MMORPG.com Blogs - MMORPG Thoughts and Other things that I can't get out of My Head

Perpetual received a lot of flack for not investing much time in regards to the starship interiors of the Star Trek ship. Let's hope Cryptic doesn't make the same mistake.

There are a lot of ways Cryptic can approach the Starship Interiors concept, the question always comes down to, what is FUN?

Will the Starship be merely a transport vehicle for groups to travel? And players use them only to fight starship fights by themselves?

Or will Starships be a moving "base of operations" (like City of Villians Instanced base)? Drawing from previous Star Trek games like Bridge Commander, wouldn't it be fun to get an intergration of both concepts?

Let's say our Captain has been comissioned a ship from a Federation Starbase or Earth. The Ship has the basics - a bridge, engineering, sick bay and mess hall. The Captain has been given an assignment from an NPC Admiral. The Admiral tells the captain what officers are required for the task. The Captain can assemble his team or use the City of Heroes style LFG system (Lists players lfg , their rank, their specialty). Players requesting a team get a beep on their badge and a message..

Once the team is assembled the Captain assigns them to the ship. Not everyone gets to sit on the bridge. The entire team can explore the ship and interact with it. Sit emotes, eat/ drink, sleep, etc. Bring up a map of the ship schematics, etc..

Going to do away missions are easy, because the ship is merely a transport vessel. It is when ship to ship combat occurs is the real problem.

Perpetual noted that they do not want players staring at consoles during a fight. Understood. I can see that it lacks action pack activity that other MMOs offer. BUT this is Star Trek. It is not Anarachy Online or Star Wars Galaxies for that matter.

I do believe Cryptic can make ship vs. ship combat exciting as a group effort. The roles are already there in the Star Trek Universe. Captains in this case, not only set the mission and its difficulty, they can set NPC behavior of the crew. Maybe he could not find an Engineer for his mission. Well he "buys" one from the Starfleet manifest and sets it behavior. The Captain also receives reports from his players and the game translates it into statistics of his ship. For example the Captain wants to know his Shield status. He does not know it always. He must receive a report from his tactical officer. A good officer updates this regularly and it shows up to the captain as a blue bar surrounding the ship. The status bar remains that way until updated again. So teamwork is essential. An AFK Tactical Officer would mean he is literally asleep at the post and may mean defeat for the team.

Captains have other roles but I will go into that some other time.

Each team member has a role on the ship during space combat. Give the Captain reports and keep the area you are in charge of in peak performance. I would then propose to throw a wrinkle into the system..

Mini instances. What? We are in the middle of a battle and I am off doing an instance? Hear me out..

These could be mini scenarios that may turn the tide of battle or provide unique "buffs" for the team. An example , Suppose the Ship is in combat with a Romulan. The Lieutennant is stationed at the Conn and is charge of navigation. Normally he has a host of abiltites, combat manuevers to aid the ship in this fight. The game throws a curveball to the team and it seems the Romulan ship has blasted the Lieutennants station. The team sees the player is down and the bridge is on fire. Instead of the game continuing its space fight, the mini instance has started. Save the player, save the bridge in 10 minutes or the Ship suffers. The lieutennant has to be carried to sick bay through the ship interior map. All the while the ship trembles in the heat of combat. Someone has to stop the fire and repair the console to a workable condition. A Doctor has to heal the fallen member or he is out of the fight. The captain has the option of skipping the scenario and suffer the ship movement and combat debuff or go through the scenario and keep functioning systems...

Would that be feasible for a game?

I thought I was reading about STO not having any real progression system of sorts. While this is not a "new" idea per se, Here is how I would argue for the idea of a progression system in STO.

Star Trek has a Rank system for chain of command. Here is a site how the chain of command is listed in the Star Trek world.

Ok these ranks are hallmark points of advancement in a players career. How do you measure ones progression through these ranks? My suggestion would have a few twists.

First would be a players special interest - these are skills sets which could be used like any other sci fi MMO. It also helps a player customize his/her avatar. Think of the Star Trek shows. Captain Piccard loved archeology, ( Maybe as a game mechanic players who take the skill archeology receive benefits from exploration, more special unlocks from ancient cultures and perhaps able to receive unique missions that challenge an archeologist. What caused this civilization to die? Why is my ship debuffed when I visited here and my engineer has no clue?). Maybe you want to be Captain Waorf type and focus on fighting tactics. You might get bonuses for melee / weapon combat important for away missions and/ or if your ship has been boarded by the enemy...

So I would set an experience bar for these skills and level them up to unlock new skills for the player. Adding benefits to performace and perhaps unlocking new game experiences such as quests, items, and / or enhancing ship performance.

Set that aside now, lets focus on moving our avatar from a mere Cadet to a Starfleet Captain. What would be a measuring unit of progression. I say give them Achievements and Commendations. When a player performs activities to complete a goal, it is an Achievement. Perform X amount of Achievements and you are up for a Commendation from your Captain. Earn enough Commendations and you are eligible for a Promotion of Rank. So to lay things out:

Johnny is an Ensign on a Ship. The game requires Johnny to perform 50 Achievements to qualify for a Commendation. Five Commandations qualify him for a Promotion. Finish an epic type of Promotion mission and DING! You have been promoted to Lieutennant.

What could be an interesting twist on the advancement system is that Players reward other Players. That means as a Captain you can award your officers of your group Achievement Experience towards a Commendation. Obviously safegards have to be in place to prevent abuse. Things like AFK timers, Limiting the total amount of experience given, keeping the rewards private for Captain eyes only, etc.

Here is an example:

Suppose a mission for the Captain and his team of officer players are assigned a mission. The Mission Pool has 1,000 experience points assigned to it upon completion. The Captain decides at the end who gets what Up to a maximum of 250 exp per person (say it is a 4 man team). The game also has a minimum of 50 exp as a minimum so the Captain can't deny anyone exp at all. So, this system promotes roleplaying and gives a sense of respect to the Captain. When the experience numbers are dealt to the players, the system message may read .. You gain 250 experience! or You gain 100 experience! or You gain 50 experience!

This would not affect a players specialized skills.

Captains still get experience as well, to become an Admiral. The Captain cannot assign his own experience, but in case of a raid situation where the Captain is part of an Armada, the Admiral can assign Captains experience. In regular missions, experience goes to the Captain upon completion of the mission. Mission restarts diminish the Captain rewards.

It is wonderful news that Cryptic is taking up the reigns of this massive IP for an MMORPG. So much potential is here! What worries me a tad is that they fall into a gaming system all too familiar. Player run ships. Earth and Beyond was one of the first MMO’s on the market that had players flying their own customized ships around taking out enemies and doing missions for money. The player avatar was simply a driver who went to ports and got rewards or picked up assigned missions. It was the thing that was assigned the stats and did the work.

Cryptic has an opportunity to revamp the whole concept of the ship is the central core to a space game. Let me explain:

The Cryptic Customization Touch

We all know Cryptic has revitalized customization of the avatar appearance and costumes in its CoH games.

Instead of a variety of costumes, Cryptic can try scaling stats for avatar creation. It should be noted that personal stats should not be the emphasis of the game. We are not hoping to deck out our avatars in silly armor or clothing because we want to maximize our hit points. However, there is nothing wrong with statistics of our avatar to aid us in our skills.

So stats are simply modifiers for players in how they perform. The game should still not let stats dictate the game. The players actions do. Stats should not be requirements for improved gear or ships

Everyone with some MMO experience has seen the incredible about of scaling one can do with his or her avatars? Make them taller, more muscled, skinny, bustier, chunky, ugly, etc. What if you had a stat bar to correlate with your changes? You want a muscled character? As you scroll his physique towards the max, his Strength and Constitution scores go up, but his intellect, wisdom and dexterity creeps down. Want a genius? His cranium might get bigger and more head details open up to you. (Pointy ears, frills, etc.), however, his constitution and strength will be capped lower. Want a Captain Kirk whose guile and handsomeness rule the stars? He won’t be as strong or hardy as a Klingon character.

Had some time at work today envisioning one of the tough losses from Warhammer Online: The Blackguard...

“Fools!” the armor clad Druchii general slams his scroll on the table, “I cannot imagine Malekith has decreed this himself! It surely is a forgery!” He points to the discarded scroll and then looks at you. Eyes ablaze with fury and nostrils flaring like a raging bull.

“Retreat and Decommissioned? NOW? When we are so close for victory?”

He slumps down and sits reminiscing his days as a Soldier for the Dark Elves.

I learned how I became who I am. I feed off of the pain. What does not kill makes me stronger. It is said Dwarves bear grudges against those that hurt them or their allies. The difference between us and them is clear.

I have no allies. I hate everyone.

Sure it behooves the Druchii to work with the Chaos fanatics or dumb brutish Greenskins, but only because they serve our ends. They are tools of our campaign. I simply hate them less than I hate the High Elves and their friends.

So how does my Hate really work in detail? Why not give a player the same mechanic a PvE monster gets???

For example the Blackguard does into battle against a tank, and healer. For simplicity purposes the base damage of the Blackguard (BG) attacks are 10. If the tank hits him for 5, his hate meter goes up 5 points. The BG has a 0.5% damage increase against the tank now. Suppose the healer heals the tank the BG is engaged with for 30. The hate meter goes up 30 points and the BG gets a 3% damage increase against that healer. He still has only a 0.5% damage increase against the tank. This might prompt the BG to go after the healer, because he has considerable more benefits to do so.

We also know that as a Tank, if you are ignored by an opponent, that opponent suffers a penalty. Blackguards get an additional benefit from this mechanic. Blackguards hate being ignored. So a Blackguard ignored generates some hate on his meter.

Blackguards are proficient in the polearms weapons. This is great because most MMOs favor the sword and shield combination. Blackguards don’t evade opponents (Swordmasters), don’t have the highest hit points (Greenskins) and don’t have the highest armor mitigation (Chosen/ Ironbreakers do). So how can a Blackguard tank?

Two components – 1^st should be frustration. This means their longer polearm weapons these BG’s use enable them to jab and keeps an opponent at a distance. Melee opponents are unable to get their hot buttons to turn on because they seem to be out of range when fighting a Blackguard. The halberd can damage and push the opponent back. Very frustrating for players. As a defensive strategy, it generates hate for the monster and keeps himself from being harmed often. Knockdowns are also possible of course.

Blackguards also generate tons of hate from dps. Their hatred mechanic ramps up quickly by design and as a result they pour out a lot of damage to keep a monsters attention. So the overall group/raid strategy is to jab and push, then when hate flies up, slash for big damage. This should be tweaked to give Blackguards a good tank role comparable to other tanks.

Another neat ability might be Lockdown. The BG ties up an opponents weapon with his halberd. The opponent can’t attack and if he moves he may lose his weapon for a period of time. Opponents break the lockdown with a loss of Action points.

I picture the massive hatred attacks have animations including a halberd spinning behind his back, a spin overhead and combination crouch spin maneuver whirling his halberd on a low plane of attack. Lots of fun to be had!

Mastery lines

Path of Frustration – designed to boost defenses of the BG and irritate opponents with disruptions and “toggle off” an opponents hot bar.

Path of the Relentless – focuses on PBAOE damage attacks. Also they seem to have a higher magical resistance than other tanks.

Path of the Conqueror – focuses on hatred generation and suffers less from tank ignoring than other players. These are killer tanks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS7Y7T3thD4

Knights of the Blazing Sun

This installment of the lost Warhammer Online profession goes to the Empire’s vaunted Knights of the Blazing Sun. My first worry about this profession is when Paul Barnett announcement them in a podcast at the Mythic Christmas party. He described them as a class for someone to play a tank role for Empire and that was about it. They seemed to be a profession that was a necessary evil for Mythic. They are tanks, but what can we do to make them stand out?

Tanks in other races are pretty bland in the MMO world. They either have high hit points, or have high damage absorption. At least in WAR we could try something else. KOBTS were thought to fill a role as group buffs via shouts. This is fine and dandy but we can elaborate more.

While many MMOs use “stances” for melee characters, few have tried formations as a method of gameplay. What I propose is similar to a City of Villain Mastermind character who can lay down a device which emanates burst heals in a small geometric area of effect.

What could happen is the KOBTS decides which Formation he wants. And then a geometric shape seen only by his party is outlined on the ground. Party members inside this shape gets the benefit. Those who are not, don’t. The shape is located behind the KOBTS in general and moves with him.

Of course there can be variants on this mechanic such as a stationary formation buff that can give residual benefits allowing the Knight to move elsewhere.

So while the KOBTS won’t be able to soak up damage like a Black Orc, or dance through a battlefield like a Swordmaster, He will use his battle formations to keep himself and his party at peak performance and a lean mean fighting machine.

Even more important is raid formations. Knights should be able to access raid formations from Generals as tactical options. Raid buffs!

As an interesting nuance, Knights may be made great by giving them a party evacuation skill. Retreat! This skill would provide everyone behind the Knight a 50% speed increase without any AP loss. The Knight expends all his Morale and AP to fire off the skill A morale and AP minimum must be required. In return 75% movement buff for the Knight and a 50% speed for the rest. There is a penalty is group members leave this formation. This penalty is not only because a solider didn’t follow orders, but to prevent abuse in battle. Its whole design is to get the party out of an area and regroup. How it would work is the Knight might be in a middle of a battle going bad. Use up his morale and execute Retreat. Then the party behind him has a 5 second boost to run. The Knight can maintain the boost by running in front of his party and keeping the Retreat buff behind him. This retreat is not without limits. A knight in retreat that is snared is prime pickings, because his whole party will run out of the area and be debuffed. The knight is also weak because he has no action points or morale..

The last item I propose is a deviation from Everquest 2. It is heroic opportunities. I propose the Knights use a system of Battle Commands that give the party a chance to do some heroics. This could be easily implemented in the morale system. While most players build up morale to unlock their big hit, Knights can have up to 3 Heroic Opportunities. 1/3 morale, 2/3 morale and Max. When morale reaches this point, the Knight can execute a Heroic Opportunity. A Special battle Command perhaps. Each character will have one of his ability bars light up its borders. If the character hits it then a special effect may occur. It may take a combination of abilities to unleash something fantastic, enough to turn a tide of the battle. Mythic can keep those combinations under lock and key for players to decipher. No need to create a HO icon by which everyone takes a turn to hit an ability. If the ability is part of a chain a different animation on the UI can be seen. Maybe a purple fire. When a player sees this it means the battle command is part of a chain and players should wait until it is their turn to fire it off. When the purple fire goes red. Mash the button within a short period to keep the chain going.

We want this to be easy to use, difficult to master, but FUN always.

Masteries

Path of Glory - focuses on heroics. More combinations are available to them allowing magnificent effects. A Knight well versed in Battle Commands could not only save a party from impossible odds, but perhaps turn defeat into victory.

Path of Honor - For those Knights who enjoy party buffs. They are experts in battle foormations. More formations are available to them and the general foramtions are perfected to be even more potent.

Path of the Commander - a hybrid of the two above paths, has access to some of each, but never as competent as a specialist. Commanders really shine with Raid buff enhancements.

Dear Marc Jakobs,

I understands you be puttin’ me out of a job, eh? Given me the ol’ pinkslip, eh? Now why ya be doing me and my brothers that way? I have been dair since you built dis stinkin world, now you say I aint good enuf?

::takes a giant gulp of Ale::

****BUUUUUURP***

Since, now I hafta be sittin’at the unemployment office line fer a long freakin time. I am gonna write me out an application. I heard some folks in Hyboria may be needin someone, dunno yet.

I gots a lots of skills. Just take a look at em! So what are you sore about?

Bah! Humans! Always wanted more. Ok I bet with a lil more work and a lil less time off da good ale, I can show ya a thing or two.

My buddies made some suggestions too. Lookie here!

Roll attacks/ mechanic – Someone says we Hammerer used to have rolls. A forward ground roll like a bowling ball could put a worry on a greenskin as I follow up with my hammer strikes. I can spice it up with Roll left and Roll right too. This gives me a 90 degree side roll burst for a short period that can be used to quickly change targets, save my weaker buds from attacks or move out of da way from a missile. I know it eats up my action points and it won’t generate morale, but a dwarfs gotta do what hes gotta do.

I know it seems my best work is done when my foe is dizzy from blunt hits from my mallets. Momentum is da key. I start off slow, but da longer I’m fightin’, the more hammer hurts ya.

(In the videos I see, I see no animations that reflect this momentum. Swinging a hammer or hammers should simulate some movement in the direction where he or she is swinging. I see this akin to a drunken brawler in battle. Picture a dwarf in battle stumbling slightly to the left or right as he swings. He should not stand still. That is not “great”. The movement gets more pronounced as momentum builds as if the dwarf is building up for an Olympic discus throw. To make this mechanic really shine, each ability should be directional right or left. That would be “great”! Momentum builds faster when attacks are executed from one side. If the dwarf attacks with two hammers, momentum buildup is slower because attacks are coming from both arms.

But isn’t that gonna throw off targeting? I mean, if you max out one side you character could be stumbling off its target. Not necessarily. If the dwarf is smiting a single target for a long period of time, his animations should be whirling in place like an Olympian discus thrower. Each successful ability strike when Momentum is high results in a rapid whirl and inflicts big damage.)

I also realize that a separate button for directional attacks might be disastrous for UI. I would propose culling some other abilities to make way for these innovations. For example, I do not think a Hammerer needs an AOE snare. (Impact Wave).

Do Hammerers have any self buffs? Maybe a wind up which provides a short prep period and a certain amount of time to deliver the payload on an opponent. Failure to deliver payload is a waste of AP.

Mastery lines eh? I likes to think I mastered everything, but I guess I’d be fibbin. So listen up!

Two Handed Mastery – For Hammerers who like to dual wield. They get faster momentum buildup and can stun more, but stun duration is more of an interrupt than a real game stopper, still this style is harrowing to any foe.

One big Hamma – these are for dwarves that like using a Sledge hammer to pummel opponents. Momentum is slower, but damage is higher. Knockbacks are more common and these guys can transfer damage to other opponents. This means if a dwarf hits one guy for 100 damage, 60 of it kills the enemy. The remaining 40 could go into the next nearby opponent without expending any action points. Big Hammers take big swings, so attacks are slower, but they pack a whollop. Many attacks have a chance to stun an opponent.

Mountain Hammerer – a dwarven style which uses his surroundings to his advantage. He likes to bust up objects which spray damage around him. Sometimes weakening his foes in the process. His attunement in his hammer(s) allow him to strike the ground itself to disorient , trip up foes. He also gains bonuses in structural damage abilities to keep or fortress doors.

Thanx for da memories,

Hammerer

http://warhammeronline.wikia.com/wiki/Hammerer

http://video.aol.com/video-detail/warhammer-online-dwarf-hammerer-rune-priest-rvr-gameplay-12/2321826006?icid=acvsv3

Warhammer Design for Fun

In the recent shock of Warhammer Online removing some character classes and delaying city content for all but two races it bucked MMO communities everywhere. This blog is not going to be a rant. I have done enough of that already. Now it is time for constructive suggestions.

What I plan to do is try to salvage what we know about the nixed classes and offer how I think these professions could be great and worthy to be put back in to game. It will be a long post regardless, but I will hyperlink as much as I can.

Orc Choppa – the Warhammer online description is here. The direction I believe they wanted these hooligans was close to a beserker.

Morale Buildup concept: Berserk – big damage output

Weakness: less durable

Analysis: I can understand how as Mythic looked at this class and asked themselves. How does this stand out from other berserkers in MMOs?

Judging from videos the Choppa is slow, has some slow attack and a frenzy bash.

Overall the older videos do show a slow combat mechanic. It seems that the Choppa swings – wait – swings – wait. This is boring. Don’t remove the ability, but improve the animation. Maybe a better wind up. When the orc is done swinging these basic attacks, the cooldown button should be ready for another swing…

Lets spice it up!

Movement buffs – Give the Choppa something to move in close to surprise an opponent. In an old Gamespot interview, orcs were supposed to be about shouts and leaps. Yet in videos observed I never see any combat leaps. Only falling from high places.

What if all dps classes have an ability that drains APs over time and increases combat movement and ability recharges (like the COH/COV Haste Power).

Squish! – the animation could be the Choppa jumping a short distance and sitting on his target. This ability serves two purposes. One to get the Choppa in close, two to toggle off an opponents abilities for a few seconds and three a chance to jump over an obstruction and get in the back lines. This ability could be upgraded or maybe bought from a tactics vendor for even a greater leap, more damage on a single target, less damage more AOE splash damage, less leap longer stun, etc. I would enjoy a woopie cushion sound effect as my Choppa lands on your Order character please!

Slide attack – I hate to say it, but take a page from Age of Conan combat mechanics. Give these fellers a form of strafe attack. A slice animation followed by a slide to right or left which positions the Choppa 90 degrees of his opponent. Slide attack left and right. If you choose one, both buttons cooldown. This gives more opportunity to use a back attack like Go For Da Soft Spot.

Use da Feets! I see A Choppa occasionally getting some interesting maneuvers using their Choppa as an anchor to do a swing kick. Maybe a fast knockback maneuver or toggle effect on the enemy. I would only have this ability available while running. So they run, post a Choppa, blade down into the ground and the Orc swings up an smacks the victim with his legs, then lands on both feet and pries Choppa out of the ground. The Victim is knocked back a foot or so.

Improve the Short range attack – All I am aware of is one Choppa Hurl ability. However, we are trying to make this character great, remember? Being a wild fighting type why not improve this mechanic? The Choppa Hurl should have variety of effects. Direct damage (for fleeing foes), Stun or movement debuff (no damage), DoT (a Choppa stuck on your side aint fun), debuff to armor and slow an opponents ability recharge effect.. The strategy in this gives a player a choice. Do I ignore my dual wield abilities as I RISK to use my Choppa toss? I emphasize risk because if I miss that Choppa is out of my hands and I have to spend time and action points to pick it up again. Not to mention all my dual wield abilities are toggled off. However, with risk comes reward. A Choppa thrown may be a last resort to catch that fleeing foe, stumble that caster, annoy and weaken that PvE Boss.

Mastery Lines

This can really make a Choppa stand out and fun.

TWO Choppas

This mastery line focuses on dual wield combinations and inflicting heavy melee damage. These Choppas want to go through enemy lines like a weedwhacker and care little about much else, including their preservation. It doesn’t matter if they are reckless as long as the enemy is dead before they are.

One Choppa

This mastery line is focused on more versatile than two hander Choppas. While they can’t produce the raw damage to multiple targets, they could focus on one victim by using both hands with one choppa for more power, utilize a shield for increased defense and maybe off tank for a period of time, use throwing weapons to catch runners or disrupt other enemies.

Heli Choppa

These Choppas love the thrill of being airborne landing in the heat of battle and using enemy bodies as shoes. They leap over enemy ranks, are more effective when being launched by engines of war, and hurt less when falling. They revel in causing chaos to battlefields, causing even the best laid battleplans to fall apart in retreat. The life of these Choppas are risky at best, because you can be shot out of the sky, and you are not fighting every second so your moral gain is slower. But when your blood is boiling, heaven help your foes, ‘cause you will be splattin em a lot.

References:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=for1V1y86QI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4p_I-H_MTTs&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1IX5jtlKf8&feature=related

What would your suggestion be?

I think it is safe to say that MMO quests are designed to reward us with gear or coin as well as experience. This method promotes gaming behavior which discourages role playing and immersion. We take on tasks from NPCs to kill enemies, gather stuff and deliver things all in the name for coin and some gear. While this is a reasonable trade by itself, we repeat this behavior to improve our rewards which usually means better gear. We do this until the games content is consumed and you are at "max level". Then our characters usually "grind" in raids to hope to score on a rare item from a loot table off a rare boss.

Do we really enjoy grinding or rifling through quest dialouge to simply get the task and the reward until we get to the end?

What if:

A game design caters to the characters personality/principles? Hear me out!

When WAR offers players who purchases a pre order Collectors Edition unique quests that no other player can access, I thought to myself. Well, this means unique quests can be given to some players and not all upon starting the game.

Suppose in character creation we are given the standard D&D alignment systems: lawful good, lawful neutral, lawful evil, neutral good, true neutral, neutral evil, chaotic good, chaotic neutral and chaotic evil.

These can be put in flagged criteria for players avatars to have the game code to execute certain programs or dialouges..

That doesn't solve your gear problem however. The gear you earn is the gear you keep. Why have to toss it in a day or two after grinding to a higher level? I propose if you want a certain weapon, you choose its initial design. When you complete a mission you reward is a choice of stat enhancements, or abilities to that weapon or item. Similar to city of heroes/villians. You may also choose cosmetic features like item auras or ability particle effects. I even think we can get new abilities as a reward for doing the quest. Not when you reach level X.

Still want the challange of boss fights or rare spawns? Fair enough, make the rewards better. Offer a rare design model or an opportunity to wield that bosses weapon/ gear. Of course you get the initial benefits of that weapon at the start and as you grow in its experience you unlock abilities of that weapon or stat enhancements.

It is a method that may even remove the need for levels. Skill based gameplay has always been a favorite of these forums. However, players do want to be able to know what level of expertise their character is at any given time. So this may still need to be in place.

Player balancing is a matter of perspective. Instead of award a host of abilities when you "ding", your abiltiies are awarded as you complete a mission. Note the more difficult the mission, the better your abilities rewarded. If the game mission was simple or designed for short game time, your reward might be a slight stat enhancement. Maybe +1 to one stat (or as Age of Conan has it +.01% - WTF is that?).

Overcome a mighty challenge and you acquire a new skill or ability. Want that ability to improve? (in other words, rank 2, rank 3 etc.) do an appropriate mission that warrants that reward.

Here would be some general guidelines to such rewards:

1. Quests that take less than 15-20 minutes -> kill x, gather x, deliver x : single minimal stat enahncement reward or cosmetic item reward

2. Quests that should take 30 min - 1 hour solo - multiple stat / resist enhancement reward and/or cosmetic item modifier

3. End of solo quest chain - new ability award or improved ability ( rank 2, rank 3 , etc)

4. Group reward - stat enhancement and cosmetic reward of your choice

5. End of group quest chain - new ability or improved ability + stat enhancement and cosmetic modifier

6. Epic reward - unique ability, unique item offered which provides base stat enahncements and improved ability of one of your exisiting skills. For those player averse to raids, you can group or solo into a series of adventures to get this reward, but it will take signifantly longer to accomplish.

Thoughts?

Star Trek Online is the working title of a MMORPG being developed by Perpetual Entertainment which was announced on September 7, 2004.^[1] The game is expected to be a major release that will create a massive online arena for PC players to participate as Starfleet officers in the Star Trek universe. The stated plan calls for the launch in the final quarter of 2008.

SO says the infamous Wikipedia.

As of this post, it has been three years, and we have an official website with scant amount of pictures of concept art, a page or so of development logs (Although the world builder stuff was interesting) and a few press releases. Is that it?

Wikipedia seems to explain the game well enough, but developer interviews leave us scratching our heads. The big issue with followers of the game is starship interiors. We do not want an Earth and Beyond experience where players simply acquire a ship, seek to obtain a means to upgrade your vessel so you can be a proud owner of your very own Galaxy Class Starship. We also do not want all our ships to be hubs or socialized areas where you seek out missions beam to your location and play like every other instanced MMO.

They say its going to be 50% space oriented and 50% 3rd person missions. This would be a good start. I just do not know where to go foward from there. Wikipedia says you will choose from professions like tactical/security, science and engineering. Medics is a skill not a profession in this game. The Commanding track is optional?

The ship doctor in Star Trek has definitely been a major character in all the Star Trek series. I cannot imagine why Perpetual could not develop this role in the game. Doctors, as we know can command their own medical starships as well. I can only surmise the designers are stumped on how a doctor would truly contribute to space combat. After all, an Engineer can "heal" a ship via repair abilities. What can a ships doctor do? Heal players at their consoles?

Not at all. I see the doctor handle the entire crew during a ship to ship battle. Lets imagine a "group" of a Captain, an engineer, a security officer and a science officer player on the same ship. Now obiviously in the dangerous away missions it would be foolish to leave their doctor on the ship. However, we want to keep the doctor active during a space battle. I propose that the ships performace is intimatley tied the crew, players and NPCs alike.

The ship has a complement of x amount of ensigns or crew members for each section of the ship. Lets say this ship is small and has 10 crew in engineering, 10 science officers, 10 security members and 10 in tactical. These crew all contribute to the perfomance of the ship in addition to other player skills. For simplicity sake, the engineers contribute to the ships repair rate and the speed of the ship. the security members are essential protecting the crew from on board attacks as well as weapon targeting and reload rate of torpedoes. The science team provides accurate informaion on the your ship and enemy data, such as its shield /weapon systems, and special attacks by the enemy or special tehnologies implmented by the ship. The tactical crew contributes to ship responsiveness in movement and allows rapid commands from captain to crew to take place.

IF the ship is in combat, the ship undergoes damage. If the hull receives damage, crew become injured. Injured crew are immediately sent to sick bay. It is up to the doctor to get the crew back in healthy condition so they contribute to ship duties. The doctor could simply act like a "crafter" at a machine at first. A bumped head condition is delat with a stimulant. A burnt officer is given a dermal regenerator treatment. If another player is hurt, the player is taken to sickbay. The player cannot do anything until the doctor medic fixes him up. The player becomes a "crafting table" with various conditions going on that can vary from a simple laceration to a critical life threatening injury. The doctor uses all the skills, items and medicines available to heal the player. Failure to heal the player effectively means the ship is without a key team member.

Doctors also can protect the crew with immunizations, medical innovations to protect them against alien incursions and predatory life forms that come on the ship.

Just one of several suggestions for STO.

Ok just going to throw some concepts out for this card based game. Again, just going to draw from Magic the Gathering as it is one of the pioneers in this system.

We would like some customization in an MMO. So players can choose various elemental forces to specialize themselves. So players can either start as an adventurer with no special card sets, however they are more flexible with what they can use. Downside as an adventurer is that they are less likely to use more powerful skills/summons that demand several lands of a specific element. Those that desire a special elemental build can unleash mega skills of that element, but may find themselves at a disadvantage from certain foes. Suppose a M

MMORPG Thoughts and Other things that I can't get out of My Head
As a disciple of the MMORPG system, I offer my humble thoughts in this blog.

Show Blog

STO: The Ship mechanic ( Part 1)

STO New ideas (Continued)

Star Trek Online – Rebirth! Can we try something new? (Part One)

An Angry Blackguard

Knights who say Please!

Hammering out a Hammerer

Forget the Whales, Save the Chopaa!

Quest/ Mission Design - Outside the box

Star Trek Online - is it going nowhere or where no MMO has gone before?

Devil is in the Details : What a modified Card based MMO could do

MMORPG Thoughts and Other things that I can't get out of My Head As a disciple of the MMORPG system, I offer my humble thoughts in this blog.

Show Blog

MMORPG Thoughts and Other things that I can't get out of My Head
As a disciple of the MMORPG system, I offer my humble thoughts in this blog.