What type of item removal system would you like to see in new MMORPG in order to help keep an economy in balance?

y personal view is I'd like to see a version of item decay over a length of time but the decay can be reparied by multiple skills, back to its original strength or very near, but repairing also has a chance of damaging an item but not destroying it. Repairing would cost a decent amount of currency but not so much that it would make it easier hunt for the same item again.

None.

It would greatly depend on how central having items are to being able to play the game. If its EQ, none. Equipment farming is teh debil.

None. There are enough time sinks as it is in EQ

I'm not talking EQ, talking about a new MMORPG. Keep economy in balance would require very little time investment

None

i think this would suck but, they could make it so each item is only useable by the looter ( kinda no drop ) BUT you could sell it to a vendor only, and for that matter only buy frmo a vendor.
would get rid of bazaar, equipt farming, twinking items, i guess there'd be nothing to do with your haha 'extra' plat. tradeskills would be more difficult...

would SUCK big time!

None - that is the reason I will never play EQII (item decay). I played a game in the past that had that lovely little feature. I will never play another game that has item decay.

Of course EQII may have done away with the idea of item decay for all I know. Once SOE made the announcement that EQII would have item decay, I quit reading anything about EQII; as far as I was/am concerned that game ceased to exist.

I agree with those posting above. i wont play EQ2 for the reason of item decay. There is enough time sinks without this crap.

Fenani

so....all the people who dont want item decay.... do you change the oil in your car? Or just keep the same forever?

With no rotting of items there are always more and more items flowing into a player economy. Since pricing is based on demand and supply, that means there would have to be an ever increasing amount of characters to buy the supplied items or prices plummet. This is what happened in EQ. Lower levels are * BROKEN * in EQ as all items quests and item camps are completely redundant just because bazaar prices are so ridiculously cheap.

Something has to change in EQ2 or else lower levels will be similarly broken there within a year. Final Fantasy has a heavy restriction on inventory and auction space so people tend to vendorsell or discard lots of low quality items, and they don't miss them. There does have to be a solution to the massive influx of items into the game, but it doesn't necessarily have to be item decay.

Regnon, you are comparing something that is actually real and tangible and actually gets used up over time, to something that is made up of pixels on your screen.

None. Item decay has never been "fun" in the slightest. And a working economy is one of the those "game design purist" things that ultimately doesn't matter. If the item will destroy itself players hate it, if it's repairable then it's just a money sink, it also tends to hit players unequally (gear damage on hit or attack cripples melee compared to casters).

The no drop tag is a much better mechanism for deciding whether or not an item will enter the economy after the looter is done with it. Combined with the natural obsoletion of the item as the game progresses.

Think of item decay with this logic. When EQ was in beta, before it went live, no one knew for sure how many players would be on the PvP servers, or how many would turn red on the blue servers. But after a couple of months of being live, a large majority of servers were non-pvp and red characters were quickly becoming scarce on blue servers.

There will always be many players who like the idea of item decay, and the degree of realism it brings to the game. But I won't, and I won't play on a server with it if I have a choice.

Rolaque

do you change the oil in your car? Or just keep the same forever?


Not relevant. Changing the oil in my car is not a game, nor is it entertaining. I do not pay money to play games that simulate the most tedious aspects of real life.

oreover, the assumption that you need item decay for a working in-game economy, and the assumption that you can have a working in-game economy, or the assumption that a working in-game economy is important, are all basic assumptions that fundamentally are in question. You need to address those basic issues before you get to the point of discussing whether item decay is needed in some form.

In addition, consider the fact that no drop items, more than anything else, interfere with the workings of an in-game economy in EQ more than anything else. 90% or more of what high level characters wear is no drop. Can't buy it? Can't sell it? Can't trade it? Can't even give it away? There effectively is no economy at that point.

For the oil comment, though I don't think it applies to a fake world -

http://www.amsoil.com/

I'm all for item decay as long as there is also no such thing as "No Drop" (for decayable items). Without item decay you have no hope of a feasable tradeskill system or reasonable economy.

Weapons and armor should get banged up and worn down to the point where they may very well break if they aren't repaired. Repairing an item should bring it up in condition but not back to where it used to be (ie, each repair would not be quite as effective as the previous repair).

Item quality should play a major role in decay rates. Using EQ as an example, the Rusty weapons that the orcs in GFay and the like drop should break on a regular basis. Low end trade skill stuff should be faily easy to make but not very reliable.

I also think that "charged" or once-and-done items were missing from EQ. A cleric might carry around a number of scrolls with powerful heal spells on them for those times when he/she is out of mana and needs get a heal in. The mechanics of EQ make this tough (since it would be totally impractical in a CH Rotation world) but once-and-done items were always a favorite (from the DM standpoint) in old Pen and Paper games because you could provide treasure and powers to the players that could be game unbalancing if they had continual access to them in an interesting form. (ie, you can drink this potion and gain super strength, regen, etc, but once you do, it's gone).

Item decay would tend to fall more heavily on melee-type classes, though, so I'd want to see a consumable spell-component system implemented as well. Maybe not for every spell, and the components don't need to be really expensive, but just something that creates a market for spell components (and maybe some powerful spells have really expensive components).

Expendable and consumable resources allow you to control "mudflation" to an extent as well. If there is a real cost to ripping loose that Super Fireball of Doom spell you don't need mobs that can laugh at 20 wizards casting them over and over and over for 10 minutes.

None.

Item decay is a bad idea, but the turnover of items can be done in smart ways. Turning in planar armour into guildmasters in PoK to get Diamonds and into tribute points is pretty good way of removing items from the game, and getting something tangible for it.

No item decay. There are a lot of facts in real life that I don't want to simulate in a game. On balancing an economy I think that making all armor and weapons “No Drop” with a few charges of "change bearer" would be sufficient to maintain the economy.

Deller

Item decay sucks.

Besides, the game is supposed to represent the players being heroes in a fantasy world.

Look at all the fantasy books and movies you have seen. Did the heroes magic items ever fail or break unless it was for a plot point?

Excalibur never broke except when King Arther used it in a non righteous way.

The sword of the King in LOTR was broken only when it was used to cut off Saron's hand and was reforged for Aragorn.

No, the above really has nothing to do with a MMORG but I figured why not say it anyway :)

None. Wont play a game that has item decay.

And a working economy is one of the those "game design purist" things that ultimately doesn't matter

Sorry but not true.

When I was level 10 upwards in old Norrath I could do quests, camp items, and had lots of fun exploring different zones to get things done. A level 10 character has *NOTHING* to do now except level up and buy items in the bazaar. There is probably almost nothing but xp for them to do until they're 55 or so. Level 10 was great fun in old pre-Kunark times and it isn't now. Perhaps this is one reason why there are fewer and fewer people entering the game unless they're taking over existing level 65 accounts.

It might not matter to you at level 60+ that newbies don't have the fun people used to, but that's because you have a working high level bazaar on your server. Consider a broken bazaar where you personally had absolutely no groupable, quest, LDoN, or raid drop items to currently work for that you couldn't buy easier in the bazaar on the cheap. I suspect you'd find it slightly frustrating doing xp and cash camps every day over and over again until you hit a point where the ecomony was ...... working.

I used to run a DnD adventure.

Lots of player made stuff, very, very little magic, the players even had to repair their stuff.

I ran it for about 4 years on and off, from High School to college, none of my friends ever complained.

They KNEW that it was not going to be easy. Was going to require work and was not a Twink fest, and they loved it.

The adventures where they got hundreds of gold and all +1 magic maces, cheapend their charaters.

If your want to play a game is based on how many toys you have... your playing it for the wrong reason.

IMHO

None, what is it good for? Nothing but timesinks. :)

Sirrocco hit the nail on the head. In old school EQ, a lot of the best items were droppable. Cloak of Flames, RBB, Mystical Eyepatch, etc. Sure, planes armor that came later wasnt, but really, those few no drop items didnt affect the EQ economy. So even the best players on the server could still save up and possibly buy an upgrade item that they didnt already have. After all, those items only dropped every 7 days or so.

Nowadays, if you have raided at all in the last 2 years, odds are there is nothing you can or want to do with the plat you have earned with your main character for your main. No drop has seen to that. If you are 65 and been to VT, Time, or even GoD (Kod or past), you will not be spending plat on equipment for your main character. So those of us with a ton of plat and nothing better to do twink. And this has a HUGE negative impact on the economy. Items such as Fungi Tunics, AoN, Holgresh Beads, etc that are realistically worthless in todays end game go for ridiculous prices because we have nothing better to do with our plat. And even decent middle range gear that mid range players should be able to afford are too high in price because end game players buy for their twinks at high prices (Cloak of Flames is a great example here of a WAY overpriced item nowadays because of twinks).

Item decay is NOT the way to deal with this situation. All that does is increase the time sinks in an already time consuming game. The best way to deal with this situation is make EVERYTHING older than so long droppable. in my opinion, that would be older than the last major expansion. So in my opinion, make everything Luclin or older droppable (LoY and LDoN do NOT count as expansions!) This would bring some of the currently over priced mid range items back down to a reasonable level and allow some higher end players a chance to buy items they always wanted, but could never get.

ore items, larger range of power, more flexibility. Thats how to fix the EQ economy. Not force us to buy the same items with more and more plat flowing into the economy every day.

Fenani

When I was level 10 upwards in old Norrath I could do quests, camp items, and had lots of fun exploring different zones to get things done. A level 10 character has *NOTHING* to do now except level up and buy items in the bazaar. There is probably almost nothing but xp for them to do until they're 55 or so. Level 10 was great fun in old pre-Kunark times and it isn't now.


That has nothing to do with a "working economy." You're simply describing a younger vs. a mature economy. Neither one is any more broken than the other.

Item decay is NOT the way to deal with this situation. All that does is increase the time sinks in an already time consuming game. The best way to deal with this situation is make EVERYTHING older than so long droppable. in my opinion, that would be older than the last major expansion. So in my opinion, make everything Luclin or older droppable (LoY and LDoN do NOT count as expansions!) This would bring some of the currently over priced mid range items back down to a reasonable level and allow some higher end players a chance to buy items they always wanted, but could never get.


First of all ... if you're a high end player then a cloak of flames is not expensive so go buy one. If you think it's expensive then you're not a high end player. If you still need one as an upgrade then you're not a high end player. If you don't need one for yourself but want it for an alt then get in line behind the people who'll pay more to twink their alts than you do.

There might be money flowing into the economy but there's items flowing into the economy every day too. Aren't there enough saleable items in all of EQ to make you happy? How many thousands of items do you want? There are usually about 17000 or so of them on sale in CT bazaar all the time.

By making everything droppable in old expansions you're just going to see high level players farm raid zones for saleable drops. Do you really want to see correctly levelled guilds prevented from raiding NToV because one group of uber people keep farming it all for cash? Also if players want these "special" droppable items at the moment they can perfectly easily hunt for them, just like all the players who got them before. It doesn't take that much nouse to keep an eye on Talendor, say, and mug him when he pops.

oreover, the glut of extra droppables onto the market will put lots of power into the hands of characters, as you said. So what good is that? It trivialises content for players, removing the fun and challenge from the game. It drives down the prices of other goods further so that even more people will buy clothes in the bazaar than hunt or quest them (ie. play EQ). The old fashioned favourite items like the cloak of flames would lose their mystique when 41% haste items come on sale, and you'll have exactly the same problem as before but with desirable 41% haste items, farmed by groups of ubers in NToV then priced out of the reach of casual players.

There's an old adage about expensive items I'm afraid. If it's expensive then go hunt it for yourself and sell it. Make it an opportunity not a problem. If you can't hunt it for yourself then you should at least understand why it's expensive.

In Morrowind items (armor and weapons) decay as you use them. Better armor could take more of a beating before it was finally unuseable. However, even if something reached 0 you could bring it back. You just couldn't use it until you got it fixed. You can either train in black smithing and fix them yourself or pay an NPC to fix it.

It was actually sort of useful because the more you practiced your blacksmithing it would increase your strength. So I didn't mind lugging around a hammer to fix my armor. And the act of repairing was painless, in fact, kind of fun. I liked the noises it made.

In a game where all items were tradeskill items, items eventually getting used up might be a beneficial thing.

That has nothing to do with a "working economy." You're simply describing a younger vs. a mature economy. Neither one is any more broken than the other.

If LDoN points could only ever purchase items that were much poorer than cheap bazaar equivalents, I think something would be broken..

If tradeskill items were never worth producing because bazaar equivalents are cheaper then I think something would be broken.

As far as I know, whenever players look at a quest and decide that it's never worth the effort to anyone, the quest is worthless. By this standard almost all the quests below level 55 are already worthless because bazaar items are far simpler to obtain. I'd say that means something is broken. I'd suggest the market is broken, but you're welcome to persuade me that almost every quest under level 55 is broken instead Sirocco.

First of all ... if you're a high end player then a cloak of flames is not expensive so go buy one. If you think it's expensive then you're not a high end player. If you still need one as an upgrade then you're not a high end player. If you don't need one for yourself but want it for an alt then get in line behind the people who'll pay more to twink their alts than you do.

You make my point here. Its NOT expensive for a high end player. But really, should the end game players be the target market for this item? No, the mid range players should be. but the high end players buy it because there isnt better to buy to twink with.

There might be money flowing into the economy but there's items flowing into the economy every day too. Aren't there enough saleable items in all of EQ to make you happy? How many thousands of items do you want? There are usually about 17000 or so of them on sale in CT bazaar all the time

None of which really affects the high end player. So the high end player keeps accumulating more and more plat with nothing to do with it.

By making everything droppable in old expansions you're just going to see high level players farm raid zones for saleable drops. Do you really want to see correctly levelled guilds prevented from raiding NToV because one group of uber people keep farming it all for cash? Also if players want these "special" droppable items at the moment they can perfectly easily hunt for them, just like all the players who got them before. It doesn't take that much nouse to keep an eye on Talendor, say, and mug him when he pops.

Now this is a good point. by making these items farmable, we do take away some raid possibilities. But this is already happening. Gore, Sev, Tal, Wuoshi, even Trak were all once raid mobs. Now they are soloed at every chance. This is not a bad thing. This is the game evolving. More raid opportunties will come up as they always do.

oreover, the glut of extra droppables onto the market will put lots of power into the hands of characters, as you said. So what good is that? It trivialises content for players, removing the fun and challenge from the game. It drives down the prices of other goods further so that even more people will buy clothes in the bazaar than hunt or quest them (ie. play EQ). The old fashioned favourite items like the cloak of flames would lose their mystique when 41% haste items come on sale, and you'll have exactly the same problem as before but with desirable 41% haste items, farmed by groups of ubers in NToV then priced out of the reach of casual players

This is exactly what has already happened to the game. People out grow old content. it loses its mystique, as it should. Old items should be just that, old. As for items priced out of the reach of casual players, the old items would become more reasonable. Do you think a Fungi Tunic would still cost 75k (current price on RN) if people could get the VT one for 200k or 300k? Giving more options makes the mid range items more affordable for casual players.

There's an old adage about expensive items I'm afraid. If it's expensive then go hunt it for yourself and sell it. Make it an opportunity not a problem. If you can't hunt it for yourself then you should at least understand why it's expensive.

I believe in a free market. A free market will always balance. Unfortunately, with the current artificial restraints, such as no drop items and level requirements, EQ does not reflect a free market system. Expensive items should be expensive because they are hard to get, not because high end players with more money than they know what to do with think something is a cool toy.

Fenani

As someone said before: Item decay is a tax on melee for being... melee. An unfair tax at that.

By making everything droppable in old expansions you're just going to see high level players farm raid zones for saleable drops. Do you really want to see correctly levelled guilds prevented from raiding NToV because one group of uber people keep farming it all for cash? Also if players want these "special" droppable items at the moment they can perfectly easily hunt for them, just like all the players who got them before. It doesn't take that much nouse to keep an eye on Talendor, say, and mug him when he pops.


Anka, I thought you wanted a working economy in the game. What you describes interferes with a working economy, and proves my point about no-drop items.

ake up your mind.

Meh, I've said it before. People are too frelling worried about losing their lame phat lewts. If EQ wasn't designed the way it was, you wouldn't care if there was item decay or not. Look at SWG. It has item decay. Plenty of it. The only time items do not decay is when you die during participaiting in the PVP aspect of the Galactic Civil War. The economy in SWG proves that a working item decay system is possible that is as painless as it can be.

EQII is going that route and I think those of you whining and crying that you're not going to play because EQII has item decay, are ignorant. It's an ignorant, uneducated, illinformed reason to not play a game. You just can't look past your phat lewts that you've farmed/raided for. You can't look past your EQ mindset and realize, y'know, it's EQII, not EQ. Maybe it will be different and be worthwhile playing. Even with item decay.

I envision the lot of you as the proverbial ostrich. A row of you with your heads stuck in the sand with the words: Timesink scrawled into the sand. I'd rather have item decay timesinks than the current craptastic camp/rare spawn timesinks you see in EQ.

so....all the people who dont want item decay.... do you change the oil in your car? Or just keep the same forever?

That's why we're playing Fantasy games on our computers. To get away from having to change the ****ing oil.

90% or more of what high level characters wear is no drop. Can't buy it? Can't sell it? Can't trade it? Can't even give it away? There effectively is no economy at that point.

It took me a long time to try and find out where the contradiction you suggested lies, so forgive me if I've misunderstood. I want an EQ where people can get off their butts and hunt and quest to put good clothes on there backs, with an economy to fill in and help out. Anyways I'll put my points and your points together and see where we stand.

Below level 55 there is nothing to hunt or quest as everything is better bazaar bought.

From 55 to until you're VT/elemental geared you can choose how you play and can buy in the bazaar or hunt and quest for items.

Past VT/elemental equipment all clothes have to be hunted as nothing can be bazaar bought and there only 2 or 3 tradeskill/quest items of comparable quality in the game. Money accumulates and the only thing to spend money on is twinks.

That looks sort of broken to me, or at the very least not working as Sony intended.
If EQ was working properly, I'd suggest that from level 1 up to just short of high end gear, players should have the option of hunting and questing for items or buying in the bazaar. It widens the game out and gives more game content, more freedom, more to explore, more fun, just as it used to be. At the moment the bazaar so dominates low level equipment that those options just aren't there.

This is the last I'll post on the subject as it could veer off topic soon enough and I don't suppose many people actually care that the low level game is in a mess. I won't even reply to Fenani's post even though I completely disagree with is still ;).

I like the idea of item decay. Anything that makes the game more immersive and real from a RP point of view, and that contributes to the "Suspension of Disbelief" aspect of the game is goodness IMO. I want this to be more of a game, and less of a chat system with Hack & Slash attached. I am finding more and more that the noise associated with the malfunctionng economy is impacting my enjoyment of the game. There are idiots auctioning off gear and drops in BOT for goodness sake.

Of course I am a very casual caster, and only have a couple of level 25ish twinks on my account, so item decay and doesn't affect me that much.

And to the person who commented that "item decay is a tax on melee," does that mean that purchased/bought spells are a tax on casters? or maybe spell reagents? Please try and consider every angle before you pontificate.

None. I haven't played a game where I liked it, MMORPG or single player, and I dislike the idea on the principle that one of the things I play games for is to get away from the hassle of having to maintain or worrying about maintaining the tools of my trade.

One of the things that I always sounded neat, but wouldn't work real well in a gaming society would be single-instance items. Imagine defeating a_uber_mob01 - he drops a_uber_sword01. You would be the only person on the entire server to have that particular item. Now, if somewhere along the way, you got killed, the mob that killed you could "loot" an item, putting that item back into the game world. Say a goblin killed you and looted your new sword. If the goblins are "friendly" with the uber mob, they would give the item back to the mob, but gain a "reward" from the uber mob - maybe gold. So the uber mob would regain his sword, and the goblins would drop more gold per kill for a short while. If they weren't friendly, the goblins could decide to keep the particular item - maybe the mob was greedy and would keep it for himself, or he would give it to the leader of his particular "tribe".

Now, this doesn't mean that uber_mob01 wouldn't drop anything - like most warriors, I'm sure he'd have an assortment of weapons to choose from, but, after a while, he would stop dropping "premium" weapons, until his horde looted and pillaged items for him again. Hypothetically, this would also help curtail mob camping because the major boss would only be dropping the same items as his lackeys until he was able to "power up" again.

Player_01 who died would have a certain amount of time to track down "his" goblin, maybe putting a halo around the mob in a UI sense, so you know who you have to kill. The player would know who has his item until it's passed off to the local "boss". To make gameplay a bit fairer to the player, no one else can loot his item off the goblin, and if the goblin dies before the player can return, it's "passed on" to another mob until the player's timer runs out.

Also, not all creatures loot items. Animals, for instance, don't generally steal armor, but in return, they generally don't drop it either.

Again, something that I thought would be neat to play in for a while, but hard as hell to implement and keep going.

none, there are enough timesinks and frustrations that can occur in every game (no matter which mmorpg or single player rpg)

isnt it enough that RL items get damaged and decay and poof and cant be repaired and or can be repaired but it cost horrendous money? i want to play a game, not a RL copy of frustrations.

People become quite alarmed when they log on and discover that an item or bag has disappeared from an inventory slot. Even if the lost goods aren't especially difficult to replace, a player will usually petition or use any means available to get their items restored.

Why? To the player, those items reflect a portion of time and energy *already spent* on acquisition. Whether or not the items are restored, the actual loss equates to additional time and energy RE-acquiring the same items.

To me, "item decay" carries all the negative attributes above -- it's still very much a form of loss -- but instead of being considered a glitch or bug, designers slap the "feature" label on it. The only real difference in perception of loss is the absence of alarm, because players are told to expect their items to become less usable or even unusable. Depending on the amount of time required for repair/restoral, the impact from that loss will range from mild annoyance to quitting the game in disgust. And even the mildest of annoyances become more than the sum of parts when they happen too many times or too often.

Therefore to me, item decay has no place in a game setting. It's an artificial and particularly "unfun" timesink to keep players from consuming content too rapidly, whereby players are forced to spend a portion of their time just to maintain what they already have.

Some folks make analogies using real-world examples to support their theories on what a game economy 'needs' in order to work, but such examples are irrelevent in a setting which can be made to follow, or not follow, any physical laws or principles - all on the whim of the game's designers.

Gaming is a totally optional form of entertainment. Certain aspects of realism can lead to more immersion, but a game environment can only force so much in the way of 'negative realism' before players no longer feel entertained.

Games without currency/goods exchange between players have existed for centuries, so there's no reason to assume any given MMORPG 'must' have such an economy in order to be fun and successful. It is foolheardy to further assume that a game's economy needs to emulate anything in the real world to serve its purpose, or even to make assumptions about what purposes a game's economy should serve.

~Firemynd

And to the person who commented that "item decay is a tax on melee," does that mean that purchased/bought spells are a tax on casters? or maybe spell reagents? Please try and consider every angle before you pontificate.

A tax on casters? Hardly. Note that you only buy spells ONCE. You don't need to keep rebuying the spells because they decay in your spell book when you use them, do you? Do you need to keep repairing your mind with platinum because it decays? Of course not. But melee would be required to repair their weapons often and tanks would get the double whammy by having to repair their weapons AND their armor. Casters would have the least 'tax' since they rarely melee or get hit so their items don't get much wear. Next are DPS classes that use their weapons, but don't get hit very often. Finally, tanks would have to spend the most money on item decay in order to fix both their armor and weapons in order to keep 'up to par.' Of course meanwhile they also have to buy new armor and weapons at the same time. That's some pretty hefty discrimination against melee and tanks in particular.

edit: And reagents are only on a couple spells. But, yes, ask just about any cleric if they feel item reagents are a tax on clerics. It is, in effect, a money sink to make spells cost money and take more currency out of the game. So: A tax on casters. One crucial difference though. We can chose to cast the spell or not to cast the spell. As a druid we don't have to turn the rain off if we don't want to. Melee, by being melee, are forced into this tax by the very nature of their class. They don't have a choice to avoid it since all their weapons and armor (except for some powerful magical items perhaps) will decay. A rogue can't exactly say, "Hrm.. I don't think I'll use my weapons today."

EQII is going that route and I think those of you whining and crying that you're not going to play because EQII has item decay, are ignorant. It's an ignorant, uneducated, illinformed reason to not play a game. You just can't look past your phat lewts that you've farmed/raided for. You can't look past your EQ mindset and realize, y'know, it's EQII, not EQ. Maybe it will be different and be worthwhile playing. Even with item decay.

I envision the lot of you as the proverbial ostrich. A row of you with your heads stuck in the sand with the words: Timesink scrawled into the sand. I'd rather have item decay timesinks than the current craptastic camp/rare spawn timesinks you see in EQ.

It isnt the item decay for many of us non-uber, non-Time flagged players. Its the addiitonal time sink thats really unnecessary. And its a time sink that is perpetual. That's the issue.

Yes, camps suck. But personally, as a casual player who only logs on around 20 hours a week, I'd rather spend 10 hours on some random camp ever couple of weeks whenever I want something than spend 20 minutes every day removing the previous 24 hours of item decay on my equipment. Its that constant grind that gets annoying. Its a major reason I'm not playing SWG.

I've done the uber raids. I've done the uber camps. I've done most things people would want to do in EQ. Great and fine. And now in my twilight days of EQ I'd rather take things easy than worry that my backup gear is going to decay. Or even my primary gear will decay because I had to take a week off due to work. Or risk that nice item I got as a gift being destroyed because it was repaired improperly. Yeah, it might be a small risk, but eventually the odds will catch up with you. If they didnt, Las Vegas would have gone out of business long ago.

Is it possible for a form of item decay that is casual friendly and does it job to appear that I would like? I suppose its always possible. There was a time when I was 19 when I thought that no online game without an inheirent PVP aspect would be playable. After all, how would you get rid of all those idiots and beggers if you cant at least kill them? And yet EQ has thrilled me for years and I dont remember the last player I killed. So its possible a form of item decay could appear that I'd enjoy.

But so far nothing I've seen has even been close.

There are tons of things to do in a game. And it is a game. I've got better things to do with my time than to be forced to do timesinks. In EQ I get to choose which timesinks I invest my time in. I get to choose when I invest in those timesinks. I definitely dont need a game that forces me to do a timesink on a regular basis simply because they are trying to emulate reality.

If you want reality shut down the computer and go outside and see the sun. Talk with a girl. Go out on a date. A game should be real enough to be fun, but not so real as to force people to do the tedious things like bill paying on a regular and constant basis.

A game should be a temporary escape from reality. It should not take the place of reality, nor even try to be a substitute for it.

To those of you that like item decay; enjoy EQII - don't let the door hit your backside on the way out.

Not being mean or anything, I just get tired of people tellling me how much better off I'd be with item decay in the game. Been there, done that, have the tee shirt, don't want to ever do it again.

Those of us that don't like it will cheer you on your way out. Less lag and competition for hunting spots here.

Don't be to surprised though when the item decay and repair of items eventually becomes tedious. At that point of course you are stuck, you have developed your characters and don't want to leave them.

There are those of us that think the economy is just fine thank you. We don't need or want to have everything break, become no drop or be overpriced.

Enjoy!

Meh, I've said it before. People are too frelling worried about losing their lame phat lewts. If EQ wasn't designed the way it was, you wouldn't care if there was item decay or not. Look at SWG. It has item decay. Plenty of it. The only time items do not decay is when you die during participaiting in the PVP aspect of the Galactic Civil War. The economy in SWG proves that a working item decay system is possible that is as painless as it can be.

EQII is going that route and I think those of you whining and crying that you're not going to play because EQII has item decay, are ignorant. It's an ignorant, uneducated, illinformed reason to not play a game. You just can't look past your phat lewts that you've farmed/raided for. You can't look past your EQ mindset and realize, y'know, it's EQII, not EQ. Maybe it will be different and be worthwhile playing. Even with item decay.

I envision the lot of you as the proverbial ostrich. A row of you with your heads stuck in the sand with the words: Timesink scrawled into the sand. I'd rather have item decay timesinks than the current craptastic camp/rare spawn timesinks you see in EQ.

The problem with most decay systems is they, necessarily, remove rare and "unique" items from the world. There is no "UberWeapon of DoomGod" because, frankly, if you spent four hours of 35 peoples lives getting that weapon in a raid...just to have it decay...people wouldn't bother, and in fact would be correctly pissed the hell off.

So your choice is. EQ style, where you can get fancy rare items which show you're uberness. Or you can have SWG style...where everyone and their mother has the same weapon depending on what class they are.

e...I'll take EQ style. Because frankly SWG got very boring very quickly.

There are several reasons why I'm no longer playing SWG. And Aly has stated one of those reasons.


I am finding more and more that the noise associated with the malfunctionng economy is impacting my enjoyment of the game. There are idiots auctioning off gear and drops in BOT for goodness sake.

I'm sorry, but I have to laugh. On the one hand, people complain about a malfunctioning economy in EQ. Yet they turn around and attack activities that actually are indicative of a healthy, functioning economy.

Do you really not know what a functioning economy is? Or the role of the market in an economy?

It does not take a rocket scientist to realize that buying and selling items is part of a functioning economy. So why are people who want a functioning economy arguing AGAINST buying and selling items?

Anka's argument is particularly inconsistent. The concept of efficient production means that those who are efficient at producing goods or services do so, and sell them to purchasers (who, in turn, are producing other goods or services at which they are most efficient). In EQ terms, this means farming by high level characters is part of an efficient, functioning economy.

If you want to argue for no drop items, or for protecting the lower level game by preventing high level farming of lower level items, then realize that you are DISTORTING and INTERFERING with an efficient, functioning economy. You cannot be both for a working, functioning economy and against farming and droppable items.

I'm not saying that you cannot be in favor of no drop items, or for protecting the lower level game. Just don't complain about a malfunctioning economy in EQ, then. Be consistent.

People become quite alarmed when they log on and discover that an item or bag has disappeared from an inventory slot. Even if the lost goods aren't especially difficult to replace, a player will usually petition or use any means available to get their items restored.

I accidentally destroyed 3 very important pieces of my rogue's armor. I petitioned, but never got a reply back. So I stopped worrying about it and bought some really cheap and crappy replacements for them. I still look good in my armor, so I'm happy.

Casters would have the least 'tax' since they rarely melee or get hit so their items don't get much wear.

I can think of a perfectly viable way to "tax" casters as well. Focus items. As they're used during spell casting, have them gradually degrade. Reagents would also be another "Tax". And perhaps focus items like in D&D, where the item isn't used up, but is required for the spell (ala Fire Beetle Eye for some druid spells). As long as the degredation system is designed with fun in mind (I can think of a few ways to make it fun off the top of my head), it would work and it would add to the immersiveness of the game.

From the responses I see here, you all just want a pretty picture on the screen, with big shiny numbers that flash, and people to talk to. I don't want that, I want a game that challenges me. EQ isn't a challenge, it's a chore. Because items do not decay, they use rare spawn mobs, rare drop items, long camps to somewhat control how fast items enter into the economy.

Yes, camps suck. But personally, as a casual player who only logs on around 20 hours a week, I'd rather spend 10 hours on some random camp ever couple of weeks whenever I want something than spend 20 minutes every day removing the previous 24 hours of item decay on my equipment. Its that constant grind that gets annoying. Its a major reason I'm not playing SWG.

*laughs really loudly* Give me a break. It was not a constant grind to repair my items in SWG. Hell, the full set of stormtrooper armor my character had was barely scratched, and I used it quite often. ST Armor in SWG has 45,000 durability. I think a couple pieces of armor were nearing 44,000 durability when I quit SWG. I used that armor for nearly two months of regular playing. And that was before they took out item decay for pvp deaths.

Also, I never replaced my main pistol once. It was at roughly 1k durability when I bought it and only 400 or so four months later. Again, where's the daily 20 minute grind to keep my weapons and armor repaired? Anyway, item decay is based on usage, not a set timer that slowly ticks down til the item goes poof.

Uneducated? So in other words if you don't like item decay you're stupid? It must be great to continually make posts like this with no repercussions from the mods Aly. People like me get nailed for the slightest thing and you're allowed to come right out and call people stupid because they don't see things your way. What a freaking joke.

Ignorant, uneducated, and ill-informed does not make you stupid. Nor does it mean I'm calling you stupid. I'm just saying you have no clue what you're talking about, i.e. you have no knowledge of what you speak of. Hence, ignorant. You can be ignorant of something and not be stupid Autumn. www.m-w.com is a great place to start educating yourself on the definitions of the words I used. I used them instead of stupid for very specific reasons. You're one of them.

e...I'll take EQ style. Because frankly SWG got very boring very quickly.

You're only as uber as every other uber goober on the servers. The only unique items are the artifact items rarely given out. Personally, I'll take a fantasy world SWG-style over EQ any day of the week, but there's not one out yet. I'd rather have the individual's personality, knowledge, and skill be what seperates people instead of one piece of gear having +1 more int than someone elses. All it is, is a virtual wang waving contest. "I've got the more goober gear than you, so obviously I'm better than you."

I see that attitude in EQ all the time and it sickens me. I can be the best damn player in EQ, know how to play just about any class in any role, know how to beat any mob/encounter, and it means diddly-squat because I don't have a certain amount of gear. I'm not saying every mob should be killable in patchwork and banded, but I'd love to see a fantasy mmog where skill and knowledge play a greater focus than having the gooberest gear.

If that means all the gear ends up being similar, ala SWG, with item decay, I'm all for it. It will promote a better community that prides itself on skill, knowledge, and reputation than on who has the better gear.

Ignorant, uneducated, and ill-informed does not make you stupid. Nor does it mean I'm calling you stupid. I'm just saying you have no clue what you're talking about, i.e. you have no knowledge of what you speak of. Hence, ignorant.


Aly, chill on the personal attacks. Calling someone ignorant doesn't enhance your argument at all.

Ignorance isn't a bad thing Scirocco, as long as people are willing enlighten themselves. I wasn't using it as a personal attack. Just pointing out how ill-informed that people against item decay are. They are ignorant of the benefits it provides to the game as long as it's properly done. If I wanted to attack people, I would've called them stupid, which is an entirely different meaning from ignorant.

And anyone that does not play a game because of one little feature is a bonehead. That's like saying I'm not going to play WoW because it has guns. A well designed item decay system (similar, but improving upon it) will be a good feature of the game that adds to the experience of playing it. I'd much rather have to repair my items every now and then instead of camping some rare spawn mob 36 hours in a row.

edit: Uneducated means stupid in my book

Buy a new book.

Actually, Aly sounds like someone trying to convince others that brocoli and cauliflower is delicious and should replace ice cream as desert.

We know what we like, we know what gives us pleasure and what we don't like and what is a pain in the backside to us.

We don't have to spend our money on games we don't like. Now if you enjoy SWG and want to play EQ II then go for it.

I may not be a game critic but I sure know what I like. Of course you seem to think you know what I like better than I do!

That's not ignorance, that is arrogance.

To move this forward ..

Rightly or wrongly, players didn't like item rot as seen in DAoC. Those who've seen it before in DAoC would consider it a big minus when considering buying another game.

Rightly or wrongly, manufacturers now seem to think there is a flaw in a game where items are continually created but never destroyed. It seems like they're trying to remove items from the game through item rot, tribute, or simply encouraging players to vendorsell their poorest loots. EQ has tribute, DAoC had item rot, and FF has very limited inventory and bank space.

Rather than moaning and arguing, can we think of a good way of removing obsolete items from EQ2 that players would be happy with?

PS: Uneducated does not mean stupid. All the three year olds in your country are uneducated, but if you ask their parents they'll all tell you how clever their child is ;).

I'm sorry I offended your delicate sensibilities Autumn. Excuse me for not being the polite little serving wenches that never step out of line around you. Sheesh. I destroyed three pieces of my armor (tunic, leggings, boots) that were worth 25k total. That makes me a complete and total bonehead. Dingbat. Scatterbrained. *shrugs*

I do think it's a stupid reason to not play a game because of one tiny little feature that you don't like. A properly designed item decay system would add to the atomosphere and immersiveness of the game instead of detracting from it as you seem to think it would. You continue to ignore the data I provided concerning SWG's item decay system. You can go for months at a time without replacing any gear. I spent money on clothes for fashion than I did for practicality.

The only time you would have to worry about quick item decay is when facing a pistoleer in PVP. Their disarming shot directly targets your weapon to cause damage to it and reduce it's durability. Not many people used that shot though. It was more of a kill or be killed in SWG.

I may not be a game critic but I sure know what I like. Of course you seem to think you know what I like better than I do!

No, I just think you're basing your likes off faulty perceptions of item decay. That's like saying, "I'm not going to play WoW because it has tradeskills in it." It's a bogus reason to not play a game and to not give it a chance.

You keep missing the point and not frelling reading what I posted Autumn. I have provided a concrete example of a well done item decay system and you keep frelling ignoring it. SWG has a good system. It was months before I had to spend any time concerning myself with repairing or replacing any of my gear. MONTHS. Real time MONTHS. Not days, not weeks. Not hours. MONTHS. Got it? It does not have to be a daily worry that your gear is going to degrade.

If you like tedium and doing stuff that trivial how about we make everyone wash themselves(and their clothes) too?

I can think of several scenes in fantasy literature where someone was surprised during bathing. In a game focused on immersiveness and roleplaying instead of phat loot whoring and virtual wang waving, why not include it? People that don't bathe have an emote that plays every now and then about them being stinky. It could lower a characters chance to sneak by a guard. Lower prices at the market. However, bathing could provide bonuses when talking to the local lord.

Anything you throw at me Autumn, I can find a way to make something good out of it. Care to test it? PM me. 8p

I've never seen a "healthy" economy. It just can't exist.

That's in the real world.

Now try to take all the things that make real world economies "function" and try to stuff it into a game? Well that's even more impossible than making an economy "healthy".

Aly, I have a serious question for you. How many hours would you say you played in those 4 months? I can play an hour a week for 4 months with any item decay system and see no impact on my armor. Im not saying thats what you did, just trying to show time does make a huge difference.

Other than that, the item decay for me was a game breaker while thinking of eq2 honestly. I dislike waiting for an item to break, it makes me to nervous. Im the paranoid type anyway, so I am always just waiting for something to screw me over. Im also a serious pack rat. So with item decay not only do I have to worry about my items decaying (and its always a serious concern in my head) I have to worry if I try to push it a little to far in a critical condition and breaking (I have had this happen to me so many times with item decay and I always hate it).

But somehow even after all this thought I am somehow ignorant? That doesnt seem to add up to me. Really the ignorant one in this conversation is you Aly, and willfully so. You refuse to believe some people would not enjoy an item decay system no matter what happens, and say eq2 will be great because of it. The other thing is, you seem to think item decay means there will be no uber loot. That I find absolutly ****ing histerical. With item decay comes item repair, meaning there will be rare items like always, they will jst need to be repiared every so often. Item decay isnt the answer your looking for aly, unless you make all damage unable to be repaired (irrepairable?). If that is what your looking for, then you are simply ruining the game for packrats like myself who want to use an item for as long as its useful and keep it. Maybe later use it on a lower level character, but usually not.

Now I would like to take you up on your challenge for how to make item decay "fun". Take sometime and think it out so it will be perfect. Since you can think of a few off the top of your head, a concrete one with some thought should be cake. Also anything can have good aspects but still be bad, and you can pm to try me on that.

PS: Autumn I must admit most of the time I cant stand you, but right now I want to have like 10 million of your babies. If only it were physically possible.

The problem with most decay systems is they, necessarily, remove rare and "unique" items from the world. There is no "UberWeapon of DoomGod" because, frankly, if you spent four hours of 35 peoples lives getting that weapon in a raid...just to have it decay...people wouldn't bother, and in fact would be correctly pissed the hell off.

A small comment on this. EQ2 will have uber items too... but they won't decay like normal items. They may decay a TON slower, or they may not decay at all. Personally I don't mind item decay. Item decay in and of itself is fairly meaningless. It all depends on how it's implimented and how loot is implimented. You put item decay in an exact EQ style game.. it's not going to work at all. Item decay in UO was good because of like you said, there was no real rare or unique items. This kept items cycling, and people constantly wanting to buy sets of armor from crafters/crafters vendors, as it was affordable and easy, and effective gear, not as good as the best magic items, but the best magic items were not needed. There is now though uber items in UO,and there still is item decay, but it's a very slow process, so as to be an almost non issue.

[Edit] UO also had corpse loss though, much more so then EQ or any other game. Corpses had a decay time of about 15 minutes in UO, and anyone who passed by could loot your corpse. Again, not exactly a big deal in UO, especially once you're past super newbie stage. As the stuff you carried on you was fairly replaceable. Regs for your spells, some potions, a weapon or two, and your armor on you. It's not like this in UO now as a lot of people whined (not completely unfounded though), but it was for a couple years.

Tedium is allready enough present in a game played for FUN.

Item decay is an horrid idea that spoils half the fun in games largely based on accretion and gear progression.

It might look ok on paper but it's still a very unpalatable solution.

Also, I never replaced my main pistol once.


This is one thing I have noticed about people who claim to like item decay systems - it is ok as long as no items they own ever actually decay.

Obvious problem with this is if no items actually decay, couldn't you have saved time and effort by not including the system? Because if no items actually decay, then there is no effect on supply and demand, and so no change to the economy, which was the whole point of putting in item decay in the first place.

Face it, what everyone wants is an 'other people's items' decay system. First MMORPG to implement that has my money (but obviously, not the other people's money).

soru

Give me a break. It was not a constant grind to repair my items in SWG. Hell, the full set of stormtrooper armor my character had was barely scratched, and I used it quite often. ST Armor in SWG has 45,000 durability. I think a couple pieces of armor were nearing 44,000 durability when I quit SWG. I used that armor for nearly two months of regular playing.

Such a slow rate of decay cannot possibly serve the purpose of removing items from the game's economy, a purpose frequently vaunted by those favoring a decay system.

So again, the only remaining reason to have item decay is this supposed sense of immersion -- and again I have to say there are some elements of reality that don't translate well in a game environment. Item decay ranks right down there with sleeping; no one wants to log on and be greeted by a message that their character is tired and must remain inactive for an hour before he/she can 'do' anything.

A properly designed item decay system would add to the atomosphere and immersiveness of the game instead of detracting from it as you seem to think it would.

Item decay isn't pleasant in the real world. I'm trying to imagine how you can possibly glamorize it enough to make decay fun in a game world. Feel free to try.

You continue to ignore the data I provided concerning SWG's item decay system.

Ignore your data? On the contrary, I'm intrigued by it.

SWG has a good system. It was months before I had to spend any time concerning myself with repairing or replacing any of my gear. MONTHS. Real time MONTHS. Not days, not weeks. Not hours. MONTHS.

If items take that long to decay, and can be repaired with minimal cost, what's the point? It's just an unnecessary burden in the back of players' minds, trying to anticipate when they'll need to spend time repairing or replacing gear. And hope that doesn't happen when they don't have any extra time to spend.

~Firemynd

Face it, what everyone wants is an 'other people's items' decay system. First MMORPG to implement that has my money (but obviously, not the other people's money).

Lol... sometimes you come up with a good one...

Only game with item decay I didnt mind was Diablo2, cause it was just a money sink and a quick trip to the smith and you were good to go. You never actually lost an item unless you went out of your way to destroy it through overuse, and it wasnt tedious or time consuming to have the item repaired. A few clicks, some plat, and done.

As a sidenote, I also think "tradeskills' in the MMOG sense are stupid... I'm always reminded of watching my dad play Quest for Glory 4 (whatever number it was) many years ago... he'd run his little guy to this "training ground" and move him across the ropes, time and time and time again. My mom would ask "What are you doing?" and he'd say he was building up strength... Well to this day my mom and I laugh about that... it was just so tedious and meaningless... raising up a number by mindless repetitive action... it's just a number! There's not any *real* skill backing it up... just the skill in clicking the mouse.

That's why I hate the idea of these "real" economies in MMOG's... real economics isnt fun... making money in RL is called having a job. I dont want to do that in a game, that's the whole point of playing a game.

So you have this trend lately of these devs who played EQ and went "Oh my god look at the horrible economy! I must design a better game!" and come up with utter crap like SWG, filled with tedious timesinks that make even the old EQ devs jealous. Only they're renamed, now it's tradeskills, and item decay, and marketing your wares in a "real" fake economy, to other fake players who can give you fake money so that you can buy other people's fake goods...

Well, some people are just weird, I guess. Some people get off on the stupid time wasting of corpse recovery in GoD... different strokes... but you cant make a successful MMOG game if it's not intended to be Massively appealing.

Wow, this turned into a full out brawl overnight.

Aly, I have a serious question for you. How many hours would you say you played in those 4 months? I can play an hour a week for 4 months with any item decay system and see no impact on my armor. Im not saying thats what you did, just trying to show time does make a huge difference.

I played quite frequently. Generally four or five evenings a week for about four hours at a time. And if I didn't have anything scheduled on the weekends, I'd play all day once I got done cleaning up things around the house. Granted, some of that time was spent dancing in the cantina, but being a stormtrooper and living up to the part, I took part in several raids against Anchorhead and defended Bestine from rebel incursions quite often. I also enjoyed just exploring the game and that often got me into tight spots out in the boonies. Usually earning my a trip back to the nearest cloning facility.

This is one thing I have noticed about people who claim to like item decay systems - it is ok as long as no items they own ever actually decay.

I was pointing out the fact that the decay system was a gradual process and not something that happens overnight all the time like some people have insinuated. There are a variety of factors that kept the item decay from happening quickly. One of the factors was that I carried three different types of pistols and a couple rifles. I also had a big stick I carried around when I got bored with shooting. The stick also looked cool when used as part of a dance routine in the cantina. ^.^

Such a slow rate of decay cannot possibly serve the purpose of removing items from the game's economy, a purpose frequently vaunted by those favoring a decay system.

Stormtrooper armor is an extreme example. Most armor only has a durability of 10,000 or so. Some a lot less. The reason I used stormtrooper armor as an example, is that it's a long endeavor to aquire a full set. Roughly 45,000 faction points. And on a good mission, you can get about 250 faction points. It took me two weeks to get a full set of storm trooper armor. Instead of making the armor easier to get, they just made it last longer. Hence the 45,000 durability of it.

Player made armor is much easier to aquire and decays faster. However, it's still not going to decay overnight. It only decays as fast as you punish it in combat.

If items take that long to decay, and can be repaired with minimal cost, what's the point? It's just an unnecessary burden in the back of players' minds, trying to anticipate when they'll need to spend time repairing or replacing gear. And hope that doesn't happen when they don't have any extra time to spend.

Any player with half a brain or a drop of common sense should know better than to never check the condition of their armor and weapons. Once a week or so, just check the numbers and if they're starting to look bad, make plans to replace them soon or go ahead and purchase a second set of gear to have ready.

It's not like the devs suddenly decided to add in item decay into the game overnight. The players know about it and should keep that in mind. You people keep looking at these games from a lame power gaming point of view. I look at them from the roleplayer's point of view. It makes the games much more fun.

There's not any *real* skill backing it up... just the skill in clicking the mouse.

That's going to change in EQ2. Tradeskills aren't going to be just something you click a button and make an item. They're going to be like mini-games, where you have to make sure the temperature is right, the tempering is done correctly, and more. It's not going to be just a mindless clickfest like it used to be.

Some people enjoy tradeskills. Others enjoy playing a merchant in the bazaar. It's what they enjoy. Without item decay and good player crafted gear, those people are limited in their options. If I enjoyed making stuff, but hated selling it, I'd set up a partnership with someone that did enjoy the trading/selling aspect of the game.

ost of this stuff make a helluva lot more sense if you just forget about your ill-conceived perceptions and look at them with a fresh point of view. Especially from a characters role. Aren't these games supposed to provide an escape from reality? Yet it seems like you just want glorified 3D world chat rooms with boring, mindless, repetititive tasks to perform.

... but you cant make a successful MMOG game if it's not intended to be Massively appealing.

And that's why I think they should just scrap the bull**** MMOG template and go with a focused game that is targeted at a specific audience. Like Shadowbane was. It aimed to be the best damn city siege/pvp game out there. And it mostly is. I'd love to watch some of the full scale city raids and sieges, but that kind of game attracts all the griefers. Guess that's what's wrong with all these games out there. All the other damn people in them. ^.^

Yawn Yawn Yawn

Aly: But but but Item Decay will rock. Anyone who disagrees with me is ______
((fill in the blank with a negative word of your choice, ill informed, uneducated, stupid, wrong etc))

95%+ Replies: We don't like or want Item Decay and will not play a game for enjoyment with something thats causes us such negative feelings.

Reality: Wait and see what will happen. Everyones own taste will dictate whether they purchase EQ2 or not. Unless of course Aly is volunteering to buy everyone a copy to proove her point.

Prediction Personal Point of View: Not planing on buying EQ2. Big part of the reason is item decay.

As for the "realistic" economy crap.
No-Drop is such a waste of resources. I'm sitting on over a million pp right now and absolutely nothing to spend it on. And thats with 4 chars to choose from to spend it on.

I've thought about offering Luclin Level Guilds Ssra/VT guilds like 250k for "loot rights"
for a variety of pieces of interest. Figuring the temptation may be there to turn that 250k into say ornate bp or coffin fund or whatever.

I wish they would implement a way to trade No-Drop Gear to someone else for even a Large Charge. Say a Merchant would make the trade as a middleman for a nominal 10 to 50k fee.

I'd love to be able to see guilds pass down more gear.

Aly, you need to understand that there is a difference between what works for a book or a pen and paper roleplaying game and what will work in a computer game.

A book is written by the author and everything (or most) that happens will happen for a reason. If descriptions are given of the hero taking baths, then this is likely to be because the author has decided to make the villain surprise the hero in the bath as part of the plot. Such a plot device may work very well for a particular book. This should not be extended to mean that descriptions of bathing should be an integral part of every fantasy book.

The same will apply to brushing teeth, getting dressed, going to the lavatory, combing hair, etc. In the right places these can be effective plot devices, or simply used to add atmosphere but regular use of these will be extremely dull for the reader.

These work in a book because the author can only include specific and necessary examples in the book without them looking out of place, and without needlessly slowing the action. A computer game has no such means of choosing where and when to make characters brush their teeth. If it is all the time it is extremely boring, if it happens only when an ambush is to occur it will be extremely obvious. If it happens randomly but rarely to cover the occasional surprise it will just seem rather odd.

In a similar way, in a pen and paper game there are many ways I can roleplay. If entering a tavern I can open the door normally, try to sidle in, kick the door down, smash the windows in, climb down the chimney, slip around to the back entrance, or come up through the wine cellar. A real live GM can cope with all of these possibilities and decide what effect they will cause. No computer game can cover all of these possibilities – I can simply open the door and walk in.

The main reason I dislike roleplaying in computer games is not because of a particular hatred of roleplaying – if I can really immerse myself in it then it is very enjoyable. Unfortunately computer games are a peculiar half breed in that I can attempt to talk in a roleplaying manner with other players, but NPC’s will be oblivious to my attempts and will destroy the illusion. I also can’t roleplay effectively with any means other than talking. To an extent I can change how I appear and what weapon I use, but it has little effect.

I think I would enjoy a proper computer roleplaying game, but the technology simply isn’t there to do it to my satisfaction. And it isn’t even nearly there – 50 years from now it is unlikely to be good enough for my tastes (and I’ll either be dead or too old to play by then!).

Finally what one person enjoys may not be the same as what someone else enjoys, no matter how many times you tell them they haven’t understood you.

Again, you keep looking at it from your greedy and lazy point of view. The point of a game is to have fun. The point of a role playing game is to have fun playing a role in that game. It just so happens that in EQ, that role was supposed to be a fantasy hero or heroine. You could also play the role of a tradeskiller. If item decay was in EQ, tradeskillers would have even more reasons to play their role. In character. Not just as Autumn10 playing goober_druid1337.

Immersion is being able to play your role as full as it can be played. You want a glorified chat room with pretty colors, go play There, or the game Cloudien plays, Second Life. EQ was supposed to be a ROLE playing game but people like you turned it into a lame chat room with pretty colors and things to kill.

I have tried playing on FV as well. It didn't work there either. Idiot uber goobers saw the no drop tag was removed and flocked to the server. I got told to shut up one day by two people in my group because I was roleplaying. I say add even more tedium to the game if it gets rid of people like that.

Also, people enjoy changing the oil in their car. I know my grandpa loved just tooling around the garage fiddling with this or that on the car. Those are the kind of people you will find in a game with tradeskills. Item decay is what allows them to be sucessful. It's not like every single person in the game would have to learn how to be a blacksmith to fix their armor. They could go to a guild smith or a friend and pay them to fix it. It gives them something to do that they enjoy doing, stimulates the economy, and creates new oppurtunities for roleplaying.

I'd remove zonewide communication as well. To stop the /auc crap I see in PoK all the time. I'd create in game means of advertising smithing/tailoring/enchanting whatever kind of services. Players would be able to set up shops (similar to bazaar), people would have to rely on word of mouth and reputation to maintain their business. Markets would be interspersed throughout the lands in different cities. There wouldn't be just one central bazaar with a lame search function.

Again, some people enjoy the "tedium" of crafting. Why should game designers neglect making the game fun for them too?

If you're looking for that level of immersion then you need help.

Even I have my limits. I just want to see a game that promotes roleplaying instead of loot whoring. I'm tired of seeing the petty arguments over loot. I'm tired of seeing the lame debates over KS'ing, training, ninja-looting, cockblocking. I'm tired of that kind of game. I want to see a game where people actually roleplay and there are reasons in game to do it.

I bet you're the kind of person that would push a button if it gave you a +100 mana augment every time. No challenge, no work. Just push a button. And you'd be happy about it. Cause isn't grinding XP/levels/AA tedious? Isn't raiding the same mob, doing the same event, over and over, tedious? Seems to me you're advocating the 'push a button-get phat lewtz' route. After all, leveling is a tedious chore. So let's get rid of it. :rolleye:

I'm more of a roleplayer myself and I don't like it.

You're just blind to the opportunities it provides for roleplaying.

These work in a book because the author can only include specific and necessary examples in the book without them looking out of place, and without needlessly slowing the action. A computer game has no such means of choosing where and when to make characters brush their teeth. If it is all the time it is extremely boring, if it happens only when an ambush is to occur it will be extremely obvious. If it happens randomly but rarely to cover the occasional surprise it will just seem rather odd.

Personal Hygiene could be something that just happens every now and then. Doesn't have to be fully done, step-by-step, in game. Just go to the nearest bath-house and click the water or something. And it plays a short little cutscene (ala FFXI) and you exit the bath-house. Out in the wilds you could use a kit or something and a pool of water, stream etc.

Doesn't take long, and if you're not careful, someone or a monster could sneak up on you. If it's another player, to be more precise, another role player, it provides an oppurtunity for player ot player interaction, in character. If you don't bathe... after awhile, you start to smell and the game emotes this automatically. NPC's could react to it with simple emotes, npc merchants might charge higher prices. Little things that make the game seem more dynamic and immersive.

I can imagine some people that like roleplaying barbarians never, EVER bathing. Other roleplayers, upon receiving the emote, could react appropriately. Holding their nose, etc. I imagine people would have fun roleplaying that out. It's just a lot of little things I would add to games to promote roleplaying.

Item decay is one of those things. It also has other benefits to the economy in addition to more roleplaying oppurtunities.

I also can’t roleplay effectively with any means other than talking.

/em is a wonderful command for roleplaying. I use it all the time. People usually remember me for the way I act, not for my real-life/ooc rambling.

What type of item removal system would you like to see in new MMORPG in order to help keep an economy in balance?My personal preference is none at all. I don't find it "fun" to have to tradeskill or pay hard earned game money to repair. Seeking out another player with a skill is next to impossible most times after the initial "fun" wears off, and when you gain levels it merely becomes an inconvenience... like a persistent itch that won't go away.

BUT, if it is something that a developer feels is important to the game and is going to happen despite player input, let items degrade but do NOT make items disappear. Just make them less effective or ineffective, but repairable. Make NPCs that can repair and post them in easily accessible areas throughout the game. Base repair cost on level of character, not item. Perhaps even make items undropable unless they are fully repaired so that twinking costs a little more if twinking is possible in the game.

/shrug That's MY opinion on the question that started the thread. It's not something I feel is worth fighting over for a game that isn't even created and I don't even play. :p

On another note: I would never support item decay in EQ. I have no intentions of playing EQ2 so....

Seeking out another player with a skill is next to impossible most times after the initial "fun" wears off

I think there are plenty of people that would thoroughly enjoy a tradeskill based class. SWG and the Den Mother's site (EQTraders?) are proof of that. They wouldn't be that hard to find. If they were, they wouldn't get any new business.

For me the final proof (as if any was needed) that Aly is out of touch with reality is that I find myself agreeing with Autumn!

They're trying to take the tedium OUT of the game.

I'd rather have the tedium in the game, so long as it was somewhat fun. Especially tedium that promotes roleplaying.

edit:

Out of touch with reality? Give me a break. I just want a game that's fun to play, immersive, and populated with roleplayers. Not greedy, loot whoring, idiots only concerned with their personal gain and welfare. If it takes tedious things like tradeskills and item decay to get rid of those people, I'm all for it. I'll happily click a little pool of water somewhere so my character doesn't stink.

I'll happily roleplay out any encounters that might come about because of that. I'll happily roleplay bartering with a smith to repair my weapons and armor. I don't enjoy doing tradeskills myself, but I do know there are people that enjoy them. I have enough common sense to keep track of my own gear that I would happily pay some coin every now and then to get it repaired or just buy a new set. And I'd happily roleplay a weapon breaking if I ever was so scatterbrained as to not pay attention to the condition of the weapon.

I'll happily do all of those things if it gets rid of the greedy, lazy whiners that have no interest in being part of the story of the game instead of treating it like a chat room.

I'm sick of that. EQ should not be a chat room with pretty colors and graphics. It was supposed to be a ROLE playing game. Again, if it takes things like item decay and bathing to put the ROLE back into the game. I'm all for it. I know it won't work for EQ consindering the path it's followed, but new games can be designed with those concepts in mind.

To summarize, I want a role playing game. Not an AOL chat room filled with greedy kids.

Huzzah Autumn; Boo Hiss Aly!!!

Aly's leaving - she doesn't like us, oh dear! She's leaving for EQII (or maybe returning to SWG) and us lazy, whining, greedy people won't have her to annoy anymore; oh what will we do?

Oh why, why, why did she leave her beloved SWG with it's wonderful item decay? She must have decided we need to be enlightened; we think we're having fun but in reality we don't really know what we like.

That's it she is here for our good - we must eat our broccoli and move to a game with item decay - that is the way to true happiness.
:moon:

Wow... another catfight thread. Guess I should have read what was posted before I posted to the initial question.

Plenty of different tradeskills can benefit from item decay. It's obvious to me you only know what you want out of the game and nothing about the design aspect. I've spent years playing D&D and building worlds for various campaigns. Spell components, armor upkeep, little things like that, I have used in my campaigns. I never had any complaints from my players. Nothing like the mewling you're doing over item decay.

Food doesn't wear out, you're right. It does get eaten. It leaves the game. That's a form of item decay. Nice of you to choose an example that already has item decay built into it. Would you rather the Misty Thicket Picnic Baskets never get eaten? That'd make Yogi and BooBoo quite happy, I'm sure.

Tailoring would benefit from item decay, so would smithing, pottery. Alchemy/Poison Making already has item decay built in, or do you think potions should have unlimited charges as well? Smiths would need to replace their hammers, tailors would need new needles, a tanner would buy pelts, plenty of little things to stimulate a health economy and provide day to day in character interaction aside from "INCOMING! %T is hot on my tail!" or "CHEAL INC TO: %T".

I hate groups where the only interaction is hotkeys. And it's damned awkward when you're the only one talking.

edit:
Oh why, why, why did she leave her beloved SWG with it's wonderful item decay? She must have decided we need to be enlightened; we think we're having fun but in reality we don't really know what we like.

Because I got bored with the setting. I prefer medieval fantasy over sci-fi. I'm not saying you don't know what you like, I'm saying you don't know what you don't like. Especially if you're that boneheaded, you're going to not play a game just because it has some form of item decay int. Guess you should quit playing EQ. Food and Potions and Poisons are a form of item decay. Anyway, Autumn is back on ignore. I'm tired of his short sightedness. Hope all of you put me on ignore too. Then I can feel like I'm talking to myself again, just like in my groups in EQ. 8p

Yes, Aly I'll put you on ignore so you can go back to "playing with yourself."

EQ was supposed to be a ROLE playing game but people like you turned it into a lame chat room with pretty colors and things to kill.

I beg to differ. Any multiplayer online game will be designed first and foremost as a chat medium; everything else is decoration to entertain and occupy players. Just because EQ's theme is fantasy you're incorrectly assuming that it was intended to roleplayed in the traditional manner of pen&paper games.

Therein lies the reason you find yourself in opposition with most folks here when you try to insist that EQ is a roleplaying game. In this genre of software, "RPG" simply means the players control avitars which vary in appearance and attributes. Somehow, Aly, you've arrived at this notion that if the game says "RPG" it is designed to be roleplayed.

I enjoyed playing D&D for years, yet even among our small group of 5-7 regular players -- all with similar social background, age, education, and game knowledge -- we had different ideas about roleplaying, and while playing, took differing approaches and degrees of committment to the roles of our characters. And btw, throughout those years, not once did we play an entire session without occasionally chatting about stuff that was totally unrelated to the game or current adventure.

I can't see how you'd expect thousands of players -- most strangers to each other with a wide variety of ages and backgrounds -- to all come together online and achieve some universal agreement about how (and to what extent) their characters should be roleplayed ... especially in an online setting where the world around them is dictated by a pre-written set of codes, none of which can accomodate more than two or three possible choices.

I got told to shut up one day by two people in my group because I was roleplaying. I say add even more tedium to the game if it gets rid of people like that.

That doesn't surprise me. You expect everyone around you to play the game exactly like you play it, and it seems you take a very condescending attitude with anyone who doesn't. Perhaps if you expanded your own definition of roleplaying beyond the mechanics of what a role is 'supposed' to say/do; perhaps if you tried to be more adaptive to other people's ideas from situation to situation; perhaps if you didn't try to dictate how others played their roles .... maybe, just maybe, you'd find them more receptive to your ideas, you'd have more fun, and those around you would too.

I can imagine some people that like roleplaying barbarians never, EVER bathing. Other roleplayers, upon receiving the emote, could react appropriately. Holding their nose, etc. I imagine people would have fun roleplaying that out.

I imagine people might have fun roleplaying that out .... once or twice. However, being forced to roleplay the same scenario repeatedly, even if you think of a dozen ways to roleplay it, eventually becomes tedium. Thereafter, most people skip it and move onto something else. But in *your* vision of a roleplaying world, they'd have to continue roleplaying such a situation over and over, when it has long since ceased to carry any entertainment value whatsoever.

You'd be wise to get it through your head that for the vast majority of gamers, even for the most diehard roleplayers, performing mundane chores in a virtual setting is only "immersive" the first time or two. Most folks can, and do, choose to allow those mundane chores to be an understood factor -- i.e. to happen in the background without consciously and physically acting out each of the steps.

Heck, even in the real world, most people aren't thinking about the mechanics of a routine activity such as taking a bath; they're not telling themselves, "okay now turn on the water, now step in the shower, now pick up a washcloth, etc" ... they just do it, and all the while, are thinking about other things.

You set yourself up for disappointment if you expect that everyone will find as much enjoyment as you do from being forced into performing tedious tasks. To most roleplayers and non-roleplayers alike, such things detract from the time they can spend engaging in more productive and fun activities- whether it be questing or raiding or trading in bazaar or just chatting with friends and guildies. Having fun is, after all, why they're playing a game.

~Firemynd

I can't see how you'd expect thousands of players -- most strangers to each other with a wide variety of ages and backgrounds -- to all come together online and achieve some universal agreement about how (and to what extent) their characters should be roleplayed ...

It's not that hard to roleplay your character in EQ and I'm not telling people how to roleplay their characters personality. Use of emotes and general knowledge of the history and lore of Norrath, et al., easilly allows anyone with half a brain to know how most people would react in certain situations.

For example, my shadowknight on FV absolutely hates anything to do with Mistmoore and sets aside her hatred of even the high elves, if it means she can further her goals against the abominations of Mistmoore. Doesn't mean she has to like the pasty skinned high falootin elves, but she will put up with them. They often have to deal with her hateful nature and snide remarks, but most either ignore me or play a long a little.

Others tell me to shut up. Yet I don't tell them to shut up when they ramble on and on ooc. Who's more tolerant there?

Therein lies the reason you find yourself in opposition with most folks here when you try to insist that EQ is a roleplaying game. In this genre of software, "RPG" simply means the players control avitars which vary in appearance and attributes. Somehow, Aly, you've arrived at this notion that if the game says "RPG" it is designed to be roleplayed.

It was designed to be roleplayed... otherwise they just would've called it an adventure game or just a plain game. However, they chose to market it as a ROLE playing game. Unfortunately gooberheads took the role out of the game and turned it into a chat room.

I imagine people might have fun roleplaying that out .... once or twice. However, being forced to roleplay the same scenario repeatedly, even if you think of a dozen ways to roleplay it, eventually becomes tedium.

If you group with the same people, day in, day out, yeah... you'll just accept it as fact that soandso stinks. And always will stink so you stop mentioning it. Think of what would happen if suddenly one day they were clean and not stinky. More RP. Do I really have to go through and detail and list every single aspect of how something can be used to futher roleplaying? Are you people that unimaginative?

Heck, even in the real world, most people aren't thinking about the mechanics of a routine activity such as taking a bath; they're not telling themselves, "okay now turn on the water, now step in the shower, now pick up a washcloth, etc" ... they just do it, and all the while, are thinking about other things.

I never said you would have to do each little step. Go re-read what I posted. You go into a bathhouse, pay a small fee, click something and it plays a short cutscene (ala FFXI style). Your character doesn't stink anymore. The NPC's don't charge you more. They treat you with better respect. And it's just one click every now and then. Not a daily requirement.

That doesn't surprise me. You expect everyone around you to play the game exactly like you play it, and it seems you take a very condescending attitude with anyone who doesn't.

I was roleplaying. And got told to shut up. And you defend them for telling me to shut up? I never did anything to them, except roleplay, by speaking in character, and using emotes. I didn't even step ooc after they told me to shut up, even though it was quite obvious they were not being in character at all. And this was on the RP preferred server.

I wasn't expecting them to jump in with both feet and RP with me... but I did not expect them to blatantly tell me to shut up. That was just plain rude.

I was roleplaying. And got told to shut up. And you defend them for telling me to shut up? I never did anything to them, except roleplay, by speaking in character, and using emotes.

If you choose to roleplay an *******, don't be surprised when you're treated like one. Then you have the nerve to say they're not being tolerant. Hmm... maybe they're roleplaying characters who don't tolerate *******s very well?

It was designed to be roleplayed... otherwise they just would've called it an adventure game or just a plain game. However, they chose to market it as a ROLE playing game. Unfortunately gooberheads took the role out of the game and turned it into a chat room.

I already explained to you why games can be classified as RPGs without necessarily being intended for traditional roleplaying. You're trying to assert your own definitions over the categorization standards used by the game software industry.

Insulting people who don't agree isn't the only thing holding you back in this discussion. You are clearly incapable of debating a topic unless everyone else allows you to rewrite established conventions so your arguments can make sense. That just isn't going to happen.

~Firemynd

Then you have the nerve to say they're not being tolerant. Hmm... maybe they're roleplaying characters who don't tolerate *******s very well?

I was not roleplaying a bunch of asterisks. I was roleplaying a dark elf shadowknight who hated the abominations in Mistmoore so much that she would set aside her differences with even high elves, if it meant she could put an end to the abominations. All I was doing was roleplaying out the choice of an adventure for LDoN using phrases like, "It matters not to me what task we accept from the Wayfarer's, so long as my hungry blade finds the flesh of the abominations of Mistmoore this night."

One of the other people in the group played along with me as well. We were having fun roleplaying and then the two greedy loot whoring stat mongers told me to shut up. And you're defending that kind of person? I am so glad you're not on either server I play on.

You are clearly incapable of debating a topic unless everyone else allows you to rewrite established conventions so your arguments can make sense.

Excuse me for believing in simplicity and established genre from years past. Lesse... RPG = Role playing game. You're playing a role, in a game. In EverQuest, that role just happened to be one of many classes of different races... a member of society in Norrath. Not some greedy loot whore who's only concern is bigger numbers. I don't remember seeing that as a class/race combo when I made a character last.

As for what a role playing game is,a simple search in a browser turned up a ton of sites that:

http://web.ask.com/web?q=+What+is+a+role+playing+game%3F&o=0&qsrc=0&askbutton.x=0&askbutton.y=0

Something that caught my interest from one of the sites, and something that I believe most roleplayers would agree with is this:

"Role playing, in essence, is putting yourself in someone else's place, and reacting to situations the way you think that person would react."

You're not roleplaying when all you care about is what loot you get and how big your numbers are. You're trying to take an RPG and make it into an action/adventure game. That is the big difference between your definition and what is accepted elsewhere. You're the one who's wrong here Fire. Not me. RPG = Roleplaying Game. EQ Today = Action/Adventure.

ps: That quote came from this website: http://tm.wc.ask.com/r?t=c&s=a&id=30780&sv=za5cb0dda&uid=23fbdd1e83fbdd1e8&sid=33fbdd1e83fbdd1e8&p=%2flinks&o=0&u=http://www.microtactix.com/whatrpg.htm

However, the background there is a hideous yellow with black text and black lineart d6's on it. Very hard to read.

The ecomony of EQ is interesting because there is this store of "wealth" and very little of the wealth is consumed. Wealth can be thought of as XP, AA, Equipment, plat and anything that is considered valuable to a vendor or player which may include secluded farm camps.

So to compensate for this increasing wealth you see equipment becoming obselete with each expansion, plat values for valuable items go up, progressively more plat comes into the game as players are more efficiently able to farm the plat, items that are droppable/farmable/trade-skillable become cheap minimum standards for players unable to obtain them.

I guess the question is.. Is this good or bad?

There are some consquences for following EQ's path. The first consequence is needing players to gain levels to go along with their new equipment. The level gain has to have the perception of that charater(translated to the person) becoming powerful. I think this is the core of every game is the feeling that a charater becomes more powerful and that gives enjoyment. However, the original eq had severe penalties for failure. These were CR time sinks, loss of xp, loss of a corps(rarely), and loss of regeants because of rebuffing. All of these prevented farming and kept the overall store of "wealth" down.

Unfortunatly, EQ seemed to have a net gain of "wealth". This brought on a high number of high end charaters, relatively expensive prices for desirable droppable items, charaters with "uber" items that were common from one player of that class to the next, and growing bank accounts of the top end players that are able to farm plat/items they want.

So how does a game keep a constant net gain of wealth, remain interesting and discourage farming lower level items? That is the 10kp question!

I think there are a variety of approaches that could be used. I want to mention some that I can think of but other ideas may be just as good to address the above question. The approaches that I can think of include: Potions required for an event which will yield a desireable item, item decay, money sinks such as NPC's which grant a rez, stiff xp loss for dying, random loss of an aa for dying, loss of an item apon death(weapons would be excluded or this would be reflected in decay points and repairable), make a buffs benefits porportional to the reagent you use when casting(a dot for normal buff, ruby for 10X better buff), make droppable items/no drop items part of a recipe to make a better item/weapon that is trade skilled, and remove no drop status on old uber items but add level restriction and make part of a trade skill recipe.

I am not saying that mudflation is bad. Mudflation gives a player a sense of accomplishment for overcomming difficult tasks. What needs to be addressed in EQ is the accumlation of wealth by farmers and "uber" players. Farmers, in particular, sell plat or items with little or no in-game cost. This makes obtaining items by new players much more difficult due to overcrowding at certain cherry camp spots. This may be an error in design or scope as much as apparent greed.

Now, take Shadowbane's game concept. If I remember correctly, when you die, you lose pretty much everything but banked items and 2 soulbound items. In addition, seiging cities takes organization and lots of cash. This may be a brutal opposite to EQ. The contrast is apparent but would the typical player want to level up just to be killed again? or to camp items that they will lose due to lag or being jumped by a gang of players? I have not followed the game since it started but I would like to hear others comments on this point.

This is too amusing.

...

Four points before you guys waste anymore bandwidth.

1.) Chill
2.) Everyone is entitled to there opinion even if it clashes with yours.
3.) If you don't agree.. argue the points.. and quit the name calling and personal attacks.
4.) Next person who name calls - or personal attacks someone in this thread - link it to me in email at admin@thedruidsgrove.org and the person who broke this rule will get a nice 5 day ban to "Chill out".

Fair Warning has been made and the line starts after my post hits! ;)

Be Well,

After a bit of thought I'll suggest an alternative to "item rot" for people to ignore or laugh at as usual. I know you like having fun that way ;).

y suggestion is for most items in my new hypothetical game to start life saleable. They wouldn't have their full bonuses straight away however. Players could improve the items by 'soulbinding' them with simple spells or taking them to a temple, doesn't really matter how. The item would then be permanently no drop and fully 'activated'. Soulbinding would take an item from being a high quality non-magic item to being a magical item with the equivalent of EQ effects, procs, and stat gains.

As an example a looted sword might start as a non-magic 40/40 saleable item, but turn into a 42/40 STR10 STA10 with fire effect no drop sword after being soulbound. As a consistent idea in a new game world it's a simple and easy concept. You could also add in other ideas like level restrictions on soulbinding. If you wanted to be fancy then different effects can be activated on an item depending on your class, race, religion, or how you soulbind the items.

Anyway this would maintain a player economy in raw items discovered but unactivated, which I expect players would like. Anything soulbound would be with players permanently until they decide themselves to destroy it when it's obsolete. I can't see this is a problem as it seems to work ok in EQ with ornate armour. If high end money reserves are a problem then make soulbinding cost a lot of money at high levels. Soulbinding would certainly remove saleable items from all levels of the game, and if the best items are rarely on sale then hopefully players will just go hunt/quest it for themselves (my new hypothetical game prevents monopolizing items btw, erm somehow).

Any thoughts?

Wow never expected this much to develop from a simple opinon poll.
Thanks for your input guys will take it in to consideration(as if you have any clue WTF i'm talking about atm)

Wow never expected this much to develop from a simple opinon poll.

It's what happens when I forget to leave Autumn on ignore. ^.^

"I'll happily do all of those things if it gets rid of the greedy, lazy whiners that have no interest in being part of the story of the game instead of treating it like a chat room."

It wont. Plain and simple you can never get rid of them ever. Ya know I talked to a couple of my friends who play galaxies just today, and one of them was trying to explain why macroing wasnt a bad thing. Apparently he was working on gaining 40k exp so he could use a rocket launcher with his wookie, and just didnt feel like grinding out a day or 2 of experience. Oh yeah, item decay killed the people who will stop at nothing to be the best, or the loot whores as you call them. There will always be people who want to do nothing but get more more more. The greedy kids wont be stopped, especially if there are easy (notice not tedious or time consuming) ways to fix them. Seeking out one person to fix an item will not stop them. Hell if the item just up and breaks after so long no matter what it wont stop them. You would have to be very ignorant and uneducated to not see this.

No matter what you do, no matter how hard you try there will always always be lootwhores and those that dont like to roleplay. Unless you make it against the game rules to not roleplay and actually ban those that refuse to, you will get the lootwhores and power gamers. Happens everytime without fail, and I feel really sorry for you if you cant see this coming every time.

Ban 'em then. I bet a lot of roleplayers would join a game that actively focused on promoting a good atmosphere for roleplaying and was very upgront about banning people that continually acted out of character publicly. As for any arguments about what's IC or OOC, a set of guidelines published by the game company would be the guidelines for what is allowable and not allowable.

Ya know I talked to a couple of my friends who play galaxies just today, and one of them was trying to explain why macroing wasnt a bad thing. Apparently he was working on gaining 40k exp so he could use a rocket launcher with his wookie, and just didnt feel like grinding out a day or 2 of experience.

That's a flaw in the game design SWG used. Being able to write recursive macros in the game itself was a very bad game design. I enjoyed my time in SWG, just the sci-fi genre isn't my thing. I never used recursive macros overnight when I was dancing in the cantina. I had some 30 second macros so I could actually roleplay instead of push buttons all night. Which is what macros were intended for. They were not intended for overnight, unattended xp grinding.

I know item decay just by itself won't keep the uber goobers away, but it seems to have staved off a few them in EQ2, just judging by this thread. Good riddance. I still think they're being silly, but oh well. Hopefully there will be enough stuff in EQ2 that drives the uber goobers away that people won't get ridiculed for roleplaying.

You're playing a role, in a game. In EverQuest, that role just happened to be one of many classes of different races... a member of society in Norrath. Not some greedy loot whore who's only concern is bigger numbers.

Aly, it is wrong to make an assumption that just because someone doesn't agree with YOUR idea of roleplaying, that they're a loot whore. Why do you resort to this labelling and namecalling tactic whenever you feel your notions are threatened? Do you not have enough confidence in your own ideas to argue them on their own merits?

~Firemynd

I call it like I see it. Every day, I see it in PoK, I see it in my xp groups, I see it on raids. The only thing people are concerned about is getting that next phat lewt, that next AA, or spell. They whine about their class being broken or some other class being too powerful. It's disgusting. It's like being in a room full of toddlers with only one toy for each person, and they all want what the person next to them has.

I wish there was a better alternative to EQ out there. One that focused less on loot and gear, and more on story and roleplaying. There's not however. The game designers and developers are too chicken to take a chance on that kind of game. They're pushed by investors to make the most money possible. More greedy loot whores.

Item decay, forced in-character responsibilities, accessible content, lack of "uber gear", robust tradeskill system, and lack of statistical feedback would serve to drive a game's story forward, encourage roleplaying, and remove that lame competitiveness you see in the group of toddlers. It's a dream, but it'll never see reality because in the real world, again, the only thing investors care about is money. They could care less about the game itself so long as money keeps coming in.

*sighs* Someone cryo-freeze me and thaw me out when it's the future and we don't need money like in the Federation in Star Trek.

A game filled with run of the mill items or generic loot would be boring as hell. I'm trying to remember the game I played that had a generic RNG for loot, maybe the first Daggerfall? You would get silly garbage like "Box of Fireballs' or "Sword of Fireballs'. That's boring and not very creative. If you make a game that's entirely story driven without all the glitz and glamor of a normal fantasy game not only will it bore people to tears it won't appeal to many either, even most hardcore RPG'ers.


Autumn, you win points for persistence. But you have to realize that Aly, quite frankly, doesn't understand what makes a game commercially successful, and wears the thickest set of blinders I have ever seen. As is evident here, she simply ignores anything that does not conform to her view of virtual reality, or dismisses it by labeling anyone who disagrees with her as "ignorant," a "lootwhore," or something similar.

There have been designers of games who have had similar approaches in the past. They've all had to face reality and ameliorate their approach, or have lost their shirts. People will pay for and play something that is fun for them (and what is fun will vary from individual to individual). If it's not fun for them, they won't buy it or will stop paying for it.

I suspect that if Aly ever had the money to put her ideal game on the market, she'd still somehow blame its catastrophic commercial failure on the "lootwhores" and the "ignorant."

But you have to realize that Aly, quite frankly, doesn't understand what makes a game commercially successful, and wears the thickest set of blinders I have ever seen.

You're the one with the blinders Scirocco. You and every other loot mongering uber goober that is only concerned about loot and personal advancement via numbers. You refuse to see any of the good that can come about because of item decay. Just because your precious phat lewts might be taken away. You refuse to see any of the possibilities that could come about because of item decay, required in-character events, and more. Just because you want a pretty chat room with colors and things to see, kill, and loot.

Anyone can put together a game like EQ so long as they have the money and resources to back them up. It'll flop in the current market however. Too many MMOG's coming out and not enough gamers to fill them up. Wasn't there another post recently, about that very topic?

I predict that in years to come, MMOG's will stop being massive and instead they will take a focused outlook one what they want to do. Be it PVP (SB is already out for that and DAoC to some extent), roleplaying, powergaming, whatever. Instead of trying to cater to the whims of the majority, they'll choose one aspect they want to focus on and be the best damn game about that focus that they can be.

I couldn't care less what the masses want out of their game. They've already proven they'll mindlessly grind and grind and grind (as proven by EQ and SWG), over and over. I'm sick of that kind of game and I'm willing to bet there are plenty of other people out there that feel the same way. If I had the resources I would make the game I desire and wave the birdy at all the mindless zombies still grinding away for numbers while I have fun writing a story and being part of the story.

You can only read a book so many times, but an online ever changing world, where roleplaying is advocated and even enforced, would be the best novel out there. I love reading and writing, but it'd be a helluva lot more fun if you had other like minded people to do it with. People's greedy and selfish nature have proven that to be a false hope however. The average EQ gamer is proof of that. They're only concerned with themselves and gaining levels/loot in the end.

. People will pay for and play something that is fun for them (and what is fun will vary from individual to individual). If it's not fun for them, they won't buy it or will stop paying for it.

*laughs* I've heard in EQ plenty of times, even on this very message board, people just keep playing EQ because it's the only thing out there that interests them, even remotely. And that they're just playing it til the next best thing comes along. So they put up with the daily boring grind. I've also heard of people that continue to play EQ only because of the friends they've made. I'm one of those people.

I already know WoW is not going to be the game I desire either. Just looking at the forums for it... and knowing what the Battlenet ******s are like... there's no way there's going to be any meaningful roleplaying on a massive scale in that game. Small pockets, here and there, just like in EQ. Just like in SWG. DAoC, SB, etc. Now imagine if a game was made that catered to these roleplayers. And brought them all together in a single game.

I'm willing to bet it'd be successful. It'd require a strict set of rules and a variety of systems in place to make it work. Established guidelines for roleplaying. Private channels for ooc gibbering. A well designed player reputation system with safeguards in place to prevent griefing. Plenty of ways for the community to police itself as well. Design the game so that deleting an old character and starting a new one doesn't mean a long chore of grinding to lvl 65 and hundreds of AA just to have fun.

You're the blind one here Scirocco. EQ and it's level/loot grind have done that to you.

Aly, you are by far the most arrogant and ignorant person I have seen on these boards.. and that’s saying something…

Everyone has a right to express their views and tastes. In the post that opened this thread, you asked:

What type of item removal system would you like to see in new MMORPG in order to help keep an economy in balance?

And then proceeded to try to degrade anyone that didn’t agree with your VIEWS …not facts, hell not even truths.. just your opinion and views and how you think things should be…

Anyone saying that item decays sucks is just as valid as you saying it doesn’t

Until you learn that another persons opinion or taste is just as valid as yours, you should not be allowed to post on board that others have access to.. just a speacial “Aly’s board” where every post you make automatically generates a response saying “you are so right” and “where would we be without your insight”….

aybe when you learn the difference between an argument and a discussion… not nessicarily the dictionary definition, but the real world definition…… you will be allowed to interact with real people….

I think Aly's vision of a perfect on-line game is one where you have a human DM that will give rewards for RPing and acting their charater. Charaters would be moved or travel through instanced lands such as Norrath and mob densities/agro radius could be tuned to the level and the instanced circumstance. The environment would be personal and not a livestock yard that is PoK.

How close am I?

In the post that opened this thread, you asked:

What type of item removal system would you like to see in new MMORPG in order to help keep an economy in balance?

I can tell you didn't bother to read or comprehend any of the posts here. I wasn't the one that started this post. Nothing I have said is not true. People against item decay are just worried about losing their precious phat lewts. That's the basics, all boiled down. Loot. Greed. Laziness. They could care less about creating a story. And if it takes item decay to keep those kinds of people out of a real roleplaying game, not the facsimile that EQ is, I'm all for it.

I'm sick of the constant grind/loot mentality so prevalent in EQ. People like Scirocco, that are so adamant against item decay, just haven't given it a chance. They keep pointing to flawed systems and the fact they don't want to lose their precious lewt. They're as bad as Gollum and the One Ring. "On no, I have to go see a blacksmith and spend some gold to repair my item. It's going to take 10 minutes out of my day. Woe is me! The world is going to end! And I'll have to do it again in a month!"

That's the image I get when reading the bleating and whining about item decay. People crying about having to spend maybe 10 minutes once a month to repair their items. If you can't do that, or don't want to... you're lazy. There are similar time sinks (10 minutes once a month is really big timesink... :rolleye: ) in EQ. Clerics having to stop at a merchant and buy new dots. Necros having to farm bone chips for reagents. Everyone has to buy food. If you buy the best stuff, it lasts awhile, but you still have to go buy more. More often than once a month I'd say.

Yet... you still continue to play EQ despite that tedious task?

I wonder why that is.

Heh there is no need for speculation on what making stuff not nodrop would do to the economy. Simply head on over to the FV server and take a peek at our bazaar.

Things we do that don't happen on other servers.

buying and selling of LDON AP points.
Augs, charms for sale in the bazaar.
Elemental/VT/time/GOD gear for sale in the bazaar. (expensive but there none the less)

Borblefoot Furtoe
Storm Warden
Resolution
Firiona Vie Server

Sounds like FV goes the farthest towards a real economy of any EQ server.

Sounds like FV goes the farthest towards a real economy of any EQ server.

Yeah, but the price variance is ridiculous. Most likely exacerbated by the platinum dupe problems. I've seen some items selling for 800,000 platinum that sell for 150,000 on other servers. However other items sell for far less than their counterparts on other servers. If the economy had been kept stable without interference from people like Yantis, it'd be the truest economy in EQ. Just needs item decay. 8p

That's the basics, all boiled down. Loot. Greed. Laziness. They could care less about creating a story.

Item decay doesn't create a story. Therefore it is illogical to conclude that people are anti-storyline just because they're opposed to item decay.

In EQ, EQII, and most other games designed with their own lore and storylines, players aren't responsible for creating the story anyway. The only real choice is whether or not to read and follow the storylines given, and since people have widely varying tastes even within the fantasy genre, not everyone is going to find a storyline interesting enough to spend their time digesting it.

See, I accept the fact that only a small portion of the playing population will derive entertainment from any particular storyline. For a game to be successful, any good producer must accept this fact as well, and must ensure their game provides elements which can keep players occupied regardless of how much they like the story. Otherwise the game fails to make profit, it shuts down, and those who DO enjoy the story no longer have a story to enjoy.

I might not like some types of players in EQ, but I recognize that their subscription fees help to pay the bills to keep this game afloat.

That's the image I get when reading the bleating and whining about item decay. People crying about having to spend maybe 10 minutes once a month to repair their items. If you can't do that, or don't want to... you're lazy.

As you yourself pointed out, there are already 'chores' in the game which impose small amounts of non-productive time. What people here are saying, essentially, is that they wouldn't care for a game which imposes an even greater number of such chores.

How can you call people "lazy" because they don't want to WORK any more than they have to, in a GAME in which they're paying to have fun? That isn't lazy, it's common sense. I wouldn't go to a theater and pay to see a movie if I knew they were going to stop the film every half hour and ask me to spend a few minutes sweeping floors and cleaning the popcorn machine. That certainly wouldn't further the storyline, and in fact would be a constant interruption.

~Firemynd

Quit responding. You will get nothing from banging your head into a brick wall except a headache. Aly, dont give up. I am sure you will be right if you keep saying that you are.

In EQ, EQII, and most other games designed with their own lore and storylines, players aren't responsible for creating the story anyway.

Hrm, FFXI and Horizons have both done events that affected the storyline with players driving the events forward. They either do them, or they don't. I predict more and more games in the future will have such events.

That certainly wouldn't further the storyline, and in fact would be a constant interruption.

It would further your characters personal storyline however. That's the point I'm trying to drive home here. Little tasks that your character undertakes set the tone for what kind of game it is. Instead of far reaching, epic, quests which require a herd of wet cats to complete... are impersonal. I'd rather have tons of personal quests that are designed around specific character class/race combinations instead of generic quests with crappy rewards.

I'd love to see quests that don't take forever to complete, that are well written, and have a decent reward. It's the only way to start enticing people to think about their character's motivations... entice them to roleplay through the quest. Give them a reason to understand why their character would do that quest. Not just for the reward. That's the player's motivation. I'd design quests and tasks that drive character motivation.

That's the biggest problem most of you have. You ignore character motivation and instead focus only on gratifying yourself. When roleplaying on FV, I have ignored obvious and clear choices for instant self-gratification because it was not what my character would do. The sense of accomplishment I get for staying true to my character and the enjoyment of roleplaying with others is the only reward I need.

I'm tired of games looking at that aspect of a game as a minor annoyance. Design the game from the ground up to promote, entice, suggest roleplaying. Reward roleplaying instead of rewarding the person behind the character.

Again, if it takes tasks in game like item decay, force in character responsibilities, and such... add it in. It'll add a whole lot more incentive to roleplay and create a more immersive, dynamic, and rich enviroment conducive to playing to your characters chosen motivations, instead of relying on player motivations.

Aly I really think you need to take a step back.

Loosely speaking, EQ is a game designed about repeatable RPG content with player progress measured by xp, items, and in game friends. People who play EQ like that. Coming to a board full of EQ players and telling them that's rubbish is going to get only one reaction, and you've had pages and pages of it.

If you want an immersive RPG with lots of custom designed content then you really need to look elsewhere. Neverwinter nights might suit you as there are many amateur story creators making their own modules. However any professional supplier will be entirely unable to meet your aspirations for an endless supply of interesting, quick to complete, non-repeatable, wholy integrated, story driven content, with much of the content only seen by a fraction of the players as it's specific to class/race combinations. It takes a long time to write good stories and characters. Ask any novelist. Would you be satisfied in your online games with daytime TV style content which can be thrown together quick and cheap every day?

Getting back to the original post ... if someone has found that item rot is unenjoyable, then it's reasonable for them to see that as a minus point when comparing online games and deciding which to buy. It would be foolish for them not to.

As for responsibilities in game .... that's just a horrible thought. I play games to get away from real life responsibilties. Players having responsibilities to their guilds, like being needed at raid events, is one of the worst parts of EQ for some too. Players having responsibilities towards the items in their EQ backpacks would be the worst thing ever. If I wanted to be responsible I'd quit EQ tomorrow and stand for local goverment instead.

Good. I wouldn't want to game with you in a game designed that way. I'd want only people that enjoy that kind of in depth roleplaying. I really don't see anything wrong with NPC based in character responsibilities. It provides a base for roleplayers to build upon and expand.

Like I said before, I am willing to bet that in the near future, MMOG's won't be so massive. As technology advances and becomes cheaper, smaller companies will be able to create games focused on a specific style of gaming, be it PVP, RP, power game, or whatever. It's been proved to me here, that most EQ'ers wouldn't like the style of game I would. However, it's also proven to me you're all as stubborn as you claim that I am.

I have seen what it's like in your shoes and you all refuse to look at it from the other side. You refuse to see the benefits that item decay could bring to a game. You all are the ones wearing the blinders. That's why I argue so adamantly in it's favor. It does have benefits and you're just too blind to see it. EQ has proven to me repetition is the only way some people here will learn anything, so I continue to debate my point of view against your biased point of view.

Not one of you has acknowledged that any good can come about because of item decay, yet I've acknowledged there are drawbacks to it as well. Really now... who's wearing the blinders here?

"I have seen what it's like in your shoes and you all refuse to look at it from the other side."

Or perhaps we have, and we just still agree that its not worth it.

You make some good points in it all, but you keep trying to prove it the wrong way. You are going about things fairly badly Id say. Item decay, and virtual mundane tasks are not going to enhance an rpg setting, and they certaintly do not help build an rpg element to work with. At least in my 6-8 years of tabletop gaming I have not known that to be true. Given I am not a hardcore roleplayer, just a casual one, but I have never had any problems with myitems and armor never decaying affecting my ability to roleplaying abilities. You cited a great example yourself, FFXI. No item decay, and a great and optional story. perfect for those that like to roleplay and those that dont.

You are really the one with the blinders for not being able to see the flaws in making a game to real, and overestimating the benefits. For example your bathing idea, the ubers would only bathe when they were about to buy/sell or enter a town (which is usually for one of the first 2 reasons). I have another serious question for you, have you ever done serious tabletop gaming. If so then you know the power of min/maxers. Those are the lootwhores you speak of. There is nothing you can do about them.

Now I will admit, there are tolerable way to deal with all of them, I still feel that games are better off without them. But hey to each their own I suppose. You play your way, I play mine and all can be happy really.

PS: In galaxies I actually know someone who burned through an 800 endurance weapon in a little over a week. Overshot is crazy.

Or perhaps we have, and we just still agree that its not worth it....Item decay, and virtual mundane tasks are not going to enhance an rpg setting, and they certaintly do not help build an rpg element to work with.

No, no one has even acknowledged that there might be any benefits from item decay. You're the first that has even mentioned it at all. Again I ask, who is the one wearing the blinders? All Scirocco and Autumn can do is whine about how they'll have to spend their precious time doing something that's in character, instead of farming their precious phat lewt or grinding the almighty and holy xp.

All they do is whine and cry about how something is going to negatively effect them. They're as bad as the monks over at MB who're still crying about the monk nerf. They absoballylutely refuse to look past their own greed and selfish desires to look at the overall picture.

...If so then you know the power of min/maxers. Those are the lootwhores you speak of. There is nothing you can do about them.

Get rid of stats and numbers. No powergaming or loot whoring then. The computer handles all the calculations. Search my profile for previous posts of that sort as I've discussed it at length, and yet again, the same people whined and cried about the notion of a statless game because they wouldn't get their fix. They whined because they wouldn't get to see their numbers get bigger and better. And again, they ignored any benefits that might arise from such a game.

Just a quick count of names in this thread shows approximately 20% in favor of some form of item decay, either for RP reasons or a healthy economy. Let's assume that maybe just 5% of those people would quit EQ for a game that was designed to focus on RP, with a healthy economy, good tradeskills, and all the other successful trappings of a MMOG. Let's assume 5% of the people playing SWG, DAoC, SB, AO, even NWN, or other games quit playing those.

That's a sizeable playerbase and would likely be successful if the business aspect was ran efficiently. It'd be a smaller, more intimate playerbase, devs would have an easier time discussing aspects of the games with the players, and if RP was somewhat enforced and a player reputation system was developed, it'd weed out the bad loot whoring powergaming kids.

Scirocco keeps assuming I'd be designing a game for the mass market. Nope. I'd focus on the portion of the market that is looking for an immersive atmosphere conducive to roleplaying. Where people won't get told to shut up for being in character.