MB vs. CB: summary and answers

[Talad]

Hi everyone,
first of all, thanks for the feedback given. This enables us to understand a bit better what are the feelings of the players toward the latest release.

(For the ones that have no clue of what we are talking about, MB=Molecular Blue=previous release, and CB=Crystal Blue=current release)

A number of points have been hightlighted in your posts, which I would like to summarize and give answers to.

There is one important premise to this discussion: you are playing a tech demo. We never had the presumption to say that the current released version is a complete game. CB surely is closer to a full game in terms of features, but surely not in terms of content and balancing. Balancing in particular is probably the most overlooked factor, but it\'s done by purpose. We cannot balance a game that is still growing a lot, or we will be forced to rebalance everything at any new features we add. So we decided to have rules in place that allow people to enjoy the game, but not to go into the details of making those fair and finalized. A great example of this is weapon loot. The current weapons spawned are VERY powerful, and they are spawned by nearly all monsters, so a character can gain money and exp very fast. Content is another problem, mainly quests. We worked on a new simpler quest system, that allows us to define quests 10 times quicker. Most of the effort was placed in developing the tool, so the results are not yet visible to players.

Now to the most interesting points brought up in the MB vs. CB thread.

More bugs in CB compared to MB

Having added a lot of new functions to CB, more bugs are a reality we have to face. The code is more complex, so there are more possibilities for errors and leftovers. The difference with CB is that we added a public bugtracker so the bugs are surely more evident, but on the other hand, we receive patches from a greater number of people, so bugs are fixed quickly. In the next month you will surely see new features and new bugs, that will not decrease until we stop adding features and start fine tuning the code. Just a note about labels cluttering the screen. The default option is now to have labels only on mouse over.

More lag
Having moved from an average of 20-30 players online (MB) to 100-150 (CB) surely increased lag. But one of the main reason is that we have a lot more new players, causing the main server to be slowed down by all the downloads for updates. To fix this problem, in the next update all files served by updater will be hosted on another server. We hope this will lighten the load on the main server. The only traffic sustained by the main server will be the in game traffic.

More limited movement system
There are two parts of this topics: ability to expoit movement bugs to climb impossible-to-climb walls and usability. On the first part, it\'s a design intent to fix movement in that direction, players should not be able to reach places that were not planned to be reached. Even if having shots from the top of the world can be fun, it\'s not something we can allow. House roof hopping is still possible and permitted and makes perfect sense. When we will have a climb skill implemented more walls will be climbable.
On the second part, we introduced the new movement system to have more control on it and we now just need fine tuning.  Please tell us more of what\'s bad in the current movement, and suggestion on how to improve it.

Updater easier to use
CB release saw a number of big files added, so the updates take longer. To fix this problem we recently decided to improve the situation, and in the next update you will get a smarter updater. It downloads full zips more often, so download is faster. Also the addition of the new server, dedicated to updater only, should improve the current status.

Crystal hunt
Crystal hunt was really just a small game added to entertain people in MB, then became the most interesting part of MB. We were surprised by that, but surely we didn\'t stop it. It was a way to \"power level\" anyway, and opposed to RP. I remember people camping spawn locations, or using speed hacks to get all crystals before any newbie. To make the game more fun, we planned to add a number of small \"games in the game\" like crystal hunt in the future, but we want to do it in a realistic and meaningful way. Maybe crystal hunt will be back, but in a different format. To the ones that say that crystal hunt was a good way to compete, and now it\'s gone, the answer is that now people compete with combat and dueling. So the ones that want to compete still have their meat.

Bigger community
CB has a bigger community and that brings in many people that are just interesting in \"testing\" our features. So they enter, they play it for 1-2 weeks, they fight and ask silly questions a lot. This behaviour is surely caused by the fact the game is not complete and by the enlarged number of people playing. It\'s not something we can avoid, so the community should develop their ways around this problem, giving more power to the guilds, restricting members to the RP ones only, organizing online meetings and RP parties. On our side, I would like to have in the future more areas that are not accessible to newbies (due to number of quests required to enter, or NPCs allowing you in based on guilds standings or factions), so that high level players will see \"a better world\" around them. Currently this is not possible since all newbies can run everywhere. A bigger world will make this possible. Same can be done for guildhouses, there will be placed restricted (unless they sneak in breaking locks) to guild members only, where RP will be a lot easier to enforce. On this just give us a bit of time.

Fighting
Fighting is seen by many as a bad feature to have today because it\'s unbalances the game toward an hack\'n\'slash approach. I surely agree with this, but combat was really a needed feature to be added in as soon as possible because the NPC AI has a number of big implication with all other parts of the code and features. Adding combat later would have been a *lot* harder for us, since most of the base code should have been changed and redesigned. There are two parts of the \"fighting\" problem. First, fighting is one of the only rewarding actions in game and weapons given in loot are way too powerful. We are aware of this problem and working toward fixing it. The main way to fix it to add new features like crafts and usage of other skills, that will rebalance things. If fighting is not very rewarding people will do it less. We are now fully committed to adding the other features in, so the situation from now on can only improve. Second aspect is that fighting is now allowed nearly everywhere. So you see people fighting even in the plaza, or basically in every location you can walk. This will be change a lot in the future where the city will become mostly an RP place, with crafting, questing and chatting as main activities. Due to space restrictions we couldn\'t implement that yet, so the game is now like a big arena. This will improve with the new areas, and with more quests.

Lack of items
That\'s very true. Roleplaying is also done by buying, trading, wearing, discussing about items found in game, and those should not be only weapons and armors. We will work on that aspect quite soon and we will bring also back the mugs . As soon as crafts are added you will see an incredible number of new items in game.

Setting inconsistencies
As we expanded the world, the story behind the game started to be too limited, and so some changes have already been done to it. I can\'t tell you everything that\'s behind the scenes, but there is much more setting material than the one you see on the web site, and we hope to release this content in books/quests in game soon. The addition of the \"describe world\" feature is already a great way to start. This feature is the one that enables you to right click on the plaza fountain and get a description of it. About inconsistencies in the races introduction text this is now improved. Please read it again now. The racial differencies are evident and cities will keep their traditions and architecture style.


The direction of PlaneShift will always be toward RP against hack\'n\'slash, but surely we need all base features in place, like fighting, before starting the real balancing. There is still much to do, and the playability of PlaneShift will surely change a number of times before reaching a stable point. That\'s one of the aspects of open development, you can play the game earlier with the good and the bad sides of it.

We hope you find the game enjoyable nonetheless, and work with us to make it better and more RP oriented.

[sesmi]

I have an idea: many people like to use the WASD keys for movement, but don\'t want to strafe everywhere. Why not move strafing to the Q and E buttons? that way you can move and strafe at the same time without using both hands.

[Moogie]

Can\'t you just bind those keys yourself?

[Seytra]

First off: thanks for the insights and reasoning behind the points! Especially the reasons for the fighting system being implemented so soon, it\'s a lot clearer and more understandable now.

Originally posted by sesmi
I have an idea: many people like to use the WASD keys for movement, but don\'t want to strafe everywhere. Why not move strafing to the Q and E buttons? that way you can move and strafe at the same time without using both hands.

Or add a \"strafe modifier\" key, like is common in FPS games, that makes you strafe when pressing the turn keys while the modifier key is held down.

Also, I have made a suggestion about reducing / removing the problem of having to click outside the chat window to move, and back inside to chat. The chat toggling key doesn\'t work under all circumstances.

Also, movement should be fine-tunable by the player. Some prefer to walk by default and have a run modifier, some prefer the opposite. Likewise, the autorun / autowalk wish has been posted many times. Additionally, the \"move to\" mode was something really nice. Basically, I wish chatting would be more easy when walking or running somewhere; ATM it\'s close to impossible (to which, at least in part, my aforementioned suggestion would also apply). The problems about mouse run and mouse look (especially in free rotation) have probably been addressed already. Most importantly, though, from an aesthetic aspect, is the mouse cursor that should be selectable to vanish when a key has been pressed and only reappear when the mouse is being moved. Furthermore, I find it annoying that whenever I use mouse look, the cursor is placed at the screen center when I release the mouse. I think it should be placed whereever it was when the mouselook modifier was used.
Likewise, it should be toggleable, not just a modifier key having to be pressed all the time.

Another issue with the movement system is that turning sticks when it was pressed before jumping. So the char jumps in a curve, which is unrealistic. Likewise, movement sticks, but you have to press run before jump, while the other way, jump before run, should also work, at least when the keys are being pressed in quick succession (I often hit both simultaneously and the outcome is more or less random).

Furthermore, but I think that one is well known, when you run or walk down somewhat steep stairs, you almost completely lose control, because you are being treated as jumping and thus turning or other movement is locked in mid-air (not blocked, so when you run down a staircase but had released the turn key only after you entered the stairs, you\'ll end up running into the wall without ability to stop. Likewise, when you move down but didn\'t aim precisely, the line of the fixed movement may well end up in front of a wall or other obstacle without allowing you to maneuver before it\'s too late). This just needs some fine-tuning AFAICS, so as to allow movement for a little while after the initial jump (at stairs, you\'ll have initial jumps each time you hit a step).
Likewise, when walking off an edge, you keep moving forward. However, most of the time, what is meant to be done is to just hop off the edge, as slose to the edge as possible. It now is much harder to stand close to things that you can climb without jumping, like chairs, because you\'ll climb them and when you hop back down, you end up far away, even when you strafe over the edge. So I think this should apply only while running off an edge.

Edit: For the guilds / restricted zones: please be sure to provide an easy way of allowing non-guild members in. Maybe even for the newbies into the \"oldbie zones\". The problem of a newly created char not being allowed out the newbie zones has been discussed in the numerous \"tutorial map\" wishlist threads before, and it probably wouldn\'t be so bad if one had to do a few quests: would making new chars something to think over twice, which IMO is good.
But AFAICS there will be some cases of non-members of guilds still being allowed into some guild HQs. Even members of other guilds. It might be worthwhile to consider an IC-able key or password system: the trusted character would be given a key / admission card / password by an authorized member. This may even be time restricted if the issuer wishes so, and should be, depending on what it is, revokable by the issuer, possibly at some cost, though, in case a key was handed out and locks have to be replaced now.
Likewise, a \"guardian\" mode could be used to on a case by case, temporary basis allow visitors in when they ask at the door. That mode should be arbitrarily assignable to the ranks or even individuals in the guild by the leader or the guilds council.

[jonmack]

I didn\'t post in the original thread, since I spotted it late and everything that I would have said had already been mentioned.

But I do want to take the time now to thank Talad for these public questions & feedback threads. I think to a lot of people the PS team has been perceived to be closed/quiet about feedback and such ( although those of us who have stayed with PS a while know that it\'s just because there are more important things in an already busy schedule ). I think it\'s a very Good Thing indeed to take the time to do this kind of things, so thanks again.

All hail Talad!

Originally posted by Talad
... we will bring also back the mugs .

Best. News. Ever.

[zanzibar]

Originally posted by Moogie
Can\'t you just bind those keys yourself?

Agreed.  It\'s very easy to customize the controls for yourself via the options menu.

[stfrn]

Originally posted by Seytra
First off: thanks for the insights and reasoning behind the points! Especially the reasons for the fighting system being implemented so soon, it\'s a lot clearer and more understandable now.

Originally posted by sesmi
I have an idea: many people like to use the WASD keys for movement, but don\'t want to strafe everywhere. Why not move strafing to the Q and E buttons? that way you can move and strafe at the same time without using both hands.

Or add a \"strafe modifier\" key, like is common in FPS games, that makes you strafe when pressing the turn keys while the modifier key is held down.

Also, I have made a suggestion about reducing / removing the problem of having to click outside the chat window to move, and back inside to chat. The chat toggling key doesn\'t work under all circumstances.

Also, movement should be fine-tunable by the player. Some prefer to walk by default and have a run modifier, some prefer the opposite. Likewise, the autorun / autowalk wish has been posted many times. Additionally, the \"move to\" mode was something really nice. Basically, I wish chatting would be more easy when walking or running somewhere; ATM it\'s close to impossible (to which, at least in part, my aforementioned suggestion would also apply). The problems about mouse run and mouse look (especially in free rotation) have probably been addressed already. Most importantly, though, from an aesthetic aspect, is the mouse cursor that should be selectable to vanish when a key has been pressed and only reappear when the mouse is being moved. Furthermore, I find it annoying that whenever I use mouse look, the cursor is placed at the screen center when I release the mouse. I think it should be placed whereever it was when the mouselook modifier was used.
Likewise, it should be toggleable, not just a modifier key having to be pressed all the time.

Another issue with the movement system is that turning sticks when it was pressed before jumping. So the char jumps in a curve, which is unrealistic. Likewise, movement sticks, but you have to press run before jump, while the other way, jump before run, should also work, at least when the keys are being pressed in quick succession (I often hit both simultaneously and the outcome is more or less random).

Furthermore, but I think that one is well known, when you run or walk down somewhat steep stairs, you almost completely lose control, because you are being treated as jumping and thus turning or other movement is locked in mid-air.

I\'d like to fix those bugs with movement, but most of them I\'m waiting on blueCommand to either finish, or explain what he was planning on doing. For example the turning while falling, you can only move while you are on the ground. That would be a good bit of realisim, except that stoping movemnt is also locked. So if you jump in a curve you will spirial down very oddly because you can\'t tell it to stop.
Hiding the mouse while typing I had not thought of, and can be done pretty quickly. having the mouse reappear where it was before you turned on mouselook is a bit tricky, but I think I can do it too.
So, good suggestions, if you had posted them earlier, you might have them by now

[Keyaz]

the ability to run in any direction, as in reality I can for one, i suppose strafe running is more of a touchy subject, it having no animation currently whatsoever, a simple side step for walk strafe would be simple enough to put in, but the cae if strafe running, i guess, is to have the upper body rotated in the desired direction whilst the lower body remains trotting happily in the chosen direction, this owuld be awkward to animate, and would require more movement rules, im guessing here so just ignore any babble ^^.

bring me to another point, t\'would be wonderful to have the character look in the direction the player is facing, to an extant of reality limitations, ie, no heads on backwards, this would be awesome for roleplay,

example

\'Demarthl looks over idly at the bar\'

*player then rotates entire character back and forth*

as opposed to

\'Demarthl looks over idly at the bar\'

*player moves camera view (mouselook?) and character rotates, head and upper body to suit*

a lot to work on but heh, we\'re getting there ^^

[lynx_lupo]

Very nice summary, it will surely bring more optimism to this place.
*bows* Keep it coming!

@others: this isn\'t a feature request/wishlist thread, you have a whole forum dedicated to that.

[Lolitra, Celorrim Purrty Twins]

It is all much much clearer now... keep up the good work Talad....

The game is still fun presently and looks like it will become the best online!

[Seytra]

Originally posted by lynx_lupo
Very nice summary, it will surely bring more optimism to this place.
*bows* Keep it coming!

Indeed it does. It got rid of a lot of the pessimism that had accumulated with me during the CB era.

Originally posted by lynx_lupo
@others: this isn\'t a feature request/wishlist thread, you have a whole forum dedicated to that.

Originally posted by stfrn
So, good suggestions, if you had posted them earlier, you might have them by now

Well, actually, I have posted a lot of them on the wishlist months ago (save the locked turning issue, which is a bug AFAICS).

And I re-posted them here now because Talad has specifically asked for comments on the movement system, so I figured it would be reasonable to post them here since it\'s on topic and means he won\'t be wading through the wishlist.

Originally posted by stfrn
For example the turning while falling, you can only move while you are on the ground. That would be a good bit of realisim, except that stoping movemnt is also locked. So if you jump in a curve you will spirial down very oddly because you can\'t tell it to stop.

That is exactly what I was trying to say. Basically, when you are turning while jumping, then you will move downwards in a straight line, where your movement was when you left the ground. Your body may retain a rotation, but this would mean that you would be tumbling while falling in a straight line. You wouldn\'t fall in a curve.
Note that \"curve\" and \"straight line\" refer to horizontal movement only. The vertical component will obviously be parabolic due to friction and gravitational acceleration (which will also reduce your tumbling, but only so slightly it can be neglected).

Originally posted by stfrn
having the mouse reappear where it was before you turned on mouselook is a bit tricky, but I think I can do it too.

The way I see it, it would only require you to save the coordinates upon activation of the mouse look / move. Then, when it is released, the mouse cursor could be positioned back there, just like it is being positioned in the center ATM, no?