Bots and the nature of the game

[Ysh]

You control several units. Your units level up and have specializations. They are so meaningless to you that you give them crappy names, if not just numbers. You send some of them to die sometimes, because you have a full line of fighter alts, and that doesn't bother you one bit. Progress is considered more of a barrier than an actual part of the game, so you automate it with autocurio. You gather resources by the bulk with different chars. Then you expand to gather more resources. You build bases all over the map. Roleplay is laughed upon both in and out of the game. Do you remember coles’ old signature? He had like 15 clients open. And the devs just confirmed that they consider interplayer competition a priority. And in order to compete, you have to bot and own that many alts.

Look me in the eye and tell me this is more an mmorpg than an rts for you.

I do not have webcam. Have you ever see gameplay of Starcraft II? It is not remotely the same. You can call any MMORPG an RTS if you are multibox by this logic. You are looking at too high level. It is like if I say ''oh this Haven game is just like FPS game, I use mouse and keyboard to play and control man on screen.''

[ven]

I do not have webcam.

For fuck’s sake ysh that’s autism in the most literal sense of the word. Quit the fake troll persona already.

Game genres are fluid and you can argue that some elements are indeed shared between rpgs and rtss. The objective necessity of multiple chars and aversion to roleplay are not, as aren't the automation and the absence of meaningful progression. Besides, there aren’t many survival mmorpgs to compare with and that is the fucking point of my thread.

[dafels]

A few thoughts to continue the discussion of that other bot thread in another direction.

I'm always asking myself what kind of game this is. Officially, it's a MMORPG focused on survival and player-made content. In practice, the community's habit of using bots and alts makes it something else entirely. One could convincingly argue that it's really a RTS, and already on the way to devolve into a slightly complex MOB arena. It's common to see people with 8 combat alts and villages all over the map, self-sufficient lone hermits with 12 characters, murder alts, griefing alts, road-bashing alts, fake alts - just like a RTS.

I love when people overexagerate, this is a new level of retardness, goddamn!
I have done some light botting in legacy haven myself, but I was still better than the heavy botters(one example was the combat, which was more about your tricks and strategies than your stats that could be botted) even tho there was only a few since people that actually does such a thing as heavy botting and none were doing that on the way you described. People like to heavily overexagerate on this subject. I don't support botting and I don't care about the people who do it and I suggest you to do the same and I really hope these cancer spreaders that heavily overexagerate won't get to loftar's / jorb's ears and won't allow the game develop without having stupid antibotting measures and limits as the statcap which is a way to turn the game shit.

[Ysh]

I do not have webcam.

For fuck’s sake ysh that’s autism in the most literal sense of the word. Quit the fake troll persona already.

You ask to looking in eye. I can not do this with no camera. I assume you are sincere in this asking. It is my mistake I guess.

Game genres are fluid and you can argue that some elements are indeed shared between rpgs and rtss. The objective necessity of multiple chars and aversion to roleplay are not, as aren't the automation and the absence of meaningful progression. Besides, there aren’t many survival mmorpgs to compare with and that is the fucking point of my thread.

My point is that you calling this game ''an RTS'' is not sense making. Clearly people are playing this game ''like an RTS'' as you say despite ''better RTS games exist.'' Unless you are suggest these player are stupid irrational, obvious your premise is false. Why waste time to argue this distinction of genre? This is not useful. Drop this whole line of thinking and just describe what you want, why you want it, how to do it.

E.g. I think we can make player only play with one character. I think this is better because it will move game into more niche market so player has less alternative. I think we can do this by forcing all player to pay for each character with real live currency.

Do this so that people can discuss your actual point. Do not just make irrelevant bad point and then get mad when people disagree.

[ven]

A few thoughts to continue the discussion of that other bot thread in another direction.

I'm always asking myself what kind of game this is. Officially, it's a MMORPG focused on survival and player-made content. In practice, the community's habit of using bots and alts makes it something else entirely. One could convincingly argue that it's really a RTS, and already on the way to devolve into a slightly complex MOB arena. It's common to see people with 8 combat alts and villages all over the map, self-sufficient lone hermits with 12 characters, murder alts, griefing alts, road-bashing alts, fake alts - just like a RTS.

I love when people overexagerate, this is a new level of retardness, goddamn!
I have done some light botting in legacy haven myself, but I was still better than the heavy botters(one example was the combat, which was more about your tricks and strategies than your stats) even tho there was only a few since people that actually does such a thing as heavy botting and none were doing that on the way you described. People like to heavily overexagerate on this subject. I don't support botting and I don't care about the people who do it and I suggest you to do the same.

I can give you multiple examples for each one of those cases I mentioned.
Actually I'll give them to jorbtar if they want, won't ever post it publicly.

Like you, I don't care really. This is likely my last C&I thread. But I can't deny alting has a massive influence on the game. Even the updates have to revolve around the alt culture. And I can't even count how many times the devs have reluctantly shot down a good idea because alts would ruin it.

My point is that you calling this game ''an RTS'' is not sense making. Clearly people are playing this game ''like an RTS'' as you say despite ''better RTS games exist.'' Unless you are suggest these player are stupid irrational, obvious your premise is false. Why waste time to argue this distinction of genre? This is not useful. Drop this whole line of thinking and just describe what you want, why you want it, how to do it.

E.g. I think we can make player only play with one character. I think this is better because it will move game into more niche market so player has less alternative. I think we can do this by forcing all player to pay for each character with real live currency.

Do this so that people can discuss your actual point. Do not just make irrelevant bad point and then get mad when people disagree.

I don't call them irrational, but rather emotional. They play this game because they played it before and are attached to it. For me, the failure to retain new players confirms something like this could be true.

Mine is a business question, not a suggestion. If smarter folks on the IP couldn't push their ideas, what hope do I have? My question is whether it wouldn't be a better move to kill the alting and focus on the survival mmorpg aspect of the game. For the reason that,as rts games go, there are better alternatives, but almost no existing mmorpg matches haven as it's described on its about page.

[Ysh]

I don't call them irrational, but rather emotional. They play this game because they played it before and are attached to it. For me, the failure to retain new players confirms something like this could be true.

Two sides of same coin I think.

Mine is a business question, not a suggestion. If smarter folks on the IP couldn't push their ideas, what hope do I have? My question is whether it wouldn't be a better move to kill the alting and focus on the survival mmorpg aspect of the game. For the reason that,as rts games go, there are better alternatives, but almost no existing mmorpg matches haven as it's described on its about page.

I think it is mistake to muddy waters by bringing up whole RTS arguing at all, as see by our disagreeing before. I think if you approach from a business standpoint it can be hard to justify ''make change that alienate current playerbase and make it against rules for them to pay you more money (sub fee for multiple account).'' But then again, I think for business standpoint this game is far too niche for it to be worth risk of doing. This is sort of game that I think can never have mainstream appeal.

I can say though that I do not like to play other RTS game, but I do like to play this game with alt. I would be sad to see some system added to make it only able for having one character.