https://thepurge.net/ Sun, 13 Sep 2026 19:22:34 +0000 MyBB https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17396 Mon, 31 Aug 2026 18:51:46 -0400 Slamz]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17396
I know we've thought about this a fair bit in general because we like survival games and they do always wear thin. I thought I'd try to assemble some thoughts on the topic. I think it just comes down to needing some sliders that get set just right because if you set them wrong the game will die. And maybe it's not even possible to set them so perfectly that we could play a survival game nonstop for three years.

In particular I think of this in terms of PvP survival games but I'm actually not sure which survival games have made it harder on themselves: PvP or PvE. They both have issues that can very easily turn crippling for the game.

Some factors (sliders?) I'm thinking of....

Staleness vs upheaval.
Transience vs investment.

Obviously people get bored and quit once things go stale, which can happen for any number of interesting reasons:

• You win. You are the top dog and your position is sufficiently unassailable that no one wants to challenge you.
  
• You lose. Someone else is the top dog and their position is sufficiently unassailable that you can't challenge them.
  
• Either of the above especially combined with "moving is hard". We have won or lost and either there is nowhere else to go (as in Conan Exiles) or it's such a pain in the ass to move that you don't want to do it (as in Myth of Empires or Life is Feudal).
  
• You neither win nor lose but it's pretty much the same fight every day forever so if you ever get tired of the combat then you're tired of the game.
  
• The game is PvE content based, you have done all the content, the developers cannot keep up with your pace of consumption.
  
• The game is PvE content based, and to draw it out they made it slow to do, and to make you want to do it, the carrot is a big jump in power, so if you don't do it, you're useless, and now the game is a grind for unemployed sweats.
  

I think in the end, it's the same problem as MMORPGs:
How do you make a game with no endgame, or, maybe more reasonably, how do you make an endless endgame (whereupon, ideally, your entire game is "endgame"), and can it be done.

It's tempting to say it can't be done but I can also think of games that might have easily gotten another 1000 hours out of me, had they not had some fairly specific problem.]]>
I know we've thought about this a fair bit in general because we like survival games and they do always wear thin. I thought I'd try to assemble some thoughts on the topic. I think it just comes down to needing some sliders that get set just right because if you set them wrong the game will die. And maybe it's not even possible to set them so perfectly that we could play a survival game nonstop for three years.

In particular I think of this in terms of PvP survival games but I'm actually not sure which survival games have made it harder on themselves: PvP or PvE. They both have issues that can very easily turn crippling for the game.

Some factors (sliders?) I'm thinking of....

Staleness vs upheaval.
Transience vs investment.

Obviously people get bored and quit once things go stale, which can happen for any number of interesting reasons:

• You win. You are the top dog and your position is sufficiently unassailable that no one wants to challenge you.
  
• You lose. Someone else is the top dog and their position is sufficiently unassailable that you can't challenge them.
  
• Either of the above especially combined with "moving is hard". We have won or lost and either there is nowhere else to go (as in Conan Exiles) or it's such a pain in the ass to move that you don't want to do it (as in Myth of Empires or Life is Feudal).
  
• You neither win nor lose but it's pretty much the same fight every day forever so if you ever get tired of the combat then you're tired of the game.
  
• The game is PvE content based, you have done all the content, the developers cannot keep up with your pace of consumption.
  
• The game is PvE content based, and to draw it out they made it slow to do, and to make you want to do it, the carrot is a big jump in power, so if you don't do it, you're useless, and now the game is a grind for unemployed sweats.
  

I think in the end, it's the same problem as MMORPGs:
How do you make a game with no endgame, or, maybe more reasonably, how do you make an endless endgame (whereupon, ideally, your entire game is "endgame"), and can it be done.

It's tempting to say it can't be done but I can also think of games that might have easily gotten another 1000 hours out of me, had they not had some fairly specific problem.]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17291 Sun, 01 Feb 2026 13:05:40 -0500 Zeddash]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17291
I've had the same feeling playing threes in board games. Even without the verbal creation of alliances, there is sometimes a tenancy to pick on the weakest to get them out of there, which is a very viable strategy and possibly part of the fun (doesn't just need to be 3 players here.)

There is enough balance issues with two factions.

What games do you think did this best, video game or board game?]]>
I've had the same feeling playing threes in board games. Even without the verbal creation of alliances, there is sometimes a tenancy to pick on the weakest to get them out of there, which is a very viable strategy and possibly part of the fun (doesn't just need to be 3 players here.)

There is enough balance issues with two factions.

What games do you think did this best, video game or board game?]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17263 Tue, 11 Nov 2025 13:14:53 -0500 Zeddash]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17263
Forum based discussion is something that I miss now. Reddit dev communities are becoming a slog-fest of bots and look-at-what-I-did posts with no real value or discussions happening. My favourite sub being completely inundated with bots lately. I use Discord but it’s really just walled communities. Who knows, maybe as a society we’ll ‘devolve’ back to forums again, IRC… Gopher anyone?

I’m not here either to fish for ideas or get anyone involved, although there are some truly great minds here when it comes to world building and game design. I’m just working alone in a vacuum right now, where historically I’ve mostly worked with teams. Posting… even if no one reads this or cares, makes it a little more real to me.

While I’m not going to make an MMO, this game will be multiplayer and the server will be MMO ‘ready’ as per my design philosophy.

I have a few game design documents made but still not sure where I’m going, I'm fine with this because I really want to get a good multiplayer foundation first. The first idea was to build something like Dwarf Fortress or RimWorld with more RPG elements. In RimWorld you learn that very little is going on behind the scenes outside of the map you’re currently on. It's an effect and fun solution so I'm not knocking it at all. I’m building my own server partially to have a more world-like simulator for NPCs. Building this in a 3D world gets quite complex. The initial idea was one massive 2D world loading in chunks. I was thinking of having a character you control initially as opposed to pure colony sim ‘god mode’, then Dwarf Fortress came out with Hero Mode. I really want to avoid the ‘I’m going to make x game but make it better!’ to a degree. That would be very subjective and also you fall into the trap of players reasoning, ‘why would I play x when I already own y?’ I think so many MMOs over the years fell into this trap of trying to make a better WoW as one example.

So, thanks all! Hope you’re having fun doing whatever you’re doing and wherever you are!]]>
Forum based discussion is something that I miss now. Reddit dev communities are becoming a slog-fest of bots and look-at-what-I-did posts with no real value or discussions happening. My favourite sub being completely inundated with bots lately. I use Discord but it’s really just walled communities. Who knows, maybe as a society we’ll ‘devolve’ back to forums again, IRC… Gopher anyone?

I’m not here either to fish for ideas or get anyone involved, although there are some truly great minds here when it comes to world building and game design. I’m just working alone in a vacuum right now, where historically I’ve mostly worked with teams. Posting… even if no one reads this or cares, makes it a little more real to me.

While I’m not going to make an MMO, this game will be multiplayer and the server will be MMO ‘ready’ as per my design philosophy.

I have a few game design documents made but still not sure where I’m going, I'm fine with this because I really want to get a good multiplayer foundation first. The first idea was to build something like Dwarf Fortress or RimWorld with more RPG elements. In RimWorld you learn that very little is going on behind the scenes outside of the map you’re currently on. It's an effect and fun solution so I'm not knocking it at all. I’m building my own server partially to have a more world-like simulator for NPCs. Building this in a 3D world gets quite complex. The initial idea was one massive 2D world loading in chunks. I was thinking of having a character you control initially as opposed to pure colony sim ‘god mode’, then Dwarf Fortress came out with Hero Mode. I really want to avoid the ‘I’m going to make x game but make it better!’ to a degree. That would be very subjective and also you fall into the trap of players reasoning, ‘why would I play x when I already own y?’ I think so many MMOs over the years fell into this trap of trying to make a better WoW as one example.

So, thanks all! Hope you’re having fun doing whatever you’re doing and wherever you are!]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17197 Thu, 02 Jan 2025 14:30:47 -0500 Slamz]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=17197 don't judge me!). One thing that's kind of interesting is the number of animes out there that are basically:

Guy dies and wakes up in a video game.
Guy falls asleep playing his video game and wakes up in the video game.
Here is a group of adventurers in a fantasy setting with dungeons and monsters but also they have video game stats and it's part of their normal life. Like "Oh, you have 198 agility? That's cool bro. How'd you get it so high and you're only level 15?"

The part that got me thinking is how these shows always incorporate the reality of what's happening as part of the lore of the show.
Like you need a group of heroes to endlessly fight some dungeon. Okay. Why is the dungeon there? Where do these monsters keep coming from? What's the point of it all?

Well, you see, what happened wuz... there's some God-being who spawns dungeon cores and some local monster finds it and becomes a dungeon master and starts summoning in creatures and blah blah blah and everyone wants to kill them to rank up their entirely visible stats that appear in front of them on magical parchment whenever they want to check because why wouldn't they. It doesn't necessarily make sense but it's what's actually happening.

This made me realize why I hate so many computer RPGs, especially so many MMORPGs. I mean, I put thousands of hours into them but for every hour of it there's at least one thing going on at all times that irritates the hell out of me.

The problem is video game RPG lore never matches what's actually happening.

"Adventurer! Save us! There are these wolves and they have already killed my grandmother and taken her necklace! We might all be next! Kill the wolves, retrieve her necklace and save our village!"

And there I stand looking at a field with 37 adventurers standing around waiting for a wolf to spawn. Come back two years later, the wolves are still there. Bro has gotten 159,000 necklaces returned to him. Keeps them in a barn somewhere, presumably. Stacked to the ceiling. Wolves ain't ever taking over the village. Far as I can tell the only thing they're guilty of is being bloody stupid and standing around in a field. And every time I see something like this, which is constantly, it takes me right out of the experience.

We need better lore.

Video game lore. To match the video game. I don't mean "we need deeper lore with tales of old gods and how we are the chosen one meant to save it" but more like the opposite of that. We need lore to match whatever is actually happening around us.

I want to log in for the first time and be unceremoniously handed a sword, a spellbook, a hat, and pointed towards the door because after the first 1200 "heroes" spawned in, the people (NPCs) at the starting area couldn't be bothered to give us all proper intros anymore and treated us as exactly what we were: an anonymous assembly line of cookie cutter level 1 bozos who keep tromping in out of nowhere. If there's a tutorial let it be in the form of some tireless personal imp whose only purpose in life is exactly that. Your sword, your book, your hat, your imp, off you go.

If we are fighting a war without end, don't pretend that it's a glorious fight to save our people (unless, via actual game mechanics, that's actually what it is). Just tell us the Gods are having a contest, and they are keeping score (Imp: "You can see the score on a magical floating parchment if you hit TAB"), and we will respawn when we die, may the best team win, Gods will reset the scoreboard every 3 months because they like to keep things fresh.

Now that's some lore. Now I can play the game and feel like I'm not distracted by some made up stories that are completely out of touch with what's actually going on.

I just want a lore that actually matches the gameplay.

Or vice versa.]]> don't judge me!). One thing that's kind of interesting is the number of animes out there that are basically:

Guy dies and wakes up in a video game.
Guy falls asleep playing his video game and wakes up in the video game.
Here is a group of adventurers in a fantasy setting with dungeons and monsters but also they have video game stats and it's part of their normal life. Like "Oh, you have 198 agility? That's cool bro. How'd you get it so high and you're only level 15?"

The part that got me thinking is how these shows always incorporate the reality of what's happening as part of the lore of the show.
Like you need a group of heroes to endlessly fight some dungeon. Okay. Why is the dungeon there? Where do these monsters keep coming from? What's the point of it all?

Well, you see, what happened wuz... there's some God-being who spawns dungeon cores and some local monster finds it and becomes a dungeon master and starts summoning in creatures and blah blah blah and everyone wants to kill them to rank up their entirely visible stats that appear in front of them on magical parchment whenever they want to check because why wouldn't they. It doesn't necessarily make sense but it's what's actually happening.

This made me realize why I hate so many computer RPGs, especially so many MMORPGs. I mean, I put thousands of hours into them but for every hour of it there's at least one thing going on at all times that irritates the hell out of me.

The problem is video game RPG lore never matches what's actually happening.

"Adventurer! Save us! There are these wolves and they have already killed my grandmother and taken her necklace! We might all be next! Kill the wolves, retrieve her necklace and save our village!"

And there I stand looking at a field with 37 adventurers standing around waiting for a wolf to spawn. Come back two years later, the wolves are still there. Bro has gotten 159,000 necklaces returned to him. Keeps them in a barn somewhere, presumably. Stacked to the ceiling. Wolves ain't ever taking over the village. Far as I can tell the only thing they're guilty of is being bloody stupid and standing around in a field. And every time I see something like this, which is constantly, it takes me right out of the experience.

We need better lore.

Video game lore. To match the video game. I don't mean "we need deeper lore with tales of old gods and how we are the chosen one meant to save it" but more like the opposite of that. We need lore to match whatever is actually happening around us.

I want to log in for the first time and be unceremoniously handed a sword, a spellbook, a hat, and pointed towards the door because after the first 1200 "heroes" spawned in, the people (NPCs) at the starting area couldn't be bothered to give us all proper intros anymore and treated us as exactly what we were: an anonymous assembly line of cookie cutter level 1 bozos who keep tromping in out of nowhere. If there's a tutorial let it be in the form of some tireless personal imp whose only purpose in life is exactly that. Your sword, your book, your hat, your imp, off you go.

If we are fighting a war without end, don't pretend that it's a glorious fight to save our people (unless, via actual game mechanics, that's actually what it is). Just tell us the Gods are having a contest, and they are keeping score (Imp: "You can see the score on a magical floating parchment if you hit TAB"), and we will respawn when we die, may the best team win, Gods will reset the scoreboard every 3 months because they like to keep things fresh.

Now that's some lore. Now I can play the game and feel like I'm not distracted by some made up stories that are completely out of touch with what's actually going on.

I just want a lore that actually matches the gameplay.

Or vice versa.]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=16350 Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:23 -0400 Slamz]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=16350
I keep thinking about "skillful gameplay" and how hard it is to find in online gaming. Especially in MMORPGs and even more especially in PvP and extra super especially when discussing something like a 1v1 fight (or a 1vX fight).

First person shooters mostly inject skill into the game by rewarding clever ambushes, situational awareness and twitch/aiming skill. In a good FPS, a fresh faced newbie can beat a 3 year veteran by outplaying him with good old human player skill. Even if it's 5v1 or 50v1, that newbie still stands a good chance of getting at least a kill out of it because FPS games are inherently skillful. I've ambushed and killed entire teams in games like DayZ just because I had a great position, the perfect gun for the job and several of them were dead before they knew where I was. It feels skillful. Choices I made and my own ability to land hits with a gun lead to me killing a group I'd never beat in some worse circumstances.

Ship combat games usually do a good job of this too, without the twitch. Understanding wind angles, how this impacts each ship's performance, how to best use your gun layout vs their gun layout and proper timing of turns and aiming can make a sizable difference.

But then there's a typical MMORPG warrior vs warrior duel. There is frequently little to no room for player skill to shine. You do 120 dps, I do 100 dps. You have 2000 health and 100 armor, I have 1500 health and 80 armor. I'm just flat out going to lose and there's no human player skill that's going to change that. Maybe there's a little bit of stunning and interrupting but the margin by which skillful use can swing a 1v1 fight against a higher level opponent is going to be minimal. My best bet is to rely on lag to help me escape via running away. In a "melee combat game" like Mount & Blade, it's a different story. Directional parrying is a human player skill so if I'm better at parrying then I can probably beat that higher level opponent.

So MMORPGs tend to inject skill via "group synergy". 1v1 there's little to no room for skill but understanding how my 5 man team can work together better than your 5 man team at least throws a lot more variables into the mix and therefore creates space for human player skill to make a difference.

But then think of movies like Harry Potter. They don't go into a lot of depth on this but there's at least a concept of "magical defense". Someone shoots a spell at you, there are ways to parry that spell if you're quick enough. Or you outdraw them and kill them first. But how would you do that in a game without making it twitch based (and therefore, lag dependent). If I see a fireball coming at me and there is a counterspell for that, then the fireball needs to move slow enough for me to see it coming and counter it but ideally not so slow that countering it is easy or obvious.


I just keep wondering if there are ways to make a non-twitch based RPG PvP setup where even a 1v1 feels skillful.

I'm sure the secret ingredient is "active defense". Or maybe decisions on switching your character between stances. Not rock-paper-scissors but maybe rock-paper-scissors-lizard-spock. Similar to group synergy (or naval combat), maybe the key is to throw more complication at it so that there are more decisions to be made and therefore more ways to do things wrong, even 1v1.


I just hate the old MMORPG trope of I-kick-you-then-you-kick-me until someone runs out of hit points and I get depressed about the future of ever seeing a really good, skill based RPG PvP setup that doesn't simply lean hard on group synergy.

(I do recall thinking that Guild Wars 2 did a good job of this. They added interesting ways for things to interact. Ability X + Ability Y yielded Effect Z that you couldn't get any other way. It was fast paced but not quite twitchy. Shame about the lack of maps and content, but looking back I still think GW2 was one of my favorite actual RPG PvP combat systems.)]]>
I keep thinking about "skillful gameplay" and how hard it is to find in online gaming. Especially in MMORPGs and even more especially in PvP and extra super especially when discussing something like a 1v1 fight (or a 1vX fight).

First person shooters mostly inject skill into the game by rewarding clever ambushes, situational awareness and twitch/aiming skill. In a good FPS, a fresh faced newbie can beat a 3 year veteran by outplaying him with good old human player skill. Even if it's 5v1 or 50v1, that newbie still stands a good chance of getting at least a kill out of it because FPS games are inherently skillful. I've ambushed and killed entire teams in games like DayZ just because I had a great position, the perfect gun for the job and several of them were dead before they knew where I was. It feels skillful. Choices I made and my own ability to land hits with a gun lead to me killing a group I'd never beat in some worse circumstances.

Ship combat games usually do a good job of this too, without the twitch. Understanding wind angles, how this impacts each ship's performance, how to best use your gun layout vs their gun layout and proper timing of turns and aiming can make a sizable difference.

But then there's a typical MMORPG warrior vs warrior duel. There is frequently little to no room for player skill to shine. You do 120 dps, I do 100 dps. You have 2000 health and 100 armor, I have 1500 health and 80 armor. I'm just flat out going to lose and there's no human player skill that's going to change that. Maybe there's a little bit of stunning and interrupting but the margin by which skillful use can swing a 1v1 fight against a higher level opponent is going to be minimal. My best bet is to rely on lag to help me escape via running away. In a "melee combat game" like Mount & Blade, it's a different story. Directional parrying is a human player skill so if I'm better at parrying then I can probably beat that higher level opponent.

So MMORPGs tend to inject skill via "group synergy". 1v1 there's little to no room for skill but understanding how my 5 man team can work together better than your 5 man team at least throws a lot more variables into the mix and therefore creates space for human player skill to make a difference.

But then think of movies like Harry Potter. They don't go into a lot of depth on this but there's at least a concept of "magical defense". Someone shoots a spell at you, there are ways to parry that spell if you're quick enough. Or you outdraw them and kill them first. But how would you do that in a game without making it twitch based (and therefore, lag dependent). If I see a fireball coming at me and there is a counterspell for that, then the fireball needs to move slow enough for me to see it coming and counter it but ideally not so slow that countering it is easy or obvious.


I just keep wondering if there are ways to make a non-twitch based RPG PvP setup where even a 1v1 feels skillful.

I'm sure the secret ingredient is "active defense". Or maybe decisions on switching your character between stances. Not rock-paper-scissors but maybe rock-paper-scissors-lizard-spock. Similar to group synergy (or naval combat), maybe the key is to throw more complication at it so that there are more decisions to be made and therefore more ways to do things wrong, even 1v1.


I just hate the old MMORPG trope of I-kick-you-then-you-kick-me until someone runs out of hit points and I get depressed about the future of ever seeing a really good, skill based RPG PvP setup that doesn't simply lean hard on group synergy.

(I do recall thinking that Guild Wars 2 did a good job of this. They added interesting ways for things to interact. Ability X + Ability Y yielded Effect Z that you couldn't get any other way. It was fast paced but not quite twitchy. Shame about the lack of maps and content, but looking back I still think GW2 was one of my favorite actual RPG PvP combat systems.)]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=14793 Wed, 28 Jun 2017 11:02:41 -0400 Kiefer]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=14793
Just curious if in knowledge bank of Purge-pedia there were any games that had been more successful in removing the need and/or clamping down on nefarious alt usage in MMOs.

What is the solution if any? Naval Action seems to be experiencing the early onset of this alt disease. I have been following your actions and responses, it seems as if only everyone treated alts like Purge does it might not be an issue.]]>
Just curious if in knowledge bank of Purge-pedia there were any games that had been more successful in removing the need and/or clamping down on nefarious alt usage in MMOs.

What is the solution if any? Naval Action seems to be experiencing the early onset of this alt disease. I have been following your actions and responses, it seems as if only everyone treated alts like Purge does it might not be an issue.]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=14780 Wed, 21 Jun 2017 15:17:25 -0400 Vllad]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=14780
Rather than devising strategies based on the mechanics they are given players would rather just have the developers given them a dotted line of the strategies employed.

Is it age or are players getting lazy as time goes on? Have we not been able to come up strategies on our own in every game we have played?]]>
Rather than devising strategies based on the mechanics they are given players would rather just have the developers given them a dotted line of the strategies employed.

Is it age or are players getting lazy as time goes on? Have we not been able to come up strategies on our own in every game we have played?]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=14079 Wed, 23 Sep 2015 20:24:27 -0400 Kiefer]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=14079
I come at this from a Pirates of the Burning Sea (PotBS) perspective (big surprise, lol).
Labor is the only feature in the PotBS economy that is fixed. Most players bypass this by creating multiple accounts and this is made even easier with a Free-to-Play game that provides so much for free.

My thoughts on the matter are:

What if the labor "cost" was tied to the number of accounts active in the game? Say the population activity was measured and averaged every month. The number of active accounts would directly impact the labor cost. In reverse to what one would expect, though. More players would raise the labor cost, while less players would lower the labor cost.

So, if a particular item requires five raw structures to fully operate a processing structure. It would require ten raw goods structures to produce for one processing structure when player population was up, but maybe require only three when player population was down.

Sort of an overflow gate feature to minimize the ability of solo players to vertically integrate their operations when there are ample players provide the supply, but also to allow solo players to supply more when population is down. The month to month adjustment would ensure a certain consistency to pricing schemes for players, while also adding another element to the economy so folks will need to pay attention to labor costs/hours.

I suspect this will only be appreciated by those who have played PotBS and its sole player crafting monopolies.

Just brainstormed this up this afternoon. Please provide the Purge treatment, 8).]]>
I come at this from a Pirates of the Burning Sea (PotBS) perspective (big surprise, lol).
Labor is the only feature in the PotBS economy that is fixed. Most players bypass this by creating multiple accounts and this is made even easier with a Free-to-Play game that provides so much for free.

My thoughts on the matter are:

What if the labor "cost" was tied to the number of accounts active in the game? Say the population activity was measured and averaged every month. The number of active accounts would directly impact the labor cost. In reverse to what one would expect, though. More players would raise the labor cost, while less players would lower the labor cost.

So, if a particular item requires five raw structures to fully operate a processing structure. It would require ten raw goods structures to produce for one processing structure when player population was up, but maybe require only three when player population was down.

Sort of an overflow gate feature to minimize the ability of solo players to vertically integrate their operations when there are ample players provide the supply, but also to allow solo players to supply more when population is down. The month to month adjustment would ensure a certain consistency to pricing schemes for players, while also adding another element to the economy so folks will need to pay attention to labor costs/hours.

I suspect this will only be appreciated by those who have played PotBS and its sole player crafting monopolies.

Just brainstormed this up this afternoon. Please provide the Purge treatment, 8).]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13760 Tue, 16 Sep 2014 14:57:09 -0400 Slamz]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13760
Traditional MMORPG guilds do not do a good job of modeling real life social connections. Guilds are more like workplaces and have some of the same problems as workplace environments, namely: drama, because you have lumped a bunch of people together who do not necessarily all like each other and any disruption can disrupt the whole organization.

I like Bob. Bob likes you. I hate you. We're guilded together. Drama ensues.


What if a game came out that, instead of guilds, had something more like Facebook: a really nicely designed, well integrated friends list that gives profile pages and lets you get to know people (as their characters -- I am not talking about people's real-life persona) and open chat channels and so forth.

This actually replaces your guild interface. There is no "The Purge". There's just a Facebook-type interface. Which of your friends are online? What are they doing? Message someone and see what's going on. "Hey Slamz, yeah, I'm just over here grouping with Sally." Dammit, Bob. You know I hate that bitch. Lemme know if you're up for some castle sieging later, I'll be around Mordor.


I wonder if that would actually be a vastly superior solution to the concept of "guilds".

("The Purge" may well live on in this environment but it would be like a Facebook Group. Your connection to this group is fairly superfluous. Your friends list is your real social connector.)]]>
Traditional MMORPG guilds do not do a good job of modeling real life social connections. Guilds are more like workplaces and have some of the same problems as workplace environments, namely: drama, because you have lumped a bunch of people together who do not necessarily all like each other and any disruption can disrupt the whole organization.

I like Bob. Bob likes you. I hate you. We're guilded together. Drama ensues.


What if a game came out that, instead of guilds, had something more like Facebook: a really nicely designed, well integrated friends list that gives profile pages and lets you get to know people (as their characters -- I am not talking about people's real-life persona) and open chat channels and so forth.

This actually replaces your guild interface. There is no "The Purge". There's just a Facebook-type interface. Which of your friends are online? What are they doing? Message someone and see what's going on. "Hey Slamz, yeah, I'm just over here grouping with Sally." Dammit, Bob. You know I hate that bitch. Lemme know if you're up for some castle sieging later, I'll be around Mordor.


I wonder if that would actually be a vastly superior solution to the concept of "guilds".

("The Purge" may well live on in this environment but it would be like a Facebook Group. Your connection to this group is fairly superfluous. Your friends list is your real social connector.)]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13746 Wed, 03 Sep 2014 16:03:34 -0400 Breand]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13746
http://www.zenofdesign.com/how-uo-change...e-of-mmos/

Response to griefing to me, is a company's reaction to fixing a weakness in their code. By players exploiting the system that was created, a company has to do what is expected of them, and try and close the loopholes. One could even say the MMO product is so bogged down with its response to griefing, that we have a milquetoast, more vanilla product now that doesn't break any new boundaries and is why we are currently stuck in a cycle of the same MMOs with a different IP because no company wants to create a new version that will be open to new exploits . We have instanced dungeons now because of griefing, which I think is a cheap, lame band aid to the issue and has really hampered genuine fun in MMOs for years. Human behavior and the culture of MMOs has not changed, we just have a police force now. In Everquest, we had to respond to griefers as a vigilante force and respond back ourselves. I think in regards to the actual point of the article, yes, the culture had to shift for maximum profitability of the product, but as someone who played MMOs back when they were called MUDs, darn if it wasn't a fun, and camaraderie building exercise to have a guild drop everything it was doing to go and respond to a guildmate getting griefed. Guilds were the central focus of MMOs...finding and accumulating that group of likeminded players that "get it," poor game design be damned. You could take action as a group instead of waiting for Big Daddy to arrive and stick the guy in the corner.]]>
http://www.zenofdesign.com/how-uo-change...e-of-mmos/

Response to griefing to me, is a company's reaction to fixing a weakness in their code. By players exploiting the system that was created, a company has to do what is expected of them, and try and close the loopholes. One could even say the MMO product is so bogged down with its response to griefing, that we have a milquetoast, more vanilla product now that doesn't break any new boundaries and is why we are currently stuck in a cycle of the same MMOs with a different IP because no company wants to create a new version that will be open to new exploits . We have instanced dungeons now because of griefing, which I think is a cheap, lame band aid to the issue and has really hampered genuine fun in MMOs for years. Human behavior and the culture of MMOs has not changed, we just have a police force now. In Everquest, we had to respond to griefers as a vigilante force and respond back ourselves. I think in regards to the actual point of the article, yes, the culture had to shift for maximum profitability of the product, but as someone who played MMOs back when they were called MUDs, darn if it wasn't a fun, and camaraderie building exercise to have a guild drop everything it was doing to go and respond to a guildmate getting griefed. Guilds were the central focus of MMOs...finding and accumulating that group of likeminded players that "get it," poor game design be damned. You could take action as a group instead of waiting for Big Daddy to arrive and stick the guy in the corner.]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13281 Tue, 14 Jan 2014 15:21:47 -0500 Slamz]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13281 Player skill results from having a greater number of interesting, viable choices. I can charge you straight on, or I can wait for you on this hill, or I can flank you, or I can throw fireballs at you from a distance, etc. The more options I have, the more that player skill, which is to say, picking the best option, comes into play.

I want you to re-read that and think about if you agree or not, just as a stand-alone statement.


Adding a crowd control measure, such as a stun, seems to give us one more option. I can fireball you or I can stun you. Another option! Clearly, we have increased the importance of player skill by adding another option.

Or did we?

From your perspective, your options increased by +1. By stunning the enemy, however, you have decreased his options to somewhere around 0 or 1. Instead of having a huge array of things to choose from, he now possibly has no option at all or maybe a stun-breaker as his only option.

There was a tremendous net loss in battlefield options because you had a stun.

Even lesser effects like snares can do this too. I used to have a wide field of choices and now, because I am snared, my options are considerably reduced. My game now involves fewer skillful choices because I can't move very fast.

In fact, Crowd Control is meant to reduce your options -- it's what the term "crowd control" is defining! You are, to some extent, controlled by the enemy. They have reduced your options. By reducing options, we have decreased the amount of player skill involved in the game (revisit the bold sentence up top).

We SAY things like, "Well I don't want the enemy to just be able to escape" but what we're really saying is, "I want to reduce the number of skillful battlefield options so that we can wrap this up and get to the inevitable part where I win".


Do debilitating crowd control effects really increase a game's depth by adding skillful options?
Or do they, overall, actually make the game less complex, removing more options than they add?]]> Player skill results from having a greater number of interesting, viable choices. I can charge you straight on, or I can wait for you on this hill, or I can flank you, or I can throw fireballs at you from a distance, etc. The more options I have, the more that player skill, which is to say, picking the best option, comes into play.

I want you to re-read that and think about if you agree or not, just as a stand-alone statement.


Adding a crowd control measure, such as a stun, seems to give us one more option. I can fireball you or I can stun you. Another option! Clearly, we have increased the importance of player skill by adding another option.

Or did we?

From your perspective, your options increased by +1. By stunning the enemy, however, you have decreased his options to somewhere around 0 or 1. Instead of having a huge array of things to choose from, he now possibly has no option at all or maybe a stun-breaker as his only option.

There was a tremendous net loss in battlefield options because you had a stun.

Even lesser effects like snares can do this too. I used to have a wide field of choices and now, because I am snared, my options are considerably reduced. My game now involves fewer skillful choices because I can't move very fast.

In fact, Crowd Control is meant to reduce your options -- it's what the term "crowd control" is defining! You are, to some extent, controlled by the enemy. They have reduced your options. By reducing options, we have decreased the amount of player skill involved in the game (revisit the bold sentence up top).

We SAY things like, "Well I don't want the enemy to just be able to escape" but what we're really saying is, "I want to reduce the number of skillful battlefield options so that we can wrap this up and get to the inevitable part where I win".


Do debilitating crowd control effects really increase a game's depth by adding skillful options?
Or do they, overall, actually make the game less complex, removing more options than they add?]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13081 Wed, 11 Sep 2013 15:03:48 -0400 Dharus]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=13081 https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=12524 Sun, 17 Feb 2013 12:53:28 -0500 Dharus]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=12524
Any of you actually tried to put some of the ideas on this subject into practice?]]>
Any of you actually tried to put some of the ideas on this subject into practice?]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=12338 Mon, 31 Dec 2012 14:55:14 -0500 Slamz]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=12338 * A game can be judged by how much chatter it generates between players on forums like this one.
* Lack of chatter means a game, however fun, is becoming routine, which will translate into "boring" eventually.
* What are the secrets to creating a game that's interesting enough to generate a lot of chatter between players 4 months after launch?

SWTOR, for example, died quickly with relatively little chatter generated. There just wasn't a lot to talk about. Early on you talk about your class and class interaction and tips on leveling and zones but after 4 months that's all been hashed over. Nothing more to discuss. You might still be logging in and playing and having fun but there's nothing to talk about. ("Today I logged in and had a great time doing basically the same thing I did yesterday.")


I have a growing suspicion that what you need to keep a game interesting are goals that require a minimum of 24 hours to achieve. For example, no matter how interesting a particular Stonemist Castle battle might be, it's not going to generate much chatter because it's a fleeting thing. It starts and ends one way or another over the course of a couple of hours and unless there's something really new that someone is doing (trebuchet in a spot you hadn't seen before), there's not much to talk about.

Pirates of the Burning Sea was probably the best game for this. Day-to-day strategy could change based on the state of port ownership and which ones were under attack. If my oak production port is being attacked tomorrow, we may have to discuss what to do about oak if we lose it. We may have to discuss which areas we should patrol and which areas we should attack tomorrow because it's not going to be the same as today. What's more (something EVE lacks here), the actual combat mechanics are interesting enough (and get tweaked by the devs frequently enough) that there's usually something to discuss there: dealing with rageboarders or stern campers or what's the new hot ship this month. Battles were also lengthy and costly so it was kind of a big deal -- it was worth discussing if you could pick up a new tip that would save from you losing an expensive ship.

POTBS never really became routine. (The only reason I quit, really, was the need to always have exactly 6 players online... I never got bored with it, it's just that sometimes I'd log in and not be able to play.)

Games like Rift and GW2 will always have their days numbered because ultimately you just run out of things to talk about. (And half of Rift discussion was actually just bitching over raid rules so I'm not sure that should count.) Even if the games are fun and mechanically interesting to PLAY, it's too minute-by-minute to really come to the forums to discuss, which means it's starting to become routine and "fun" + "routine" will become "boring" eventually.]]> * A game can be judged by how much chatter it generates between players on forums like this one.
* Lack of chatter means a game, however fun, is becoming routine, which will translate into "boring" eventually.
* What are the secrets to creating a game that's interesting enough to generate a lot of chatter between players 4 months after launch?

SWTOR, for example, died quickly with relatively little chatter generated. There just wasn't a lot to talk about. Early on you talk about your class and class interaction and tips on leveling and zones but after 4 months that's all been hashed over. Nothing more to discuss. You might still be logging in and playing and having fun but there's nothing to talk about. ("Today I logged in and had a great time doing basically the same thing I did yesterday.")


I have a growing suspicion that what you need to keep a game interesting are goals that require a minimum of 24 hours to achieve. For example, no matter how interesting a particular Stonemist Castle battle might be, it's not going to generate much chatter because it's a fleeting thing. It starts and ends one way or another over the course of a couple of hours and unless there's something really new that someone is doing (trebuchet in a spot you hadn't seen before), there's not much to talk about.

Pirates of the Burning Sea was probably the best game for this. Day-to-day strategy could change based on the state of port ownership and which ones were under attack. If my oak production port is being attacked tomorrow, we may have to discuss what to do about oak if we lose it. We may have to discuss which areas we should patrol and which areas we should attack tomorrow because it's not going to be the same as today. What's more (something EVE lacks here), the actual combat mechanics are interesting enough (and get tweaked by the devs frequently enough) that there's usually something to discuss there: dealing with rageboarders or stern campers or what's the new hot ship this month. Battles were also lengthy and costly so it was kind of a big deal -- it was worth discussing if you could pick up a new tip that would save from you losing an expensive ship.

POTBS never really became routine. (The only reason I quit, really, was the need to always have exactly 6 players online... I never got bored with it, it's just that sometimes I'd log in and not be able to play.)

Games like Rift and GW2 will always have their days numbered because ultimately you just run out of things to talk about. (And half of Rift discussion was actually just bitching over raid rules so I'm not sure that should count.) Even if the games are fun and mechanically interesting to PLAY, it's too minute-by-minute to really come to the forums to discuss, which means it's starting to become routine and "fun" + "routine" will become "boring" eventually.]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=11979 Tue, 23 Oct 2012 10:03:59 -0400 Sebrent]]> https://thepurge.net/showthread.php?tid=11979
Why do we need the ability to do crit damage x% of the time? Sure, it eventually normalizes so that you crit roughly x% of the time but sometimes player A beats player B simply because they "got lucky" and spiked several crits in a row. Then later player A gets rolled by player C because A gets no crits at all. Instead, why not have close battles each time by removing the possibility of "lucky" crits?

In that same train of thought, I dislike chances to miss, dodge, block, parry, etc. I enjoy GW2's system where you actively block and in order for someone to miss you either have to blind them, be using some "blocking" type skill, have aegis, or use line-of-sight. If it hits you it's because you did nothing to prevent it. If the attack misses, it's because you did something.

What are your thoughts on whether or not random numbers are needed in games, particularly MMOs.]]>
Why do we need the ability to do crit damage x% of the time? Sure, it eventually normalizes so that you crit roughly x% of the time but sometimes player A beats player B simply because they "got lucky" and spiked several crits in a row. Then later player A gets rolled by player C because A gets no crits at all. Instead, why not have close battles each time by removing the possibility of "lucky" crits?

In that same train of thought, I dislike chances to miss, dodge, block, parry, etc. I enjoy GW2's system where you actively block and in order for someone to miss you either have to blind them, be using some "blocking" type skill, have aegis, or use line-of-sight. If it hits you it's because you did nothing to prevent it. If the attack misses, it's because you did something.

What are your thoughts on whether or not random numbers are needed in games, particularly MMOs.]]>