Hey, Vanguard fans! Last weekend members of the team (myself, producer Harvey “Rahtiz†Burgess, designer Corey “Ceythos†Lefever, designer Will “Wigin†Bidermann, and technical director Todd “Hobart†Schmidt) descended on Vegas for SOE Live. Meeting players and seeing their dedication and enthusiasm was awesome, and much fun was had by all. On Friday we hosted the first of two Vanguard panels, simply titled “Meet the Devsâ€. It was an informal get-together in which the team introduced ourselves and took questions. We were joined by Free Realms creative director Salim “Silius†Grant and discussed a variety of topics about the history and present state of the game. Thanks to it being recorded by our friend Quert, you can watch the panel for yourself here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvWd...eature=youtu.be The second panel was called “The Future of Vanguardâ€, which, as the name implies, focused on upcoming changes to the game. We detailed a few things you can expect in the near future, as well as hinted at some places we’d like to take the game further down the road. Once again, Quert recorded the festivities and posted them for us: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooeA...eature=youtu.be At both panels, we were joined by our community manager Zatozia, who chatted with attendees and handed out goodies! (continued below)
In addition to the two panels, our team spent a lot of time hanging out with our players, chatting, socializing, answering questions, and sharing a cookie (and beverage) or two. This was perhaps the most valuable time of all, as everyone could just be themselves and see that the biggest thing we have in common is an abiding love for this game. GM Autobahn also spent time with the crew and received much praise for the awesome job he does making Vanguard great. There were several overall themes that connected the panels, as well as our general discussions. First and foremost, we need to keep improving the game; stomping out bugs and increasing performance is a big part of that, but so is raising the quality of content in Vanguard. Basically, we need to have a solid foundation to build from and draw players back in. Along with that, we need new, fresh content at the high-end game. Our players have gone far too long without new content to enjoy, and resolving this is a key area of focus for the team. We revealed that we’re rolling out two changes that have been much requested by players: the removal of XP penalties for upper level zones, and a change to the Shores of Darkness riftway to allow level 50 characters of any sphere to use it. These are great changes that should increase options for players near the level cap. City of Brass is our first new zone in a long time, and will be going live in November. It has group content targeted at high-level players, with drops intended to complement—not replace—Pantheon gear. We realized that the testing history of this zone is a bit storied, but we need the help of players to ensure the zone is fun and rewarding. Ceythos has already begun organizing a playtest on the Test server, and we immediately got volunteers to help. Our next target for new high-end content is Pankor Zhi, which has been highly anticipated by players for a long time. It will be the beginning of a story arc that leads to Stiirhad and beyond. On the raid front, we plan to continue the Sons of Torsheim arc with more fights from that saga. Looking further down the road, we will be revamping some of the zones that used to be starter areas (such as Lomshir) and creating additional paths of quality content through the world. We also intend to support the spheres of diplomacy and crafting, continuing the sagas that currently end at level 30. And though it didn’t come up at the panel, we also are looking at ways to a viable path for solo/small group play from levels 50 to 55. Someone in the audience asked how we saw the future of Vanguard five years down the road. Our response was that we want to see the game live up to its potential, that it becomes a stable and polished play experience with great content that fills out the massive world that is Telon. We need to be able to attract and keep new players, and if we can keep on doing that, the future for the game is bright indeed. There were a lot of other topics that came up during the course of our panels and conversations—far too many to go into a lot of detail about. I’ll just mention them here, with additional comments where appropriate. Keep in mind that these are not things that we are promising; they were items discussed that we will consider, but may or may not act on in the short or long term. The LFG tool needs to be improved. (We agree, and will investigate improvements.) Simplifying the level 1 to 10 abilities went too far. (We agree, and will add a few abilities back in to restore the flavor of the classes.) Currents in rivers are cool. Some players wished they hadn’t been mostly taken out. It sucks that drums no longer affect bard speed. (We agree, and intend to let drums give a bonus again, but this requires digging through some code to implement properly.) There was desire for us to implement a flying mount quest around level 20. Players ask that on threads where we ask for feedback/input, we provide a recap of key points of what we’ve taken away from the information presented so far before locking threads down. (Good idea.) Item appearances in houses – making sure more items have an appearance when placed, rather than just a cup as the current default. (This will take some digging, but we’ll work on it.) Need more level 45+ content. (We agree, but need more time to make sure we deliver at the right level of quality.) Custom UIs need to save properly on server side rather than just on client side. (We agree and will investigate.) More customizations in the UI (textured fonts, movable compass, etc). Changes to clickies was brought up multiple times. While things won’t go back to the way they were, it was suggested that we look at some of the items that share timers to see if they should be categorized differently. Need auto stacking of inventories, such as when moving items into the bank. A search feature for inventories would be awesome. Need more options/availability for epic slivers. Veteran’s Lockbox was intended as a new bank accessible only to eligible players. Unfortunately they were pushed out before the account entitlements were implemented. We will try to get this resolved soon. Pantheon and KDQ faction grinds feel excessive. A 70-slot bag for crafting items would be a welcome addition to the Marketplace. Need tool tips for items in your house. Need a quest to teach classes about their choice in paths. For example, a cleric at level 20 is not told they have a class path they can pick, When feigned death, the player’s name reads "corpse of XXX " and can be targeted but not healed. Currently pets are too close when summoned or returning from a fight. Would be nice to have a use for city faction coins after you’ve gotten mounts and gear. Lost souls still drop even if you are done with the quest. Lower level shadowhounds have the same abilities as the level 56 shadowhounds in SoD, which makes it pretty tough for a person to do part of the shadowhound quest. Echoes for the T3 Pantheon gear only drop off crates or the metal nodes only. Would be nice if reaping, lumbering, or skinning yielded Echoes. Level 6 bags drop off names in SoD. Mobs killed in BoD will not disappear, some stay up for days or till server /chunk is restarted. Want more NPCs like smelly cat. I’m sure there were plenty of other topics and tidbits that my sleep-deprived brain missed. Those who attended can feel free to chime in on other items we discussed. Once again, I want to say a huge thanks to the players who spent their time giving us their thoughts and feedback. It may sound cheesy, but I’m sincere when I say that we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for players like you. You inspire us to want to make the game better, and that’s something we’re tremendously grateful for. Thanks to Tinqu, Rufin, Leav, Dosi, Quert, Azakulos, Autobahn, and everyone else who made SOE Live so awesome! We can’t wait until next year!
Thank you for the recap, I am amazed no one asked this: What is vanguards future for the level cap of 55/55/50? Is the idea to never level beyond current caps and just quest for slightly better gear? OR is there a plan to continue the best part of Vanguard pre 50? The dungeon quest!!!! I stop playing at 50, but if there was 100 more levels of what we see 1-50, I would be level 150!
Moorgard wrote: Huge thanks to the team for going ang listening, now for the first time ever I wish I went to a Fanfaire.
Thanks much for the recap. Very encouraging stuff to hear. I hope you can work out as fast as possible some of the small annoying bugs that drive away new players. We need them to stick around!
One more thing.... I hear a lot of talk about new content, so thats great. What I was thinking was maybe it would be better to try to bundle a bunch of content together all at once, along with some new features and such. Call it an expansion pack, and sell it for like $30. My feeling is that if an announcement of an expansion was to come out, that would be a big draw in getting people who have quit to come back and start playing again. There is this mentality of "oh I better get geared up for the new content" that exists when people think about an expansion. New content is great, but it just seems like an official Expansion Pack announcement would carry more 'oomph'
Moorgard wrote: they do disapear, but you have to harvest them first. this requires a high level quarrier.
Take a look at how Eve Online does their inventory search. I mentioned this a while ago before EQ II added a search feature. You type in a box and as you type the inventory auto searches, narrowing down until it finds what you are typing. This way you can also just partially type something and have a list of what you typed (or icons as Eve Online has icons, text, etc) if there is more than one item with similar text in its name. Please stop removing crafting options from players. Didn't the EQ II panel (Dave) say that they want to stop doing this and give back crafter's the option of creating items so that the Marketplace doesn't steal from their income? Bags should be made by the appropriate professions, not put on the Marketplace.
darn was hoping someone would ask about the graphic for the t3 disciple hat... that was my second favorite head slot graphic in game! (my favorite being the regular rice hat worn by an npc in tanvu).
Moorgard wrote: Also to note that similar mobs in surrounding chunks ( the 5 dot elementals in Forgotten Peninsula and Isle of Garuzamet) do not respawn either until the server or chunk is restarted. Also there loots tables seem to have been changed with F2P i.e certain thigns no longer dropping or drop chance reduced.
Mattise wrote: I could not agree more. I believe a lvl cap increase to 60 would put it over the top too! However with VG back on steam and an official real deal expansion release VG will get some serious returning players and new ones as well for that matter. I know I'd buy it up in a hearbeat. Just like at least 95% of this forums users too. Get us some more fixes and CoB then get this expansion going! It would be a tremendous success for VG IMHO
This is a very good list and I am glad that it looks like VG has a lot going foward for it which was discussed at SOE live. What I am surprised that wasn't discussed is: 1. Adding tails to the animal races. There was a whole forum post about this where a few devs (even Silius) commented on it. 2. Brining back the original charater models AND water reflections, etc. Moorguard, if you get a chance, google search beta screens for VG, it's hard to believe that this game actually was more visually stunning in beta than it is now. I know these things were changed/disabled because computers at the time just couldn't run the game that well, but now a days most standard gaming PCs can brute force this game to decent frames. Just my 2cp. Oh and welcome aboard Moorguard!
First off, I have to give a shout out and a big thanks to Moorguard, Ceythos, Wigin, Hobart and Autobahn. The two panels were excellent and we had unprecedented access to all of them during SOE live, and really got our moneys worth from the trip. Here's some additional information I had in my notes, based on the discussions in the panels and outside. As Moorguard said, many of these were discussions not promises, but I was greatly encouraged by these discussions and left feeling like the devs and players both shared their passion for this game. I'm also sure I don't have everything down here (we talked, A LOT!), so don't be surprised if there are things you think should have bee discussed but don't appear in the notes. Stairs - yes, I said stairs. They have identified both a code and an art issue that causes the problem with stairs. The good news is they now have artists working on the game again and are actively working on fixing the art issue with stairs. They hope to have a fix out for both the art and code issue. Lag - Hobart and Wigin have identified a whole bunch of code issues causing lag and are working on fixing them as hard as they can. Should see more of these fixes going in with patches in a couple of weeks and the following weeks. Chunk dismount and fall to your death = amazingly the code that handles chunking is really silly and also different for different chunks. Basically, for some reason it tries to move you to 0,0 in the chunk and back again without any regard for what your toon has to go through to do that, hence the dismounts. Worse, sometimes the code will get confused and not spawn parachute (doesn't recognize that you are falling and need parachute), hence the fall to death. They are changing a lot of things in the coming months to fix these issues. Falling through world - two issues here - simple holes in the geometry and the code that was put in to stop peeps leving around areas and avoiding mobs to get to the boss quicker. The first they are fixing by filling the holes when they find them. We can help by doing a /loc and reporting it when we fall through the world. The second causes those falling times when you fly or swim into a slope. They are going to disable the code and see what issues it causes with folks leving around areas/mobs etc. Raid mobs - they are going to add in a continuation of the Torkauld line, so another giant. I asked that they took a look at the head rewards and brought the rewards up in line with the pota gear. Epic slivers - we talked about adding these in to rewards for one or more of the quests. They will take a look at this. Most likely will be the pota daily quests. Wikia - putting up a wiki for all their games. Hoping to incorporate the Telon Project and Bow's site plus info from vgtact and craft. Players to add to it too, to try and stop the loss of player made sites. Raid UI- looking into fixing the bugs with this. Hobart moving things to a more stable coding system that everyone knows works and will improve the lag issues. VG will NOT become an instances game. We talked about player added or designed quests including the possibility of class sagas or quests to help newer players learn the nuances of their class. Also talked about adding back some of the class specific abilities to level 4 to help folks understand what distinguishes their class from the others. Might also add other weapons and quests after IOD to help those classes that have different play styles understand their options (e.g. Give monks hand wraps in a level 12 quest so they can see the different styles, foci for casters etc). This might also boost the lower level crafting opportunities. Grinds (SoD, POTA) - we talked a lot about this issue and gave and got some good ideas about helping lessen these. One that I heard and really liked was the idea of reducing the faction grinds for successive toons on the same account. I think it would work by granting more faction for the second toon to go through the grind area if the first is at max faction, then more again for the third and so on. No promises here though, I may have misheard the intention, completely misunderstood....
my list will obviously overlap with mooregards, but here is everything i captured while at SOE LIVE Consolidated Notes The following lists are a combination of notes from panels, general discussions, and casual converations at meals. The things on this list topics were discussion and not agreements to take any specific action unless noted as such, Priorities (as presented by the team): 1. Make things work smoothly so that performance does not affect gameplay. 2. Extend content for long term players 3. Insure that the new player experience improves retention Many conversations dovetailed into other topics, so I am listing these by subgroups that I have chosen. General Game Issues Planned work on raid UI needs to include, 7 man in group, players appear dead, inability to move between groups All rifts should be allowing access if the player has reached appropriate level in any sphere Character select screen should default to last character played (especially when forced to character select by game action) Evack ability on sorcs and other casters as well as evack potions fail for the caster when evack point is out of chunk, Flying dismount after chunking, Tossed off boats after chunking God walk bug (both a blessing and a curse) Guild hall chunks going to sleep Stop drops of quest items once the quest is complete unless they are subsequently useable in some way (eg:souls in kdq) World chat channel as a default channel (can be clicked off in chat settings and autojoins) Default UI windows should have a show/no show option (rather than just sliding them off screen) may also help performance. UI's need to save on logging, more customization available in UI Remove lid on KDQ area, especially since quests require lower levels to go there Explain the reason levitate was removed from kdq chunks (impacts a few named mobs, otherwise not clear why it was implemented) Revisit faction requirements, especially kdq and POTA but other faction areas as well like Celestine Ward Allow a one-time or SC option to move veteran rewards from old characters to current ones Testing Guilds will encourage more testing, especially in raid sized groups Devs will look at specific test dummies in addition to the commonly used stature in Kojani Test events will be posted in advance and character copies run to support the planned events. Where possible, level boosters and gear merchants will be provided to aid in creating test groups and raids with appropriate levels and gear During test events all rift chunks should be UP A civic buff npc should be in several key locations to facilitate buffing for content. Access keys to places like COB should be available from the entry NPC rather than have to redo the questline every time test is reset, and players wiped. Keep in mind the level and quality of testers (usually high end players with top gear) Encourage testing with test rewards (things that can benefit a player in live game) Diplomacy: Needs some work to make it easier for new players to get started on. Suggestions included having players start with a preset deck and fewer cards Modify the tutorial to focus more on the concept of the colored dots being fuel types rather than have names like flattery, demand Have the first quest give them only 4 cards and then have the player place them in a strategy deck. (the cards would contain a racial card, a card to play that uses no "fuel" and 2 cards that make use of some "fuel" color to play. The quest reward would give them addtional cards with other "fuel" colors to interchange as needed. Have all the early diplo gear contain some presences rather than modify the npc's. Have subsequent diplo gear always offer multiple presences to reduce the number of items needed by the player. Make initial diplo bags larger. Rethink the reward aspect of diplomacy so that the items have more cash value (especially all the hand held, one-time use items) Let regional trade be an actual income stream again by allowing stackable items and adjusting the cash value (same for deeds) Insure that any changes to civic buffing for raids dont cause additional problems via chunking,rifting, etc. Look at buff centers for raid diplo. New content zones may have internal civics rather than external (like POTA), new content zones should include diplo elements When chunks crash , the diplo buffs are no longer given , but the levers are still up, forcing us to push the diplos down before we can push them up again. Crafting:and Harvesting Is complex by design and contributes to the immersion feel. It is difficult for new players to get the hang of , but the community is the best resource rather than trying to revamp how crafting works. Make all utilities stack to at least 100 Give XP for higher end combines like POTA t3 gear (no xp once mastered) Include crafting in new content areas Encourage use of crafted gear vs quested by creating crafted set bonuses Consider crafted items in the Station Cash store (see also krono discussion) Look at required crafting components gained through harvesting and their accessibility. Example, wild echoes limited to mining, shining souls limited to skinning. Introduce recipes using materials currently harvested but no matching recipes, Example, bosonic flakes, dragons eye, shimmering souls OR remove them from the loot tables so they don't consume a random number generated rare or UR reward in lieu of one that can be used. Change all fish to ungraded and let them stack unless cooking is coming soon as a craft skill. Provide special craft recipes via quest or SC store that allow crafters to make unique items only available through crafting All craft areas should have a banker and mailbox nearby (example: POTA) Add larger crafter bags either in game or SC (current largest size is 70) Consider letting a crafter learn both sides of their craft (eg: smith both armor and weapons) . Adventuring Low level abilities that provide class distinction should be given to new characters at earlier levels clickie item timers still need further review given the number and variety that are still sharing common timers. potions never share with items, out of combat not share with in combat, pet items separate timer, many others, see original thread removal of xp penalty at 51 would encourage more 48 to 54 groups that can better utilize existing content like RI, Innovus, etc If magi hold had a cousin with similar content but 2 levels higher it would provide another adventuring avenue for 50+ solo and small group content (also be another source for ulvari power shards so lvl 55's won't be killing everything in the lvl 50+ zones) please consider lore when building this. Confirm plans for COB, timing, difficulty, rewards (do imbueds really exist?) Revamping as opposed to nerfing classes preceded by explanations of intent. Solicit input before the change, not after. (discussion covered everything from drums and druids to fire pummel and flying phoenix) Look at scaling with mentoring to make it a more meaningful role as opposed to overpowered killing machines. BOD mobs that never despawn unless harvested Look at itemization in general as pointed out by players in several zones Review quest rewards in the new player paths for class appropriateness, consider optional rewards (example, sorc gets staff as reward for over 30 levels, instead of focus items, Monk gets bladed staff instead of handwraps or claws). or make no change, but insure that alternative items are good drops that are BOE. Look at crate (SC) items and whether they should be Best - In - Slot items. Low level, non stacking bags , make them stop dropping off high level mobs Thats all that i managed to get written down before dozing off each night, Again, much appreciation to the team for spending time with us outside of the scheduled time.
leavwiz wrote: Thanks Moorgard, and Leavwiz for the additional notes. I found the quoted portion to be very positive and look forward to those things. It was mentioned before by Dielle that perhaps players could be given small amounts of station cash in exchange for their help with some testing. I personally don't see the need for it but if it would help get more people testing I am all for it. In addition to the things mentioned above I would also like to see some form of class buffing npc, that could provide the majority of the main buffs used. Kind of like the raid grenade used to function, minus the 50k hp.
all sounds great but what about the levi restriction in SOD aswell? "the reason i bring up the levi restriction is that there are boss mobs that aren't able to be done now because they kick and when they do the mob resets on the group. also the bard feather fall can't negate this has been tried and resulted in a group wipe the group just gets kicked too high too fast to negate the reset of the mob" also sore subject but the fire pummel, really only had one use and it was a post 50 purchased ability that is useless now with the exhaustion on it. is there a chance that it could just get scaled back to only being useable on 12 mobs and the exhaustion gotten rid of?
Why move right into Pankhor Zhi from COB for a new arcing storyline? I understand the draw this brings as it is real estate that has limited value to the playerbase (aesthetics aside) but why not FINISH the existing storylines like PotAb/HOSS or Tehatamani and then focus on the PZ->Stiirhaad story? I hate to say this but y'all are making the same mistakes that your predecessors did. PZ and Stiirhaad both are going to need optimization passes on art assets similar to the reasons the team did this for PotA and APW. You are also talking on order of around 1000+ NPCs and, on the safe side, let's assume 80 named mobs with scripts hooked into their routines and making changes to around 9 zones? In addition to the itemization, you're probably also looking at diplomacy and crafting storylines, which does nothing more than adds to the workload of your team. In case you need a history lesson, here's the path that I think most recall as the worst VG ever went through: 1. Announcement is made about the level increase was going to complement PotA about 2-3 months prior to it going live. 2. A lot of players warned the team not to release it without adequate content to support the players. 3. When it finally hits test a number of use gave feedback on issues that went unheard, up to and including lack of content. 4. Dev team (and I am certain this was driven by Smed at the time) forces out the level increase. Instead of creating tons of new content what they did in their haste was to revamp the KDQ areas that were all ready in the game. This wasn't new content, it was a trashy way to act like there was a wealth of things to do. The real kicker? In their infinite wisdom to scale difficulty post-50, the developers decided accuracy needed to be changed. So even though one may have been on T4 KDQ prior to POTA's release, a level 50 with limited accuracy gear stood little chance of landing a successful ability on a level 57 or 58 mob. So let's recap this one real quick: new content to your old dev team meant increasing levels on an area the players all ready had access to and, because we all needed a kick to the teeth, even if you could access the higher tier areas you couldn't challenge the content because of a revised mechanic that was necessary at the time. What was new sans POTA (for those that wanted level 55 before "testing" the trials)? NPCs on Dresla's isle, Troll Coast and the unbalanced 3-dot elementals running around BOD. 5. Playerbase is up in arms over this, the untested accuracy and mitigation changes, the massive grind, the xp penalty, the thoughtless hooking of 51+ NPC abilties on old world areas (interesting seeing trash mobs in Nusibe going Furious). Not to mention the changes to the accuracy, defense and mitigation of the mobs (old and new) were NEVER QA'd or tested. Meaning this made even the simple T1/2 KDQ mobs unaccessible by most who weren't near to BIS at the time. 6. Not wanting to be funneled into KDQ for leveling players get creative and begin killing NPCs in cities. Devs spend an inordinate amount of time "fixing" these issues instead of doing the right thing and rolling out more content. Eventually they rolled out Vi'Rak. 7. So finally if you survived all of this crap and made it through PotA T1 and T2, got level 55, managed to harvest or buy your necessary resources for your abilities and made it to PotA T3 then you were able to discover a wealth of untested garbage that was anything T3 POTA and beyond. Nothing was QAd. Don't mean to rain on your parade but I've been in contact with ex-guildies about coming back due to F2P but every one of them remembers some issue between #1 and #7 that gives them enough reason to not download this game. They all say the same thing: it was a great game, it was fun, love to play again but ... insert comment here . I don't mean to point fingers but how long has COB been on test? It's one zone. One. Yet you want to tackle project that is going to be as intensive manhours-wise as a PZ->Stiirhaad? Your focus, in my opinion, would be better spent on small updates just as significant to the playerbase on things like Cave of Wonders, reworking Old Targonor's dungeon, PotAb, Garuzamet (the big dude in IOG), AAs, the big temple no one can access in Tehatamani, etc. The theme being that you can concentrate on one area in one zone with a hundred or so mobiles and crank out much needed content faster than spending the majority of a year on one arcing storyline and essentially two areas. Don't ignore history. Smed made that error and just about killed this game. Silius was at a disadvantage from day one of him taking over as creative director. edited because I fizzled while typing.
/ grabs oxygen tank and defibrillator and starts searching for Ghostchild / If even 20% of the things listed here come to pass (and even when the changes create other issues as always happens), this will still be more Dev Love than the game has seen in.... Forever? And if more than 20% happens? Wow. Just wow. While I'm not a fan of everything that is happening (eg cash store bags/ships), I am amazed at the vision and willingness to discuss the goals (even if subject to change)- outstanding!
leavwiz wrote: Thanks Leavewiz great set of notes, and a lot to digest. How ever one thing that struck me was this, I am not in favor of such a change, the idea of two specialties to each craft is really great, and one I think should be kept and even expnanded. But over all very encouraging what we are seeing and reading from SOE Live.
