Poster: Ouliath at 6/17/2005 3:47:34 AM PDT
Subject: Cay Plz |
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Cay, this post will be as constructive as I can make it, and really is quite simple. Before I continue, I just want to let everyone know that I am not trying to catch Blizz in a contradiction or back them against the wall. I spend a lot of time discussing this game with friends, and ways that they could improve it.
One of many things I feel would help would be live events, the kinda thing you had to be there to expirence, one time deal sorta thing. This basically ties in with an advancing storyline situation. Now I have read the post you made Cay, and with all due respect, I dont think its fair, and I dont agree. What you said was basically that it would not be fair for new players coming in, that just because a player was new should not limit them to miss out on certain expirences.
This cannot be prevented as it is anyways, and thus I feel it is an unreasonable answer as to why you guys feel live events and an evolving storyline are not feasible. New Players on PvP servers now will not get to expirence what it was like before the honor system was implimented (a system that is the centre of contraversy), new players will not get a chance at the old epic mounts evan if they really want one etc.
Now I understand that the things I have listed are not quite as dramatic as say maybe having a town destroyed by a battle, or a WoW after the dark portal has opened etc. but I think as long as you guys made it quality like you are usually good for, it would go a long way towards making this game seem more alive. On a personal note, I would not mind a bit if I missed out on something big, it would just motivate me to stay more informed about the going-ons of WoW and try to play more:)
Only three generic responses are needed to give up on
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3627643 | | | Poster: Caydiem at 6/17/2005 11:08:58 PM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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If that's all you got out of that long post and my many answers, Ouliath, you missed a great deal of what I had to say about why it isn't feasible. That was from the first or second post in the thread and is not the main reason a live event system is not in place; I continued to respond beyond that. I'd say I posted a good ten to twenty times in that thread alone.
I'd rather not go deeply into all the other myriad reasons this is not in place, as I already did so in the past at great length. I understand where you're coming from on the player's end, but I'd like to lay out why what has been suggested in this thread -- and other potential solutions -- are not logical or feasible with our current system.
1) Dynamically change existing areas into a different play experience.- Why is this not feasible/logical/planned? It looks fabulous from a player standpoint, but this is not necessarily the best use of development time. It's replacing existing content rather than adding to it. The many, many manhours that went into developing the current content of Ashenvale, say, to use the example above, would be scrapped, as such a drastic change would make the majority of it nigh unusable. It's not necessarily a good practice to replace content when another option is available. When asking most players what they'd rather have, a replaced with b or a AND c, they'll probably go with having more content and/or features over having simply shifting ones. Keep in mind also that it takes many, many manhours to develop areas like the ones you see in game; to keep that as dynamic and shifting as some of you seem to want would take either an extremely large team or the developers working on it to the exclusion of all else.
2) Have a live team acting as NPCs in the game, bringing life to an otherwise static world.- Why is this not feasible/logical/planned? This is a system with which I'm most intimately knowledgable, and while I know what benefit it can bring to those players who do get to participate in its results, I am also keenly aware of the managerial nightmare, potential cost, and overall impact of such a program.
We do not make use of volunteers due to the legal and managerial concerns therein, and have no plans to in the future, so any and all actors would have to be employed by Blizzard. You'd want a quality team, so each actor must have a near-encyclopedic knowledge of Warcraft lore from ALL racial perspectives (since they do differ), be able to think quickly on their feet while still remaining true to the storyline, and be both a fast and accurate typist. Assuming you had nothing but quality actors lined up (which is normally far from the truth), you would then need to employ enough to run events across all 100 or so realms (and that's just in North America alone; similar teams would need to exist in other parts of the world). The sheer cost of keeping such a program running would far outweigh any benefit gained from the events themselves.
Plus the matter of size is a problem. If you hold large-scale events, everyone rushes to the same area at once in hopes of seeing the event (or, more likely, getting something from such an event), and then the server crashes. Servers have limitations, Ouliath. You may not like that and consider it a poor excuse, but the technology does have limits; that's the simple reality of the matter. If your events and team tend towards the smaller side of the scale, the overall impact on your playerbase is less than a mosquito bite. Most players will never even know they exist, no matter how you use them. Thus the cost outweighs the benefit in either case.
3) Have cutscenes in the game that draw you more into the story.- Why is this not feasible/logical/planned? This is far more feasible, but they're difficult to pull off gracefully and logically. (Before you bring up any other games, yes, I know how they did it, and no, I do not believe that their manner of executing such is "graceful" nor does it address all issues we ourselves would have to consider. Do not turn this into a game comparison thread.) They're a possibility, certainly, but there are no plans for them at this time.
4) Add more scripted world events into the world to make it feel more alive.- This is what we currently plan on doing. You haven't seen much of what we have in store yet, but the next patch or two should show you more of what we're capable of doing, and what possibilities lie beyond.
I hope I've covered most of it. Understand that, while you may feel excited and motivated if an entire city was destroyed (for example), several other players would feel inconvenienced and frustrated. You're all customers, and we have to take everything into consideration.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3642638 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/17/2005 11:56:04 PM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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Q u o t e:
While this is a well thought out argument it is flawed. Guild Wars already has a system that changes an area you have been to dynammically. In fact in the game an entire series of zones are destoyed and yet this does not effect other players because of the way their system is set up. As for your system, as usual it is almost perfect, but it is not original and there in lies its fatal flaw. If wow had a similar system as GW one could easily accomplish this task, but I also understand that you can not do this. That is why it would be nice if you could try implimenting something like this in a future expansion/patch for a specific zone such as the Caverns of Time or Lower Sithilus. Some thing like what people here are asking for could easily be done in an instance enviroment.
Again, I asked this not to become a game comparison thread. Please do not turn it into one, or I will lock it.
World of Warcraft is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, and it has a largely persistent world; the game you cite does not, and we have no plans to make World of Warcraft closer to that model at this time.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3643016 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 9:13:23 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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Lazy? Hardly. It's not something we've simply brushed off and dismissed; these are things the design team has gone over again and again, and this is their current stance on the matter.
Those of you who bring up the end of Beta event -- that was planned out by none other than myself, and I'll tell you why it went off well and why that wouldn't be the case now.
1) The number of realms we did this on worldwide can be counted on my fingers.
2) Because it was the end of beta and support wasn't really needed, it was the GMs that executed the scripts and such.
3) I didn't have to worry about spawning a huge Infernal in Orgrimmar/Ironforge because such an event wasn't going to anger paying players. Much more consideration is needed for an event on a retail service.
As you can see, things would be far different now.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646167 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 9:43:24 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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This is the last time I am saying this:
Do not turn this thread into a game comparison thread or it will be locked.
You are free to discuss concepts and ideas, whether implemented elsewhere or no. Game comparison threads, however, are off-topic and I will lock this if the trend continues; I would prefer to continue the discussion, so please refrain from this activity.
Descille, I have personally run live events for two massively multiplayer online games over a period of years; I am not ignorant in how such things are run. How many players can be handled in a given area is often a limitation of the very core of a game; it can be stretched with hardware, but changing such is very difficult in an already-released game. Again, you may find it a poor excuse, but it is the simple reality of the situation as it is today and is a very real and practical consideration when looking at the possibility of live events.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646450 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 9:46:14 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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Q u o t e:
If it is not feasible at this point and you don't see it becoming feasible any time soon why promise it to your players on the friggin box and in most of your other literature. "evolving worlds" means that change happens.
Hm. You know, I don't recall Maraudon's doors being open when I first started playing. Dire Maul was nothing but an area of ogre-infested ruins; no way into its halls. The Thorium Brotherhood was far more secluded... they certainly didn't have an outpost in Searing Gorge. They must have built that later on. The armies of the Stormpike Dwarves and the Frostwolf Clan of Orcs were not yet actively warring against one another.
I could go on. ;)
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646476 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 10:08:36 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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Descille, I understood the point of your post perfectly. I would like you to understand it from my own end, however. I would LOVE to have a discourse on this with you folks, but I can't if you keep citing examples from other games. As an official representive of Blizzard, I obviously cannot use those same examples or go in-depth as to why they would not work in our particular case if you cite specifics. If you work with and explain the concepts themselves, however, I can.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646647 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 10:31:27 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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Well, part of the problem with that plan is that quests are tied to these NPCs; this could be worked around in some respects, but not in others. For example, let's say you have an NPC in Thrall's chamber, say his advisor, giving his quests while he's away. They'd obviously have to be rewritten versions, since the Warchief has a particular voice and his quests sound as if they're coming right from him. Therefore, the quest itself would be a different quest (and different ID). What happens when Thrall returns home and those quests are no longer available? Do you keep that version of the NPC there and allow people to do the quest twice? As I understand it, you can't have multiple NPCs who end a particular quest as it stands. It's a bit of a pickle.
Another problem is that the NPCs you name are targets for extreme honor rewards, and part of the challenge of defeating them is their highly defended "seat of power", normally swarming with elite guards. Having them go out to defend anything would, no matter what is done, make killing that particular leader far easier, thus imbalancing the PvP system, etc.
I don't know about the PvP battle part of your second suggestion, as you'd require a scripted "win condition" -- extremely hard to do in a PvP environment unless you're in a Battleground, really.[ post edited by Caydiem ]
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646843 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/17/2005 11:08:58 PM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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If that's all you got out of that long post and my many answers, Ouliath, you missed a great deal of what I had to say about why it isn't feasible. That was from the first or second post in the thread and is not the main reason a live event system is not in place; I continued to respond beyond that. I'd say I posted a good ten to twenty times in that thread alone.
I'd rather not go deeply into all the other myriad reasons this is not in place, as I already did so in the past at great length. I understand where you're coming from on the player's end, but I'd like to lay out why what has been suggested in this thread -- and other potential solutions -- are not logical or feasible with our current system.
1) Dynamically change existing areas into a different play experience.- Why is this not feasible/logical/planned? It looks fabulous from a player standpoint, but this is not necessarily the best use of development time. It's replacing existing content rather than adding to it. The many, many manhours that went into developing the current content of Ashenvale, say, to use the example above, would be scrapped, as such a drastic change would make the majority of it nigh unusable. It's not necessarily a good practice to replace content when another option is available. When asking most players what they'd rather have, a replaced with b or a AND c, they'll probably go with having more content and/or features over having simply shifting ones. Keep in mind also that it takes many, many manhours to develop areas like the ones you see in game; to keep that as dynamic and shifting as some of you seem to want would take either an extremely large team or the developers working on it to the exclusion of all else.
2) Have a live team acting as NPCs in the game, bringing life to an otherwise static world.- Why is this not feasible/logical/planned? This is a system with which I'm most intimately knowledgable, and while I know what benefit it can bring to those players who do get to participate in its results, I am also keenly aware of the managerial nightmare, potential cost, and overall impact of such a program.
We do not make use of volunteers due to the legal and managerial concerns therein, and have no plans to in the future, so any and all actors would have to be employed by Blizzard. You'd want a quality team, so each actor must have a near-encyclopedic knowledge of Warcraft lore from ALL racial perspectives (since they do differ), be able to think quickly on their feet while still remaining true to the storyline, and be both a fast and accurate typist. Assuming you had nothing but quality actors lined up (which is normally far from the truth), you would then need to employ enough to run events across all 100 or so realms (and that's just in North America alone; similar teams would need to exist in other parts of the world). The sheer cost of keeping such a program running would far outweigh any benefit gained from the events themselves.
Plus the matter of size is a problem. If you hold large-scale events, everyone rushes to the same area at once in hopes of seeing the event (or, more likely, getting something from such an event), and then the server crashes. Servers have limitations, Ouliath. You may not like that and consider it a poor excuse, but the technology does have limits; that's the simple reality of the matter. If your events and team tend towards the smaller side of the scale, the overall impact on your playerbase is less than a mosquito bite. Most players will never even know they exist, no matter how you use them. Thus the cost outweighs the benefit in either case.
3) Have cutscenes in the game that draw you more into the story.- Why is this not feasible/logical/planned? This is far more feasible, but they're difficult to pull off gracefully and logically. (Before you bring up any other games, yes, I know how they did it, and no, I do not believe that their manner of executing such is "graceful" nor does it address all issues we ourselves would have to consider. Do not turn this into a game comparison thread.) They're a possibility, certainly, but there are no plans for them at this time.
4) Add more scripted world events into the world to make it feel more alive.- This is what we currently plan on doing. You haven't seen much of what we have in store yet, but the next patch or two should show you more of what we're capable of doing, and what possibilities lie beyond.
I hope I've covered most of it. Understand that, while you may feel excited and motivated if an entire city was destroyed (for example), several other players would feel inconvenienced and frustrated. You're all customers, and we have to take everything into consideration.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3642638 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/17/2005 11:56:04 PM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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Q u o t e:
While this is a well thought out argument it is flawed. Guild Wars already has a system that changes an area you have been to dynammically. In fact in the game an entire series of zones are destoyed and yet this does not effect other players because of the way their system is set up. As for your system, as usual it is almost perfect, but it is not original and there in lies its fatal flaw. If wow had a similar system as GW one could easily accomplish this task, but I also understand that you can not do this. That is why it would be nice if you could try implimenting something like this in a future expansion/patch for a specific zone such as the Caverns of Time or Lower Sithilus. Some thing like what people here are asking for could easily be done in an instance enviroment.
Again, I asked this not to become a game comparison thread. Please do not turn it into one, or I will lock it.
World of Warcraft is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, and it has a largely persistent world; the game you cite does not, and we have no plans to make World of Warcraft closer to that model at this time.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3643016 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 9:13:23 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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Lazy? Hardly. It's not something we've simply brushed off and dismissed; these are things the design team has gone over again and again, and this is their current stance on the matter.
Those of you who bring up the end of Beta event -- that was planned out by none other than myself, and I'll tell you why it went off well and why that wouldn't be the case now.
1) The number of realms we did this on worldwide can be counted on my fingers.
2) Because it was the end of beta and support wasn't really needed, it was the GMs that executed the scripts and such.
3) I didn't have to worry about spawning a huge Infernal in Orgrimmar/Ironforge because such an event wasn't going to anger paying players. Much more consideration is needed for an event on a retail service.
As you can see, things would be far different now.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646167 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 9:43:24 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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This is the last time I am saying this:
Do not turn this thread into a game comparison thread or it will be locked.
You are free to discuss concepts and ideas, whether implemented elsewhere or no. Game comparison threads, however, are off-topic and I will lock this if the trend continues; I would prefer to continue the discussion, so please refrain from this activity.
Descille, I have personally run live events for two massively multiplayer online games over a period of years; I am not ignorant in how such things are run. How many players can be handled in a given area is often a limitation of the very core of a game; it can be stretched with hardware, but changing such is very difficult in an already-released game. Again, you may find it a poor excuse, but it is the simple reality of the situation as it is today and is a very real and practical consideration when looking at the possibility of live events.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646450 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 9:46:14 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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Q u o t e:
If it is not feasible at this point and you don't see it becoming feasible any time soon why promise it to your players on the friggin box and in most of your other literature. "evolving worlds" means that change happens.
Hm. You know, I don't recall Maraudon's doors being open when I first started playing. Dire Maul was nothing but an area of ogre-infested ruins; no way into its halls. The Thorium Brotherhood was far more secluded... they certainly didn't have an outpost in Searing Gorge. They must have built that later on. The armies of the Stormpike Dwarves and the Frostwolf Clan of Orcs were not yet actively warring against one another.
I could go on. ;)
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646476 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 10:08:36 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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Descille, I understood the point of your post perfectly. I would like you to understand it from my own end, however. I would LOVE to have a discourse on this with you folks, but I can't if you keep citing examples from other games. As an official representive of Blizzard, I obviously cannot use those same examples or go in-depth as to why they would not work in our particular case if you cite specifics. If you work with and explain the concepts themselves, however, I can.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646647 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 10:31:27 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz *edited post* |
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Well, part of the problem with that plan is that quests are tied to these NPCs; this could be worked around in some respects, but not in others. For example, let's say you have an NPC in Thrall's chamber, say his advisor, giving his quests while he's away. They'd obviously have to be rewritten versions, since the Warchief has a particular voice and his quests sound as if they're coming right from him. Therefore, the quest itself would be a different quest (and different ID). What happens when Thrall returns home and those quests are no longer available? Do you keep that version of the NPC there and allow people to do the quest twice? As I understand it, you can't have multiple NPCs who end a particular quest as it stands. It's a bit of a pickle.
Another problem is that the NPCs you name are targets for extreme honor rewards, and part of the challenge of defeating them is their highly defended "seat of power", normally swarming with elite guards. Having them go out to defend anything would, no matter what is done, make killing that particular leader far easier, thus imbalancing the PvP system, etc.
I don't know about the PvP battle part of your second suggestion, as you'd require a scripted "win condition" -- extremely hard to do in a PvP environment unless you're in a Battleground, really.[ post edited by Caydiem ]
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646843 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 10:45:14 AM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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You can expect whatever you like, Dorenal -- I'm certainly not one to dictate what you can and cannot expect from a game. Your expectations may or may not happen, however.
I cannot say to what extent the scripted events will go, because I myself do not know and obviously the developers would like to keep it secret in any regard.
I'm aware that much of what has come has "popped" into place... but I hope that the world event we're adding with the next patch will show you, at least a little, that we do understand the desire for a more organic change to a living world. It's nothing huge, nothing life-changing, but I think it'll give you a better idea of what our system is capable of. As a role-player, I am looking forward to the next world event very much. :)[ post edited by Caydiem ]
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3646916 | Poster: Caydiem at 6/18/2005 11:51:41 PM PDT
Subject: Re: Cay Plz |
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I have not confirmed any of that, Alexei. What I am saying is that our current method of bringing a more dynamic world to you is through scripted events. That's all. Don't imply any more than that.
- Caydiem -
Assistant Community Manager
| | | http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=3627643&p=#post3652390 |
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