Granger wrote:The reasons (gameplay wise) that makes me prefer actual movement through the world is that teleportation:Surely it's convenient to be able to hop over to the (literally) other side of the map to buy a loaf of bread to go with the stew that is currently cooking in the cauldron.... but I really question this ability to be fun or the experience of such a trip being rewarding.
- removes encounters (as you skip everything on your path) which effectively makes the world feel way more lifeless than it actually is
- removes locality by folding the effective map dimensions down to a tiny fraction, making it irrelevant where you an other things are located
- removes the feeling of accomplishment when travelling
To be sure, I don't want to pretend that I actually disagree with your arguments. Fast-travel is a slightly problematic mechanic even in single-player games to me, for a number of reasons. All the same, however, the following counter-arguments are also true:
- "Encounters" with people zipping past at unnatural speeds and never responding to you because they have their client in the background anyway are hardly much more meaningful than not having them to begin with.
- The main effect of having to dedicate an afternoon to go trade at the CF is that the CF will always be mostly empty.
- To the extent that this travelling mechanic is handled automatically by the game while you don't have to look at the client, there is hardly much of a feeling of accomplishment to it anyway.