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View Full Version : What do you think of this..


Kyusoath
27-06-2007, 10:34 PM
just tell us what you think of this.

the 4 tree system.

The 4 trees of the four tree system are :
1 Combat.
2 Craft.
3 Specialise.
4 Master.

Combat: Easy to understand what this is about , this is where key combat abilities lie.

The Combat tree is divided into branches,dealing with different weapons and different fighting styles

(ranged,unarmed,1h,2h,Combat tactics,defence)

you may spend 1000 skill points in each branch of the combat tree, skills/abilities cost between 1-3 points
this means there are lots of abilities.

its possible to master a low level skill with only one or 2 kills, meaning that it doesn't take vast amounts

of time to gain 1 ability.but after a point abilities reach a cap of 1000 xp per 'box'.

this is not a game built around a time sink like a lot of other online games. this is a game built from the ground up to allow you to do whatever you want to , based on your own skills rather than on boring grinds for hours at a time to reward you with a slightly better weapon, all the while killing enemies using 4 keys and not even having to look at the screen during combat you know that the raw stats of your charactor make it impossible for what you are killing to kill you.

so beacuse the game is based around skill you can get very far with the weapons and armor you were wearing at

the start of the game. in fact wearing nothing more than a loincloth and fighting unarmed can get you a long way.

weapons and armor increase 'stats' in diferent ways, for example weapons only increase your attacking power, and armor only increases your defensive power,also no armor or weapon will increase your health.

Does health increase ?
health starts at 1000 and caps at 10000, no single hit from any ability will ever hit harder than 4000 .ever.
your health increases naturally from gaining xp .

Misc combat related information.
There is no player 'level' there is only a skill level,
a new player will identify higher skill level players and enemies by the color of there name as follows:

grey-white-green-yellow-red,

blue names are reserved for special character npcs, that roam around the game world as players do, they may live like assassins or killers or vagabonds or politicians , they may organise gangs of other npcs or players to further thier cause or might live as hermits trading or murdering travellers
they may be friendly or may (try to)kill you on sight.

Players when killed by other players will not lose the items they are carrying to other players, however npcs when killed will 'drop' everything they are carrying when killed. so ambushing those farmers when they are returning home from selling their crops at a market will pay off. the same goes for carefully watching the actions of a blue named npc, following him to his stash or killing him after he made a sale to a player.

I see a lot of combat abilities, but what about healing? how do regain lost health?

unlike a lot of games of this type , there is no direct healing ability , no one will restore your health for you .
some abilities in the defence and combat tactics branches of the combat tree will restore health in combat, but the main method of not dying is to prevent yourself from taking damage, and to use your damage mitigating and avoidance abilities at the right time.

when not in combat your health will regenerate faster,and you will be able to use food or crafted items to regain health or patch up wounds.

health regens constantly, combat will never be a simple button mashing , carelessly attacking an enemy will not be wise, even a low skilled enemy could wound you and deepen that wound to an extent that you might die quickly unless you take quick defensive action. in this game at all times , you are the tank and dps in one , and there is no healer.

what about a threat/hate system ?
if more than one player is attacking one enemy who does the npc decide to attack ?
that is a complex question that cannot be easily answered , however they will attack whoever is the
most threatening, based off the abilities used by the players.


after a lot of combat you may become tired or seriously wounded so much you cannot continue to fight
at times like those, the only option is old fashioned rest and relaxation.


Craft : the art of making things . lots of things.

the 6 branches of the craft tree are weapons, engineering, armor, tailor, research, salvage making things can often require abilities from more than one tree, for example to make a piece of head armor you may need abilities from tailor and armor , or armor and engineering research includes abilities that improve the quaility of other crafted items, and improve salvaging results.
Salvage is the art of taking old items and salvaging usuable materials or creating new items using old ones as a base.

crafting works diffently than the combat tree, spending your 1000 points in a branch of the craft tree will fill it completely,however due to the nature of leveling crafting skills it may take a lot longer , depending on what crafting materials are availible. also the research branch works differently , as many abilities can

be worked on at once depending on what other crafting you do. for example, salvaging will generate research points that will automatically be distributed in the research tree.

you cannot, and will not need to unlearn abilities in the craft tree, however there are many crafting abilities in the specialise and master trees that you may wish to unlearn to try and gain more relevent abilities to the type of crafting you wish to pursue.

it is important to note that nearly all items can exist in 3 states, New, Old or broken , also that items can be broken and new or broken and old but not new and old (duh!) . items are marked new or old depending on thier age.

also items can be not new and not old (somewhere in the middle) . an old item may break easier or may take longer to break, its stats may increase or decrease, all this depends on the quality of
the item.
also, anyone can use any weapon , there are no restrictions on the use of weapons or armor, as this game is based far more on the skill of the player rather than what equipment he is using.

gaining levels in a tree

lets look at the lets look at the sword pathway of the 1h m.w. branch of the combat tree, lets say you want
to gain the ability "Quick striking" which is the first box in that pathway. to gain this ability, you first

select it, then confirm that you wish to work on this ability. you will not gain this ability until you gain enough experiance to master it, so you go out into the world and hack people up with a sword.
to level this ability quicker, hitting enemies faster will result in more xp for the kill.

also, you gain xp based a series of factors, such as the all round skill level of what you are fighting,the amount of damage you and the enemy inflict, the speed you kill the enemy, what weapon you kill the enemy with.
these all factor in to the equation used to determine how much xp you are awarded.

Is it all 'grind' based?

no. investing very large amounts of time to level through the trees is not needed. for example playing 10

hours in the course of a week or all at once can get you to the very top of the combat tree for a single weapon, but this is not the end of your quest for mastery of a weapon, you can spend further points in the

master tree when you have reached a certain point in the other trees. also you can spend points in the Specialise tree to customise your ability set for a particular tree.

changing the way your points are set out is free and unlimited, and once you have gained an ability and decide to lose it to try another, you can gain xp towards a a previously learnt ability at 2x the normal rate.

can i learn other things not covered by these trees ? what about 'magic' ?

there are things that work in a similar way to magic from from other games, such as summoning up a ball of fire to throw at your enemies, these are not covered by the the tree system , and can only be learned from a
player or a npc that knows them. it is worth noting that if an npc can do something , you can learn to do it somehow.

these 'secondary skills' include , but are not limited to:
-changing own or others hairstyles,or certain cosmetic features
-grafting weapons or cybernetics to people.(in conjunction with other abilites)
-the training of animals for combat or other reasons(for fun or to ride)
-surveying or foraging
-psychic conditioning
-surgically altering a being for looks or performance
-various arcane arts
-survival abilities (trapping animals for food, building shelters,survival in bad condition)
-farming abilities(growing food or keeping a herd of livestock)
-the building of structures for use as dwellings or places of business(in conjunction with the craft tree)
-cosmetic changes to armor/vehicles/structures( as in painting designs on to them)

the specialise and master trees are special and have there own sections to describe them.

poopsmcgee
27-06-2007, 10:51 PM
did you ever play star wars galaxies? sounds very similar to its early days when it didn't have a level system. but from what i read it looks like all the toons will be masters of everything. idunno if people would find the play experience as rewarding as wow.

Tanitha
27-06-2007, 11:08 PM
Reading through all of that I keep on thinking "Time Sink", "Grind" and "Complicated". Players who invest hours upon hours a day will rapidly outstrip players who can only play your recommended 10 hours a week. That closes it to casuals immediately. Might be the aim, but the level of complexity puts me off the whole idea. People struggle making talent choices in World of Warcraft, expecting them to cope with thousands of combinations would be too overwhelming.

poopsmcgee
27-06-2007, 11:44 PM
lol yah i know what ya mean. but i do find the structure of developing your character without have a real level appealing. that is one of the things i really liked about star wars, so much individualization of characters.

Kyusoath
29-06-2007, 03:33 PM
yes i did play SWG in the early days. the system had its flaws but was a good. i've heard a lot of the same thing back, that its too complex and would favor hardcore players.

to lets say tho, that a player plays 20 hours a week and another plays 60 hours per week.

playing 20 hours in a week you could easily spend 2000 points in 2 seperate branches of the combat tree and have a good amount of the combat tactics and defence branches filled out (these use general combat experience and would be filled as you filled other weapon specific branches)

playing 60 hours woudl mean 6000 points spent so that could mean the 6 branches of the combat tree are maxxed out. both of these player could have full sword mastery, if they fight, skill determines who wins not the time investment or epics. time investment pays off in other ways than combat domination , financially, or territory control or higher levels of customisation.

however i think that were my game to be released, it would be of the same popularity of EVE or SWG(in the days before the CU) it would not achieve the numbers wow has .

i didn't know when i started playing wow, but theres an awful lot of children playing and people that do not play the game to high levels
when i realised that this is where those 8million subscribers come from, lots of very very casual players.

it seems to get 8million players, an mmo even simpler and lacking in customisation options is the only thing that could challenge wow

Tunga
01-07-2007, 11:06 AM
I really liked the SWG skill system. Shame the rest of the game was so badly implemented and it got tedious after about a week. UO's system is still the best in my opinion: simple, fairly fast, and unrestrictive. Things like 8x8ing were stupid but assuming you put a decent gain system on the basic principle of UO's skill system, it would be great.

Vulcanz
01-07-2007, 11:19 AM
i pwned in SWG, probly the only game i could play for long amounts of time and not get bored. But then it all went wrong and i went on wow, this skills thing you have posted intresting but a game with that many skills......could take the creators years......