Reason to log in: Difference on forcing and encouraging players

[DarkRepulsor]

Hey guys, you both made this into one of those threads. Just take the penalty, shake hands, and let’s keep the ball moving. Sorry for the RDJ meme, just had to catch attention, you know.

So where were we?

• Obviously, we’re still in alpha here - this topic sounds like it’s years down the road, but like someone said, it’s great to think about now, because that’s what these forums are for There is a great thread about long-term game funding that ought to be reviewed here.
https://forum.oortonline.com/t/long-term-game-funding/619

• Lots of windows popping up definitely seems like an unpopular idea; people seem more in favor of a sparser game experience.

• F2P concepts like “energy” and capping earnings and such also seem unpopular.

• The idea of having spawned “shrines” that allow players to convert lesser materials into greater materials sounds really interesting, especially when combined with the thread below.
https://forum.oortonline.com/t/shards-auras/1738

Okay, let’s keep going – what else makes a game fun to play in the long term?

@Tercel @Squidgy Tell us more about Destiny; what made that a great experience?

[Squidgy]

@DarkRepulsor

Tell us more about Destiny; what made that a great experience?

I wouldn’t say great experience, but a fun and addictive one. This guy says it pretty well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1ir7yAe1W8

Not only is it a game that is tight, easy to play, etc. But the added bonus of the possibility of some rare armour or weapons, PLUS the fact that you can get rewarded once daily for things like public events (happen every now and then when free-roaming) and once weekly for raids, etc.
It all added up to me literally playing for at least 20 hours a week until a few months ago and it’s the game I’ve spent the longest on in my life and it has only been out a year.
My friends and I would meet up weekly for the Tuesday night reset so we could do all the raids and gain more loot, and then complete bounties or play PVP for the rest of the night.
When weekend rolls around, a rare weapons and armour vendor comes for a couple of days with new exciting things that we would also immediately checkout.

Eventually, the DLC made it a terrible game and everything we had earnt up until now became basically useless because the DLC stuff was better. Bungie handled the game from launch very badly.

[Tercel]

I’ll agree I wouldn’t call Destiny a ‘great’ experience, but…
I suppose the biggest reason I played so much early on ( I don’t mess with it very often anymore ) was that it’s simply well built. It is easy to pick up and learn, the varying skills are satisfying and fun, and the controls are just…perfectly tight. The daily missions and weekly strikes did keep me hanging on for quite a while. Participating in one of the random Public Events that happen as you wander around is always a fun change of pace and getting the gift package for the first one you do each day always manages to catch me by surprise.

I will respectfully disagree with Squidgy that the DLC made it terrible, but I don’t think it improved much either. Leveling after the soft level cap is horrendous, nor am I a fan of having to grind for reputation points with basically every vendor available, but that’s another topic.

[Zouls]

@DarkRepulsor let them argue. they both have good points. as you know i tend to work the same way so i understand why they say what they say, in a case like this there might not be a right or wrong answer, however i think it is up to the idividual to argue for systems they would like to see an against systems they dont want to see. if you have to actually argue your points then you get way more interesting arguments.

lets do like this. pointing out flaws in an idea is okay, any argument for or against the idea is fair game. Personal attacks are absolutely no go. i will try to put up peoples arguments side by side in 12 hours time.

Round 2. FIGHT!

PS: for everybody talking about material changing shrines. already mentioned it in the automated time sinks posts. feel free to use these things as arguments too.

[Vastar]

@DarkRepulsor

• The idea of having spawned “shrines” that allow players to convert lesser materials into greater materials sounds really interesting,

@Zouls

for everybody talking about material changing shrines. already mentioned it in the automated time sinks posts.

I think you both somehow meshed together my shrine idea and @Clexarews material enhance idea. Those are two different ideas, mine being about sacrificing materials to get a specific game wide buff and his about sacrificing x of some less valuable material to get y of some more valuable materials with a ~24h cooldown.

Also the material enhance idea could easily fall into the “forcing player” category as @Clexarews already stated by himself.

@Clexarews

We obviously want to steer away from a system that only provides rewards players for doing certain tasks as this turns more into forcing rather than encouraging. My previous thought about daily transformations of some base materials into rare materials might actually fall into this category.

[Zouls]

no. its a mixed system, highly depending on how you do it. as i also mentioned in the thread i posted. case you find it too long to read, in short. it is a good way to add timesinks to higher level crafting, so if you need to sacrifice materials and time to get the best materials then it would also make those materials more worth (like having oort infused material would take 17 hours for 10 bars or something) rather than just having a ton of them

automatic time sinks are always tricky. you should go read it because it is everything about it in detail, both good and bad parts of it.

EDIT: for the shrine idea, i find the concept worth checking, but the way you propsed it working seems like a really bad idea in my eyes , that and having to grind a piece of equipment for 1 day to get a buff for 1 day. but as i said. i will let people chime in, and then i will gather them up later.

[Vastar]

I´m familiar with that system since WoW used exactly the same thing to make endgame materials valuable. I see that the material enhancing idea is more a time sink feature than a daily reward system.
And as you already said: there is a separate thread where time sinks are discussed.

@Zouls

EDIT: for the shrine idea, i find the concept worth checking, but the way you propsed it working would really not have much to do with this thread, i recommend you make a post with it , that and having to grind a piece of equipment for 1 day to get a buff for 1 day. but as i said. i will let people chime in, and then i will gather them up later.

I think you got my shrine system wrong. There is no time sink included in that. It´s a weekly/daily event that rewards you with buffs(or only the buff you wanted) for participating. It doesn’t artificially make endgame materials scare just because there is a cooldown on making those.

For your concern that this idea might not fit in your thread:

@Vastar

This would 1. Give us a reason to log in every day without forcing anyone 2. Add a nice use for pre-genrated structures in the world 3. Would add occupation even after clearing the biggest titan/building the biggest house.

As far as i got it that’s exactly what you asked for in your thread.

And for your concern about grinding a certain item: I thought about it like that: you just sacrifice things you have plenty of anyway. So the shrines don’t demand some scarce hidden items you have to search for but rather common things in masses. Also the buff depends not on how much you collected yourself but rather on how much every player of each “playstile” (miner/builder/PvE/PvP) collected together.

@Zouls

the way you propsed it working seems like a really bad idea in my eyes

Could you please explain that a little bit? Whats bad about my suggestion and how would you alter it to make it better?

[Bootlegger]

A system that encouraged daily login and play that I appreciated was Power Hour. From early versions of UO.
Power Hour was where your stats increased by a multiplier the first hour of play each day.
Definitely not end game, but helped to get you there. (5 character slots, so the bonus was helpful for quite a while)
In addition to encouraging daily you often spent a good amount of time setting up for the next one. Gathering and preparing to make tomorrows Power Hour most beneficial.

[TheBirne]

I like such mechanics because on this way more inactive players (due to work or other real life time problems) could get less lost on their way up in the progress. This would wolk well if done in addition to a logoff-resting-bonus

[Thorbjorn42gbf]

@Exsu

Fixing problems require analysis about problem and without information you cannot make analysis nor fix , only hypothesis what can happen and how it could be fixed in one instance. One cannot pre-plan life in advance with 100% accuracy because certain unexpected things may arise that throw every pre-made calculation off. Same applies here, unless we know exactly how Oort will look like when it´s officially launched and why people will then quit, we are only wasting time here with hypothetical problems and answers. We don´t know if there isn´t enough content or another game like Starmade will get so popular that people will go play that.

If you don’t agree with “wasting” time by doing this discussion why are you joining in? At the Stonehearth forum we use the time between updates to play forum games here we talk about situations that will maybe become relevant.

@Exsu

Which one is more fun, rewarding and needs more time?

Searching group for very hard titan and then finally killing it after some failed attempts or 10 quick and simple daily tasks/quests for title?

Why not both? Why is it bad to reward people with titles if they play it a lot? It is just another type of achievment.

@DarkRepulsor

Hey guys, you both made this into one of those threads. Just take the penalty, shake hands, and let’s keep the ball moving. Sorry for the RDJ meme, just had to catch attention, you know.

Give this man a cookie

[Zouls]

Apologies, wasnt meant as insults. just at that point i had to leave in a hurry, so i didnt have time to explain. lemme go through them

@Vastar

I think you got my shrine system wrong.

not at all. i was quoting both your shrine and grind system. Behold!

@Vastar

For example: Sword grinding, takes 22h to complete and gives you a 5%dmg bonus on the selected sword for the next 24h after completing (this could also be applied to tools like pickaxes).This is an idea that´s quite simple to implement and yet gives you a reason to log in every day. Simple and effective)

this seems like the most annoying system i could possibly think off. but opinion.

for the system the things that stuck me most was, 1) the idea, 2 ) the attitude.

I think having a system where you can sacrifice either gold or something to get a buff once a day would also be a pretty good system, it is basically just the rested exp system, just instantly and with a gold sink instead of a time sink. this idea i think is really cool.

for the reason that it bothered me

@Vastar

After the day/week the shrines would give rewards to all players (or only to the ones who to sacrificed something) and the “sacrifice points” are resetted

for one thing, encouragement to get on and play now, this is more like ‘‘pay now, and at one point you will get a buff’’ not too practical, again i think it would be cool if it was instant.

the next 2 things are what makes it fall into a hole

@Vastar

Only the the shrine with the most “points” in it gets activated. So if the “builder” sacrificed the most blocks the builder bonus is active for the next day/week. (my favorite so far)

so yes. i am a fighter, i sacrificed for 1000g worth of combat mats, but the builders won. so suck to be me. this would make people either 1) refuse to use it 2) fight over the freaking buff. like it would turn into basic bidding wars, hence kinda strafing away from the original idea

@Vastar

Only the top 10 guilds get the reward (from each shrine). (this could become unfair but hey, life is hard)

really? ‘‘life is hard’’? that is just… freaking horrible.

for the actual idea, this elimantes the entire point of the system. like the previous points.

i think one thing you miss, one thing you cannot see. this discussion is to encourage people playing, and help those who are behind, but you only want rewards for those who are ahead so they can get even more ahead?

I understand your opinion and your views, i just dont agree with them. generally you seem to be against anything that would actually help other people than those who play alot. which is what this entire post is about.

so sorry. i like your idea, but i dont like the mentality it holds.

[Zouls]

@TheBirne

I like such mechanics because on this way more inactive players (due to work or other real life time problems) could get less lost on their way up in the progress. This would wolk well if done in addition to a logoff-resting-bonus

this is basically the point summed up. we shouldnt be limited too much ofc, but that doesnt mean those who dont have much time to play should stop, the point is finding something that makes people think ‘‘well i am going to use my 1 hour of today gaming on oort, i might not have much time, but i can still make some progress because of a bonus’’ instead of ‘‘well i have 1 hour of game, i kinda want to play oort, but it feels like a waste of time, because i know i will never catch up to those who play all the day, everyday.’’

there should clearly be a difference of people who play the game 30 hours a week and those who play 5, but that also means that there need to be something for the people who only have 5 hours. a way to make them feel like the game is worth the time

[Exsu]

I want to say sorry about yesterday. I got too tunnel visioned because lately these topics have been lists of things that what other big budjet mmorpg´s have rather than thinking about limitations of Oort. It´s good to have wide comparison and idea list where to take bits and parts for Oort, but without compact package these topics die and in the end our hands stay empty.

Now that this have been said I can start for real this time around. If somebody is new to this topic and have skipped most of this topic, I found quite easy to understand and read website: http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/29/mmo-mechanics-encouraging-the-daily-grind/

Shrine system is lovely because its optional and if reward is kept at balanced level its also equal system. I don´t know about how extra weekly content it will add, but it´s also great goldsink for lower leveled equipment so that we don´t suddenly have 100k stone pickaxes.

However people are strongly against Oort turning to number based stats/equipment system where person with highest numbers will always win so percentage based weekly boost system must be something that everyone can complete and thus everyone can have same benefit.

This might little bit silly idea but I have seen it working before. We could have “events” like gathering material to Oortian temple that takes huge amount of effort and materials. This system could be done in multiple levels;

1. Worldwide aka bringing people together daily in certain realm/world together in order to build temple that will give certain bonus to all players in that same world and easy to complete personal collection target that will give little bit extra bonus. Last one will also somewhat make certain worlds for player as “homeworlds” as they have invested time and resources there to have little boost.

2. Guildwide. Encourages people to join in guilds and have them play often together in order to get that “little bit of edge” in battle/contest between guilds and groups. Not entirely sure what and how much guild boost would be yet so I leave that part to you guys if you like this idea in general.

3. Party- or area wide smaller and/or even temporal temple for example titan hunt. Uses time and resources plus giving more dedication for certain activity or project.

These temples could have anything from mining, attack power boost to healing bonuses etc and people can decide what temple they want to build for certain boost in all other options but not in world wide which are random.

Larger ones like worldwide temples could be hidden or something that devs could spawn once in 2 months or so. This means that people will regularly come to Oort to maintain buildings/equipment or skill in order to participate in next temple project.

Before I throw more ideas to bucket I want to hear general thoughts about this temple building/event idea.

[Zouls]

Thanks for apologizing, i know it is easy to lose your head in a discussion, i have been verbally abused more than once for that reason xD

but when you say building you just mean contribute the mats right? not like people physically can build a temple? cause that would be weeiiiird xD

but yeah i think the ideas of shrines are pretty good, i dont think these things you mentioned really would encourage people to log in daily, but it would definately make people work together.

people keep talking about buffs. i dont think any of these buffs should add combat stats, cause in my eyes that would make it unbalanced. it would generally be things like crafting, building, exp etc…

i also think guilds should have goals, things i like are guild levels, or guild progress so to say, either using gold or get a certain currency for doing guild activities to level your guild and what it can do is great in my eyes, so if you and your guild works together you get certain bonuses, could be unlocking things too, such as being able to put your guild emblem on your armor and weapon, or having some bonus exp when in group with a guild mate, other things such as cosmetic banners and flags would also work.

the 2 biggest things that keeps MMO’s alive and balanced are Time sinks and Gold sinks. everything needs to fall into one thing or the other.

but a bit off topic i imagine, not that it matters, given that it is my post xD

PS: thanks for the great link. this was just something i made on the top of my head. so it might not be the best setup.

[Vastar]

@Zouls

Apologies, wasnt meant as insults.

And i haven’t taken it as one. As far as i know this is just an objective discussion between two people with different opinions on a topic.

@Zouls

‘‘pay now, and at one point you will get a buff’’ not too practical, again i think it would be cool if it was instant.

I´ve had in mind that today you have yesterdays log in buff etc…

@Zouls

so yes. i am a fighter, i sacrificed for 1000g worth of combat mats, but the builders won. so suck to be me. this would make people either 1) refuse to use it

Only if one has a “If i don’t get a reward with 100% certainty I wont even bother participating” mentality.

@Zouls

2. fight over the freaking buff. like it would turn into basic bidding wars,

Well here we have just two different opinions about this. I think a bidding war between builder and fighter sounds awesome and i intended encouraging something like that when i worked out his idea. Tastes are different so there is no use to discuss this specific point.

@Zouls

really? ‘‘life is hard’’? that is just… freaking horrible.

Yeah i thought that many people would see this as an unfair system but as i already stated in my original post this is only one possible solution.

@Zouls

i think one thing you miss, one thing you cannot see. this discussion is to encourage people playing, and help those who are behind, but you only want rewards for those who are ahead so they can get even more ahead?

Where does it say that higher lvl player get a better buff/ more reward? If i remember correctly according to my system everyone gets the same buff. So no extra benefit for higher leveled player.

@Zouls

people keep talking about buffs. i dont think any of these buffs should add combat stats, cause in my eyes that would make it unbalanced. it would generally be things like crafting, building, exp etc…

I was talking about 5-10% percent dmg buff not like 50% one. A ~7.5% dmg buff would imo make nothing unbalanced (first because it would only affect PvE since all players get the same buff, second it adds (approximately) as much battle strength as getting a slightly better item and thats not unbalanced)
Your idea with additional exp for the “PvE” shrine sounds also fitting.

[Exsu]

We could also think things that make players play more regularly and not only think about possible log in rewards or forced daily skilling log ins.

If somebody asks me what makes mmo´s fun I would say something like:

1. Social interaction, success and fun that can be shared with friends.
2. Having a persistent character that you can continue to make “better” over the course of many, many days of playing. Seeing your character progress and get stronger as you level is a reward in itself.
(3. Getting overpowered, lol)

So social player like myself Oort should/could have content for groups of players like;

Guild versus Guild hunting/PvP hiscore that could be viewed in world capital location and maybe have flag poles or something that shows guild logo of most awarded guilds in certain world.

This week [the Watchers] -guild have vanquished total number of 1743 Horned Gahtans in Gortnen.

I know that builders and PvE -players want also content, but it´s generally so much easier to have PvP content. Although same flag pole thingy could be applied to solo players.

One thing could also be in game calendar events or local events that will bring game world more living thing than just plan sandbox.

I think one of Guild War 2‘s greatest asset was their version of Rift’s live map events. In fact, Guild Wars 2 is the best example of how local map events should work. You are in an area and suddenly a group of centaurs raids a local village; or a dragon / (titan) alights on the land to wreak havoc. Suddenly you have new event or quest that you can choose to partake in, or laugh while others become dragon / (titan) fodder. It’s fun, especially when you have groups of players and people cry out for help via the chat.

Those events could have special rewards like titles, cosmetics like golden stone pickaxe

[Zouls]

cough
https://forum.oortonline.com/t/ingame-calender-time-specific-events/757

Cough cough

https://forum.oortonline.com/t/destruction-of-worlds/406

Too slow mate. already talked about that a long time ago, but they do say great minds think alike xD

but lemme see… where was that… ah here. about a sort of ‘‘remembrance’’ or ‘‘highscore’’ i have my titan post.

https://forum.oortonline.com/t/titans-in-oort-online/67

main focus being this part:

@Zouls

Reward: im not sure if the titans respawn or not and if you will actually go as far as to make it named (really hope they have names though) but i would really like a system from the latest SAO episode because that would fit so well.The system would be that in the citadel on every world there would be a giant stone tablet that people could inspect and on the tablet would be the name of every slain titan on every world and under that name there would be the names and guild name of every player who contributed to slaying that titan, this would be an immense reward to see your name on that tablet and know that it will be saved for everyone to see and it would be a way to get recognition in the world if you form a guild made only for titan slaying or if you are just a solo player who enjoys it.

for the pvp vs pve. you realize that killing mobs counts as PVE right? xD

and lastly for another guild highscore:

so this have been thought about by the devs. there needs to be some long term goals ofc. but the most important is getting people into the game, like i have many good games that i love playing once i get into them, but i honestly never do. because it wont matter if i play it today, in a week or in a year. i wont get rewarded for playing conistently, and hence i have no reason to actually enter the game.

[TheBirne]

Japp, all those points are good reasons to keep playing (also for long time aims), but having something special for logging in (like mentioned above) every day is a good bonus encouragement. Also, on this way people with less time to play feel to reach something (even when on a smaller basis) which let them keep playing.

Sometimes I only have an hour or less time to play per day. Normally I would then prefer to play another game. But if there is a short bonus or aim for that short time I will think about common online to Oort and play. Having such mechanics is good and important to keep the players online for long (cuz if I log in on a rarer frequency I faster lose hold to the game (like in many others I played before (also in single player games))