 1 (albeit the more time spent in the zone and more pieces of soulbound zone exclusive gear you obtain, the easier future visits will be). The risk is tremendous because it should be extremely difficult to navigate to the bottom of this dungeon, but for the adventurers that are commited to seeing it through, the reward should be legendary.
Have a blend of instanced and open-world contested content so that a guild must choose whether or not to enter the instance because if the contested open world raid boss spawns, they would have to risk leaving their instance to have a chance at killing the contested. The contested raid mobs should drop the best loot in the game.
Also see the last tenet regarding tiered quest rewards. Every major city can have a ring event that can only be attempted once per day. There are 5 versions of reward, and each can only be looted once. Make it so each ring event has 5 variables for winning. Beating it in general gives you the T1 reward. Beating it while also managing the bonus objectives scales that reward. T4 reward can be obtainable for beating it while simultaneously completing 3/4 of the bonus objectives.
Remove "rested" XP. If you don't log in to progress, you shouldn't be rewarded with free "catch up XP." If a group or raid wipes, retrieving their corpses should be difficult because of a death penalty debuff. Make it so that ALL classes provide valuable contributions for a raid. I don't want my guild's sole monk to have to sit on a raid because having a 3'rd enchanter is more important. There should be very few solo quests and the rewards for solo quests shouldn't be significant unless they are very difficult and somehow tied into the Rites of Passage. I am fine with skill/gear checks where only a well geared and knowledgeable player can progress through their solo quest timeline.
As unfair as it might seem, people with high playtime should be rewarded for going the extra mile. Don't implement generic progression walls that penalize someone for having a greater commitment to the game. Having an AA system implemented at launch could do wonders for this one. The AA's cannot be grinded out, rather, can only be advanced by doing quests or killing unique named mobs for the first time (helping other classes with their unique questlines can help with this because it's the only way to experience that content). Maxing your AA's should be just as difficult as maxing your level and for the players that are cognizant of this and expand their leveling process in a way that experiences as much content as possible rather than farming static camps, they should have an easier curve for maximizing their character progression.
Huge fan of this tenet. The more unique ways for a character to advance their progression, the better. Gear, Spell Mastery, Faction, Resists, Rites of Passage, Encounter Knowledge, and optional side quests or dungeons should all be impactful. Obtaining the maximum tiered reward from each cities ring event should be highly sought after. Navigating all 100 floors of the legendary dungeon crawl should be a total end-game accomplishment that rewards them with something significant in both power and prestige. And even before completing all 100 floors, the players that are commited to the dungeon will still have a great sense of power based on how much "blue" gear they loot during their dungeon runs, as this gear is soul-bound to them and only useable in this dungeon. This allows an epic progression opportunity within the dungeon that doesen't interfere with the regular in-game progression designed by the development team.
Acclimation progression should be difficult and this is achievable by making it so that there are rare pieces of resist jewelery for every resist and every slot, and they are all spread throughout the entire game. This makes it so that the ultimate sense of progression for a given resist will take a genuine effort to accomplish, but once completed, is very beneficial to the player since they won't be getting 1 shot from every AE. Make it so that the tank who actually spends a huge amount of time to farm a full set of red armor (fire resist) is rewarded with both the resistance buff and also the cool looking armor. I don't want to see every warrior looking the exact same. The tank who goes out of his way to have a full set of green armor should also be aesthetically pleasing to look at.
Boat rides, travel time, night time terrors galore. Have an in game chapel where characters can get married, and allow players to rent a party hall that can be used to host a variety of events, ranging from fun social gatherings to extravagent weddings, progeny showers (fancy baby shower for our progeny) or other types of celebrations. Also consider implementing an in-game card game. It doesen't have to be Hearthstone but something like what FFVIII used. It's a mini-game inside the game that has no impact on the game itself other than giving players something to do during downtime. Whether it's waiting for their final group member to arrive to a destination or weekly/monthly tournaments(these can reward gold maybe), this is entirely for the social aspect of the game. Local banking and auction houses are also a means to this end. If a player is a blacksmith, they're probably going to want to set up shop somewhere near the mountains. Likewise, if their recipes also require rare leathers that can only be skinned from a coeurl on the other side of the world, they should probably become friends with a skinner that is native to that region. No 1 stop shops for crafting or resource gathering.
If a kobold camp is being farmed to oblivion, there should be scouts that can send this information to their warlord. It shouldn't be 100% staged and predictable, rather, after 1,000 are killed, a ring event starts. It would be very difficult to determine how many of the 1,000 have been killed at any point unless someone completes the ring event and stays for another round while also managing to count and identify every other kill in the area.
Certain NPC's should be programmed to try and kill or disrupt a particularly troublesome healer that just doesen't seem to let their tank die, or the enchanter who affords their group a crazy amount of sustainable power. If NPC's know that they are outmatched, let them try to escape from battle, forcing their would be slayers to chase them and possibly pull other mobs that they may or may not be able to handle. Set up booby traps, mobs that can spell reflect, and unpredictable roamers.
Make it so that certain boss encounters scale with difficulty the more you kill them. Let's say you have a T1 raid zone on farm status. After a month of farming them, when that boss sees you next time, he remembers your face and all the pain that was inflicted upon him on your prior visits. This time he is more prepared and has enlisted the help of additional add waves, booby traps, or other surprises. With this greater difficulty also comes a potentially better reward. (Can implement optional hard mode for dungeons or raids or make it feel purely organic based on a given raids experience / success rate on said boss/zone)
I like the idea of each major city (and even small outposts) having their own faction and benefits for becoming allied with them. Whether it's utilizing their banks, auction house, item shops, or "shortcuts" (backdoor entry into another zone) they should all have some sort of benefit to becoming allied with. You could also consider the legendary dungeon crawl and major city ring event from one of my prior paragraphs to be faction related as well. Maybe the master blacksmith in the icy mountain ranges is the only way to acquire a certain belt with ice resists, or master forger in the volcano region to be the only way to acquire some fire resist shoulders. The more of these the better. Don't make it linear. Every area should have it's own faction related incentives and there is no specific order that is more advantageous than the others since all resists have hard content associated with it to stack for.
Certain quest givers will only give you the time of day after you have earned ally status with them and mastered their language and that you have already helped all of the other denizens from that tribe. Maybe you can only set your homepoint at a certain city once their chief gives you their blessing.
Make it so when a human is introduced to their first PC ogre, there is a real sense of adventure and in-world awareness. The further you progress through the game, the more likely you're going to run into other races or alignments. I'm a huge fan of allowing players at a low level to travel to the other side of the world though, but this should require a higher level guide, or very mechanical/sneaky/time consuming route to get there. Being the only human at an ogre questing depot would be pretty cool. They wouldn't be able to utilize all of the camps features unless they grind their faction higher, and it would be more difficult for the human since the ogres start with a naturally higher faction with that tribe. Significant risk to travel all the way over there but a potential reward in being the only human in the zone and building important early relationships with players of another race or alignment.
Please make it so that soloing is the least viable option available when it comes to questing, crafting, or gaining experience. Rather than having zones heavily populated with solo content with a smaller area of group content, make the majority of the game designed for grouping. Make it so traveling to that next major city or zone feels like a real accomplishment because you weren't able to just sneak your way through. Make it so that the best crafted items require items from various crafters so that the crafting community has to work together to make the best items. This will help a lot with their economy and reward some crafters more than others, but also forge valuable relationships and bartering opportunities.
Make it so that early on when an elf gets to around level 20 or so, they meet a human adventurer that offers to guide them to another region that they otherwise would have no idea how to get to. Make it so the map is only uncovered when you actually travel to the destinations on the map rather than giving everybody a completed map from the get-go. Allow players to put special markers on their map with custom text so they can remember where certain items were looted or exceptional faction gains were available. Forcing cooperative play is key! I don't want to see hundreds of dual boxers that take the steady eddie approach because it's viable. Sure it might work but they're going to XP at 1/4 the rate of a full group that has a nice composition.
Raiding should be the end-all be all. Hardest encounters, best loot, and longest quest timelines. When a cleric loots their epic weapon, ALL players that participated should feel a sense of accomplishment because that epic weapon could be a real difference maker for their guild's overall potential raid progression. If we piggy back to tenet #2, tying some of those unique abilities into epic weapons would be a great way to accomplish this. That covers the shared aspect, but what about earned?
Well, it's all tied into progression and character advancement. You can make it so that the in combat rez for direlord is only obtainable by a direlord after they defeat the Arch Lich boss at the end of a dungeon. There should be some sort of potential reward for all classes that participate (rare resist jewelry, spell drops, etc) but the major reward for defeating that Arch Lich is unlocking the rez for the direlord. I'm perfectly fine with helping out a guildmate fully advance their character because at the end of the day their unique advancement is opening up another angle or option for our raid efforts.
There should be plenty of locations, quest lines, spell upgrades and dungeon options that are only available at certain level thresholds. If the minimum level to enter a certain area is 35, a group would be more inclined to help their lowest level player (34) to finish grinding out that final level to gain entrance. There should be game changing buffs at certain levels as well. Make the grind from 1-20 seem really slow (no mana regen) and the travel time obnoxious. Once you get to 20, spells like mana regen and SoW are instantly noticeable and more convenient. Allow certain buffs to be cast on target rather than just group only so if a group doesen't have an SoW caster, they can still get lucky when they find a random shaman or druid wandering around and be fortunate enough to get buffed.
Unlock various storyline quests or Rites of Passage opportunities every 10 levels. There should be a noticeable impact for completing these but they aren't required in order to continue leveling up. This is heavily tied into the concept of having "dynamic" players. The more opportunities to have our characters be "dynamic" the better, and I feel that an AA system implemented at launch could help with this. Instead of just making each level feel meaningful, there should be other opportunities to advance our characters through AA's or questing that make some players more desirable than others. Having group taunt, for instance, shouldn't be a freebie. Make it challenging to unlock this feature but for those who go through that extra effort, their aggro management is superior and opens up much better farming locations or potential to progress through harder zones or questlines.
Exploration, exploration, exploration! Have huge zones where there is no linear approach for adventuring. Put forks in the road that all lead to different locations and have their own set of challenges. One route might be particularly easier to navigate if you have a ranger, while the other may be more demanding of the AE damage from a wizard. Instead of littering zones with tons of NPC's, also include environmental obstacles that tap into your resists or spell casting abilities. Some places should require you to travel underwater where a breathing buff or consumable is necessary. Make jumping/climbing a risk vs reward concept implemented into the zone atmosphere where missing a jump can be punishable by a group member being separated from their party. Utilize the day/night time so that certain NPC's, quest givers, ring events, or quest updates are only obtainable based on the time of day. Add a zone where swimming through a river might be the fastest way to a certain destination but for those who opt to go this route, they are missing out on potential rare NPC spawns or faction gains from going through the tougher more fortified route.
If someone has other ideas for a specific tenet, feel free to use a similar format (paste the tenet and below it share your idea) and reply to this post. What I don't want to see is people coming in and shooting down the ideas of other players. Some ideas will be better than others. The goal for this post is for members of the community to come together and share their own unique perspective on either what these tenets mean to them or share their ideas on how they can be achieved.
Nice write-up. I think your vision falls mostly in-line with the direction that VR has already been headed for a long time now. These foundational ideas were settled pretty early on and I think the development process is well beyond this. As we have seen in the streams, they have already made significant process toward making their vision a reality, so there's no turning back now.
Solid read. And I mostly agree. The only area I might slightly disagree with is this part:
Raiding should be the end-all be all. Hardest encounters, best loot, and longest quest timelines.
I say slightly because I dont completelly disagree, but as you have already cited FFXI a few times, I like a varied approach to endgame. So while I think Raids should be a part of that, so should group dungeons, Epic quests, Faction, and crafting. Because I think if you want to be "the best" you should have to be involved with all types of content. So make high end content in all these aspects and spread different "BiS" gear around to these and you can acheive that. And it can all still be very social and shared if done right.
Amsai said:Solid read. And I mostly agree. The only area I might slightly disagree with is this part:
Raiding should be the end-all be all. Hardest encounters, best loot, and longest quest timelines.
I say slightly because I dont completelly disagree, but as you have already cited FFXI a few times, I like a varied approach to endgame. So while I think Raids should be a part of that, so should group dungeons, Epic quests, Faction, and crafting. Because I think if you want to be "the best" you should have to be involved with all types of content. So make high end content in all these aspects and spread different "BiS" gear around to these and you can acheive that. And it can all still be very social and shared if done right.
Thanks for the response Amsai. When I mentioned raiding being the end-all be all, I envisioned being able to incorporate the other features that you are talking about into end-game. I feel that raiding dungeons have a greater risk than group dungeons and should thus have a greater reward. When I think of an "epic-quest" raiding is naturally ingrained. The final boss for any epic weapon should require a full raid, not a group. As far as faction goes, beating the final boss in a raid zone could yield a considerable amount of faction, more than any amount otherwise attainable ... it just makes sense when thinking risk vs reward. And finally, crafting. Raid bosses can drop rare crafting materials. I'm glad that you mentioned all of these points though because raiding should be a dynamic feature of the game that encompasses more than just tanking and spanking. I'm also perfectly fine with having BiS options available outside of raiding, but they should be the exception, not the norm.
Amsai said:Solid read. And I mostly agree. The only area I might slightly disagree with is this part:
Raiding should be the end-all be all. Hardest encounters, best loot, and longest quest timelines.
I say slightly because I dont completelly disagree, but as you have already cited FFXI a few times, I like a varied approach to endgame. So while I think Raids should be a part of that, so should group dungeons, Epic quests, Faction, and crafting. Because I think if you want to be "the best" you should have to be involved with all types of content. So make high end content in all these aspects and spread different "BiS" gear around to these and you can acheive that. And it can all still be very social and shared if done right.
I second this. But hopefully this doesn't turn into yet another argument about raiding and best-in-slot gear.
Amsai said:Solid read. And I mostly agree. The only area I might slightly disagree with is this part:
Raiding should be the end-all be all. Hardest encounters, best loot, and longest quest timelines.
I say slightly because I dont completelly disagree, but as you have already cited FFXI a few times, I like a varied approach to endgame. So while I think Raids should be a part of that, so should group dungeons, Epic quests, Faction, and crafting. Because I think if you want to be "the best" you should have to be involved with all types of content. So make high end content in all these aspects and spread different "BiS" gear around to these and you can acheive that. And it can all still be very social and shared if done right.
I agree here. there is a slippery slope once we go down the raid path that means everyone has to do it in the rail based option.
Solid post!!
Ox
Bazgrim said:Amsai said:Solid read. And I mostly agree. The only area I might slightly disagree with is this part:
Raiding should be the end-all be all. Hardest encounters, best loot, and longest quest timelines.
I say slightly because I dont completelly disagree, but as you have already cited FFXI a few times, I like a varied approach to endgame. So while I think Raids should be a part of that, so should group dungeons, Epic quests, Faction, and crafting. Because I think if you want to be "the best" you should have to be involved with all types of content. So make high end content in all these aspects and spread different "BiS" gear around to these and you can acheive that. And it can all still be very social and shared if done right.
I second this. But hopefully this doesn't turn into yet another argument about raiding and best-in-slot gear.
I mentioned in another post how I felt that there should be extremely rare loot in the game that may not be quite as amazing as raid gear, but it could be pretty darn close. The min/maxers are still satisfied because their raiding gear is slightly more powerful than anything else in game, and for everybody else, they still have a chance of getting something really good even if they never set foot in a raid zone. The only way to make this work though is by controlling the rarity of the drops. Rather than making them drop exclusively from names where people can camp them and monopolize the loot, they should just be extremely rare drops from a given area. Let's say you find a tribe of ice giants ... those ice giants can have a 1 in 5000 chance to drop an awesome caster belt. Having a diverse world loot table is key to making this work, and not every single NPC should have a chance to drop something rare. I'm fine with names having an increased chance to drop rare loot but by putting stuff like this into the world loot tables for certain trash (still group mobs, not solo), it adds another cool aspect to the game. I remember making my way through a zone once and our bard accidentally pulled a roamer that we were going to skip. Lo and behold, that accidental pull ended up rewarding us with a super rare breastplate. THAT was a special memory, moreso than any memory I have of farming the same placeholders over and over to get something I wanted.
@OneADseven
Fair enough. As for my tastes, Id say BiS gear evenly split across all high end features (20% raids, 20%crafts, 20%factions, 20%group encounters, 20% Epic quests.) But Id rather these all be seperate aspects to make it where I feel endgame activites are split up enough and feel different enough. Keep in mind that doesnt mean you couldnt get some very good gear for other slots from a Raid, if you prefer only to raid but in order to be the best you still need to pursue these other aspects.
You could tie in rare crafing ingredients to come from the other four aspects. But Id want Raids, Epic Faction Quests, and the Hardest Group Encounters to stand on their own with seperate BiS that only comes from those things. Epic quests I would want all apsects incorporated into them. You'd need to have the right faction to access the quest (maybe high enough perception rating), and you would need to do many steps along the way (all with a good story for lore) that would include crafting, exploring, researching, overworld bosses, dungeon bosses, Raid bosses, and maybe special activities that tie in more directly to your class (Bards proove their worth to NPCs in Taverns in every major City? something like this).
My overall purpose to keep things interesting and fresh so that when I reach endgame the question isnt always, "So what are we raiding today?"
But its not like I think your idea of how it should work is bad. That could work too. I just like more variety and want activities to feel different. And that just wouldnt be the case if everything at high end is always tied to raids. But to each their own and other than this aspect, I think I agree 100% with everything else you wrote in the OP.
Edit:
@Bazgrim
Yea I should probably say that I was using "BiS" as a general term as I want there to be different pieces of gear and not "The chest piece for Paladin at max level is X period". So maybe I should have said best in slot-ish? LOL. So yea lets not turn it into a BiS argument please ^.^
I want to clarify really quick that I appreciate the responses from other players on some of my points, and I'm okay with people responding to my ideas. For the sake of keeping this post in context though, I feel that it would be best if people do one of the 2 following options:
A) Paste a tenet and then provide your own perspective on why it's important to you or an idea on how it can be achieved.
B) Paste an idea that someone shares that you are a big fan of to show support for it, and be sure to include your reasoning as to why or any of your own ideas that can expand or improve upon it.
The only thing I don't want to see is people downplaying other player's thoughts or ideas. If you aren't a fan of someone's idea or perspective on a given tenet, just provide your own perspective! This way we can keep the post on track with it's original purpose and there won't be any need for moderating. I don't want the thread locked because of conflict. There will always be disagreements but this isn't the place for that. This post is strictly for sharing your own ideas or supporting someone elses, not getting into a debate on what's right or wrong or which idea is better or worse.
Thank you!
Make epic weapons epic. The final bosses required to obtain these weapons shouldn't be killable with sloppily thrown together pick up raids. They should require coordination, great raid compositions, and a fair time commitment.
This is something that I really really want. Raiding should not be done by everyone or else it becomes trivial and boring when you hear about a boss being downed. Pantheon bring back the times when bosses took months of progression to finally kill, please!
A lot of people argue when you make raid content this hard that it is a waste of developers time because only 1% of the community will ever be able to down it but it's not a waste of time because back in the days when I was a kid starting out in mmo's(2001) I got a oooh ahhh type of expression when I saw members of these elite guilds in towns. I was still in school and had no chance of putting in the time those days to ever experience what they did but that's what made it seem epic to me, that it wasn't something you would achieve unless you put in a ton of work and that in itself still gave me enjoyment.
Implement the legendary dungeon crawl that I mentioned earlier in my post. 100 floors of hell that has the ultimate death penalty ... you have to start over at level 1 (albeit the more time spent in the zone and more pieces of soulbound zone exclusive gear you obtain, the easier future visits will be). The risk is tremendous because it should be extremely difficult to navigate to the bottom of this dungeon, but for the adventurers that are commited to seeing it through, the reward should be legendary.
This would be so sick. I would love to do something like this but only if we get to keep our gear/titles that we worked hard for before if we died. I think the punishment of having to re-level all over again is harsh enough to the point where this idea is viable.
Remove "rested" XP. If you don't log in to progress, you shouldn't be rewarded with free "catch up XP."
Agreed.
A lot of nice ideas here man, I admire your enthusiasm for this potentially great mmo.
Stephen said:
Make epic weapons epic. The final bosses required to obtain these weapons shouldn't be killable with sloppily thrown together pick up raids. They should require coordination, great raid compositions, and a fair time commitment.
This is something that I really really want. Raiding should not be done by everyone or else it becomes trivial and boring when you hear about a boss being downed. Pantheon bring back the times when bosses took months of progression to finally kill, please!
Implement the legendary dungeon crawl that I mentioned earlier in my post. 100 floors of hell that has the ultimate death penalty ... you have to start over at level 1 (albeit the more time spent in the zone and more pieces of soulbound zone exclusive gear you obtain, the easier future visits will be). The risk is tremendous because it should be extremely difficult to navigate to the bottom of this dungeon, but for the adventurers that are commited to seeing it through, the reward should be legendary.
This would be so sick. I would love to do something like this but only if we get to keep our gear/titles that we worked hard for before if we died. I think the punishment of having to re-level all over again is harsh enough to the point where this idea is viable.
Remove "rested" XP. If you don't log in to progress, you shouldn't be rewarded with free "catch up XP."
Agreed.
A lot of nice ideas here man, I admire your enthusiasm for this potentially great mmo.
Hi Stephen!
The idea behind the legendary dungeon is that you would be able to keep certain gear, but not all of it. There would be 3 tiers of gear. T1 are pretty common drops and are regular items/gear that can be equipped that are obviously better than being naked, but they disappear when you wipe. The T1 gear should be pretty common because when you first start out you won't have any T2 or T3 gear and you'll be naked in every slot. T2 are semi-rare to rare drops that you get to keep for future visits, and can drop randomly or off of rare names that have a chance to spawn on each floor. T3 are exceptionally rare drops that can also be kept for future visits, and should generally be considered BiS for all intents and purposes of this dungeon. In my other post regarding this topic, there was also a 4th tier of loot, but it's not actual gear. It would be considered an artifact -- 20 artifacts in total, and the full set can be traded for a reward outside of the dungeon. I don't have a lot of input on the T4 artifacts other than they should be really rare, tradeable, and perhaps have a higher drop% the deeper you go into the dungeon.
Hi Stephen!
The idea behind the legendary dungeon is that you would be able to keep certain gear, but not all of it. There would be 3 tiers of gear. T1 are pretty common drops and are regular items/gear that can be equipped that are obviously better than being naked, but they disappear when you wipe. The T1 gear should be pretty common because when you first start out you won't have any T2 or T3 gear and you'll be naked in every slot. T2 are semi-rare to rare drops that you get to keep for future visits, and can drop randomly or off of rare names that have a chance to spawn on each floor. T3 are exceptionally rare drops that can also be kept for future visits, and should generally be considered BiS for all intents and purposes of this dungeon. In my other post regarding this topic, there was also a 4th tier of loot, but it's not actual gear. It would be considered an artifact -- 20 artifacts in total, and the full set can be traded for a reward outside of the dungeon. I don't have a lot of input on the T4 artifacts other than they should be really rare, tradeable, and perhaps have a higher drop% the deeper you go into the dungeon.
Sorry my bad, I think my post might have been confusing. What I meant was the gear we have already obtained outside of the legendary dungeon. For example gear I may have obtained from a raid or rare spawn in the open world that took me weeks of camping. But I'm all for losing the gear that was only obtained in the "legendary dungeon" and the harsh death penalty.
Think I need to understand something here...why would only a wizard suffer from fatigue and have to cast an antidote to this. How about melee types or are they able to keep hitting target with no fatigue, how about other casters? Not sure I understand the reason for this? We already have to watch our mana, and meditate for more if we've been a bit careless with our nukes?
Cana
CanadinaXegony said:
- Cleric -- Buff/Debuff vs Undead/Demon/Unholy, 2'nd group cleanse (other healers only get 1), AC and/or Block/Parry Buff, best direct/raid heals of three healers, no movement speed buff,weakest resist buffs (mental only no elemental), medium HoT's, Medium Single Target Wards,
- Crusader -- Armor Pledge (Can cast on self or ally), Lay on Hands, AE Blind, Single Target Wards (not as good as Shaman or Cleric)
- Warrior -- Aggro Rage, Tower of Shield (EQ2 Guardian ability), Group Absorb/Intercept
- Direlord -- Harm Touch, In Combat Rez (Only non-healer to get it), Zombie pet that can be sacrificed for choice of significant HP/Mana/Armor
- Ranger -- Pathfinding, Tranq Shot (Removes buffs), Trueshot (Pull designated target (or encounter) without aggroing other mobs (or encounters) in LoS or aggro range)
- Rogue -- Small radius group stealth, lockpicking (chance for extra loot, consumables, crafting materials, or gold), threat transfer
- Monk -- Feign Death, Drag (or drag corpse), Tsunami (temporary invuln)
- Summoner -- Strong Consumables (food/drink, mana potions, acclimation buffs), on hit damage buff (imbue with fire/ice/lightning/etc), and powerful pet of each archetype
- Enchanter -- Charm, Memwipe, Group Mezz, Max Mana Buff/Burst transfers, aggro/deaggro modifier
- Wizard -- Nuke (Not as strong as Harm Touch but on shorter cooldown) Self Buff with fatigue gauge, has increased casting speed/damage but with risk of burning out (temporary stasis)and needing rest the higher or lower they are on the gauge, consider a mastery of some sort for this gauge where they can control it better through advancement)Teleport
- Druid -- Strongest resist buffs (Non physical), Best HoT of three healers, no wards, medium direct/raid heals, better movement speed buff than shaman, druid rings and/or ability to cast recall on target, ability to manipulate nature for acclimation buffs/debuffs (this is in excess to them already having strongest resist buffs)
- Shaman -- Best raw stat buffs (STR/STA/AGI), Strongest Wards, Only Group Wards, Strongest Debuffs, weakest pure healing, no HoT's, medium resist buff, medium movement speed buff) - end quote
Think I need to understand something here...why would only a wizard suffer from fatigue and have to cast an antidote to this. How about melee types or are they able to keep hitting target with no fatigue, how about other casters? Not sure I understand the reason for this? We already have to watch our mana, and meditate for more if we've been a bit careless with our nukes?
Cana
Hi Cana,
The fatigue system was just an idea I came up with to make the wizard class unique. Please note that it isn't just a disadvantage for wizards as there is another side to the fatigue system, which is increased casting speed and damage. I guess I should have highlighted the idea further. Basically they can enter a trance as to where while entranced, they have increased casting speed and damage output, but now also have to deal with a fatigue meter. The higher they get on the meter, the more likely they are to suffer a fizzle or temporary stasis that will also lock them out of the trance. The idea can be broadened further by allowing them to somehow master this fatigue meter as they level up, advance AA's, or based on the quality of the spells they are casting while entranced. Let's say casting an apprentice spell increases their fatigue meter by 5 increments, while casting a master spell only increases it by 1. Trust me, I want every class to get some love and I want wizards to have their place! In my opinion, that place should be potentially the highest damage output, but with the risk vs reward tenet comes the fatigue meter. Just one random idea out of many that I have had. =D
Stephen said:Hi Stephen!
The idea behind the legendary dungeon is that you would be able to keep certain gear, but not all of it. There would be 3 tiers of gear. T1 are pretty common drops and are regular items/gear that can be equipped that are obviously better than being naked, but they disappear when you wipe. The T1 gear should be pretty common because when you first start out you won't have any T2 or T3 gear and you'll be naked in every slot. T2 are semi-rare to rare drops that you get to keep for future visits, and can drop randomly or off of rare names that have a chance to spawn on each floor. T3 are exceptionally rare drops that can also be kept for future visits, and should generally be considered BiS for all intents and purposes of this dungeon. In my other post regarding this topic, there was also a 4th tier of loot, but it's not actual gear. It would be considered an artifact -- 20 artifacts in total, and the full set can be traded for a reward outside of the dungeon. I don't have a lot of input on the T4 artifacts other than they should be really rare, tradeable, and perhaps have a higher drop% the deeper you go into the dungeon.
Sorry my bad, I think my post might have been confusing. What I meant was the gear we have already obtained outside of the legendary dungeon. For example gear I may have obtained from a raid or rare spawn in the open world that took me weeks of camping. But I'm all for losing the gear that was only obtained in the "legendary dungeon" and the harsh death penalty.
Wiping in the dungeon wouldn't have any impact on any regular gear that you looted outside of it. The major penalty for death here is that you have to start all over from floor 1, and it costs you gold or plat every time you enter the dungeon.
oneADseven said:CanadinaXegony said:
- Cleric -- Buff/Debuff vs Undead/Demon/Unholy, 2'nd group cleanse (other healers only get 1), AC and/or Block/Parry Buff, best direct/raid heals of three healers, no movement speed buff,weakest resist buffs (mental only no elemental), medium HoT's, Medium Single Target Wards,
- Crusader -- Armor Pledge (Can cast on self or ally), Lay on Hands, AE Blind, Single Target Wards (not as good as Shaman or Cleric)
- Warrior -- Aggro Rage, Tower of Shield (EQ2 Guardian ability), Group Absorb/Intercept
- Direlord -- Harm Touch, In Combat Rez (Only non-healer to get it), Zombie pet that can be sacrificed for choice of significant HP/Mana/Armor
- Ranger -- Pathfinding, Tranq Shot (Removes buffs), Trueshot (Pull designated target (or encounter) without aggroing other mobs (or encounters) in LoS or aggro range)
- Rogue -- Small radius group stealth, lockpicking (chance for extra loot, consumables, crafting materials, or gold), threat transfer
- Monk -- Feign Death, Drag (or drag corpse), Tsunami (temporary invuln)
- Summoner -- Strong Consumables (food/drink, mana potions, acclimation buffs), on hit damage buff (imbue with fire/ice/lightning/etc), and powerful pet of each archetype
- Enchanter -- Charm, Memwipe, Group Mezz, Max Mana Buff/Burst transfers, aggro/deaggro modifier
- Wizard -- Nuke (Not as strong as Harm Touch but on shorter cooldown) Self Buff with fatigue gauge, has increased casting speed/damage but with risk of burning out (temporary stasis)and needing rest the higher or lower they are on the gauge, consider a mastery of some sort for this gauge where they can control it better through advancement)Teleport
- Druid -- Strongest resist buffs (Non physical), Best HoT of three healers, no wards, medium direct/raid heals, better movement speed buff than shaman, druid rings and/or ability to cast recall on target, ability to manipulate nature for acclimation buffs/debuffs (this is in excess to them already having strongest resist buffs)
- Shaman -- Best raw stat buffs (STR/STA/AGI), Strongest Wards, Only Group Wards, Strongest Debuffs, weakest pure healing, no HoT's, medium resist buff, medium movement speed buff) - end quote
Think I need to understand something here...why would only a wizard suffer from fatigue and have to cast an antidote to this. How about melee types or are they able to keep hitting target with no fatigue, how about other casters? Not sure I understand the reason for this? We already have to watch our mana, and meditate for more if we've been a bit careless with our nukes?
Cana
Hi Cana,
The fatigue system was just an idea I came up with to make the wizard class unique. Please note that it isn't just a disadvantage for wizards as there is another side to the fatigue system, which is increased casting speed and damage. I guess I should have highlighted the idea further. Basically they can enter a trance as to where while entranced, they have increased casting speed and damage output, but now also have to deal with a fatigue meter. The higher they get on the meter, the more likely they are to suffer a fizzle or temporary stasis that will also lock them out of the trance. The idea can be broadened further by allowing them to somehow master this fatigue meter as they level up, advance AA's, or based on the quality of the spells they are casting while entranced. Let's say casting an apprentice spell increases their fatigue meter by 5 increments, while casting a master spell only increases it by 1. Trust me, I want every class to get some love and I want wizards to have their place! In my opinion, that place should be potentially the highest damage output, but with the risk vs reward tenet comes the fatigue meter. Just one random idea out of many that I have had. =D
Okay I understand it better now, thanks for your response. :) One more question if they are in the trance, does that make them immobile (stuck unable to move) and vulnerable? (defending my beloved wizard class here lol)
Cana
@ Cana
I would imagine that the wizard would be pretty immobile while entranced, yes. Timing and positioning would be pretty important before initiating the buff. You just need a good tank with you to protect you while you're entranced ... it may be challenging for them to hold aggro, and if they lose it they gotta be ready to peel for you. All in all I think something like this would still be pretty cool for a wizard. I wouldn't mind seeing something like this for the warrior class either. Plant / Entrench was an ability for Guardians in EQ2. Basically they rooted themselves and all NPC's nearby, and had a large bolster to their defense for as long as they were rooted (also slowed attack speed of any NPC's that were rooted.) Sometimes you need to give in order to receive ... it could be great if timed properly, but bad if more adds suddenly popped up on the other side of your group and you're stuck there, immobile, and from your own doing.
oneADseven said:Cleric -- Buff/Debuff vs Undead/Demon/Unholy, 2'nd group cleanse (other healers only get 1), AC and/or Block/Parry Buff, best direct/raid heals of three healers, no movement speed buff,weakest resist buffs (mental only no elemental), medium HoT's, Medium Single Target Wards,
Druid -- Strongest resist buffs (Non physical), Best HoT of three healers, no wards, medium direct/raid heals, better movement speed buff than shaman, druid rings and/or ability to cast recall on target, ability to manipulate nature for acclimation buffs/debuffs (this is in excess to them already having strongest resist buffs)
Shaman -- Best raw stat buffs (STR/STA/AGI), Strongest Wards, Only Group Wards, Strongest Debuffs, weakest pure healing, no HoT's, medium resist buff, medium movement speed buff)
I think it would be pretty interesting to give shaman the ability to hit a mob with a spell that heals those who damage it, Life Leak or something. A bit of a different flavor from the other two healers for sure.
Iksar said:oneADseven said:Cleric -- Buff/Debuff vs Undead/Demon/Unholy, 2'nd group cleanse (other healers only get 1), AC and/or Block/Parry Buff, best direct/raid heals of three healers, no movement speed buff,weakest resist buffs (mental only no elemental), medium HoT's, Medium Single Target Wards,
Druid -- Strongest resist buffs (Non physical), Best HoT of three healers, no wards, medium direct/raid heals, better movement speed buff than shaman, druid rings and/or ability to cast recall on target, ability to manipulate nature for acclimation buffs/debuffs (this is in excess to them already having strongest resist buffs)
Shaman -- Best raw stat buffs (STR/STA/AGI), Strongest Wards, Only Group Wards, Strongest Debuffs, weakest pure healing, no HoT's, medium resist buff, medium movement speed buff)
I think it would be pretty interesting to give shaman the ability to hit a mob with a spell that heals those who damage it, Life Leak or something. A bit of a different flavor from the other two healers for sure.
EQ2 had this ability for the Defiler (Evil Shaman)
Bane of Warding VI (Master) onAnyHit this spell has a 10% chance to cast Curse of Shielding
13. Bard -- Best Combat Buffs (Haste/attack up/Acc up/etc), Most out of combat utility (movement speed buff/Lighting/find corpse/tracking/etc), Good pulling and kiting (Not OP Boss solo crap), Good debuffs, good CC (But lets not copy paste Enchanter skills, lets be more original with lullaby, confuse, sound blast (stun), etc.). Songs are low cool down but short durration.(hope for a fun but deep mechanic, easy to play, difficult to master, and wouldnt mind an element of RNG to the songs). And of course mana/health/stamina regen songs. Cant tank or Heal. Not a major source of DPS, but a helpful amount.
Note: Out of combat skills are just examples but the point is that they can fish out a gambit of helpful tools.
Amsai said:
- A requirement that classes have identities. No single player should be able to do everything on their own.
13. Bard -- Best Combat Buffs (Haste/attack up/Acc up/etc), Most out of combat utility (movement speed buff/Lighting/find corpse/tracking/etc), Good pulling and kiting (Not OP Boss solo crap), Good debuffs, good CC (But lets not copy paste Enchanter skills, lets be more original with lullaby, confuse, sound blast (stun), etc.). Songs are low cool down but short durration.(hope for a fun but deep mechanic, easy to play, difficult to master, and wouldnt mind an element of RNG to the songs). And of course mana/health/stamina regen songs. Cant tank or Heal. Not a major source of DPS, but a helpful amount.
Note: Out of combat skills are just examples but the point is that they can fish out a gambit of helpful tools.
Not gonna lie ... I totally felt like a piece of the quaternity was missing when I was going through the classes and bard wasn't one of them.