The Art of Unlocking: Exploration and Crafting

I heard Pac-man had maps that you could buy from the vendor for certain places. I say, let's have to buy/earn maps to get into our Key Items inventory, and if we don't have those, we just go into the place not knowing where we are going, but unlocking shades of the map as we walk in.

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Originally Posted by Coldfire

What's wrong with copying something good from other games that does not break with the franchise but increases the quality/fun-factor?

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Pretty sure he was just failing at being sarcastic.

I do would love a recipe book, but i like the maps the way they are. If that's the case, you could leave only the raw map at start and unlock just additional info when you get to the camp the first time, like originally you seeing just the map and the safe road...when you get to a camp the camp and gates become visible and as you get the gates additional content, like local NPCs, road names, dungeon positions and other local map markers becoming visible.

I Like this idea. It loved exploring every bit of a map in the Remake of FFIV on the DS.
I would also like if when you complete a map 100%, you can obtain a reward from a map obsessed npc with a funny costume....or just a regular npc....

Also, when in a party, allow all party members to share map info until the party is dismissed. Any new map areas explored during the party time are added to your own map.

I also like the idea of a recipe book. you discover a new recipe? added to your book! a npc gives you a recipe? added as well!
i would also like to see recipe books that npc's sell. For instance... a book called "The amazing guide for hempen" would be sold by a npc at the weaver's guild. buying this book would automatically add several useful hempen recipes on your recipe book. However, the book (which you should be able to open and read) would not have every recipe that could be done with hempen. instead, at the end it would say something like: "experiment by combining different amounts of hempen cloth, hempen yarn and sheep leather to discover new recipes!"

Its a crazy idea... and nobody will probably listen but i think it would encourage experimentation and make crafting less mindless...

leveling up just for the sake of it its not very fun...

I also dislike automatically getting everything. I want a sense that my character is growing by learning spells, abilities, recipes and maps. I want there to be stuff easy to learn, super rare, and everything in between.

Thumbs up! I support this idea and there was a reason it was done this way with MMOs in the past, as it's already been stated, a motivation to explore.

As for recipes I would like to see a system where the more you craft the more recipes are discovered.

It would certainly seperate the novice from the expert, recipe book is a must have obviously.

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Originally Posted by KamikazeMan

If any of this has already been confirmed to be coming out, let me know.

For 2.0 I think maps should be blank and only filled in as we explore them. There's no sense of exploration since we already know where every mountain, body of water, cave, etc are located before we even take 2 steps in an area because our maps tell us where everything is. Because of this, I've never felt the need to explore and only get to where I need to go. I feel that exploration is a huge part of what immersion is all about and the more immersion we have, the better.

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I liked buying/questing/chest hunting maps in XI. Having all the maps from the start might have been a good thing with the huge zones in 1.0, but in the new 2.0 zones we should acquire them in some fashion.

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Originally Posted by KamikazeMan

In regards to crafting....could we a proper recipe book? A book that organizes all synths via category and level of difficulty.

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At least some recipes should be unlocked in some fashion and added to the book before they can be used. Adding recipes that can only be obtained through endgame events, and must be obtained to be used would be a fun addition for crafters. Adding in other conditions like locations/times and other conditions for crafting would be fun too. Think along the lines of the sort of epicness associated with making magic items in 'The Lord of the Rings,' or 'The Silmarilion.' The most powerful and valuable items should be hard to make, and not just acquired from a list of 100 identical items in the market wards.

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Originally Posted by Yelta_Sumasu

I also dislike automatically getting everything. I want a sense that my character is growing by learning spells, abilities, recipes and maps. I want there to be stuff easy to learn, super rare, and everything in between.

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I Agree ;)

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Originally Posted by Masamune1004

This game failed at launch partially because it tried to be different than every other MMO. Whether it's in another MMO or not is an invalid argument. It's a good idea, and it could add more exploration achievements since that area is a bit sparse right now.

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I believe this game failed at launch because it wanted to be too many things and ended up being none well enough. If it had remained true to its roots, courting its assured constituency, it would've had at least the love and devotion of the FFXI legacy crowd, while perhaps puzzling and alienating the WoW crowd. If, on the other hand, it had broken with legacy, but had gone on to become a standard MMO, within the Western tradition (yes, you might read this as cloning WoW,) it might have alienated those legacy players, but at least it would've stood a chance with the Western MMO/ Wow Clone crowd. At the end, and this was the fault of its producer, it ended up alienating both groups, and pleasing none. This without mentioning that even the failed and compromised, middle-of-the-road vision of said producer wasn't even cooked enough to be launched. Time wasted, resources misapplied, bad decisions... but fundamentally, an indecisive identity starting at the drawing table.

I have much better hopes for version 2.

R