What are your top three issue's that should be improved?

Redruum

Hello everyone!

As you all can see I created a thread www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/216839 for those people that are interested in coming back to AoC or are looking to try AoC for the first time.  It is titled, Ask your AOC questions here. Feel free to ask any questions you would like in that thread and I will answer them to the best of my ability.

For this thread I figured it would be fair and a good idea to hear from the people out there that are currently playing AoC.  Believe it or not the Dev's at Funcom do read these boards.  You my have more then 3 issues, but please only post your top 3.  Also please only post if you are a current or recent subscriber because I am looking for current issue's, not things that have been fixed since you might have left the game 4 months ago.

So my question to you is.....

What are your top 3 issue's that should be improved?

MindTrigger

1)  The linear, closed-up, instanced, zone based world.  This, in my opinion, was the single most depressing gameplay problem with AoC.  You are shoved down pathways, and blocked off by invisible walls everywhere you go.  People were spread around in different instances, so once I left Tortage, the world always felt devoid of other players. There was no sense of world scale or traveling, because you zone everywhere. All of this is a serious step backwards in MMO design, and it just screams "we designed this with consoles in mind".

2)  Crafting and resource gathering is a disaster, and couldn't be much more boring.  The idea of static resource nodes has to be on of the dumbest things I have ever seen in an mmo.  That's just for starters.

3)  The idea I always had while watching the game develop was that PvP battles would be breaking out all over the place, and they would be epic and exciting.  We all know this is not the case.

Two and Three on my list could be fixed by Funcom, should they decide to.  I don't see how they could ever fix the game world design, and that alone is enough to keep me away.

OrionMan

First I'd just like to say to MindTrigger I don't have your problems with the Zoned maps at all. I love the way it's set up in fact. Let me just out of interest ask you, did you play out of the introducing parts of the game >lvl 30. Tortage you see is linear for the reason it is a tutorial and is only supposed to funnel you into the real world. However, your point does touch on something that would be a good idea and I will let that good idea be my forst point.

1) In R.E.Howards literature there are multiple pirate harbors or harbors of free nature harboring a mixture of all races, cultures and nationalities. It would be easy for FC to fetch a couple of more of these starting zones out in the game so that there would be more variety to the first 20 lvls

2) Even though the latest PvE content added to the game is great, it would be great with more Zones (like Field of dead or Ymirs Pass)

3) Sieges is wild fun, it should be easier accesible to people even though it's just to join a guild. Some way to sign up for Siege would be great.

MindTrigger

I played to 40 before my "free" 30 days was up and I quit, so yes I got out of Tortage.  Hell, linear gameplay aside, Tortage was the only polished part of the game, and it really made the rest of it look like garbage when you left the island.

I can understand that some people don't mind the "on-rails" feel of AoC's world, and I truly hope you continue to enjoy AoC.  I'm one of those people who *expects* vast, explorable game worlds.  As AoC is designed now, it feels like a console game, or an FPS single player game adapted to an MMO.  It's not for me, and this is why I most regret buying the game in the first place.  It's too bad, really.  I had nothing but high hopes for it. MMO disappointments seem to be the rule these days, rather than the exception.

xpiher

1) Adding in elements to the PvP system that were talked about prior to beta. Beneficially, the Battle Towers, Blood Money,  and the Mercenary system. For thoes who don't know

Blood Money- In addition to PvP experience points, when a player died he/she would drop blood money. Blood money would be used to purchase the PvP gear, PvP portions, and maybe skills. Every player would drop money based on PvP level, and a portion of that money would come from the players own pocket

Battle Towers - A siege system very similar to Battle Keeps and would offer similar invuls (t3 would be just above t1 keeps). These BT would be 20v20 sieges. A guild that owned a BK could not own a BT, and if a guild had a BT and won a BK they would lose their tower. It gives smaller guilds a chance to do sieges and helps them get into BK sieges either.

Mercenary system - A simple contract system that allows guilds to fill their rosters for sieges, give unguilded players a chance to siege, and could be expanded into a bounty system.

2) Smaller raid dungeons similar to Onyx should be added to the game. These should be 12 man and 18 man dungeons that drop epics, recipes, social pets, ect. The drops shouldn't replace the current raid loot that we do have, but still make the loot good enough to be viable.

3) More social aspects should be added. I like they are adding social pets, but other things like player housing, lock picking, mini games ect should be added to the game as well.

Redruum

These are all great and valid issues.  You can never expect an MMO to get better if you don't voice to the Dev's what you feel is missing or not right with the game.  I will keep compiling these and I will email them to Funcom every so often.  I feel emailing all of these will help as I do not know how often the Dev's check these forums, but I know they do from time to time.

 

Thank you all and keep them coming!

MindTrigger

There is a plethora of feedback, both positive and negative, for Funcom to read and learn from if they care that much. I also know that Funcom had all kinds of feedback and warnings from people in closed beta, and it was clearly ignored as the game went forward and released even though it wasn't ready for prime time. If you are going to enlist players for a closed beta, but then completely ignore their issues, what exactly is the point?

Redruum

Originally posted by MindTrigger


There is a plethora of feedback, both positive and negative, for Funcom to read and learn from if they care that much. I also know that Funcom had all kinds of feedback and warnings from people in closed beta, and it was clearly ignored as the game went forward and released even though it wasn't ready for prime time. If you are going to enlist players for a closed beta, but then completely ignore their issues, what exactly is the point?

 

Thankfully they have moved away from their ways since closed beta.  They removed the old Game director, got rid of a few Dev's and put in place a new Game Director and things are definately looking up.

monoth

1) More level 80 Content

2) Crafting System

3) Better Interface for finding Groups

 

The Crafting Systems needs a major overhaul.   I dont' understand Funcom's direction with crafting, why allow players to craft items that are easier to get by doing the quests or farming mobs?

For example, why even have crafters make Potions if your going to have a NPC sale them also at a fixed price, this makes having a player ran economy next to impossible because your fixing the prices, not to mention it takes a lot of work to get all the ingrediants to make these potions yet ony takes 2 seconds to buy them at a very cheap price.

The player made armor and weapons are terriable looking, there nothing more then copies of the junk armor that drops of mobs. 

The new city/cultural armor / weapon recipes is a good idea, but Funcom has made it so the cost of making them is more then what you can sell them for, 10 rare mats just for a level 60 helmet?!? WTF was Funcom thinking, especially since the crafted helmet is no better then what you can loot.   Also if your going to have crafting make sure that the items players can craft are unique looking and not just skin copies of loot drops. 

 

I agree with the invisable wall design Funcom has used to push people down a predetermined path, It's craptastic