Dev Diary : August 2017

[sonorous]

Heya awesome work. Just a suggestion, when sending out a newsletter the vast majority i suspect will come back to wiped accounts which might not be the best PR. Perhaps have some sort of insta/fast level potion/script to lvl 31 so they can see t4 without having to regrind. Or have something in place to deal with a bit of salt.

[Yaliskah]

1. how do u see the future of RvR? Today RvR is about Tactical gameplay. Are u planning content and place of strategy?

A big YES. As said, i would like to give to players options (probably the most important word). Which means, strategy AND communications between players. My purpose isn't to make a "Revolution" and change completely the game( :p), cause in my opinion everything is under our eyes to make this part of the game great and incentive. Ofc, you can enjoy solo play, 6team, Wb or zerg, but in the end; victory must depends on cohesion and choices you all made (and faction cohesion) during the campain.

2. Are there any benefits for the faction / guilds depending on the results in the RVR?

If loot roll system works fine and is implemented, everyone will know why he is fighting, cause everyone will be able to be rewarded.

[Everything below is must be taken to the conditional]

About guilds (but this will come much later in dev), i would like to engage guilds more deeply in campain (cause even on the original, be part of a guild was pretty useless for RvR and expensive without real payback). Meaning for exemple, claiming a keep ( paying an important amount of gold), and by this way, providing to their faction (increased resource generation, better rank of siege weapons, dunno..) AND in a major way to their guild (immunity to starvation, XP/RP buffs, Tax system, yadayada) some advantages during campain, with ofc some risks. If the faction lock, Claimer will gain more and recover major part of their initial investment , but if faction lose ... ...prepare for misfortune.

Higher rank player will probably find some challenging objectives too cause i plan to put a target on their head.

In search of faction pride, i'm looking for something transversal between tiers and later some specific areas ( LOTD for exemple).AFor Exemple, when a zone is locked in T1, some collected resources should reinforce the T2 tier. Nothing critical, but i think you see the idea.
Ofc, this is an exemple and these parts haven't been solved and blueprinted atm. It is in the box and it must be completed and worked.

My top 1 priority is to make something "simple" to understand, "simple" to read when playing, obvious in many ways and as said, much more nervous.

3. Do you plan to enter the forts into the game in the last zones?

And Capitals too. But i don't see the point to work on it unless the global mecanic through all actual tier is fine. I must conceed we probably have made a mistake accelerating the move to deploy all tiers without the assurance to submit "perfect" rules and playground in lower tiers before. Once again, thats my personnal opinion. Players pressure .

[anarchypark]

(renegades : virtual 3rd faction).

i don't want derail topic. and i understand it's almost impossible.
i'm just super happy that seeing this comment in dev diary
undead!

For Exemple, when a zone is locked in T1, some collected resources should reinforce the T2 tier. Nothing critical, but i think you see the idea.

perma ammo for 1 cannon. 1 perma cannon for defenders. hero guard at 1 BO? special merchant? portal?
so many ideas. so many potentials.

[Penril]

Spoiler:

May we have a definitive statement around what scale/form of gameplay class balance will be discussed & conducted? It is a bit hazy to me and a few others.

For instance, will balance discussions be conducted assuming that class X is being played optimally in Z environment (be that in a warband, or a group)? Will issues brought forward concerning classes overperforming/underperforming, in a non-group environment/solo play, now be taken into account for balance discussion, and will pug/solo PoV now be deemed as important as group/wb scales?

I think this may be of particular importance to ascertain.

Cheers for all the hard work.

As far as I know, the same rules apply. You know how I feel about PUG arguments. Still, I need to learn how to GM first, and then talk to the team before I even think of moving something to Discussions, but hopefully we can start soon.

Spoiler:

Thank you for the dev diary.

Questions/ideas/grumblings;
-Will there be any balancing efforts towards making sure that all classes might have a good reason to join certain group compositions, meaning they would be a solid choice for a 6man, or a solid choice even for a WB? Because as it is, there definitely are classes that are very much undesired in WB scale. (for example, WH/WE, Blackguard)

-Shaman/AM overperformance in smallscale; now I don't hate those classes, in fact I got both shaman and AM at 40/40, but oh boi they sure heal well in smallscale. Some would say they heal too much, some would think "it's just fine", but I certainly hope you take a look at their current performances and somehow adjust them to be more in line with the rest of the healers.

-internal balancing between mdps classes; we know which are the best, and we can most likely agree which of them draw the short stick, any hope of minor adjustments in the future, or would it rely on players who play potent classes being willing to create threads where they voluntarily ask for small nerfs to their favoured classes?

As I said, afaik same rules apply. Meaning, if you feel there is something wrong with a class, you make a Proposal following the Balance Discussion forum (from now on I will refer to it as BDF) rules and I will eventually move it to Discussions. I will try move the proposals in cronological order.

[Morf]

Tnx for this Yali, im sure this will reassure some of the community that there is future promise for this project .

Few questions, any update on being able to convert medallions and emblems to conq ? i can completely understand the need for some sort of grind but currently its putting alot of players off playing.

Lastly balance stuff, any plans to reintroduce a balance team ? like there was before Az left the team, this team spent alot of time going over issues and picking at each others ideas to get the best outcome, because right now criticism on balance implementations is deemed as whining and gets a provocative response from some staff members even though some of the concerns are legitimate, surely its better to have a bunch of experienced minds going over ideas looking at what is good, bad, what is needed, what isnt etc etc, cheers

[peterthepan3]

Lastly balance stuff, any plans to reintroduce a balance team ? like there was before Az left the team, this team spent alot of time going over issues and picking at each others ideas to get the best outcome, because right now criticism on balance implementations is deemed as whining and gets a provocative response from some staff members even though some of the concerns are legitimate, surely its better to have a bunch of experienced minds going over ideas looking at what is good, bad, what is needed, what isnt etc etc, cheers

You and I both know that this has been tried several times, and it always seems to dissipate. Is it really worth trying again?
I'm all for the idea, provided it is done properly and with regular to-and-fro.

Cheers for confirming that, Penril (re balance).

[Halhammer]

Lastly balance stuff, any plans to reintroduce a balance team ? like there was before Az left the team, this team spent alot of time going over issues and picking at each others ideas to get the best outcome, because right now criticism on balance implementations is deemed as whining and gets a provocative response from some staff members even though some of the concerns are legitimate, surely its better to have a bunch of experienced minds going over ideas looking at what is good, bad, what is needed, what isnt etc etc, cheers

This, absolutely. The amount of biased BS labeled as 'balance suggestions' posted in those forums was staggering, even more so some of them that were actually moved forward to discussion.

[Penril]

Lastly balance stuff, any plans to reintroduce a balance team ? like there was before Az left the team, this team spent alot of time going over issues and picking at each others ideas to get the best outcome, because right now criticism on balance implementations is deemed as whining and gets a provocative response from some staff members even though some of the concerns are legitimate, surely its better to have a bunch of experienced minds going over ideas looking at what is good, bad, what is needed, what isnt etc etc, cheers

This, absolutely. The amount of biased BS labeled as 'balance suggestions' posted in those forums was staggering, even more so some of them that were actually moved forward to discussion.

Keep in mind that most proposals, regardless of how good or bad they can be, get to be moved to Discussions as long as they follow the BDF rules. This is to avoid bias accusations; something that I consider idiotic might be considered brilliant by someone else, so I can't go around declining everything I don't like. It is then up to the community to discuss the proposal for 2 weeks and, if it is really that terrible, you can be sure it will be declined in the end.

Of course, there are some exceptions: I will simply post "declined, you should feel bad" if someone makes a proposal like, say, giving Pounce to a Mara. Or ranged KD to Sorc. Common sense

[Buran]

2Yaliskah:
Thank you very much for your detailed response.
I understand your difficulties in rebuilding the project and balancing. However, I will say for those whom I know well, in this project we do not need a revolution, but a feedback between you and the players and, as a consequence, the responsibility of all participants. I am sure that the feedback in the form of surveys, questions-answers, guides, etc. etc. will reduce the appearance of such topics as "Revolution" to zero.

And about responsibility. Tell me, is it possible for group leaders and warband leaders to create a separate chat, accessible only for them?

[Grobbok]

any info about city sieges?
are anyone thinking, working, wondering about this element of game?