Where we are so far...
Posted: Wed May 30, 2012 8:59 pm
It's almost a year since we started thinking about doing this. We've done pretty well - admittedly all the work has been done in two big bursts of energy with a 4-5 month gap in between, but we've kept on track.
It's probably about time we looked at where we are, where we're going - and considering all this in relation to our original aims. Have we strayed too far from our goals? Neglected many issues or areas? Are we in danger of drifting too far into custom-land, like IPY2? What are we trying to recapture from old UO, and what are we trying to lose from AOS, whilst staying relatively true to the era we are basing our shard on.
I think the main thing to consider is have we stayed true to the free-form nature of UO. The sand-box, do as you like nature? I think we have, completely.
People will disagree because we have insurance - but really does anyone care about looting someone's armour and weapon now? I'd just as happily have the insurance money and their regs and pots. Insurance also works great for the elusive murderer deterrent that all shards have been looking for. 4x costs for murderers, or whatever amount we end up at should be exactly the right dose of discouragement.
We've also decided against any kind of scripted or controlled PvP system. Despite Attard's good ideas, factions is too restrictive. It's much better to allow players to make their own conflicts as they fight for resources. Factions was only needed on OSI because they took the player conflict away with trammel. The same goes for our decision to go against using scripted events.
We've changed PvP, but not unneccesarily. I think all the changes we've looked at either; Pre-empt problems that we saw developing in p25 onwards or on Legacy, or; improve balance.
We've added a lot of PvM rewards and in theory, excitement. All Doom rewards are now in Felucca dungeons, with additional rewards like reward clothing, hairstyle deeds, CBD's, etc.
We've attempted to make crafters more relevant. They can now own houses in town - exclusively purchasable/rentable by crafters. They can place vendors in them, decorate them, keep secures in them. There are no repair deeds, and high-end crafting now isn't just limited to those with the time and patience to get involved in the BOD system. Runics being available from vendors for big gold prices is completely fair - obviously bigger groups are at an advantage - but find a part of UO where they aren't. It's a much superior system to BODs, and hopefully we'll get the right balance between affordable and useful low-end runics, and expensive and luxury high-end units.
We've added a lot for collectors. There's new daily rares, there's new decoration items. Custom housing is in, minus the later SE ugly crap.
There's also a few new areas to explore, secret passages to previously unaccesable areas, etc.
Hopefully we've balanced the economy a bit. 3x housing prices(5x for castles), as well as adding in huge gold sinks like war horses and runics.
I'll add more later, and produce a complete change-list, but for now it's worth looking at this post, and seeing how we've done in relation:
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=4733
I think we're very much on course to having exactly the right kind of shard - it's mostly out of game issues now. Having a good webpage, getting myUO setup, advertising, getting some staff in place, looking at server costs, etc.
It's probably about time we looked at where we are, where we're going - and considering all this in relation to our original aims. Have we strayed too far from our goals? Neglected many issues or areas? Are we in danger of drifting too far into custom-land, like IPY2? What are we trying to recapture from old UO, and what are we trying to lose from AOS, whilst staying relatively true to the era we are basing our shard on.
I think the main thing to consider is have we stayed true to the free-form nature of UO. The sand-box, do as you like nature? I think we have, completely.
People will disagree because we have insurance - but really does anyone care about looting someone's armour and weapon now? I'd just as happily have the insurance money and their regs and pots. Insurance also works great for the elusive murderer deterrent that all shards have been looking for. 4x costs for murderers, or whatever amount we end up at should be exactly the right dose of discouragement.
We've also decided against any kind of scripted or controlled PvP system. Despite Attard's good ideas, factions is too restrictive. It's much better to allow players to make their own conflicts as they fight for resources. Factions was only needed on OSI because they took the player conflict away with trammel. The same goes for our decision to go against using scripted events.
We've changed PvP, but not unneccesarily. I think all the changes we've looked at either; Pre-empt problems that we saw developing in p25 onwards or on Legacy, or; improve balance.
We've added a lot of PvM rewards and in theory, excitement. All Doom rewards are now in Felucca dungeons, with additional rewards like reward clothing, hairstyle deeds, CBD's, etc.
We've attempted to make crafters more relevant. They can now own houses in town - exclusively purchasable/rentable by crafters. They can place vendors in them, decorate them, keep secures in them. There are no repair deeds, and high-end crafting now isn't just limited to those with the time and patience to get involved in the BOD system. Runics being available from vendors for big gold prices is completely fair - obviously bigger groups are at an advantage - but find a part of UO where they aren't. It's a much superior system to BODs, and hopefully we'll get the right balance between affordable and useful low-end runics, and expensive and luxury high-end units.
We've added a lot for collectors. There's new daily rares, there's new decoration items. Custom housing is in, minus the later SE ugly crap.
There's also a few new areas to explore, secret passages to previously unaccesable areas, etc.
Hopefully we've balanced the economy a bit. 3x housing prices(5x for castles), as well as adding in huge gold sinks like war horses and runics.
I'll add more later, and produce a complete change-list, but for now it's worth looking at this post, and seeing how we've done in relation:
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=4733
I think we're very much on course to having exactly the right kind of shard - it's mostly out of game issues now. Having a good webpage, getting myUO setup, advertising, getting some staff in place, looking at server costs, etc.
