Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

anthriel
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Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby anthriel » Sat Jul 22, 2017 10:04 am

To NiteHawk,

Thankyou for your work in producing the game we know and enjoy today. I hope to see this game and community continue to grow and thrive. However based on my experiences/observations and many discussions with people from all different clans/locations/stage-of-game-progress etc, here are some fundamental/core issues that appear to be causing several once-committed players to stop playing due to discouragement, frustration and/or boredom. It is my hope that in writing this post that you will consider making necessary changes to take Ember out of ROK’s shadow and stop the leakage of good players coming and going before its too late. Once the player base is burned/gone, its game over.

All following observations are based on the one simple premise: The more fulfillment and satisfaction a player finds in the game, the more motivated they are to keep on playing. (Conversely, the more frustrated/discouraged/bored they feel, the more demotivated they are to keep playing). This may seem obvious to everyone…. but the following are core game dynamics that actively display a complete disregard for this premise (and which I am therefore suggesting need rethinking/changing).

Issue #1 – The OAD Loot System.
This is honestly a very antiquated and ineffective system for current gaming and lifestyle needs. Requiring 6-10 players to mobilise/wake at odd spawning hours, spend 15-30mins farming keys and 1+ hours running an OAD zone/boss for the reward of 1-2 item drops to be somehow split between the 6-8 players is just plainly ineffective at encouraging player motivation whichever way you look at it (not even mentioning the discouragement for the 4-8 people from a competing guild who bothered to mobilise but lost the key battle and didnt get the chance to run the OAD). The system creates issues with people’s real life commitments, it causes perceptions of inequality based on spawn times, it encourages drama in loot distribution and mathematically it means lots of ppl are putting in effort for no reward/fulfillment on any given day/run --> basically this entire system fosters more discouragement, frustration and or boredom in more players than it achieves in fostering player rewards/fulfillment.

Possible Solutions to Issue #1 (suggested by myself and others):
    1. Get rid of OADs as a loot system and revamp to diablo style system with random drops off monsters (and afflixes to make items more unique)... or really almost any other loot system employed by contemporary RPG games!
    2. Have more OADs be able to be run in 15-20mins by parties of around 3 players
    3. Randomise OAD spawn times each day and have a soothsayer mob that you can run a quest for (eg gather random items from around the realm) to find out daily spawn times
    4. Have bosses/minibosses drop a “summoning stone” that can be used to summon the final OAD boss at a time and place of choice (allows people to do it at convenient time when party is assembled and bored… but risk is they need to find somewhere private so others don’t come and steal the boss they summon)
    5. Some sort of split reward system (like Crimson Scales or Thanatos death hexes) so that ppl contributing to OAD keys or run can each get a crafting item to save away for future item creation rather than scratch heads trying to split 1 sword

Issue #2 – The Guild System.
Most players are forced/incentivised to join big established guilds for access to OAD gear or protection from PKers. This leads to the current (predictable) super-guild oligarchy/arms-race we have. However this puts great strain on the super-guilds to organise themselves and keep everyone happy etc which creates unnecessary drama, frustration, disenchantment etc. This eventually causes some people to get demotivated by the drama of dealing with other players they are ‘forced’ to play with by the current guild system, and leads to them quitting or playing a lot less than they once did (have seen this happen a bit lately). Basically more guild diversity helps retain players to EO by giving them options to avoid other players they don’t want to play with, while still having some have hope of making progress within the game.

Possible Solutions to Issue #2 (suggested by myself and others):

    1. Fix OAD/loot system so belonging to a large guild isn’t a necessity
    2. Introduce ‘guild diversity incentives’ of some kind (to incentivise ppl to risk starting more guilds themselves)
    3. Implement a hard cap on number of characters/accounts that can belong in each guild (forcing focus on ‘quality’ rather than ‘quantity’)
    4. Associate guilds with towns so multiple small guilds can still be connected/allied with a larger “town chat” but also be abit more independent also….. this could lead to interesting Game of Thrones-esque dynamic of cooperation between guilds


Issue #3 – The Character Creation System.
Basically the problem here is someone creating a character they think will do well (based on Rok perceptions or otherwise) only to find out hundreds of million EXP later that it’s actually a crap build. This is often very demotivating as people have used the name they want on a bad character and don’t want to bother leveling a 2nd char of the same class just to be competitive etc. The 100% inability to salvage investment in EXP and redesign character (e.g. change to more suitable race) also raises lots of emotional baggage whenever re-balancing occurs as some feel they have invested lots of effort in a character build only to see it ‘nerfed’ in their perception. All these ‘character creation’ related issues are another great cause of frustration/boredom that I’ve seen eventually lead to players quitting.

Possible Solutions to Issue #3 (suggested by myself and others):
    1. Have an in game “Scroll of Reincarnation” item that allows people to keep all their EXP but re-design a lvl 25er of a particular class (possibly change race, picture and gender also). This should obtainable via questing (not easily mind you, but possible) rather than paid with real money. This also helps when inevitable game-rebalancing is done and certain races etc get nerfed (which cant be changed with current Realloc functionality)… Changing name can be done with a separate scroll that could potentially be charged real money for (cos we don’t want ppl trying to mask identity all the time by changing names). Changing class should not be allowed by Reincarnation scroll as this is something people are unlikely to have made a mistake on (plus we don’t want ppl levelling an ‘easier’ class only to change it to a ‘harder’ one)
    2. Have a “Create a Test Character” functionality were you can essentially spawn a lvl 25 version of the character you are thinking of creating on a quarantined test zone/area (wearing OAD level test equipment) where you can test the effect of stats on things like druid morph bonuses, bard song bonuses etc and PVP/PVE against other mobs or test characters. This gives ppl a solid vision of what they are working towards when they decide to invest in 300-350m worth of leveling.


I know that large scale changes cannot be rushed without careful thought and community consultation and this is not what I expect. However I do hope this post will open the discussion for others to comment on the suggested issues/solutions and/or suggest their own core frustrations. Hopefully this will give NH the confidence that the player community does indeed want EO to evolve from the core of ROK’s flawed shadow and therefore make needed changes before EO dredges up enough feelings of frustration, discouragement and boredom under the current system to effectively burn through all of the ROK-nostaligia-induced goodwill that is currently sustaining the player base.

Sorry for the long post - it’s been a long time coming. Peace.

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Folder
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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby Folder » Sat Jul 22, 2017 6:52 pm

anthriel wrote:Issue #1 – The OAD Loot System.
This is honestly a very antiquated and ineffective system for current gaming and lifestyle needs. Requiring 6-10 players to mobilise/wake at odd spawning hours, spend 15-30mins farming keys and 1+ hours running an OAD zone/boss for the reward of 1-2 item drops to be somehow split between the 6-8 players is just plainly ineffective at encouraging player motivation whichever way you look at it (not even mentioning the discouragement for the 4-8 people from a competing guild who bothered to mobilise but lost the key battle and didnt get the chance to run the OAD). The system creates issues with people’s real life commitments, it causes perceptions of inequality based on spawn times, it encourages drama in loot distribution and mathematically it means lots of ppl are putting in effort for no reward/fulfillment on any given day/run --> basically this entire system fosters more discouragement, frustration and or boredom in more players than it achieves in fostering player rewards/fulfillment.

Possible Solutions to Issue #1 (suggested by myself and others):
    1. Get rid of OADs as a loot system and revamp to diablo style system with random drops off monsters (and afflixes to make items more unique)... or really almost any other loot system employed by contemporary RPG games!
    2. Have more OADs be able to be run in 15-20mins by parties of around 3 players
    3. Randomise OAD spawn times each day and have a soothsayer mob that you can run a quest for (eg gather random items from around the realm) to find out daily spawn times
    4. Have bosses/minibosses drop a “summoning stone” that can be used to summon the final OAD boss at a time and place of choice (allows people to do it at convenient time when party is assembled and bored… but risk is they need to find somewhere private so others don’t come and steal the boss they summon)
    5. Some sort of split reward system (like Crimson Scales or Thanatos death hexes) so that ppl contributing to OAD keys or run can each get a crafting item to save away for future item creation rather than scratch heads trying to split 1 sword


1) Not happening. That would be an entirely different game.
2) Yes, this should be a thing and I know builders are aware of this.
3) More random spawn timers and oad indicators should 100% be a thing.
4) Interesting idea, I wouldn't mind seeing this for some bosses but for all bosses it sounds weird. It's also very unfriendly to lore and overall area design, but I could see it if it's part of the base design for an area.
5) Too complicated for all items imo, I like that it's available for some but if this were all items it would be cumbersome.



anthriel wrote:Issue #2 – The Guild System.
Most players are forced/incentivised to join big established guilds for access to OAD gear or protection from PKers. This leads to the current (predictable) super-guild oligarchy/arms-race we have. However this puts great strain on the super-guilds to organise themselves and keep everyone happy etc which creates unnecessary drama, frustration, disenchantment etc. This eventually causes some people to get demotivated by the drama of dealing with other players they are ‘forced’ to play with by the current guild system, and leads to them quitting or playing a lot less than they once did (have seen this happen a bit lately). Basically more guild diversity helps retain players to EO by giving them options to avoid other players they don’t want to play with, while still having some have hope of making progress within the game.

Possible Solutions to Issue #2 (suggested by myself and others):

    1. Fix OAD/loot system so belonging to a large guild isn’t a necessity
    2. Introduce ‘guild diversity incentives’ of some kind (to incentivise ppl to risk starting more guilds themselves)
    3. Implement a hard cap on number of characters/accounts that can belong in each guild (forcing focus on ‘quality’ rather than ‘quantity’)
    4. Associate guilds with towns so multiple small guilds can still be connected/allied with a larger “town chat” but also be abit more independent also….. this could lead to interesting Game of Thrones-esque dynamic of cooperation between guilds


I think 1) fixes most of this. I don't yet have a good idea for guild incentives, although I could possibly see it being a thing. Breaking up guilds on purpose or limiting the amount of people who can join seems like not a great idea though, not a fan of that.


anthriel wrote:Issue #3 – The Character Creation System.
Basically the problem here is someone creating a character they think will do well (based on Rok perceptions or otherwise) only to find out hundreds of million EXP later that it’s actually a crap build. This is often very demotivating as people have used the name they want on a bad character and don’t want to bother leveling a 2nd char of the same class just to be competitive etc. The 100% inability to salvage investment in EXP and redesign character (e.g. change to more suitable race) also raises lots of emotional baggage whenever re-balancing occurs as some feel they have invested lots of effort in a character build only to see it ‘nerfed’ in their perception. All these ‘character creation’ related issues are another great cause of frustration/boredom that I’ve seen eventually lead to players quitting.

Possible Solutions to Issue #3 (suggested by myself and others):
    1. Have an in game “Scroll of Reincarnation” item that allows people to keep all their EXP but re-design a lvl 25er of a particular class (possibly change race, picture and gender also). This should obtainable via questing (not easily mind you, but possible) rather than paid with real money. This also helps when inevitable game-rebalancing is done and certain races etc get nerfed (which cant be changed with current Realloc functionality)… Changing name can be done with a separate scroll that could potentially be charged real money for (cos we don’t want ppl trying to mask identity all the time by changing names). Changing class should not be allowed by Reincarnation scroll as this is something people are unlikely to have made a mistake on (plus we don’t want ppl levelling an ‘easier’ class only to change it to a ‘harder’ one)
    2. Have a “Create a Test Character” functionality were you can essentially spawn a lvl 25 version of the character you are thinking of creating on a quarantined test zone/area (wearing OAD level test equipment) where you can test the effect of stats on things like druid morph bonuses, bard song bonuses etc and PVP/PVE against other mobs or test characters. This gives ppl a solid vision of what they are working towards when they decide to invest in 300-350m worth of leveling.


1) I am 100% a fan of being able to reallocate stats for a price. Changing anything else is debatable, although tbh I do like the idea of a pay system for changing other variables such as gender and portrait. Chris should get something for his time.
2) I like this as well. I get asked -daily- about this and that, how characters and stats work, etc. This would be a pretty cool feature.


Got some good ideas here, thanks for the post.
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Lateralus
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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby Lateralus » Sun Jul 23, 2017 2:11 pm

1/2. Ember is about 100x better than rok was in this case. There are actually tons of soloable minibosses and lots of reg npcs that drop good level 25 items as well. There was none of this in rok. There are also some bosses that can be done with teams of 4 if you play it right. Salamader and Archfiend can be done with 3-4 you might die a few times but its possible. Than can also be done with as few as 2 people it will just take a while and yes the dying will happen. plus anyone down there has a chance to grab loot no matter who kills it.


A new oad area is going in any day now (its actually done just waiting on other updates to go in). The area has 3-4 mini boss drops as well as the final boss with great drops. This boss is limited to 4 players and could even be killed with 3 players if done right. So while options are a bit limited atm they are getting better.



3. I totally agree character creation system needs to be fixed its annoying having to tell players hey you gotta reallocate. I think a super simple fix would just be having set stats on the roller when you start it up (you would still be allowed to change them if you know what you are doing). Then its just a matter of deciding on the set stats which is pretty easy to get a good standard idea. it doesnt need to be too complicated.

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daedroth
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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby daedroth » Mon Jul 24, 2017 3:06 am

Lateralus wrote:... A new oad area is going in any day now (its actually done just waiting on other updates to go in). The area has 3-4 mini boss drops as well as the final boss with great drops. This boss is limited to 4 players and could even be killed with 3 players if done right. So while options are a bit limited atm they are getting better.



3. I totally agree character creation system needs to be fixed its annoying having to tell players hey you gotta reallocate. I think a super simple fix would just be having set stats on the roller when you start it up (you would still be allowed to change them if you know what you are doing). Then its just a matter of deciding on the set stats which is pretty easy to get a good standard idea. it doesnt need to be too complicated.


New area yay!

3) I wouldn't have the stats pre-allocated, but I would have a colour code to show how important the stats are? Or some info bit on the class that tell you the important stats and why (during creation). Maybe extend the creation window with an added panel with the class info, and maybe race info as well.

New panel with:

Assassins
The assassin can hide and back stab, blah blah blah
STR - Needed for assassins for their physical damage output
END - Needed for everyone. More END = More hit points = Live longer
blah blah blah


New Panel with:

Saurians:
They excel in physical combat due to high STR/AGL combination blah blah blah. Recommended class are blah blah blah ... Poor magic resistance ... blah blah blah

etc

Obviously better worded.
Disclaimer: Any ideas I come up with may not even meet my approval. I am just posting an idea based on the topic I have just read.
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anthriel
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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby anthriel » Sun Jul 30, 2017 12:37 pm

Lateralus wrote:1/2. Ember is about 100x better than rok was in this case.


Totally agree with you there... EO is a far better game than RoK in many ways. But because it is based off Rok and still mirrors core game dynamics from RoK (such as the OAD system, character creation, backstab mechanics and various other things that have often been raised on other threads), the game is really still abit like RoK 2.0 (which is what i mean by "living in Rok's shadow"). I get that this familiarity is likely to give ex-Rok players a feeling of comfortable nostalgia, but most Non-Rok players (and even some from other MUDs) seem to find these mechanics plain weird and annoying.

EO does have many improvements over Rok, but for all of these the game still feels like "80% Rok : 20% Improvements" to me.... But given that the world has progressed some 15yrs since Rok and gaming/lifestyles etc have evolved too, im suggesting that EO could benefit from evolving further from its Rok roots by changing some of these core game dynamics to reflect changing gaming trends... which might lead to EO eventually looking say "60% Rok : 40% improvements". Being willing to examine core familiarities (like the issues i raised) in the cold light of day (albiet slowly and carefully) is probably the only way to ever expand beyond a Rok (or similar MUD) playerbase (which is what i think NH has previously stated he eventually hopes for).

daedroth wrote:3) I wouldn't have the stats pre-allocated, but I would have a colour code to show how important the stats are? Or some info bit on the class that tell you the important stats and why (during creation). Maybe extend the creation window with an added panel with the class info, and maybe race info as well.


i still think this doesnt go far enough.... most ppl i know from RoK (including myself) made their initial chars thinking they would perform like they did in RoK (only to find out that they dont later).... in fact im guessing most players pretty much retire their first 1-2 lvl 25ers cos they realised they sucked.... Then there are those that dont come from Rok who would be even more confused by more advice text because (as NH has pointed out previously) almost every stat has its uses (e.g. it isnt enough telling someone that "Intelligence will help your assassin hide better" when the reality is they may not know this is much less important to the character than "you generally need good AGI to land a backstab") .... Lat's suggestion to pre-allocate stats somewhat prevents people from being too far off the mark but still denies them the chance to have chosen properly with full knowledge of what they are choosing... that is why the best solution for player morale and retention would be to have the "create a test character" functionality (so they can see for themselves) or at least allow people to eventually quest for an item that effectively allows them to re-stat/re-race their characters so they can actually have the character they envision (its a big part of why people invest time in RPGs really) without having to start over.

peace

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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby Tucker » Sun Jul 30, 2017 3:15 pm

i still think this doesnt go far enough.... most ppl i know from RoK (including myself) made their initial chars thinking they would perform like they did in RoK (only to find out that they dont later).... in fact im guessing most players pretty much retire their first 1-2 lvl 25ers cos they realised they sucked.... Then there are those that dont come from Rok who would be even more confused by more advice text because (as NH has pointed out previously) almost every stat has its uses (e.g. it isnt enough telling someone that "Intelligence will help your assassin hide better" when the reality is they may not know this is much less important to the character than "you generally need good AGI to land a backstab") .... Lat's suggestion to pre-allocate stats somewhat prevents people from being too far off the mark but still denies them the chance to have chosen properly with full knowledge of what they are choosing... that is why the best solution for player morale and retention would be to have the "create a test character" functionality (so they can see for themselves) or at least allow people to eventually quest for an item that effectively allows them to re-stat/re-race their characters so they can actually have the character they envision (its a big part of why people invest time in RPGs really) without having to start over.


Or read up on the game and talk to people. You can look at the wiki, the forums, changelogs, or discuss with your guild or people you meet. I figured out a lot of key stuff in the game and the differences between EO and ROK before I got to lvl 20 on my first crit. Sure a sandbox realm would be cool but it'd be quite a development that would likely be weighted very low in the priorities of things to be honest.

The other thing is that you can respec your characters for a very reasonable penalty - there is also a FREE respec coming done the line with the AGI change.

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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby killa » Mon Jul 31, 2017 10:12 pm

ya somethin should be done about thanatos. try to go there instantly everyone killed by silhouette guild, pretty intense. haven't said shit in a while but that's pretty annoying, was my 2nd time ever going there same thing as the first time. maybe make it easier for smaller guilds, or maybe sil people find jobs or something irl I dunno

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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby daedroth » Tue Aug 01, 2017 4:55 am

killa wrote:ya somethin should be done about thanatos. try to go there instantly everyone killed by silhouette guild, pretty intense. haven't said shit in a while but that's pretty annoying, was my 2nd time ever going there same thing as the first time. maybe make it easier for smaller guilds, or maybe sil people find jobs or something irl I dunno


I am at work right now! Wheeeeeeee! :D
No Ember Online for me :(
Sad days.
I have never saw Fan'o'toes yet.

It is kinda funny. We always think the "enemy" clan are on too much so they must not work! Is this true? Do any of us in the game work?
Apart from me off course :)
:popcorn:
Disclaimer: Any ideas I come up with may not even meet my approval. I am just posting an idea based on the topic I have just read.
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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby Lissy » Tue Aug 01, 2017 10:23 pm

killa wrote:ya somethin should be done about thanatos. try to go there instantly everyone killed by silhouette guild, pretty intense. haven't said shit in a while but that's pretty annoying, was my 2nd time ever going there same thing as the first time. maybe make it easier for smaller guilds, or maybe sil people find jobs or something irl I dunno


wait, what's a "job"? i'm not familiar with that word
ooh well, see you at than!
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Re: Unhelpful core design issues slowly killing interest in EO

Postby daedroth » Wed Aug 02, 2017 1:26 am

Lissy wrote:
killa wrote:ya somethin should be done about thanatos. try to go there instantly everyone killed by silhouette guild, pretty intense. haven't said shit in a while but that's pretty annoying, was my 2nd time ever going there same thing as the first time. maybe make it easier for smaller guilds, or maybe sil people find jobs or something irl I dunno


wait, what's a "job"? i'm not familiar with that word
ooh well, see you at than!


Jobs/employment is an entirely different issue Lissy!
Apparently a job/employment is something you do to get money from. You do something for someone and they give you money (sounds kinky eh). So I hear.
The work I was referring to was cleaning up the hosue and stuff. Wife doesn't pay me for doing that, but she does punish if it is not done :(
Damn slave driver.
I have no paying job though *shudders*. I like to sit and watch the world go by. Thank the Gods for the benefit system that funds my lifestyle choice!
Disclaimer: Any ideas I come up with may not even meet my approval. I am just posting an idea based on the topic I have just read.
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