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[Column] Elder Scrolls Online: Asymmetrical Factions
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May a Daedric Prince drag you to purgatory!
Remove classes, let all skills be open and you choose what you want to use, change just takes time.
They want symmetry - allow any race to join any faction.
They want asymmetry - allow any race to join any faction.
Sandbox means open world, non-linear gaming PERIOD!
Subscription Gaming, especially MMO gaming is a Cash grab bigger then the most P2W cash shop!
Bring Back Exploration and lengthy progression times. RPG's have always been about the Journey not the destination!!!
Thats exactly what they are doing and that is the core problem with TESO
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ITS TOO HARD! - Matt Firor (ZeniMax)
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"You're either with us or against us"
If you have asymetrical PvP, players will quickly figure out which one is overpowered FOTM and then the nerfs start. And then they jump to the next FOTM, and they get nerfed, and then the community devolves into calling another class/race/faction overpowered and begging for nerfs.
Mythic games have been horribly unbalanced. Fun? Sure, if you had the right class or were in the preferred faction. Terrible if you were in the wrong class or faction. With 3 factions, it can be masked for a while with population, but with just 2 factions you can't mask the imbalance, as shown with Warhammer.
It is nearly impossible to balance asymetrical PvP.
If races do have different stuff like breathing underwaterm better at magic etc...(which is core to TES games) then you need to minimise other places where imbalance can take place. Locking each race into a faction only cements the imbalance. I really do not understand how the designers do not see the flaw in their design logic by doing so.
Allow all races freedom in the world (I see no downside to it) allow all skills to all races (thus removing any imbalance through skills as anyone can learn any skill so you just need to make sure skills are balanced in themselves and if something is too powerful...well anyone can have it as long as it isn't a neccessity to survive) and allow any race the freedom to join any faction they choose (you can still have prefered factions by race but at least allow people who want to play a particular race the option, via long quest chain perhaps, the freedom to join a faction they choose).
Perhaps you want to play a Redguard who is really not hapy with the alliance and so you want to fight against the alliance to destabilise it and let your race walk free again. What if your character concept were that your family suffered at the hands of an allied faction and you hate the faction because of it...would you relly just accept it or would you at the very least leave the oppression?
I just don't get these design choices...at least not unless I see the choices being made simply because they think they are easier to program and will promote the PvP...which in a TES game is not really a big part of it even if in an MMO it seems you can't mive without PvP being demanded. It just seems they went this direction because they think they can use the TESO lore combined with the DAOC PvP and please everyone....bad news guys....
Michael, that was a well written article using history as a predictor (sort of).
I guess my issue is the same as many others. The fact that we are going to be faction locked based upon race leaves a bad taste in my mouth. These sorts of choices tend to split up groups of folks, or leaves someone mostly unhappy with what their choices are.
In the Elder Scrolls games, there have been alliances between different races, even if they are somewhat shakey. However, at the same time those alliances were also mostly forged in political bonds. The Stormcloaks pretty much didn't like anyone who wasn't a Nord, but if you proved yourself to them, they accepted you with open arms. The Khajit aren't allowed in cities in Skyrim, but they still were able to have successful trading caravans (or so it was implied).
These hard and fast forced alliances between races are being created for game balance reasons, but the fact that they are being created goes against much of what made TESO series great....freedom of choice.
At the same time, perhaps things will make more sense once we are able to see more of the backstory behind these factions. If they take the time to flesh them out using well written lore, that's something many purists can get behind. I have my doubts they will take the time though, which is a shame.
[quote]Originally posted by sapphen
Wow, you completely misread my post. I thought I laid the sarcasm on pretty thick too.
Also, first you said that "balance is an illusion", now you say "MMOs have always been a balancing act".
Which is it.
Yes, animosity that will be fought on the official message boards in the form of nerf posts.No one takes the animosity to the PvP field anymore.
If 1 faction has a class that is perceived as better than the other 2 then the message boards will light up like a Christmas tree. And the perception will never be forgotten.
Heres a hint: Bright Wizard.
Both at the same time. You see as people play and learn the classes they figure out new ways to play them. Sometimes these ways can become OP, then it spreads to other players and before long you have to nerf it to bring it back in line.
That is the balancing act.
The fact that the class was OP the entire time but no one knew it is the illusion.
Sad how only maybe half a dozen posts in this thread had anything to do with the thread's topic on the factions.
I couldn't be more happy that ESO will have more than two factions, because that is the best way to balance out conflict and progression between them all. Every other mmo that only uses two factions are complete and utter morons for not learning from the success of DAoC and soon to be ESO as well.
Diversity > Balance.
I will be very put off with TESO if they water their races down to what Rift did with theirs ie every race the same except for a useless fluff ability.
Balance is a myth, and will never be attained. as long as theirs say maybe 100 people trying to test a system for balance and a 100K players trying to find a advantage/edge the only way for balance to be achieved is to make everyone the same. (Boring!) Even if some form of balance ever was achieved players would still QQ that this or that class or power is over powered.
Developers need to stop worrying about pleasing everyone and trying foe some kinda of mythical "balance" and instead focus on make a FUN, deep and game with enpough complexity that players will play (and keep playing) it and enjoy it even with their perception/opinion that this or tha might not be balance to their liking.
Nope
It's completely imposible to balance any pvp at all where classes and gear exist.
The "balance in a mmo thing" is a lie sold to you by the likes of blizzard, you can't balance a mmo completely, its impossible.
Better to embrace what mmos are and concentrate on what you can do with a massive amount of players in a permanently live world than Chase the pipe dream of balance like unreal tournament or whatever
I'm not sure it is necessary to balance PvP on a class by class basis, but that does not seem to be the issue discussed in the article. At the level of factions a game should be at least roughly balanced.
Losing every time you fight a thief but winning every time against a warrior is one thing. Your whole faction always losing is something else.
Faction balance does not have to be an exact 1:1 match, but it should not be off so much that it makes the game un-fun for a third of your player base.
I'd rather they make an Elder Scrolls game instead of a carbon copy wash.
These factions are at the very root of what makes this game unappealing. DAoC similarities aside, design aspects of 2001 aren't exciting any longer.
a yo ho ho
3 factions was the beauty of DAOC and 2 factions the downfall of Warhammer.
The problem is, with 2 factions.. they do have to be balanced.
With 3 factions, if the devs mess up and make one faction slightly stronger than the other two, the two weaker factions will almost always gang up on the stronger faction. This was constantly the case with DAOC, when one side started to get an advantage, the other two sides would start to cooperate more and more.
There is just a lot more wiggle room for the devs when there are more than 2 factions.
I'm looking for the love button but I can't find it!
I can't believe another great IP is going to be trashed because of this nonsense.
EDIT IN: Don't get me wrong, I don't mind that they have 3 factions. I just think races shouldn't be locked to a faction. They should've been 3 groups of people (mainly comprised of said races) that are fighting over the crown. You would have to join one of these factions to PvP but you can choose not to join and just PvE. There should be quests all over the place for everyone (like in other ES games). The game should have never been focused around this racial war, it doesn't even makes sense lorewise.
It IS impossible to balance anything without removing all differences. The reasons FPS's aren't unbalanced is generally everyone is human and everyone has the same weapon options. The only skill is how a player uses those limted options. You are Fooling yourself if you beleve there will ever be balance in any game with multiple race/class options. Its also human nature to make up excuses like that player only won because he's playing a OP class. Very few will ever admit maybe the flaw was how they handled the fight on ther side or possible lack of skill with thier class. So why chase after something that can never be reached balance is the holy grail ofmany games with developers putting countless time, effort and money into something player will never be happy with rather then trying to make a good game.
This is not to say there should be one class that rules all but the basics should be fairly simply. (A) no class that will win vs every other class more then 50% of the time. Sure a Dragonknight orc may own a wood elf acher 75% but as long aas the breton shadow blade can take the orc dragon knight down 75% of the time and the already mention Wood elf archer can take down the Breton Shadowblade 75% of the time there is a very rough sense of blance in that no one class rules all or is best in all situations. yes a darkelf mage should be better then a Orc mage at magic and yes the orc Warrior should be better then the darkelf warrior in mellee. As such yes One will always be overpowered vs the other in their specialty. Don't make every the bland one size fits all were say a gnome fighter is judt as good a warrior as a human fighter dispite the obvious lack of strength, size, and speed such a class race combo would have.
Themeparkl balance issues seem like such a silly thing to discuss in an mmo based on one of the most popular single player, sandbox RPG series of all time.
Silly indeed.
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Open Factions and races choice would solve the problem of, unbalanced classes or faction. Having mixted races and class would simply have a higher/bigger diversity.
I am also tired of mirror classes, SWTOR is one of them, and the game is dying (to only name one of the reasons).
I can see right now this game is doomed to fail-(in my eyes at least). When I finally got my hands on skyrim I instantly knew that the effort I took to get it was worth it 100 %.
The game you describe is not Elder Scrolls. It's just some other dumb Cookie-cutter MMO.
As for balance, I really don't give a hoot. What bothers me is that they've taken away the ability for me- the consumer - to do whatever the heck I want, and I'm not letting that fly. When I play Elder Scrolls, I want to be able to roam the vast beautiful landscape finding random dragon skeletons and accidentally falling to my death. I want the relative racial freedom that ES has generally provided. Most of all, I WANT TO KILL THE CHILDREN!!! UGH! I could be randomly murdered by some level 300 jerk like in the WoW episode of south park for all I care as long as Tamriel is Tamriel and not Azeroth part two.
Lemme hear those that agree!