Alpha First Look: Video 5 - Quests and Combat

[Jinrya-Geki]

Ya cause you cant do that when you do quest as a group of friends.

Am I the only one that remembers this is Alpha, things are still being made and the guy is lvl 20. . .

I am SURE that the grizzly 50 everything Vets will have PLENTY to do.

I could do it with a group of friends, but when I want to an experience party I like to do it with different people to make even more in-game friends.

[Ruisu]

I could do it with a group of friends, but when I want to an experience party I like to do it with different people to make even more in-game friends.

Why are people so desperate for friends? Just use content finder if you want to make new friends.

[Davy]

I have to admit, I did feel it to be a bit ... Tera-ish but I'll wait and see what other footage is released. It's Alpha and all and maybe showing the quest along with the battle footage gave me that feeling. If I saw one or the other, meh who knows?

My only REAL complaint in these videos; why the hell is the camera right up on the character?! Can I get a little zoom out FFS? I almost feel a bit claustrophobic. :-s

You sir can shut it!

Yours Truly,
Davy "Sing Bitch" Jones

[Biggs]

Here's the thing..

When you play a WoW-like MMO, level progression is always the same.

1. Go to Quest Hub
2. Obtain all Quest in the Area
3. Leave Quest Hub
4. Complete simple Quest Objectives listed above
5. Return to Quest Hub
6. Move to Next Quest Hub

This is mindless, repetitive and boring. Worse than that though, it makes people not want to read the Quests. They serve no purpose but XP. This severely degrades the enjoyability of the game. You might as well be doing an FFXI Party grind. At least in a party grind, your not alone.

The fix, is very simple.

1. Go to NPC Hub
2. Select One Quest
3. Proceed to Location
4. Complete simple Quest Objective
5. Something Dangerous happens
6. Quest Objective - Run for your life
7. Get Saved by something
8. Examine the Previous Danger
9. Get call on your Linkshell from Quest Giver
10. Investigate what caused the danger
11. Get lead to some cool location like a dungeon
12. Unlocks a new area
13. Complete a starter objective in the dungeon
14. Bring your Findings to the NPC

The Quests demonstrated in the Alpha video are the painfully boring cookie cutter WoW-Clone Quests that have destroyed this Genre by turning MMOs in to Single Player games. By simply adding plot twists and adding additional objectives to quests, you remove the boring NPC > Kill > NPC and create a Miniature story progression. Players will become immersed in the world and pushed to explore if the quest spontaneously pushes them away from their original destination and grouping will be Promoted by guiding players to group combat zones or boss fights.

NPC > Kill > NPC is the reason every WoW-Clone has failed to hold the attention of Modern Players.

You sound just POSiTIVE that will be the only option for the 100's of quests promised to us. NPC > Kill >Npc? There is NO possible way it could contain other quests (out of 100's of possible quests) that follow more along the format you laid out?
I bet you will still play this though and pay money to do so. So whats worse? A game designed after something that you yourself have stated is responsible for destroying the genre? Or someone that knowingly pays money to support said game they just "knew" was cookie cutter while at the same time condemning it?
You see how this is making people that say things like this look?

There is of course a third option. One that plays out in real time and is, IMO, whats going to happen. You will buy the game even though your SURE its a WOW clone (or try it anyway, you may not even pay a cent to do so being a vet) because, while the cynic in you is just SURE that its going to suck, the small little optimist in you that wants this game to do well, besides all the evidence you claim to provide to the contrary based on a 5 min alpha video, wants it to be good and do well. All thats left in this 3rd option is to see how things play out, but at least this way, if it doesn't go the way you want, you can then jump back on the forums and say I TOLD YOU SO for three to six months before moving on to something else. See you on here in april either way I guess man. Way to stand for something.

[Kyra]

Have really been impressed with the last 2 alpha vids, getting very excited for 2.0 now!

Seriously. Gamers are far smarter than this nonsense.

What a cop-out.

Hahaha no their not lol.

[Psykotsu]

Have really been impressed with the last 2 alpha vids, getting very excited for 2.0 now!



Hahaha no their not lol.

I don't see why people think you have to be a rocket scientist to play an MMO. Crazy. This is not a cop-out, it's called convenience.

You know how you don't have to use dial up because of wifi?
You know how you can use cell phones instead of a land-line?
You know how you can drive your car to the convenient store instead of walk.

Same shit.

Or do you just want the first 3 digits of a phone number for a person you need to call, and figure out the rest of the digits for yourself?

Edit: Sorry, this isn't directed at you but at everyone who feels that this game requires a high-school degree to play at their elite level.

[Rukira]

Quests can be easy, honestly I don't care. Plus, it's user friendly just like every other MMO out there.
It's the boss fights and dungeons that I want an actual challenge.

[Shurrikhan]

See I agree. When you initiate a levequest you go and fight the same mobs at the same level over and over again. Take away the leve initiation and you're still fighting mobs over and over again. Same thing with the "WoW Method." They are all different methods to the same end, grinding.

So what is the something special then? If all experience is a series of triggers and killing, what could make it unique?

The directorship? The interconnectivity? How interesting the plot points and fights are by themselves?

I don't disagree that be it mob grinds, leve grinds, or quest grinds, the only difference to the xp-expedient is amount of time between killing ex-reward triggers.

- - - - - - - - - -

On a side note though, just a small example with no defense intended, I enjoyed mob grinds over leve grinds because I was able to focus on my learning additional bits and practicalities of combat. In leves it simply felt unnecessarily mangled, distracting. In 1.0 quests, I really felt connected with the story. Regardless of xp, that was worth something to me. And if the mere triggers that compose those quests could be more widely used, so that they further felt a more fully integrated part of the world-exploration and leveling experience, that's just one of many ways they could be something really great.

And... a side note from the other side...
When going through generic WoW quests (in WoW, in this case), the less directed quests were often more fun. In other words, I'd often take the "kill large number of X" over the quicker, more story-based quests. This might sound contradictory to my enjoyment of 1.0 quests, but trust me, it's not. When given the length of time to really play around with a setting, or combat with a certain type of mob, etc, I was able to develop something more of my own. Often, the simple rare mob and slightly humorous dialog (if there were enough possibilities) added much more than the text leading to the quest, though this was especially true when the quest-text and those features coincided.

Back in those days, my interest was more on developing each quest as a setting for an experience, rather than a requirement checklist for experience points. I still believe that, while difficult, this is an admiral target for development.

Use of concept in mob-grinding

Real quick though: given all that, I do think this same kind of improvement can be done with mob-grinding too. When mite-grinding for the first time, there did seem to be enough unique between the party and the playing field that I felt I'd have the chance to progressively master this kind of fighting. My second time mite-grinding was a loop-system instead, through Copperbell Mines, and simply by switching classes it too felt highly different. I think there's a lot that can be done to vary the way these grinds can progress, perhaps with newer mechanics in un-instanced dungeons.

Let's take that same underground mite-grinding environment but add these:
- More types of mites, spawning due to relatively intentionally triggers (shouldn't be accidentally popped)
- Quick sand fields from large mites fleeing, some of them (noticeably different) leading to different areas
- Different mobs within the dungeon killable for
- War-horns mounted to some of the pillars, some meant to bring in mites, others meant to repel them.
--> leads to some mad retreats from horn to horn, or taking a center position to moves all mites to your location before diving down a hole to a different area, etc
--> A small percentage of mobs in type and number will try to get through anyways and destroy the horn to stop you from blowing it.
- In general, the entire instance is an intelligent enough computer, rather than just a spawning-zone, if you so choose (and trigger), and challenge should come with fair reward. These are simple enough ideas, but with good design they can make the previously tedious a highly enjoyable, highly replayable experience.

[Shurrikhan]

I don't see why people think you have to be a rocket scientist to play an MMO. Crazy. This is not a cop-out, it's called convenience.

You know how you don't have to use dial up because of wifi?
You know how you can use cell phones instead of a land-line?
You know how you can drive your car to the convenient store instead of walk.

Same shit.

Or do you just want the first 3 digits of a phone number for a person you need to call, and figure out the rest of the digits for yourself?

Edit: Sorry, this isn't directed at you but at everyone who feels that this game requires a high-school degree to play at their elite level.

Speed-dial is convenient for calling someone.
'Follow the arrow' is convenient for killing mobs.

But then, what happened to the 'quest' part in "quests"?

Or do we merely want 'auto-run and follow' for bonus xp on your next (x) kills upon return?

[Jinrya-Geki]

Why are people so desperate for friends? Just use content finder if you want to make new friends.

Because why would I bother playing an MMO if you don't have others to enjoy playing with?