Is EQ2 Worth Exploring?
As I’ve stated in the past, I’ve tried playing EQ2 several times and for whatever reason, I just can’t really get into it. I have a 25, a 24, and an 18, but I am really not enjoying myself when playing recently with the Living Legacy promotion. The last time I came back to play, I actually enjoyed myself for a few weeks, but this time it wasn’t the case. I jumped back in with my 25 wizard, got used to the skills again, and was once again feeling stuck because I don’t enjoy the zones I’m currently playing in (Thundering Steppes and Butcherblock Mountains) and the quests are too difficult or quite simply don’t sound fun. So there I am with my level 25 wizard at the Thundering Steppes dock wondering whether I should keep playing. Granted, I don’t have a guild and there isn’t a real sense of community for me, but this was never a problem with WoW. If I was guildless or just starting out on a new server, this didn’t prevent me from having fun or having a clear idea of where to go or what to do.
So with that in mind, is the world of EQ2 worth exploring? Right now, this seems to be the only real reason to play EQ2. I could find a guild and hopefully this would make my experience more enjoyable, but I think the problem goes much deeper than that. I don’t really like the graphical style of EQ2 (It tries to be too photorealistic and without the right computer, fails miserably,) I don’t enjoy the zones I’ve been in so far, and I’m not particularly drawn to any of the classes I’ve played. So where does this leave me? As I’ve stated before, I don’t believe you should have to force yourself through a few levels or zones in an MMO to get to content that you WILL enjoy, however, I don’t even know that once I get to a new zone or a new level that I will start to really enjoy myself anyway. Maybe you all have some comments/suggestions/feedback to offer for this, but as of now, I’m beginning to think that Tobold was more correct than I originally gave him credit for: If players have some problem with a game and that doesn’t get changed in some way, the promotion will be meaningless because it won’t get used. I know this might not be true for other players, but for me, this is looking to be very much the case.
As for EQ1, I’m still playing it and I want to give this more of a chance, so we’ll see whether I can get SOME value out of this promotion.
~Kanthalos
Nine Years Later…
Comments(1)I finally set foot in EverQuest today. Well, that’s not entirely true. I did play for about thirty minutes around 2001, but I was still playing Asheron’s Call, and EverQuest confused me immensely when I first booted it up. That said, I never really gave it a fair shot. Now that it’s 2008, I realize I’m a bit late to the party and I won’t really get the full experience that I would have back when I first tried it, but I still want to check it out.
I finally got it up and running early this morning, so I made a wizard. I ran into a bit of a snag when I jumped into a pool of water and couldn’t seem to find my way out in Felwithe. I looked for close to 15 minutes before I finally gave up and made a new toon. I rolled a necromancer instead and logged in. I got to level four in the Mines of Gloomingdeep before I took a break. It was interesting getting used to some of the settings and differences in gameplay (for instance hailing NPC’s) but it wasn’t too bad and I’m definitely looking forward to playing some more later.
So there’s my beginning as of yet with my necromancer being my main. Have I made a good or bad decision? Is there a class that is much more fun or easy to progress with as my first character in EQ? Let me know what you think or give me any suggestions you have.
~Kanthalos
*I decided to try out a fighter class, so I just got a beserker to level 6. I’m not sure whether I like it or not, but I can’t find any skills to use other than my basic attack. Am I missing something? In any case, I would really love to get some advice before I continue because I don’t want to get invested in either of these characters and find out that I’m messed them up or that they really aren’t worth playing, so please let me know what you think if you have something to contribute.
Making MMO’s For the Long-Haul
Comments(5)Age of Conan was released about three weeks ago, and there are already people at max level…. Seriously? This just seems insane to me. This means that the somewhat-more-than-casual player will likely reach the level cap by the middle of July at the latest. I am completely baffled by this. I understand that players will eat through any content they are given, but an MMO should not have players reaching the level cap several weeks after it’s release.
Asheron’s Call took the first player over two years to reach the level cap, and a lot of that was done through serious grinding. Many of the players at that time (that were not in guilds built to gain xp and level faster) were around 80-90 if not lower with several more months before they were able to make it there. When AC was first released, there was no intention from the developers for players to reach the level cap righ away, which I think is evident by the arbitrary level cap of 126. I think they had it right for the most part, though. They started with a very large world with two big continents with probably 40 levels of content at release and through monthly content updates, they slowly filled in the landmasses with dungeons, landmarks, quests, leveling areas, and all sorts of new things to do. To me this makes much more sense than making content for 50 levels and jam-packing everything you need into 8-10 zones and then having to create new landmasses whenever you need to add content. Not only did this make players feel like their $10 a month was worth it due to the content updates, but it also allowed the developers to stay slightly ahead of the leveling curve so no one was left with nothing to do.
One thing that I would not really stand for which was considered the norm in AC was grinding. This was basically the only way to level, and while it was fun due to interaction with other players (8-man groups were the best way to maximize xp) it’s not something that I would want to do anymore. There were lots and lots of things to keep players busy outside of leveling, but there’s no doubt that leveling is where the progression happened. I don’t mind a good grinding session from time to time, but there is no way that I will play an MMO where this is the only means of progressing. The only way I would consider grinding through levels is with other players (grouping actually meant more xp than solo, go figure) who were literally pushing forward into a zone with some goal once we reached the end which would reward us with something other than just xp.
AC had something really good going here. The idea that it took two years for the first player to reach the level cap is brilliant. This means that you can’t even have an end-game really, at least not for many months in which you can prepare for it, or keep raising the level cap, so it’s barely reachable. I’m not saying that progression in these games should be agonizingly slow, but the rate of progression in AoC is pretty silly to me. If you put the max level pretty far out of reach, I think it will force players to take their time and really enjoy what they are doing. Obviously, this can go both ways and players can question why they are even playing if they can’t make it to the end, but as long as they are satisfied with content, I don’t think that will really matter.
~Kanthalos
Can We Get It Back?
Filed under: Asheron's Call, EQ, EQ2, EverQuest, MMO's, MMORPGS, WoW, World of Warcraft |
Comments(4) If you read this blog, it’s pretty safe to assume that you have played an MMO before, and if you have, chances are you have very fond memories of your first. It will always hold a special place in your gaming heart, and you will never truly forget the places and the people you encountered in your time there. For me, this is Asheron’s Call, though for many others it’s EQ, Ultima Online, Dark Age of Camelot, WoW, AC2, or pretty much any MMO to date. For me, I’ve always been looking for something to replace the euphoria and obsessive behavior that accompanied my time spent running around Dereth, but I’ve never quite gotten there. I’ve played over a dozen MMO’s since Asheron’s Call, but nothing has really drawn me in the way it did. I suppose this is to be expected as the first time is usually the most memorable with many things, MMO’s included. That said, is it fair to say that we shouldn’t or couldn’t try to get as close to that feeling again as possible? I don’t think so. If this were the case, we should have stopped playing MMO’s after we tired of the first one we played. We don’t, however, because we understand that improvements are being made every day to MMO’s currently out and those being developed for the future.
So why is it that our positive experiences don’t really seem to carry from our first MMO experience to all the others we’ve played since? The obvious response is that no two games are the same and expectations change as these games evolve. The reasons we loved our first might have been an afterthought or purposely minimized or not included at all in another game. No one with any common sense would ever implement Asheron’s Call melee combat system into a game now, and this is true for many of the systems that these games used. The problem is that by the time you change all of these systems to modernize them, the game that you loved so much is nothing more than a shadow. This is typically why sequels struggle so much. Just look at AC2 for evidence. Not only was it plagued by bugs on all levels, but they altered the game so drastically from the first that most of the AC1 players hated it. It’s reasonable to speculate that if the bugs hadn’t been there it would have had a much different result, but I think regardless, they would have been shooting for different market because the game was so incredibly different. The combat system was changed, the skill tree was added to replace the skill system that was used in AC1 (one that I truly miss and would love to see again in the future.) These two changes alone were enough to make it feel as though this wasn’t a sequel at all, so it made it very difficult for AC1 players to jump straight over, and instead many went on to other games completely.
Not only do we have to consider the game itself, but the way our lives have changed since then. Back in 1999, I was just entering high school with far less responsibilities than I have now. Granted, I am currently unemployed, but between looking for a job and taking care of other things, the time I have to play is much more limited than it was back then. I would literally spend 3-5 hours every night after school playing, and this is simply not feasible, or really desired, now. So since I have less time to play and less desire to spend that much time playing, does this mean that I can’t get as invested in a game, and therefore, won’t get as much out of it? I don’t think so. At least, I don’t think that should be the case. If I’m forced to spend 30-40 hours a week playing an MMO to fully enjoy it, then it’s not something that I’m going to be willing to do. If I WANT to play that much, it’s a completely different story (not that I actually would play that much) and I think it’s serving it’s purpose.
Taking into account that these games are constantly being upgraded and changed, can we really get back that experience that we long for? I really don’t think so personally, but I do think that when we find the game that suits us best that is a really good product, we will create a new set of memories and consider them to be equally valuable. Whether that means a fantasy-based game or not, I don’t know, but I do know that as long as I enjoy MMO’s, I will be looking for this type of experience again.
~Kanthalos
Slightly Bummed…
Well, apparently I misunderstood how the Living Legacy program worked. Since I didn’t have a subscription to the original EverQuest, I don’t qualify for the two free months. This bums me out quite a bit because I was looking forward to playing this game basically for the first time, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. I actually bought EverQuest long, long ago, but there is no way that I could ever remember my username and password to re-activate it. Guess it’s EQ2 for me.
~Kanthalos
*Great news! I actually did manage to recover my old account information! That said, I’m patching EQ currently and I should be up and running soon.
Living Legacy: Act of Desperation?
Tobold just wrote up a post regarding Living Legacy being an act of desperation to get players to come back. He states that if there haven’t been significant changes to the game, players aren’t going to have any reason to come back and stick around if the problem that caused them to leave in the first place wasn’t fixed. He also thinks that two months is too long to be effective. While the second statement has merit, I can’t agree with the first or the last. I don’t think that this has anything to do with desperation or that it is too long. Two months is really a perfect amount of time to give players to check out the game without making it too long. Honestly, if what he said about people leaving for a reason was true (which 99% of the time it is) then having two months to give it a try could possibly help with that. With all the players coming back in to give it a try, it could really increase the population for a couple months and liven up the community a bit.
MMO’s are constantly looking for more players and the competition is getting steeper, but I don’t think that EQ2 NEEDS players. I think they have enough to be profitable and to keep running, but they would definitely like more. I think the people that are playing now are happy, and the developers enjoy their jobs and want to keep EQ2 going while continuing to improve and expand upon it with an unparalleled expansion cycle. EQ and EQ2 are almost surely the two biggest and most content-heavy MMO’s out there (with the possible exception to vanguard in terms of sheer size, I don’t know) but if players are generally stopping at 20 or 25, or not playing EQ at all, they won’t ever get to see that anyways, so this is a big problem. As for EQ2, is it the leveling people don’t like? Is it the lack of guidance? Is it the community (or seeming lack thereof in the lower levels?) For me it’s the community, but I think it’s different things for different people.
To wrap things up, I think this is an excellent marketing maneuver, not an act of desperation. I think that if this doesn’t work wonders to bring in more players, then it will be pretty clear that they won’t ever see a big jump in players again (without massive changes as you said) and that they should be satisfied with the player base they have now, but until it’s over, I think this was worth a shot. Players likely weren’t going to come back on their own, but this gives them that opportunity if they choose to use it. While they want to build their numbers before the competition gets any stiffer, I think EQ2 (and possible EQ) will still be around for a long time to come.
~Kanthalos
What Should I Do?
Now that I’m back in EQ2, I’m really left with a dilemma on several things. Basically, it’s two fold in that I don’t know whether I should keep playing one of the characters that I’ve already gotten to 18/24 (I have a 25 wizard too but on a server I have no interest in playing on) or whether I should start over. My 18 is on Befallen where Tipa is (as far as I know) with her guild Nostalgia the Guild, and my 24 is on Antonia Bayle. This is a popular server, but I don’t really know anyone playing on there right now. I’ve also started a character on Guk in case I want to hook up with Revelry and Honor which sounds like a lot of fun, too.
In terms of where I should start over or keep going, I really don’t want to start over unless it is with the toon on Guk that I just created. He’s a level 5 warlock and I don’t know whether I’ll like him or not, but I’d already played a wizard to 24 and 25, and an illusionist to 18. I like both of those classes a lot (as you can see, I prefer the caster classes in EQ2 for some reason) but I don’t want to start one over again for some reason. It’s sort of tough restarting with a mid-level toon, though, especially if you aren’t very familiar with the game. In WoW, it wouldn’t be a problem at all, but when your highest level character is the one you want to jump back in with, it’s tough to know what to do or where to go, especially if you quit because you didn’t like any of the zones you were currently playing in or were feeling stuck.
As for where to play, this is tough, too. One of my biggest problems with EQ2 the past two times that I’ve played it is that I really felt no sense of community. I didn’t have a good guild or group of friends to play around with. It felt more like a single player game with a really big world. I’m afraid that if this happens again, I’ll be done with EQ2 for good, so I really need to find a good group of players who would like to have me. I don’t want to be babied or have my hand held really, I just want to have a group of players to socialize with and help me out with advice or a quest from time to time, nothing more than a good guild SHOULD be.
I’m also not asking anyone to fight over me because, well, I’m not worth it 
This is especially true in a game that I’m not familiar with and am struggling to enjoy. I’m just writing because I would like some advice from you all about what I should do or ways to make starting up again easier. That’s all for now, but let me know if you have anything to help make EQ2 home.
~Kanthalos
P.S. Tipa, I’ve never played EQ for more than 30 minutes, so I really have no idea how it works. If you’re interested in working with me to get up to speed and help me understand what’s going on (if you think that’s necessary) then I’d be willing to give it a shot. Send me an e-mail or just comment if you want.
Daily Quest #3
Sorry it’s been a while since I wrote up the last quest, but I’ve got a new one for today. Basically it’s a combination of a few elements that I think would be pretty interesting. It’s really not even a quest in the strictest sense of the word, but more of an opportunity for risk vs. reward.
With this talk of gambling both here and on the SUWT podcast, it got me thinking of a way to make this aspect of the game more fun. With that said, I’ll dive into the heart of it.
For the sake of this “opportunity,” I’m going to use the Shimmering Flats raceway in Thousand Needles, something that doesn’t actually involve gambling (though I wish it did.)
Game: World of Warcraft
Quest Location: Shimmering Flats Raceway
Quest Giver Location: Gadgetzan, Tanaris
Quest Dialogue: “Greetings, traveler. I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind doing me a small favor. You see, this here shop hasn’t been paying the bills as well I’d like, so I’ve been using most of our earnings over at the Shimmering Flats Raceway. The returns have been… well, there haven’t been any returns, but I plan to change that with the next race. One of the mechanics told me he’s going to sabotage the other rockets, which means that the CX-250 is a shoe-in to win the race! I’d go and place the bet myself, but the wife’s been on me to fix a leak for too long, and I can’t take it anymore.
Here’s 20 gold to go place the bet. If it wins, I’ll split the return with you, which isn’t bad with 4:1 odds. Come back when the race is over, and we’ll have a drink to our success!”
Quest Reward/How it works: This depends. This situation requires you to make the decision of whether to place the bet or not. Obviously, you can’t be certain whether the mechanic will sabotage the other rockets or not, and if he doesn’t, you the odds of winning aren’t really that great compared to the other rockets.
Here’s where some new game mechanics could be incorporated. If they were to be used, it would add some neat elements to the game, but they wouldn’t necessarily have to be used. Here are several scenarios that could come about from this:
1) You keep the money and never return to the shop-keeper.
2) You keep it and tell the shop-keeper that the rocket he bet on lost the race. There is a chance that he will discover that you lied, and all of the shop-keepers in town find out. If this happens, prices go up and money for selling goods goes down. He might not find out, though, and you could get 15 gold with no consequences.
3) You bet the money and lose. Obviously in this case, you get to go bet on a race but get nothing out of it.
4) You bet the money and win and go back to the quest giver to return his share. In this case you get 40 gold for yourself and you make a shop-keeper happy.
5) You be the money and win, but keep the money for yourself. Similar to the second scenario, you could avoid the shop-keeper and pretend it never happened, or lie and run the risk of negative effects if you get caught.
6)You bet the money and lose. You feel bad for the shop-keeper and decide to give him the gold that he would have won. This will cost you 60g basically, but if you can afford it, then you might consider doing this, as it would increase your favor with people in town and you recieve monetary and other benefits of some kind.
Obviously, the amount of gold here could be changed depending on the amount of gold you should have at that level and other circumstances. This was just a value that I picked randomly. Also, this quest could be simplified to just be a “quest” to go bet on a rocket and see if it wins. It could be taken to all different levels depending on how much effort and detail you want to put into it. I just thoguht this would be a neat way to incorporate both betting as well as an element of choice. Let me know what you think.
~Kanthalos
Heading Back Into Norrath
Well, I was pleased to read about this offer to re-up all former EQ and EQ2 players accounts through July 31st, as well as include EVERY expansion. This is excellent news, and an amazing marketing strategy for SOE by my thinking. For me, this means a $70 value for free if I only play EQ2 since I’ll be getting the RoK expansion for free as well as two months of free play. If I do decide to give EQ a shot (which I’m considering) then the value is probably in the $100+ range.
The only thing I am concerned about is that players who have already bought the most recent expansion might feel upset that they paid for the expansion when all of these returnees might not have. I personally don’t think I would care because they have been playing it since November (I believe) and have experienced all of this content already, and they will also potentially have an incredible amount of new players to meet and join up with.
I really can’t tell you how excited I am about this. Yes, I have played EQ2 twice and given up both times because something didn’t feel quite right, but the fact that I have two months to play without feeling pressured by a subscription fee to do so is wonderful. My goal is to get a character to 35 (or 50 or so if I start with one of my characters at 24 and 25.) I’m not sure that I’ll get there, but who knows, I could end up much further along than that even. The only online game that I’m seriously playing right now is Mythos, so this gives me another game to add to the mix, which is always nice.
Regardless of what I get out of this personally, I am really impressed that SOE went ahead with this. It must be incredibly hard “throwing away” all the money you would get from customers for the expansion(s) as well as two months of play, but on the other hand, if players were never going to come back in the first place, what have you really lost? Nothing. Hats off to you, SOE. I really hope this works out well for you for using such a bold strategy. Now if only I could patch in less than 16 hours… 
~Kanthalos
Overworld - Like It or Not…?
Well, as I said late last week, the new overworld patch for Mythos has been released. After they fixed one big problem, things have been pretty smooth, but how are people liking it? Most people are pretty glad to have it, and I’m in the same boat. With that said, I don’t feel that it made the game leaps and bounds better or made it seem like a completely different game. There are still a great deal of the same elements now as there were before, just with some modifications. I’ll dive in and hopefully you can follow along.
Many people say or claim that this is making the game much more like WoW, but this is actually pretty far from the truth. Yes, there is now an actually world that you can run around in, but this alone doesn’t make it a “WoW clone.” For one thing, WoW has the vast majority of its content outside, and a great deal of quests and activities to do outdoors as well. This really isn’t the case in Mythos, even with the new overworld. Almost all of the quests are still based around the randomly generated maps that you enter. I understand that the big emphasis was on getting this implemented smoothly and also that it is just a beta product, but what is the point in making this new improvement if you aren’t really going to take full advantage of it by implementing quests outdoors?
Also, the world is rather small which I don’t understand. To go from corner to corner of the map takes about 6-8 minutes, which should give you a rough idea of how big it is. Also, there are seven anchor shrines littered throughout the zone which you can teleport to and from, which means that you can be anywhere you need to be within 2-3 minutes of running from one of these anchor shrines. With that in mind, why not have things spread further apart with a bigger map? If transportation is still relatively fast and easy, why not make it so that getting from point a to point b take five minutes instead of two or three and have a much bigger map full of things to do? I guess this wouldn’t be so much of an issue for me if I knew that there were going to be 6-8 of these zones at release, but they’ve already said that they weren’t planning on adding more than three. Also, by the time they do have three zones implemented, my mind could completely change, but right now, I feel like Greenreach should have been bigger and more spread out.
Combat in the overworld is for the most part not necessary. The mobs are too spread out and there aren’t really enough of them to make grinding viable, so this basically means they are there almost solely for atmospheric purposes. However, there is the occasional champion running around that is worth killing to hopefully find a nice piece of gear. There aren’t an unique mobs or quests that can only be done in the overworld right now, though.
The map could use some more detail. The static dungeons that are there for quests don’t show up on the overall map unless you have a quest there, so unless you know where it is or happen to run by it and see it on your mini-map, then it can be tough finding certain locations. It’s not a big deal, as most of the time when you finish the quest there, you don’t need to go back, but if they are going to remain available for players to enter, why not have them show up on the map to find them?
Rune stones and rune gates are the new equivalent to random regular and epic maps. The major difference is that they don’t disappear if you or your party members all leave. You need to run back to the rune gate, but the last one opened will always be available to you. Once you are finished with one of these and want to use another rune stone, you simply click on the gateway and select which stone you want to use. There are four rune gates of different colors and likewise four sets of rune stones. The color seems to be an indicator of the level the stone is good for. Blue seems to be the lowest (1-6) with yellow and green (1-6, 3-16) in the middle and red (3-16, 14-26) being the highest. This leads me to believe that the effective cap for the game right now is about 30, not that this is all that important, but worth mentioning I think.
Combat is basically the same. They’ve made some alterations to pyromancer and bloodletter I believe, but I haven’t really checked them out. I went with my old blade breaker build for now, which I’ve gotten to level 17. No real changes there.
Stonehill is pretty neat now. It’s the only part of the world that has it’s own instance (other than the dungeons, obviously.)
I haven’t really gotten a chance to do any crafting other than a few of the quests. I hear it got a bit of an overhaul so I’ll have to give it a look later. I’ve been having enough trouble getting enough money to buy potions and charms that I don’t really have the money to buy materials for crafting right now, but I’m finally starting to save some of the gold that I’m getting along the way.
So there was an extremely choppy rundown of what I think of the overworld so far. Basically, I enjoy it, and I think it makes the world seem a little more visible and not so divided and chopped up. That said, I think there is a lot that needs to be done to make it more appealing and worthwhile. For instance, the zone should be quite a bit bigger, as it feels smaller than a WoW zone and there is only one right now. Also, the developers said that they created the world themselves, so why not put it to use? Why not add some quests and unique mobs and such to make it worth exploring? If these two things are done (especially the second) then I will be very happy with this change, but right now I’m pretty “meh” about it.
As I figure more things out about the changes, I’ll either write up new posts or mark them with a *.
~Kanthalos
Mythos Info
Last night at some point the overworld went live, but shortly after went back down for some fixes. Hopefully whatever they needed to fix will be done shortly, at which point I can get in and check it out. Whenever this happens, you can be sure that I will be letting you all know what I think of it. Keep checking in throughout the day, as I’ll be modifying this post once it’s back up.
~Kanthalos
XBox 360 and Long Weekend
As it is a holiday weekend and we just bought an XBox 360, your regularly scheduled posting will recommence on Tuesday. Kthxbye.
-Mrs. Kanthalos
Daily Quest #2
Well, some of the commenters on my Daily Quest #1 thought I should spice up my quests a little more, so that’s what I’ll try to do with today’s quests. I hope they satisfy. I actually wrote this first one about a year ago for another post I wrote about questing in general. Since I’m sort of re-using this one, I’m also including a second quest. Hopefully you’ll find them to be a bit more exciting.
Game: Any MMO with a fantasy setting.
Questgiver: N/A
Questgiver location: N/A
Quest Destination: N/A
Quest text: “Hero, please help me! The other day while I was out in the forest rummaging for mushrooms a band of goblins took me by surprise. I barely escaped with my skin, but that’s the least of my concerns. I had a ring inside a lockbox that I desperately need back.
I believe the goblins are hiding out in an old tower not too far into the forest. There were some big stones out behind the tower. If you are sneaky enough, you could trap them inside the tower by placing a stone in the front of the doorway. I have this explosive device here that I found a while back, but it’s of no use to me. Perhaps you can use it to burn that tower down and find my ring. I don’t have much to offer you for your services, but I can give you some of my best mushrooms. Will you help me?
Concise Instructions: Find the old tower to the east within the forest. Use the stones out back to trap the goblins inside before tossing the explosive up top to burn it to cinders. Depending on how well the stone protects the door, goblins may escape, and they won’t be happy. Be prepared!
How it works:
you find a dilapidated tower in the middle of the woods has been taken over by some goblins. Occasionally a patrol walks around the tower but eventually go back inside. If the patrol spots you, they would shout to the others and they would all charge you, forcing you to flee or fight. If things go well though, this won’t happen. A pile of hefty stones is laying at the back of the tower, which you can pick up and place in front of the door once the patrol walks back inside. You could then toss an explosive to the top of the tower, burning the goblins alive. If you don’t secure the door well enough they could burst through enraged and attack you dealing twice as much damage with only a quarter of their health, but if you secure it tightly, you can watch them jump from the top of the burning tower falling to their death. Once the tower burns down, you enter to find a lockbox containing the ring. Here’s where a dilemma enters. Either you can return the ring to its owner, keep it for yourself, or simply sell it. You could gain faction for killing the goblins, a nice ring to wear or sell, faction and an xp reward should you return the ring, and you’d get to watch a tower burn to the ground while goblins are falling from the sky! This shouldn’t even be that difficult to code either. LotRO has the ability to pick up, carry, and drop things as does Guild Wars so it’s already in games. Then you would just have to determine whether the stone adequately secured the door or not then they would break out or jump out accordingly. If you had more than one person, you could put multiple stones at the door to secure it better.
Reward: This depends on your choice. Either a ring, money for selling the ring, or a faction and xp reward from the owner.
This seems incredibly fun and interesting to me. You have an interactive quest where the better you perform the required action, the easier and more enjoyable the quest becomes. You also have a choice involved with three options, all of which could be equally appealing.
Here’s the second quest for the day.
Game: World of Warcraft
Questgiver: N/A
Questgiver location: Arathi Highlands
Quest Destination: Arathi Highlands
Quest text: “The dark iron dwarves has taken up residence on an outcropping near the Thandol Span. They are posing a problem to passing travelers, and we need to do something to stop them. Their choice for their camp site was poor, however, and it plays perfectly into our hands. I’m going to need you to destroy that bridge so they can never leave that place again! Your method of destruction is up to you. Should you not have a powerful ranged attack, I have this incendiary bomb that you can use to ignite the bridge. Let’s be rid of those dwarves once and for all! Should you feel the desire, you can destroy them at a distance once the bridge has collapsed.”
How it works: It’s pretty self-explanatory. You use a ranged attack of some sort to blow the bridge up so that they can’t use it to escape. Now my memory of this location is not crystal clear and I’m not currently subscribed to WoW, so I can’t check, but if I remember correctly, this location has no other means of escape but the bridge, which is the way I wanted it. Obviously, the bridge would need to reappear after so long so that the quest could be done again, as well as in the event that a player was out there when the bridge was destroyed. I think it would be pretty fun to blow up a bridge and trap a bunch of no-good dwarves. What do you think?
Obviously, this is going under the assumption that no other quests are tied to this location, which there are. A way to remedy this would be to re-word the quest text and make this the last quest in the chain, which wouldn’t be too tough.
So there are a couple more quests I’ve come up with that hopefully you’ll find to be a bit more interactive and unique. Let me know whether you like them or not.
~Kanthalos
Gambling in MMO’s: Why Isn’t There More of it?
Thinking back on Asheron’s Call yesterday, one of the things that came to mind was the casino. I won’t really go into the details of how it worked, because it was actually somewhat monotonous, however, it did make me wonder why gambling has played such a small part in MMO’s as of now. I think it would be a wonderful thing to implement into a game, as it provides a different sort of interaction, and allows the player to win some money or lose some money.
Granted, there are some reasons that immediately come to mind for why a developer might be reluctant to add gambling to their game. First of all, it could be seen as an unhealthy way of promoting addictive and gambling natures with people, especially younger kids. I hate to sound callous, but there many, many resources available to children on the net that do a much better job (not that this is necessarily a good thing) of this than an MMO could. Also, this is following the same argument that because you play GTA 4 you are going to go out and shoot the next person walking down the street. Yes, this is a slight risk, but it doesn’t mean that everyone shouldn’t be able to enjoy themselves at the expense of the very few. Perhaps parents could put a lock on their children’s account so they can’t participate. This might help to alleviate some of those concerns.
The next thing that could cause problems would be that the games were rigged in favor of the developers to try to take more money out of the economy or to keep from shelling out more money into the economy. This is the way gambling works, folks; The house always wins. They might have a lot of small and a few very large payouts every once in a while, but they are always going to end up ahead. Does that mean that we are going to refuse to gamble? Hardly, and why should we? As long as you only gamble with what you can afford to lose, then it can be a lot of fun.
How often are you sitting around in town either waiting for a group to form or just chatting with your friends? I’m guessing fairly often. Wouldn’t it be fun if you could run over to the bar and play a few games, and possibly come out a few gold richer? This is a great time-filler for when players are feeling a bit bored, need to pass the time for a while, or simply have some gold burning through their pocket.
Now for a few ideas that I would really love to see implemented in a few MMO’s. One of the things that really irked me in WoW was the fact that you couldn’t bet on the races in Shimmering Flats! Not exactly a game-breaker, I know, but I still think it would have been great. This was such a great feature to implement into the game, but they could have done much better. These are the kinds of things that make the world feel alive, but why not take them as far as you can go? Make it so there are seven or eight machines racing, all with different odds, but they all have at least some chance of winning. After all, those bleachers aren’t really getting any use right now so why not fill them up?
Also, what about an arena? This is actually sort of a two-fold issue for me. I would really love for players to be able to fight randomly generated monsters with each wave getting tougher and tougher than the last. On the other hand, how freakin’ awesome would it be to bet on a murloc fight? I hate those little things, let them kill each other! DIE DIE DIE!! *breathes* So I really don’t like murlocs… I don’t think I’m the only one. Plus, if I can make some coin in the process, this would be the best thing ever.
So some gambling elements that I would like to see are races, arenas, and luck games. Are there any other games or events that you guys would like to see, or simply mini-games you would like to play in your favorite MMO? Are there any problems with gambling that I haven’t considered? Let me know.
~Kanthalos
Daily Quest #1
I am constantly considering quests and missions of all sorts, thinking up new and interesting quests that I would love to see implemented into a wide variety of MMO’s. After all, this is ultimately what I want to do as a career, so shouldn’t I be thinking about this stuff? In that vein, I decided that I would come up with a new quest of some sort each day (hopefully) for either a specific game or one that would fit any number of MMO’s out. Obviously, without knowing the inner-workings of these games, some of the details might have to be shifted a bit, but they provide a general idea of what would happen. I also know nothing about the format these would be written in, so bear with me. So for the first day, I’ll create two. Since I’ve been playing Mythos mostly, I figured I’d use it for my quests today.
Game: Mythos
Quest Title: Helping Raskin
Setting: Instanced
Quest Giver: Raskin
Quest Giver Location: Stonehill
Quest Destination: Stonehill Valley
Quest Text: “Greetings <player>! It is truly an honor to meet you. Stories of your valour have reached even my little ears, which is saying something. Adventurers such as yourself do much to ease the fears of the villagers here in Stonehill, and we can never truly thank you for that. However, there is a task I would very much like your assistance with. Though it doesn’t involve slaying any great beasts, it is something that I fear I cannot do myself. You see, I am in need of some wood to fix several holes in my home, but no one in town seems willing to share any with me, so I need to go find some. I know of an old windmill that no longer works that would likely have some wood that I could use. I don’t think it would be missed since the valley is swarming with beasts, anyway. If you could go destroy it and bring back five of the best pieces, I would reward you for your efforts.
Reward: Unknown
How It Works: The windmill spawns in a random location with X hit points. After dealing X damage, the windmill explodes, splintering into a mass of pieces. The pieces worthy of retrieving are labelled as such, and once enough are collected, “‘Helping Raskin’ complete, return for your reward.” flashes briefly across the screen.
Obviously this wouldn’t need to be instanced, it would just need to be set to respawn on a regular basis so it could be completed by more than one person.
Game: Mythos
Quest Giver: Unknown
Quest Giver Location: Stonehill
Quest Destination: Stonehill Valley
Quest Text: “<player>, as I’m sure you know, Stonehill Valley is teeming with monsters of all kinds, but there is one kind that is truly a nuisance: the Lazarus Beetle. They have the power to resurrect their fallen allies, and they must be stopped.
This is not all, however. Their wings have powerful magical properties. If you could bring me 15 of their wings, this would provide me with plenty of material to experiment with as well as craft you a fine cape. This cape can also be imbued with other properties, depending on what you need. If you desire to be stronger, a wolf’s frayed hide would be required. Should you seek great intelligence, the eye of a hollow would serve well. Greater dexterity could be achieved with the use of an imp claw. Bring me the wings and the reagent of your choice, and the cape will be yours.
Reward: 1,500 xp and:
“Lustrous cape of [modifier]” Stats: 8 armor, +5 to all attributes, with a +3 bonus based on the reagent.
How it works: It’s pretty self-explanatory. The creatures could of course be switched, and the drops could be things that they already drop, so they wouldn’t necessarily need to be a unique item used just for this quest, but the general idea is there.
I think the idea that you can alter your quest reward is one that hasn’t really been used enough. Yes, there are currently reward choices, but wouldn’t it be nice if there was a way to alter the stats to suit you better? Obviously they could simply offer more items, but I think this is better because something that you do (acquiring the reagent) has an effect on your reward.
So there are a few quests I thought up. More than anything, this is a way for me to get some of my thoughts out. I just figured they might be worth putting up here. Let me know what you think. I tried to make them pretty simple so they wouldn’t be all that tough to implement. Obviously, the windmill explosion would have to be created, but barrels and crates can explode, so the ability to do this is already there.
~Kanthalos
