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MMORPG item design . Are there only good ?
iixviiiix
Member RarePosts: 2,256
Most of MMORPG create item with only good option , the more level , the more good stats , defend or attack.....ect
But do you think that kind of design interest ?
IMO , things should always come with pros and cons , but nowadays designer only add more than take some out
Why not make sword with super high damage but reduce your MP to 0 ?
Why not make armor give you highest defend but take more damage again magic ?
Why not make item that make player invincible for a minute then die after use it ?
So what are your though about item design ?
Comments
in wizardry online you could get cursed items with only detrimental stats
and they where hard to remove if you equipped them
Most mmorpgs i play have that "balance", high meele defense = low magic defense, high meele brust damage = slow attack, high magic brust damage = high resource consume, etc. Alot of them have diferent itens/sets/enchanted stones/ whatever the name where we choose to increase the X stat but lose Y one.
Even in high lvl, if we choose to have high value in some stat, theres allways other that stay low.
Unless i missunderstand the OP question.
I haven't played DDO in forever but cursed items were always a part of the PnP game so it only makes sense that they found a way to incorporate them in DDO, I just can't remember if there were truly cursed items such as a long sword -2. Of course with identify scrolls you "should" discover that prior to equipping it.
Either way, I do sort of miss having that dynamic in games, but I don't think many gamers these days would agree. They want reward with little to no risk generally from what I've seen.
It's like a good item with a drawback (which is often very worth it to equip like a cursed ring of +5 intelligence might also give you a -1 strength penalty when you wear it but of course a wizard is still going to use that).
DDO also has curses which some monsters cast on you which damage your attributes until you get them removed by a spell/potion.All items in the game come-pre identified so no one would ever equip an only bad item in the first place.
No , you not , but IMO , the "balance" you said not enough , ( i mean not interest)
as you said that they use the balance like "low damage high defend" .
But what ever new version of gears / items are just the upgrade of the old with higher cost , like steel armor have higher defend than copper .
Can't they make the gears/items difference in more interest way ?
For example steel armor is tough but heavy and make you run slower or copper add more shock damage to lighting magic ?
Or like other said "curse" item give greater power but also take away something from you .
ya i'm a tad confused here as well.
although arguing for a more drastic detriment to accompany a more overwhelming reward sounds good in principle.
i think part of the issue would be that it would have to be upfront and obvious so that the player was still in some control of the character's build. like a TCG (i just read the combat post on SotA, so TCG's are on my brain) in mmo's you do build a 'deck' of sorts in that you stack equipment and abilities in a particular fashion. this is part of the fun for a lot of folks i think.
"There are at least two kinds of games.
One could be called finite, the other infinite.
A finite game is played for the purpose of winning,
an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play."
Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
I don't like that design personally.
If you were to go with that, I think a design in which items compliment or "talk" to eachother would be better.
For example:
Sword Does Cleave + Elemental armor = Cone Lightening.
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There are a few games that have those kinds of features, but it's not a very popular design choice.
When designing a game you need to be careful about how (and how much) you punish the people playing your games. If you over do it, you just end up detering people from playing the game. Which is one of the reasons why positive choices are often a better design decision than a bunch of negative tradeoffs.
Having passive negative effects for your characters sound neat on paper, but it doesn't really make your game any more fun. The one exception to this being mechanics which harm your charactr in some way, in order to deal extra damage (or healing) in exchange. Though such mechanics are rarely offered passively, and usually require some kind of activation to trigger.
I self identify as a monkey.
MMOs used to do that. Players didn't like it so they removed it. That whole nasty "decision" and "result of choice" thing.
This went away during the time of you old school diehard flagellates, so any claims this was because of "the instant gratification crowd" is simply ignorance. YOUR crowd didn't like it, so waggle your cane at your buddies.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
If it's simply trading stats, it's rather pointless, especially when you do not need some of those stats.
Whether you get +10 str and -5 int or +5 str., and a ring with +10 int and -5 str. Thats the same as a a wepaon with +5 str and a ring with +5 int. Also, instead of negative values, you can simply have different magnitudes of positive values.
One weapon has +20% damage, but only +5% attack speed. The other one has only +5% damage, but +20% attack speed. No matter which one you use, you "lose" stats, without using negative values. Even if you want to make extreme weapons, one with +200% damage, you can simply assign this weapon the lowest speed. This is still only useful if e.g. only weapon have attack speed, so you can not counteract it, or if the stats are appropriately handled, so +20% attack speed on a weapon is different from +20% attack speed on a ring, as the later may refer to the base value, while the weapon may take feats or skills etc. into account - or the other way round.
Only if you introduce items that do not fit into the current system, which you can not really change at this point (e.g., in an expansion) you would need to resort to negative values. The question would be why one would want to introduce such radically different items into the usually already complex equation..
Negative values can make sense for semantic reasons, e.g., a metal weapon reducing lightning resistance is easier to understand than a wooden weapon *increasing* it. I don't think negative values should be used simply to create differences between weapons, as positive values can do that perfectly fine.
I'll wait to the day's end when the moon is high
And then I'll rise with the tide with a lust for life, I'll
Amass an army, and we'll harness a horde
And then we'll limp across the land until we stand at the shore
GW1 did that in different ways, it was stupid.
WoW had "hurt yourself" ret pallies, bad.