Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Should we expect to see Gear like this in Pantheon - one day?

    • 844 posts
    June 10, 2018 4:17 PM PDT

    • 162 posts
    June 10, 2018 4:27 PM PDT

    What in the pluck is this? I wouldn't even touch this game lol, but eventually im sure it will come down to some kind of system like this, it might take many many years, but EQ eventually wen't to something like this, with the heroic stats and all that. I think it was like GoD where if you tried you could actually max out almost every stat. Maybe luclin or PoP? I don't remember. But this is just insanity, how is anyone supposed to keep up with this kind of stuff?

    • 844 posts
    June 10, 2018 4:30 PM PDT

    That game is Vanguard. Created by Chris Perkins(Joppa), Brad, etc. Sometimes called the true EQ2. One not created by SoE out of whole cloth.

    Vanguard credits http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/vanguard-saga-of-heroes/credits benefit from Darkintellect

    Granted LOTS of free license changes made to it after it was turned over to SOE of course.

    But the question still stands. 2 years, 4 years down the road - what will Pantheon look like? How will it keep adding more content for long time players.

    Pantheon is essentially EQ3, the child of EQ1->Vangaurd->Pantheon.


    This post was edited by zewtastic at June 14, 2018 9:10 AM PDT
    • 257 posts
    June 10, 2018 4:36 PM PDT

    Doesn't look like much of a shovel to me. Doubt it digs well at all. At least they didn't put RGB lights on it. 

    • 1921 posts
    June 10, 2018 5:08 PM PDT

    Looks good to me, especially if it's (and all items) are craftable, moddable, or customizable in any/some way. :)

    • 388 posts
    June 10, 2018 7:10 PM PDT

    I sure hope hope pantheon is better than Vanguard. Vanguard, for a the short time I played it, sucked. really bad. 

    • 1714 posts
    June 10, 2018 7:22 PM PDT

    I hope not. It's so...busy. I'd fear that it would take away from the iconic status that items can have when you start adding so many mods. 

    • 162 posts
    June 10, 2018 7:59 PM PDT

    Well, I played vanguard once, til one day a company messed it up, won't name them, we all know the company. The base game was awesome, but after a while the content seemed to fade.

    However, this piece of gear looks like way too much going on. Kinda like EQ now. There's too many buttons to press, and too many effects on gear, and too many AAs, basically if you haven't been playing for like the last 5 years, it'll be very difficult to keep up.

    I like games simple, EQ2 wasn't too bad, at least all the buttons were pretty easy to understand and organize. It had it's charm but at the same time had it's flaws. But classic EQ is love. Your character had 8 spells, all the macro's you wanted, but you had to create those macro's yourself. So you understood them, and used them to your ability. I don't mind having macro's that i can create myself.

    Then you get into games that just want to push you into the door, that has 100 things going on at level 1, and those are the games i won't play. I don't need fancy graphics, I loved EQ and still do. I just want basic, maybe add some crit rate here and there, and some other stats, but EQ was awesome at it's basic form. 

    • 1714 posts
    June 10, 2018 9:24 PM PDT

    Dubah said:

    Well, I played vanguard once, til one day a company messed it up, won't name them, we all know the company. The base game was awesome, but after a while the content seemed to fade.

    However, this piece of gear looks like way too much going on. Kinda like EQ now. There's too many buttons to press, and too many effects on gear, and too many AAs, basically if you haven't been playing for like the last 5 years, it'll be very difficult to keep up.

    I like games simple, EQ2 wasn't too bad, at least all the buttons were pretty easy to understand and organize. It had it's charm but at the same time had it's flaws. But classic EQ is love. Your character had 8 spells, all the macro's you wanted, but you had to create those macro's yourself. So you understood them, and used them to your ability. I don't mind having macro's that i can create myself.

    Then you get into games that just want to push you into the door, that has 100 things going on at level 1, and those are the games i won't play. I don't need fancy graphics, I loved EQ and still do. I just want basic, maybe add some crit rate here and there, and some other stats, but EQ was awesome at it's basic form. 

    Well said. 

    • 1785 posts
    June 10, 2018 9:47 PM PDT

    I agree with Dubah here - I believe that was something that showed up in the later years of Vanguard, stuff wasn't that extreme when I stopped (3 years in or so).

    None of the things I see in that item description are bad by themselves but the cumulative effect is just stat overload.  I would love to see some of these concepts in Pantheon, but with limits so that you don't end up with items like that screenshot.

    We haven't really talked much with the devs about itemization in Pantheon - which makes sense, since itemization is really one of the last things you do when designing an MMO, after you get all the big systems figured out that the items have to work with and support.  I would love to see Joppa and some of the others discuss their thoughts as we get closer to Alpha though.


    This post was edited by Nephele at June 10, 2018 9:51 PM PDT
    • 303 posts
    June 10, 2018 10:18 PM PDT

    Whats wrong with complex item stats? Having lots of different and unique modifiers makes one think about and compare gear pieces and having a curve of ever more powerful items gives one dreams and hopes of things to strife for and/or admire on those who were able to get their hands of them.

    • 844 posts
    June 10, 2018 10:24 PM PDT

    Before Dubah derails the topic completely, what broke Vanguard was the introduction of KDQ.

    At that point the best gear was now grindable vs. being skill-based.

    Once Vanguard was not a skill based game it fully broke from the spirit of the original intent and became a grind2win (G2W).

    That being said - there has to be some path forward for gear and players. The ceiling has to keep rising otherwise the game will grind to a halt as players bump into it and leave from boredom.

    So it is fully expected to see weapons and armor that will become ever increasingly superior (to match new progression content), with plugins of some nature, AA like abilities, etc.

    • 780 posts
    June 11, 2018 1:55 AM PDT

    I mean, I hope not.  That looks like a disaster.

    • 31 posts
    June 11, 2018 2:07 AM PDT

    Not Likely.  It was expressed that one of the things the vr team has already done is to plan out the goals for the next ten years expansion wise to prevent power creep.  Instead making it a slow rise in power.  So this should not happen if their plans are well thought out.  Considering their pedigree and experience on other games their experience is likely to prove useful in not allowing typical pitfalls to befall pantheon in subsequent expansion.

    • 1785 posts
    June 11, 2018 7:25 AM PDT

    zewtastic said:

    Before Dubah derails the topic completely, what broke Vanguard was the introduction of KDQ.

    At that point the best gear was now grindable vs. being skill-based.

    Once Vanguard was not a skill based game it fully broke from the spirit of the original intent and became a grind2win (G2W).

    That being said - there has to be some path forward for gear and players. The ceiling has to keep rising otherwise the game will grind to a halt as players bump into it and leave from boredom.

    So it is fully expected to see weapons and armor that will become ever increasingly superior (to match new progression content), with plugins of some nature, AA like abilities, etc.

    I think depending when someone played Vanguard and when they left their opinion on "what broke it" might be different from yours.  Let's not assert opinions as facts, please :)  (For the record, I left before KDQ, and at the time, I was considered a "holdout" amongst many of my gaming friends)

    I get where you're coming from with your statement about gear needing to become more powerful but I think you are conflating the ideas of character progression and power progression.  It's true that in many games (even in EQ and Vanguard) that has been the norm, but over a longer period of time it actually becomes a bad thing if characters/items keep accumulating more and more stats.

    I think what's true is that we, as players, want our characters to be able to continue to grow in some way - however, that doesn't have to be levels, or AAs, or raw power all the time.  It can be horizontal progression as well.  I think VR recognizes that and they're trying to build a game that is as broad as it is deep, so that even if you hit that level cap or get all the best gear, there's still things you can go and do and work on.

    I also think that it is really important to avoid a "piling on" effect of different systems.  Someone else above said "what's wrong with complex stats?"  Honestly, nothing is wrong with complexity - but there is a point where it becomes overwhelming for normal humans (ie, not people like us on these forums).  Given that I hope and intend to spend the next 5-10 years playing Pantheon, I would like my next girlfriend to play it with me.... even if she's not the sort of person who thinks building spreadsheets to figure out the optimal conversations of stats is a fun thing.

    So for Pantheon let's keep it sane.  If the tooltip on an item takes up half or more of the screen to list all the stats it provides, that's too much.  And for expansions, let's not go crazy adding to the level cap either.  We don't want to end up in a situation 5 years down the line where a new player logs in and finds out that they don't really get to do much with anyone else until they've "caught up" to all the level 85 people so that they can do the level 85 things.  Instead, we want Pantheon +5 years to look a lot like Pantheon on day 1 - only bigger, but with people still enjoying and doing all that "older" stuff alongside the "newer" stuff.

    My opinions :)

    • 3852 posts
    June 11, 2018 8:22 AM PDT

    Vanguard was a very good but very unfinished game at releaase. It remained playable for years with many fine features but also many issues. It died from lack of funding and support, not because it was a bad game in its basic approach.

    I agree entirely with the consensus - that weapon is far too busy. But item creep is the way of the world in the MMO universe.

    How do you prevent it? You cannot - but you can slow it and restrict it.

    1. Start out with very low numbers by MMO standards. Go back to D&D and other source games. Have lower level items mostly have no bonuses at all. Go for quite a few levels with improvements being slightly greater armor class and slightly better "to hit" or damage numbers (using the old D&D terms for reference not suggesting that Pantheon use them). Have a +1 dagger or gloves be enough to wet one's panties until the middle of the game and +3 be an endgame item. 

    Do that and maybe two expansions in you will have epic +6 weapons - I can live with that.

    2. Do what LOTRO did with several expansions. Every few expansions introduce a new statistic or make an old one more important. Thus instead of going from +6 to +9 maybe expansion three introduces "light" that needs to be had to successfully fight certain new enemies. Or makes an almost useless "finesse" attribute become critical to hit certain new enemies.

    • 844 posts
    June 11, 2018 8:26 AM PDT

    The fact that one change converted Vanguard from a "SKILL" based game, to a "GRIND" based game is monumental.

    For those that did actually play Vanguard throughout it's lifespan, that was the major breaking point. Whether they liked it or not.

    • 137 posts
    June 11, 2018 8:35 AM PDT
    Minimal stat upgrades and horizontal progression can help prolong this
    • 432 posts
    June 11, 2018 9:23 AM PDT

    Nephele said:

    We don't want to end up in a situation 5 years down the line where a new player logs in and finds out that they don't really get to do much with anyone else until they've "caught up" to all the level 85 people so that they can do the level 85 things.  Instead, we want Pantheon +5 years to look a lot like Pantheon on day 1 - only bigger, but with people still enjoying and doing all that "older" stuff alongside the "newer" stuff.

    My opinions :)

    The "we" probably means "I" and it is wishful thinking .

    Pantheon like most MMOs is level based . A fact .

    The environment challenges scale with level . At level 10 there are more things that can't be done than things that can be done . At level max it is opposite . A fact .

    The percentage of players at max level will be increasing with time . A fact .

    The number of new players starting the game 5 years down the road will be much smaller than the same number at release and in year 1 . This is not a fact but this is what was observed in most MMORPGs so it is a reasonable assumption that it will happen in Pantheon too .

    So it is also a reasonable assumption that a new player (if there are still any) starting after 5 years will find himself in an environment where everybody is max level with the exception of a few alts . It seems clear that Pantheon 5 years down the road will not look at all like Pantheon on Day 1 from the demographic point of view .

    I read a few things about horizontal progression but I never understood what it is supposed to mean in a game world where the majority of the players is stacked at max level and is no more amused by creating new alts . I can see how it works during the first year but after 5 years the demography changed too much so that to keep this max level majority happy, every game I know used the same recipe - increase levels and/or increase the item power . It is possible to just add a new continent without changing levels or item power but when it has been explored after a few months it is again back to Square 1 .

    The weapon shown above is perhaps too extreme but I expect this kind of things to happen in Pantheon as the years go by .

    • 70 posts
    June 11, 2018 4:02 PM PDT

    I'm hoping that we will see more character skill than powerful armor and weapons.  I noticed that a lot of games like to make you weak until you have found armor to match your spec.  I have a lot more fun when my skill in playing my character is what matters most.   I hope we can avoid a serious gear grind and leave the focus on our ability to play our character.

    • 319 posts
    June 11, 2018 4:35 PM PDT

    I sure hope not.

    • 162 posts
    June 11, 2018 5:22 PM PDT

    zewtastic said:

    Before Dubah derails the topic completely, what broke Vanguard was the introduction of KDQ.

    At that point the best gear was now grindable vs. being skill-based.

    Once Vanguard was not a skill based game it fully broke from the spirit of the original intent and became a grind2win (G2W).

    That being said - there has to be some path forward for gear and players. The ceiling has to keep rising otherwise the game will grind to a halt as players bump into it and leave from boredom.

    So it is fully expected to see weapons and armor that will become ever increasingly superior (to match new progression content), with plugins of some nature, AA like abilities, etc.

    Before I derail it completely? Listen man, first, keep my name out of your mouth you want to try to be disrespectful, this is a good community and if you took the 20 seconds to actually read my whole post it was right on track with what the topic was about. So don't try to name call and disrespect me. I don't appreciate that, and I bet you wouldn't if I did it to you either. Try reading before responding with disrespectful comments. K thanks bye.

    Now, back onto the real topic before zewtastic completely derails it.

    Sure there needs to be gear progression and in game progression. But one day EQ was normal, just for instance, and the next they added heroic stats and completely rebuilt the entire system with 1 expac. 

    EQ2 did the same thing. I'm sure Vanguard didn't slowly work it's way to the above mentioned weapon either. Most companies don't, one day it's normal then the next it's crazy gear with all kinds of added effects and stats. Now, this could be to make up for dwindling population. Take EQ for instance, I can't imagine very many groups going on a live server these days, real groups, not boxed groups. Which means they had to make up for this by making your character 10x stronger than before, because they can't dumb the NPC's down, so they gotta bring us up. I'm hoping these types of things are just a reaction to population increase, and not actually something that 20k players are expected to equip and fully understand. 

    • 763 posts
    June 12, 2018 1:43 AM PDT

    Simply put - planning is the key to all of this. It is essential that any game (be it Pen'n'paper, RPG or MMO) has a pre-planned structure for ALL items. This does not mean they have to design them all at day 1... but it does mean they have to create the scaffolding/(meta-)templates for all items to be created. You may well have an idea of 'starting' the MMO with levels 1-50, but you have to assume that this will slowly expand over time to 55, 60 ... perhaps higher.

    If you do not, then you run the very real risk of creating new, overpowered items (for a given level) in the new content. Not to mention you will not scale the higher level items appropriately.

    1. Framework:

    Designate 'bands' of item strength for given level bands:


    -------------+------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
                 | Name |         L E V E L   R A N G E S       |
                 |      |   --  |   -   |       |   +   |  ++   |
    -------------+------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
    ordinary     |  o   |   -   |  1- 4 |  3-8  |  7-10 |  8-11 |
    Modest       |  m   |  7-12 | 10-14 | 13-17 | 16-20 | 17-21 |
    Potent       |  p   | 19-22 | 20-25 | 25-30 | 30-35 | 35-40 |
    Most Potent  |  mp  | 34-38 | 35-42 | 40-50 | 48-55 | 52-60 |
    Artefact     |  A   | 53-58 | 55-65 | 60-80 | 75-85 | 84-90 |
    Relic        |  R   |       | 85-etc|       |       |       |
    Deity        |  X   |       |       |       |       |       |
    -------------+------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+

    Now this allows us to have a level range for use of any given 'power band'. Thus a 'Most Potent +' item (mp+) would be expected to be 'of use' for a level 48-55 character (optimally). From here we can now compare any created items and give them a 'power band', rather than try to set them an arbitrary level. Thus there will be a large number of items in each band, but since they have been collected by comparison with others in the band, they should be fairly homogenous in power rating.

    2. Categorise components for comparison of power:

    It is now necessary to determine which components are to be used for comparison! The following is a list of the type of things..

    Material: Eg Copper (-10), Bronze (-5), Iron (0), Low Steel (+5), High Steel (+10), Mithril (+25) etc
    Quality:  Eg Cast (-15), Poor Forged (-5), Forged (0), Quality (+5), High Quality (+10)
    Manufacture: Eg Lightness, Sharp, Weighted, reinforced etc
    Enchantment: Eg Low Enchanted (+5), High Enchanted (+10), Bane ('Slaying' vs a creature), Wounding (causes Bleeding), etc
    Magically Imbued: Eg +Stats, Cast Spell X, etc

    Once you have determined a rough value (in arbitrary 'points' for comparative use only) you can assign a 'point range' to the 'level band' so as to ensure you have a rough yardstick with which to compare other (newer) items into the correct bands.

    3. Associating Crafting levels with power bands

    It is also necessary to ensure you have a framework for crafted items that dovetails into your power bands for items. In other words ... tie up crafting level with the levels of items that can be crafted with that skill. this determines how far ahead/behind the item power curve crafted items fall. Note that it may be setup such that once a crafting skill has reach a 'journeyman' level of ability (sufficient to be considered competent) they may move ahead of the drop curve until higher level, where they slow down and, ultimately, fall behind the drop level (for creation of complete items).

    If more powerful items have subcomponents, this makes the balance easier, since crafting can then be the main source of item customisation above a certain level (eg 30+) even though the individual item drops themselves at that level are superior. Thus crafters would have distinct bands to their profession: eg

    Crafting levels:
    01-05 : Induction      : Only create tools and (poor) ordinary items.
    06-15 : Apprentice    : Create basic items/weapons, but behind the drop curve
    16-30 : Journeyman  : Start to move ahead of the curve for creating items/weapons vs dropped ones (should be ahead by lev 25, say)
    31-50 : Master          : Begin to fall behind, (parity at Lev 30, say) dropping significantly behind by Lev 40+. Can now create 'sub-components' for customising drops.

    Thus, at launch 'end-game' (lev 50) crafters would not be able to produce as good a weapon/item as the equivalent level mob drops, but would still be able to create 'behind the curve' items for situational encounters and also create components to be added/customise mob drops. This makes crafters 'better' than drops for levels 25-30, on par with drops for levels 20-25 and 30-35 and behind the curve for all other levels. But, they have other areas of crafting to excel at for the other portions of their progression.

    Conclusion:

    You have to plan ahead (not just to what you consider will be 'max level' at launch) and create a framework for items/drops and also how it will dovetail into your crafting system. Most important is to ensure a consistent approach such that new items will not supercede older items of equivalent level - merely  be of a different flavour!

    So, in answer to the OP's question:

    "Perhaps, but as long as the item progression increases in a consistent manner from levels 1 up to max, this is not a bad thing! Item stats should be part of a systematic approach for items, slowly introducing the concepts of a few of them at lower level and slowly adding to them as power/level progresses. This allows players to be able to understand the stats and how they affect the character.

    This is the diametric opposite of having to introduce a sea-change for item stats 3 years down the line because your expansions introduced items of inconsistent or comparative inequity of power compared to their level. It also has the negative effect of bombarding players with a multitude of data to learn/master in a short period of time. This is to be avoided!"

    Evoras, is somewhat of a fan of the 'Rolemaster (TM)' system of item creation/power designations as a sum of their parts!

    • 3852 posts
    June 12, 2018 7:31 AM PDT

    I agree that it will be helpful if VR has a plan for item progression from the start. At least up to the maximum level the game supports at release. Thus, if they release a new zone or dungeon or raid (and I would hope that increases to the level cap will not come quickly - there are better ways to keep maxed out players busy) they can fit itemization into an overall plan.

    One reason that this is important is that the crafting recipes need to fit within this framework. If the best gear is +2 at level 50 hopefully crafters can get +2 recipes, although letting us craft items as good as raid bosses drop may not be the way to go. And I say this as a crafter not a raider. I'm thinking of reusable recipes - no reason a boss can't drop a one-use recipe to make an item just as good as anything that it could drop.

    One way to keep itemization under control, for a while, is to not increase bonuses every time you introduce a new area and want to give players an incentive to grind for gear again. In other words, not to increase their power against enemies in the existing areas since that would be very unbalancing.

    Thus, suppose you introduce a new zone called the Plane of Fire (I am not trying to be original here just give a rough idea of what I mean so please don't flame me for being so obvious). You can have new armor that gives protection against local conditions but that will not be of any use to a level-cap in the existing zones. You can have new weapons that give bonuses against local entities that will not be of any use against entities in other areas. Thus, a level-cap may need to spend 3 months getting his or her gear up to speed for the new zone, but this process will not make the character even marginally more powerful against the trolls or dragons in the previous zone. Voila, old enemies do not become trivial, and item bonuses stay at +3 and to not start the endless path to the item the OP showed. Other than adding one new power or attribute which may still be at a reasonable number as in flamebane +3 not flamebane + 157,000.


    This post was edited by dorotea at June 12, 2018 7:33 AM PDT
    • VR Staff
    • 176 posts
    June 12, 2018 8:18 AM PDT

    In short: no, you will not see itemization like this in Pantheon, not under my watch.

    The longer answer involves points that many of you have mentioned already. The need to raise the power ceiling over time as expansions release and players want to continue to grow their characters and reach new heights of ability. This is a good expectation and anyone designing an MMORPG should devote some long and hard thought into providing good solutions.

    One very simple and practical solution to the stat/tooltip bloat you see above is nestling more of these standalone bonuses into the parent attributes.

    Things I see off the top of my head:

    - Opportunity to collapse several of these bonus statistics into one (I'm a huge fan of elegance and simplicity in statistics). So all of this granular stuff, like Rage resistance, Flurry resistance, Critical and AoE resistance would be rolled into Physical Damage Mitigation and Spell Damage Mitigation groups.

    - When you roll the granular bonuses into families, you then roll those up into Attributes. So when you hover over Strength, you may see a popup that says: "Currently increasing your Damage Rating (+X%) and Physical Damage Mitigation (+Y%) and your Critical Strike Chance (+Z%).

    - Plan ahead to limit the amount of sockets on items. If we do anything like this, which I'm generally a fan of, I wouldn't see us going past 3 sockets total, ever.

    - Remove "Weapon Bonus" and replace "Equipped Effect" with a slot for Item Enchantments.

    These things alone would immediately clean that up and make it much more scaleable. But there are many other thoughts I could add as well - it may be worth the time to write a blog post on this at some point in the near future!