Divinity indicator

[kaijick]

One thing I always hated about the old game was that I was constantly having to go look at the wiki to see things like how much exp I needed, costs, etc.

I have seen some of these things addressedin other threads.

I haven't seen, but think it would be a great quality of life upgrade, is if we could see what divinity our enemies were. They play a big part of the game, I think it should be transparent upfront.

If not for everything, then for mobs at least so we know what we should be hitting for leveling?

[Aieron]

I'd rather monster divinity just make sense OR/AND you have a resource to find such information in game (academia). Putting it in the description is the easiest solution, but it detracts from the adventure of exploration/learning that RPGs have. Should you have to run around hitting every monster to figure out its divinity? Hell no. Should you have to research and learn about an area to unlock secrets like monster weaknesses? Yes, definitely.

[Thoth]

I think by giving into people wanting to know mob divinity you are removing the challenge of the game. Make'em work for it and keep making them do so. In fact I say go the other way with this idea.

If your keen on divinities being logical then to me logic dictates that periodically people change their beliefs/divs. You might say these are just kill'em up shoot'em up mobs but in a fantasy world where fantasy creatures can actively tell you to gtfo or die it wouldn't be a far stretch to think that they could change their allegiances.

Once a year mobs should have a divinity scramble capability (eventually as this isn't even halfway important at the mo) so that players that once thought Treants were the place to level for yourdiv type crit have to find a new place. It keeps the challenge up and going for leveling so that it doesn't remain the same constant grind of treants for blahdiv crits. It also keeps PKers on their toes to search for people in different spots every so often rather than always just knowing the hotspots of where to go.

[daedroth]

or... make most of them a certain div, but every so often their not...
75% usual div
25% random div

[kaijick]

I think of it in terms of a game dev.

I understand where this game comes from, and the past was great, don't get me wrong.

But today is a decade in the future. Do we want new players, or just the 30 or so hardcores we have had following this game for years? Then we need to get rid of the shadow stats and have everything be transparent. This game is already doomed to fail if we are seriously wanting shadow stats that players need to "discover themselves", especially in the subject of something so major as divinity.

Players today do not expect to have to memorize an entire compendium of information, nor spend a bunch of their time GUESSING at things. The worst thing about RoK back in the day was constantly having to refer to a third party wiki that felt like it had information that should have been inside the game to begin with.

Let the divinities change by the week or whatever, or the 75% idea stated above (I like that one actually, it could be on each individual spawn as opposed to a day or week etc), but at least have them be transparent and easily identifiable.

[Thoth]

Guessing on how to do a thing right IS playing a game. Games are things like puzzles, riddles, problems, conflicts, stories.....all that we are trying to figure out the reason/response/answer/ending for. Take that away from the game and you have work. Work is a set standard of things that you NEED to know how to do in order to earn a paycheck. The joy of a game is having folded that piece of paper a thousand times (it's an exaggeration so don't focus on the thousand...yes some people do and it's annoying af) before you get the "OOooooohhhh that's how you make an origami bird."

This is not work. This is a game.

[daedroth]

one of my ideas was to have a thing like diablo (the original), where the more you killed a creature the more info you got on it
i have mixed feeling on how much info shouild be known, knowing too much infro makes you lazy but makes things easier, knowing too little is frsutrating but more rewarding... meh like i said mixed

[Aieron]

The argument that not showing divinities is an old way of doing things is so very wrong. I'm getting tired of that cop-out being used for lazy game design. Even modern games like Witcher 3 make you learn about the world / monsters before you know their weaknesses.

Should you have to go hit every monster in game with multiple characters to figure out every divinity? No, you're right, that is an ancient way of doing things.

You should however have to be engaged in the game world to learn about it. This is where good world building comes in. Want to know a monster you should be killing at lvl12? The game's NPCs/town/academia/quests should have this information for you.

[Thoth]

I don't mind the idea of forcing people to research areas to learn about their weaknesses but to make it so that they can just do it once and done IS lazy game design. One and done means the game grows stale. Perpetual change (and for that like I said once a year or 6 months so that the change is more before your eyes rather than instantaneous daily which would be dumb) so that areas go through slight changes to offer a constant challenge to a player is what may keep a player playing. The problem with RoK and games like it is that they never account for realtime. I can level the same area ad infinitum (or until an admin just garbages it in favor of a new game direction) but why not account for the fact that real life areas go through changes.....so why shouldn't it in a game?

You already create time movement through quests but the rest usually stays stagnant. People quit games like these and return because at the time of quitting they have maxed out alot of the things they can have....when they choose to return years later it is usually because they have forgotten most of everything about the game but remember the nostalgia of it and return. At the point of return some changes may have been made but then they reaquire the knowledge and before you know it again it's quit city....what would you prefer? Constant playership or sporadic popins?

[kaijick]

I see your concerns, Thoth, but you are using reality as a basis for what can/should be done in a game (a MUD for that matter) and that is ALWAYS dangerous territory for a fantasy game (or RPG in general usually) that has spells, goblins, etc. It's just not a good door to open.

Think about this from the perspective of someone who has no clue what RoK was, and stumbled across this game due to a friend, website, etc. THAT is the crowd we need to be concerned about attracting and retaining.

We need to worry about what will get people to START the game before we can discuss with them what will KEEP them in the game a year down the road. I don't think making leveling, which is by the far the worst part of most games these days, to be a hassle for "lore" purposes is the way to go.

People want to be able to level the most efficient way possible. That means the fastest (albiet not safest usually) way of leveling. The wonder of most MUDs is gone after the first hour of grinding exp. You start making things grindy and annoying with something as upfront and influential as div, it's going to go nowhere fast.

There's nothing fun about an RPG (NOT a puzzle game) making me run everywhere or talk to a dozen people ("go here", "retrieve this" "kill that" "talk to this person") so I can learn which mobs I should be leveling on.

That takes right straight back to a third party wiki becoming required for the vast majority of people to play, learn, and enjoy this game