Petition to Jorb for Stat Caps

[MagicManICT]

Every thing has an ''end.'' For game this is when you have seen and experience all of the content in this game.

That's what, 3, maybe 5 days? I know it was less than 24 hours in EVE. After that first day in EVE, it was up to me on how to ride the roller coaster that is player driven content. And that's the point Lunarius is trying to make: content in Haven is about what the characters do to each other, not about finding another boss to raid.

For games that are about "experiencing content" I've put thousands of hours in WoW over the years. There are still areas I haven't cleared all the content in. I get too busy gear grinding in dungeons and raids or playing grab ass on PvP servers... or in other words, I suppose you could say "making player driven content," and in a theme park game!

We can have what is considered "end game" content as well as player driven drama. Being a sand box game doesn't make it mutually exclusive from theme park experiences.

[Ysh]

Every thing has an ''end.'' For game this is when you have seen and experience all of the content in this game.

That's what, 3, maybe 5 days? I know it was less than 24 hours in EVE. After that first day in EVE, it was up to me on how to ride the roller coaster that is player driven content. And that's the point Lunarius is trying to make: content in Haven is about what the characters do to each other, not about finding another boss to raid.

For games that are about "experiencing content" I've put thousands of hours in WoW over the years. There are still areas I haven't cleared all the content in. I get too busy gear grinding in dungeons and raids or playing grab ass on PvP servers... or in other words, I suppose you could say "making player driven content," and in a theme park game!

We can have what is considered "end game" content as well as player driven drama. Being a sand box game doesn't make it mutually exclusive from theme park experiences.

You can not see all EVE content in 24 hours, not even close. This I think will imply that you can fly every ship in game (or at least one of each class/role/size or some thing like this) and participate in every type of activity in game. But yes, I do agree that these are not mutually exclusive idea. I think any game that is good will have some element of ''themepark'' and ''sandbox.'' In general I think Haven is forced to lean more heavily on this sandbox type content. Two man development team cannot satisfy lust for content of player. Not even big money company Blizzard can produce WoW content faster than player can consume it. But on other side of coins I think this is not excuse to say ''it do not matter what developer does, since player must make all content anyway.'' Developer can and should add mechanism to assist player in creating this content.

[Lunarius_Haberdash]

u never said y end game is toxic

Your reading comprehension is impaired then. It is toxic because it breeds a tendency to think about design in ways that are counterproductive and even damaging to a game without a victory condition. Is that clearer?

[xdragonlord18]

u never said y end game is toxic

Your reading comprehension is impaired then. It is toxic because it breeds a tendency to think about design in ways that are counterproductive and even damaging to a game without a victory condition. Is that clearer?

wtf no that isnt clearer ur writing competence is whats impaired what ways of thinking does it cause how r those ways of thinking counter productive or damaging 2 a game without a victory condition my little brother explains things better than u and he cant even tie his own shoes

[Lunarius_Haberdash]

In general I think Haven is forced to lean more heavily on this sandbox type content.[/spoiler] Two man development team cannot satisfy lust for content of player.

If you think Haven is *forced* to lean on this kind of content I suspect you vastly misunderstand Haven's purpose and the goals of its developers. Haven is not meant to be a theme park game, it does not have theme park elements (though the addition of quests smack a little bit of that ride, but is not implicitly a part of theme park style games.). Dungeons are dangerously veering in that direction, but again are not implicitly theme park rides.

Haven is a Sandbox style game by deliberate choice, intention, and design. The trick the developers have, in my opinion, is producing content that will, in turn, develop into emergent content. I'm not quite sure that the presence of coins in the game counts, but I suspect that since there is no point during the game where coins are REQUIRED for trade purposes that our use of them and the markets that result from them count. We don't have to have a Community Faire (I rather wish we didn't), each village could be a competing market of its own, but we as a community developed the Community Faire instead. This was not planned, not designed, and not required by the creators, it happened because of other elements of game design.

A theme park ride puts you on rails... Haven and Hearth does not put you on rails.

Theme Parks need an end Game for what to do once you've finished all the rides.

There are no rides in Haven and Hearth except the emergent gameplay we produce as members of its community.

Therefore End Game development is a poor direction for the developers to choose.

The arguments against stat caps are largely based in the desire for there to be something to do during this 'End Game'. If all you do is grind for stats, kill things, and push quality as far as it will go? I feel like you're missing out on a huge part of the game experience that is richer, deeper, and more nuanced than simply pushing numbers.

Community efforts, political strife, moments of heartwarming support and soul-crushing defeat are all so much more of a game than just pushing numbers. I'm not saying that PvP and number grinds are, in and of themselves, bad things. But far more important is what the actions of the people pushing these numbers and engaging in PvP produce in the way stories shared later.

If we are to see this game truly flourish and reach its potential, we need to stop this incessant obsession with "End Game". We need to turn our minds to everflowing threads of emergent behavior based on interesting and engaging content and instead look for ways that will keep the world growing and evolving whether numbers grow or not.

Haven and Hearth is only mechanically a game of numbers, experientially it is one of the most interesting social experiments I've ever had the pleasure to be a part of. "End Game" content design will just turn it into every other MMO, and that is a sorrow I could not bear to see visited on it.

We have enough traditional game design. Jorb and Loftar seek to break that mold, and do so with regularity... If you're looking for the same old game, you might need to look somewhere else. If that's what you keep expecting this to become with your "End Game" obsession, then you're part of the problem plaguing it, not the solution.

Stop talking about End Game, and start talking about how and why stat caps are good or bad for long term gameplay.

If "Nothing to do once we hit cap" is your answer, it's time to rethink how you play.

wtf no that isnt clearer ur writing competence is whats impaired

I apologize for the ad hominem, that was unseemly of me. End Game content focuses around "what do we do to keep players playing when they've done all there is to do." That is a dead end, there will always be "nothing more to do" after a certain point. Instead, consideration needs to be focused on "content that drives emergent gameplay", tools for the players to do things WITH in potentially interesting and unexpected ways, not things for the players to DO and complete. End Game content you have to reach, the other kind of content is an integral part of the way the game is played and typically doesn't jump out and say "do this."

Gilding is, perhaps, an example. It is a tool we can use that is available to us at every stage of the game, and has resulted in strategies of how to utilize this tool. It created trade options for this equipment, balanced against the possibilities of recycling, gilding song, and other options. There were a million different things that came out of this implementation that were not theme park, they were yet another tool for us to shape our game experience with.

Dungeons, on the other hand, were an example of "End Game Content". They were a thing for us to encounter, deal with, and leave with loot. This is typical of theme park End Game content. New challenges to overcome deliberately coded instead of new elements of gameplay introduced that produce effects that go beyond the scope of mere design and number crunching.

Yes, gilding involves a lot of number crunching, but it also affected character design, trade negotiations, importance of resources, etc. This is good game design, the other is a cheap ride on a roller coaster.

[Ysh]

In general I think Haven is forced to lean more heavily on this sandbox type content.[/spoiler] Two man development team cannot satisfy lust for content of player.

If you think Haven is *forced* to lean on this kind of content I suspect you vastly misunderstand Haven's purpose and the goals of its developers. Haven is not meant to be a theme park game, it does not have theme park elements (though the addition of quests smack a little bit of that ride, but is not implicitly a part of theme park style games.). Dungeons are dangerously veering in that direction, but again are not implicitly theme park rides.

Haven is a Sandbox style game by deliberate choice, intention, and design. The trick the developers have, in my opinion, is producing content that will, in turn, develop into emergent content. I'm not quite sure that the presence of coins in the game counts, but I suspect that since there is no point during the game where coins are REQUIRED for trade purposes that our use of them and the markets that result from them count. We don't have to have a Community Faire (I rather wish we didn't), each village could be a competing market of its own, but we as a community developed the Community Faire instead. This was not planned, not designed, and not required by the creators, it happened because of other elements of game design.

A theme park ride puts you on rails... Haven and Hearth does not put you on rails.

Theme Parks need an end Game for what to do once you've finished all the rides.

There are no rides in Haven and Hearth except the emergent gameplay we produce as members of its community.

Therefore End Game development is a poor direction for the developers to choose.

The arguments against stat caps are largely based in the desire for there to be something to do during this 'End Game'. If all you do is grind for stats, kill things, and push quality as far as it will go? I feel like you're missing out on a huge part of the game experience that is richer, deeper, and more nuanced than simply pushing numbers.

Community efforts, political strife, moments of heartwarming support and soul-crushing defeat are all so much more of a game than just pushing numbers. I'm not saying that PvP and number grinds are, in and of themselves, bad things. But far more important is what the actions of the people pushing these numbers and engaging in PvP produce in the way stories shared later.

If we are to see this game truly flourish and reach its potential, we need to stop this incessant obsession with "End Game". We need to turn our minds to everflowing threads of emergent behavior based on interesting and engaging content and instead look for ways that will keep the world growing and evolving whether numbers grow or not.

Haven and Hearth is only mechanically a game of numbers, experientially it is one of the most interesting social experiments I've ever had the pleasure to be a part of. "End Game" content design will just turn it into every other MMO, and that is a sorrow I could not bear to see visited on it.

We have enough traditional game design. Jorb and Loftar seek to break that mold, and do so with regularity... If you're looking for the same old game, you might need to look somewhere else. If that's what you keep expecting this to become with your "End Game" obsession, then you're part of the problem plaguing it, not the solution.

Stop talking about End Game, and start talking about how and why stat caps are good or bad for long term gameplay.

If "Nothing to do once we hit cap" is your answer, it's time to rethink how you play.

I am not sure if you are reading what I am writing.

[Lunarius_Haberdash]

I am not sure if you are reading what I am writing.

Please edit your post down, no one needs to read my entire post twice. XD

'dynamic repeatable content'

You may be right that I missed this... I object to the term "repeatable", so why not just settle on "dynamic content". Or to use something my professional writing career dynamic "Evergreen" content. That which is always relevant and useful, kind of like gilding (though perhaps not once you've become a monster, a problem all its own)

[Ysh]

I am not sure if you are reading what I am writing.

Please edit your post down, no one needs to read my entire post twice. XD

'dynamic repeatable content'

You may be right that I missed this... I object to the term "repeatable", so why not just settle on "dynamic content". Or to use something my professional writing career dynamic "Evergreen" content. That which is always relevant and useful, kind of like gilding (though perhaps not once you've become a monster, a problem all its own)

Really, I think you and I are saying similar thing, just using different word. In general it seem to me that you are treating all of the men here as adversary! But I think every one here is just trying to think up some good thing to help the game. I would say it is not controversial to say that this ''evergreen'' content is best content that can be added to game. If the men wanted to play these themepark game like WoW then there is plenty of option on the market for this, but instead the men stay here to play this game. This suggest to me that these men do not want to play WoW. I do not think the men asking for ''end game'' content are asking to make this game like WoW. I do not think ''end game'' is word that implies ''themepark.'' In context of sandbox game like this ''end game'' is referring to this notion of ''evergreen.'' It is my opinion that your interest is better served to not wage campaign to try and stop the men from using these phrase ''end game content,'' because I think this is common term used in other games to talk about this idea of ''evergreen'' content. Instead I will rather look at meaning of what the other men try to say, instead of focus so much on words they will use.

[xdragonlord18]

I apologize for the ad hominem, that was unseemly of me. End Game content focuses around "what do we do to keep players playing when they've done all there is to do." That is a dead end, there will always be "nothing more to do" after a certain point. Instead, consideration needs to be focused on "content that drives emergent gameplay", tools for the players to do things WITH in potentially interesting and unexpected ways, not things for the players to DO and complete. End Game content you have to reach, the other kind of content is an integral part of the way the game is played and typically doesn't jump out and say "do this."

Gilding is, perhaps, an example. It is a tool we can use that is available to us at every stage of the game, and has resulted in strategies of how to utilize this tool. It created trade options for this equipment, balanced against the possibilities of recycling, gilding song, and other options. There were a million different things that came out of this implementation that were not theme park, they were yet another tool for us to shape our game experience with.

Dungeons, on the other hand, were an example of "End Game Content". They were a thing for us to encounter, deal with, and leave with loot. This is typical of theme park End Game content. New challenges to overcome deliberately coded instead of new elements of gameplay introduced that produce effects that go beyond the scope of mere design and number crunching.

Yes, gilding involves a lot of number crunching, but it also affected character design, trade negotiations, importance of resources, etc. This is good game design, the other is a cheap ride on a roller coaster.

fundamentally their isnt much difference between dungeons and a system like gilding they both add content to the end game i would even b inclined 2 agree that gilding is the better system however they r both still examples of end game content they both give players who have completed or conquered most things in the game something 2 do

[Lunarius_Haberdash]

fundamentally their isnt much difference between dungeons and a system like gilding they both add content to the end game i would even b inclined 2 agree that gilding is the better system however they r both still examples of end game content they both give players who have completed or conquered most things in the game something 2 do

If you can't see the clear difference between Gilding and Dungeons I don't know how to help you. They have absolutely nothing in common in relation to types of content. Gilding is available at the start, is important at the start, and remains important at essentially every relevant point in the game. It remains similarly difficult to achieve well-gilded items at most points of the game past the earliest stages, and these gilding remain relevant throughout. People keep trying to achieve that 'next great gild'.

Dungeons take time to become accessible, enter a period where they're approachable, and then reach a point where defeating them is trivial (in the balanced ones) or damn near unbeatable (from the reports I've heard from the Titans). Once balanced they will become like Mammoths and Lvl 5 Trolls, easily tanked without much concern or risk. The resources you receive from dungeons, mammoths, trolls, etc all become relatively unimportant once they're trivial to obtain.

These two things have nothing in common, aside from the fact that there are gildings you can only get from dungeons. I don't know how you can consider them anything like 'the same'.

Instead I will rather look at meaning of what the other men try to say, instead of focus so much on words they will use.

What they say is shaped by the words they use, as is the mode of thought that accompanies it. This is why I focus on it, because I keep hearing the same arguments, and they almost inevitably focus around 'we need stuff to do at the ennnnnd'. Meaning they're still thinking about the game as having a beginning, a middle, and an end. As long as that thought is driving them, they're going to keep suggesting similar results to those already being achieved.