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instynctiveinstynctive Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,885 Arc User
I did quite a bit of playtesting for the Maze Engine mod while it was on preview... when I realized that the campaign progress was time-gated, I predicted that I would quickly lose interest in it.

While some might say that was a "self-fulfilling prophecy", my prediction came true.

What is available is.. "ok" ..but there is a lot of "go kill these" and "go kill these".. walk 20 yards and fight a mob. Another 20 yards and fight a mob.

Honestly, the design is crushingly uninspired. My over-geared GWF is plowing though all the content with zero difficulty, even though the devs upped the difficulty. The time-gate is, honestly, just lazy.

I guess I don't understand why it is so difficult for a team of full-time personnel to come up with a more "flowing" storyline with longer, more immersive quests. Instead of time-gating things, why not create a more D&D-inspired adventure? I .. yeah.. I just don't know.

Anyway.

I got nothing. :-(
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"...I grab my wiener and charge!" - ironzerg79

Comments

  • linaduinlinaduin Member Posts: 187 Arc User
    I guess it's a response to the Mod 8 experience that after 1.5 hours players had finished the quest-chain content. I've just started Maze Engine today (and didn't look on preview) so I'm taking a wild guess that the quest chain is about as long as the Mod 8 one but with time-gating between sets of chapters so they at least squeeze a few weeks out of it. If the initial daily quest (go kill two demons in Tower district - only one I've done so far) is any indication of what's to come then it's very uninspired. I think you can't get immersion from little dungeons/lairs cut up into pieces. And big open landscapes don't seem to be NW's thing (I mean one's you can't ride around in <5 minutes). NW's content is really just 'something to do to kill time while you refine'.
  • silverkeltsilverkelt Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 4,235 Arc User
    ya im not a fan of the time gate either.. reason being is I would rather plow through 8 quests when I have time then worry about when one is out..

    this is why IWD was great.. you could save all quests .. do them all when you had time , just do the 1 daily to progress .. then collect what you needed later.

    Dread ring same way more or less.

    The real issue is how they decide that 1 quest every 12 hours or something isnt just plain boring to wait for.. i just want to blow through this HAMSTER.. and hope they never release another campaign again..

    In fact I will start a NO more campaigns ever!

    we seriously do not need any more boons ever..

    I dont mind a story quest, rewarding a open gate to a DD or something(account wide!).. similar to other games.

    the chapter quests system (that again seen from other games as well.. is also better then what they had previously.

    But meh.. more boons =P ..

    no reason to keep throwing these at us..
  • eldeskaleldeskal Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 214 Arc User
    linaduin said:

    NW's content is really just 'something to do to kill time while you refine'.

    +1 for Concise summary of endgame

    That's what kills me. I played the old Neverwinter-Nights PC game, where they gave you a level builder that was spectacular (even if it did require a background in programming to use it)...I had such high hopes for the foundry. Unfortunately, the foundry is so neutered, you can only build the same type of "if it moves, kill it" quests that Cryptic turns out. If they'd give the tools, the foundry community would probably turn out enough content to fill the gaps between modules without needing time-gates. (and one of those tools needs to be the ability to have actual meaningful drops, even if that takes the form of 'foundry seals' or something else to farm)
  • instynctiveinstynctive Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,885 Arc User
    Agreed. A beefed-up Foundry with more controls in place to prevent exploits, and bring on substantial rewards (on par with other quests of similar levels, etc.)..

    Yeah. Foundry Authors could single-handedly make this game mindblowing.

    As opposed to mindnumbing.
    header.png
    "...I grab my wiener and charge!" - ironzerg79
  • l0th4ri0l0th4ri0 Member Posts: 589 Arc User

    Agreed. A beefed-up Foundry with more controls in place to prevent exploits, and bring on substantial rewards (on par with other quests of similar levels, etc.)..

    Yeah. Foundry Authors could single-handedly make this game mindblowing.

    As opposed to mindnumbing.

    The Foundry could have saved this game. But they went for the skinner-box progress-bar route instead (see: current "endgame") and cut the longevity of NWO by like 6 or 7 years. There could have been more paying customers to stick around instead of quitting after 50 bucks. And the intense irony of this is that in their dash to get big numbers every three months, they all but scuttled the one content stream that was practically free, and had hundreds of "producers" that didn't require health benefits or a living wage.

    Ah, hubris... you always get your man, don't you.

    I have this sense that someday someone will be making another MMO of some kind and stumble across the foundry concept here. "Hey! Remember that one game that came out in 2013 or whatever? Wasn't there some thing they bragged about where the players could make their own content? Why don't we do that instead of copying what phone games do?" Perhaps they might laugh at what happened with NWO as they successfully implement their own version of it.
  • joyousdecieverjoyousdeciever Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 127 Arc User

    Agreed. A beefed-up Foundry with more controls in place to prevent exploits, and bring on substantial rewards (on par with other quests of similar levels, etc.)..

    Yeah. Foundry Authors could single-handedly make this game mindblowing.

    As opposed to mindnumbing.



    ^^^^^^^^Yes

  • casey0267casey0267 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 46 Arc User
    even if all they did was give us the daily foundry quest from neverember (or make it come from someone else) it would give the players something to do other than the same stuff over and over and well you know lol
  • torontodavetorontodave Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 992 Arc User
    It's almost like Foundry Authors spent 2014 and 2015 asking for the very same things.

    Cryptic's response: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

    NW-DSQ39N5SJ - 'To Infinity, and BEYOND!' - Spelljammer Quest. Skyships, Indiana Jones moments
    NW-DC9R4J5EH - 'The Black Pearl' - Spelljammer! Phlo Riders and Space Orcs
    Thanks for all the fish.
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited March 2016

    I did quite a bit of playtesting for the Maze Engine mod while it was on preview... when I realized that the campaign progress was time-gated, I predicted that I would quickly lose interest in it.

    While some might say that was a "self-fulfilling prophecy", my prediction came true.

    What is available is.. "ok" ..but there is a lot of "go kill these" and "go kill these".. walk 20 yards and fight a mob. Another 20 yards and fight a mob.

    Honestly, the design is crushingly uninspired. My over-geared GWF is plowing though all the content with zero difficulty, even though the devs upped the difficulty. The time-gate is, honestly, just lazy.

    I guess I don't understand why it is so difficult for a team of full-time personnel to come up with a more "flowing" storyline with longer, more immersive quests. Instead of time-gating things, why not create a more D&D-inspired adventure? I .. yeah.. I just don't know.

    Anyway.

    I got nothing. :-(

    +1

    Cryptic could consult Wizards of the Coast if an advice is needed.

    Some basics:
    • Make healers needed. Currently self-healing is out of control.
    • Make rogues needed or able to bring their parties some bonus. Currently there is no deadly traps and locked doors/chests.
    • Make some contents in which players want to stick together and cooperate, not rush ahead and contest for dps. Disable the sparkling trail, which tells players "Go this way. Go!" and ruins immersion and exploration.
    • Secret doors, secret paths, puzzles, riddles, mysteries, etc.
    Post edited by ianthewizard2012 on
  • edited March 2016
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  • arabaturarabatur Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 778 Arc User
    I personally like spending more time going to and from the "event" than actually completing the "event", it makes my game experience so much more rewarding. My favourite is going to Icespire Peak, as there is nothing more satisfying as spending 2 minutes or so getting to the second area and then 10 seconds finishing it. The ride back is lovely to.

    Kudos to whoever fought/thought for and implemented this. The metrics must be awesome!
    Definitely not an Arc User.
  • l0th4ri0l0th4ri0 Member Posts: 589 Arc User


    Taking into account that no publisher wants to create a boring and broken game, I can only assume the problems are time, money and assets which are all far too few to maintain an MMO properly. Once a game stops doing major bug fixes on a frequent basis, you can be sure that the publisher is in trouble.

    I'm pretty sure NWO won't make it all the way through 2018, but I'd like to be proven wrong.

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  • sockmunkeysockmunkey Member Posts: 4,622 Arc User
    edited March 2016
    l0th4ri0 said:


    Taking into account that no publisher wants to create a boring and broken game, I can only assume the problems are time, money and assets which are all far too few to maintain an MMO properly. Once a game stops doing major bug fixes on a frequent basis, you can be sure that the publisher is in trouble.

    I'm pretty sure NWO won't make it all the way through 2018, but I'd like to be proven wrong.

    People said the same thing when Champions went into maintenance mode. It sat neglected for years while people expected death to come any day. It has yet to happen, in fact, the game has actually started to see new content and development again. So while its population might be small, it seems to be still generating enough income to still be worthy of continued development.

    Neverwinter is, still very much, a long way from that point. And Cryptic, despite its other problems, seems a place very unwilling to shut down any of its games.
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited March 2016
    (The following comment contains minor spoilers of the Maze Engine Campaign.)

    I just advanced in the Maze Engine Campaign, and found something worth mentioning. In two dialogues with NPCs, I was surprised to see that, in my list of response options, there were Ability Score checks and different attitudes. These new additions are in my opinion nice improvements as they make the game starts to have some elements we saw in good old games like Neverwinter Nights. Keep it up!
    Post edited by ianthewizard2012 on
  • darkstarcrashdarkstarcrash Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,382 Arc User
    I don't have a problem with the way the Maze Engine campaign was set up.

    Every other campaign is time-gated: although some make it easier to pile up daily quests and run once a week, there is still no way to finish the campaign faster than a set number of days (without using Zen boosts).

    Most campaigns give you 10-20 minutes of work to do daily, with no added storyline after the first day. With multiple characters, this leads to 1-2 hours daily per campaign.

    With the Maze Engine, you get interesting quests interspersed with super-fast dailies. So I staggered when my alts started the campaign, and I'm making regular progress on several characters without it taking a ton of time. 10 minutes when it's time for a chapter, and less than a minute other days (yay for VIP signpost to speed up travel one way).

    Add in great exp and other rewards, and I think this might be the best campaign yet.
  • khagaskhagas Member Posts: 1 Arc User
    > @ianthewizard2012 said:
    > (The following comment contains minor spoilers of the Maze Engine Campaign.)
    >
    > (Spoiler)

    Seeing that makes me happy at least but I do have to agree with the general consensus that the game seems uninspired and lacking... depth. Cryptic has the right idea but they need to decide what direction they want this game to go and fix the simple mistakes that have been made. For example, squishing monster camps so close together and then giving them *incredibly* fast respawn rates (as well as the inconsistent aggro ranges) is just bad decision making in an MMORPG. It practically screams poor design, as if it was hastily thrown together without given any real thought. If there had been an iota of effort these issues wouldn't even exist. I genuinely want to like this game but it desperately needs focus. It's so busy trying to do everything that it ends up really doing nothing well. As an experienced D&D player I have to say that there are *far* too many attributes and the item enhancement system is one of the most boring and unimaginative that I have ever seen. It's almost similar to the old City of Heroes style of "upgrades" where you just keep dropping higher level enhancements into slots, as if the dev team just couldn't be bothered to even come up with an actual upgrade system at all. I'm not sorry to say that it's not enjoyable "socketing" your items constantly and, quite frankly, doesn't make even the slightest bit of sense from a D&D standpoint. Simply relocating mob camps, increasing respawn timers, and a new (and interesting) system for upgrading equipment would be such a massive improvement on it's own. It feels rushed and sloppy for the considerable potential it has and that is so incredibly frustrating.
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  • plasticbatplasticbat Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 12,435 Arc User
    For these daily, the longest time spend is travelling. Sometime, I may not even have a chance to hit the foe before it is cleaned by others.
    I think this excessive travelling is a tactic to get people to buy VIP. For me, one trip of travelling is already painfully long. Non VIPers need to do a round trip.
    *** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
  • c1k4ml3kc3c1k4ml3kc3 Member Posts: 1,257 Arc User
    edited March 2016

    I did quite a bit of playtesting for the Maze Engine mod while it was on preview... when I realized that the campaign progress was time-gated, I predicted that I would quickly lose interest in it.

    While some might say that was a "self-fulfilling prophecy", my prediction came true.

    What is available is.. "ok" ..but there is a lot of "go kill these" and "go kill these".. walk 20 yards and fight a mob. Another 20 yards and fight a mob.

    Honestly, the design is crushingly uninspired. My over-geared GWF is plowing though all the content with zero difficulty, even though the devs upped the difficulty. The time-gate is, honestly, just lazy.

    I guess I don't understand why it is so difficult for a team of full-time personnel to come up with a more "flowing" storyline with longer, more immersive quests. Instead of time-gating things, why not create a more D&D-inspired adventure? I .. yeah.. I just don't know.

    Anyway.

    I got nothing. :-(

    This reminded me of a story, it goes like this :

    A little bird in Russia refused to join the pack which was flying south for the winter. It refused to listen to its' parents and elders thinking it can tough it out.
    Winter came and It was so cold so the bird froze and fell to the ground covered with snow. A cow came by and dropped some dung on the bird. The pile of cow dung warmed the bird and brought it back to life. It lay there all warm and happy, and soon began to sing for joy.A passing cat heard the bird singing took the bird out of the pile of cow dung, and ate it.

    So, be happy while you have Lostmauth' set power, for it won't last for a long time once it get's fixed, and neither will the companion's gift agenda. It will arguably reduce your power by more than 50%, so play wise.
    True Neutral
    Left the Game due to heavy Damage Control & Missing Spanish Language
  • urlord283urlord283 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,084 Arc User
    I like this Mod... but that said... I miss the maps.

    I still adventure on all the lvl 70 maps every day... but when this mod is completed it seems it will be done.

    In future please have a map with the mod
  • jumpingmorksjumpingmorks Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 876 Arc User
    It's cheaper and easier to nerf players who can plow through content easily rather than create content and by contrast, create content that only a niche market, can engage in.
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