progression
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Star Wars: The Old Republic adds a grab bag of grab bag reputation
Do you love the feel of cracking open a random assortment of items in Star Wars: The Old Republic? Do you wish that the game rewarded avid grab-bag grabbers with their own progression path? Because the latest development blog explains the new Cartel Market reputation track does precisely that; it allows players to gain reputation and earn the right to purchase new items by purchasing several random packs within a given shipment. Items are divided up into Shipments, which share a thematic name such as "Cartel Packs" or "Contraband Packs." Opening these packs provides reputation tokens that allow players to gain reputation with a different faction for each Shipment. Eventually, the Shipment in question will be temporarily removed from circulation, but players with enough reputation will still be able to buy the items directly from reputation vendors. It sounds a little messy, but in practice it means that people who love some grab bags get a little more motivation to keep buying them.
What does progression mean to you?
I've been pondering the question of what progression really means a lot over the past couple of weeks. Big Bear Butt mentioned it in a blog post last week, and talked about how the word is defined depending on who you are and what you're doing in game. Whenever I hear the word progression in reference to WoW, I immediately turn to raiding -- but is that the only place that it really applies? And even if you're a raider, it's not as cut-and-dry a meaning as you'd think. My current guild is a progression raid guild. But we aren't bleeding-edge and we don't push ourselves like it's a second job. My first raid guild was also a progression guild, but it was definitely far more hardcore, with six nights a week spent raiding our hearts out and trying to get those coveted server firsts. Is there really a difference between the two? It certainly felt like it -- but both guilds were focused on progression, so maybe there wasn't quite as much a difference as I'd like to think.
Officers' Quarters: Extinction event
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. For some raiding guilds, the last couple of weeks before a new patch is an opportunity to get those last normal or heroic encounters down, earn achievements, or farm for the last few items the raid team needs for the next tier. For others, they are a reminder of how little the guild has progressed. This reminder prompts raiders to weigh leaving the guild. This week's email comes from a raid leader facing this tough situation. Hi Scott. I've become Raid Leader of my old guild. Which, is driving me crazy. This raid team has been through thick and thin, through multiple Gm's and having lost multiple strong raiders I came back to the guild to help them and to join the team as Raid Leader. I've been having a really tough time though. Progression is non-existent. We're stuck on Blade Lord due to a lack of strong dps players and the new people who show promise need to do Mogu'shan Vaults to get gear for Heart of Fear. The raiders who've been on the team since the start of this tier are bored and have had enough of no progression and Mogu'shan Vaults. They're mainly all thinking of leaving the guild and if so, it'll mean the end of this guild, which I love.
Daily iPhone App: Earn to Die lets you upgrade cars, kill zombies
I'm spending the first part of this week in France working on judging for the International Mobile Gaming Awards, along with a whole crew of other app writers and professionals. As usually happens whenever a bunch of app fans get together, we've been talking about our favorite games, and even recommending new titles to each other. Touch Arcade's Eli Hodapp recommended Earn to Die to me, and since I picked it up, it's been very hard to put down. The core game is a 2D driving physics title, similar to other monster truck and stunt car games, set in a post-apocalyptic zombie wasteland. The real draw is the progression system: Every drive you make earns you money, which can be used to upgrade and beef up your car. An improved vehicle lets you drive for longer and earn more money. Each car has several potential upgrades (on everything from engines and wheels to anti-zombie weapons and even a boost system), so nearly every time you complete a run, you can head back into the garage and spend more money to make your car better. The whole cycle is very addictive, and the scope of the game is huge. You'll start out with just a weak little buggy, and end the game a few hours later with a huge monster truck outfitted with all sorts of zombie-killing extras. Earn to Die is a fun, addictive time-waster. You can pick up the app for just US$0.99 on the iPhone, $2.99 on iPad or try out a free lite version on either platform.
Flameseeker Chronicles: Ascended gear in Guild Wars 2
It's time to take a look at the new Guild Wars 2 item rarity: the Ascended tier. The first bits of Ascended gear came in with the Lost Shores patch, but we've been a little busy since then, have we not? Anyway, ArenaNet's Chris Whiteside took some time (like, the better part of a workday -- and then he went home and kept on taking time) to do an Ask Me Anything on Reddit, which largely focused on the question of Ascended stuff and what it means for the game. So let's get into it, shall we?
Guild Wars 2 staff tackles the ascended gear controversy head-on
It's been a rough couple of weeks for Guild Wars 2, following the news that ArenaNet would be implementing a new tier of gear to the game. Studio Design Director Chris Whiteside and President Mike O'Brien took to Reddit today for an Ask Me Anything (AMA), accepting the brunt of the blame while denying that the team had gone against its stated design manifesto. Whiteside said that the addition of ascended gear was not meant to add a necessary grind to Guild Wars 2, but to fill in a necessary gap in gear that the team identified early on. "It's an exciting problem," he wrote, "but one that has been poorly communicated and handled. And for this I take responsibility and apologize." O'Brien chimed in to address the many comments levied about the design manifesto: "We're left with a balancing act. Some progression is OK, but pushing players onto a gear treadmill isn't OK and isn't what the game is about. I don't think [the ascended gear] invalidates the fundamental concept that GW2 can have gradual stat progression without being a gear treadmill game." The AMA didn't merely dwell on the ascended gear issue; Whiteside fielded questions about the game's approach to future events, a desire to reduce grind across the board, the potential fracturing of the community, and ArenaNet's definition of grind ("Repetitive game play that is not fun," is the official answer, in case you were wondering).
The Daily Grind: What's your days-to-max-level record?
As I mentioned earlier this week, DC Universe Online is taking up the majority of my MMORPG time lately. I've finally decided on a main character (for now, at least), and I'm closing in on max level despite the fact that I rolled him just over a week ago. I'm a notoriously slow leveler, and while I've been told that DCUO's grind kicks in after the cap, I'm still amazed at how quickly the one to 30 content goes by. I'm not running out of things to do, either, as there are whole quest arcs that I haven't even started yet, to say nothing of group dungeon content, PvP, and what passes for superhero tradeskilling. What about you, morning crew? Have you ever blown through a game's level range in record time? How long did it take? 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!
The Daily Grind: Why is fluff considered fluff?
Yesterday's news of the World of Warcraft player who leveled to 90 without a single kill generated some interesting comments. A couple of them got us to thinking why MMO fluff is considered fluff, and why video gaming in general is so heavily focused on combat. Combat is probably the easiest answer when it comes to progression and monetization-based design, but shouldn't MMOs be something more than sticking the pointy end into the other man over and over again? So how about it, Massively readers? Why is fluff considered fluff? 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!
The Daily Grind: Are you sick of gear resets?
Earlier this week, Massively RIFT columnist Karen Bryan expressed frustration over the seemingly inevitable MMO expansion problem: gear resets. We expect new gear along with our new content, but a complete gear reset, she argued, "renders all previous raid content irrelevant." Everything you earned before an expansion may as well never have happened because you can top that gear with a new crop of easymode quests. And the realization that a gear-grind is mostly for naught can have a ripple effect on a game as disillusioned players give up on acquiring it (or bail out of the game completely). The Daily Grind crew has discussed gear resets in relation to raid progression before, but even games without raiding face this problem. If a game has any kind of scaling gear or levels, then the addition of new content, like an expansion, is bound to generate growing pains. So where do you stand? Are you sick of gear resets, of having to effectively start over at the dawn of every expansion? Or do you see gear resets as a good thing, as a way to bridge the gear divide between players and re-experience what you loved about the game originally? And since you're going to tell us anyway, here's a bonus question: Which MMOs have successfully avoided this problem and how? 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!
DC Universe Online's update 18 goes live
If you're hoping for a bunch of new content with the latest update to DC Universe Online, you'll be disappointed. If you're hoping for a better system of player rewards and more challenging encounters, you'll be quite pleased. Game Update 18 ushers in several changes to the game's challenges, alerts, and duos, providing players with both a smoother set of progression content and a more unified system of rewards. Aside from reorganizing several pieces of group content into clearer progression tiers, the update unifies reward currencies into Marks of Triumph. Reward items are all purchased via Marks of Triumph, with higher-tier items requiring a correspondingly larger number of Marks. Players will also receive a weekly award box the first time they clear a Tier 1 through 3 challenge within a week; these award boxes contain both Marks of Triumph and a random level-appropriate item. For more details on the particulars of these revisions, take a look at the full update list, or just log in and start playing.
Hyperspace Beacon: Gear grinding is unfun
If you have been following me for the last few years on this column and some of the podcasts that I've done, then you are aware that hardcore progression raiding and PvP are not my thing. You will also know that I don't fault players for having their own fun, but the MMO industry often assumes raiders and PvPers are the ones game developers need to target and pursue. It could be that they are the loudest, the fastest, or maybe just the most competitive. I appreciate the players who blast through content. They are usually ones who make the guides that the slower players use to fight the "unbeatable boss." Unfortunately for developers, these are not the players who stick to the game. BioWare made a lot of naive mistakes with Star Wars: The Old Republic, but one of the biggest is that it listened too much to the vocal minority instead of attempting to make a game that caters to the long-term player. I consider myself and my guild long-term players. We play SWTOR for a multitude of reasons, ranging from basic Star Wars fanboyism to exploring new content to engaging in intense PvP battles. But one thing that is consistent among all of us is that we don't like to gear grind. Don't get me wrong; I understand that there need be a carrot for the players who complete high-level content, but I believe that SWTOR, along with other MMOs, is doing it wrong, and frankly, it's not fun.
Some Assembly Required: Guild Wars 2 goes back to the future
Like a lot of you, I've been goofing around in Guild Wars 2 this past week. What does that have to do with Massively's sandbox column? Not much other than that I feel like ArenaNet's game has arrived at an interesting crossroads in the history of MMO development. In one direction, you have World of Warcraft 2.0 and the continuation of the themepark model. In another direction, you have a sandbox akin to Ultima Online or Star Wars Galaxies. A third fork leads to the so-called sandpark hybrid. ArcheAge may live at the end of this road, and even titles like The Secret World and Age of Wushu can be said to mix both sandbox and themepark mechanics when it suits them. ArenaNet avoids all three paths with Guild Wars 2, though, and instead makes a fourth that's 80 percent themepark and 20 percent... well, I don't know what to label it. It's almost like the devs wanted to make a virtual world, though.
Daily iPad App: Puzzle Craft is puzzle farming bliss
I came to a realization a little while ago: I love grindy games. I really enjoy games with a certain amount of repetition to them, games where I slowly but steadily build up resources and a character (or an empire) while performing somewhat mindless but infinitely amusing tasks. Puzzle Craft fits right in that category -- like that other great puzzle/RPG mashup, Puzzle Quest (as well as the recent 10000000), it provides a solid and rewarding system of progression to a fairly basic but amusing puzzle system. The progression system is all "built" around a town: You start out the game with just a farmfield, and then slowly use that field, collecting its resources in the puzzle game, to build up houses and a mine, and then a windmill and so on, until you have a thriving metropolis in its place. To do all of this, you collect a series of resources, each of which can be used to build buildings, tools, or hire certain citizens or workers. Because Puzzle Craft is published by Chillingo, all of this is very clear, and the graphics are colorful and clean, with specific icons used for each resource that easily and quickly convey what you need to collect more of. The puzzle mechanic itself is reminiscent of Dungeon Raid -- it's a match 3, but instead of moving items around a grid, you need to draw a line through as many of the same items as possible. Puzzle Craft does iterate on that system, however, by letting you combine objects when you collect enough of them -- you can combine 10 grain into a carrot, and then combine carrots into a soup. Hiring workers lets you change how those combination rules work, and tools can be used in certain situations to help clear the screen or collect a certain kind of resource. Puzzle Craft is a really terriffic game, possibly my favorite App Store entry of the year. It's a 99-cent universal download, and I highly recommend it. Yes, it can get a little grindy, and specific strategies (like when to use tools) can get very complex. But it brilliantly combines a very casual puzzle mechanic with a very engaging progression system, and that's made me put hours of gameplay into it since it was released last week.
Diablo III adding 100 levels via new Paragon system
How do 100 more levels of Diablo III grab you? Blizzard has just announced a new Paragon system for its fantasy dungeon-crawler, one that gives high-level players a reason to keep grinding. Once you reach level 60, additional experience will go toward your Paragon level. Each level boosts core stats, and a new dev diary says that "the time to reach the upper Paragon levels approximates the long-term time investment required to get a level 99 character in Diablo II." Blizzard's Jay Wilson also elaborates on how Paragon levels will impact D3's Magic Find system. The devs are capping Magic (and Gold) Find at 300%. The aim is to "slowly and gently move Magic Find off of items in the future," Wilson explains.
The Daily Grind: Do you really want MMO innovation?
Sony Online Entertainment's new SOEmote feature debuted in EverQuest II last week, and you could almost hear the yawns from the game's core community. While our own Karen Bryan was willing to give the feature an objective go, most of the EQII vets I know have been disinterested at best and downright hostile due to the "wasted development time" at worst. SOEmote's mixed reception was both predictable and irritating, as it often seems to me like MMO gamers cry for innovation out of one side of their mouths and decry it from the other side on those rare occasions when it happens. Granted, SOEmote isn't a combat- or endgame-focused innovation, but isn't that the point? Shouldn't MMO devs be spreading their creative wings and giving us new things to do that aren't the same old hotbar-spamming gear grind? So how about it, morning crew -- do you just want more progression, or do you really want MMO innovation (and if so, what kind)? 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!
The Daily Grind: Are you sick of raid progression?
If there is one concept I would love to see struck from every MMO past, present, and future, it's raid progression. "Progression" even sounds like slow, tedious, unrewarding work, and since I already have a job, I kinda like my video games to be about having fun rather than about spending my evenings inching through raid content designed to kill me repeatedly and make me cry when we get that stupid two-hand axe for the 20th time and not the gear we need to keep... progressing for progression's sake. Raid "progression" is problematic on multiple levels. Games with raid progression create unnatural barriers to entry in guilds (who'd want to recruit someone who's a tier behind in content?). The trappings of raid progression cause powercreep and shatter balance in seemingly unrelated content (like PvP). Only a small number of people ever get to take part. And come the next expansion, of all your progress is effectively nullified. So what about you Massively folks? Are you also sick of MMO "raid progression" being a thing? 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!
ArenaNet devs talk legendary weapons, endgame, and more
Have you always wanted to wield a unicorn bow and shoot trails of rainbows? (We know you have; don't lie to us.) If you have, ArenaNet developers Eric Flannum and Colin Johanson have confirmed today that Guild Wars 2 is the game for you. The two devs took to Guild Wars 2's Twitch page today to talk about late- and endgame content and progression for the game. To begin with, they talked about Orr, the erstwhile city of the gods, which has recently been turned into the abode of the dragon Zhaitan and his reanimated minions. Orr has no renown hearts, the quest-like activities that have been known to litter the lower-level areas, "because there are generally very few friendly NPCs in Orr." Instead, players' focus in Orr will be on huge events. There are roughly twice as many dynamic events in the Orrian areas as in other explorable zones; many of these are tied together as nets, rather than simple chains. Events tend to have farther-reaching effects than we've seen so far in lower-level areas, putting emphasis more on holistic zone control and cooperation than in the early game. Johanson suggested that players will need to recapture the fallen temples of the old gods and then keep control of those while also pushing deeper into the zone and fighting baddies at the frontlines.
Details unveiled about Star Wars: The Old Republic's Legacy Perks
It's always fun to hit significant progress milestones in a game... the first time. The next three or four times it can start to get just a bit more tedious. Star Wars: The Old Republic's Legacy Perks in the upcoming patch 1.3 are intended to help ensure that your alts can focus on doing the things you like the most and get a little extra boost along the way. Unlike account-wide unlocks, Legacy Perks are unlocked per character, meaning you can tailor different characters to different fashions. The perks are split into four main categories: Advancement, Convenience, Companion, and Travel. Advancement perks lets you earn more experience from your favorite activities, whether you'd prefer to advance faster from story quests or Warzones or even just exploring. Convenience perks give you access to remote vendors and mailboxes, while Travel perks grant you special teleports and earlier speeder options. Last but not least, Companion perks let you improve your crew's crafting skills, affection gains, and turnaround on missions. Take a look at the full rundown for a more in-depth picture of how your Legacy will affect individual characters in the upcoming patch.
Leveling to 80 through pure crafting possible in Guild Wars 2
Combat has long been the focal point of most MMOs' progression systems, and in most games it's borderline impossible to get to max level without spilling some blood. Pacifistic Guild Wars 2 fans seem to be in luck, however, as ArenaNet designer Linsey Murdock has revealed on the forums that, with some hard work and perseverance, players will be able to level all the way to level 80 by doing nothing but crafting. According to Murdock's post (viewable only if you have access to GW2's beta forums), it works something like this: Leveling a single crafting profession to level 400 will grant enough XP to gain 10 character levels. As a result, by maxing out all eight crafting professions, a player can go all the way to the level cap without ever laying hand on a weapon. A few players on the forums have expressed concern that this will lead to a "pay-to-win" style of play, since players can pay money for gems, exchange those gems for gold, and then use that gold to buy crafting materials for a (relatively) quick level boost. Others point out that while this method may increase a character's leveling speed, it offers no statistical benefit and therefore is not pay-to-win in the truest sense of the word. So what do y'all think, kind readers? Is this treading dangerous pay-to-win territory or not? Give us your tuppence in the comments.
Drama Mamas: When casual raiding is neither casual nor raiding
Drama Mamas Lisa Poisso and Robin Torres are experienced gamers and real-life mamas -- and just as we don't want our precious babies to be the ones kicking and wailing on the floor of the checkout lane next to the candy, neither do we want you to become known as That Guy on your realm. There is a common misconception that "casual" is synonymous with being inconsiderate or incompetent. Perhaps this is because many raiding guilds that take long breaks, don't show up on time, and don't read strategies before new encounters call themselves casual. What category does the letter writer's guild fall into? Hey dear drama mama's I'll try not to make any mistakes in my language since English isn't my native tongue. I've read your colum/posts for a long time now and I always praise myself lucky that I've been spared of that drama. Unfortunatly I'm in a conundrum.
