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Soooo... just saw the Dungeon Maker vid...
Vesavius
Member RarePosts: 7,908
...and have to say... really dissapointed.
Especially considering it's a cornerstone of an expansion that mot devs would deliver as a update.
Pre set maps? No quest giving? No scripting? Not getting to use your characters? Grinding for 'glass' gear?
I was really looking forward to this feature and thought because they were charging that it would be a deep and involved system, especially as I love their housing so much, but what they are offering is a lot less then what CoH gave us for free back when.
Really SOE... this really just needs to be a free update... charging folk for this half arsed system is a farce. It is actually just an basic extension of the housing system 
Comments
you cant use your own character but you do earn exp
at around 25.20 they say how at the end of the dungeon - your character will get the experience earned
its a 40min long video -- with 18 questions answered from players midvideo
as a reminder,
the full feature list for AOD
Beastlords — The most frequently requested feature of EQ1 arrives with the Beastlord class. The 25th class will wear Brawler equipment but otherwise have an archetype of Scout. Will have a separate AA tree for their pet.
Mercenaries — NPCs which can be hired to assist in questing, groups, and raids
Tradeskill Apprentices — Little is known about these, but they use a new crafting table type and offer unique new recipes.
Design Your Own Dungeon — Based on an updated version of the housing system, players can build dungeons using existing Zone styles, placing Items and Mobs picked up from around Norrath. They can then publish their Dungeon for others to play *using avatar NPCs* (you may not use your own character to run a DYOD). Rewards include gear for your main character, or items which can be used to build your own Design Your Own Dungeons.
Item Reforging — Reshuffle some (but not all) of the stats on your items. You’ll also gain an in-game Particle Effect editor.
More AA
I agree its not an inspiring list (EQ's 18th expansion sounds much better)
EQ2 fan sites
I get that there is more in the xpack, but all of it could/ should have been rolled out as GU IMO, as other devs seem to manage (even NCSoft for a game like Aion). Hell, they could have even put the Beastlord in the cash shop and I wouldn't have cared... The inclusion of 'more' AA (how much is 'more'?) is just a cynical move to sell this xpack to folks that don't give a crap about the rest of it tbh.
I guess what I am saying in general is the implemetation of the Dungeon Maker is so below what I was expecting, given what CoH offered years ago... the fact that they are charging for it makes it worse. I just was not expecting simply bigger housing maps that you can put killable mobs on to for others to grind on.
I'm reserving judgement til I actually see the system but in an interview this was said
http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/100699/page/3
What we do is when we’re laying down spawners, people are always like, “Can we script the spawners?” We really don’t want to set up a scripting language. That’s Neverwinter Nights and I don’t want to go there.
What we’re going to do instead is that when you throw down a spawner, it’ll watch around itself for objects that can interact with it. For instance, if you threw down an orc spawner and put down a campfire next to it, when the orcs spawn, they’ll have fire weapons. Or if you put several groups of orcs in several areas, normally, you’d be able to pull each camp separately, but if you put an alarm bell near one of them, when you pull that camp it’ll ring the bell and all of them are going to come. So there’s this object interactivity that the builders can play with. As they collect these different things and put them next to spawners, they’ll be like, “Holy crap! I didn’t expect that!” That will provide variety and eventually they’ll learn what works well and they’ll be able to make really customized content without having to learn a single thing about scripting.
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there's supposed to be traps too but the webcast didnt talk about that
EQ2 fan sites
Well, the trouble is with things like that is exploiters. If you've played CoH lately, probably 90% of all maps are farms for quick leveling or for loot (tickets which can be traded for stuff and sold). Even if you want to use it legit, you have a heck of time finding story arcs to play and getting people to play your story arcs.
R.I.P. City of Heroes and my 17 characters there
Sounds to me like you're ignoring some key facts here when complaining about the content in the expansion.
There's no land content in it, why ? Because the rest of velious is going to be free.
They're offering the most important parts of an expansion for free (actual areas, which they've already named the likes of Skyshrine,WL,Wastes,SG)
To me this expansion is basicaly Lost Dungeons of Norrath..for EQ2.
SOE still gives plenty of content, free and not free in my opinion. Especially when compared to games like WoW that make you pay for damn near everything and push out content at the slowest pace I've ever seen.
SOE will be judging challenge based on how fast players can finish the dungeon
the easier the challenge - the less tokens you get
http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/100699/page/3
Every spawn, every trap, every object of interactivity thing all add up points, so that room will have a certain number of points in it called a challenge rating. We then measure every possible path to get from A to B and we find the easiest path.
Whatever the easiest path challenge rating is becomes the challenge rating for the dungeon.
there will be no loot or experience until you finish the dungeon
players who do not buy expansion will be able to use these dungeons and earn experience/tokens
- but players cannot build dungeons or spend tokens unless they own AOD
EQ2 fan sites
Not sure where you got your 90% statistic from... is that just a guess from you?
I find that the search function is good for finding stuff that dosen't bubble to the top, especially if you use this-
http://cohmissionreview.com/
Sure some folks use it to farm, but there is plenty of legit use of the CoH AE in my experience. A lot of what I see is created is excellent as well.
The EQ2 take on the builder is sorley lacking when compared to the AE toolset.
Well, shame for them is allI can say.
NWN's creation tools, and what was done with them, were amazing.
There is a reason that game is still alive today.
Agree with the OP completely. I think this really could have been implemented better all around.
I give them one or two months after release before they finally allow us to use our real characters, when they realize how little it will probably get used with the way it's setup now. People want to play their own characters - it's not rocket science by any stretch of the imagination.
Well there is two things....
ONe,I do not trust Semd at all,he will somehow tie cash shop into the ideas,i am sure of it.
Two is they do not tihnk at all.They are using the voting,leader boards to police the maps every 24 hours.On the free server people can vote with many accounts.It is also a BIASED system,example you get a large guild to all vote for each other while solo type players are wasting their time to see their map maybe be there for 24 hours then gone ,all that hard work wasted.
I would prefer they just release an Editor.the tools and let people design new maps for them and they pick and choose 1 or 2 every month.The problem is they can't justify charging when you make the content,so they create this design to charge us money.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
i agree your idea is better but i dont thinks soe is trying to charge for maps
-- guess we will have to see if theres any dungeon maps on the SC store (tho I doubt it)
as to the house leaderboard voting being biased? I havent seen any complaints on the forums
EQ2Live or EQ2X
this seems more like WHAT IF reasoning on your part
EQ2 fan sites
I have a very strong suspicion that SoE is not behind this 'expansion'. It looks like a bunch of ideas were thrown together unrelated to the current development and this is unlike anything SoE has ever done before.
Its just speculation,but I would bet money the bigwigs at SCE told Smedley he has to deliver expansions this year for EQ1 and EQ2 due to the huge losses caused by the PSN/SoE hack earlier this year.
more info on dungeon "decorator" posted
http://www.everquest2.com/news/read/current/5054
Once you've chosen a dungeon, you and your friends zone in. The first step is to choose which Adventurer you want to use. You get four Adventurers to start with, but new Adventurers can be found in other ways, such as loot drops out in the game world. (There are about 50 different Adventurers potentially obtainable at launch!)
Each Adventurer has 4-5 abilities and varying stats. Each is designed to fulfill a different role when playing through a dungeon (tanks, dps, support, etc.) When you first pile into the dungeon, each person can select from any of the Adventurers they have collected. You'll have a group window where you can see which adventurer each person in your group has selected, and you can watch the Adventurers change as your groupmates make their choices, allowing you to plan the best party composition.
Once everyone has chosen which Adventurer they want to play, you hit the Ready button and start exploring!
You can fight as much, or as little, as you want in that dungeon. What's the goal? To survive through the dungeon exploration until you find the exit point. Once you reach the exit point, and are ready to leave the dungeon, you click it to get your rewards in the form of XP and dungeon tokens. However, the rewards you earn will depend on the degree of challenge that you defeat while in that dungeon, so sneaking through without killing anything will not gain you as much reward as fighting your way through.
The XP for all the challenges you've overcome throughout the dungeon is awarded all at once when you click the exit point, and the XP goes to whichever character you are logged in as when you play Dungeon Maker. Additionally, your character gets a reward of dungeon tokens to spend on armor, weapons, potions, Dungeon Maker items, and more. However, these tokens can be given to any of your characters, so rewards earned on a dungeon spree can be literally spent on any of your characters, not just the one you currently have logged in.
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