Read our announcement today on our decision as a team to focus in on making Darkfall: Rise of Agon much more casual friendly. Read more: Darkfall: Rise of Agon - A Pivotal Moment
Jesus H Christ. Get ready boys. The bang is coming in hot. Keep your heads up BPG. You're doing the lords work.
I don't know if I should be worried or excited. Are we talking about core principles like full loot and skill based combat or grind and accessibility?
I think it's the best direction to take if we want the game's future to stay healthy. That said, removing the grind doesn't have to be an option. Hell, the grind can even be made as huge as it was in original DFO launch, it would keep people playing longer. For ANY grind to be bearable though, players would have to have visible "character levels". And around NPC cities, you could only fight players of a similar level. So a level 99 player wouldn't be able to attack a day 1 noob. You could make it like Runescape, and the farther you go out into the wilderness, the larger the gap is. So if that level 1 noob goes all the way to mid-map or any of the subcontinents, he can be killed by anyone. Runescape is an old ass game and still boasts a thriving population. I think this option should be considered.
It will all be open for discussion before any final decisions are made, but keep in mind while you think about it that player skill alone is a long and daunting grind. This isn't your typical MMO where player skill consists of mashing skills off cooldown.
That is literally not what the game is about and that sounds stupid. This is Darkfall keep it Darkfall and not anything else.
All right well I have an idea I'll shoot out real quick. A piece of gear that imbues the user with skills/stats to make them viable. This gear would become obsolete once the player develops their character past a certain point so it would be used only by new players and developing characters. It could be a chest piece and there could be a couple of different types such as melee focused, magics and support. You could acquire this gear from tasks, pve, crafting, quests and pvp. Think of it like an EVE ship that noobs can use to contribute to the space battles.
Right, being able to compete with other new players in areas without having to worry about getting stomped into the ground by a vet will keep up a noobie's motivation to learn the game and get better
The game needs to provide instant access to PvP. I can't think of any other game on the market that creates such a shitty environment for organic PvP. The odds are stacked against players that actually roam the world looking for fights. Centralized PvP would give the impression of a larger population and would promote more PvP for individuals that don't have the time to understand dynamic hot spots or "roam" to gank naked AFK players in holdings/unsuspecting pve'ers. The gear grind would need to be adjusted with respect to the increased rate at which people will be PvPing with guaranteed PvP(arena, battleground, whatever). @kilrain I would also suggest the route of allowing players to level their characters through PvP(think Warhammer Online)
I think stats are the hardest grind so I think developing with what we have is the better route to take. Expand on the Nectar of the Gods from the starter quests and let them take a player to 50 stats. I don't think gear should give skills. I do think there are too many skills though and some could be consolidated.
no mmo is like that. thats a common misconception of mainly fps players who dont comprehend the finesse of normal mmo combat. nevertheless you´re right that df has a steep learning curve.
and to fix the enligment problem make it this way, if a blue ataks a grey first the grey doesnt get enligment hit but if the grey ataks the blue first then he gets enligment hit that will fix alot of people going red same with the reds if the red ataks the blue first he gets enligment hit if the blue ataks the red first the red doent get enligment hit well that is my opinion
Yes, technically you are correct. I know because I'm more from an MMO background than FPS. I've only actually played a couple FPS games aside from Darkfall. The point is there is a lot more player skill in Darkfall than any other MMO.
- Reduce the gear grind, ALOT - Even out the difference in gear, let playerskill be the deciding factor in pvp, not what you wear. Im thinking how UO handled gear. You were fine with GM made armor/weapons. People running around in vanq/invul gear had an advantage, but not a big one. - Revamp the portal system. Im thinking UO (moongates) again, put up some portals around Agon and let the player choose which portal he wants to teleport to.