To stop alts and altocalypse

[Humps]

The first issue is more to do with the problems of permadeath and offline killing than anything else, which are two aspects that Jorb and Loftar have claimed not to be happy about.


How do you figure it's harder? Because it's not as simple as just adding PvE content/dungeons?

Yes this is retarded.

[Ai_Shizuka]

There are many flaws with the game design that H&H follows making it impossible to go large scale without as much effort as goes into large games like Mortal.
It's just part of the whole design that doesn't work on a larger scale.

It's called an Alpha.

[Delamore]

There are many flaws with the game design that H&H follows making it impossible to go large scale without as much effort as goes into large games like Mortal.
It's just part of the whole design that doesn't work on a larger scale.

It's called an Alpha.

No what I'm claiming is that the design behind HH is very hard to actually expand to a large player base, regardless of how much of an alpha it is.

[kobnach]

There are many flaws with the game design that H&H follows making it impossible to go large scale without as much effort as goes into large games like Mortal.
It's just part of the whole design that doesn't work on a larger scale.

It's called an Alpha.

No what I'm claiming is that the design behind HH is very hard to actually expand to a large player base, regardless of how much of an alpha it is.

That sounds right to me, just seeing how game play has changed as the population has expanded. I just don't have enough experience with game design to put my finger on the reasons why, other than the obvious - people behave very differently in groups that are small enough for all to all know each other (villages) compared to the way they behave in groups that are large enough to make most people anonymous strangers (cities).

[Potjeh]

I think the game will become well-suited for a larger playerbase when we get proper town management tools.

[Jackard]

I'm in the Mortal Online beta (multi-million dollar game using the UT3 engine) and they aim to give it basically the same gameplay elements H&H already has, except that H&H will have more freedom in worldbuilding.

hi~

[Ford]

I like how you left out the option of expanding the town area over the affected areas and instead only listed the hardest possible options.

True enough, I don't know why my town hasn't done that yet even though we have had big problems with griefers.

There are many flaws with the game design that H&H follows making it impossible to go large scale without as much effort as goes into large games like Mortal.
It's just part of the whole design that doesn't work on a larger scale.

That any sizable group can kill anyone else and ruin everything they're worked towards.

I think both games suffer from that problem. When the PVP rules say you can kill anyone anywhere won't most of the PVP be non-consentual? So far I've never seen consentual PVP in H&H (but i haven't played long and that's just me), just me getting murdered by griefers or town people murdering griefers- I've never seen an actual duel or battle. Same for Mortal, it's just a big FFA (so far, because guilds and parties aren't implemented). Why have it like this when only one person in the fight is having fun? Wouldn't it be better to have PVP in the form of arranged battles or duels only, where everyone has consented and are having fun?

The fact that it's alot harder to add content to a game like this than it is to the normal MMO type game.

How so?

Limitless growth for levels, so people can always get more powerful forever.

Truth.

[jorb]

No what I'm claiming is that the design behind HH is very hard to actually expand to a large player base, regardless of how much of an alpha it is.

Maybe so, is this a flaw? What, more concretely, are you referring to here? Which particular systems?

That any sizable group can kill anyone else and ruin everything they're worked towards.

Arguably. I don't think a game like this could be built without that being true to some extent, though. In part, some of this is due to an unbalanced combat system, which we hope to improve upon, and a slightly broken tradition/change mechanic, which is not in its final iteration by any standard. Also, this line of reasoning confuses potentials with actuals. A lot of people seem to get by just fine playing Harvest Moon.

It'd be kind of hard to find a mechanic that allows for both strength in numbers and balance between groups of different sizes. Disallowing any imbalance is also the equivalent of leaving the outcome of a conflict up to the roll of a die. If you're arguing against permanent death per se I am both surprised and unconcerned. I want the game to have permanent death -- if players don't want that then, by all means, play World of Warcraft.

There's also a more principal issue of logged off players having a hard time defending themselves and protecting their stuff. But with landmines and barbed wire implemented, that shouldn't be a problem.

The fact that it's alot harder to add content to a game like this than it is to the normal MMO type game.

If you contemplate how much content there really is in the game, with just the two of us working on it, I think you'll see that this is hardly the case. Most MMOs aren't built by two people in their spare time. If we were working on this full time... I don't think you'd experience any lack of content any time soon.

[Potjeh]

But with landmines and barbed wire implemented, that shouldn't be a problem.

I'm so building the Maginot line when we get this. I'm sure it'll work great