Le... Sigh...

drakedge2 · May 2013

So I wanted to check out some of the new foundry content that has been coming out by awesome authors. I click on "New" and start scrolling through... tons of

"Training grounds!" - kill as many mobs as you can <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>
"Easy as 123" kill waves and waves of mobs!
"hack and slash mayhem!" - waves of nothing but brute ogres so you can easily dodge their attacks and kill them.

The list goes on, and on, and on, and... on.

I knew this garbage was coming but it's just sad. Prologue has taken me 52 hours to craft, Chapter one took 54 hours, chapter two took 72 hours because limbo was a pain in the *** to test, place, and build.

I could easily whip up one of these things in less than ten minutes, publish it, and have ten thousand plays.

I know it's the nature of the beast, I just needed to rant in a public space lol. Send me your awesome stories, engaging foundry content I want to see it, heck I want to play it WITH you so I can ask questions as we go.

veei · May 2013

You can play mine. Progenitors Shadow, Book 1, The Skullcracker Tribe. I will be changing the entire cave area this weekend along with some dialog cleanup and some other tweaks. I know I have some changing to make, but I would appreciate the feedback.

drakedge2 · May 2013

Awesome, gonna check it out when I get home from shopping! Yes I am going shopping, no you can't have the stuff. Unless you like eating cat food, then ... okay you can have some cause I am a nice guy.

veei · May 2013

I had JimmyJohns for lunch. I am good.

senjax · May 2013

Mine is pretty linear but I have four stars and folks think it's entertaining. "The Bandit Highway" Let me know how I can improve if you play it.

zaphtastic · May 2013

Yeah... farming quests took over the 'best' list. "I am Jack's complete lack of surprise."

Feel free to give my quest (March of the Destroyer) a whirl. It's not my best work, but I like to think it's at least decent... and so do the people who played it so far (there's an obligatory Mr. One-Star, but all quests have those

)

tedwa · May 2013

You could check mine out as well. I need reviews and opinions! It's called Restoring Balance and it's in Reviews atm.

drakedge2 · May 2013

Now zone chat is full of nothing but "level 23 rogue LFG for 123 foundry farm group" lol. Oh well, we stay as the niche group of true authors.

zaphtastic · May 2013

This is pretty much how it went down in COH, yep. I'm having 2009 flashbacks... when asking for a 'MA group' meant running the powerlevelling missions over and over and over.

(NB: I have nothing against farming or powerleveling... it's the player's decision to make. What I DO have something against is not having any kind of separation between farming and story quests... like tags. HINT HINT)

apocrs1980 · May 2013

yeah they need a separate catagory that is labeled Level Troll

drakedge2 · May 2013

apocrs1980 wrote: »

yeah they need a separate catagory that is labeled Level Troll

Rofl, I know right? People like those in those in this thread labor for hours and hours to get a 25 minute average play time out of their quest.

Meanwhile trollfacemcgee over there spends 5 minutes in the foundry lays down a ton of easy mobs, and one objective to get to the end of the map and bam, instant hit.

I tried to play one, the "Easy as 123" that has been getting spammed with plays and zone chatter. Nothing but ogres, lots and lots of ogres, stacked ontop of each other in two large groups, kill them and you get your reward chest. Group can cut through it in 8 minutes.

kimonagi · May 2013

Totally agree, seems like the highest rated (not all of them) are "test your might" types of quests. Shame since many have spent time making great quests for us. Gives me more reason to tip the good ones.

evakane · May 2013

drakedge2 wrote: »

Prologue has taken me 52 hours to craft, Chapter one took 54 hours, chapter two took 72 hours because limbo was a pain in the *** to test, place, and build.

I want to play your quests. What's your @ Drak?

drakedge2 · May 2013

You can search my quests by the short codes, but it would probably be easier on your brain to just search "drakedge2" lowercase. I hope you enjoy them, you can find change logs, brief overviews and the like in my signature.

At first I was half tempted to send hatemail to the "authors" of those grind "quests" but that would do no one anygood lol.

Then I was tempted to whip one of these lolfests together in 2 minutes on the foundry, but then I didn't want to tarnish my rep as an Author.

digidag · May 2013

Haha, my story might not be as engaging or well thought out as most people their work seems to be, but I agree with this to an extent. It is a little frustrating to see farm maps being more popular than my own tidbits I try to put as much effort into as I can, and pretty much tweak every day.

mokah · May 2013

Did Cryptic ever add any new catagories or ways to filter UGC to MA or STO? If not then asking for it seems a bit pointless. They might add stuff, but judging by no response and past history, I'd say the likelihood is less than optimal.

some1inatree · May 2013

I haven't started playing the beta yet and this thread already has me a bit disappointed. If they want the UGC for this game to be at least somewhat a spiritual successor to NWN-content, then they need to introduce easy ways to find content based on what the player is after.

foxwater · May 2013

Worry not. I and my groups look for interesting content and story. We tip n rate highly too. Ive played the pathetic ones. They get low ratings from me. Im here for dnd n never winter not that rubbish. I intend to use the foundry myself and become an author. This is on ny phon e so sorry for the typos!

I will be add ing the author s here to my list.

zovya · May 2013

Thanks, I'm sure there are plenty like you foxwater. It's just going to be hard to find those quests with the search system like it is right now. Forums is probably the best tool at the moment.

fongador · May 2013

Bah keep making your fleshed out stories. There are those of us out there that will play and appreciate them.

I can't totally fault them though least when it comes to the times they're searching one to achieve the AD daily.

zaphtastic · May 2013

mokah wrote: »

Did Cryptic ever add any new catagories or ways to filter UGC to MA or STO? If not then asking for it seems a bit pointless. They might add stuff, but judging by no response and past history, I'd say the likelihood is less than optimal.

Robobo himself (aka badbotlimit, the Foundry producer) said that they are aware of the necessity of tags, but they couldn't get it implemented in time for OB, as it requires a reworking of the Foundry search engine.

Whether this means it'll be added in a week, a month, or a year (or never) depends on your level of cynicism.

apocrs1980 · May 2013

I have a lot of faith in the Cryptic team they have worked very hard on this project and surely have great things in store for the future. I'm sure they will find a way to filter out the trash.

imivo · May 2013

I actually think that these "training ground" modules are fine. If people want to rush a character, they will find ways, and this method at least doesn't cause them to negatively impact anyone else's experience (e.g. whining in PvP when losing, being super impatient in dungeons, etc.). Also, and yes, my tongue is firmly anchored in my cheek while I say this, the sooner they hit 60, the sooner they will find other things to do. Those "other things" may be story/quality foundry quests.

By the sound of it, we'll get tags eventually, which is probably an ideal compromise. (If tags are chosen appropriately, unlike with guilds where people seem to check every available tag.)

zaphtastic · May 2013

imivo wrote: »

I actually think that these "training ground" modules are fine. If people want to rush a character, they will find ways, and this method at least doesn't cause them to negatively impact anyone else's experience (e.g. whining in PvP when losing, being super impatient in dungeons, etc.). Also, and yes, my tongue is firmly anchored in my cheek while I say this, the sooner they hit 60, the sooner they will find other things to do. Those "other things" may be story/quality foundry quests.

By the sound of it, we'll get tags eventually, which is probably an ideal compromise. (If tags are chosen appropriately, unlike with guilds where people seem to check every available tag.)

Yes, I fully agree with this. Fighting the farmers / powerlevelers is, in effect, telling someone how to play the game. That's a huge no-no. Yeah, they'll get to level 60 slightly faster (or maybe even at the same pace) as a person who farms mobs at good farming spots. So what? How is my experience diminished by people getting to level 60 faster than me?

Also, from a pragmatic standpoint, there's no point in trying to nerf what they're doing -- it'll only lead to tears. This is pretty much proven by the COH MA's 3.5-year track record (and I assume the STO foundry as well).

tldr: Everyone should read THIS post. If we don't learn from the past, we're doomed to make the same mistakes over and over.

kamaliicious · May 2013

zaphtastic wrote: »

Yes, I fully agree with this. Fighting the farmers / powerlevelers is, in effect, telling someone how to play the game. That's a huge no-no. Yeah, they'll get to level 60 slightly faster (or maybe even at the same pace) as a person who farms mobs at good farming spots. So what? How is my experience diminished by people getting to level 60 faster than me?

Also, from a pragmatic standpoint, there's no point in trying to nerf what they're doing -- it'll only lead to tears. This is pretty much proven by the COH MA's 3.5-year track record (and I assume the STO foundry as well).

tldr: Everyone should read THIS post. If we don't learn from the past, we're doomed to make the same mistakes over and over.

"telling someone how to play the game is a huge no-no". You can't have it both ways. if you want some kind of tag system, there should be a tag for xp farm/powerlevel to be fair to people who want that. That tag will dominate the lists just like the current farming missions.

hercooles130uscg · May 2013

They just need to create a "farm" tab and get it over with, and forcefully move all that garbage out of the other lists like New and Best.

As for telling people how to play the game, ya can't really do that. However, that does not mean that play style should be allowed to take over the foundry. which at it's heart SHOULD be so much more then a tool for power levelers. It's not about playstyles, but about the image that the Foundry portrays.

If everyone just sees the Foundry as a gimmick that allows people to power level, and Cryptic or the rest of the community just go "eh let them play how they want" then the rest of the gaming community will see the Foundry as a complete joke, when it has infinite more potential.

There is a fine line between telling people how to play because that play style clashes with your own, and telling people how to play because it degrades the entire system as a whole.

The line has to be drawn somewhere, just like it always has. Just like freedom of speech has it's boundaries, some does play styles. If the Foundry flops, because all the quality quests are buried under pages and pages of power level crud, then who do we have to blame?

Us! for just sitting back and trying to be the good guys and hoping it will all just run it's due course.

And in my opinion, my honest opinion, I don't think there SHOULD be any of these marketed power level quests allowed. I think it will help the Foundry as a whole, because these kinds of quests are just useless filler. Imagine a Foundry where the only quest allowed were ones that at least attempted to be more then just a hack-n-slash. Not saying to has to be top quality, but at least an attempt. How many more plays will everyone get, when there is less to sift through. How much better will the general Neverwinter public opinion be of the Foundry when they don't have to sift through tons and tons of these quests to find one that someone actually put work into.

It's like spam email. You can have one important email in that inbox somwhere, but you just as soon select all and delete instead of sorting through 200 useless "grow bigger" or "free money" or whatever <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>. Same with the Foundry. How many people will just give up instead of having to do that.

Tags won't solve it either. Most of these degenerate authors will just tag their quests with ALL the tags, to guarantee people are forced to see them.

kamaliicious · May 2013

hercooles130uscg wrote: »

They just need to create a "farm" tab and get it over with, and forcefully move all that garbage out of the other lists like New and Best.

As for telling people how to play the game, ya can't really do that. However, that does not mean that play style should be allowed to take over the foundry. which at it's heart SHOULD be so much more then a tool for power levelers. It's not about playstyles, but about the image that the Foundry portrays.

If everyone just sees the Foundry as a gimmick that allows people to power level, and Cryptic or the rest of the community just go "eh let them play how they want" then the rest of the gaming community will see the Foundry as a complete joke, when it has infinite more potential.

The idea that Cryptic cares about that, after 3.5 years of these quests dominating CoH/STO, is amusing.

zaphtastic · May 2013

kamaliicious wrote: »

"telling someone how to play the game is a huge no-no". You can't have it both ways. if you want some kind of tag system, there should be a tag for xp farm/powerlevel to be fair to people who want that. That tag will dominate the lists just like the current farming missions.

Yes, those tags would dominate... and that's their purpose, to let players find the content types that they want. Most people playing foundry missions want fast xp/loot.

No matter what you do, farm quests will be there. With a tag system, people could just opt to filter out those tags entirely, and thus be able to actually find 'real' content. This also addresses the problem of farm quests with 'every single tag on the planet'.

ralandar · May 2013

As the OP said, I think we just need to be realistic and recognize that lots of the Foundry content is going to be sub par. Personally, I can't wait to start crafting my own campaign for you guys! I've DM'ed for about 15 years of my life, and I'm chomping at the bit to publish something in this game.

jkpark · May 2013

Just started creating my own foundry quests. Been thoroughly enjoyable so far. Well, up until the issues today where I lost 2 hours of work. >.> But yes, I'm all about story, really, so I shall definitely be checking out some of the quests and authors posted here.

Quality over quantity, I say!

boydzinj · May 2013

To each his or her own.

Let the "Training grounds" and the "ZERG FEST" have their place. I like story, I like challenge, and I like a foundry that is different. If you like something simple (golf clap) GOOD FOR YOU. So be it. The foundry has those set of people it caters to. Let them be catered. Likewise, if you enter a foundry that says: (Recommends 3+Companions and/or heavy fighting) and it has a ton of mobs - I would Not give it 1 or 2 or 3 stars because of that. It is all in the eye of the beholder (lol). If I read a foundry quest/mission that says it is has allot of fetching quests. I, again, would not hold the foundry quest/mission at fault (unless the quests were boring and uneventful).

There will be tons of great content. There will be even more content which is average - yet, sadly, there will be (even more-so) more content that will be generic and bland. If someone wants to do a foundry quest/mission about barbecue sauce - you never know... and let them have their giggles. Even if you do not like it, someone else might. That is what the foundry is for. For the barbecue sauce lovers versus the serious stories versus the training grounds versus the most generic quests. Everyone can see and play what they like and if it is tooooooo boring - you can always leave or finish and give them a poor rating.

As for the farming thing....

I find most encounters EASY. Sometimes the only way to make it a challenge is to throw a few well place mobs together. 1 Encounter.... even on "HARD" is not 'hard' for me. Two encounters can be difficult, or still easy. For someone else, it may too "tough" and for someone else "TOO EASY."It is hard to balance the game sometimes. I will never judge a person or a foundry badly that tells me upfront it, that it is difficult and fight intensive, and it has 2 "HARD" encounters near each other.

Le... Sigh...

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