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Amazing article detailing the innovation of EQN and Storybricks

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  • mhallqvistmhallqvist Member Posts: 7
    Originally posted by lizardbones
    Originally posted by Azoth
    Originally posted by Nadia
    Originally posted by lizardbones

    I haven't seen any explanation of what will happen if the players kill all the Orcs, or if they cut down all the trees, which seems very likely, especially on opening day.

    seems like orcs (or mobs) will migrate to easier targets

     

    from Pax 2013, last year

    http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.827117-EverQuest-Next-Is-the-Next-Generation-of-MMOs-PAX-2013

    Georgeson said he wants to get rid of the permanent spawn point for all monsters. Instead, he wants to program monsters with specific AI characteristics and "release them into the void." Take orcs for example. Orcs like gold, but they dislike areas which are patrolled by guards because hey, that means death. So if the designers release a thousand orcs into the world, they will congregate in low-population areas that happen to have a lot of rich adventurers walking through it. "They will stay there until the situation changes," Georgeson said. If you ask guards to start patrolling the woods where orcs are, the band may move on, or if adventurers stop being an easy target, they might also migrate. Of course, your actions could have unintended consequences too. If the band of orcs moves somewhere else, then that area will have to deal with them, and so on.

    The design team will also use this AI to create major story arcs called "rallying calls" and it will be up to the players to complete them. The example given was a noble asking the players to establish an outpost near a goblin king's stronghold. If you go there, you'll have various activities you can do such as building a stone wall around the tents or thinning out the goblins in the nearby woods. Keep in mind, these aren't quests, but open activities you could engage in, and some of them will trigger a response from the AI. If you kill too many goblins, the king will get mad and start sending out raiding parties. If the raiding parties are stymied by the stone wall you erected, the goblin king could recruit gnoll allies and storm your walls with massive siege engines. If the army is defeated, the goblin king will retreat and head off to another region to possibly start another rallying call, while the town you helped found becomes a permanent feature of Norrath.

    But what happens if every orc of a clan is killed ? Is there an invisible spawning point of that tribe that will move till it find a new spot to rebuild the clan or is this clan gone forever ? Does one of those orc have to survive for your action to be remembered or does your action against them is also erased ?

    What happen to the merchant that dies after you spent weeks  to get to like you, will he respawn or be replaced by a new npc that knows nothing about you  ?

    If I kill orcs, does that affect every orcs in the game or only the ones that sees me do the deed or the ones that come in contact with the witnesses ?

     

    Right.  I've been following StoryBricks for a couple years at least.  I'm pretty familiar with how it operates under idea circumstances, but what happens when players act like players?  i.e. Farm the Orcs out of existence or farm the trees out of existence.  That type of thing.  Even if a single player couldn't do it because the Orcs ran in fear, a team of players could certainly do it.  That's the problem with dropping a bunch of demi-gods into a carefully crafted world.  :-)

     

    I'm pretty sure that they have thought about players destroying everything or focusing on a particular race/location but I agree it would be really interesting to get answers to these kinds of questions.

     

    My guess is that you cannot extinct races, they will respawn somewhere else but you might be able to limit their influence greatly. I also guess that some things cannot be destroyed or it might have consequences if you destroy it. If you destroy peaceful cities you might eventually be killed on sight by all civilized races or something similar.

     

    Player will eventually try to break everything in a system thus safeguards are needed. It might seem limiting but I would find it more limiting if I log in after a while and all intelligent NPC:s are dead on the whole server and there are no more quests or stories.


    Also thanks everyone for the links with more storybricks information :)

     

     

  • NanfoodleNanfoodle Member LegendaryPosts: 10,610
    Originally posted by Bresha

    Remember when GW2 had amazing sounding articles? yeah....I do too..

     

    then the game released.

    GW2 preformed just like it said it would. Show me one thing they promised that didnt happen?

  • MarkusrindMarkusrind Member Posts: 359

    A couple of points made by devs.

     

    Area's also have storybricks attached so an area will have tags. These tags are interacted with by NPC's and mobs too. So if you cut down all the tree's in an area it will most likely lose it's 'nature' tag which will have a knock on effect. NPC's and mobs attracted to 'nature' will no longer stick around and those that want to spread nature will be attracted. Basically for each action there will be a reaction.

    As for Orcs a tribe can be destroyed totally apparently. What does that mean? It means that Orcs in an area will no longer be there (but they will be somewhere else). But it also means that there is an area that does not contain Orcs which will of course have a reaction from the storybricks world. Things that were kept away by the presence of Orc's will now find the place attractive and migrate.

    The devs are absolutely aware of the dangers of what players might do and are designing things with that in mind.

  • NadiaNadia Member UncommonPosts: 11,798
    Originally posted by Markusrind

    The devs are absolutely aware of the dangers of what players might do and are designing things with that in mind.

    agree

    http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/08/02/everquest-next-is-real-and-its-amazing

    Players will occasionally be prevented from destroying things, Georgeson says, because otherwise "player cities would become player parking lots." Monsters, however, can and will show up to wreak havoc, and left unchecked, they can do plenty of damage to player settlements.

  • BreshaBresha Member Posts: 65
    Originally posted by Nanfoodle
    Originally posted by Bresha

    Remember when GW2 had amazing sounding articles? yeah....I do too..

     

    then the game released.

    GW2 preformed just like it said it would. Show me one thing they promised that didnt happen?

    Not my point.

     

    My point is this - most people ran wild with all those articles and got so overhyped and excited.Then the game released and it all really wasnt that exciting...

     

    Im betting the same for EQN

  • amx23amx23 Member Posts: 102
    Isnt gw2 the same model as wow only with action/tab combat? This is a totally different animal. You should check out the 2014 videos of this game. Promises are one thing but seeing it for yourself is another.
  • MarkusrindMarkusrind Member Posts: 359

    ZAM (www.zam.com) have just put up an interview with the 2 leads from Storybricks by Locksixtime.

    A very informative listen and sheds more light on what their system does.

    Of course there will be some who doubt it all but these 2 guys are at the top of the tree and really know what AI can or cannot do and they certainly seem confident about it all.

     

  • InfantryonlineInfantryonline Member Posts: 113

    "Change the world, and you write your own story..."       "If you think its the same old mmo, you havent played our game"

     

    "When you walk into a city you will not see a sea of people with question marks over their heads, period. You will see a group of people over there chopping down trees and putting them on a pile next to a group of people building siege equipment. And over on that side of the town you see guards training and over there you see a group of bards having an argument..."

     

    "the game can have a chunk of story, that it wants to tell. The story can be important to be moved up and it doesnt wait on player interaction. the npcs take over some of the roles in this particular chunk of story and they can find the perfect person and come to him and say 'Ted and I, are out to kill such and such orc in the next town over because it will dramatically cut this such and such. And we think You are the perfect guy. So essentially the quest can find you instead of you finding the quest".

     

    "So you find this weapon at the very bottom of a dungeon and you are very proud of it...and what if npcs were afraid of you because you had this weapon, because they know what you went through. Or how about some people saying 'Ok, i want to challenge you, because i want to prove my worth". 

     

     

    image

    ...That's essentially what being smug is. Acting like you're so blatantly right that even the thought of someone disagreeing with you is appallingly stupid and comical. you have a good chance of bullying them into believing you.

  • GdemamiGdemami Member EpicPosts: 12,342


    Originally posted by Infantryonline
    "Change the world, and you write your own story..."       "If you think its the same old mmo, you havent played our game" "When you walk into a city you will not see a sea of people with question marks over their heads, period. You will see a group of people over there chopping down trees and putting them on a pile next to a group of people building siege equipment. And over on that side of the town you see guards training and over there you see a group of bards having an argument..." "the game can have a chunk of story, that it wants to tell. The story can be important to be moved up and it doesnt wait on player interaction. the npcs take over some of the roles in this particular chunk of story and they can find the perfect person and come to him and say 'Ted and I, are out to kill such and such orc in the next town over because it will dramatically cut this such and such. And we think You are the perfect guy. So essentially the quest can find you instead of you finding the quest". "So you find this weapon at the very bottom of a dungeon and you are very proud of it...and what if npcs were afraid of you because you had this weapon, because they know what you went through. Or how about some people saying 'Ok, i want to challenge you, because i want to prove my worth".  

    ...and how is MMO environment handeled - when you have 2 people with different traits interacting with an NPC?

  • AeliousAelious Member RarePosts: 3,521
    Great stuff. I imagined an,early hug where you're outside a city killing a skeleton and 50 NPCs come rushing out after you needing something done.

    Traaaaaain!
  • AeliousAelious Member RarePosts: 3,521
    *bug
  • MarkusrindMarkusrind Member Posts: 359
    Originally posted by Gdemami

     


     

    ...and how is MMO environment handeled - when you have 2 people with different traits interacting with an NPC?

    What do you mean traits?

    Can you give an example of what you are specifically trying to work out or have explained.

     

     

     

  • AeliousAelious Member RarePosts: 3,521
    I think they are wondering what will happen if two players approach an NPC, one with good faction and one with not so good faction.

    If the NPC would have two separate reactions, which would have dominance? It's a good question and I wonder if there will be a priority for "emotion", meaning how far up or down the faction scale the player is.
  • ArchlyteArchlyte Member RarePosts: 1,405

    I'm pretty sure Azzamassin said he wasn't going to play this game at some point. Now those who don't want to play it are somehow bad people? Put me in that category then, because all the cool AI won't make up for the cartoon characters and the shit combat as demonstrated in Landmark. This would have to be the first MMO that delivered blowjobs to overcome the deficits it has. Oh, and there is no case history to be pieced together, I don't hate EQN because of any other game before it. I hate this fucker for how dumb it looks and feels all on its own. The AI thing is only good because someday someone will make a serious MMO with the same features.

    Innovation: Yes

    The second coming: No

     

     

    MMORPG players are often like Hobbits: They don't like Adventures
  • InfantryonlineInfantryonline Member Posts: 113
    Archeage has a million people sign up for it. Frankly, if EQ Next has half of that it would be a success in my mind. The draw of having 40 classes and no quests super cool AI feature and interface and free to play will draw people. They are already planning the first expansion i heard at SOE live at least the AI (storybricks) has something in mind on how to expand it. Im pretty sure they can capitalize on the marketplace or something of that sort. So, basically i couldn't care less if people don't want to play it or will not. They will be griefers anyway. I personally predict 500,000 people will sign up at launch limited to the hardware you need to run this game. If only SOE knew how to market their games...

    ...That's essentially what being smug is. Acting like you're so blatantly right that even the thought of someone disagreeing with you is appallingly stupid and comical. you have a good chance of bullying them into believing you.

  • InfantryonlineInfantryonline Member Posts: 113
    Originally posted by Archlyte

    I'm pretty sure Azzamassin said he wasn't going to play this game at some point. Now those who don't want to play it are somehow bad people? Put me in that category then, because all the cool AI won't make up for the cartoon characters and the shit combat as demonstrated in Landmark. This would have to be the first MMO that delivered blowjobs to overcome the deficits it has. Oh, and there is no case history to be pieced together, I don't hate EQN because of any other game before it. I hate this fucker for how dumb it looks and feels all on its own. The AI thing is only good because someday someone will make a serious MMO with the same features.

    Innovation: Yes

    The second coming: No

     

     

    I can guarantee you this game wont see red. Its planned for 15 years. And they dont have to spend tens of millions to target and appeal to the pokemon generation (though thats kinda money seeing how the tweenieboppers dominated MTV TRL voting boy bands in and how they determine the most viewed in youtube) i mean the devs at SOE just use their higher than average brains and pop out mmo after mmo and games after games. And their games are so much more intelligently thought out than WoW which probably spends millions trying to get to what appeals to pokemon type kids. Most minimum wagers CAN afford crappy computers and internet to run such games that Blizzard pops out and as long as its reasonably a game they will make TONS of money off of them because it feeds into what these kids want. Cinematics and a game that understands them because "adults" don't. I laugh at that ecological system they got going. Yeah, cute.

     

    I should post a video on the reveal of WoD and how the Blizzard employees tried to appeal to the reason why theyre billionaires. Just the way they talked to the audience was funny. These were 40+ year old men. It reminded me of a Simpsons episode where Mr. Burns tried to get the school to invest in his power plant.

    ...That's essentially what being smug is. Acting like you're so blatantly right that even the thought of someone disagreeing with you is appallingly stupid and comical. you have a good chance of bullying them into believing you.

  • MarkusrindMarkusrind Member Posts: 359
    Originally posted by Archlyte

    Put me in that category then, because all the cool AI won't make up for the cartoon characters and the shit combat as demonstrated in Landmark.

    Cartoon characters or Stylized characters? First pass. Only 1 version shown. Many different models to come.

    Shit combat? You tried it? It's fun. Its the first pass. It is only 3 weapons out of many, with no class skills of at least 40.

    On second thoughts, the game will not miss you so good luck elsewhere.

     

     

     

  • RydesonRydeson Member UncommonPosts: 3,852
    Originally posted by Aelious
    I think they are wondering what will happen if two players approach an NPC, one with good faction and one with not so good faction.

    If the NPC would have two separate reactions, which would have dominance? It's a good question and I wonder if there will be a priority for "emotion", meaning how far up or down the faction scale the player is.

         This is exactly the issue I have and been asking , with no response..  If I'm playing a Paladin and my wife is playing a Shadow Knight..  Technically we are opposites, so will this cause significant problems on HOW NPC's react to us, and will Storybricks end up being an invisible wall that keeps my wife and I playing together..  Let alone what this will do with groups of 6 or more..  And if Storybricks doesn't effect us, then the whole premise of "things matter" is just a ruse.. ???

  • AeliousAelious Member RarePosts: 3,521
    Originally posted by Rydeson
    Originally posted by Aelious
    I think they are wondering what will happen if two players approach an NPC, one with good faction and one with not so good faction.

    If the NPC would have two separate reactions, which would have dominance? It's a good question and I wonder if there will be a priority for "emotion", meaning how far up or down the faction scale the player is.

         This is exactly the issue I have and been asking , with no response..  If I'm playing a Paladin and my wife is playing a Shadow Knight..  Technically we are opposites, so will this cause significant problems on HOW NPC's react to us, and will Storybricks end up being an invisible wall that keeps my wife and I playing together..  Let alone what this will do with groups of 6 or more..  And if Storybricks doesn't effect us, then the whole premise of "things matter" is just a ruse.. ???

     

     

    We'll have to see how that pans out. Other than going back to previous mentions by SoE or SB it would all be guesswork. When I listened to the interview Lock did with the two SB developers they did hit on the fact that influence with one entity or another was fluid and could go back and forth depending on current actions. There may be a scenario where you and some Elves fight with Orcs to battle a common enemy. I believe they also stated that races of different geological locations may treat you different.

     

    Hypothetically speaking in a game where your actions are "remembered", being in a party that is gaining or losing influence should effect all players in the group. In the specific scenario you pose you've both already attained one of the perks of gaining high influence of an NPC faction or group, unlocking the class. If you were each trying to gain those classes I doubt you'd be able to do that as they are on seemingly opposite sides of the spectrum.

     

    There will be certain trade-offs to a system that attempts to be a "living and evolving world." I like the idea that if I want to be a Paladin I need to act like one and even once I am a Paladin need to continue acting like one if I wanted to be treated as such. This includes the actions of the company I keep.

  • FdzzaiglFdzzaigl Member UncommonPosts: 2,433

    The story bricks sound very interesting. Of course the proof will be in the tasting for that feature too.

    There are many features of EQN which interest me and I have no problem with the artstyle. But to get me interested in the game they'll need to show me their combat is worth playing, I'm thoroughly underwhelmed with the direction they've taken there so far.

    Feel free to use my referral link for SW:TOR if you want to test out the game. You'll get some special unlocks!

  • AeliousAelious Member RarePosts: 3,521

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COdpL6rwuao


    The audio of the interview Lock did with the StoryBricks guys.

  • mhallqvistmhallqvist Member Posts: 7
    Originally posted by Infantryonline

    "Change the world, and you write your own story..."       "If you think its the same old mmo, you havent played our game"

     

    "When you walk into a city you will not see a sea of people with question marks over their heads, period. You will see a group of people over there chopping down trees and putting them on a pile next to a group of people building siege equipment. And over on that side of the town you see guards training and over there you see a group of bards having an argument..."

     

    "the game can have a chunk of story, that it wants to tell. The story can be important to be moved up and it doesnt wait on player interaction. the npcs take over some of the roles in this particular chunk of story and they can find the perfect person and come to him and say 'Ted and I, are out to kill such and such orc in the next town over because it will dramatically cut this such and such. And we think You are the perfect guy. So essentially the quest can find you instead of you finding the quest".

     

    "So you find this weapon at the very bottom of a dungeon and you are very proud of it...and what if npcs were afraid of you because you had this weapon, because they know what you went through. Or how about some people saying 'Ok, i want to challenge you, because i want to prove my worth". 

     

     

    image

    Here are some more information from that interview. They are not really exact qoutes since I tried to shorten them a bit but they should give you an idea of what the developers want:

    The developers realize that there are a lot of unanswered questions.

    It didn’t make sense to have static quests in an evolving world.

    The map in the storybricks demo could represent large regions or small regions like a cursed temple could be a region. You could affect that temple which then creates values that affects a regions which then creates values that affects a country which then creates values that affects the world.

    For example if the evil god that is buried in the cursed temple is awakened it may affect a region larger than the temple. If that god starts a religion it could affect the whole country or world.

    It’s like overlapping spheres of influences which affects larger or smaller areas

    Can I miss content? Yes but there will always be content. There is no scripted content, you are participating in a changing world. This will be problematic for completionists since it will no longer will be realistically possible to do everything. There will always be too much to do and you will never be able to finish all of it. When you log in next there will be different stuff to do.

    The more you do for certain factions the more they will ask of you. You can declare that there are things that you care about in the world and invest in that. We know what people of a certain organization wants and if you invest in an organization you will get that kind of content. This means that you can tailor your experience to your playstyle.

    When you invest in a faction you will get deeper story, but you will also get access to classes, advanced items and things that the developers couldn’t talk about. “I improved my story as much as my character.”

    There is an idea to put the Rohsong online and share it so other people could see your story. There is also an idea to let the Rohsong show only short text or go into a lot more detail about your story. You can also go to a place and learn the story and history of that place. You could for example learn that the nature essence has gone from a region due to devastation and you might be able to work to bringing it back.

    The lore, design and the AI is three components of the same thing. Even if the content is generated SOE still would want the lore and story.

    If you want to find out what happens in neighbouring areas you could for example go to a tavern and NPC could tell you.

    The world shows the state it’s in. If the NPC:S are sick they look sick, if they are famished they looked famished. If they are attacked they are afraid and try to barricade themselves

    NPC can react to how you look. If you have a religious item on you NPC can assume that you support the values of that religion and react differently. If for example you look like a knight of justice an NPC can tell you about a justice quest.

    If an NPC will get clothes of a queen like in the night elf demo she will act like a queen and other NPC:s will start treating her like the queen. The player could wear the same clothes and get the same response. This will enable a lot role playing. Items you find could could make NPC:s react differently to you and for example different night elves could react differently.

    Things that dictates NPC behaviour is among other race, emotions, group belonging, location and traits. An example could be a greedy priest, a violent priest.

    Resources are at the heart of this system and we have only shown a few of them but there are resources that are not tied to stuff you can find in the world like gems. It could be security, honor, justice or chaos. If there for example is no stability in the region, well monsters like that alot.

    One npc won’t decide that he/she will move from a town but we can have a sim city approach like your level of happiness is not high enough so 10% of the population will move and will not be there anymore.

    Organization can change relationship between each other. It works in the same way as relationships between players and organizations.

    We don’t want to gate content. We don’t want you  not being able to talk to the orcs if you are friends with the elfs. But the elfs will give you more content and a deeper story.

    If you want to make your story about helping farmers for the next 10 years you can do that and travel around the world and help farmers. You will be the farmers hero.

    What if I’m the middle of a quest and can’t log on for a couple of days and most other people are working in another direction? Then you might not be able to finish your quest. If you are in a location where there is a large amount of player you are part of a community and the will of that community will shape that location.

    Something a lot of players worry about is that a certain group will ruin the experience for everyone else?I don’t think that a small portion of players can ruin the fun for everyone since the world is big and the forces in the world are large as well. That being said the first months of a launch is often plagued by some bugs and you might need to put some checks and balances in place. But if a large amount of players want something this will happen and lead to other events and stories.

    Do you expect servers to develop personalities? Yes the world will become a reflection of the population on that server.

    We don’t want to lead players into traps but there could be action will lead to bad results. Like if you kill all dryads the forest could become much dangerous. We could give hints like NPC:s saying that I remember before the dryads came and how dangerous it was. Choices are only choices when they are informed.

    Indirect pvp, players are working on opposing goals. There could be direct pvp for players interested in that, it’s not the focus of the experience right now. Your actions would matter to other players to. If you have a group of players collection food resources for an army one method to thwart that is that you could burn the food, poison the food and let them deliver it or take the food for you own army.


    The game will in general be harder the further away from civilization you are since it would be less secure.

  • mhallqvistmhallqvist Member Posts: 7
    Originally posted by Aelious
    Originally posted by Rydeson
    Originally posted by Aelious
    I think they are wondering what will happen if two players approach an NPC, one with good faction and one with not so good faction.

    If the NPC would have two separate reactions, which would have dominance? It's a good question and I wonder if there will be a priority for "emotion", meaning how far up or down the faction scale the player is.

         This is exactly the issue I have and been asking , with no response..  If I'm playing a Paladin and my wife is playing a Shadow Knight..  Technically we are opposites, so will this cause significant problems on HOW NPC's react to us, and will Storybricks end up being an invisible wall that keeps my wife and I playing together..  Let alone what this will do with groups of 6 or more..  And if Storybricks doesn't effect us, then the whole premise of "things matter" is just a ruse.. ???

     

     

    We'll have to see how that pans out. Other than going back to previous mentions by SoE or SB it would all be guesswork. When I listened to the interview Lock did with the two SB developers they did hit on the fact that influence with one entity or another was fluid and could go back and forth depending on current actions. There may be a scenario where you and some Elves fight with Orcs to battle a common enemy. I believe they also stated that races of different geological locations may treat you different.

     

    Hypothetically speaking in a game where your actions are "remembered", being in a party that is gaining or losing influence should effect all players in the group. In the specific scenario you pose you've both already attained one of the perks of gaining high influence of an NPC faction or group, unlocking the class. If you were each trying to gain those classes I doubt you'd be able to do that as they are on seemingly opposite sides of the spectrum.

     

    There will be certain trade-offs to a system that attempts to be a "living and evolving world." I like the idea that if I want to be a Paladin I need to act like one and even once I am a Paladin need to continue acting like one if I wanted to be treated as such. This includes the actions of the company I keep.

    As I interpret it both of you would probably be able to talk to both factions but one of you would get much more content. However if you help the faction by helping your wife with her quest your standing with that faction will rise but your standing with the opposing faction could fall.

    But if you think if it in another way if you play wow and you are alliance and your wife is horde you can’t play together at all and even if you choose the same faction you miss “half” the content. Here it could even be beneficial to play with people with different allegiances since you can see more content until your actions push you down to neutral with both factions :)

    There would probably also be a lot of other factions which you could work together on. In the interview they will state that you will never run out of content or be able to finish all content so one solution is to neither work on faction A or B when you play together but help faction C-Z.

    Since they also stated that they don’t want to gate content and that there always will be more than one way to gain for example classes I believe that skipping one faction won’t limit your characters “power”  but lore and personal preferences could of course want a player to work with different factions.

  • NitthNitth Member UncommonPosts: 3,904


    Originally posted by mhallqvist
    Originally posted by Infantryonline "Change the world, and you write your own story..."       "If you think its the same old mmo, you havent played our game"   "When you walk into a city you will not see a sea of people with question marks over their heads, period. You will see a group of people over there chopping down trees and putting them on a pile next to a group of people building siege equipment. And over on that side of the town you see guards training and over there you see a group of bards having an argument..."   "the game can have a chunk of story, that it wants to tell. The story can be important to be moved up and it doesnt wait on player interaction. the npcs take over some of the roles in this particular chunk of story and they can find the perfect person and come to him and say 'Ted and I, are out to kill such and such orc in the next town over because it will dramatically cut this such and such. And we think You are the perfect guy. So essentially the quest can find you instead of you finding the quest".   "So you find this weapon at the very bottom of a dungeon and you are very proud of it...and what if npcs were afraid of you because you had this weapon, because they know what you went through. Or how about some people saying 'Ok, i want to challenge you, because i want to prove my worth".      image
    Here are some more information from that interview. They are not really exact qoutes since I tried to shorten them a bit but they should give you an idea of what the developers want:

    The developers realize that there are a lot of unanswered questions.

    It didn’t make sense to have static quests in an evolving world.

    The map in the storybricks demo could represent large regions or small regions like a cursed temple could be a region. You could affect that temple which then creates values that affects a regions which then creates values that affects a country which then creates values that affects the world.For example if the evil god that is buried in the cursed temple is awakened it may affect a region larger than the temple. If that god starts a religion it could affect the whole country or world.It’s like overlapping spheres of influences which affects larger or smaller areas

    Can I miss content? Yes but there will always be content. There is no scripted content, you are participating in a changing world. This will be problematic for completionists since it will no longer will be realistically possible to do everything. There will always be too much to do and you will never be able to finish all of it. When you log in next there will be different stuff to do.

    The more you do for certain factions the more they will ask of you. You can declare that there are things that you care about in the world and invest in that. We know what people of a certain organization wants and if you invest in an organization you will get that kind of content. This means that you can tailor your experience to your playstyle.

    When you invest in a faction you will get deeper story, but you will also get access to classes, advanced items and things that the developers couldn’t talk about. “I improved my story as much as my character.”

    There is an idea to put the Rohsong online and share it so other people could see your story. There is also an idea to let the Rohsong show only short text or go into a lot more detail about your story. You can also go to a place and learn the story and history of that place. You could for example learn that the nature essence has gone from a region due to devastation and you might be able to work to bringing it back.

    The lore, design and the AI is three components of the same thing. Even if the content is generated SOE still would want the lore and story.

    If you want to find out what happens in neighbouring areas you could for example go to a tavern and NPC could tell you.

    The world shows the state it’s in. If the NPC:S are sick they look sick, if they are famished they looked famished. If they are attacked they are afraid and try to barricade themselves

    NPC can react to how you look. If you have a religious item on you NPC can assume that you support the values of that religion and react differently. If for example you look like a knight of justice an NPC can tell you about a justice quest.

    If an NPC will get clothes of a queen like in the night elf demo she will act like a queen and other NPC:s will start treating her like the queen. The player could wear the same clothes and get the same response. This will enable a lot role playing. Items you find could could make NPC:s react differently to you and for example different night elves could react differently.Things that dictates NPC behaviour is among other race, emotions, group belonging, location and traits. An example could be a greedy priest, a violent priest.

    Resources are at the heart of this system and we have only shown a few of them but there are resources that are not tied to stuff you can find in the world like gems. It could be security, honor, justice or chaos. If there for example is no stability in the region, well monsters like that alot.

    One npc won’t decide that he/she will move from a town but we can have a sim city approach like your level of happiness is not high enough so 10% of the population will move and will not be there anymore.

    Organization can change relationship between each other. It works in the same way as relationships between players and organizations.

    We don’t want to gate content. We don’t want you  not being able to talk to the orcs if you are friends with the elfs. But the elfs will give you more content and a deeper story.

    If you want to make your story about helping farmers for the next 10 years you can do that and travel around the world and help farmers. You will be the farmers hero.

    What if I’m the middle of a quest and can’t log on for a couple of days and most other people are working in another direction? Then you might not be able to finish your quest. If you are in a location where there is a large amount of player you are part of a community and the will of that community will shape that location.

    Something a lot of players worry about is that a certain group will ruin the experience for everyone else?I don’t think that a small portion of players can ruin the fun for everyone since the world is big and the forces in the world are large as well. That being said the first months of a launch is often plagued by some bugs and you might need to put some checks and balances in place. But if a large amount of players want something this will happen and lead to other events and stories.

    Do you expect servers to develop personalities? Yes the world will become a reflection of the population on that server.

    We don’t want to lead players into traps but there could be action will lead to bad results. Like if you kill all dryads the forest could become much dangerous. We could give hints like NPC:s saying that I remember before the dryads came and how dangerous it was. Choices are only choices when they are informed.

    Indirect pvp, players are working on opposing goals. There could be direct pvp for players interested in that, it’s not the focus of the experience right now. Your actions would matter to other players to. If you have a group of players collection food resources for an army one method to thwart that is that you could burn the food, poison the food and let them deliver it or take the food for you own army.

    The game will in general be harder the further away from civilization you are since it would be less secure.


    The thing is, Who puts the cursed god in the temple?

    Is a model selected at random and behaviors generated dynamically?
    or is there structure to this? (trigger does this).

    Regardless, I think they will come back to the problem gw2 has, That is events have a predefined cycle and trigger.(in the case of unique mobs).

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  • MarkusrindMarkusrind Member Posts: 359
    Originally posted by Nitth

     


     


     

    The thing is, Who puts the cursed god in the temple?

    It could be there from the original design of the game.

    It could be there through player interaction.

    It could be there through the actions of the developers, introducing another storyline into the world.

    Is a model selected at random and behaviors generated dynamically?

    Each NPC can be individually created or procedurally generated.

    Probably how it will work is a template is chosen, lets say a Dark Elf, and then the procedurally generated traits are modified by a developer where needed.


    or is there structure to this? (trigger does this).

    Not sure what you mean by a trigger but because NPC's, actions, activities, regions, objects, area's, items....basically everything is tagged and so interaction with it can effect everything else.

    For example a stream might be tagged as nature and hydration. So anything that needs to hydrate would drink if they were thirsty upon coming across the stream. A fish swimming in the stream is there because they are nature. The fish is also tagged food so when another creature or animal needs food they might catch the fish to eat it. Perhaps a group of Orcs capture the fish but they will not eat raw food so will cook it. Perhaps one of the Orcs doesn't like fish so will have to go hunt something else, like a rabbit (tagged food) or deer (tagged food).

    Regardless, I think they will come back to the problem gw2 has, That is events have a predefined cycle and trigger.(in the case of unique mobs).

    It doesn't really work using predefined cycles. Each NPC works by following certain rules. Each of these rules is influenced by the current environment around it. As their needs and environment change so does their activities.

    I guess there might be predefined things going on but essentially they would be needs based. So the Orcs might see a certain place as their 'home' so will always try to recover it if they are driven away but how they get driven out and how they achieve getting back would not be done using predefined scripts over and above generalised things like 'acquire x wealth, recruit x Orcs to army, elect leader, hold war council, declare war, return to home, fight for home, win home, relax. All of these 'needs' can be achieved in various ways so essentially even a 'predefined cycle' would consist of many variations during each cycle.

     

     

     

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