Yes, the upcoming issue (now in open beta) includes a new zone and task force, villain epic archetypes, and . But have you seen the quality of life changes? The patch notes for just that section run 1,421 words, with more in the full notes. They include saving local settings (for importing to your next alt), saving notes and ratings for other players, more power trays and interface options, revamped chat and hide systems, linkable item and power names (like most new games have), more combat attribute window options, in-depth power information, a new contact user interface, and a list of smaller changes like map notification of zonewide events. I want to note this one, for lovers of real numbers:
In-Depth Power Information
Detailed Power Information is now available at Power Selection, Level up, Respec, and Enhancement placing screen as well as a new tab in the info window. This information shows the powers basic data along with every effect the power has.
- There is a slider to see the effect of the power across all levels.
- There is a class selector to see how the power would perform for each class.
- There is a PvP toggle to see how powers will change in PvP.
- Powers that spawn pets will show all powers the pets use and their effects.
: Zubon
Playing The Lord of the Rings Online™: Shadows of Angmar™, I have really been enjoying the PvP content. This is unusual for me, as I am not a big PvPer. Maybe it will fade, but let me tell you about it.
There is one The Lord of the Rings Online™: Shadows of Angmar™ zone in which people play the monsters. Human-played orcs, uruks, wargs, and spiders (”creeps”) work with similar NPCs and huge trolls to control five keeps. Any player can hit a button to get a level 50 monster. The opposing forces are the normal PCs, the Free People (”freeps”) who unite to dethrone the tyrants of each keep and claim them for the light. This is Player vs. Monster Player (”PvMP”), The Lord of the Rings Online™: Shadows of Angmar™’s answer to PvP.
Continue reading ‘PvMP’
A WoW guildie of mine organized a pretty awesome druid flash mob earlier this week. The concept: Get a bunch of druids together, fly around Nagrand as a flock (in bird form) and find an unsuspecting Horde, swoop down to the ground, surround him, and stare at him until he cracks, a la Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds”.
WoW Insider has a pretty great writeup of the event, which included druid skywriting, mobs of cheetahs running down Horde on Quel’Danas, and other craziness. There must be other cool possibilities here. I think it would be fun to get a lot of hunters to hide inside of a building near a questing area, then when a horde approaches, use Eyes of the Beast to send out a ton of turtle pets to swarm him.
I’m a little surprised fun events like this don’t happen more often in virtual worlds, given how much easier it is to execute creative, crazy ideas. But I guess you still have the burden of actually organizing a lot of people to do something, which is a non-trivial task in the virtual world, too.
Scott Hartsman’s roundtable at IMGDC was about scripts, stemming from a blog fight that I had missed. I summarize the consensus as, “Scripts are often implemented poorly. If you are going to use them, take them seriously and design them well.”
Designers know that players will work creatively to get around restrictions. Players are bound by the limits of the code, not the intent of the vision. If a system can be broken, it will be. Programmers should know the same thing about designers. If you place artificial restrictions on the designers to keep them from mucking something up, they are still creative people who will find ways around them, sometimes breaking things more interestingly along the way.
If you want to see how this applies in your game, think of how one thing can break while a seemingly identical other thing still works just fine. There is a good chance that two developers used the same tools to create the same outcome in different ways. The latest patch changed something that one implementation depends upon, while the other is unaffected; for more fun, both could be broken in different ways. Good programming practices were not adhered to, and now the game is much harder to update. Now multiply that across several dozen people working over several years, most or all of whom now work on other products. Have fun maintaining the code!
To explain the title, “x is often implemented poorly” is a common issue. Jason Booth explained that about procedural content, which is neither a panacea nor the destroyer of worlds. Jeff Freeman explained that about forums, which can use valuable tools or useless noise. It may be a bad sign that some tools are misused more than others.
: Zubon
In another attempt to keep me from reaching the level cap in any MMO, Turbine has done their part by introducing fishing to Lord of the Rings Online. I spent much of my recent game time on the shore of any lake or river I could find, doing battle with another form of monster, the fish of Middle-earth.
Some of my prize catches have already been stuck on the walls of my house. First trophy was the Giant Goldfish, yes that’s correct. Later on I caught a Magnificent Minnow. Hard work paid off with some bigger fish. Eventually I caught a Colourful Charr and then a 4-pound Salmon.
Not all was fish guts and glory. I also pulled in piles of weeds, more rusty daggers than I can count, and several of these tasty items. All and all, Turbine did a fine job of adding the first of many hobbies to the game. At this rate I’ll never get to level 50.
- Ethic
In our continuing series on online and ancient communication, our friends at Language Log have discovered that l33tspeak was responsible for the fall of Rome.
The villain was none other than txting, that widely-feared destroyer of civilizations. While IM and SMS had not yet been invented, the Romans used a medium that motivates textual concision even more strongly: marble.
I shudder at the use of “8″ in words like “l8r,” but we had entire millenia where you did not write vowels.
: Zubon
It is Sunday, bedtime. I have the urge to stay up until four. Heck with this, we’ll get some fast food and play late into the night. We’re going to hang out, play some games, maybe watch a movie or something. Anyone up for Settlers?
Wait, no, I’m a grown up. I have work in the morning. Oh well; most of my friends live out of state, or too far in-state, and have work too. Being responsible sucks.
: Zubon
I am sorry, you are not high enough level to eat pork chops. Note that you can crit when cooking pork chops.
: Zubon
