World of Warcraft killer? - Page 3 - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

Zeraph · 12-14-2009, 02:03 PM

Sigh, I just realized how far away the old republic probably is. Closed beta hasn't even started yet

So knowing bioware might be up to 2 years till release. I'm guessing CB won't start till Jan or maybe even March of next year. They did open up sign ups for it though a month or two ago, so sign up if you haven't. I usually try to ignore games until their out, but meh I'm bored. I'm liking the looks of the ideas floating around on their forums though. The community already seems quite strong for a game not even in CB yet.

Zeraph · 12-17-2009, 12:42 PM

So back to the subject. I'd like to see spellcasting be more of a thinking man's (or woman's) game. Spell choice, some sort of preparation, etc, rather than just blasting with fireball for the nth time. I want creative purposes to spells that don't just give X amount more damage.

I'd like to see puzzle rooms, or encounters based more around traps and such, rather than just npc X. Personally I'd like a "kid*" unfriendly game. One than punishes random reckless behavior. For instance hunter-stalker mobs that only strike when you're alone, or trap rooms.

I'd like to see some sort of randomized stat loot system like Diablo2. On the otherhand, I'd like a reward for every person for every major encounter of some kind. Exact rewards would vary of course, but I'd like to see a loot system to reflect this. I am so sick of dealing with ninja looters taking rare items that don't benefit their class. So whenever the treasure chest or mob was looted all loot would be preassigned to make sure everyone got at least one reward, but there'd be a trade drop down menu so you could switch loot with someone if you both agreed. This would take care of those rolling shenanigans I've had so many headaches over the years from.

Mounts, mounts, and more mounts. I want mounted combat, different types of mounts, different stats on mounts, attacking mounts, different uses for mounts. Underwater mounts, flying mounts, maybe even burrowing mounts. Pets and summons, everyone should be able to summon something or have some sort of animal companion that can help them fight. Of course they'd have restricted uses (to keep down the clutter), especially in groups. For instance in PvP and boss encounters there could be an anti summon spell that kills all summons in an AoE. They'd mostly be useful for soloing and flavor.

Unique travel encounters. I want there to be certain places that require certain groups or spells or rituals to reach and that have dangerous encounters along the way. For instance, to travel to the plane of fire you'd have to find an elementalist to cast the spell, and then brave the fire elementals that may come out to eat you. No easy flight path for you.

I want more horror elements. Not in the gore sense, but in the Doom3, or RE, or Silent Hill where things jump out at you and scare the shit out of you.

I want there to be some kind of mob scaling so that a horde of zombies is always dangerous and there is no point in your progresssion that you can walk up to 56 zombies and 1 shot them in an AOE. Sure you should feel like youre growing in power, but the scaling is ridiculous in current games. Even level 1 monsters should still pose *some* kind of threat.

*Kid in quotes since plenty of adults are responsible for such behavior too.

Xerxys · 12-17-2009, 12:55 PM

I thought this was funny. I found this on Reddit a while ago.

Quote:

Taiwanese Man Defeats World of Warcraft

There is big buzz in blogosphere after a man from Taiwan playing on Taiwan servers showcased his scores to the public and everybody is surprised as the worlds biggest game cannot be completed. The man plays with the name of Little Gray in the World of Warcraft.

His Level 80 Tauren Druid! accomplished all the 986 accomplishments which everybody thought was impossible to achieve and also completed all the 5,906 quests of the enchanted world. His Lifetime Honorable Kills are a monstrous ‘100006’ with 10850 points. Though some people are saying that its due to a glitch in the game but whatever it is the man did it…

Here are some his stats.

>>LINK<<

nomcat · 12-17-2009, 01:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zeraph

So back to the subject. I'd like to see spellcasting be more of a thinking man's (or woman's) game. Spell choice, some sort of preparation, etc, rather than just blasting with fireball for the nth time. I want creative purposes to spells that don't just give X amount more damage.

Along these lines, I really liked the combat Heroic Opportunities you could complete with groups in Everquest 2... depending on which class in the group starts it, and the order of the classes that follow, you could massively increase the group damage, healing, buffs etc etc. That was fun.

From http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Heroic_Opportunities

"Opportunities begin when a group member uses their starter ability, then members of the group advance the starter chain to pick a table to roll an effect from, then advance the finishing chain to trigger the effect. Advancing chains is done by using spells and combat arts with particular opportunity symbols and sometimes in particular orders. The opportunity system uses symbols/icons which can be found in most spell and combat art examination windows as the second icon down on the right side. When the opportunity ring flashes a particular symbol, any spell or combat art that is represented by that symbol can be used to choose that option (for starter chains) or fulfill that requirement (for finishing chains). Valid abilities will flash on players' hotbars as well. Abilities that are used to advance the chain also cause their normal effects."

Zeraph · 12-17-2009, 01:32 PM

Sounds interesting, didn't play EQ2 though, so not sure. My only caveat with that type of a system (its sounds like anyway) is it may become too commonplace and and formulaic and too much of a requirement for everyone to participate in and lag spikes might ruin the chain or some newb. On the other hand if the complicated stuff is kept to the major spell casting classes then hopefully only people good at that kind of thing will keep up with it to end game. As I'm not sure I'd want it to be a requirement for everyone, for every tough encounter.

Although I'm definitely not averse to more advanced tactics. And maybe something along those lines could be developed so long as it didn't rely on the weakest link in the chain kind of thing (by making several people able to complete each step).

I can just see it:
"Dude, hit your ice spell, ice ice!"
"Dude, wtf!"
Group dies.
"what happened? Sorry was afk."

So to sum up, tough encounters, but encounters that don't exploit the weakest member of the group. I like it when the good players can take up the slack.

Shauk · 12-17-2009, 04:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zeraph

Sounds interesting, didn't play EQ2 though, so not sure. My only caveat with that type of a system (its sounds like anyway) is it may become too commonplace and and formulaic and too much of a requirement for everyone to participate in and lag spikes might ruin the chain or some newb. On the other hand if the complicated stuff is kept to the major spell casting classes then hopefully only people good at that kind of thing will keep up with it to end game. As I'm not sure I'd want it to be a requirement for everyone, for every tough encounter.

Although I'm definitely not averse to more advanced tactics. And maybe something along those lines could be developed so long as it didn't rely on the weakest link in the chain kind of thing (by making several people able to complete each step).

I can just see it:
"Dude, hit your ice spell, ice ice!"
"Dude, wtf!"
Group dies.
"what happened? Sorry was afk."

So to sum up, tough encounters, but encounters that don't exploit the weakest member of the group. I like it when the good players can take up the slack.

Sounds like Viscidus

Viscidus - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

Zeraph · 12-17-2009, 07:23 PM

He sounds really neat, wish I could have fought him. In other news does WoW ever have an original idea? :P It's art and style is 90% from fantasy warhammer and half the ideas are from D&D or other games. I can't really fault them too much though, especially the ideas as that'd be dumb not to capitalize on. But I always thought it was a little weak how much stylization they took from warhammer (which was around on tabletop before its MMO came out before anyone says WoW came out first).

Cynthetiq · 12-17-2009, 07:51 PM

Warcraft itself is 15 years old. but all that stuff kind of borrowed from each other, making slight tweaks and adjustments to make it slightly different.

Baraka_Guru · 12-17-2009, 08:09 PM

I don't know what you guys are talking about. This is all a ripoff of Tolkien, who, in turn, ripped off the authors of the classics and the periods of antiquity.

It's all good.

Zeraph · 12-17-2009, 09:36 PM

I'm talking more about style; that's different than a green dude that's called an orc and tends toward chaos. I don't have a problem with those standards. Also, I played warcraft too, and there's very little similarity in there between it and WoW. WoW is a heck of a lot more fleshed out I mean, obviously the orcs are fairly standard and what not.

I wish I could find the old warhammer thread where someone detailed out all the similarities between em and clearly showed that warhammer had developed the style first. Keep in mind warhammer was around in the early 80s, way way before warcraft I came out.

Zeraph · 12-20-2009, 05:10 PM

So we've been talking about gameplay, but what about business models? What do you want to see? ~$50 + free month + ~$15 each month after? Free to download and play at low levels but pay per month to unlock the rest? Cash shop? Pay per content unlock ala guild wars?

I'm really not sure personally. I really, *really* dislike the current popular model of $50 + $15 per month (especially when you throw in the $40-50 expansions). Seems like a total ripoff (I could be totally wrong of course). In the old days it made sense because of how insanely costly bandwidth was. Now though servers, bandwidth, and even employees are all cheaper. Yet the costs haven't gone down at all. Basically stayed the same (in time with inflation).

Cash shops generally suck, though I suppose if they did it right... so long as you didn't get any undue advantages and still paid reasonable amounts.

I'd like to see some sort of hybrid system. I think MMORPGs should definitely be free to download and initially play. They tend to end up that way pretty quickly anyway. The reason being is that unlike most games, MMORPGs rely on new people way way more, otherwise the game becomes quite stale and goes in a downward spiral (see warhammer).

So for costs, I'd say some sort of low monthly cost, about 5 bucks or so. Then add a cash shop, but only for non essential items, just for a way for the company to make extra cash for those with money to burn. Also, some sort of content unlock, not a lot at once, but many mini-expansion like unlocks here and there for ~$10 instead of doing full expansions that cost $40 one month and $10 6 months later. This will also help keep long boring dry periods away and let people play more at their own pace.

So in summary, use every option available but scale down the $ way more. Best of all worlds hopefully. Leave some parts of the game perma unlocked so people can come back and visit friends without paying per month, this hopefully wets their apetite as well as keeps the game populated. I'd probably still be playing WoW if they had used this model. I think all MMOs need some sort of free (but not fully unlocked) way to go back and check things out.

MMORPGs are like social networks such as facebook or myspace, they need a way to pull people into the drama. Esepcially to draw old players back between major expansions. The best way to do this is to make some parts of it free (and not just trial accounts for new players).

Arandrul · 12-26-2009, 08:33 PM

As much as I am hoping for the best for TOR, i will support Blizzard until it crumbles in the mmo world. Now this scenario seems almost impossible with a company with such history but there is something about dual-wielding purple lightsabers that just makes me want to close my Battlenet account, take a trip down to bioware HQ and smuggle myself into the building

Zeraph · 12-30-2009, 04:12 PM

No one has a single opinion on the business model aspect?

Cynthetiq · 12-30-2009, 04:56 PM

I've been gnawing on it for some time now and with the development costs and overhead costs in the millions I'm having a hard time with any other business model. I don't like the idea of advertising in my MMO or video games that aren't natural so sports games it makes sense. Other than that, I don't see how they can keep the revenue to get the development dollars to further production on the game.

Baraka_Guru · 12-30-2009, 07:15 PM

I see nothing wrong with the monthly subscription model, even in addition to single-sum payments for major expansions. I see the subscription cost as necessary for maintaining the world, tweaking it, fixing it, and the number of little goodies that Blizzard creates/runs each month. I see $15ish per month as reasonable for a game that has the extremely high ongoing play value as WoW. I'm just waiting for something better to come along that deserves my $15.

Zeraph · 12-30-2009, 09:07 PM

But why do you guys think they deserve the $15 a month? I'm not saying its not worth $15 a month to an individual (since it often is, myself included) but I don't see how its possible that costs are still that high per month.

The math is pretty easy to do for total sum. Anyone know the current subscription number blizzard has? Pretty sure its in the millions per month. Where is all that money going? Programmers don't cost millions to pay. Bandwidth doesn't. I can't prove it but I have a feeling $15 is a total ripoff.

I remember when, it was either EQ2 or WoW was in beta and they were considering going below 12.99 a month (the current cost of EQ1 at the time) but decided to go with 15 a month once they each heard the other was willing (I think they made a deal behind closed doors). If they were considering less and still wanting to see a profit, I can't see it costing more than $10 a month. Probably more in the ballpark of 6-8$.

Especially when one considers all the free MMORPGs out there that still make a profit when only like 30% of the player base is paying for cash shop items.

Orchrist · 12-30-2009, 09:24 PM

The upkeep costs for your free MMO's compared to WoW are probably night and day difference, with the amount of server hardware it must take to run all of the servers they have up, and in all the various places they now keep servers in addition to the cost of the number of GM's to support a playerabase in the millions plus funding development for future expansions then throw in all the money they blow to put on Blizzcon every year which is a loss for them despite how much people spend to go there. Also theres marketing costs throw in the WoW commercials and the ads you see for it everywhere... I'd say it adds up.

As for my personal opinion as to why it DESERVES $15 dollars a month? I'm with the crowd that looks at it this way, as a gamer on average playing regular games even if I ONLY purchased a new game every 4 months which would be a rarity considering how short most single player games are that'd be close to equaling out what I'd spend on WoW. As most WoW players can tell you chances are if you play it you won't be bothering spending your time on much else because of the time investment and wealth of things to do in the game. So in the end by spending 15 a month on this and not buying any other games I'm really saving myself money in the long haul.

Cynthetiq · 12-30-2009, 09:37 PM

WoW -> Info -> F.A.Q. -> General

Quote:

Is there a monthly fee to play the game?
Yes. After the end of the free month included with the game, you need a subscription in order to continue playing the game. There are three subscription options: a month-to-month package at $14.99 per month, a three-month plan at $13.99 per month, and a six-month plan at $12.99 per month. The subscription fees for the three-month plan and the six-month plan must be paid in full.

I don't pay $15/mo. I pay $12.99/mo. And if I could pay a yearly amount at $11.99/mo I would. If I was to play the game every DAY once a day for 1 year for 365 days a year, it's not even $0.43 a day. There's no single bargain for entertainment than that. Not even your cable bill hits that price point.

Even if you were to pay the full $15 you're talking $0.49 per day to play the game.

How is that a rip off if you were to just play every day for one single hour of game play?

Since I'm in the middle of spec'ing out a new rig, I'm looking at the cost of what it costs for me to play the game including the hardware and software costs, and quite honestly there are people who spend more on golf clubs and all the greens fees in a year than what I will spend on a good rig and the associated subscription and upfront Blizzard costs.

Overall, I think that the business model is fair and hits that profitability price point. So long as they continue to pump out good content and support as far as hardware is concerned, meaning pushing my own graphics cards and hardware to the limit as new tech comes out, it's in the millions for development costs.

I know someone who is at the a college that pumps out the workers for Blizzard and the like down south and it isn't much different now than it is for the movie industry as far as content and story telling, then you still have to have the technical people to engineer the back end tech to support and scale to the story telling. Make a bad one like Matrix Online and you never get a core of players that make the investment worthwhile.

Runningwater · 12-31-2009, 08:05 AM

Man I wish I had been able to hop into this thread earlier.

Reading back on all the fun stuff from EQ makes me wonder how it fell off...

I remember playing with Lasereth many times, we both agree that being in first person made you almost feel a "connection" with your character.

I started playing WoW and never felt the same connection there. Anymore it definitely is a stats race rather than enjoying a world and enjoying your character.

I really liked how things in EQ weren't "soul-bound" I remember giving my Necromancer's pets weapons...the better the weapon the more damage he'd do. Also swapping weapons with a friend was awesome (I beat Lasereth in a duel with his own weapon...couldn't beat him with mine

)

I also miss that every class had it's own niche...all the classes in WoW seem to be getting more and more homogenized. Example, Rangers could actually track things, specific things, including other players bodies - you got paid money for this if you could help another player find their body that was way out in the middle of nowhere.

Biggest reason I play WoW now is that I loved the world from playing Warcraft 2 and 3. The stories are awesome, the characters are awesome. I just wish it had more of a "fantasy-realism" feel to it.

Jaegyr · 12-31-2009, 08:43 AM

I really love this thread. I had so many great memories of my time in EQ. Great old friends, a world that took my breath away.
Anyone remember seeing hill giants in the distance and being blown away by the size?
Stepping foot for the first time into Gfay and realizing i was stepping into a whole new world!
I may be sadistic because it did have its evil faults but i wouldnt mind playin classic before any expansions EQ (maybe kunark)

Oh well its in the past im very much looking forward to SWTOR. Ive long since given up on WoW. After playing and quitting 4 different times i just have no energy to do the same shit over and over again!
Raiding is subpar every instance is so scrypted its like the same movie over and over again!
I just wish SWTOR would hurry up. Though i know bioware does nothing before its 110% ready

Zeraph · 12-31-2009, 11:55 AM

On the $15 a month- I'm not getting anywhere and I already feel I adequately stated my point. By deserve I already said I meant it on a business scale, not a personal one. And orchist- half those things you mentioned aren't upkeep and bring new money and new players into the game (new expansions pay for themselves, same goes to ads and blizzcon despite what they tell you.) Companies are not a charity, they don't do cons for the lawls, marketing is either worth it and they do it, or its not and they don't. Blizzcon is just another marketing avenue. And scaling up is actually the opposite, it gets more profitable and more efficient rather than the other way around. That's just general business principle, look to walmart and target for proof.

Old EQ- I also loved how races actually felt different. I remember the lighter races feeling a certain racism toward dark elves and laughing at the dark elves that would have to beg for food when they came to our zones. On the other hand, I remember this dark elf warrior fully decked out in bronze armor (the thing at the time) and being a terrifying sight to behold. We all gathered atop a hill and had an anime style fight and took turns rushing him like some old movie where the henchmen only fight one at a time

Cynthetiq · 12-31-2009, 12:33 PM

Selling tangible goods is not the same as selling server ended services. All the initial hardware from the launch of Wow is not the same hardware any more. Being on one of the original servers it was one that had extended downtime because they had to upgrade the hardware so that it was inline with the rest of the newer servers.

On a business scale they still deserve the $15 because it's a great price point versus the total cost of their operations. Look at gyms, they have a similar subscription model. If everyone showed up that had subscriptions it would be horrific, that's what happens during times like now where everyone is in Lagalaran, and the World Event times.

Zeraph · 12-31-2009, 01:24 PM

I don't get what you're saying Cyn, that only supports my point

Gyms do do the same thing for the most part and are just as much of a ripoff. Except people don't show up 24/7 so I fail to see how that has anything to do with the subject. If people did start showing up more then they'd change their business model to reflect it and become more profitable. It almost feels like you guys don't see them as a business. Upgrading hardware also attracts new people to the game to an extent, but yes, that is a point, that would be an additional upkeep cost. Still not seeing the total cost though. Server hardware has also gone down a lot since the days of EQ.

In general you can't argue a company is doing something out of kindness or "quality," it is always for profit margins, don't kid yourself. The bigger the company, the better they are at doing it (and hiding it). The question is if those margins are reasonable. When something dominates and gets out of hand and inches toward the monopoly side of things we get things like Windows and I really really don't want to see a homogenized gaming culture.

Cynthetiq · 12-31-2009, 02:02 PM

First of all the way that I understand that they have created their backend is that it isn't just run on one single server. Each server is many blades and many blades are set in clusters.

Depending on how Blizzard sets up their costs, this could be an expensive contract for them.

Quote:

World of Warcraft Will Stay on AT&T Servers
March 4th, 2009 : Rich Miller

Some customer renewals are more important than others. Hosting deals don’t get much bigger than AT&T’s contract to host the infrastructure for World of Warcraft, the world’s largest massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) with more than 11.5 million players worldwide. AT&T said Tuesday that game publisher Blizzard Entertainment has agreed to a two-year renewal to host World of Warcraft in North America.

AT&T has been working closely with Blizzard Entertainment for nine years, providing hosting for World of Warcraft and the Battle.net online-gaming service. “We’ve been pleased with AT&T’s service over the years, and we’re confident in their ability to continue to provide the quality support we need,” said Paul Sams, Chief Operating Officer of Blizzard Entertainment. “This renewed agreement allows us to stay completely focused on our games while AT&T applies its hosting expertise to help us offer the speed, reliability and security our players expect.”

AT&T’s Gaming Core Team hosts Warcraft’s infrastructure in multiple data centers, providing network monitoring and management. The AT&T Gaming Core Team was formed in 2004 to host gaming operations using AT&T’s IP network. The team consists of engineers and hosting specialists who provide round-the-clock support to companies offering MMO games.

AT&T’s data center network spans more than 2.6 million square feet of space in 10 countries. The company recently announced it will expand its data center hosting capacity in Atlanta, Annapolis, Md. and the New York/New Jersey metro area in the U.S., as well as in Hong Kong, Tokyo and the United Kingdom globally.

now AT&T is expanding their datacenters to the tune of $1B, so they aren't giving this away to Blizzard for nothing. Also because AT&T knows that Blizzard has a lucrative userbase, they probably have a decent profit margin as well.

Quote:

AT&T Expands Data Center Network
February 23rd, 2009 : Rich Miller

AT&T is expanding its data center network, and will expand its Synaptic Hosting cloud computing service to additional sites as part of a $1 billion investment in infrastructure in 2009, the company said today. AT&T will expand its data center hosting capacity in Atlanta, Annapolis, Md. and the New York/New Jersey metro area in the U.S., as well as in Hong Kong, Tokyo and the United Kingdom globally. AT&T’s data center network spans more than 2.6 million square feet of space in 10 countries.

The telecom giant also said that it would expand its AT&T Synaptic Hosting platform in new “super IDCs” in Singapore and Amsterdam as well as three additional sites within the United States. AT&T also said it was expanding its managed hosting services onto the client premises, a move that can deepen already ’sticky” managed hosting relationships.

I don't care if something is reasonable or not if there's no other player in town, that is to say, I don't have to pay $5 for a cup of coffee from the nice restaurant down the street if I can go to diner and pay $1. But if I want to be in that nice restaurant, I have to fork over the $5.

I still think you don't consider just how much upfront costs there are to games. GTA4 supposedly is the most expensive which was $100M to develop. But the real profit money isn't in the box or the software, it's the subscription and the merchandising.

Quote:

World of Warcraft was first announced by Blizzard at the ECTS trade show in September 2001.[44] Development of the game took roughly 4–5 years

That's 4-5 years with NO INCOME on that product. None, zero, zilch. Do you think they are making any money on Starcraft 2? or Diablo 3? That's all sunk in development costs which are in the millions of dollars these days. This isn't just the personnel, but the hardware that they design on, and the software that they use for modeling, engines that are licensed, code that is licensed, etc.

Here's an article about the costs to maintain, it's from 2008.

World of Warcraft Cost Blizzard $200M in Upkeep Since 2004

Quote:

World of Warcraft Cost Blizzard $200M in Upkeep Since 2004
That includes staff payroll, hardware support, and customer service -- for the last four years.
By Kris Pigna, 09/16/2008

World of Warcraft screenshot

Everyone always talks about how monumental a money generator World of Warcraft has been for Blizzard, but here's a figure you don't hear much about: How much does WoW actually cost Blizzard to maintain? According to Kotaku's report, Blizzard stated during their Analyst Day conference call yesterday that the price has been over $200 million since the game launched in 2004.

That's $200 million for the total cost of upkeep since the game's November, 2004 release (presumably not including the initial cost to develop the game). This includes payroll for the entire staff, hardware support, and -- apparently the biggest infrastructure cost -- customer service.

We don't have figures for exactly how much revenue World of Warcraft has generated since its launch, but we can at least do a little arithmetic (and some loose estimation) to try to put this in perspective. Most recently, Blizzard put the total number of WoW subscribers at over 10 million. According to Gamasutra, this number includes those "who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card...as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access." It does not, however, include expired subscriptions and prepaid cards, or promotional subscriptions.

Okay, so let's do a conservative estimate, and say even 1 million of these counted subscribers are still in their free month. That leaves 9 million paying subscribers who, at the $15 fee, are generating $135 million every month. Hell, even if you adjust that to, say, $120 million (since many subscribers may be paying for slightly discounted 3- or 6-month subscriptions), that still means Blizzard more than recouped their entire upkeep costs over a four-year period in just two months. We believe the words you are looking for are "hot damn."

I don't want that kind of gaming culture either, but yet it already exists, and has existed since the days that the Pac Man look and feel laws affected how gaming and computer software development is today. Look at the FPS and fighting games, they aren't much different, as are the MMOs or the RPG arena.

Bring it down to the Popcap casual gaming level and you really start to see the originality of game development that was the hallmark of the 80s gaming culture. The smaller development houses can be freer with their ideas and development because well, it costs little and the payback is large.

Zeraph · 12-31-2009, 04:32 PM

The development time is generally covered by the box sales. Maybe a little less from MMORPGs, but not much less. And that article supports my PoV. Thanks for finding the article.

Things certainly have already affected our gaming culture, but I think we can keep it from influencing it further and pigeon holing it even more. With MMORPGs I think we have a special opportunity as it is a rather untapped genre still.

12-17-2009, 12:42 PM	#82 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	So back to the subject. I'd like to see spellcasting be more of a thinking man's (or woman's) game. Spell choice, some sort of preparation, etc, rather than just blasting with fireball for the nth time. I want creative purposes to spells that don't just give X amount more damage. I'd like to see puzzle rooms, or encounters based more around traps and such, rather than just npc X. Personally I'd like a "kid" unfriendly game. One than punishes random reckless behavior. For instance hunter-stalker mobs that only strike when you're alone, or trap rooms. I'd like to see some sort of randomized stat loot system like Diablo2. On the otherhand, I'd like a reward for every person for every major encounter of some kind. Exact rewards would vary of course, but I'd like to see a loot system to reflect this. I am so sick of dealing with ninja looters taking rare items that don't benefit their class. So whenever the treasure chest or mob was looted all loot would be preassigned to make sure everyone got at least one reward, but there'd be a trade drop down menu so you could switch loot with someone if you both agreed. This would take care of those rolling shenanigans I've had so many headaches over the years from. Mounts, mounts, and more mounts. I want mounted combat, different types of mounts, different stats on mounts, attacking mounts, different uses for mounts. Underwater mounts, flying mounts, maybe even burrowing mounts. Pets and summons, everyone should be able to summon something or have some sort of animal companion that can help them fight. Of course they'd have restricted uses (to keep down the clutter), especially in groups. For instance in PvP and boss encounters there could be an anti summon spell that kills all summons in an AoE. They'd mostly be useful for soloing and flavor. Unique travel encounters. I want there to be certain places that require certain groups or spells or rituals to reach and that have dangerous encounters along the way. For instance, to travel to the plane of fire you'd have to find an elementalist to cast the spell, and then brave the fire elementals that may come out to eat you. No easy flight path for you. I want more horror elements. Not in the gore sense, but in the Doom3, or RE, or Silent Hill where things jump out at you and scare the shit out of you. I want there to be some kind of mob scaling so that a horde of zombies is always dangerous and there is no point in your progresssion that you can walk up to 56 zombies and 1 shot them in an AOE. Sure you should feel like youre growing in power, but the scaling is ridiculous in current games. Even level 1 monsters should still pose some* kind of threat. Kid in quotes since plenty of adults are responsible for such behavior too. Last edited by Zeraph; 12-17-2009 at 12:44 PM..*

12-17-2009, 01:32 PM	#85 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	Sounds interesting, didn't play EQ2 though, so not sure. My only caveat with that type of a system (its sounds like anyway) is it may become too commonplace and and formulaic and too much of a requirement for everyone to participate in and lag spikes might ruin the chain or some newb. On the other hand if the complicated stuff is kept to the major spell casting classes then hopefully only people good at that kind of thing will keep up with it to end game. As I'm not sure I'd want it to be a requirement for everyone, for every tough encounter. Although I'm definitely not averse to more advanced tactics. And maybe something along those lines could be developed so long as it didn't rely on the weakest link in the chain kind of thing (by making several people able to complete each step). I can just see it: "Dude, hit your ice spell, ice ice!" "Dude, wtf!" Group dies. "what happened? Sorry was afk." So to sum up, tough encounters, but encounters that don't exploit the weakest member of the group. I like it when the good players can take up the slack. Last edited by Zeraph; 12-17-2009 at 01:34 PM..

12-17-2009, 07:23 PM	#87 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	He sounds really neat, wish I could have fought him. In other news does WoW ever have an original idea? :P It's art and style is 90% from fantasy warhammer and half the ideas are from D&D or other games. I can't really fault them too much though, especially the ideas as that'd be dumb not to capitalize on. But I always thought it was a little weak how much stylization they took from warhammer (which was around on tabletop before its MMO came out before anyone says WoW came out first). Last edited by Zeraph; 12-17-2009 at 07:27 PM..

12-17-2009, 07:51 PM	#88 (permalink)
Cynthetiq Tilted Cat Head Administrator Location: Manhattan, NY	Warcraft itself is 15 years old. but all that stuff kind of borrowed from each other, making slight tweaks and adjustments to make it slightly different. __________________ I don't care if you are black, white, purple, green, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, hippie, cop, bum, admin, user, English, Irish, French, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, indian, cowboy, tall, short, fat, skinny, emo, punk, mod, rocker, straight, gay, lesbian, jock, nerd, geek, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Independent, driver, pedestrian, or bicyclist, either you're an asshole or you're not. What's the best nation in the world? DO-NATION!

12-17-2009, 08:09 PM	#89 (permalink)
Baraka_Guru warrior bodhisattva Super Moderator Location: East-central Canada	I don't know what you guys are talking about. This is all a ripoff of Tolkien, who, in turn, ripped off the authors of the classics and the periods of antiquity. It's all good. __________________ Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing? —Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön Humankind cannot bear very much reality. —From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

12-14-2009, 02:03 PM	#81 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	Sigh, I just realized how far away the old republic probably is. Closed beta hasn't even started yet So knowing bioware might be up to 2 years till release. I'm guessing CB won't start till Jan or maybe even March of next year. They did open up sign ups for it though a month or two ago, so sign up if you haven't. I usually try to ignore games until their out, but meh I'm bored. I'm liking the looks of the ideas floating around on their forums though. The community already seems quite strong for a game not even in CB yet.

12-17-2009, 09:36 PM	#90 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	I'm talking more about style; that's different than a green dude that's called an orc and tends toward chaos. I don't have a problem with those standards. Also, I played warcraft too, and there's very little similarity in there between it and WoW. WoW is a heck of a lot more fleshed out I mean, obviously the orcs are fairly standard and what not. I wish I could find the old warhammer thread where someone detailed out all the similarities between em and clearly showed that warhammer had developed the style first. Keep in mind warhammer was around in the early 80s, way way before warcraft I came out.

12-20-2009, 05:10 PM	#91 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	So we've been talking about gameplay, but what about business models? What do you want to see? ~$50 + free month + ~$15 each month after? Free to download and play at low levels but pay per month to unlock the rest? Cash shop? Pay per content unlock ala guild wars? I'm really not sure personally. I really, really dislike the current popular model of $50 + $15 per month (especially when you throw in the $40-50 expansions). Seems like a total ripoff (I could be totally wrong of course). In the old days it made sense because of how insanely costly bandwidth was. Now though servers, bandwidth, and even employees are all cheaper. Yet the costs haven't gone down at all. Basically stayed the same (in time with inflation). Cash shops generally suck, though I suppose if they did it right... so long as you didn't get any undue advantages and still paid reasonable amounts. I'd like to see some sort of hybrid system. I think MMORPGs should definitely be free to download and initially play. They tend to end up that way pretty quickly anyway. The reason being is that unlike most games, MMORPGs rely on new people way way more, otherwise the game becomes quite stale and goes in a downward spiral (see warhammer). So for costs, I'd say some sort of low monthly cost, about 5 bucks or so. Then add a cash shop, but only for non essential items, just for a way for the company to make extra cash for those with money to burn. Also, some sort of content unlock, not a lot at once, but many mini-expansion like unlocks here and there for ~$10 instead of doing full expansions that cost $40 one month and $10 6 months later. This will also help keep long boring dry periods away and let people play more at their own pace. So in summary, use every option available but scale down the $ way more. Best of all worlds hopefully. Leave some parts of the game perma unlocked so people can come back and visit friends without paying per month, this hopefully wets their apetite as well as keeps the game populated. I'd probably still be playing WoW if they had used this model. I think all MMOs need some sort of free (but not fully unlocked) way to go back and check things out. MMORPGs are like social networks such as facebook or myspace, they need a way to pull people into the drama. Esepcially to draw old players back between major expansions. The best way to do this is to make some parts of it free (and not just trial accounts for new players). Last edited by Zeraph; 12-20-2009 at 05:19 PM..

12-26-2009, 08:33 PM	#92 (permalink)
Arandrul Upright Location: Canada	As much as I am hoping for the best for TOR, i will support Blizzard until it crumbles in the mmo world. Now this scenario seems almost impossible with a company with such history but there is something about dual-wielding purple lightsabers that just makes me want to close my Battlenet account, take a trip down to bioware HQ and smuggle myself into the building __________________ I love Everything Carl Sagan said, however: "Where we have strong emotions, we are liable to fool ourselves" >>>------l> Arandrul <l------<<< (ORLY?)

12-30-2009, 04:12 PM	#93 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	No one has a single opinion on the business model aspect?

12-30-2009, 04:56 PM	#94 (permalink)
Cynthetiq Tilted Cat Head Administrator Location: Manhattan, NY	I've been gnawing on it for some time now and with the development costs and overhead costs in the millions I'm having a hard time with any other business model. I don't like the idea of advertising in my MMO or video games that aren't natural so sports games it makes sense. Other than that, I don't see how they can keep the revenue to get the development dollars to further production on the game. __________________ I don't care if you are black, white, purple, green, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, hippie, cop, bum, admin, user, English, Irish, French, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, indian, cowboy, tall, short, fat, skinny, emo, punk, mod, rocker, straight, gay, lesbian, jock, nerd, geek, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Independent, driver, pedestrian, or bicyclist, either you're an asshole or you're not. What's the best nation in the world? DO-NATION!

12-30-2009, 07:15 PM	#95 (permalink)
Baraka_Guru warrior bodhisattva Super Moderator Location: East-central Canada	I see nothing wrong with the monthly subscription model, even in addition to single-sum payments for major expansions. I see the subscription cost as necessary for maintaining the world, tweaking it, fixing it, and the number of little goodies that Blizzard creates/runs each month. I see $15ish per month as reasonable for a game that has the extremely high ongoing play value as WoW. I'm just waiting for something better to come along that deserves my $15. __________________ Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing? —Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön Humankind cannot bear very much reality. —From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

12-30-2009, 09:07 PM	#96 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	But why do you guys think they deserve the $15 a month? I'm not saying its not worth $15 a month to an individual (since it often is, myself included) but I don't see how its possible that costs are still that high per month. The math is pretty easy to do for total sum. Anyone know the current subscription number blizzard has? Pretty sure its in the millions per month. Where is all that money going? Programmers don't cost millions to pay. Bandwidth doesn't. I can't prove it but I have a feeling $15 is a total ripoff. I remember when, it was either EQ2 or WoW was in beta and they were considering going below 12.99 a month (the current cost of EQ1 at the time) but decided to go with 15 a month once they each heard the other was willing (I think they made a deal behind closed doors). If they were considering less and still wanting to see a profit, I can't see it costing more than $10 a month. Probably more in the ballpark of 6-8$. Especially when one considers all the free MMORPGs out there that still make a profit when only like 30% of the player base is paying for cash shop items.

12-30-2009, 09:24 PM	#97 (permalink)
Orchrist Tilted Location: NJ, USA	The upkeep costs for your free MMO's compared to WoW are probably night and day difference, with the amount of server hardware it must take to run all of the servers they have up, and in all the various places they now keep servers in addition to the cost of the number of GM's to support a playerabase in the millions plus funding development for future expansions then throw in all the money they blow to put on Blizzcon every year which is a loss for them despite how much people spend to go there. Also theres marketing costs throw in the WoW commercials and the ads you see for it everywhere... I'd say it adds up. As for my personal opinion as to why it DESERVES $15 dollars a month? I'm with the crowd that looks at it this way, as a gamer on average playing regular games even if I ONLY purchased a new game every 4 months which would be a rarity considering how short most single player games are that'd be close to equaling out what I'd spend on WoW. As most WoW players can tell you chances are if you play it you won't be bothering spending your time on much else because of the time investment and wealth of things to do in the game. So in the end by spending 15 a month on this and not buying any other games I'm really saving myself money in the long haul.

12-31-2009, 08:05 AM	#99 (permalink)
Runningwater Tilted Location: North Carolina	Man I wish I had been able to hop into this thread earlier. Reading back on all the fun stuff from EQ makes me wonder how it fell off... I remember playing with Lasereth many times, we both agree that being in first person made you almost feel a "connection" with your character. I started playing WoW and never felt the same connection there. Anymore it definitely is a stats race rather than enjoying a world and enjoying your character. I really liked how things in EQ weren't "soul-bound" I remember giving my Necromancer's pets weapons...the better the weapon the more damage he'd do. Also swapping weapons with a friend was awesome (I beat Lasereth in a duel with his own weapon...couldn't beat him with mine ) I also miss that every class had it's own niche...all the classes in WoW seem to be getting more and more homogenized. Example, Rangers could actually track things, specific things, including other players bodies - you got paid money for this if you could help another player find their body that was way out in the middle of nowhere. Biggest reason I play WoW now is that I loved the world from playing Warcraft 2 and 3. The stories are awesome, the characters are awesome. I just wish it had more of a "fantasy-realism" feel to it.

12-31-2009, 08:43 AM	#100 (permalink)
Jaegyr Crazy Location: Central Ore	I really love this thread. I had so many great memories of my time in EQ. Great old friends, a world that took my breath away. Anyone remember seeing hill giants in the distance and being blown away by the size? Stepping foot for the first time into Gfay and realizing i was stepping into a whole new world! I may be sadistic because it did have its evil faults but i wouldnt mind playin classic before any expansions EQ (maybe kunark) Oh well its in the past im very much looking forward to SWTOR. Ive long since given up on WoW. After playing and quitting 4 different times i just have no energy to do the same shit over and over again! Raiding is subpar every instance is so scrypted its like the same movie over and over again! I just wish SWTOR would hurry up. Though i know bioware does nothing before its 110% ready

12-31-2009, 11:55 AM	#101 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	On the $15 a month- I'm not getting anywhere and I already feel I adequately stated my point. By deserve I already said I meant it on a business scale, not a personal one. And orchist- half those things you mentioned aren't upkeep and bring new money and new players into the game (new expansions pay for themselves, same goes to ads and blizzcon despite what they tell you.) Companies are not a charity, they don't do cons for the lawls, marketing is either worth it and they do it, or its not and they don't. Blizzcon is just another marketing avenue. And scaling up is actually the opposite, it gets more profitable and more efficient rather than the other way around. That's just general business principle, look to walmart and target for proof. Old EQ- I also loved how races actually felt different. I remember the lighter races feeling a certain racism toward dark elves and laughing at the dark elves that would have to beg for food when they came to our zones. On the other hand, I remember this dark elf warrior fully decked out in bronze armor (the thing at the time) and being a terrifying sight to behold. We all gathered atop a hill and had an anime style fight and took turns rushing him like some old movie where the henchmen only fight one at a time

12-31-2009, 12:33 PM	#102 (permalink)
Cynthetiq Tilted Cat Head Administrator Location: Manhattan, NY	Selling tangible goods is not the same as selling server ended services. All the initial hardware from the launch of Wow is not the same hardware any more. Being on one of the original servers it was one that had extended downtime because they had to upgrade the hardware so that it was inline with the rest of the newer servers. On a business scale they still deserve the $15 because it's a great price point versus the total cost of their operations. Look at gyms, they have a similar subscription model. If everyone showed up that had subscriptions it would be horrific, that's what happens during times like now where everyone is in Lagalaran, and the World Event times. __________________ I don't care if you are black, white, purple, green, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, hippie, cop, bum, admin, user, English, Irish, French, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, indian, cowboy, tall, short, fat, skinny, emo, punk, mod, rocker, straight, gay, lesbian, jock, nerd, geek, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Independent, driver, pedestrian, or bicyclist, either you're an asshole or you're not. What's the best nation in the world? DO-NATION!

12-31-2009, 01:24 PM	#103 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	I don't get what you're saying Cyn, that only supports my point Gyms do do the same thing for the most part and are just as much of a ripoff. Except people don't show up 24/7 so I fail to see how that has anything to do with the subject. If people did start showing up more then they'd change their business model to reflect it and become more profitable. It almost feels like you guys don't see them as a business. Upgrading hardware also attracts new people to the game to an extent, but yes, that is a point, that would be an additional upkeep cost. Still not seeing the total cost though. Server hardware has also gone down a lot since the days of EQ. In general you can't argue a company is doing something out of kindness or "quality," it is always for profit margins, don't kid yourself. The bigger the company, the better they are at doing it (and hiding it). The question is if those margins are reasonable. When something dominates and gets out of hand and inches toward the monopoly side of things we get things like Windows and I really really don't want to see a homogenized gaming culture.

12-31-2009, 04:32 PM	#105 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	The development time is generally covered by the box sales. Maybe a little less from MMORPGs, but not much less. And that article supports my PoV. Thanks for finding the article. Things certainly have already affected our gaming culture, but I think we can keep it from influencing it further and pigeon holing it even more. With MMORPGs I think we have a special opportunity as it is a rather untapped genre still.