Game Development: Surveyor's Delight

[animary]

"...they seem happy with the state of their game."

Exactly. Since the operative word is "their". This is their baby, they have worked on it for years, no big development team, just them; thus it is what they want it to be. They listen to players and if something is proposed that fits their view of the game it will be incorporated; but no matter what it is, if it is not congruent with their concept of their game it won't happen.



"Honestly steam release if biggest missed opportunity of their life."

Many predicted that. Steam players came here with none of the things they are accustomed to - walkthroughs, tutorials, threads in Steam forums, and no idea of the rampant violence and aggression in this game. I've never seen so many abandoned HFs so early in the world. Two major demoralizing factors - dropped into a deadly world with no idea what to do or how to do it, and spending days building your first camp only to have it trashed by some griefer.

With more knowledge of the game and a little experience it isn't as deadly as we make out at times (in the past five worlds I've only been attacked by players three times, KO'd once; by comparison I've been killed by animals four times, a cave-in once, and drowning once). There should be a good starter tutorial delineating the basic "do and don't" of the game and briefly describing what you should concentrate on accomplishing your first days; at least newcomers (who read this) wouldn't just appear in the world and think "what now?" (exactly how most of us started here, but that was years ago, it's a different gaming world now).

[dafels]

Where is the new world that was supposed to been live last month, late september won't cut it

[Genabeton]

Honestly steam release if biggest missed opportunity of their life. If they would actually listen to community they would've understand that. Steam release was perfect for dividing audience, you let people choose between "Seasona' PvP server with like 3-4 months of lifespan and forever PvE server. Because most of people who were insterested in game ( not PvP we have enough of PvP games) died in first 2 months to snail and never returned to the game. That's such a loss for a game health. Now even people who stayed for long enough like me lost all interest in the game. Because what can actually revive it now? Another FEP rework? WoW no thx. Another siege rebalance? Wow who cares.

PvE server? Did I hear right? So you are against violence, war and death, and that's great. But you want to rip out the still beating heart of this game and trample it. You should work a little on your personal level of intelligence, charisma and stealth. And I assure you, all the problems of PvP will pass you by. Of course, if you don't want the opposite. I am not a supporter of violence and I am not bloodthirsty at all, but the awareness of such possibilities in both directions is certainly exciting, contributes to deep immersion, so to speak. Let me remind you, friends, this is not just a game with PvP capabilities. This is a serious hardcore game close to real life, IMHO. And this game is simply magical. Please, do not touch it with your wet hands.

[animary]

"But you want to rip out the still beating heart of this game and trample it. You should work a little on your personal level of intelligence, charisma and stealth. And I assure you, all the problems of PvP will pass you by."

The universal cry of the PvP supporters. I'm not against PvP per se, it is the unprovoked attacks, the attitude of "look! there's another player, let's go kill him!", to which I take exception. Those people who brag "I love to hunt sprucecaps", and the greifers who ride around destroying anything they can; all to the detriment of attracting and/or retaining new players. Yes, murder has been a part of every human society over the ages, but ...there have always been repercussions; no society has ever endorsed murder as this game does.

I've known people who've been playing for years who, once they have a secure farm/village, never go exploring or questing, the only time they leave is to take a road to a thingwall to go to a well or market (and the way things are developing we shall soon be deprived of those).

But the PvP crowd is quite vociferous and will shout down any proposals to modify the system ...unless it is to make it more deadly. So instead of a cooperative world where you get to know your neighbors this game fosters paranoid recluses hiding behind their walls and hearthing home at first sight of anyone else on teh map.

PvP in this game, as it is, will never "pass you by". You just do your best to stay away from it.

[Neppy]

It's time to make Salem 2.

[mvgulik]

But the PvP crowd is quite vociferous and will shout down any proposals to modify the system ...unless it is to make it more deadly. So instead of a cooperative world where you get to know your neighbors this game fosters paranoid recluses hiding behind their walls and hearthing home at first sight of anyone else on teh map.

Hmm. Sound a bit like real life to me, considering whats going in the self-proclaimed, and "O please, God bless us", leading country in the world.
(and some other self-proclaimed "do-gooder" countries/leaders too of course. Who in his right mind would pick those kind of leaders/parties. O wait ... we, the real idiots(/voting cattle), do. lol.)


... Yea. MANkind can't seem to help itself from polluting(/destroying/eradicating/etc,etc,etc) wherever they go, in there everlasting pursued for more, more, more (money, power, land, resources, etc,etc,etc) ...

(Astrum): The Invisible wall (30min, 30 juni 2025, Bad video-page sub-title btw.)

Not worried yet ... Your probably going to be, one way or an other.
(not that I really care anymore. It just amaze me how primitive, in essence, mankind still is. Lingering evolutionary side effects I guess.)

[mvgulik]

Decade old siege thoughts.

Everyone can say/claim something is easy. That's of course the easy, and save, part. Proofing it ... well, that's "Something Completely Different".

[SnuggleSnail]

Decade old siege thoughts.

Damn that's actually so crazy to me. I wish I were around 10 years ago instead of now. They seemed so willing to cater to interesting brutal stuff happening. Now it's a given that nothing interesting will happen after the world is 6-8 weeks old. Maybe 5 real people die per world, and still every thread is about how everything is too harsh. Makes me a little sad.

I desperately want somebody to break my ankles and fuck me bloody, then to spend the next 6 months trying to get them back, but we're just out here hitting each other with pool noodles

[Genabeton]

"But you want to rip out the still beating heart of this game and trample it. You should work a little on your personal level of intelligence, charisma and stealth. And I assure you, all the problems of PvP will pass you by."

The universal cry of the PvP supporters. I'm not against PvP per se, it is the unprovoked attacks, the attitude of "look! there's another player, let's go kill him!", to which I take exception. Those people who brag "I love to hunt sprucecaps", and the greifers who ride around destroying anything they can; all to the detriment of attracting and/or retaining new players. Yes, murder has been a part of every human society over the ages, but ...there have always been repercussions; no society has ever endorsed murder as this game does.

I've known people who've been playing for years who, once they have a secure farm/village, never go exploring or questing, the only time they leave is to take a road to a thingwall to go to a well or market (and the way things are developing we shall soon be deprived of those).

But the PvP crowd is quite vociferous and will shout down any proposals to modify the system ...unless it is to make it more deadly. So instead of a cooperative world where you get to know your neighbors this game fosters paranoid recluses hiding behind their walls and hearthing home at first sight of anyone else on teh map.

PvP in this game, as it is, will never "pass you by". You just do your best to stay away from it.

On the other hand, it may look like this: "look! there's another carefree, unburdened by intelligence player, neglecting the advice of experienced players, let's go kill him!" Although I also consider these impatient bloodthirsty maniacs fools, they only tear out the young shoots that have appeared, instead of waiting for the harvest to gain mass and ripen. But in any case, be that as it may, these are the problems of each person in particular and all of humanity as a whole. But not of any particular community and certainly not the problem of this game.

[MaltGrain]

Decade old siege thoughts.

• That players actually make progress in a siege is not too important. What is important is the ongoing threat of being able to do so if not prevented or counteracted, and the ability to always/often act toward furthering this goal. As long as both sides have to/are able to continously take meaningful action on account of the siege, it does not matter whether either side actually breaks the other, but in fact a protracted siege is highly desirable. This in itself creates activity and a sense of action and purpose.

This has completely reconceptualised sieging for me, it sounds great. To think that building a Battering Ram takes only a few hundred LP and low material requirements? A Thing Challenge only need 5 bars of any metal. These mats are lying around all over the place at the moment.
Why isn't everyone using them? There're tons of abandoned claims that're just running out their authority before decaying open. Those could be yours and all of a sudden the stat and gear gap is closing between you and the top Hearthlings.

• War and siege should be a collection of informal, localized states, rather than formal and global. Formal states create distinct interfaces between states that are prone to manipulations, workarounds and exploits. The game devolves to a game about those states, rather than a game about siege warfare.

What does this mean?

I desperately want somebody to break my ankles and fuck me bloody, then to spend the next 6 months trying to get them back

Did you like the Stephen King book and film Misery?