Haven 2.0: "Hafen"

[loftar]

Certainly, but there is no such thing as "infinite" grind in Haven. There is, if anything, "indefinite" grind. And I don't see how something that is not indefinite grind can mean anything but a hard cap.

A game should not force its players to log off because they can't do anything else, at least not a good game.

Looking back at this, I'm not sure to what extent this argument is valid. Clearly, there are a lot of time-dependent processes in Haven apart from only curiosities: hide-drying, tanning, farming, and whatnot. Pretty much half the game is built around these processes, and I don't think they are a bad mechanic at all. There is of course a difference between these and curiosities in that they can be indefinitely parallelized, but I'm not convinced that that truly makes such an enormous difference.

[Potjeh]

Well I did just spend like five pages discussing the merits of capping the actual advantage granted by delta UA without capping UA itself

[Dzedajus]

Everyone who grinds in this game should permanently have their slider set to "tradition" since it's clear as day that none of you want to see any "change".

LOL!

Anyway I completely agree with Danno. I've been playing since the world with Ring of Brodgar up to the world before the curiosity system(which I must admit is a better alternative). Now I'm back but before I decided quit, the best time I've had with H&H was easily the period before we had an established village and everything wasn't a quality grind. I'll admit I've never been a super high level player, but that's not where I found the enjoyment. The fun came from finally finishing an ambitious project and interacting with other villagers.

The social aspect of H&H needs to be expanded upon, because the way it is encourages isolationism. Yes I know there is SOME interaction, but its abysmal for an mmorpg even with the small populations.

A while ago Potjeh said something that I believe holds true till this day;
High investment characters, permadeath and pvp. Pick two.

Danno really has a lot of valid points that others hardcore players reject instantly. And really probably the best part of HnH is building your place from scratch up until the point where you say "yep, i now have pretty much everything so lets start playing with numbers".
The infinite grind is like a hardcap for fun thats why all those titans never leave their walls because "I can grind a couple more stats but from this point it will take 2 weeks to gather enough LP" and this goes on and on.
Also those mmorpgs where edgy teenagers are sitting in one place being edgy and circlejerking are doing a better job at player interactions and socializing than HnH.

[loftar]

Well I did just spend like five pages discussing the merits of capping the actual advantage granted by delta UA without capping UA itself :roll:

Yes, but that's still indefinite grind, per se.

A while ago Potjeh said something that I believe holds true till this day;
High investment characters, permadeath and pvp. Pick two.

I've responded by that previously by saying that if that is actually true, we can just as well call this project quits and move on with our lives. Half the point point of making Haven is to make a game with those three attributes, and if that can be shown to be impossible, then I'm not sure I'm interested anymore. I don't think that has been thusly shown, however.

The social aspect of H&H needs to be expanded upon, because the way it is encourages isolationism. Yes I know there is SOME interaction, but its abysmal for an mmorpg even with the small populations.

This is probably true, but I'm not sure I've seen any suggestions that have held water in any good way.

[Potjeh]

Yes, but it's not mandatory. I don't really give a fuck about shitty features as long as they're not mandatory for actually playing the game to it's full extent.

[loftar]

Yes, but it's not mandatory. I don't really give a fuck about shitty features as long as they're not mandatory for actually playing the game to it's full extent.

In that case, it sounds like you're just saying that you suggest this because you want an implementation of it that in effect removes the mechanics of character progression and/or puts an effective hardcap on characters.

[Potjeh]

No, a hardcap on maximum advantage granted by grind. Grinding further can always increase advantage against people with a similar level of investment in character, because you're not going to be at that maximum against them. I really don't see why it's so hard to understand, because it was originally your idea (or it might have been Jorb's, I'm not sure).

[Duderock]

A while ago Potjeh said something that I believe holds true till this day;
High investment characters, permadeath and pvp. Pick two.

I've responded by that previously by saying that if that is actually true, we can just as well call this project quits and move on with our lives. Half the point point of making Haven is to make a game with those three attributes, and if that can be shown to be impossible, then I'm not sure I'm interested anymore. I don't think that has been thusly shown, however.

Maybe we are looking at things from a wrong angle. Are you interested in those attributes specifically or where they just a means to achieve something else? Maybe an emotion you want to evoke in players or something like that?

[Dzedajus]

The social aspect of H&H needs to be expanded upon, because the way it is encourages isolationism. Yes I know there is SOME interaction, but its abysmal for an mmorpg even with the small populations.

This is probably true, but I'm not sure I've seen any suggestions that have held water in any good way.

I think its quality grind fault. Most of the time to get into some group of players you need to have good stats and to be willing spend most of your time on doing tedious tasks if you don't have either of those well then too bad you won't play with them in their sandbox.
Want to be friends with some nearby neighbor? Sometimes he will think you're going to ruin his nodes and hes just going to wreck your shit.
This grind competition just drives away players further apart.

[loftar]

No, a hardcap on maximum advantage granted by grind. Grinding further can always increase advantage against people with a similar level of investment in character, because you're not going to be at that maximum against them. I really don't see why it's so hard to understand, because it was originally your idea (or it might have been Jorb's, I'm not sure).

Of course I understand it, and it's not like I'm opposed to it in itself, but that depends, of course, on the actual realization of it. What I'm saying is that, when you say that "don't really give a fuck about shitty features as long as they're not mandatory", it sounds like you keep suggesting it because you want it to be given a realization that makes character progression irrelevant to the point where you can ignore it. If this is not the case, then character grind is still effectively indefinite, which you explicitly state you want to avoid.

Also, this has also been mentioned previously, but I'm sure you must recognize that going too far on this issue creates a situation where the only way to grind "effective strength" is by mass-producing alts instead. If, per your suggestion, the current combat Delta were given a hardcap of, say, 2 or 3 or so, then that situation would obviously arise. Did you have any thoughts on how to combat that problem?