PvE- Raiding - Progression - etc

[TheQuadler]

So I'm curious about how everyone feels about this type of content, Alot of us played firefall and there wasn't much there in terms of this type of content.

I look forward to this type of content in games for the friendships that form and stories and memories it can create. What would you like to see Upon a release for things like 5-mans 10-mans 25-mans 40-mans etc. Do you prefer it to scale with your level for earlier content so you can re-do things you did during the "leveling process" of a game? or the style where theres no reason to go back to a place unless your helping a friend or making a new character or something of that sort.

I liked the latter, where you look forward to seeing new things as you get near the "end" of the leveling experience in games. it helps with the burnout feeling that your not redoing things you did already just in a harder way.

I like learning the higher end things with a group of friends in a "gearing" process to prepare yourself for the bigger things to come (raids for example). deciding which guilds/clans/etc to join that best suit our needs for how seriously were taking the game at the time.

I think there's ALOT of untapped potential for raid mechanics in any shooter based game, it opens a whole new can of worms for devs and players alike.

This is just a small portion of the gaming experience for anything MMO for alot of people. but its a very important portion for some of us. Discussion of PVP and other things deserve an entirely different thread.

So what are your thoughts?

 

[Torgue_Joey]

SH*T SOUNDS KINDA VERTICAL TO ME.
EXPLAIN ME WHAT THIS "RAID" IS. I PLAYED SOME GAMES WHICH HAS "RAIDING" AND IT'S FULL OF SH*T AND A**HOLES.
YEAH, IT'S A THING FOR "FRIENDS".

A YEAR LATER, 3 OF YOUR SO-CALLED-FRIENDS GONE INACTIVE, SO YOU NEED TO JOIN SOMEONE ELS FOR A 5 MAN RAID. BUT SINCE YOU'RE THE "OUTSIDER" TO THEM, THEY GONNA BLAME YOU FOR F*CK SH*T AND TREAT YOU LIKE SH*T.

I THINK 10-15 MAN WOULD PROVIDE SOME GOOD ACTION.

 

[Krhys]

Raids can stay in WoW and all of its other dirty MMO clones. Or better still, die a horrible, painful death in the firey pits of Hades with Satan's pitchfork shish-kebabing their prostates...

 

[Torgue_Joey]

THEORETICAL. WE HAVE RAIDS IN EMBER. WE ARE RAIDING THE SH*T OUT OF THE PLANET EM-8ER. RAIDING THEM F*CK RESOURCES WITH OUR BIG ASS THMPR (wait, what. THMPR got tiny asses). THOSE RABBITS CAN RAID US ALL THEY WANT.

 

[Biz]

Shooting bullet-sponges is the very opposite of fun. Requirement of anything above 6 players for an instance almost inevitably leads to mobs that are significantly above "reasonable" comparative power level to players. Individual performance being masked significantly by the sheer number of others who do the same or similar things.

Also as far as "memories" go, thinking back to memories of most games, what I remember the most is content that was Designed for a group that I did either alone or in a smaller group with 2-3 friends maybe with some random PUG attached.

New player areas are there to get players hooked on the game and to teach them how to play the game. If it takes 90% of the game to do that then you are doing something wrong. If your average player knows all he needs to know about the basic mechanics of the game, his abilities, weapons etc after finishing the tutorial map/quests then you do not need to cake on slow and steady progression to max level after that. You can just give him a less shiny gun and armor that has almost as much pew as the best possible version of that kind of gear and let him have fun polishing that barrel and armor plating to a mirror finish.
Suddenly 90% of the game is "Endgame" and people are not standing in line to that Single instance that gives you rewards that are worth the time and effort.

 

[TankHunter678]

If this game was using a standard WoW clone type vertical progression it would have the instances that people in MMOs refer to as "Raids". But this game is not going that route.

Instead the question should be "What would be defined as a Raid in the open world?"

We are probably going to get gigantic creatures of the natural world, we will see ember's version of Brontodon King, Baneclaw, Kana, however those wont be treated as "Raids" but just giant monster dynamic events.

 

[MattHunX]

Shooting bullet-sponges is the very opposite of fun. Requirement of anything above 6 players for an instance almost inevitably leads to mobs that are significantly above "reasonable" comparative power level to players. Individual performance being masked significantly by the sheer number of others who do the same or similar things.

Also as far as "memories" go, thinking back to memories of most games, what I remember the most is content that was Designed for a group that I did either alone or in a smaller group with 2-3 friends maybe with some random PUG attached.

New player areas are there to get players hooked on the game and to teach them how to play the game. If it takes 90% of the game to do that then you are doing something wrong. If your average player knows all he needs to know about the basic mechanics of the game, his abilities, weapons etc after finishing the tutorial map/quests then you do not need to cake on slow and steady progression to max level after that. You can just give him a less shiny gun and armor that has almost as much pew as the best possible version of that kind of gear and let him have fun polishing that barrel and armor plating to a mirror finish.
Suddenly 90% of the game is "Endgame" and people are not standing in line to that Single instance that gives you rewards that are NOT worth the time and effort, most of time.

Just a small correction at the end there.

 

[HumanTrainingBot]

When I think of raids, i think of teamwork and coordination to accomplish a goal no single person could have accomplished alone. Then again, I've never participated in a raid in any game. I suppose I've played similar things in Warframe, but noting that has officially been called a raid or involved an expanded squad. With that definition in mind, I voted yes. If it's just some place to slowly kill bullet sponges in hopes of good loot, then no. I would much rather do some drop-in, drop-out event like melding tornadoes or melding thumping for those high quality resources.

 

[MajorChuah]

If these 'raids' are like blackwater water anomaly or baneclaw, I'm in. But it has to be that everyone can play it as long as you're skillful enough.

 

[Pandagnome]

raids to me are like big signs calling for all to suit up and prepare with your trusted chums or those co-operative enough to complete the amazing raids that will be made to all of us! and a chance to grab amazing treasure loot!

 

[Squid Boss]

If you think raids are bad because you think they're all bullet sponges you've raided in nothing but terrible games with developers that lack creativity and an understanding of what a raid has always supposed to have been.

Raiding doesn't have to involve large changes or even any substantial changes to character power to exist. It can simply be a means to offer cosmetics, to offer prestige titles, weapon variants or simply places to earn more character building tools over time.

 

[Torgue_Joey]

If you think raids are bad because you think they're all bullet sponges you've raided in nothing but terrible games with developers that lack creativity and an understanding of what a raid has always supposed to have been.

Raiding doesn't have to involve large changes or even any substantial changes to character power to exist. It can simply be a means to offer cosmetics, to offer prestige titles, weapon variants or simply places to earn more character building tools over time.

THE PROBLEM LIES WITHIN THE COMMUNITY. RAID COMMUNITY BECOME F*CKING TOXIC VERY FAST.

RAID SPECIFIC TITLE OR COSMETICS ARE OK. OTHER REWARDS MAY BE UNFAIR TOWARDS POOR TRAUMATISED 'LIL PUPPYS.

AND NO. NO "MORE RESOURCES" FROM RAIDING. POOR "TINY ASS" THMPR WILL BECOME F*CKING DUST COLLECTOR.

 

[Squid Boss]

THE PROBLEM LIES WITHIN THE COMMUNITY. RAID COMMUNITY BECOME F*CKING TOXIC VERY FAST.

RAID SPECIFIC TITLE OR COSMETICS ARE OK. OTHER REWARDS MAY BE UNFAIR TOWARDS POOR TRAUMATISED 'LIL PUPPYS.

AND NO. NO "MORE RESOURCES" FROM RAIDING. POOR "TINY ASS" THMPR WILL BECOME F*CKING DUST COLLECTOR.

The world is toxic.
Game world? Best way to beat it is to immediately block/mute > Report > Move on with your life.

Replace the gear treadmill is all you have to do. The game is building right now. Build it to accommodate new types of carrots to dangle off the stick or the community will be bored a month in as usual.

 

[Daynen]

"Raiding" to me has become another term mired in traditions that would be best discarded for the sake of all. When you say "raid" on an internet game forum, for many people, the immediate image that comes to mind is a giant boss, projectiles streaking towards the center of it's object hitbox from all angles (and curves, if it's tab-targeting,) 4 or 5 digit numbers floating up the screen in such dense packs that one can hardly see the UI, let alone any of the players or the action going on, and finally, a large, sparkling corpse with purple texted items for naught but a few lucky combatants; the rest often get left out in the cold thanks to the lottery that is "the loot table."

Once the raid is finished, future raiders have now memorized the patterns needed to win; victory is now just a matter of rote repetition on the scale of 10-40 people...and repeat it they do, for there's nothing else to challenge them, nor any other meaningful goals left to accomplish.

So they raid.

And they raid.

And. They. Raid.

MARK KERN--IF YOU ALLOW THIS TO HAPPEN TO EMBER (I'm actually confident you won't and I'm rooting for you on this one--go Mark!) I WILL FIND YOU.

 

[Caconym]

PvE content should try to mitigate repetition as much as possible. Fighting a retextured enemy from the last area gets old, fast. PvE shouldn't be about who can pull the most DPS into as many bullet sponges as possible - go to WoW for that. It should have a few bullet sponges, yes, but it should also have others things that you need to do to get past a certain area - puzzles and questlines (NOT the go-there-kill-everything-fetch-this-come-back style) are just a few examples of what can be done to keep PvE content interesting.
In my opinion, one of the things that makes player keep going in PvE-only content is the feeling of novelty you have when you access a new area, or discover something new. The impression that there's more out there, the want to keep going, to explore and discover is one of the most attractive things I could possibly hope for in a game.
So if we get interesting, well-made PvE content then yes, I look forward to the memories I'll make with this game.

 

[MajorChuah]

As long as we have a BaneClaw called CaneBlaw for copyright reasons, I'm not gonna complain.

 

[Lawz]

How about a moba style 'raid' where you have to defend/push lanes and instead of having the same oponents you rotate them. Once you kill one, another will randomly sapwn.

 

[HumanTrainingBot]

Another idea is to have the order in which you kill enemies matter. Killing one enemy gives the rest of them more "strength" to keep fighting (faster attacks, stronger attacks, or more health, for exemaple) while killing a different enemy (like the leader) will make the rest scatter, or do less damage, or attack slower.

Will this lead to player patterns and optimal targeting? Yes. Is it more interesting than just stomping around and shooting? Likely yes, depending on the person and their experience with that particular enemy type. (Experienced players may find it dull or annoying, someone experiencing it for the first time may be completely confused, angry, or frustrated, but someone who just figured it out will have the satisfaction of understanding the problem and how to solve it.) Is this the only way the enemies should act? Definitely not! Is it more immersive? Again, it depends on the player. Can it create tension? If there is no obvious way to tell what "squad pattern" - as I'll call it - the enemies are using, then yes. ("Obvious" in this case means "easily spotted with minimal knowledge of the enemies.")

Any more ideas floating around?

 

[Caconym]

Another idea is to have the order in which you kill enemies matter. Killing one enemy gives the rest of them more "strength" to keep fighting (faster attacks, stronger attacks, or more health, for exemaple) while killing a different enemy (like the leader) will make the rest scatter, or do less damage, or attack slower.

Will this lead to player patterns and optimal targeting? Yes. Is it more interesting than just stomping around and shooting? Likely yes, depending on the person and their experience with that particular enemy type. (Experienced players may find it dull or annoying, someone experiencing it for the first time may be completely confused, angry, or frustrated, but someone who just figured it out will have the satisfaction of understanding the problem and how to solve it.) Is this the only way the enemies should act? Definitely not! Is it more immersive? Again, it depends on the player. Can it create tension? If there is no obvious way to tell what "squad pattern" - as I'll call it - the enemies are using, then yes. ("Obvious" in this case means "easily spotted with minimal knowledge of the enemies.")

Any more ideas floating around?

Prioritized targeting has been around for a long time. No, Ember needs a little more depth than that. For example, if anyone has gone through Smoldering Lake in Dark Souls 3,

Spoiler

you get shot at by a giant ballista for a large part of the level before you manage to turn it off - or you die. There's a giant worm on the opposite side of the level, blocking your path to the block room. It's a literal bullet sponge (or arrows or whatever), and the best way to kill it is to position yourself behind it so that the giant ballista hits and kills it for you.

Using the environment to your advantage like that should be a big thing in how you go through PvE areas. Cliffs, lava pits, lakes, trees... They should all play a role in how you fight.

 

[Luna12]

YOU'RE ALL LOOKING AT IT THE WRONG WAY!
We aren't the ones raiding the enemy, the enemy's going to raid us! Imagine seeing those giant space-lizards (kaiju things) suddenly marching towards that awesome base you just built with your guild/clan/whatever. NOW YOU HAVE TO KILL THEM, before they lay your FRIGGING AWESOME BASE to waste!

But seriously, that would be way cooler than running the exact same instanced encounter for a 100 times.