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The nature of unique mechanics and raid difficulty
One of the ideas that I always find interesting is that, as raid difficulty increases, it becomes more reasonable to expect certain abilities to be available. Like in this tweet from Nathaniel Chapman, an encounter designer for WoW, which talks about the Hand of Protection ability. (As an aside, I very much recommend his personal blog.) The basic idea is simple, and can be extrapolated to other abilities - it's reasonable to expect a Mythic raid to have access to abilities such as Hand of Protection or other class specific abilities that can alter a fight's parameters. It's this idea of raid difficulty making specific design choices acceptable that I find interesting, at least in the context of class abilities that might otherwise be seen as unbalancing. One specific mention was how Paladins could cheese tank swap mechanics, something that made them invaluable on fights like Heroic Horridon. Imagine that, in a hypothetical Mythic Horridon, the fight was designed for you to cheese tank swap mechanics, or the boss came with a huge AoE damage spell that was spell reflectable, justifying the inclusion of a warrior tank or a DPS warrior with Mass Spell Reflect. The cast could also be spellstolen, so mages would be a valuable addition. These kinds of mechanics are seen (and rightfully so, in my opinion) as punitive to struggling small raid groups who only have so many combinations of classes and specs. If your raid doesn't have a mage or warrior, for example, then dealing with that hypothetical huge AoE damage attack becomes harder. But for Mythic difficulty, with its iron-clad 20 player limit, you can expect more diversity in raid makeup, and thus can design for it.
Mythic closes, 'end of an era' for former MMO studio
We saw this coming, but it doesn't make it any less regrettable: Long-time MMO studio Mythic Entertainment has been shut down by EA. "We are closing the EA Mythic location in Fairfax, Virginia, as we concentrate mobile development in our other studio locations. We are working with all impacted employees to provide assistance in finding new opportunities, either within EA or with other companies via an upcoming job fair," EA told Kotaku. Former Mythic lead Josh Drescher tweeted his reaction to the news: "Condolences to everyone at Mythic today. It's the end of an era, but you were all part of something amazing." Mythic shuttered Warhammer Online last December, while Ultima Online, Dark Age of Camelot, and many Mythic developers moved over to Broadsword Online Games this past February.
The Daily Grind: What's the nastiest player behavior you've ever seen in an MMO?
It was early 1998, and I had been playing Ultima Online only a few short months. A male character with an offensive name approached me and began harassing my toon, using a quick succession of emotes to simulate something that I suppose to him looked like pelvic thrusts as he informed everyone at Serpent's Hold bank, including my not-at-all-amused guildies, that he was "raping" me. I think I was too astonished to be upset, and my guildies immediately called a GM, who arrived swiftly, renamed the miscreant "George," and whisked him off to prison. It didn't scar me for life or anything; I was already accustomed to rampant murder and thievery and espionage. But it was a brutal introduction to online behavior (and probably a brutal introduction to online justice for the character suddenly known as George). Curiously, that lame attempt at faux "rape" paled in comparison to the extreme psychological warfare and character defamation that I saw presumably much more mature roleplayers employ in later games. That, I found far more emotionally disturbing. How about you guys -- do you have a memory of a really nasty display of online behavior in an MMO? What's the worst you've ever seen? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Dark Age of Camelot plans New Frontiers tweaks, player polling
Broadsword Online continues its push to revitalize the veteran games it took over from EA earlier this year, including Dark Age of Camelot. The studio recently released yet another question-and-answer session with players, this time focusing on the new New Frontiers patch and ending with a soaring explanation of what makes the game so great after a dozen years. Some of the highlights: There are plans to revamp PvE after the New Frontiers content is properly tweaked. First on the PvE list is the top 10% most rewarding and difficult encounters. On the flipside, the devs agree there's too much PvE emphasis in the RvR Frontiers. The team is still looking at incentives for keep, tower, and relic defense. Shards will not be usable in housing zones. Legendary weapon updates are still on the table. Finally, there's a note that the game will ultimately benefit from in-game polling systems as opposed to relying on feedback from just the vocal minority of players. "You will be heard. Count on it," Broadsword promises.
Raid design evolution and Warlords of Draenor
Blizzard has posted parts one and two of a series of Dev Watercoolers, discussing raid design over the course of World of Warcraft. Now part three is live, highlighting and explaining where raiding is going in Warlords of Draenor. The post covers new systems like the Group Finder (basically integrating the OQueue style functionality), buffs to LFR, explains the new Mythic difficulty and flexible group system for normal/heroic, and discusses how raid lockouts will work in Warlords, with each raiding difficulty (Raid Finder, Normal, Heroic and Mythic) having its own lockout, and how valor points will be scaled back to prevent players feeling like they have to clear each raid difficulty each week. If you raid, you should probably check it out. The full text is reproduced behind the break.
Dark Age of Camelot plans character transfer service and new art
Dark Age of Camelot's grab bag -- written by Sir Grabford B. Bagsworth III Esq., no less -- is back, and at the top of the most pressing questions is the issue of character transfers. Broadsword said that these are indeed in the works: "We would like to provide the opportunity to allow consolidation. This will be among the many updates and upgrades to the Broadsword account center that is currently underway. Currently, it's planned as a premium service –- but there are no details on the prices as yet." Broadsword mentions how art improvements have been going in the game following the studio's acquisition of DAoC. "We have renewed investment in this area, and we're really excited about updating art for various features in DAoC. Things we're currently discussing are: fixes for art-related bugs, new maps, UI skins, new items, monsters, and more!" Other topics in the grab bag include the return of in-game surveys, the status of the new website, and details of the next patch. The studio teased that it will be adding "a new long-term live event with a very cool surprise" with the update.
Ultima Online, Dark Age of Camelot embark on Steam Greenlight campaign
Since its acquisition of Ultima Online and Dark Age of Camelot in February, Broadsword Online Games has not been content to let the titles sit around merely getting older. Earlier this month, the team hosted a large state-of-the-game chat about the future of UO's design, and now the developers have posted their latest ambitions: a spot on Steam bathed in green light for the venerable old MMORPGs. "We are in the process of getting UO on Steam but need your help. Please go here and vote for UO! Thank you for all your support!" wrote UO Producer Bonnie Armstrong on the official site today. DAOC's Steam Greenlight campaign is likewise now live. You heard the lady. Chop, chop.
The Daily Grind: What game deserves an expansion?
I'm actually really happy to see that Ultima Online might be getting expansions once again because I love seeing classic MMOs bucking the trend of fading away and becoming irrelevant. Actually, I'd really like to witness many more games get expansions, since an expansion gets the excitement, attention, and community interest like a mini-launch. That's always good for the genre as a whole. So what game deserves an expansion? What would you like to see in it? You get bonus points if you manage to go the entire comment without using the word "Cantha" in it! Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Ultima Online's April state of the game address
On Friday, Ultima Online Producer Bonnie Armstrong and the Broadsword Online Games crew took to Google Hangouts for an informal state of the game address and player question-and-answer session. The event marked one of the first times we've heard from the Broadsword team about its plans for the game since its pseudo-acquisition a few months ago. The highlights? The artwork update is still on the way, as are new housing tiles. A resurrection of the old MyUO.com website is planned, along with a revamp of the new and returning player experience. The team hopes to resume putting out one expansion or booster every year. On the downside, the team isn't currently working on new housing areas, new items for the cash shop, or storage expansions, and there's no ETA for the bug-free return of vendor search, which was implemented and promptly went kaput just a few weeks ago. An interesting factoid pointed out by Stratics poster Nails Warstein: The player split between the old classic client and the newest enhanced client is now 50-50.
Do we need Mythic raiding at all?
I've been talking to guild leaders getting ready for the new raiding paradigm in Warlords of Draenor, and one of the things I'm hearing is that a lot of guilds simply won't bother to do Mythic raiding. That they simply don't want to scale up. They felt that the current paradigm was perfect for them - they could raid, complete a tier on normal, then do a few heroic modes before the next tier or new expansion. This model worked in Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria for their guilds, and with it replaced by flexible normal/heroic (equivalent to current flex and normal) and 20 person mythic (replacing 10 and 25 man heroic modes) they simply have seen the end of their doing that content. Now, I don't do a lot of 10 man raiding - I've stayed 25 pretty much since I switched guilds back in Cataclysm - but I know from experience how it feels to have that stress on your guild, and I find the idea that Mythic raiding will be out of the reach of some players not because of their skill, but because of the numbers game a little sad. To hear players that have been doing heroic content for two or three expansions now say "I guess we're done with that kind of thing" seems a bit off to me. And it dovetails into another idea I have, namely this - not all fights work as a hard mode in the first place. Some fights feel epic and really different with the addition of new elements that we see in a harder mode (Firefighter from Ulduar comes to mind) but others just feel like the same fight with more damage and health - and those fights to my mind don't need to exist. This has me wondering - do we need Mythic raiding at all? Going into Warlords of Draenor, we're looking at LFR, Normal, Heroic and Mythic raiding. Four raid sizes, each aimed at different kinds of raiders. Yet all four of them present the same basic content, simply scaled differently - the same boss fights, just on a different scale of difficulty and (in the case of Mythic) presumably some different mechanics. What we're seeing right now in Siege of Orgrimmar is that for some players, this is contributing to burnout - saying 'hey, go do heroic if you're bored' doesn't help when heroic is the exact same content, just harder. Do we need more of this?
Dark Age of Camelot eyes mail system
Grab bag Q&As are special, because you never know what you'll get. Dark Age of Camelot has a new one up on the site with seven pressing questions from the community. One big revelation is that the team is strongly considering adding a mail system to the game: "It's (high) on our list of priorities! Mail opens up the possibilities for many many other things so we definitely want it in the game sooner rather than later." The topics covered include the devs' speculation on how upcoming changes to RvR conflict will play out, gear with specific bonuses, improvements to the server list screen, and titles for crafters.
Ultima Online patches in searchable player vendors
Ultima Online's new developer Broadsword announced earlier today that the latest patch for the legendary sandbox has arrived. Chief among the new additions is the long-awaited vendor search feature, which allows players to search existing player-owned shop vendors across the shard for specific items and then pay to teleport directly to that vendor to make the purchase. The patch also kicked off the game's Easter gift period because nothing says Britannia like Easter bunnies and marshmallow ducklings. In six different colors, mind you.
What will raiding be like in Warlords?
When discussing how the changes coming in Warlords of Draenor will affect raiding, we're of course looking at an incomplete picture. We don't know what new spells and abilities might come, we just know to an extent what won't be there - abilities like Skull Banner will be gone, as well many CC abilities, and healing will be greatly changed - casting on the move will also see a significant decrease. What we therefore need to consider is that raiding itself will have to change to embody these changing philosophies. It would be a disaster to alter class abilities and leave raids designed around the same high damage, high mobility kit we see in modern raiding. But what will raid design entail? Well, I'm not a raid designer. If I was, I'd be super busy designing some raids. What I am is a guy who raids a lot, so I can give you my perspective as a dude who has seen every fight in the game at this point. What are we in for in Warlords, based on what Blizzard has said is changing, and what they intend to try and do?
The Game Archaeologist: Ultima Online field report
A recent Daily Grind here on Massively asked about what games readers think deserve more coverage on the site. That's a loaded question, of course, but the answers were still very interesting to me, especially the desire from some of you to read more about older games. Even though I've looked at the history and development of classic MMOs, I don't often know what's going on inside of them right now. With insular communities and a dearth of news being put forth by the studio, the only way that I can think of to find out the real skinny is to ask those who do still love and play these games regularly. So that's when the idea for a "field report" series on Game Archaeologist came forth. Every so often I'm going to track down players of classic MMOs and see what's happening in them and their communities from these first-hand perspectives. Today we've got Dimitri and Common Sense from Ultima Online, who graciously took the time to answer my questions.
Dark Age of Camelot trims up paths, docks, and portals with a new patch
Are you looking to take a trip to scenic Agramon in Dark Age of Camelot? Then you'll definitely want to check out the latest patch notes. Agramon has been somewhat revamped with new docks and new paths into the center of the land, both from these new docks and from the milegates of each realm. And those aren't the only dock-based changes in the patch, at that; merchant docks have been moved further inland and renamed mainland docks, center keep docks are gone, and the rules for capturing mainland docks are different. Strength Relic Towns have also seen the addition of a new portal ceremony as well as various protections to keep the towns from being too easily captured. Players can also pick up new quests from the Agramon dockmasters involving killing players within Agramon... assuming, of course, that your realm controls one of the docks in Agramon. For the full details, read up on the official patch notes.
New Dark Age of Camelot developer promises game upgrades and player polls
If you're a Dark Age of Camelot die-hard, you might be interested in Mythic community manager Carol Kenny's question-and-answer post published yesterday. It covers everything from inventory adapters to hard-coded screenshot key binds to upcoming community initiatives. "There's a wealth of content in Dark Age of Camelot that deserves an upgrade in mechanics, difficulty, and rewards," the post says. "Look forward to polls and questions from Carol as to which encounters we should start with, and what kind of rewards you would like to see."
The Game Archaeologist: The care and feeding of older MMOs
When an MMO has reached a certain age and dwindled to a certain player population, what do you do with it? Do you put it out to pasture, nurture it, or put it down? With some of our older graphical MMOs approaching their 20th anniversaries, the question of what studios should do with aging titles is becoming very important. It's not just important for the games in question but as a precedent to the population of games that will one day become just as old. Lately we've seen different studios act on this topic in a wide variety of ways, all of which I find fascinating. Some of these games have seen tragic ends, while others may be entering into the enjoyable golden years. If nothing else, it's shown me that there isn't just one set answer for this and that some devs are hoping to do the right thing by their companies and their players.
Mark Jacobs talks character aging: Nixed in Warhammer Online, planned for Camelot Unchained
Players who were disappointed when the character aging feature was cut from the release of (the now defunct) Warhammer Online can look forward to seeing it implemented in Camelot Unchained. Mark Jacobs, an instrumental man in the creation of both games, talked with Eurogamer about that system and how it got scrapped as well as delved into the details of how it will work in CU. Basically, the system would allow players to visually judge the veteran status of others and therefore their threat both up close and from a distance. For instance, a larger-than-normal Greenskin or a Dwarf with a very long beard would signify a player who is more experienced and likely tougher. Jacobs relayed that he was never even informed that the feature was actually removed from the game and only discovered it when a beta tester inquired about it, noting "Nobody was more embarrassed than me when I had to say that that feature of the game had to be removed." The feature is not dead, however, and will make its appearance in Camelot Unchained. What does that mean for players? In CU, the changes will be more than cosmetic, they will actually be meaningful in the world. Jacobs added, "There will be some downside to aging, but there will also be a greater amount of upsides, because we want it to be a net-positive experience for the player. However, players won't have to worry about getting old to the point of major gimping [becoming not as effective] of their characters, or worse, perma-death, as that would simply be no fun."
Ultima Online brings back the player counselor program
Ultima Online is looking for a few good men and women to sign up for a tour of duty as a counselor. Broadsword is bringing back the game's counselor program in the near future to lend assistance to newer and more inexperienced players by pairing them up with vets. The counselor program is looking for players who are 18 or older and "have great game knowledge and a desire to work with others." In addition to being part of this team, Broadsword said that it will give an additional (work) account to those participating in the program. Interested participants need to email the devs to join.
Dark Age of Camelot gives free week of game time to lapsed accounts
Is it time for you to return to Dark Age of Camelot? It just might be, as the game is handing out a week of free game time for players with lapsed accounts! The Return to the Realms promotion is crediting a week of game time to any account that hasn't been used for more than 60 days. This game time includes access to the test server, where Patch 1.115 is being brewed and refined. Dark Age of Camelot and Ultima Online were recently acquired by the newly formed Broadsword Online Games.
