David Bowman: Reopening the AROP discussion

[Vahrokh]

I know right now, given the past record of the devs and the posted requirements, I expect another pitiful bonus. If it is pitiful, well, my Istarian days may be numbered.

Eh eh I wonder how many others would follow the same destiny.

[cauri_order]

heheheh not very many.

I can deal with bugs, I can deal wtih chapter 11 :P, I can deal with unfinished ability quests.

I can't deal with an under-powered over-sized flying hatchling.

[Bori Grimbattle]

One thing to consider if one of the requirements is that all quests must be done is an in-game checklist that will tell you either done or not done. As it is now you can pull up the Quest log but there is no way to tell you if you missed getting one Quest for a certain level or not.

My dragon has been resting lately due to the construction of our Guild Town and I awakened him for the first time in awhile the other day. Glancing at his Quest Log I can see I am going to have a bit of difficulty in figuring out just where he was with his quests.

With a list I can just galnce and see that I have 'T&C' ,"PrimaL" or whatever to do yet for my current level set and "Capacity, etc. have been done for that level.

Just an idea.

[Tryagain]

if you look at Dragon lore from many fictional references you will see that Ancients are few and far between. Its akin to the Jedi of SWG and if not done right will be over used and sought after by everyone.

Now in the context of horizons why is everyone so hot for Ancient ROP ?

Because Dragons in general are not balanced with the rest of the races and classes. Adult ROP just pretty much gives FLight and some added armor and abilities. But they still get smacked around easily and if there was PVP in this game Bipeds would absolutely own a dragon in a 1v1 battle.

Instead balance the Adult dragons out with the rest of the classes and make Ancient ROP an epic EQ style quest with a modest time requirement. But make them god oh powerful and they should be the most powerful beasts in all of Istaria hands down. But we all know they won't be.

Right now as it is pretty much any dragon left are all hard core dragons and will easily meet the 100 day requirement. So we will see nothing but ancients after AROP is released and well that just isn't right in my opinion.

In my view hatclings should be weak. When a dragon reaches Adult Hood they should be on par with Bipeds. Ancients should be almost impossibily hard to attain and they should be few and far between.

But if they do that everyone will simply play dragons.... bipeds will become extinct overnight. Well maybe not extinct but the skies I garantee will be full of dragons. See the problem faced here with dragons ?

[cauri_order]

I agree with you completely Tryagain.

AE has taken on a tremendous task in allowing dragons to be playable races. It's just about impossible to balance a dragon against a biped.

It's been brought up before, but the main reason for the difficulty in balancing the mobs is teh biped ability to multiclass. There are no restrictions on multiclassing for bipeds. Do I think this should be capped in some way? Yes. Do I think they will ever cap it? Not if they are smart. A cap on multiclassing would mostly likely drive bipeds away en-masse, something they cannot afford to do.

So now we're back to weak hatchlings, check.

Redesign Adult dragons to be on par with bipeds. What bi-ped? Single school bi-ped? biped with 2 lvl 100 schools? 3 lvl 100 schools? What are they to balance it against?

Ok, so designers re-do adults to be as powerful as say a battlemage/mage combo. I can already hear the bipeds screaming, and rightfully so.

Ive heard they are re-working hoard. Maybe they'll finally use hoard in a way to power up a dragon. They did a good job with silver strike and gold rage. These help dragons out immensely in combat, with a cost.

Tie hoarding to dragon prowess, be it attack boosts if hoard level is maintained, spell damage boost, stat/skill boosts, etc. Hoarding is akin to leveling another class into the tier V regions. Let's see how they handle this re-design.

Now back to Ancient. Yes they should be rare. But with the reqs they have now, they won't be. any tom, ******** and harry can create a dragon, level it to 100/100 in under a month, let it sleep for 100 days and poof, Ancient Dragon.

Now on the flip side, they can't be so rare that it drives away paying customers. Think about it, you joined Horizons so you could play a dragon. Should be an awe-inspiring creature. You go from hatchling to adult in a few months. That's respectable. Then you find out Ancient is almost unattainable for you? What would you do? Stay or quit? My guess would be quit. You are paying a monthly service charge to play a game and have fun. Having the last stage of your development as unattainable would be a slap in the face. You'd speak up with your subscription and go somewhere else.

[dracinfir]

Whaa? 100 days since creation? ...Lvl 90 in either? What about hoard? And that other lvl 90 or whatever!?

And what do they mean by 100 days since creation... since you could fly? Or since you had made the character?

[Safire]

all i have to say is after ARoP dragons should become powerful....more powerful then any single biped class
i know how much more ubber a biped is then a dragon and im sorry but a little dryad melee user should not be more powerful then an ancient dragon that would be just wrong....esecially since ancient prollyis gonna be so hudge they will have to gobiped formjust to enter an npc lair anyways (im not sure what lairs will look like for players prolly pretty much the same)
but i belive an ancient dragon should be the most powerful you can get...

[Kulamata]

A game must strike certain balances to thrive and grow, let alone survive. Goals must be difficult, to provide a sense of accomplishment, BUT they must be achievable by all who really try. Branding a large percentage of your players as losers, permanent losers, is a very good way to lose them. And the game is gone.

At the time of the RoP, the balancewas brilliantly done, and is one reason it was by far the best quest series in the game.

Ancient statusmust besomething that is realistically achievable. Time in game obviously is, as is level 90. Hoard of 15 M I am much less sure about. One persistent problem with the game is the equating of repetition with difficulty, which led to a lot of players leaving.

As for Ancient capabilities, one approach might be to have Ancient improve to a two century biped of intermediate strength classes, such as Ranger. Another might be to increase armor, magic defense and evasion, so the frequent deaths and frailty we now see would be repaired, but offensive capability would not be overpowering. Mithril Strike/Rage would be nice to see too.

The equivalent of multi-classing could be achieved by adding quests for new capabilities, or even biped capabilities. Dragons with Dark Cyclone, and other nature spells does not seem unreasonable.

[gopher65]

Anyone who says 100 days of Ingame time is reasonable is completely crazy! That means you are spending ~7.5 hours PER DAY PLAYING THIS GAME FOR A WHOLE YEAR!

I'm sure some of you do this. I won't say you don't have no life. I know some people don't have jobs, or have jobs that require them to sit at a computer for 12 hours a day. I know not everyone goes to school. I know some people are alergic to sunlight (I am almostone of those;)). But 8 hours a day playing a single game EVERY DAY (7 days a week for a year) is just insane (for anyone with a semblence of a normal life).

Not only that, but that is with one player. Are you now going to say that Alts don't count as playtime? I have 5 characters, and have been playing almost 1 year. I play this game probably5 days a week. But never has it been 7 or 8 hours a day.

I play about 5 days a week, about 3 hours a day (on average). I spread my playtime pretty evenly among my 5 characters. I just figured out that it would take me about 15 YEARS to reach 100 days of playtime with any given character (even assuming that I played my main character more than double the amount of time I play my other toons, it would still be 7 years). This is using a reasonable rate of play, and type of play (more than one character).

15 years is a very long time. And I play more than many casual players do. HZ was designed with casual players in mind. Therefore, 100 days of ingame time (or really anything more then 5-10 days) is silly, as it would hurt the casual player, while not hurting the PLers (who can leave their computer logged in on one character as long as they want, so simply BUY a character off E-Bay).

I won't pretend to understand why a person would play a MMOG for 18 hours a day every day for years at a time. Frankly I get bored way faster then that. I thinkpowergaming is caused byOCD personally. But whatever the reason, whatever the cause, most people don't do that. And HZ WAS NOT SET UP AROUND POWERGAMERS. Duh. They all left a long time ago.

[cauri_order]

I'm not advocating 100 days of play time. Hell I don't even hit half that yet. I do know some who have 99 days of in game time, tho none of them on a dragon character.

Personally, 40-50 in game time seems fair (ancient's are supposed to be old). Let them leave 100 days since creation in, but add Kumu's suggestion of 100 days since rite of passage. the 40-50 in game time is kept in check by the 100 days since rite of passage. As stated by many, this is about the only way of ensuring that a hatchilng isn't power levelled into ancient in a little over 3 months.

Yes Ancient should be available to anybody who wants it. I'm all for that, but make them work for it. :-)

Hoard - hoard is supposed to be very important to dragons, although with the current set up the 10-15 mil i keep hearing tossed around isn't feasible. I can't and won't hoard grind. It's boring and teh benefits are virtually nill after lvl 50. I have bout 3.02 mil hoard, will probably stay that way till the rework hoard and provided added benefits.

[gopher65]

Ok Cauri_order THAT makes sense:). 100 days after creation & 100 days since RoP.

Personally I would like to see 100 days after toon creation till RoP can be performed, + 100 days after that till you can do ARoP. 200days total(real world time, not ingame)from the time you first create your Dragon character to the time you are allowed to become ancient seems reasonable to me.

After all, they are supposed to be ancient.

EDIT: I've also recently read somewhere that the Manga (I think it was manga) thinks that the current hoard is extremely boring and useless, and wants to make hoard easier to get, and more fun to get. And to also make it so that on the average adventure night, hoard spent=hoard gained.

[Tzael]

Anyone who says 100 days of Ingame time is reasonable is completely crazy! That means you are spending ~7.5 hours PER DAY PLAYING THIS GAME FOR A WHOLE YEAR!

Must admit I was a bit freaked out by my in-game time when the /info command was first introduced, then again it was about the same time that my partner and I stopped sharing the one account and she used the new account. Ever since then I've thankfully seen my in-game time dropping to more reasonable levels [:)]

In light of your comments, and those made by others in this thread, I'd like to revise my original suggestion. 60 days of in-game time seems much more acceptable.

I'm glad others think that having all dragon ability quests completed is a good idea for a requirement of the ancient rite of passage. I did suggest ability quests to 90, however others (who actually play dragon toons regularly) think that having them all completed seems better, so that sounds fine to me [:)]

The requirements for the ancient rite of passage are a hard thing to juggle. I certainly don't envy the position of the developers here. On the one hand casual gamers want to see it as being a possible achievement for themselves, on the other hand people won't be happy if it is too easy to obtain. If the ancient rite of passage will be difficult to achieve, it had better have a suitably rewarding outcome. If the ancient rite of passage is tailored to be achievable by casual gamers then I am pretty sure that the overall reward will not be as powerful or desirable as the dedicated dragons (read : dedicated as in they play their dragon almost entirely, not play their bipeds and treat their dragon as a pet) would like.

[cauri_order]

It is a great idea, isn't it? Though we need to credit Kumu for first thinking it up :-)

Time for RoP is in all likely hood shot. Don't think they'll add that anytime soon. And besides, as it stands now, there's really no reason to limit the number of adult dragons in game. We're not over powered, not by any stretch of the imagination.

I'm hoping hoard gets reworked to something fun AND beneficial. Hell I could deal with the current grind if the rewards were worth the effort. +4 AC and +1 breath damage is laughable.

Hoard to lvl 50 is ok. It's about 1 million hoard, not too hard, not too easy. but another 24 mil hoard for 100? bleh, not for 200 AC and 50 breath damage (that misses half the time).

THere have been some threads on bonuses from hoard. The devs should get off their collective arses and read em to get some ideas of FUN stuff, not grind.

[cauri_order]

[img]/Web/Themes/Generic/images/icon-quote.gif[/img]gopher65 wrote: Anyone who says 100 days of Ingame time is reasonable is completely crazy! That means you are spending ~7.5 hours PER DAY PLAYING THIS GAME FOR A WHOLE YEAR!

Must admit I was a bit freaked out by my in-game time when the /info command was first introduced, then again it was about the same time that my partner and I stopped sharing the one account and she used the new account. Ever since then I've thankfully seen my in-game time dropping to more reasonable levels [img]/Web//emoticons/emotion-1.gif[/img]

In light of your comments, and those made by others in this thread, I'd like to revise my original suggestion. 60 days of in-game time seems much more acceptable.

I'm glad others think that having all dragon ability quests completed is a good idea for a requirement of the ancient rite of passage. I did suggest ability quests to 90, however others (who actually play dragon toons regularly) think that having them all completed seems better, so that sounds fine to me [img]/Web//emoticons/emotion-1.gif[/img]

The requirements for the ancient rite of passage are a hard thing to juggle. I certainly don't envy the position of the developers here. On the one hand casual gamers want to see it as being a possible achievement for themselves, on the other hand people won't be happy if it is too easy to obtain. If the ancient rite of passage will be difficult to achieve, it had better have a suitably rewarding outcome. If the ancient rite of passage is tailored to be achievable by casual gamers then I am pretty sure that the overall reward will not be as powerful or desirable as the dedicated dragons (read : dedicated as in they play their dragon almost entirely, not play their bipeds and treat their dragon as a pet) would like.

60 in game still seems to much. I've been here since shortly after release and I'm barely pushing 50. and that's at all ability quests done and 100/95. I don't want to leave my dragon logged in to get the time either. Not much more for me to do on Cauri really. 5 more craft levels that I don't have the will to get. Working construction classes right now to have some sort of goal. There's really no need for me to get the last 5 craft levels, and if I did desire it, wouldnt take me 10 days of in game time to get em.

As to ability quests: who cares if they are all done? If the dragon wants to gimp an already gimped class further......by all means let them. Hell I wouldn't be able to do the ARoP if all ability quests were required. I stopped Gold Rage at VI b/c I don't want ot spend almost 800 Hoard per click. I'm satisfied with it, don't really want/need VII.

[Pharcellus]

Actually, I don't think Kumu was the first to think it up. It's been posted by others before, so the credit really belongs to no one in particular. We all feed off of each others' ideas and concepts in the boards and discussions in-game and elsewhere.

I don't know what to say to those who can only put 3 hours per week into any one character. All I know is if we cater to the lowest common denominator, the effort and, thus, the reward will be worthless. With those numbers, then anyone who takes a vacation for a week can go from hatchling to Ancient in that time (assuming they have a sleeper dragon toon). Makes me feel really good to know that 170 in-game days are mostly worthless. But, that's no more than what I expect from playing Horizons anyway, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.

[cauri_order]

Ok ok ok so credit for 100 days since RoP completion credit goes to the dragon community as a whole :)

Saw Kumu post it first, my apologies :-)

[evilkarl]

Dragons are not intended for the light gamer, they have the biggest time sink of all associated with them and are designed for the players who really want to play them as much as they can.

I don't play a dragon however I think ancient needs a few more requirements otherwise people will just power level their way to it.

High hoard req inexcess of 5million imo
300+ days since birth
75 minimum 100 days preferable in game time
100 days since becomming an adult at least

But thats me..I just don't want to see ancients sucking because the requirements are so low

[cauri_order]

requirements should be on the high side yes. But my gut tells me that regardless of how high the reqs are, Ancients are still going to be an over-sized flying hatchling.

[gopher65]

Ah evilkarl but that is the problem. Horizons simply doesn't have any powergamers left. They all went to EQII (WoW doesn't cater to powergamers, it is too easy to level).

Every part of HZ is designed for casual players in mind, from the ease of leveling, to the ease of getting magic equipment (techs are broken right now. they are much harder to get then they are intended to be). Why should Dragons be different? They are one of the few selling points this game has over EQII and WoW. Should we really attempt to make them inaccessable to a large portion of the (potential) playerbase?

Now that I've said that I have one question. When are you supposed to use "then" and when are you supposed to use "than"? I'm normally good with that sort of thing (not on forums, but in essays/stories where I actually make the effort to proofread my stuff). I must be stupid cause I just can't figure it out[:'(]

[Tzael]

Now that I've said that I have one question. When are you supposed to use "then" and when are you supposed to use "than"? I'm normally good with that sort of thing (not on forums, but in essays/stories where I actually make the effort to proofread my stuff). I must be stupid cause I just can't figure it out[img]/Web//emoticons/emotion-9.gif[/img]

Good question [:)] 'Then' is a time reference, and 'than' is used in unequal comparisons, hope that helps [:)]