Can't really post the rest until Noxin puts I-C page back up, but just gonna post some of my own essays on UO, mainly AoS theory.
Wrote first one really early AoS, before artifacts were being used in PvP much, suprising how well it stands up even now actually.
I know most people can't be bothered to write anywhere near the amount I do, but be interested to hear some other people's theory.
Theory
Moderators: Benn, Calix, senji
The current state of the ‘real’ Ultima Online – Felucca and PvP.
With Ultima Online, things always seem better in retrospect. I’ve had good and bad times in all era’s in the game since mid-1998, but when I look back on them, they all have that golden glow of the good times, the friends, the fights. The opposite has always applied when looking at the present. We think of the overpowered dexxers, tamers, para-blow, scrollwhores, items, axxers. Rarely do we acknowledge that UO is fun in the midst of our bitching. Six months later, we’re all looking back saying how great it was. I’ve seen it time and time again.
So, I’m about to shock you all with an essay in praise of the UO Development team and Age of Shadows. I’m not joking.
I’ll make it simple. The easiest way to judge whether a period in UO can be classed as ‘good’ for PvP oriented types is to is to measure if it provided the elements required to make it ‘enjoyable’, for want of a better word.
What are these elements? For me, and also for almost everyone I know (Although most don’t realise it), they are:
An active Feluccan Community – To thrive, this needs to involve more than just PvPers. You need Sheep as well as Wolves.
A purpose – Everyone gets bored eventually of logging in to fight for no reason other than to fight. OSI realised this a long while ago. Factions were created as an attempt at ‘purposeful PvP’
Balanced PvP – How wide is the gap between the veteran and the newbie? The rich and the poor? The 24/7 player and the casual? The Mage and the Warrior?
My study is based mainly upon what I witness/have witnessed upon the Europa shard where I actively play and also from uo.com guilds page, as well as Fel based message boards from other shards.
Europa has an active Feluccan Community. Fights are easy to find, there’s interesting guild politics and rivalries, a healthy population of PvPers and PvMers, and even some RPers.
Two of the top ten Europa guilds for veteran members are exclusively Felucca-based. Many of the other top ten guilds visit Fel on a regular basis.
If I’m not mistaken, this is the first time this has been the case since Trammel was implemented. The biggest guild in UO (BC of Great Lakes) is Felucca based. The 5th biggest guild in UO (FL of Pacific) is Fel based. Most shards have at least 2 Fel guilds in the top ten for members. This is unprecedented in this post-UO:R UO.
Felucca is alive and well. But why is this? It’s simply due to the dev team finding a way to give purpose to combat. Factions tried and failed, Champion Spawns coupled with Statloss removal has worked.
Publish 16 was genius. Parts of it were horrid, but it achieved its objective: The revitalisation of Felucca. People that had never dreamed of entering Felucca before now found themselves daring to enter its spiritual homes, Shame, Deceit, Covetous. They got a taste for PvP, risk, and the money that could be earned. Many of these people are now prominent AOS PvPers. At the time I didn't like the idea of skill and stat scrolls, but in hindsight, what else could have motivated and energised the player-base like they have?
Resource control and player justice is at the very heart of purpose, and are concepts that were key to the original UO development team’s dream. Evocare and Adrick know this. Factions attempted resource control with town finances, etc, but it failed. It only ever affected those players involved in the system (A tiny %). Factions had no impact on the ‘lives’ of most UO players.
Champion spawns and their rewards affect every UO player. Everyone wants scrolls. You either go out to fight for them, or you buy them from those that fight for and win them.
The people that control these spawns control a major part of the UO economy, including prices and availability. This is player justice resource control and purpose.
Now we come to the negative. PvP Balance. What there was is gone. If UO:R was the most balanced period, AOS is the least. I can’t begin to list the problems (Another article maybe^^), but however bad they are, they don’t outweigh the positives I’ve listed above. I’m not convinced that balance will be restored, as this Dev team realises that a good percentage of UO players will simply cease PvPing if you take their advantages away. I’m certain a lot of the imbalances of AOS have been brought in intentionally for this reason, similar to the 'special move' additions of UO:R perhaps.
It may just be something we have to suffer to have the thriving Fel we’re now witnessing. The same goes for insurance and private housing.
In conclusion, I believe we have an ally at the head of that Dev team. Using the ‘trammelised’ Felucca dungeons of p16, he tempted a new generation of potential Feluccans. With AOS, he then took away statloss, gave us back our dungeons and set us loose on them. In some cases, these new Feluccan's were the ones being "set loose" - so far had they come.
Necromancer and Paladin are good additions to the game, if unbalanced at present. Customised housing is great, although private housing is horrid. Statloss removal is orgasmic. Removal of p16 dungeon rules is great. Upcoming p19 changes look good.
If they can balance PvP some, we have the best UO I’ve been a part of.
With Ultima Online, things always seem better in retrospect. I’ve had good and bad times in all era’s in the game since mid-1998, but when I look back on them, they all have that golden glow of the good times, the friends, the fights. The opposite has always applied when looking at the present. We think of the overpowered dexxers, tamers, para-blow, scrollwhores, items, axxers. Rarely do we acknowledge that UO is fun in the midst of our bitching. Six months later, we’re all looking back saying how great it was. I’ve seen it time and time again.
So, I’m about to shock you all with an essay in praise of the UO Development team and Age of Shadows. I’m not joking.
I’ll make it simple. The easiest way to judge whether a period in UO can be classed as ‘good’ for PvP oriented types is to is to measure if it provided the elements required to make it ‘enjoyable’, for want of a better word.
What are these elements? For me, and also for almost everyone I know (Although most don’t realise it), they are:
An active Feluccan Community – To thrive, this needs to involve more than just PvPers. You need Sheep as well as Wolves.
A purpose – Everyone gets bored eventually of logging in to fight for no reason other than to fight. OSI realised this a long while ago. Factions were created as an attempt at ‘purposeful PvP’
Balanced PvP – How wide is the gap between the veteran and the newbie? The rich and the poor? The 24/7 player and the casual? The Mage and the Warrior?
My study is based mainly upon what I witness/have witnessed upon the Europa shard where I actively play and also from uo.com guilds page, as well as Fel based message boards from other shards.
Europa has an active Feluccan Community. Fights are easy to find, there’s interesting guild politics and rivalries, a healthy population of PvPers and PvMers, and even some RPers.
Two of the top ten Europa guilds for veteran members are exclusively Felucca-based. Many of the other top ten guilds visit Fel on a regular basis.
If I’m not mistaken, this is the first time this has been the case since Trammel was implemented. The biggest guild in UO (BC of Great Lakes) is Felucca based. The 5th biggest guild in UO (FL of Pacific) is Fel based. Most shards have at least 2 Fel guilds in the top ten for members. This is unprecedented in this post-UO:R UO.
Felucca is alive and well. But why is this? It’s simply due to the dev team finding a way to give purpose to combat. Factions tried and failed, Champion Spawns coupled with Statloss removal has worked.
Publish 16 was genius. Parts of it were horrid, but it achieved its objective: The revitalisation of Felucca. People that had never dreamed of entering Felucca before now found themselves daring to enter its spiritual homes, Shame, Deceit, Covetous. They got a taste for PvP, risk, and the money that could be earned. Many of these people are now prominent AOS PvPers. At the time I didn't like the idea of skill and stat scrolls, but in hindsight, what else could have motivated and energised the player-base like they have?
Resource control and player justice is at the very heart of purpose, and are concepts that were key to the original UO development team’s dream. Evocare and Adrick know this. Factions attempted resource control with town finances, etc, but it failed. It only ever affected those players involved in the system (A tiny %). Factions had no impact on the ‘lives’ of most UO players.
Champion spawns and their rewards affect every UO player. Everyone wants scrolls. You either go out to fight for them, or you buy them from those that fight for and win them.
The people that control these spawns control a major part of the UO economy, including prices and availability. This is player justice resource control and purpose.
Now we come to the negative. PvP Balance. What there was is gone. If UO:R was the most balanced period, AOS is the least. I can’t begin to list the problems (Another article maybe^^), but however bad they are, they don’t outweigh the positives I’ve listed above. I’m not convinced that balance will be restored, as this Dev team realises that a good percentage of UO players will simply cease PvPing if you take their advantages away. I’m certain a lot of the imbalances of AOS have been brought in intentionally for this reason, similar to the 'special move' additions of UO:R perhaps.
It may just be something we have to suffer to have the thriving Fel we’re now witnessing. The same goes for insurance and private housing.
In conclusion, I believe we have an ally at the head of that Dev team. Using the ‘trammelised’ Felucca dungeons of p16, he tempted a new generation of potential Feluccans. With AOS, he then took away statloss, gave us back our dungeons and set us loose on them. In some cases, these new Feluccan's were the ones being "set loose" - so far had they come.
Necromancer and Paladin are good additions to the game, if unbalanced at present. Customised housing is great, although private housing is horrid. Statloss removal is orgasmic. Removal of p16 dungeon rules is great. Upcoming p19 changes look good.
If they can balance PvP some, we have the best UO I’ve been a part of.
"It pays to be a coward"
I posted this one on I-C frontpage before, sums up Europa after p16 very well also:
It Pays to be a Coward:
As UO has changed over the years the Dev Team has molded the game so that anyone can jump in and kill anyone else within a week. This steady stream of changes spawned things like Stat loss, med/eval/anat, Trammel, axers, special hits, etc. I've watched thousands of friends quit UO because OSI tied their hands, gimped their ability to play the game. Guilds of hundreds just up and moved and were replaced with new players who thought it was cool to be able to make a charc in a week and 1 hit kill or run every time they were in trouble. The trammel economy took over and UO went from being about reputation and style, to who has the biggest "balance" as they sit and show off. These changes have been so gradual that a lot of people haven't noticed the real reasons. They just recognize things changed and have quit the game.
There's very few people left over from the old days of UO. It's no surprize that those players have left and moved on to games where they don't have to deal with greed and ignorance. Publish 16 changes were an attempt to regain lost momentum. They caught everyone a bit off guard. I sure didn't expect a patch that would partially undo what the last 10 major patches piled on. Nerf the two major Greed classes? Nerf skill gains? Make mages do more damage? Create a spawn system that may even work? Wow...Here on Pacific we've all been playing with Publish 16 for awhile now. When I began planning for guild changes in response to publish 16 my number one concern was, will the trammys come? To be honest I just figured the entire PvP community would PK the hell out of everyone: huge battles for control of spawns, new alliances, and reds vs reds vs blues like the old days. The skilled players would fight for Champ spawns leaving no room from the random trammy. I figured after a few days most of them would be content buying the scrolls rather then actually gathering them, themselves.
Thinking back now I guess what I missed was the fact that the vast majority of the people in the active PvP guilds are Trammys themselves. They grew up in trammel or were complete newbies when trammel was implemented. You know the guy who would go fight skels at the BK wall but tell all his friends he was at the duel room? Now I realize just how few of us are left from the days when PvP wasn't shunned and nerfed. It's funny because I should have expected things to go down as they did. The older players go PKing for control of spawns while all the newer players band together to get a scroll. What I missed was the fact that the majority of the faction PvP community fall under the newer player category.
I've been looking at guild rosters for a bit today and it all makes sense now. OSI has been telling everyone that the PK existed to ruin their fun, that the PK was the same as the grief player. This is the Trammy attitude, anyone red is trying to kill them so they can get their loot or talk trash. It's not just red vs blue, its an ideological battle:
-The Blue greed type player plays UO to get stuff thus earning Trammel bank sitting bragging rights. They believe that anyone who tries to stop them is trying to ruin their fun, their chance to be "cool". So they all band together to fight those reds who try to kill them.
-The Red PK type player was once a blue greed monger. For whatever reason this player didn't buy into the whole: items = respect system. He/She comes from a dying line of people who believe in real respect. No not respect of their social skills, moral beliefs, or ability to say balance as they sit at a bank with a pure mare and an ice staff...respect of their loyalty, dedication, and ability to PvP against the odds.
As blues hate reds for ruining their chances of being an elite Trammy, reds hate blues for being groupies. Most reds see it as intelligent people vs. the average idiot or the mob. Most blues see it as mature people willing to work together vs. immature kids who take out their frustrations on the game.
The truth is UO has revolved around getting items since mid 98. It's the only unique thing UO has had to offer since they abolished player justice and skilled PvP. OSI has provided no RP background for the players and has carefully sat on the fence between PvP and PvM. Publish 16 seems to be a legitimate attempt to bring UO back together. I applaud the effort and believe that UO can't survive without making these types of changes. The problem is it will take some time for the player base to to catch up. They're all still too fixated on getting items and loot to realize that the Dev team just gave the players the ability to partially control their destiny again.
Since the patch hit I've been pretty disappointed with everyone on Pacific. I've seen no guild other than OPP attempt to control spawn points. Has any guild laid claim to a dungeon yet? Right now almost every person who is participating in the champ spawn system just wants scrolls. It seems to me that they will do whatever they can to get those scrolls. I've seen bitter enemies ask for truces and notorious PvPers turn into complete trammys. I'm disappointed to say the very least. There's an interesting Thread on the DF Forum that further proves these points. As you scroll down you'll notice these two basic arguments stated over and over:
-Reds can't loot so why go red and not loot when I can stay blue and loot reds?
Again, it's hard for me to relate to people who's main motivation is to get items. These people just want to whore the game and be done. Get all the scrolls they need and then quit because they have all the items again and they're "bored". People who are using this type of reasoning are classified as Trammys in my mind. They play to brag and show off and that's all there is to it.
-Blues have all the advantages!
Blues have always had the basic advantages. That's why red players have always been the more seasoned and skilled vets. The lack of leadership talent on Pacific is apparent. Basically these people want the quickest and easiest path to victory. Having fun to them is winning, nothing else matters so they do whatever is easiest.
They're all just making excuses (whether they believe them or not, I don't know). It deeply disappoints me to see UO continue to go down. Even after OSI finally does something to revive PvP and Roleplaying everyone continues to shoot themselves in the foot. As far as I'm concerned anyone from the PvP community that doesn't have a red is just a greedy coward. It doesn't even come down to fighting even fights anymore, it comes down to fighting at all. The Anti-OPP faction group are more pussified then ever. They don't have red characters and they won't log on their faction characters anymore. They'll only fight when they know they can't possibly lose. Right now people have a chance to build up the community and make UO fun once more, they're just too concerned about themselves to be bothered with it. Even if it will make their gameplay more ennoyable.
Europa was as much of a joke. Europa didn't really have a guild of OPP's size/means @ p16 opening, but it did have a ton of experienced/skilled PvP guilds, and all of them stayed blue. As with most people they were all too concerned with how scrolls were going to "ruin the game", so spent the next 6 months - the time some great PvP could have been had - sitting at altars hoping to get lucky.
PKing on Eu was left to:
Mark-o and co, probably the only old Europa PvPers who played reds at all.
NDK, a pretty newbie/dexxer based guild at the time.
Vem/=0=, imports from Siege
I-C, generally unknown/dialup players.
Edit: Forgot PHT, combo of NDK/I-C reasons really.
P16 was pretty shite becouse of this, no real territorial battles becouse everyone was on the same side(blue), whereas AoS eventually became fucking good.
Anyway question to you is: Would AoS have been better if it's only PvP changes were to remove statloss and change the p16 dungeon ruleset. Or was one of the main reasons it was so much better due to items, necros, chivalry, the spell changes, and everything else it added?
It Pays to be a Coward:
As UO has changed over the years the Dev Team has molded the game so that anyone can jump in and kill anyone else within a week. This steady stream of changes spawned things like Stat loss, med/eval/anat, Trammel, axers, special hits, etc. I've watched thousands of friends quit UO because OSI tied their hands, gimped their ability to play the game. Guilds of hundreds just up and moved and were replaced with new players who thought it was cool to be able to make a charc in a week and 1 hit kill or run every time they were in trouble. The trammel economy took over and UO went from being about reputation and style, to who has the biggest "balance" as they sit and show off. These changes have been so gradual that a lot of people haven't noticed the real reasons. They just recognize things changed and have quit the game.
There's very few people left over from the old days of UO. It's no surprize that those players have left and moved on to games where they don't have to deal with greed and ignorance. Publish 16 changes were an attempt to regain lost momentum. They caught everyone a bit off guard. I sure didn't expect a patch that would partially undo what the last 10 major patches piled on. Nerf the two major Greed classes? Nerf skill gains? Make mages do more damage? Create a spawn system that may even work? Wow...Here on Pacific we've all been playing with Publish 16 for awhile now. When I began planning for guild changes in response to publish 16 my number one concern was, will the trammys come? To be honest I just figured the entire PvP community would PK the hell out of everyone: huge battles for control of spawns, new alliances, and reds vs reds vs blues like the old days. The skilled players would fight for Champ spawns leaving no room from the random trammy. I figured after a few days most of them would be content buying the scrolls rather then actually gathering them, themselves.
Thinking back now I guess what I missed was the fact that the vast majority of the people in the active PvP guilds are Trammys themselves. They grew up in trammel or were complete newbies when trammel was implemented. You know the guy who would go fight skels at the BK wall but tell all his friends he was at the duel room? Now I realize just how few of us are left from the days when PvP wasn't shunned and nerfed. It's funny because I should have expected things to go down as they did. The older players go PKing for control of spawns while all the newer players band together to get a scroll. What I missed was the fact that the majority of the faction PvP community fall under the newer player category.
I've been looking at guild rosters for a bit today and it all makes sense now. OSI has been telling everyone that the PK existed to ruin their fun, that the PK was the same as the grief player. This is the Trammy attitude, anyone red is trying to kill them so they can get their loot or talk trash. It's not just red vs blue, its an ideological battle:
-The Blue greed type player plays UO to get stuff thus earning Trammel bank sitting bragging rights. They believe that anyone who tries to stop them is trying to ruin their fun, their chance to be "cool". So they all band together to fight those reds who try to kill them.
-The Red PK type player was once a blue greed monger. For whatever reason this player didn't buy into the whole: items = respect system. He/She comes from a dying line of people who believe in real respect. No not respect of their social skills, moral beliefs, or ability to say balance as they sit at a bank with a pure mare and an ice staff...respect of their loyalty, dedication, and ability to PvP against the odds.
As blues hate reds for ruining their chances of being an elite Trammy, reds hate blues for being groupies. Most reds see it as intelligent people vs. the average idiot or the mob. Most blues see it as mature people willing to work together vs. immature kids who take out their frustrations on the game.
The truth is UO has revolved around getting items since mid 98. It's the only unique thing UO has had to offer since they abolished player justice and skilled PvP. OSI has provided no RP background for the players and has carefully sat on the fence between PvP and PvM. Publish 16 seems to be a legitimate attempt to bring UO back together. I applaud the effort and believe that UO can't survive without making these types of changes. The problem is it will take some time for the player base to to catch up. They're all still too fixated on getting items and loot to realize that the Dev team just gave the players the ability to partially control their destiny again.
Since the patch hit I've been pretty disappointed with everyone on Pacific. I've seen no guild other than OPP attempt to control spawn points. Has any guild laid claim to a dungeon yet? Right now almost every person who is participating in the champ spawn system just wants scrolls. It seems to me that they will do whatever they can to get those scrolls. I've seen bitter enemies ask for truces and notorious PvPers turn into complete trammys. I'm disappointed to say the very least. There's an interesting Thread on the DF Forum that further proves these points. As you scroll down you'll notice these two basic arguments stated over and over:
-Reds can't loot so why go red and not loot when I can stay blue and loot reds?
Again, it's hard for me to relate to people who's main motivation is to get items. These people just want to whore the game and be done. Get all the scrolls they need and then quit because they have all the items again and they're "bored". People who are using this type of reasoning are classified as Trammys in my mind. They play to brag and show off and that's all there is to it.
-Blues have all the advantages!
Blues have always had the basic advantages. That's why red players have always been the more seasoned and skilled vets. The lack of leadership talent on Pacific is apparent. Basically these people want the quickest and easiest path to victory. Having fun to them is winning, nothing else matters so they do whatever is easiest.
They're all just making excuses (whether they believe them or not, I don't know). It deeply disappoints me to see UO continue to go down. Even after OSI finally does something to revive PvP and Roleplaying everyone continues to shoot themselves in the foot. As far as I'm concerned anyone from the PvP community that doesn't have a red is just a greedy coward. It doesn't even come down to fighting even fights anymore, it comes down to fighting at all. The Anti-OPP faction group are more pussified then ever. They don't have red characters and they won't log on their faction characters anymore. They'll only fight when they know they can't possibly lose. Right now people have a chance to build up the community and make UO fun once more, they're just too concerned about themselves to be bothered with it. Even if it will make their gameplay more ennoyable.
Europa was as much of a joke. Europa didn't really have a guild of OPP's size/means @ p16 opening, but it did have a ton of experienced/skilled PvP guilds, and all of them stayed blue. As with most people they were all too concerned with how scrolls were going to "ruin the game", so spent the next 6 months - the time some great PvP could have been had - sitting at altars hoping to get lucky.
PKing on Eu was left to:
Mark-o and co, probably the only old Europa PvPers who played reds at all.
NDK, a pretty newbie/dexxer based guild at the time.
Vem/=0=, imports from Siege
I-C, generally unknown/dialup players.
Edit: Forgot PHT, combo of NDK/I-C reasons really.
P16 was pretty shite becouse of this, no real territorial battles becouse everyone was on the same side(blue), whereas AoS eventually became fucking good.
Anyway question to you is: Would AoS have been better if it's only PvP changes were to remove statloss and change the p16 dungeon ruleset. Or was one of the main reasons it was so much better due to items, necros, chivalry, the spell changes, and everything else it added?
Archiving some more stuff, mainly from OSI PvP forums
Written by Calix
As the kool katz of #infernal_covenant & #i-c know, i'm stil unable to get over Ultima Online.
This probably has something to do with it being the best game ever made, and also something I spent 7 years on.
I know i'm not alone in this, even if I am probably the most vocally nostalgic ex-UOer. I know guilds and people that left UO 5 years ago, and yet their fondest memories and proudest achivements in gaming are still from UO. The abundance and success of RunUO freeshards is probably the most obvious sign of just how great UO was.
In my opinion the most intriguing aspect of this burgeoning freeshard culture is that there isn't a set timeframe in UO history that seems to be overwhelmingly popular. The whole way through UO:Renaissance the PvP community lamented the rule changes it's implementation had brought to PvP, but now there are a mass of shards with thousands of players based upon this very ruleset...
UO:R, years after it's demise, appears to have become the peak of UO PvP fairness and balance in the eyes of most people. In retrospect, people realised that it actually introduced a LOT of good into PvP. The introduction of trammel and the destruction of communities it caused is the real problem.
Will AoS, a perhaps even more criticised UO 'expansion' be looked upon the same way by PvPers given a few years to reflect on it? It contained perhaps even more good ideas than UO:R, brought back some features that PvPers had been waiting years to see. It won't, however be looked upon favourably by many PvPers in the future, and here's why.
It was obviously rushed out, unready. Remember by this time how deeply EA controlled the game, and as we know with EA, profit margins are everything. AoS had to be sold en mass from the shelves on time. A good publish wasn't important, profit was. This was obviously true with past expansions as well, but I think by this point in time the balance had shifted 100% to profit over producing a good product.
The other theory is of course that it introduced such massive changes to the game that it would have been impossible to resolve all the issues before seeing them in mass playtest live by the subscribers. We can be rather certain that this isn't the case however, as no efforts were made to correct most of these issues for well over a year, by which point the majority of the PvP playerbase had been driven away.
The people who say PvP and Felucca were never a big issue for OSI are wrong. Once Evocare became the lead developer, PvP was at the forefront of Dev team thinking. Publish 16 was an entirely PvP related publish. AoS removed statloss, it encouranged unregulated, non consentual PvP, this was a gift to us from an ex-PvPer turned lead game developer.
AoS ruined PvP.
AoS was a good PvP publish.
Both these statements can stand side by side. How? Becouse the general changes to combat and Felucca in AoS were good, the massive changes it brought in and the inbalances this inevitably caused were never fixed, and this is the problem. The way EA ran UO left no time for balance publishes. EA were about getting money making products onto the shelves in quick time.
The Evocare-led Dev team was amazingly PvP friendly, but never got the appreciation it deserved becouse it was never given time to finish it's work. p15? The favoured publish of freeshards? Was Evocare's work. p16, a publish entirely devoted to PvP, was Evocare's. AoS, the publish that removed statloss for murderers, something that the playerbase had been screaming for for years, was Evocare.
AoS removed statloss, it, combined with the p16 changes encouraged player justice, territorial conflict and unregulated PvP, the things that made UO great in the first place.
The one thing I cannot defend the dev team for is that they allowed the most powerful, important and vaulable items(artifacts) to be obtainable only in a trammel ruleset dungeon. This may have been to counteract the previous most important items(powerscrolls) being available only in Felucca, but it was still an incredibly stupid thing to do.
The combat changes in AoS were good, they made UO PvP more fastpaced, whilst keeping mage PvP still skilled, and the most powerful character type. The changes to Magic Resist were good, and certainly didnt make the skill any less powerful. The changes to paralyze, protection, reactive armour etc, were good. They really changed the game subtly, made players need to develop new tactics and adapt, without changing the game too drastically. The game had to move on, and I believe most of the changes to the PvP system were done skillfully.
Even the elemental resists, and item property ideas were a good addition, added much needed variety and strategy to the game, although very few of us could see this at the time.
The two, simple problems with Age of Shadows were 1. That the dev team did not and could not anticipate the power of the items they had introduced when taken to their extreme, as happened very quickly..and 2. As above, putting the most powerful PvP items into a non PvP facet. Which has to be the 2nd craziest decision in UO history behind making trammel a mirror. Just like the trammel mirror error, this was not a PvP system problem.
Onto the real reason I think AoS will not be looked back on as kindly as UO:R. AoS did finally get a fix for its problems, called p25. It capped the overpowered attributes, and nerfed the power of the artifacts. The best, guaranteed ways to make money were in Felucca, spawns and harrowers. AoS p25 was as balanced as UO:R, with added bonuses of no statloss and REAL prizes to fight over: Spawns and Harrowers.
p25 only lasted 6 months, UO:R lasted years. There's the reason in one line.
As the kool katz of #infernal_covenant & #i-c know, i'm stil unable to get over Ultima Online.
This probably has something to do with it being the best game ever made, and also something I spent 7 years on.
I know i'm not alone in this, even if I am probably the most vocally nostalgic ex-UOer. I know guilds and people that left UO 5 years ago, and yet their fondest memories and proudest achivements in gaming are still from UO. The abundance and success of RunUO freeshards is probably the most obvious sign of just how great UO was.
In my opinion the most intriguing aspect of this burgeoning freeshard culture is that there isn't a set timeframe in UO history that seems to be overwhelmingly popular. The whole way through UO:Renaissance the PvP community lamented the rule changes it's implementation had brought to PvP, but now there are a mass of shards with thousands of players based upon this very ruleset...
UO:R, years after it's demise, appears to have become the peak of UO PvP fairness and balance in the eyes of most people. In retrospect, people realised that it actually introduced a LOT of good into PvP. The introduction of trammel and the destruction of communities it caused is the real problem.
Will AoS, a perhaps even more criticised UO 'expansion' be looked upon the same way by PvPers given a few years to reflect on it? It contained perhaps even more good ideas than UO:R, brought back some features that PvPers had been waiting years to see. It won't, however be looked upon favourably by many PvPers in the future, and here's why.
It was obviously rushed out, unready. Remember by this time how deeply EA controlled the game, and as we know with EA, profit margins are everything. AoS had to be sold en mass from the shelves on time. A good publish wasn't important, profit was. This was obviously true with past expansions as well, but I think by this point in time the balance had shifted 100% to profit over producing a good product.
The other theory is of course that it introduced such massive changes to the game that it would have been impossible to resolve all the issues before seeing them in mass playtest live by the subscribers. We can be rather certain that this isn't the case however, as no efforts were made to correct most of these issues for well over a year, by which point the majority of the PvP playerbase had been driven away.
The people who say PvP and Felucca were never a big issue for OSI are wrong. Once Evocare became the lead developer, PvP was at the forefront of Dev team thinking. Publish 16 was an entirely PvP related publish. AoS removed statloss, it encouranged unregulated, non consentual PvP, this was a gift to us from an ex-PvPer turned lead game developer.
AoS ruined PvP.
AoS was a good PvP publish.
Both these statements can stand side by side. How? Becouse the general changes to combat and Felucca in AoS were good, the massive changes it brought in and the inbalances this inevitably caused were never fixed, and this is the problem. The way EA ran UO left no time for balance publishes. EA were about getting money making products onto the shelves in quick time.
The Evocare-led Dev team was amazingly PvP friendly, but never got the appreciation it deserved becouse it was never given time to finish it's work. p15? The favoured publish of freeshards? Was Evocare's work. p16, a publish entirely devoted to PvP, was Evocare's. AoS, the publish that removed statloss for murderers, something that the playerbase had been screaming for for years, was Evocare.
AoS removed statloss, it, combined with the p16 changes encouraged player justice, territorial conflict and unregulated PvP, the things that made UO great in the first place.
The one thing I cannot defend the dev team for is that they allowed the most powerful, important and vaulable items(artifacts) to be obtainable only in a trammel ruleset dungeon. This may have been to counteract the previous most important items(powerscrolls) being available only in Felucca, but it was still an incredibly stupid thing to do.
The combat changes in AoS were good, they made UO PvP more fastpaced, whilst keeping mage PvP still skilled, and the most powerful character type. The changes to Magic Resist were good, and certainly didnt make the skill any less powerful. The changes to paralyze, protection, reactive armour etc, were good. They really changed the game subtly, made players need to develop new tactics and adapt, without changing the game too drastically. The game had to move on, and I believe most of the changes to the PvP system were done skillfully.
Even the elemental resists, and item property ideas were a good addition, added much needed variety and strategy to the game, although very few of us could see this at the time.
The two, simple problems with Age of Shadows were 1. That the dev team did not and could not anticipate the power of the items they had introduced when taken to their extreme, as happened very quickly..and 2. As above, putting the most powerful PvP items into a non PvP facet. Which has to be the 2nd craziest decision in UO history behind making trammel a mirror. Just like the trammel mirror error, this was not a PvP system problem.
Onto the real reason I think AoS will not be looked back on as kindly as UO:R. AoS did finally get a fix for its problems, called p25. It capped the overpowered attributes, and nerfed the power of the artifacts. The best, guaranteed ways to make money were in Felucca, spawns and harrowers. AoS p25 was as balanced as UO:R, with added bonuses of no statloss and REAL prizes to fight over: Spawns and Harrowers.
p25 only lasted 6 months, UO:R lasted years. There's the reason in one line.
Written by Al Thorin:
PVP has always had different issues, some steming from template imbalances, items issues, as well as many bugs.
Through all of this, the actual system of open PVP has always seemed to have some holes in it. Not the items, or the skills, or damage, just the actual system of how an open PVP system works.
While this groups primary focus is things that are broken, I would still like to submit a concept for discussion and thought. I'm more than aware that this is probably well beyond the scope of purpose for this group, but I still think presenting it may be bennificial.
Limits and self moderation
Currently, there are very few limits to PVP, and no reason for self moderation in the activity. What was once a chance (getting PK'd) is now as close to a guarentee as you can get. While many players prefer this type of system, it serves to create a hostile segregation between different playstyles, and it severly limits the PVP facet to mostly the hardcore players.
There are many players who do enjoy a risk, they would be than willing to risk getting attacked, but the current system takes that risk, and turns it into expectation. Gone are the days where one would watch another player out of the corner of their eye, wondering if they will take a count, or how much room they have before risking statloss. Everyone was a possible foe insead of an automatic one.
The following is a concept presentation for the reintroduction and modification of the old statloss system.
The big bang. Reintroduction of Statloss
Statloss was a panic'd reaction and fix to rampent PK'ing. The amusing aspect of the introduction of it, is that it we are once again in the exact same situation, except people have the choice to going to another facet. There is no reason a player must decide wether they wish to kill someone outside of wether they wish to be red or blue.
Statloss helped create many self moderated activities. A player had no less options than they do now. You could gank, PK, and hunt players, but each act was dependent on the situation. Reds were fair game, greys had to be watched, and blues enjoyed a degree of protection from ganks, since 1 count was meaningfull, getting 5 counts on a single person was usually not desired.
Statloss rebuilt
Statloss was too harsh once the facets split. So any attempt to revisit the system involves reassesing what would now be considered fair.
Temporary Statloss
This is one option. It is not permanent, and offers a very similar effect to the old system. Simple baseline value, 15 minutes at 15% statloss for each death. It's not a crippling effect, but it is a negative one, and gives an advantage to non PK players. The risk is a temporary disadvantage for death, the reward is freedom in PVP, and the overall effect is increased challange to being a statloss red.
Restricted Recall/Gate
Another option is to limit recalling/gating to only a few times a day. Gates could be 5, recalls could be 16. (8 two way trips) This would also carry over to USING player made gates. Public moongates would be unlimited.
Again, this simply adds an additional challange to unmoderated killing. It is not destructive in nature, and offers something to think about before mowing over blues.
Increased Insurance costs
This option is simple. The insurance company considers you a high risk, and you pay more! The baseline value is 600 GP per item, per death. Not crippling again, and makes it harder to maintain status quo. Freedom comes at a cost!
Before the counts, the flagging system revisted
Before one can really consider statloss, one has to revisit what is considered PK'ing. The act of killing an -unwilling- participant. The current flagging system does -not- allow for a fair engagment between anything blue.
Reverse flagging
The basis of allowing a freeform PVP system is to allow -any- group of players to engage in mutual PVP, while offering an 'out' to those that are unwilling. For this, we need a simple way to allow for players to choose between defending themselves, or running away. One or the other.
When any player first attacks another, there will be a 2 second delay, where any 'defensive' damage returned to the attacker is 'ignored' for flagging. After the initial 2 seconds, any attack, damage dealing or not will reverse flag the defender to the attacker. The defender will now be 'grey' to the attacker, and vise versa. Any initial criminal, or grey flags will not be cancled, but till time out normally, although the oportunity to give counts will be -immediatly- removed, and both participants will become combat flagged an unable to recall.
Something would have to be added to stop people from holding down an attack last macro in hopes of an auto defend.
Possibly just making it so that in peace mode, attacks are not defended against, and in war mode they are.
This would involve many players adjusting how they play Any attack would would force a player into war mode, and that would have to be watched carefully before trying to remount. (Fix mounting by macro's so that an attempt to mount in warmode = attacking pet)
This will remove the ability to flee to recieve the aid of city guards if you willingly fight back.
Oranges are exempt from this system completly.
Factions will be adjusted to include the new flagging system when it comes to outside interfearance. Any attack against a single faction member will flag you to the whole (and present) target faction members, and any bennificial act will flag you to -all- present faction members.
Bennifical acts
Combined with reverse flagging, we'll need a way to help limit passive participants.
Thus we introduce shared flags. The ability to recieve your targets flags, and your targets foe's flag.
The only way to describe this is an example.
Players A and B are fighting, and are each flagged to each other.
Player C comes up and heals Player A.
Player C is now also flagged against player B, but player B is not yet flagged against Player C.
Player B now has the option of freely attacking Player C, but Player C cannot freely attack player B untill they are attacked first.
What happens in party, stays in party. Mostly
The concept of group PVP is a good one. So here we introduce flagging in party's. Any two or more partys can engage another party (or lone player), and flags will become shared according to how many people are in each party.
** This section is a bit messy. **
While I know it's possible to impliment, it could pose a challange
Examples.
Party A has 4 members, Party B has 6.
Party A attacks party B, all of party A becomes flagged to the target member B, plus 3 other random members in party B, while Party A does not recieve any reverse flags untill someone from Party B retaliates.
When party B retaliates, the 4 members that recieved flag from party A will become reverse flagged to all of Party A.
The 2 remaining Party members cannot recieve or share any flags untill someone from Party A attacks one or both.
If the 2 remaining members heal their party members, Party A recieves a flag for them, making them freely attackable, but the 2 players cannot freely attack untill they recieve a flag from Party A.
Also, flags can be shared beyond a party.
If 3 non partied blues attack a red in a 4 player party, the 3 blues become flagged to the red, and 2 other party members.
While auto shared flags are limited by the number of party members, initial auto defensive flags are unlimited.
If one player comes under attack by 5 people, they have 5 flags on them, thus resulting in 5 flags being shared between the party members. If one player comes under attack by 20 people (all overlapping a 2 min period), the party would still recieve all those flags.
If 5 partys of 10 blues (5 attacks by 1 of each group) attack a single group of 10 blues, the 10 blues would automatically recieve 50 flags, thus being able to freely attack -any- of the attacking 50 blues.
But if they only defend vs one group, the remaining 40 blues would never recieve a shared combat flag.
Cross healing would become very dangerous in that situation, but resising the urge would result in 400 counts
Thus ganks are still very possible, but like the old system, it comes at a great cost.
As far as implementation, I think it would be possible to be able to add it, the right approach would probably be on an individual basis, triggered by an attack or aid, followed by a party count check, followed by passing on flags.
The theory would be limiting freedom of ganks, but encouraging full participation of even fights upto 10 people per side.
(IE A larger group will always have limits, but the smaller group would end up with all the freedom)
Counts
Long Term to 24 hours.
Short term to 6 hours.
Converted to real time.
This would permit a 'free' PK a day, and upto 4 PK's a day for reds before considering statloss.
The times could easily be adjusted to allow for more, or less 'freedom' before punishment.
Overall, it is quite a bit to digest, but I think it promotes more participation in Fel with a little less of the hatred it currently evokes.
I can dream, can I not?
PVP has always had different issues, some steming from template imbalances, items issues, as well as many bugs.
Through all of this, the actual system of open PVP has always seemed to have some holes in it. Not the items, or the skills, or damage, just the actual system of how an open PVP system works.
While this groups primary focus is things that are broken, I would still like to submit a concept for discussion and thought. I'm more than aware that this is probably well beyond the scope of purpose for this group, but I still think presenting it may be bennificial.
Limits and self moderation
Currently, there are very few limits to PVP, and no reason for self moderation in the activity. What was once a chance (getting PK'd) is now as close to a guarentee as you can get. While many players prefer this type of system, it serves to create a hostile segregation between different playstyles, and it severly limits the PVP facet to mostly the hardcore players.
There are many players who do enjoy a risk, they would be than willing to risk getting attacked, but the current system takes that risk, and turns it into expectation. Gone are the days where one would watch another player out of the corner of their eye, wondering if they will take a count, or how much room they have before risking statloss. Everyone was a possible foe insead of an automatic one.
The following is a concept presentation for the reintroduction and modification of the old statloss system.
The big bang. Reintroduction of Statloss
Statloss was a panic'd reaction and fix to rampent PK'ing. The amusing aspect of the introduction of it, is that it we are once again in the exact same situation, except people have the choice to going to another facet. There is no reason a player must decide wether they wish to kill someone outside of wether they wish to be red or blue.
Statloss helped create many self moderated activities. A player had no less options than they do now. You could gank, PK, and hunt players, but each act was dependent on the situation. Reds were fair game, greys had to be watched, and blues enjoyed a degree of protection from ganks, since 1 count was meaningfull, getting 5 counts on a single person was usually not desired.
Statloss rebuilt
Statloss was too harsh once the facets split. So any attempt to revisit the system involves reassesing what would now be considered fair.
Temporary Statloss
This is one option. It is not permanent, and offers a very similar effect to the old system. Simple baseline value, 15 minutes at 15% statloss for each death. It's not a crippling effect, but it is a negative one, and gives an advantage to non PK players. The risk is a temporary disadvantage for death, the reward is freedom in PVP, and the overall effect is increased challange to being a statloss red.
Restricted Recall/Gate
Another option is to limit recalling/gating to only a few times a day. Gates could be 5, recalls could be 16. (8 two way trips) This would also carry over to USING player made gates. Public moongates would be unlimited.
Again, this simply adds an additional challange to unmoderated killing. It is not destructive in nature, and offers something to think about before mowing over blues.
Increased Insurance costs
This option is simple. The insurance company considers you a high risk, and you pay more! The baseline value is 600 GP per item, per death. Not crippling again, and makes it harder to maintain status quo. Freedom comes at a cost!
Before the counts, the flagging system revisted
Before one can really consider statloss, one has to revisit what is considered PK'ing. The act of killing an -unwilling- participant. The current flagging system does -not- allow for a fair engagment between anything blue.
Reverse flagging
The basis of allowing a freeform PVP system is to allow -any- group of players to engage in mutual PVP, while offering an 'out' to those that are unwilling. For this, we need a simple way to allow for players to choose between defending themselves, or running away. One or the other.
When any player first attacks another, there will be a 2 second delay, where any 'defensive' damage returned to the attacker is 'ignored' for flagging. After the initial 2 seconds, any attack, damage dealing or not will reverse flag the defender to the attacker. The defender will now be 'grey' to the attacker, and vise versa. Any initial criminal, or grey flags will not be cancled, but till time out normally, although the oportunity to give counts will be -immediatly- removed, and both participants will become combat flagged an unable to recall.
Something would have to be added to stop people from holding down an attack last macro in hopes of an auto defend.
Possibly just making it so that in peace mode, attacks are not defended against, and in war mode they are.
This would involve many players adjusting how they play Any attack would would force a player into war mode, and that would have to be watched carefully before trying to remount. (Fix mounting by macro's so that an attempt to mount in warmode = attacking pet)
This will remove the ability to flee to recieve the aid of city guards if you willingly fight back.
Oranges are exempt from this system completly.
Factions will be adjusted to include the new flagging system when it comes to outside interfearance. Any attack against a single faction member will flag you to the whole (and present) target faction members, and any bennificial act will flag you to -all- present faction members.
Bennifical acts
Combined with reverse flagging, we'll need a way to help limit passive participants.
Thus we introduce shared flags. The ability to recieve your targets flags, and your targets foe's flag.
The only way to describe this is an example.
Players A and B are fighting, and are each flagged to each other.
Player C comes up and heals Player A.
Player C is now also flagged against player B, but player B is not yet flagged against Player C.
Player B now has the option of freely attacking Player C, but Player C cannot freely attack player B untill they are attacked first.
What happens in party, stays in party. Mostly
The concept of group PVP is a good one. So here we introduce flagging in party's. Any two or more partys can engage another party (or lone player), and flags will become shared according to how many people are in each party.
** This section is a bit messy. **
While I know it's possible to impliment, it could pose a challange
Examples.
Party A has 4 members, Party B has 6.
Party A attacks party B, all of party A becomes flagged to the target member B, plus 3 other random members in party B, while Party A does not recieve any reverse flags untill someone from Party B retaliates.
When party B retaliates, the 4 members that recieved flag from party A will become reverse flagged to all of Party A.
The 2 remaining Party members cannot recieve or share any flags untill someone from Party A attacks one or both.
If the 2 remaining members heal their party members, Party A recieves a flag for them, making them freely attackable, but the 2 players cannot freely attack untill they recieve a flag from Party A.
Also, flags can be shared beyond a party.
If 3 non partied blues attack a red in a 4 player party, the 3 blues become flagged to the red, and 2 other party members.
While auto shared flags are limited by the number of party members, initial auto defensive flags are unlimited.
If one player comes under attack by 5 people, they have 5 flags on them, thus resulting in 5 flags being shared between the party members. If one player comes under attack by 20 people (all overlapping a 2 min period), the party would still recieve all those flags.
If 5 partys of 10 blues (5 attacks by 1 of each group) attack a single group of 10 blues, the 10 blues would automatically recieve 50 flags, thus being able to freely attack -any- of the attacking 50 blues.
But if they only defend vs one group, the remaining 40 blues would never recieve a shared combat flag.
Cross healing would become very dangerous in that situation, but resising the urge would result in 400 counts
Thus ganks are still very possible, but like the old system, it comes at a great cost.
As far as implementation, I think it would be possible to be able to add it, the right approach would probably be on an individual basis, triggered by an attack or aid, followed by a party count check, followed by passing on flags.
The theory would be limiting freedom of ganks, but encouraging full participation of even fights upto 10 people per side.
(IE A larger group will always have limits, but the smaller group would end up with all the freedom)
Counts
Long Term to 24 hours.
Short term to 6 hours.
Converted to real time.
This would permit a 'free' PK a day, and upto 4 PK's a day for reds before considering statloss.
The times could easily be adjusted to allow for more, or less 'freedom' before punishment.
Overall, it is quite a bit to digest, but I think it promotes more participation in Fel with a little less of the hatred it currently evokes.
I can dream, can I not?
Written by Al Thorin:
I've always thought Factions should involve towns outright.
A faction in control of a town should be able use/rent the buildings to player vendors.
Handle their own decoration (minimize the current deco, and place in a 5/10 item limit per 36/81 tile square of building (6x6, 9x9), and a 10 per 25x25 chunk of town.
Have fees to maintain the town, thus encouraging the 'owners' to try and draw people to the town to shop.
Faction control of a town should only come up once a week at most, say, every 6 days so it rotates. Then instead of stealing a sigil, you incorperate both PVP and non-PVP scales between factions. Maybe a kill/death ratio or even a capture the flag type situation for PVP, and maybe an activity/sales counter that must be met for merchants (IE A poorly run town has poor sales, so new management is welcome.
Allow different 'mods' for NPCs to be purchased/rented.
IE The Stable masters could be 'upgraded' to include additional stable slots (Say, max 3 or 4) so that even a trammel based tamer maintains a vested interest in aiding that town. (Must use that stable to stable over standard stable limit)
Tailors could be upgraded to sell new colors of cloth.
Blacksmiths could be upgraded to do enhancing for players at a higher success rate.
Carpenters could be upgraded to offer furniture dying of unique colors.
Guards could be hired to protect against any misdeeds (IE A guarded blacksmith shop, where even a quick theif won't find much success)
There's many options to re-create community that doesn't involve greed.
I know there could be a huge group of players interested in helping run an actual city. Being able to control decorations (They they -cannot- take home), or actually operate a tailoring shop.
There's no reason why towns couldn't be opened up, and visitation encouraged by players that have no interest in PVP.
I've always thought Factions should involve towns outright.
A faction in control of a town should be able use/rent the buildings to player vendors.
Handle their own decoration (minimize the current deco, and place in a 5/10 item limit per 36/81 tile square of building (6x6, 9x9), and a 10 per 25x25 chunk of town.
Have fees to maintain the town, thus encouraging the 'owners' to try and draw people to the town to shop.
Faction control of a town should only come up once a week at most, say, every 6 days so it rotates. Then instead of stealing a sigil, you incorperate both PVP and non-PVP scales between factions. Maybe a kill/death ratio or even a capture the flag type situation for PVP, and maybe an activity/sales counter that must be met for merchants (IE A poorly run town has poor sales, so new management is welcome.
Allow different 'mods' for NPCs to be purchased/rented.
IE The Stable masters could be 'upgraded' to include additional stable slots (Say, max 3 or 4) so that even a trammel based tamer maintains a vested interest in aiding that town. (Must use that stable to stable over standard stable limit)
Tailors could be upgraded to sell new colors of cloth.
Blacksmiths could be upgraded to do enhancing for players at a higher success rate.
Carpenters could be upgraded to offer furniture dying of unique colors.
Guards could be hired to protect against any misdeeds (IE A guarded blacksmith shop, where even a quick theif won't find much success)
There's many options to re-create community that doesn't involve greed.
I know there could be a huge group of players interested in helping run an actual city. Being able to control decorations (They they -cannot- take home), or actually operate a tailoring shop.
There's no reason why towns couldn't be opened up, and visitation encouraged by players that have no interest in PVP.
Written by Calix;
On this subject, my preferred way of completely revitalising Felucca would revolve around a fully revised and improved factions system.
Link it into champion spawns - control of certain towns gives control of certain dungeons, which gives better rewards from champ bosses in those dungeons - and also vastly improved loot on all monsters throughout said dungeon. Allow faction traps to be set in those dungeons. Allow territorial control to become a prominent part of PvP again.
The PvM rewards(champ spawns or otherwise) should be good enough that even 'trammel' players with no wish to join in the PvP segment will come for the rewards - the rewards have to be so good compared to the other facets that the risk of PvP/death isn't enough to keep most away. Create new monsters, only available in faction dungeons. Hopefully many will realise from coming to Fel and PvMing(as happened during p16) that PvP, or the risk of PvP, can be exciting, fun, exhilarating, the opposite of what they're told by their friends in trammel.
Factions are based on some pretty good Ultima lore. This tempted a lot of roleplay guilds into factions the first time around. Build on this when reworking factions, add some more lore as to why factions are back - the "fate of sosaria", or whatever. Allow the faction conflicts to shape the future of each shard's lore.
One of the main problems with factions was the constrictions it brought to player interaction/justice. You couldn't attack own faction members without penalty, no healing of other factions, one character per account, bases in towns removing reds from most fights. Remove all this.
Move TB/CoM bases away from town, allow guilds of the same faction to war each other and kill each other without penalty, remove character limit in factions(as many chars as you want in, but have to all be same faction). Conflict within a faction can be encouraged - guildwars between guilds of the same faction, temporary truces, wars that wreck a sigil defense. Politics like that are integral to UO, and really help create a community. Stop skill transfer between characters to prevent 'points muling'. Allow inter faction alliances.
Tie in crafters by giving faction crafters the ability to craft 'faction artifacts' or whatever - you can make this system tempting for all players, not just PvPers.
Rework the election system, allow the overthrow of leaders, allow temporary breakaway/dissident factions within factions.
I could go on forever. This system has so much potential.
Player Justice
Territorial Conflict
Roleplay
Politics
PvM
Crafting
On this subject, my preferred way of completely revitalising Felucca would revolve around a fully revised and improved factions system.
Link it into champion spawns - control of certain towns gives control of certain dungeons, which gives better rewards from champ bosses in those dungeons - and also vastly improved loot on all monsters throughout said dungeon. Allow faction traps to be set in those dungeons. Allow territorial control to become a prominent part of PvP again.
The PvM rewards(champ spawns or otherwise) should be good enough that even 'trammel' players with no wish to join in the PvP segment will come for the rewards - the rewards have to be so good compared to the other facets that the risk of PvP/death isn't enough to keep most away. Create new monsters, only available in faction dungeons. Hopefully many will realise from coming to Fel and PvMing(as happened during p16) that PvP, or the risk of PvP, can be exciting, fun, exhilarating, the opposite of what they're told by their friends in trammel.
Factions are based on some pretty good Ultima lore. This tempted a lot of roleplay guilds into factions the first time around. Build on this when reworking factions, add some more lore as to why factions are back - the "fate of sosaria", or whatever. Allow the faction conflicts to shape the future of each shard's lore.
One of the main problems with factions was the constrictions it brought to player interaction/justice. You couldn't attack own faction members without penalty, no healing of other factions, one character per account, bases in towns removing reds from most fights. Remove all this.
Move TB/CoM bases away from town, allow guilds of the same faction to war each other and kill each other without penalty, remove character limit in factions(as many chars as you want in, but have to all be same faction). Conflict within a faction can be encouraged - guildwars between guilds of the same faction, temporary truces, wars that wreck a sigil defense. Politics like that are integral to UO, and really help create a community. Stop skill transfer between characters to prevent 'points muling'. Allow inter faction alliances.
Tie in crafters by giving faction crafters the ability to craft 'faction artifacts' or whatever - you can make this system tempting for all players, not just PvPers.
Rework the election system, allow the overthrow of leaders, allow temporary breakaway/dissident factions within factions.
I could go on forever. This system has so much potential.
Player Justice
Territorial Conflict
Roleplay
Politics
PvM
Crafting
Re: Theory
http://www.raphkoster.com/gaming/essay2.shtml
Which brings us to the Dracul and Kazola's tavern, or the similar events that are occurring in Oasis with the reorganization of the player militia to denfend against organized attacks. (You knew I'd get to UO at some point, right?). What makes us fear the Other is the exercise of power, or the potential for it. Yet what we use as a yardstick for our own identity as a culture is very often our difference from the Other. From the enemy. From what we do not wish to exercise power over us. The last paragraph of the call to arms from the Sonoma Oasis Militia is particularly telling and eloquent in this regard:
It is the idealistic goal of most citizens of Oasis that one day the city will need few active guards, and the spotlight will rightfully fall on our tavernkeepers, smiths, tinkerers, seekers, innkeepers, chefs, tailors, beggars, alchemists, mages, bards, rogues, librarians, scholars, rangers, miners, assassins, diplomats, and tamers--ALL of whom currently exist in Oasis but are frequently overshadowed by conflicts with those who would attack us. To approach that state, however, we need to continue to surmount substantial challenges...
Oasis seeks to defend its culture from the Other, and what's more, it is coming together, and becoming a stronger entity because it faces those challenges. Kazola's tavern is famous in UO, not for being a roleplayer's tavern, but rather for being a flickering light of a roleplaying tavern that struggles against the forces of darkness.
So thank heavens for the Other, and thank heavens for the playerkillers. For without them these places would not have acquired the sense of cultural identity that they now have. Bonds have been formed by struggling against a common Other that would otherwise have been cheaper, and easily earned. Cultures define and refine themselves through conflict. What's more, you can measure the strength of a culture by people's willingness to fight for its survival.
Re: Theory
http://www.raphkoster.com/gaming/essay3.shtml
The fascinating part of the essay, however, is where Bartle discusses the interactions between these groups. Killers are like wolves, in his model. And therefore they eat sheep, not other wolves. And the sheep are the socializers, with some occasional Achievers for spice. Why? Because killers are about the exercise of power, and you do not get the satisfaction of exercising power unless the victim complains vocally about it. Which socializers will tend to do.
Further, Bartle pointed out that eliminating the killers from the mix of the population results in a stagnant society. The socializers become cliquish, and without adversity to bring communities together, they fragment and eventually go away. Similarly, achievers, who are always looking for the biggest and baddest monster to kill, will find a world without killers to be lacking in risk and danger, and will grow bored and move on.
Yet at the same time, too many killers will quite successfully chase away everyone else. And after feeding on themselves for a little while, they will move on too.
Re: Theory
http://www.raphkoster.com/gaming/essay5.shtml
At the last player lunch, a fellow told me that he was fascinated by how UO had recapitulated European history from 800AD to 1200AD in six months of existence. He commented on the parallels between marauding bandit gangs, the enclaves of feudal systems building secure spaces and leaving the wilderness to the less civilized people, the eventual overcrowding as villages covered the available building space. He also shrewdly guessed the character of our next set of changes based on historical precedent: house ownership and limits.
Re: Theory
http://www.raphkoster.com/gaming/futuredev.shtml
The game should give ownership
I'll tell you the Holy Grail of Online Knowledge: give them things they can't take with them somewhere else. People they can't take with them. Identity they can't take with them. A cool avatar is not enough-every competitor is going to offer that too. A level is not enough-they won it, they can brag about it forever after. Friends are not enough-the whole gang will migrate to another game, with guild names and titles intact. Give them something they can't take with them, something they must work to maintain, something they prize so much they can never give it up. There's lots of ways to do this, and generally speaking, traditional online games, especially the "casual" ones, have been fairly bad at it.