Posts made by GamerSeuss

The trouble with your proposal is your overempowering Guilds, when one of the stated goals of Fractured is that a solo player would not feel punished for not being a member of a guild or city. It is reasonable to limit some crafting to cities, making all players have to utilize cities to get everything done, but there are the starter cities and open cities for the solo'ist. It is not reasonable to make Guilds so empowered so that non-guilded players felt compelled to join a guild to get an equal experience of the game.

As to commerce, 'The Game' gets a cut of things as a gold-sink on purpose. This is an intended part of the game balancing. There is no limiting factor as to how much gold is available via mobs, so there has to be a way to reduce gold overall in circulation, not perpetually increase said circulation at an accelerated rate. As is, we don't have sufficient gold-sinks right now to keep Gold having a real worth as of yet, but they are working on it.

Kind of makes sense...;once you've discovered a technique, you can keep using it, even if you lose your city rank, however, if you lose rank, you can't develop new tech because of your limitations.

I admire your use of facts, shows someone willing to think out their arguments.

Some other facts:

WoW: Crafting is at best a tertiary aspect of the game, not even secondary in focus

Old School RuneScape: Does in fact use an RNG system in many aspects of its crafting. There is no Quality Level crafting system, but, when you cook, you have a chance to burn an item, up until the highest skill levels, and even then, some items never get a 0% burn rate, when you smelt Iron, you have a 50% loss chance, unless you get a magic item that cancels that, or use a spell to smelt instead. When you brew potions, the RNG comes in as to whether you get 3 dose or 4 dose potions, and really, enchanting in RuneScape is not crafting really, it's a upper level spell ability. The fact is, they use the RNG throughout their crafting system in a variety of ways, making it, of the games you mentioned, probably the most robust skiller game out. (and the main game I play when not Alphatesting Fractured)

You basically answer to the other games, WoW, Elder Scroll, Crafting is basically Money by another name, it is just a method to make profit. It's not really about the crafting. As to FF 14, I don't play that game, and actually haven't played WoW or EDO in awhile either for that matter, but really, are any of those games crafter-centric games, or is crafting merely a side Hussle to get funds and grind?

I will, however, take a look at FF 14 and see how their system works, and check back in on EDO (I hate WoW) after the Alpha is over, and make sure my info is sound.

I mainly speak from the Game Designer standpoint. I won't contest your numbers, however, your research as far as that goes is sound, and I don't have any hard numbers to back up my claim directly, unless you'd take numbers on gambling addiction and commonality of games of chance over other types of games in overall popularity.

@OlivePit I do believe the giving of max damage on melee combat instead of using the RNG was merely a stop-gap they put in during Alpha Testing as the fine points of combat are tested out. Prometheus did point out in another post that RNG was used and would be used for Spells and Skills, and their interactions with Talents, so that all damage calculations are still going to be a range.

I am trying to be constructive. Sometimes constructive isn't always about making things the way a poster wants them to be, sometimes it is more about explaining the reasoning behind certain mechanical decision making.

I'm not dismissing the discussion at all, I'm takin it quite seriously. I'm also, as we all are, looking at the longevity of the game, and realizing that a game without the randomness of a good, balanced RNG engine will be doomed to fail in the long run. As I said before, Randomness is what makes something a game, without the Randomness, it is more a Sport, Task, or Puzzle. I love Chess, for instance, but Chess is more an exercise in tactical thinking than a game. A Grandmaster chess player if not distracted, will beat the neophyte 100 out of 100 games, all day long. Thus there is no chance, whatsoever for the neophyte to do anything but maybe learn more patterns and improve. A lofty goal, but not what a game is about.

Yes, other great uses of RNG is random environment generation, randomizing the look and feel of some scenery, even randomizing the FX effects of some spells and abilities, but the Damage Range, and Critical Chance RNG systems are what will keep people coming back to combat. The RNG of success, failure, and possible total loss will cause people to obsess on crafting. Yes, it will turn some people away, and yes, Fractured has tried to make strides in not turning people away even if they are in a minority, however, the solution has to also not end up turning away the majority who play.

Believe it or not, that would be a coding nightmare. Games code on grids for a reason. Yes, when rendering a scene, every pixel gets rendered, but to save memory, processing, and resource space, standardized polygons, presets and skins are used, and then placed upon a grid anchor system in order to make the game world both visually acceptable within the medium, and possible within the current computing limitations of the servers.

I see totally where your going with this, and I do love the concept, but from the standpoint of a coder, I know it just won't happen anytime soon. Maybe in another 10-20 years.

As I have said before, those who dislike RNG are generally in the minority. In fact, many who say they dislike RNG actually don't, they are drawn to RNG systems, this is why we get compulsive gamblers, and why casinos and Lotteries are so popular. Everyone likes the Sweepstakes feel of getting that 1 in a million long shot to pay off. Most people want to try to get something for nothing, or as little effort as possible for the most reward.

Even if your talking realism, a Master craftsman still fails once in a great while. Maybe not 1 in 100 tries, depending on their level of expertise and the difficulty of what they are crafting, but there is always the chance of failure in anything, and yes, failure can mean wasted materials. In games, you generally express this by the RNG. Sooooo the RNG system both simulates the games of chance/gambling proclivities that reside in over 90% of the human population, and the real world fact that you don't always succeed, no matter how skilled or well supplied you are.

It is in fact the RNG factor in the game that makes of it a game, instead of merely a puzzle or activity. Games generally have a level of uncertainty involved in them. Sure, skill level plays a roll, but a good game includes the ability of a grand master to sometimes be knocked down by the neophyte.

When it is all said and done, this is the reason that 'Dice-less' roleplaying games generally way undersell standard dice-based rpgs on the market.

I wasn't indicating you would learn from an in-game failure, although you do, you learn when it is worthwhile to risk something, and when that risk is too much for your character.

I only mentioned the failure bit as an aside on the psychological study of the reactions people had to success and failure. Yes, you learn more from failure, BUT as far as remembering goes, you tend to remember, and get a much more visceral satisfactory HIGH from Success when success or failure is not guaranteed. It is the gambler's high, and it is a huge part of the overall draw of game play in the first place.

@Logain said in Why are young status players allowed to kill legendaries?:

First of all, killing Legendaries is what most people would consider 'real content'. It is just less dangerous real content, because you're not threatened by PvP.
Second, and even more important, as I mentioned, these people are likely to bot/macro. They can easily have the second/third/fourth account run in the background, while playing happily on their 'main character/account'.

Yes, Legendaries are a great part of the Real content of the game, unfortunately, it's not their main, heavy play account that's taking down the Legendaries, just their Alts, and sure, they can transfer over the Lost Tales, but still, they aren't getting to experience the Legendaries from the account that really matters to them.

Secondly, as with most games, I'm Sure Fractured is going to try as hard as possible to disable to possibility of using Bots/Macros for automatic play exploits, meaning these players will have to physically play the account to get the advantages. More effort, thus, needs to be put into anti-Macro/Anti-Bot play than in limiting 'New Player' safe status behavior.

As I said previously, the game began it's main marketing push with the claim that a brand new player could come out of the shoot, meet up with friends, not hold them back, and take on boss raids and such because of it's vertical over horizontal progression and thus taking away the ability to take on Legendaries from beginning accounts defeats that entire claim.

It's the uncertainty of the RNG system that gives many games their appeal. The RNG stands in for such mechanics as Dice in say a boardgame. Yes, you remember failures, but actually psychological studies show you learn more from failures, but you actually remember your successes more, despite what you might think. A success, when there is an uncertainty factor involved, triggers the release of endorphins in the brain giving a sense of euphoria, and makes you appreciate having done something special. Yes, this is only a game, and with enough repetition, such euphoria boosts eventually even out, just like RNG eventually evens out and then it becomes a simple matter of where you set the percentages.

Look at how many people still play the Lotto, and why places like Las Vegas and Reno are so popular. Everyone wants to hope for the longshot. Set the highest result to 20% chance, you get a lot of winners, set it to 5% and you get very few, drop it to 1% or less, and you get people lining up for the chance at the experience. Give the players a chance to affect their chances in a small way, or even better, the illusion that they are, and the popularity of the game goes through the roof.

Player's Crafting Window=Always Poor (very unsatisfying, used only in a pinch of when it's the only option, like currently Trinkets)
Home Crafting Bench= Chance for results from Poor to Excellent, but Excellent is harder to come by.
City Crafting Building once Research has improved chances= Chance for Poor goes to almost nil, chance for Exceptional goes up.

Players feel like they have some agency now. Instead of making it more materials to guarantee success, how about different materials to increase chance of success. Adding in in-game situations when the success numbers are more and less favorable. Crafting at night increased chance of Poor, Crafting at High Noon, increased chance of success. Leaving an offering at the town Shrine, increase chance of better quality crafting results for the next hour, Crafting while under a Ghoul's Touch affect or Poisoned, Increased chance of Poor, etc...

Then, the only thing else they need to do is adjust and balance out the real difference between the quality categories. Highest quality might have an extra Enchant Slot, Lowest quality starts at 75% durability over normal, etc...

@Logain They still only have so much time in a given day. Every bit of the time they spend on their Alt account exploiting the new Account Status is time they aren't playing their main accounts which do all the real content in the game.

Plus, New Player Status is account locked, which means every time they wish to create one of these Alt accounts, they must get a whole new user account. Fractured is set to not be a subscription based game, however, I do believe the plan is for it to be a pay once, play forever plan, so every time they want to make these Alts, they end up spending money to support the game, and the exploit really doesn't hurt anyone else

Won't happen!

Games, especially MMORPGs, rely on situations such as you describe in order to drive their in-game economy. RNG fickle results are part and parcel of the MMORPG experience and it is highly doubtful that any MMORPG developer would shoot themselves in the foot metaphorically speaking by removing the RNG aspect of the game for increasing resource costs. Yes, to the individual player/crafter, it might seem like a win-win situation, but for overall game longevity, such a move would produce a death knell.

This is not to say that Fractured won't adjust the RNG variables, and keep refining their RNG seed engine to get more randomized results, it just means you'll never see the system you propose taken up by any MMORPG wishing to have a chance at long-term success on the market.

@TekNicTerror Nature of the beast. Everything within an Alpha isn't implemented yet, but they do start to add little bits and bobs, so when they do their own internal testing, they don't have to create a whole different instance, and then forget to put things from that into the new release of the next Alpha. Also, they do it just to stuff added to the internal database as they go along. It is far easier to add 10 new reagents into a database every time you think about it, than it is to add in 1000 all at once. As they go along, they will implement things to utilize what's been added later, and this will slow down when things move into Beta, but it still may happen...shoot, in some live games, they start putting materials in the game before they necessarily implement new usage for said materials.

@Harleyyelrah
Thing is, I see nothing wrong with them using that as an exploit, if you want to call it that. Yes, they are taking advantage of protected status, but players have done that since protected status first showed up in games. If someone wants to go through all that hassel to keep their character in protected status as long as possible, they end up skipping a whole lot of other content in the game, AND they aren't out in large Ganking mobs taking advantage of that situation instead.

Basically, it's no big deal, and not exactly an unbalancing exploit. PvP shouldn't be seen as a given, but rather as an exception that happens occasionally, at least on Syndesia. If I get ganked every single time I go out to gather ore, or fight a legend, that's when I see a problem happening.

Would I use the exploit you talk about, NO, not my style of play, and I wouldn't cheat myself out of that much great content just for the slight advantage that gives.

I can see wanting this for RP purposes, but overall, that kind of spell would be way OP based on the current state of the game. Until the game starts to get other spells in that power scale, I don't see it happening

Also, I've open and read every single Newsletter since I first backed the game during the Kickstarter a few years back, and yet there still shows several Newsletters that I'm not getting credit for reading.

@Jigganaut Blocking young status players from participating in Legendary raids defeats one of the cornerstone tenets of Fractured.

Fractured bills itself as a Vertical, not a Horizontal Growth Isometric Sandbox game. As such, one of the primary selling points from the very beginning is that a new player, from Day 1, right after logging in, could meet up with his/her guild/party/friends, and immediately participate in a meaningful manner, with little more than a gear upgrade gifted by his friends.

You block the new status player from doing this, and you defeat a main reason so many bought into the game in the first place. Legendaries are already limited by needing to summon them to their Altar now, usually requiring Flawless Gemstones, so they still need someone who's been around to collect the materials for that, or the gold to buy it off of a Marketplace.

Just posting to celebrate that I'm tied in Foundation Level with the 100th place person on the leaderboard, and only 135 points separate me from overtaking them.

Thank goodness for the weekly drawings, as I never did get credit for my sister buying her Founder's Pack and joining the site.

Although there are some free keys to be had out there, they generally go to those who regularly watch Streamers who broadcast Fractured content and those who post in the forums regularly and get in on the Free Key Giveaways that are sometimes made available.

Rarely, if ever, would they give a key to someone who just begged for it. It cheapens the keys. This alpha stage is almost overwith anyway, few more days, then generally they tend to try a Stress Test for like 5 days where anyone can log in (but not always). Giveaway keys are only good for the specific Alpha Test, so getting one right now would be a bit of a waste, as well.

Need computer specs to go into too much detail, but general advice:

Clear out your Cache, History, and Cookies files
Check available Hard Drive Space
Check how much Memory Usage your typically doing.
Uninstall unused programs
Reboot and Defrag your HardDrive
Try running the Downloader without anything else running in the background.

Also, this alpha should be ending rather soon, maybe a week or a lil more.

Buy Alpha IF you can handle going periods of time without play access, followed by specific mechanics focused play, in which your character goes through a full account wipe at the beginning of each Alpha stage.

If the above would frustrate you, or your looking for a more finished game, closer to actual release, wait for Beta.