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I don't think valid means what you seem to think it means. The fact that it is my honest opinion and that I am a paying customer by definition defines my opinion as valid. The response from the game's creator seems to suggest a similar perspective.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gervase
You suggest that things should feel more rewarding? How so?
I have to say I agree with Gervase in that it's not a good response to criticism. "This might not be the game for you" is to invalidate criticism, and as someone sharing many of the concerns with the original poster, I felt unwelcome, as if I don't belong here as much as some older players do. I believe, however, that this game is as much for players with criticism and concerns as it is for those that find no flaws in its existing features.Quote:
Originally Posted by Coglin
But this is slightly off-topic. On-topic though, I think a lot of stress we have can be alleviated with a better UI. For example, I'd really appreciate if we could look up favor point without talking to the NPC, or having both favor level and skill level requirements displayed on the training tab. More advanced features can include discovered NPCs being marked on the map, and we can learn about their favor level that way. Inventory management can be vastly improved with a tab based, and not dialogue option based, menu. And looting is tedious because there's more dialogue options to choose from. This is what I consider bad limitations, as it's simply more clicks and to combine with fast respawn speed, not an enjoyable experience.
While devs can do tests they can't play the games the way players do, and a lot of features that appear to be interesting and add flavor in small scaled tests can be annoying in long term play. When the novelty of an idea is lost what's left is repetition, and one more mouse click soon becomes ten thousands and more. Gameplay is inevitably shaped and defined by this experience.
So while I understand a polished UI is likely low on the priority list, a better UI flow may be worth implementing sooner. Just my two cents.
A few problems here, the first is that you are applying motive to my statement which is both unfair and greatly dishonest on your part. Second, is that I also have my criticisms, by trying to imply I do not or that you two are the only ones who do is again, very dishonest. I was neither invalidating anyone's criticism nor was it intended to make anyone feel unwelcome. It was my perspective based on my belief of what the game designer's intentions are relative to the criticisms shared. No one is suggesting this game is not for players with criticism, I was suggesting that it struck me as if they were so negative about core aspects of NPC interaction and game aspects that I know the games creator favors. Seems to me you are looking to go out of your way to be offended by my perspective of your criticism.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vintus
So the last couple posts in this thread seem to have gotten a...bit off track. I am going to ignore them and resume the original topic.
I totally agree with the OP's original position of the game seeming demotivating at times for new players. Just to give some idea of my current standing in the game and where I am coming from I will summarize my stats. I currently have ~92 hours in the game according to Steam. Been playing about a month. I have ~45 Fire Magic, ~37 Animal Handling, and have been leveling the trade skills Cooking, Cheesemaking, Leatherworking, Tanning, Surveying, Gardening and Foraging.
I have been playing the game with a RL friend who has ~35 Priest, ~40 Staff, and he has been leveling the trade skills Tailoring, Carpentry, Gardening, Surveying, Foraging and Blacksmithing.
We started out playing together and tried to pick complementary skills so we would not run into the "trying to do everything" problem that Citan refers to.
We have some observations and would like to present them and try to give some possible suggestions.
As a new player, a lot of the problems the OP was talking about present themselves. I think the Favor system is actually the root cause of a lot of the frustration. At the beginning of the game, you have no money. The vendors don't like you, so they haven't got any money either. Ok, fair enough.
So you start to level your favor with people to try and make them like you. At the start, some of the VERY beginning vendors take basic items, so this is not so bad. You give Joeh some basic food items, and you give Larsan some Rings, and you give Velkort some trophies. Ok, easy enough.
The problem is, it almost immediately hits a brick wall after these basic vendors. First of all, it takes a LOT of these basic items to make anyone like you even a little bit. Second of all, you have no money. Third of all, soon people do not want basic things. They want advanced things. Things you do not have. Things you cannot buy. Because you have no money.
You run into a conundrum...I have no money....So none of the vendors have any money...so I cannot make any money....so the vendors will never have any money....and neither will I.
Ok. So this is a problem...BUT! I will solve it!! I will start to craft stuff!! Then give that stuff to the vendors! So I try! And! The vendors want...favor....
Oh no.....
So...You try to find the stuff that those vendors want to make them like you. And they don't want basic things either. They want other crafted things. So you find more crafts. And those vendors want favor. And...you are sad.
So you go to the player vendor area, and try to BUY the things that you need (as so MANY people have so kindly suggested to you, in game and in forum) AND they want money for the items. A LOT of money. Which you don't have. And cannot make, because the few vendors who like you are broke. And you cannot make other vendors like you because you are broke. And you cannot craft...because you are broke...and you cannot really farm because you have no storage. So....
You wait for the npc vendors to reset.
Waiting to play the game is not the most inviting option for new players. It is not very encouraging. It is actually very annoying. IMO. Others may disagree.
Lets jump forward in time to week 2-3 in game. You have made some money. Maybe you took a work order on the player boards and did 300 or so surveys in order to find Rubywalls that some high level player wants...for...reasons...you don't understand....yet....but you are pretty sure you are going to regret selling them...but here is 26k or so gold so you pretend that all those rubywalls didn't matter. And that surveying for 2 days worth of game play was fun. Which it wasn't. At all. Even a little bit. Surveying is horrible. Really horrible. I will make a different thread on how horrible surveying is later. Not fun. At all. I digress.
Now we have our 26k moneys earned from torturing ourselves...I mean surveying...
I can finally purchase some sulfur and saltpeter and fire magic recipes and level that up. I have cycled through sword, bow, staff, and tried and failed to acquire ice magic cause it is way to high level for my low butt, so I get animal handling. And go dungeoning. Joeh now kind of likes me and will buy my stuff. I make a little more money. Animal handling gets to 22 or so, and now I need a string. Which I cannot buy. Anywhere. So I get my RL friend who is a tailor to level all his textiling to aquire me a string. Which costs him a lot of money. That we just aquired by surveying which we both loathe. Now he has less money, cannot make thread, and needs to grind 20 levels of gardening. Because cotton. I give him all of MY cotton. It makes no dent. I forage flowers all over and help him level gardening. My own gardening stays the same. I am alone while he gardens.
So I explore, and discover I am too low level to kill anything anywhere but Serebule and Eltibule. The vendors are all broke. I am too low level to forage half of the stuff. So I grind foraging and throw things on the ground that I cannot sell and feel sad because I know that I will want that later. I give all the stuff that I can as gifts, get 0.4 favor a piece for my items, and am sad because I need 600 more favor to get to friends level with many vendors. I am frustrated. So I try to cook the ingredients I have foraged and discover that I need Cedar chips. Which I cannot buy anywhere. Not even from other players in the vendor area because they don't sell them. So I tell my RL friend he needs to level his carpentry he said he was going to do. Because I wanted to do carpentry but he said he wanted it so I let him have it and now I have wood crowding my inventory and now we are arguing in real life.
That is not good. So I must level something else while I wait for string and cedar chips. So I try to make butter. Butter is cheesemaking. Which cooking recipes need, and no one sells, and I can make that! Right! WRONG! I need butter muslin. Maybe I should become a textiler...what is leather used for anyway??? My friend is so slow....he must be doing it wrong...but he says no, he is not, and be quiet and leave him alone. (RLFriend: "look, I was farming silver coins to give to the lady to teach me more surveying so I could learn blacksmithing so I could make nails so I could level carpentry so you could have your GOSH DARN CEDAR CHIPS")
Fine. I need new armor. All these drops are low level and the dungeons that drop stuff I might be at a level with one shot me and I cannot go in there because it will make my pet panther kitty die and then he will be unhappy again. So I will make them! Except no I won't. Because it costs 50 gagillion gold to make armor that I need at my current level, just in recipes, not to mention tannin powder, and no one will buy the armor I made because they are broke.
Here is my point. The low levels are very frustrating not only because you have no space and to much stuff to do. Part of it is as Citan said, you are trying to do everything. But even when you try to specifically not do everything, you run into brick walls. Everywhere there are brick walls. You smash into them over and over again. Normally in a game, when you hit a wall it is because you are doing something wrong. You should be doing something else, or you should be leveling something else, or you should be grinding something else. This game has no "rails" as Citan said. But I do not think adding limits to the number of crafting skills will help. There is to much stuff that you need that no one sells and no one has and no one your level can get. Asking level 80 players for stuff is intimidating, and they probably wont have a string or a cedar chip or a whatever low level item anyway because it is behind them. It isn't profitable to make a stall to sell most of these low level items because people only need one or two of them. Items that low level players need a lot of are available, like sulfur or saltpeter. I have no problem buying these things when they are available and will save me pain.
My problem is, I have no money, and cannot make any money, because no one likes me. NPC wise. I'm sure the other players think I am a delight. :D
I think what needs to happen is that the crafting lines, and combat skill lines, and favor lines need to be examined for how they web together. I do not have a problem farming stuff and even grinding stuff so long as the amount of grinding required is reasonable for the goal I am trying to achieve. I don't have a problem with buying the stuff I need to achieve my goals so long as it is available to purchase at a level appropriate price. I don't mind that sometimes I bite off more than I can chew with a crafting line, like cheesemaking, which is way to high level for me. What I mind, is that early on, you get in these infinite loops that have no exit, or at least no exit signs. The intended progression path needs to be more obvious. It is fine that I am not ready to do something, it is not fine that the thing I am supposed to be ready for requires things from high level skills that no one is selling and that I wouldn't have the money to purchase even if they were selling it.
I think the skill lines need to be categorized into Tier 1, Tier 2, etc paths that are intended for certain levels of experience in the game. The Tier 1 paths should not intertwine with Tier 2...or Tier 4...or Tier 12....skill lines unless the items that are needed are profitable enough for people to be selling them at reasonable prices in the markets or to the vendors. NPC's in the low level areas should not only want high level gifts that I cannot acquire (through farming, buying or other means) as a low level player.
I am loving the game, but the things demotivating me are getting to much for me to keep going. There just needs to be some streamlining of who needs what when. The progression system, at least within the first 200 hours or so of gameplay, needs streamlining. It needs to be more obvious to the player what they are supposed to be doing and when they should be doing it. There does need to be some rails. The rails can be branching rails where you don't really want the player trying to pursue all the branches. It is just that when I hit a wall I want that wall to be meaningful and not incidental to the entire system. If the walls mean nothing, then I don't know what I am supposed to do and just get frustrated and quit.
Look at the web between all the skills and favor lines and trade skills and snip some of the lines. Streamline the progression and give the player some idea of what it is that you want the player to be doing at certain levels of the game.
You make a lot of good points here, but as far as not being able to make money goes, you don't seem to address NPC work orders at all. This is the main way i made/make money throughout playing PG, so i think you need to address why this isn't a viable way to make money for your argument to hold water.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cleo
I recall struggling for about 3 weeks when i started. Then i found the NPC work order board at the docks (it's now in Serbule) and within about a week (~80 hours) i felt like i'd turned the corner money-wise and haven't really looked back since.
Not that i had everything i wanted at that point or anything, but it went from feeling like i was possibly drowning to feeling like i was doing a fairly leisurely backstroke in stormy uneven waters.
I've read a lot of new players complaining about the game and honestly I think the thing I see the most in common is fire magic. Fire magic is a very good skill if you're an experienced player and you see it get recommended a lot, it's actually quite easy for an experienced player to take it on a completely fresh character with no outside help, but for new players it's a complete trap.
As much as I like the freedom of experienced players being able to go fire magic on their new characters, I think it might genuinely be a good idea to just lock new players out of fire magic completely. It seems the warnings about it costing a lot of money and not being for new players achieve nothing, since you still see so many people taking it then complaining about not being able to afford anything.
Just for comparison, if you don't take fire magic and take literally any other skill as a noob, beyond some minor (by comparison) costs for stuff like archery and animal handling, you could literally never sell a single item in your life, never talk to a single npc except the one who trains the skill and never see a single council in your life (beyond initial training cost) and still be completely fine up until level 50. At which point you could then transition into doing the daily and easily favour up the few vendor npcs you need and have enough cash for your unlocks easily within a few days of absolutely nothing.
I'm not recommending anyone ever does this, I'm just hoping to get the point across that most of the time you don't even need this money unless you decided to take fire magic.
What I would recommend is doing the dailies early, even around level 15 it's possible to get carried if you're careful and I don't think too many people mind but I would ask first if it was ok. You then use the gear from that to favour npcs and get money to buy a pocket set and tool set from player vendors. You can do the daily multiple times per day too, just without the quest subsequent times which is still worthwhile for gear if you're new. From there you've basically already cleared all issues since the pocket set solves inventory and makes combat easy, the tool set lets you get even more money/favour items and you've already favoured up all the npcs you need with high level gear or sold the gear to then buy other favour items from player shops.
If you don't want to just cheese the entire game and make it far too easy, then it's a bit more difficult but still very easy to join a guild, do surveying, do gardening, do work orders, you can make your own pocket set at a very low level of tailoring, except it won't make early game combat a joke and it's essentially the same result.
I myself started again new with fairy quite recently with no help from my main character and I had over 100k cash, the main serb vendor npcs at like family or soul mates, as well as basic levels and training in a few non-combat skills by the time I was about lvl 36 and a week into it. Fairy does start at lvl 30 so it does make it easier, but like I said most of the money was just from running the daily which you can get carried through at a lower level anyway.
This is a good point, I did not mention the NPC workorders. This is another way I tried to make money, and I think I must be doing it wrong. Question: How are you making money this way? :)Quote:
Originally Posted by alleryn
The work orders that I find are either to high level industry for me, require things in craft lines I am trying not to pursue right now, or don't pay very well. It might just be that I don't look at the boards often enough, but I have done 10-15 of these and they while they are mildly profitable, they certainly are not helping me build my pile of councils up very high. I can do the cooking, gardening, tanning and leather working ones up to about level 30 for each of those. Some of them want things that almost never drop, but I take those and wait for the items to accumulate. Mostly I do these with the idea that leveling industry will eventually be something I will want later on, not to make money. It is another thing that can kind of send a new player off on tangents as they frequently want things in various trade skills that a new player might not have unlocked yet. So then you go right back to needing money to make money and trying to do everything.
Again, maybe I am just doing it wrong. I often feel like I am playing the game "wrong". This is part of why I was saying that the progression needs to be streamlined. Not so much to make the game easier, but to make the intended progression clearer to the player.
I'm not actually trying to complain about fire magic costs. To be honest, I feel like the fire magic costs are reasonable. Players usually sell the sulfur and saltpeter in the player vendor area at 300-400 councils a piece, the recipes cost a reasonable amount, and Velkort is pretty easy to gain favor with. I just farmed up a bunch of spider legs and spider webs, and he was happy with me.Quote:
Originally Posted by Celerity
Now, the fact that I am spending a lot of money on leveling fire magic, may be part of why I am broke and having trouble with raising favor for other NPC's and buying all the other trade skill recipes. So this may be impacting the early game gameplay more than I realize as a noob. Some things are hard to judge when you haven't played very long and don't understand what the intended progression is supposed to be.
Actually, I am not TRYING to complain at all, although it may sound like it. I am more trying to point out how if feels to play the game as a complete noob and make some suggestions about streamlining the progression and suggest that it could be made more obvious to new players what they are supposed to be doing. I felt like the very early game did that, but after about 10 hours of gameplay or so everything got very confusing very quickly.
Which skills are you talking about?Quote:
Originally Posted by Celerity
Archery seemed just as expensive as fire magic with all the fletching and arrow making that was going to be required.
Staff is pretty expensive to level because gaining favor with Hogan is pretty expensive. He wants poetry, staves and fruit. This can be pretty expensive to grind and takes a long time. His recipes aren't that cheap either and the normal unlocks for staff are mostly defensive so you want the recipes he has. Also, it is gated behind Hogan's Quest.
Priest you need to go to Kur for, and then that vendor wants pretty expensive items to gain favor with (lapis). You can grind it with surveying, but then you need to grind the surveying vendor as well. Then you end up needing to buy the flame strike recipes because the low level ones don't drop very often, and those recipes cost a lot.
Ice magic is for high level players and, gated by Kur tower, I still haven't unlocked that. Druid is for high level players and, gated by needing a level 50 skill, I haven't unlocked that. Battle chemistry is gated behind Alchemy and needing to go to Rahu, a level 51-60 area. I haven't unlocked that. Necro is gated behind the second level of the Serbule Crypt, and I haven't unlocked that. Hammer is gated behind Agrashab, who is in Sun Vale, a level 30-45 area. I haven't unlocked yet.
Psychology I did not figure out the exact conversation line that I needed to unlock. I could have looked it up, but as a new player I did not know that. I thought that there was something somewhere I was supposed to do to make Riger like me and I was just missing it. Then I never got around to unlocking psychology. Looking at the wiki, I think you are going to have to grind a bunch of vendors for favor. Mentalism I did not figure out either.
I think what you mean is that there are a couple of other skills that would be cheaper, not literally any other skill. You cannot even unlock a lot of the other skills until you are much higher level. So I guess you are saying that some of the other low level skills would be cheaper. It is not obvious to a new player that taking these other skill lines would be better, or cheaper. How to unlock some of them is not even obvious.
Again, I am not trying to complain. I am trying to point out that new players get confused and go down wrong paths and start bashing into progression walls. Most of the stuff I just wrote about I only know because I just looked it up on the wiki. If you don't know what to look up, and the game doesn't guide you, things can be very frustrating.
Some of this sounds like good ideas that I should try, and I will do that. I thought dailies were for higher level players doing endgame, and I never tried to join anyone doing them. I have joined a guild, and done surveying and gardening.Quote:
Originally Posted by Celerity
Pockets are learned from a vendor in Kur, which is not something a very new player is going to know or be able to acquire. They can probably ask someone to make them for them, but only if they know they are a thing. Tailoring is pretty expensive to level when you have no money. I can try to ask someone in game to make them for me. Not sure how viable this is, but will see.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Celerity
Starting a new character is not really the same as starting as a new player. By the time you start a new character, you probably know what it is you should do to level the character quickly.
I am coming at this from the perspective of a new player who doesn't know how to do that stuff. As a new player, I don't know how to get around the roadblocks I am running into. I spend a lot of time feeling like I am playing the game "wrong". I spend a lot of time trying random things and running into new walls. I probably am spending a lot of money on inefficient things. There are probably better ways I could do everything. I just don't know what those things are.
I'm not trying to say the game as bad. That is not what I am saying at all. I am saying the game can be very demotivating for a new player. I think streamlining the progression and making the intended progression more obvious would really help with this.
It's interesting. I really enjoyed the early game. Finding money, storage and favor was all part of it. Little mini games you had to manipulate in addition to just killing things. The game seemed to have many interlocking puzzles you had to solve all at once. But I really had fun at it. It was difficult, and I think that's the key here: Some of us enjoy a more difficult game, a tougher puzzle, and some of us don't.
Managing your own expectations is important. Coming into a new game and expecting it to be similar to other games may cause some frustration, because what you expect might not be what you get. Some games hold your hand and you race up to the top level to start raiding. this isn't one of them. The fun is in the playing, not necessarily at getting to level 80 in a couple of combat skills.
But there is a lot of help when you start out. The community is good. There is the wiki you can access from in game. The clues are there for everything else. There are pathways to getting where you want to go. Just might take a bit to find them.
And some things are harder than others. I think that can cause some problems. Things aren't equal, and they don't need to be. We can each do everything. It's only when you decide "I'm a fire mage" "I only want to craft" "I hate crafting" "I want to do XX right from the start" that you cause some problems for yourself. Or maybe you ignored that warning and are now a cow :) Which, holy shit, I enjoyed. I leveled up cow for a bit and went back and kicked her ass and got on with my game. Was actually great fun. And I learned to NOT ignore those warnings :)
Let's skip to level 70. I quit for a bit, came back to find out level 80 was available. I ..EXPECTED....to just go unlock my skills. And I was disappointed. I needed money to unlock them, had to bribe fairies, and learn new things to do it. I scavenged for paintings, learned brewing, did little quests....and finally unlocked my skills to start the process of getting to 80. Now I'm working on upgrading my gear. Cooking better food. And making some good beer and terrible whiskey. It was a bit like what I did when i started the game.
What if there is no intended progression? It's a sandbox. Does there really need to be an intended progression?Quote:
Originally Posted by Cleo
The flip side to the game being more difficult at the start is that it offers you a lot more options. Normally, you pick a class and just like that you've locked in your progression forever. Your choices were taken away in exchange for that road map and easy access to a subset of skills. Here? You can try out a dozen different combinations and keep experimenting.
Raiding. LOL. Yeah, I don't raid. I'm what you would call a hardcore casual. I have over 1k hours in GW2 and have never raided, never pvp'd, never map completed, never really done any endgame content.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mikhaila
I like to walk around the maps and talk to npcs. I like doing all the small quests and seeing what NPC's say when I finish them. I like to explore every nook and cranny of every map. I like crafting. I think I am probably exactly the kind of player this game is aimed at.
I don't care if I ever hit 80 in a combat skill. I don't care that I cannot do the harder dungeons yet. I don't care if it takes me months to max out a single trade skill.
I care that I cannot figure out how to do anything and am always broke and the vendors don't like me and I feel like I am playing the entire game entirely wrong and cannot figure out what it is I should be doing to not feel that way.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mikhaila
I totally get that the game is a sandbox, and I do not feel that people should be locked out of doing anything, or locked in to doing anything. I guess I feel that there should be some SUGGESTED paths of progression that help new players get into the game. Entry points, if you will, that start you out with some guidance.
I think there does need to be some intended progression, at least early on. Otherwise you will lose new players before they get a chance to really get into the game. Guide players down paths that will help them get established and committed to the game. Leave the player free to ignore the suggestions, but add some rails to pull new players into the game with less frustration. Once they are pulled in, the rails can go away.