Gamerescape Interview: Summons, Chocobos, Train Tracks and Rocks

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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I'm totally fine with some combat utility (a few monsters with attacks that could be evaded or mitigated by jumping). I mainly want jump for more freedom of movement. Jumping up and down cliffs (% based fall damage depending on height fallen to prevent abuse), perhaps puzzles that benefit from it (e.g. jump on a switch that stepping on isn't good enough for), etc.

I'll honestly accept any use for jump, though I can understand limiting it's functional capability to appease jump-haters. I don't want a ridiculous mario jump, but I would like it to be useful in ways that it is useful in real life.

The things I'd like the most are to be able to jump down from platforms in Limsa Lominsa in places where there is solid ground below.
Especially if it's functional, jumping should have a short, few seconds cooldown.

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Constant bouncing isn't appealing to me. It looks cowardly.

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Nobody wants constant bouncing, not even the most staunch jump supporters. You don't need to constantly bounce to leverage a combat use. Like I said, all it ineeds is a bit of a cooldown, and then you'll have to time your use of it when it is appropriate or not use it at all. Its use becomes a skill instead of a "spam this and win" button.

A little cooldown and there will be no incessant bouncing, just a useful tool that won't get out of hand. I'm really scratching my head at the "cowardly" comment. How in the world is jumping cowardly?

Just ignore the people complaining about bouncing, it's easily preventable. Nobody should be denied a useful feature just because a few people are afraid that some moron might act silly.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

A little cooldown and there will be no incessant bouncing, just a useful tool that won't get out of hand. I'm really scratching my head at the "cowardly" comment. How in the world is jumping cowardly?

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I was speaking specifically about PvP (in case you were confused). I don't like PvP with characters bouncing all over the place/away from each other.

Yeah, you totally misunderstood. ^^;

I prefer PvP where people face off against each other without bouncing/running away all over the place. So I was saying I don't want it used in PvP. I'd rather my opponent face me than run/bounce away like a coward.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

Just ignore the people complaining about bouncing, it's easily preventable. Nobody should be denied a useful feature just because a few people are afraid that some moron might act silly.

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I'm not sure who was complaining about bouncing. O.o
Or who you thought was trying to deny a useful feature.
Or what it has to do with my opinion that I don't like cowardly actions in PvP. XD

If my opinion offended you somehow, sorry? I guess...
Okipuit asked, I gave my opinion.

Like I said, putting a short cooldown on it prevents that problem.

I don't think it should be able to avoid regular attacks, I'm only thinking of using it to avoid ground-based attacks (example: the dig attack used by moles, which is already evadable by running anyway)

I feel like if jumping is going to be in the game, it needs to have some slight functional purpose. Otherwise, the only thing it would be good for is doing the one thing people against it hate most.

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I'd rather my opponent face me then run/bounce away like a coward.

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People are going to run in PvP. There's really nothing you can do about it. We all have a self-preservation instinct. I don't know of one game of any sort that has successfully eliminated running as a tactic, except in one or two cases by the lame method of making damage reduce your stats, which is unfun from a gameplay perspective because it takes a potentially hopeless situation and makes it even more hopeless. Unless jumping makes you move faster (it shouldn't) it would not be an advantage in situations like this.

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I'm not sure who was complaining about bouncing. O.o

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well, you were complaining about bouncing.

Could you PLEASE stop posting in purple? it makes quoting you a pain because it turns all my text after what I copied purple and I have to manually change it back. It's really unnecessary. Colors should really only be used for emphasis....

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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I would like jump to be used for the following:

• Jump around obstacles. [An obstacle course mini-game could even be implemented!]
• Reach previously inaccessible places (climbing: jump on a railing, then on crates, then on a tree branch and finally on the roof of a house.) [use these places to hide chests, NPCs, beautiful scenery and other fun things]
• Definitely make jumping mandatory for thorough exploration! [Players should have to use jump more as they move away from the main path. At even have to jump to reach new places to explore, otherwise inaccessible.]
  
• Evade some attacks (attacks on the ground, attacks coming out of the ground, performed around the legs, etc.) [FF6 had a "float" spell to avoid ground-abilities, why not jumping?]
• Monsters should jump to try to reach players above or below them.

I think jumping should be used for more than just avoid random obstacles on the ground. It has to be used to explore otherwise inaccessible parts of the world, town and dungeons. Jumping is an exploration feature and could be used for some special mini-games.
As for combat, the influence of jumping shouldn't be great. Only reduce damage from certain weapon skills, abilities and spells. In combat, the main purpose of jumping should be strategic placement.


Also, hopefully, the new version of the game will have an actual line of sight feature that prevent us from attacking from behind a rock, through a wall and other silliness like that. I've always found it stupid that my archer was able to shoot arrows through thick walls, rocks, cliff, etc. Jumping could then be used to momentarily have the monster in line of sight and perform an attack at the cost of accuracy.

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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I would like to see jump used to get over obstacles of a reasonable height. Currently, we slide up nearly vertical cliffs as if our characters had 0 mass, and it would look much better/cooler/immersive if these sorts of obstacles were dealt with by jumping instead. At the same time, cliffs and obstacles of equal height as these we just slid right over might suddenly stop us dead in our tracks. This sort of inconsistency is really annoying, and I would hope this is something jumping could be used to get around.

It could also be used to let us jump down heights that we wouldn't be able to get back up from without taking a detour. Having to manually jump when you were at the edge of such a cliff would prevent accidental drops. There should probably be a limit on how high stuff you could jump down from, cause I could imagine it looking ridiculous to jump down from height that is more than 4 times your character's own height. Then again, we did that all the time in FF11 without dying, so maybe it doesn't matter.

Maybe jumping while on a chocobo would allow higher and longer jumps than you would be able to do on your own?

In combat, maybe to get up on platforms in the combat environment? One thing is for certain, you can't use it to directly dodge ground-based effects or other attacks that would rely on split-second timing, unless you let the client deal with this client-side (could lead to hacks). If not dealt with clientside, this sort of timing would be pretty annoying to deal with for many players, because the network latency for players around the world often varies a lot. At least as long as servers stay in one single geographical location.

@nakiamiie

Good exploration ideas. I would like to be able to find stuff that would only be reachable by jumping as well.

I do hope you understand how hard it would be to avoid damage by jumping though, unless the jump made you stay in the air for several seconds. When you see an 1-2 second long attack animation and get ready to jump over it, the attack would already have been finished on the server before you were halfway through it.

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Originally Posted by Nabiri

I was speaking specifically about PvP (in case you were confused). I don't like PvP with characters bouncing all over the place/away from each other.

Yeah, you totally misunderstood. ^^;

I prefer PvP where people face off against each other without bouncing, running away all over the place. So I was saying I don't want it used in PvP. I'd rather my opponent face me then run/bounce away like a coward.

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Simply add a small accuracy penalty when attacking while jumping. It will still allow for strategic PvP battle tactics (get out of sight) but at a cost.

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Originally Posted by Nakiamiie

Simply add a small accuracy penalty when attacking while jumping. It will still allow for strategic PvP battle tactics (get out of sight) but at a cost.

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Nice, I like it. :3
So jumping at a cost, you'd have to think more about your actions. More strategy, yes please! :D

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Originally Posted by Nakiamiie

Simply add a small accuracy penalty when attacking while jumping. It will still allow for strategic PvP battle tactics (get out of sight) but at a cost.

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I like this idea.

As long as jumping is not an inherent combat mechanic. Like, a one-time thing (like how i've heard that you have to /kneel before Odin in XI to evade his Zantetsuken) is acceptable, but definitely not something that a player should worry more than once every Astral Era.

That said, if it is implemented in a tasteful manner (as others said, no weirdly irregular jumps, make the movement fluid and natural-looking), it's a pretty interesting exploration tool. You probably want to leave it only required for exploration achievements and easter-egg-y stuff since... This game has no need to end up turning into a platformer or something close to it.

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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You should use it in boss mechanics meaning like final boss type not just small ones " Raid Bosses " but as long as I can jump off mountains if I feel like I don't care what you do with it don't restrict it! No one likes invisible walls!!!

A puzzle where everyone has to jump to a platform and stand on it to unlock a door (I loved Garliage Citadel for that)

O also maybe like for events like on Easter dress us all like bunnies and make us hop on target on the ground to win a quest it would be so much fun/cute !

AND don't restrict it!!!! No invisible walls@!@

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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I would probably jump all the time.

I think it depends on what the developers want to do. If it's just going to be used to traverse terrain it could be done automatically or through the menu when reaching certain locations. But if you want platformer boss battles then perhaps assigning it to a button would be best. There are only so many buttons on the standard controller, but the inputs to target the micro menu and status effects on your character could be combined. (Micro Menu → Status → Micro Menu → ...) Then maybe stick jump to the trigger by default so people are less likely to be jumping all over the place.

That trigger button, man... It's effort! wwww

Please no combat use.

Please yes zone / exploration use, as long as you somehow set it up such that people can /follow you and if you jump, they jump as well to keep up with you.

Double please yes places you can only jump to with a buff active or while on a chocobo after it's been fed gysahl greens or whatever as shortcuts through zones, or scenic routes, although it's probably too late for that kind of idea to make it into zone design.

Also Lalafell should be immune to falling damage by virtue of natural resistance due to being punted constantly.

No jump required strategies for boss battles please if the server optimization isn't up to par. What I mean is I don't want latency being an issue where jumping on time is required because that'll just lead to people bitching.

I do like the idea of jump being used for things like getting across rivers or getting up to a treehouse or something. As long as it doesn't allow jump spamming. If there's one thing that ruins an experience for me, its a bunch of chars jumping twice their own height all over the place when not needed.
I know this is kind of picky but you asked for feedback so there it is. =D

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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Combat, getting around obstacles, cancelling spells [if toggled] would all be great. Mario type environments are also really fun in MMO settings.

If I wanted to play a platformer I would go play one.....

Like add a 30 second cool down for jumping or something. I know you are going to add jump, just make it where you can't spam it.... PLEASE!

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

well, you were complaining about bouncing.

Could you PLEASE stop posting in purple? it makes quoting you a pain because it turns all my text after what I copied purple and I have to manually change it back. It's really unnecessary. Colors should really only be used for emphasis....

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I wasn't complaining about bouncing at all. I find it odd you thought I was. (Perhaps you're on a witch-hunt to find anyone who appears to disagree with you?) I said it was unappealing to me in PvP.
Okipuit asked, I gave my opinion.
Do you consider all opinions contrary to yours complaining? Perhaps you're complaining because your opinion is contrary to mine then. :x

If you don't like the colour purple you really don't have to quote me now do you? I'm sorry colour offends you. Purple makes me quite happy, that's why I use it. I'm not sure what it has to do with the subject though.

Don't restrict it I really just want to post this endlessly right now, really you don't need to do anything at all with jump just don't restrict it if you have jump don't set invisible walls everywhere its a mmo world in one way or another it should be set up to eventually one day have flyable mounts with the way mmos are set up now a days, don't restrict yourself nothing ruins immersion more than a invisible wall that is what terrain is for!!

Don't want jumping to have any real effect in combat, but I'm fine with it being used as an exploration tool.

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Originally Posted by Teakwood

Please yes zone / exploration use, as long as you somehow set it up such that people can /follow you and if you jump, they jump as well to keep up with you.

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I like this idea as well. I wonder if it would be possible or if lag would mess it up. Would be super helpful though, I often have to run afk on follow.

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Originally Posted by Mirage

I would like to see jump used to get over obstacles of a reasonable height. Currently, we slide up nearly vertical cliffs as if our characters had 0 mass, and it would look much better/cooler/immersive if these sorts of obstacles were dealt with by jumping instead. At the same time, cliffs and obstacles of equal height as these we just slid right over might suddenly stop us dead in our tracks. This sort of inconsistency is really annoying, and I would hope this is something jumping could be used to get around.

It could also be used to let us jump down heights that we wouldn't be able to get back up from without taking a detour. Having to manually jump when you were at the edge of such a cliff would prevent accidental drops. There should probably be a limit on how high stuff you could jump down from, cause I could imagine it looking ridiculous to jump down from height that is more than 4 times your character's own height. Then again, we did that all the time in FF11 without dying, so maybe it doesn't matter.

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Great explanation!
I'd like to add that I support not having invisible walls to prevent us from falling off things. Why? Simple, battle placement strategies. When fighting a monster with knock-back abilities, you'd have to consider it and position yourself accordingly. This allows for more strategies and sometimes restriction in fights, making the whole combat process more interesting in certain situation. On more thing, the higher level you are compared to your opponent, the more chances you have to resist a knock-back (same for the monsters).

As for falling, above a certain height, we should start getting damages from falling. I know this is not an action game but it also doesn't mean the only source of damage should be combat-related. It could also be a cool way to finish off monsters by knocking them down a cliff.
In regards to cliff marking the boundaries of a map (the bottomless pits we see in Coerthas, for example): instant-death with no exp and drop for the monsters, and for the players, have them grab the edge and climb back up. The animation time to climb back up should serve as a penalty for being careless.
It's all about adding more strategies to combat in the game. It's a strategy game after all.

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Originally Posted by Mirage

Maybe jumping while on a chocobo would allow higher and longer jumps than you would be able to do on your own?

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Definitely! Great idea!!

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Originally Posted by Mirage

In combat, maybe to get up on platforms in the combat environment? One thing is for certain, you can't use it to directly dodge ground-based effects or other attacks that would rely on split-second timing, unless you let the client deal with this client-side (could lead to hacks). If not dealt with clientside, this sort of timing would be pretty annoying to deal with for many players, because the network latency for players around the world often varies a lot. At least as long as servers stay in one single geographical location.

@nakiamiie

Good exploration ideas. I would like to be able to find stuff that would only be reachable by jumping as well.

I do hope you understand how hard it would be to avoid damage by jumping though, unless the jump made you stay in the air for several seconds. When you see an 1-2 second long attack animation and get ready to jump over it, the attack would already have been finished on the server before you were halfway through it.

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Yes, I'm aware of it as well. I'm just hoping the problem will be solved in the future. I'm sure everyone would be happy to have less perceived lag. ;D

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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To traverse obstacles, poison pools, acid pools, flame barriers, fences, rocks, to reach higher ground, to mount pets, like jumping at them auto mount if they are standing besides you.

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Originally Posted by Hohenheim

...don't restrict yourself nothing ruins immersion more than a invisible wall that is what terrain is for!!

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Well said!
+10 for this.

No use in combat since a lot of people seem tetchy about it.

DEFINITELY jumping implemented for exploration purposes. I love that sort of thing, and I loved wandering around in XI for the sake of sightseeing. That said, it was annoying to not be able to jump over a low bit of rock/fencing/what have you. Same for hills. (Although this game has done a much better job of providing scaleable hills, major kudos for that.)

I have a few thoughts about keeping jump out of combat, while I'm at it.

- Disable jump completely while you're fighting something. Definitely.
- Disable jump while in active mode? Depends on what you're doing, since "active mode" generally translates to "poking a monster with your pointed stick of choice".
- Disable jump while you're being pursued by something? It's a valid escape tactic but it might not go with the flow of the game, since you can usually legitimately outrun mobs anyway. (At least from my experiences in the field.)

I know I know this is swtor related but I think they used the concept of jump in a fun way. The games had codex which were hidden in the zone so perhaps you could place hidden locations which one can jump to or areas which people have to make a leap of faith to reach like dropping down holes in XI lol. But basically what if they were to add in secrets which could be very cryptic to unlock but unlocking them temporarily opened up paths which you would have to jump to from certain location in order to reach.

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Originally Posted by Nabiri

I wasn't complaining about bouncing at all. I find it odd you thought I was. I said it was unappealing to me in PvP.
Okipuit asked, I gave my opinion.
Do you consider all opinions contrary to yours complaining? Perhaps you're complaining because your opinion is contrary to mine then. :x

If you don't like the colour purple you really don't have to quote me now do you? I'm sorry colour offends you. Purple makes me quite happy, that's why I use it. I'm not sure what it has to do with the subject though.

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Just a quick note, I like it when I see your purple posts. Keep it up! :D
Maybe I should start using colour too.... hmm. xD

Jumping puzzles would be a very fun addition to content.

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...don't restrict yourself nothing ruins immersion more than a invisible wall that is what terrain is for!!

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the one and only problem with this is the cities are not going to be significantly altered fir 2.0, and some invisible walls are likely necessary due to their design.

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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Puzzles, jumping over stuff like water, fire, holes etc using it to get to higher ground..it would be nice for it to have a use besides simply jumping :D

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Originally Posted by Soulfire

I would probably jump all the time.

I think it depends on what the developers want to do. If it's just going to be used to traverse terrain it could be done automatically or through the menu when reaching certain locations. But if you want platformer boss battles then perhaps assigning it to a button would be best. There are only so many buttons on the standard controller, but the inputs to target the micro menu and status effects on your character could be combined. (Micro Menu → Status → Micro Menu → ...) Then maybe stick jump to the trigger by default so people are less likely to be jumping all over the place.

That trigger button, man... It's effort! wwww

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We definitely need a jumping button, it's worth it! And with button re-mapping, jump-haters will be able to simply change it to something else and assign the jump button something more "useful" in their eyes.

Definitely jumping for exploration. Combat-wise, it would need to be worth it mechanics-wise. Like some people were saying, avoiding stuff like earthquakes would be sweet if there are no latency issues. Otherwise, the only real combat use I'd like to see would be for moving around/positioning around an arena in order to avoid certain attacks. For example, a boss could be fought in an arena that fills/drains with poisonous water, so you have to jump to higher levels to stay out of it.

Regarding what button to use on the gamepad, looking at the 2.0 screenshots we are getting an active mode toggle on the action bar so they could just get rid of that button on the gamepad.

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Originally Posted by Nakiamiie

Just a quick note, I like it when I see your purple posts. Keep it up! :D
Maybe I should start using colour too.... hmm. xD

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Haha, you're sweet. :3
There's some dude who uses this bright orange colour, it's so cheerful. XD Makes me smile every time I see it. (Have to highlight it to read it, but I do that anyways sometimes to avoid losing my place lol :x )

But on topic, you have some cool ideas about knock-back. Would be more exciting if we had to worry about being knocked off the edge of a cliff. (Also for some reason I pictured a boss battle on an island-like platform where we could be knocked off any side. :o ) And if they can fix lag/delay issues perhaps we could jump to avoid earthquake-like attacks that might knock us back. I wouldn't be to bothered by that I guess.

Have to agree, with FFXIV's current combat system jumping mixed into combat wouldn't work out too well. Now jumping should also be kept within a strong sense of realism there too. Because if people can leap to extreme heights then it almost makes the whole point of Dragoon moot if everyone can do their massive leap trademark moves even as say a BLM. So yes, implemented for small things sounds good, but keep it out of combat period.

Keep Jump out of combat, but have it come in handy when crossing terrain or moving through puzzle-like portions of dungeons, etc.

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Greetings,

We would like to gather your thoughts about jump and how you would like it to be used (In combat? Getting around obstacles?) so we can pass them along to development team. Please let us know what you think. Thanks!

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I normally don't post in the forums, but since the Devs are asking, I figured I would comment.

I don't think jump is necessary. However, since we are going to get it, or likely will get it, make it tasteful and useful. I have bad memories of playing WoW and the characters who just hopped around everyone. It was quite distracting. It is my experience that FF draws a different crowd than WoW, so the annoying (to me) jumpers may not be much of an issue in this game.

Jump should be useful, as many other ppl have said. I should have a reason or a need to jump.

Maybe the Devs could consider making Jump an unlockable ability. Something you don't get right off the bat at lvl 1. Need to do a quest, or be a certain level or GC rank to get it.

Getting around obstacles, cliffs, etc. That's it. I'd like it to be similar to XIII's jump feature where it could only be performed when it was needed by certain obstacles.

You know how i would love jump to be used,..... lets think about hidden areas, for example you can see a big bush where you can leap on a rock and leap and reach a plateau that leads to an hidden area where you can gather HQ materials or maybe even fight some NMs i mean all RPG have hidden areas why not add them to this but yea i think make them really well hidden would rock. Similar to how XI had areas where you would slide down and fall to some areas, i think making it just for aesthetics its kinda... but if it can has it uses I totally approve, now thinking bout fight~wise if the game where more action based i would see jump being useful in fight, maybe on instanced boss fights where the boss leaps to another area and you need to follow him avoiding traps or something that would be cool not in actual combat unless some1 comes with a superb idea for it but till them am not sure

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Originally Posted by Nakiamiie

I would like jump to be used for the following:

• Jump around obstacles. [An obstacle course mini-game could even be implemented!]
• Reach previously inaccessible places (climbing: jump on a railing, then on crates, then on a tree branch and finally on the roof of a house.) [use these places to hide chests, NPCs, beautiful scenery and other fun things]
• Definitely make jumping mandatory for thorough exploration! [Players should have to use jump more as they move away from the main path. At even have to jump to reach new places to explore, otherwise inaccessible.]
  
• Evade some attacks (attacks on the ground, attacks coming out of the ground, performed around the legs, etc.) [FF6 had a "float" spell to avoid ground-abilities, why not jumping?]
• Monsters should jump to try to reach players above or below them.

I think jumping should be used for more than just avoid random obstacles on the ground. It has to be used to explore otherwise inaccessible parts of the world, town and dungeons. Jumping is an exploration feature and could be used for some special mini-games.

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I agree with everything Nakiamiie is saying here. This is exactly how I hope jump gets utilized.

I'd also like to add that I hope that 2.0 implements falling damage when descending from a great height. It's fine if I can fall a long ways without getting hurt, but I know the dev team will want to draw the line somewhere. Yoshida spoke in one E3 interview about adding fences or walls of some sort when a cliff is too high. That might be fine in towns, but it would look artificial if out in the mountains every cliff above a certain height had some kind of "wall" preventing you from falling. (It would also ruin the view. :p)

Fall damage is a good way to set limits: no damage for falls from medium-high places, some fall damage from high places, and a lot of damage (to the point of death) from really high places.

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Originally Posted by Zyph

Traversing the environment is the only thing I'd like to see jump used for other than aesthetics (which I think is a dumb aesthetic but whatever).

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Enough said, full agree