Talk:2018-08-08 Discord Q&A

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1:19

Steven what about EU server for alpha-1?

We are in the process of securing those for next month's testing

Thank you actually I got one more. That video of the environment was that Bear's work, the music?

No that was not Bear's work. Bear's work will be in place by phase two.

1:52

How long do you plan to keep alpha-1 servers up?

So there'll be regimented test sessions to begin with. They'll move from hours to days to weeks to persistent and that schedule depends on the performance during the testing phases.

Okay [cross-talk]

You know we'd like them up full time.

Will you guys be able to aim for like you know both during the week and also the weekends or will be specifically like based on your work hours?

So to begin with I think we are targeting the first week of testing we'll probably play for a number of hours each day between Wednesday and Saturday and then the following week we'll probably expand that out to greater selection of hours and run till Sunday and then the week after that is when we'll start to have it up kind of all-day thing around into a persistent 24/7 following in the weeks after that.

So Saturday the 15th my birthday the server will be live?

The 15th of September

Yes next month.

I don't know if it's the 15th or I mean we're aiming for we're aiming for the third week of September.

So on a weekend right I can play it?

There will be weekend days included yeah.

Make it thirteenth so Sunday American that way I can actually do something Monday my birthday.

My goal is to is to make it as soon as it is ready to be played. But I will say though that we have hit the ahead of our schedule which is what I expected from the amazing team they consistently have been performing ahead of schedule, so that's always good to know.

10/10 work

Good to hear

4:00

A quick question for you. Will you be the final boss during the Ashes of Creation Apocalypse horde mode?

That's a good question the Ashes of Creation Apocalypse horde mode will absolutely include boss mechanics, so some of the ideas behind that is going to have a wave mode of a variety of NPCs will likely include some achievable cosmetics as well in that mode depending on how far you can get and those cosmetics will include pets of the NPCs that you face, so like a little miniature version of the NPC's and we'll update those as well, that you'll have in the MMO.

Nice

It's actually really awesome

And is the Ashes of Creation Apocalypse horde mode just for specifically testing or will that be an actual mode in-game?

That's specifically for testing. It's a way that we thought it would be kind of fun to implement AI mechanics that we're looking to implement. Testing the you know the blackboard for the AI. Being able to have variable types of NPCs that have roles whether it be like a sniper, ranged, melee, boss, heroic you know kind of different AI focuses for those monsters during interesting situations.

5:23

Phase one of alpha 1 will be EU friendly as well?

Phase one of alpha 1 will be EU friendly, well the time well I'm sorry the initial time slots I think will be EU friendly. I think those will probably start around like 7:00 p.m. EU time roughly, so it should be should be relatively good.

5:48

Steven what will you be having for PAX for the demo. Is it gonna be something similar to what we've seen in the past or is it gonna be something more unique?

So PAX consists only of the panel as well as a meet and greet that we'll give meeting times out probably before the end of this week if not next week. There will not be a playable demo at PAX because it is only the hold on one second ... alright sorry about that yeah so panel and a meet and greet so there won't be a demo that's playable for participants however will be showing footage and making some announcements and stuff

6:44

Steven I got a question for you. We were discussing in chat earlier about freeholds and whether or not a person would be safe in their home or within the entirety of their freehold from getting player killed.

I think our initial testing is going to revolve around the footprint of their freehold and then we'll take into consideration the metrics gleaned from that testing.

Awesome thanks

7:10

Will we be able to keep up with friends for the large scale fights?

For the Phase one arena style stuff?

Yes

Yeah so there's going to be there's going to be party modes where you can queue up with up to four friends and then there will also be a guild mode that's implemented a little bit after the start where you can queue up with up to 19 of your friends.

Nice [cross-talk]

19 is a kind of odd ball number.

Total of 20 [cross-talk].

I can't math.

7:49

It was mentioned about the the name reservations, is there anything stopping people from griefing others with the name reservations? Saying like say if you've got a guild and there are people with doubled up accounts if they steal your guild's name is there anything against that or?

So this won't the name reservations that are present in phase 2 will not be guild name reservations, they'll be character name reservations and I guess you know there's no way really to stop an individual from wasting their name or reservation to I guess grief someone else. I would just depend on the fact that it is limited and expensive to get to gain the name reservation so.

I was more concerned about the guild.

Yeah the guild name reservations won't be implemented probably until I would say just before beta 1 once we have a initial world server list for all of the world servers that we intend to launch with, that's when we'll announce the guild name reservation.

8:59

For the name reservations for your character will be on a priority list say based on your backer level?

That's correct it'll be based on backer level. So it will be first-come first-serve within that tier. So individuals at the Kickstarter backer levels before those in the intrepid pack level.

Question will Kickstarter better come first before the summer kickstarter or?

Correct we'll have Kickstarter, then summer backers, then intrepid pack holders

Okay cool

9:36

So Stephen I know you've said in the past about there being a guild number or a guild member limit and it's kind of understood at the moment that it's gonna be 300. Is that the case or have you all changed that or what?

So in testing we'll start with that cap, however it's important to note that the 300 is the maximum cap that is attained by leveling the guild and selecting the path of size as opposed to the path of guild skills. So the the larger you choose to allow for members to join your guild increasing that member cap, the less focused and honed the available skill options will be from a guild level up perspective for guild members. So the way that kind of works is it plays as a balance/counterbalance to larger guilds versus smaller more honed and focused guilds. It kind of gives them an equitable edge of participation.

So you kind of answered my follow up question, but do you think that a guild that is a size of 150 would be able to go against a guild that is 300?

It definitely depends on the situation in which you are putting those two guilds against each other. For example if you have more objective based combat that revolves around high mobility and agility strong focus, organization I would expect the smaller guild to outperform the larger guild with regards to that. If you're speaking purely a numbers game and they're meeting on the field then I would expect the larger guild to perform in that. The balance comes in our play scenarios. Do we offer solely a field based combat system where you show up with the numbers you have in which case you lean heavily towards zergs or do you implement designs that feature both components of objective based combat that involves organizational rule as opposed to just having that field presence; and we intend to offer both.

11:52

So are you saying that like a well-balanced small guild like say you have like the right amount of healers to tanks to damage or to DPS player guild like that's a smaller guild and then the other guild might be twice as big but they have a less balanced guild like would they be at a disadvantage in that scenario?

That's kind of two questions in that sense so one is from a class organizational standpoint. I always feel that if you if you balance based on groups that in your balance focus is to incorporate features that play well from a player versus player perspective as well as a player versus environment perspective: Having support classes, having DPS and tanks that can obstruct movement and/or create you know bottlenecks on the field and stuff like that. I think a well-rounded raid it will perform better against a non well-rounded raid, however then you incorporate the second aspect of numbers; and that's where again mobility organization leadership tactics. Having objectives in gameplay that make those important helps to balance the zerg mentality that a lot of guilds can tend to have. Now zerg is an unorganized group of a large group of people. There are absolutely guilds out there that have a large following and good organizational leadership and can structure their raids well; and I think those will be the most performing in the game obviously; and that's where then guild sizes come to play you know creating the opportunity for division in the game to allow for you know this subterfuge to play a role and politics and stuff like that. But our focus is making a place for smaller guilds to be competitive with larger guilds as well.

13:47

Question since we're gonna be testing siege mechanics. Are sieges in the game meant to be specifically against nodes are they meant to be instanced where only the attacking node can be participate and only the defending node can participate? Or can any random other node just jump in the fray?

So that's a good question and there's two types of sieges right there's the city there's a node sieges in the castle sieges I think the castle sieges will be more structured towards a guild element and having some structure there. Neither will be instanced in the sense of what an instance actually is which is taking you out of the open world and putting you into you know your own shard of existence, but both will be in the open world. But there will be participation structure in sieging castles. With regards to the open siege on nodes, really the only structural component there and participation has to do with what what node you're a member of, what node you're a citizen of. That will restrict your participation to a particular side. If you're in an allied node of a - if you're a citizen of an allied node to the defender, you won't be able to participate as an attacker; or if you're the citizen at the defending node; and that's pretty much for the most part the only structure I think for City sieges.

15:07

Question regarding the guilds. Is there any prerequisites for actually having a guild? So at the beginning of the game is there anything you need to attain in order to make a guild?

Yes there will be some prerequisites with regards to having a minimum member count at start and that member count might be around five individuals. Additionally there will be a material component cost that will include both currency as well as a material and quest line; and then the last thing I think that we'll have is a minimum level requirement that should be relatively easy. But we just want we want to prevent the [cross-talk] minimum member count to start?

Maximum.

Oh maximum yes. There's a locked maximum member cap; and then as you level the guild you're going to have the option to expand the member cap significantly or expand it minimally but increase this skill component of members of the guild.

16:12

Steven could we have two guilds and be allies [unrecognizable] actually functionable but level the guild in a different way so we don't have to make it to max members?

You will have the ability to declare alliances at a certain level. So at a certain level a guild leader will have the ability to start the quest to make an alliance. He can create an alliance, become an alliance leader and invite other guilds to this formed Alliance. Yeah that that's I think I don't know specifically the question you're asking but that's how the Alliance feature will work. Then you'll have a set number of guilds you can invite to the Alliance and you won't have a member cap of the Alliance you'll just have a guild member cap; and then so: If you invited if the let's say the guild member cap is three guilds can be invited to the Alliance then it doesn't matter if those three guilds had a 300 member cap or a fifty member cap. The member doesn't really play a role, it's a number of guilds in the Alliance.

17:13

So is it like an Eve Online system of corporations and alliances in that retrospect 'cause in EVE Online you can have as many guilds or I should say corporations in an alliance as there can be.

Yeah you won't be able to invite as many guild as you'd like into the alliance the alliance will have a set guild member count. So you can only invite a number of guilds to the alliance before you must form a new alliance; and then those alliance can have a de facto friendship but they won't have any game component of connection. What the alliance system would allow is pooling of resources into by guild leaders into an alliance guild alliance bank. Will allow certain participation in different quest lines. It will allow common area chat for members and it will allow affiliations and gear that can be attained as well.

18:17

Open world PvP, more be curious. You know I know that you have the caravan system than people gonna attck caravans. But with regards to just if I run across somebody and opt to put them down, you know what kind of detriments do I face doing so?

So there's a lot of info on that currently already released with regards to corruption. I would check one of the wiki's and look up corruption because it is it is a big system and there's certain detriments that kind of balance the reward factor of you being able to participate in open world PvP through the flagging system yep.

18:55

No unknown, corruption will not be tested in alpha 1. Corruption will be tested however in phase two [cross-talk].

19:02

Is there a market system in phase two or?

The market system?

Yeah is is the market system more of like a retrospect of like a grand auction house for one node or we have to put up our own stalls to sell equipment and gear?

That's a good question. So from a stock perspective, the stock system will not be present in phase two of alpha one, however the merchant systems will be active as well as the player trading system we're targeting to have available as well.

19:40

Okay so I have a question about healing and action combat and targeting combat. I know that's gonna be it tested. I know that you said that action combat is gonna be something that's tested openly and alpha one, but my question is how is that going to work for healers?

It's a very good question. So we have a few design theories on action combat and healing to began with phase one. Part of that will be the implementation of a class system into the castle siege and horde mode of phase one. Those will be kits that play out as skills available from an action perspective, you'll be able to target in proximity, basically so positioning is going to matter: Importantly, for healers being close to the individuals are party members you wish to heal. Additionally you'll have reticle based healing methods. This would be a template that could be launched in that direction as a pulse of heels or augments. So there's a lot of different systems are playing with that you'll see more of when we get to those when we get to the castle siege system and the Ashes of Creation Apocalypse horde mode.

20:49

So Steven I have a question about sieges and siege equipment. I know a few games have siege equipment where you just plop it down out of nowhere like ESO, so are you having it's set up so you build the siege equipment and you push around the battlefield or are you basically saying these people can bring a ballista and place it here and then they can use it and pick it up?

Good question. So there's two theories behind siege equipment. One of the theories is that siege equipment will require materials, constructions, pre planning, you know, craftsmanship that's needed in order to prepare this equipment to be brought to the field. The way that that equipment will be constructed from a hands-on perspective is: You'll have a summoning sheet that will magically construct in front of you this equipment that will then be available to drive basically. This will be a vehicle basically. Some will be vehicles some will be hand held. Some will require multiple people to be quipped for it to function. That's the idea behind some of the siege equipment. And then with regards to alpha one phase one however in the castle siege system, we won't likely have that mechanic present instead what will happen is static siege equipment that's placed in the map for the attackers to utilize that will present a focal points of PvP in the match where defenders will know where to target a specific area on the field in order to attack.

22:27

Gotcha thank you. Steven I've got a question I can't believe I'm talking to you this is amazing. Yeah, so my question is involving summoners. So, say I'm a level one summoner or whatever and then I can come in [unrecognizable]. They are augment at to a healer so then maybe I'm thinking of [unrecognizable] like fireballs or whatever maybe it drops like healing dots every 3 seconds or something to kind of augment that spell. And then I was thinking or wondering, can you like level up your summoner you're summonings?

Sure so a summoner that goes with the cleric secondary class is going to be a necromancer really, so the necromancer is going to be able to choose the path of life or death with regards to its summoning influences and augments. So you'll be able to augment your summons to either aid and assist in healing and providing support to either yourself or the other summons you may have out or other party members; and the the death side of that augmentation will really influence your opponent to create damage, to sap life, to manipulate their ability to survive in combat. The idea behind the system is that you you're kind of skirting the line through these augmentations of your role, right. We have the traditional holy Trinity that's present in class designs for MMOs and it's often that those either are not deviated at all or completely deviated from entirely. The augment as to kind of offer a balance between that where you still maintain the semblance of that Trinity system while offering the opportunity to customize your play experience towards one of the other angles in the triangle. I hope that I don't know I think I kinda lost what asked.

Did you say you could level up your summoner's monster or whatever?

Oh yes you can level up absolutely those are skills is the active of skills that are found from your primary class so you gain your summons from your summoner class as an active skill and then skills can be further developed with points yes.

Thank you.

24:49

Hey Steven I've got a question about player names. So with the packages that have name reservation, are you were serving like a generic player name that will be used for all your characters, or are you reserving the specific character name?

You're reserving a specific character name. So when we have when we have a server list you will be choosing a server and saving a name on that server.

And to go off that, are there going to be player names and character names or just character names?

Something that we would like to implement and our web team has been tasked with implementing is the opportunity on our website to offer an exposeable in-depth character sheet that you can share with the rest of the players and community or turn private; and on that one on that character she basically you'll be able to import a more in-depth name that includes a surname that includes whatever you want to do there. But for our actual world representation of your character's name it's a single character name.

25:53

With the server reservations he said that we can basically pick a name along with that server. Do you know how many had starts servers you're running the house so we can kind of you know I guess gauge what we need to do in advance?

I believe that our current estimation is 3 head start servers but we may refine that to two, I don't that we're not defined on that yet so I would I would wait to make an announcement.

26:18

Also the question about the names as well, does it like is it just whoever like because your head start or is it just whoever gets to reserve a name, or is it an order of packages like for example the person as a 10000, say if someone has a $10000 package and I have the $500 package both want the same name do they get it over me because they pay more is it is it just first come first serve everybody gets name reservation?

So it's first come first serve within the tier that you own so that that yeah the 10K backer would would have first dibs and then followed by the 5, well Kickstarter first it's all packages in Kickstarter first in order and then summer backers in order and then the webstore backers yes.

27:04

So in terms of action combat is a reticle mode planned right now?

Correct. Currently there is a reticle mode, yes.

Will you be able to like attack with left and right click for the basic weapon attack?

You will be able to use the left click for your basic, currently it's left click for your basic weapon attack.

Nice thank you.

And then there's a focus button that's present on the right mouse button and also activates root motion attacks as well for melee.

27:38

We'll be able to set keybinds in alpha 1?

Yes alpha one will include our, I believe it will actually I'm thinking real quick. Hold on. I think yes I think it does include hotkey customization keybinds.

27:53

Will macros of any kind, including key word software, would that be allowed or no?

That's a good question. The issue with macros is that from an anti cheat metric perspective it's difficult to define what a macro is against a script. And in order to catch all scripts sometimes you have to prevent the macro usage. So really that's a that's a data issue. If we allow for macros then we lose our ability to precisely ban script users, botters.

28:35

Jumping back do you publish it?

I'm sorry?

In the EU are you publishing?

No news on that. Were preparing for our EU servers to be launched near the end of next month.

28:50

So Stephen about addons and mods, I know that you said before that you don't want to have too many but there is for example on WoW I'm a role player, there's one called my role play lets you have like history eye color basically lets you write in a basic novel inside the game. Are you gonna have anything in game sort of like that so people can find information about your character and stuff for the RPer?

That's part of the character sheet desire for us which hopefully will be accessible in game as well by opening a browser through our UI where you can get back history of a character that that character has input themselves into journal entries that they may choose to share with others. That is that is specifically with regard to the future you just mentioned that is something that we have actually thought about because you know for role play perspective we want people to be in depth with their characters. About API's, that is something that I am still considering [cross-talk].

30:04

I see Shunex asked Steven can we get OC friendly times for Alpha? So Shunex the thing about the friendly times is the most important friendly time during testing phases is for our developers so that we can profile and watch specific metrics, but I will say that alpha one phase one after a number of weeks is intending to be a all time access. So after a number of weeks we intend those times to be friendly because you can play at any time. But during the first few weeks it's going to be during certain hours that are friendly to developers times.

30:51

I've got a question about the-

I have time one more question but yes go ahead.

With the character creations are we able to save characters that we can make in alpha and beta into the end-game when it launches.

So I'll tell you what my hope is. This is my hope. Is that one yes character creation I would like to have the option for players to go in spend time, create characters save that character and then have it available in their suite their character creation suite as an option to preload at launch that they can take that's those settings and launch the character. I would love for there to be community rewards and competitions for the best made characters that we could do like a monthly kind of thing around and/or additionally I'd like for there to be implementation of housing and a housing suite that you can save your furniture load out as well for building out the interior of housing. I don't know if we'll be able to get to that. It is a cherry on top of the icing. And we'll see how the schedule looks with that regard.

32:06

Wait Steven please this is about character creation too [cross-talk]. How much in depth is your character calculation because I play games where you can't really create like a fat character and I really want to and like all you can do is like have really muscular characters and I look like a fat character.

So there definitely is going to be a range to the to the weight aspect of a character as well as the height because from a character creation, excuse me, from a character artist standpoint as a pipeline goes you must create the armor to fit and adjust on a skeletal body that is not blown out. So there are gonna be parameters by which you can create the width of the character height of the character yes. You won't just be able to go crazy with it. But you with that being said there we what we create is a central point on the character for specific race and then we allow a scale in one direction or the other. So hopefully that scale in one direction will be satisfying for you. I can say that if I were to give you a target of of what I felt has done character creation well in the past, I would say BDO did a very nice character creation suite. I thought that was balanced with regards to the scalability of the customization for the option of players. I would say that that was a good representation of a of a of an RPG aspected character creation suite.