AMA Response, please abandon 1 world commitment in favor of a better gameplay experience POLL

[Handsome Young Man]

Magic, taming, mounted combat, domination and necromancy aren't additions to the game. They're core features we were all promised. Like I want my money back if these don't all make it into the game (other than maybe necromancy) over the next year. I'd consider it a major failure on SV's part if all of that except necromancy doesn't it in day 1 of release even.

The problem is we're doing all these ping balances before the more ping neutral roles make it in. Most of the people being forced to play melee currently won't even give a crap even when the more ping-neutral roles are implemented.

Mounteds are not ping neutral.

But yes, I agree. They are core features - it's my point, really. If we instead had two servers - we could probably move on past the melee debate as it would play fine if it was fast, since there'd be no desync so long as you were on the right server.

 

[Kaemik]

Mounteds are not ping neutral.

But yes, I agree. They are core features - it's my point, really. If we instead had two servers - we could probably move on past the melee debate as it would play fine if it was fast, since there'd be no desync so long as you were on the right server.

Mounted builds WERE not ping neutral. They may or may not be ping neutral in MO2. A charge-based build is never going to be ping neutral but if you have heavy cav that can run 1h get up on targets/just wildly slash like in Conan Exiles that will be probably somewhere between ping intensive like foot-fighter and ping-neutral like a dominator. Campadons(elephants) are a confirmed mount choice now so I'm thinking we'll see more options than charge based builds for melee cav. Or at least charge builds with a much wider trample zone.

I think getting all the roles in will largely see the melee debate die down considerably. It's not uncommon for people to come into any MMO and be like "Well I'm trash with roles X, Y and Z but roles A, B, and C feel pretty good." As long as there are a few viable options to players of any ping level and high-ping builds aren't treated as more inherently valuable than other roles I think that will satisfy 90% of players.

And then if internet speeds are universally faster in a few years as current news suggests, more role options will open to west coast/oceanic players in the future.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

Mounted builds WERE not ping neutral. They may or may not be ping neutral in MO2. A charge-based build is never going to be ping neutral but if you have heavy cav that can run 1h get up on targets/just wildly slash like in Conan Exiles that will be probably somewhere between ping intensive like foot-fighter and ping-neutral like a dominator. Campadons(elephants) are a confirmed mount choice now so I'm thinking we'll see more options than charge based builds for melee cav. Or at least charge builds with a much wider trample zone.

I think getting all the roles in will largely see the melee debate die down considerably. It's not uncommon for people to come into any MMO and be like "Well I'm trash with roles X, Y and Z but roles A, B, and C feel pretty good." As long as there are a few viable options to players of any ping level and high-ping builds aren't treated as more inherently valuable than other roles I think that will satisfy 90% of players.

And then if internet speeds are universally faster in a few years as current news suggests, more role options will open to west coast/oceanic players in the future.

I'd still just prefer separate servers. It would just fix so many problems I had in MO1 and in MO2.

 

[grendel]

granny hands here had to google "twitch gameplay" and does not care about ping cause I will suck in pvp anyways. For me the question is about population, I very much doubt there will be enough players for more than one server.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

granny hands here had to google "twitch gameplay" and does not care about ping cause I will suck in pvp anyways. For me the question is about population, I very much doubt there will be enough players for more than one server.

A genuine question out of curiosity.

Do you think MO2, with proper development rather than constantly having to skirt around latency-related issues (Which ties into a lot) wouldn't draw a lot of people?

When it hit steam, the biggest problems were server issues, latency, and bugs.

 

[Planters]

made an account just for this thread. two servers would be better than one, mo1 was so bad with the single server and ping difference.

 

[Kaemik]

Do you think MO2, with proper development rather than constantly having to skirt around latency-related issues (Which ties into a lot) wouldn't draw a lot of people?

I think that if this game reaches its maximum potential, it would possibly reach the population to maintain two lively servers with all the continents / naval combat etc.

I think anything more than that would require a resurgence of interest in the entire MMO genre.

Realistically I think more than one server will feel pretty dead.

 

[grendel]

A genuine question out of curiosity.

Do you think MO2, with proper development rather than constantly having to skirt around latency-related issues (Which ties into a lot) wouldn't draw a lot of people?

When it hit steam, the biggest problems were server issues, latency, and bugs.

If SV release a MO2 that has the same content that MO1 had at steam release and servers are ready then I think more than one server could be populated, at least for a while - but you know..... thats not what is going to happen.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

I think that if this game reaches its maximum would potentially reach the population to maintain two lively servers with all the continents / naval combat etc.

I think anything more than that would require a resurgence of interest in the entire MMO genre.

Realistically I think more than one server will feel pretty dead.

MO1 felt somewhat lively with 200 average players (Not even joking.) Was it super healthy? Of course not, I wont even dare argue that. But it felt 'okay' around 200-400.

If the world is 6 times larger, then we can make an estimation of something like this...

200 times 6 is 1200.

400 times 6 is 2400.

Now for anyone who has played in MO1, those numbers are I N S A N E for 'amount of players'.

We already have a rough idea of players that purchased into alpha and or played it. It's easily 1000 plus and if what Henrik said is true, it was what.. 2k+ at one time with 5k in total trying it out?

Let's be generous and we'll divide that in half. That's 2.5k. That more than meets the healthy requirement, by my own standards of playing MO1, for a good population.

You don't need as many people as you actually think to have a 'healthy' population on MO2. I honestly think 2.5k players would be crowded, that's an awesome number.

This is only from the alpha / beta. Could you imagine a finished product, and on Steam + marketing through YouTube, Twitter, etc.

Henrik said himself the players are the best advertisers. Easier to advertise a game to friends when you don't need to mention they'll have 100+ ping always, also easier when the game is in a good place with all things that it needs.

I'm open to my argument having holes poked into it, because it isn't concrete; I'm aware. But I don't think two servers would kill the population. Especially if you could play on both with two individual characters or one single character that only shares skills and not material items.

 

[burtonsmall]

I think 2 servers would be better. It does limit what SV can and can't do.

 

[Kaemik]

Game pops work on a reverse exponential curve with new spikes every time there is a big content drop. What I mean by that, is whatever we have on launch day is likely multiple times the players we'll have 30 days after the launch. Even if the game is pretty successful.

Your one exception to that in the indie MMO sphere historically is EVE Online which steadily picked up population for many years after it's release and then eventually fell into a gradual decline like all other successful MMOs.

EVE also released in 2003, a year before World of Warcraft. So it existed in a very different time and market and it's the absolute best-case scenario you're looking at as an indie MMO. (It's hard to classify EVE as an indie MMO these days but that's only its own success that broke it out of that category. It had very humble beginnings.)

If this game is EVE level successful I would like to see them take the money they'll be making hand-over-fist at that point and make an absolutely gargantuan map with naval combat, including water-breathing spells/potions and deep-sea exploration, all the continents, and even eventually the ability to teleport to the moons maybe. All on a single highly-populated server.

In the event that this is a super rose-tinted glasses scenario and you aren't properly accounting for the huge population fall-off typical to all MMOs... I'll be glad to have one lively world with an extra contingent or two. I'd like to stick to one server and base that around the ping a reasonable internet package in the furthest reach of the world will give and have combat potentially sped up as breakthroughs in technology allow for.

We do seem to be at the cusp of a major breakthrough in global internet speeds so why not see where that gets us? Focus on getting in builds that feel good and engaging tactics at any ping level. And then increase the speed of more ping-relevant roles in future balance changes should the average internet package allow for it.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

Game pops work on a reverse exponential curve with new spikes every time there is a big content drop. What I mean by that, is whatever we have on launch day is likely multiple times the players we'll have 30 days after the launch. Even if the game is pretty successful.

Your one exception to that in the indie MMO sphere historically is EVE Online which steadily picked up population for many years after it's release and then eventually fell into a gradual decline like all other successful MMOs.

EVE also released in 2003, a year before World of Warcraft. So it existed in a very different time and market and it's the absolute best-case scenario you're looking at as an indie MMO.

If this game is EVE level successful I would like to see them take the money they'll be making hand-over-fist at that point and make an absolutely gargantuan map with naval combat, including water-breathing spells/potions and deep-sea exploration, all the continents, and even eventually the ability to teleport to the moons maybe.

In the event that this is a super rose-tinted glasses scenario and you aren't properly accounting for the huge population fall-off typical to all MMOs... I'll be glad to have one lively world with an extra contingent or two. I'd like to stick to one server and base that around the ping a reasonable internet package in the furthest reach of the world will give and have combat potentially sped up as breakthroughs in technology allow for.

We do seem to be at the cusp of a major breakthrough in global internet speeds so why not see where that gets us?

MO1 had a water breathing spell, it was just stationary. Also there was sea exploration, there was 'stashes' as I'll call them that littered the ocean bed floor that gave random amounts of decent materials, gold, loot, etc.

Also, I am accounting for the decline. If the game is meant to be bigger and better, then it should therefore attract a bigger audience; no? If you don't agree with at least this premise then you have a problem with the actual game it self (Which, most should currently. It's not finished, not everything is in, and there needs to be re-works in some places.)

 

[grendel]

.................... Especially if you could play on both with two individual characters or one single character that only shares skills and not material items.

I'd prefer different continents to be on different servers to two instances of the same continent/world. I simply cannot imagine that there will be enough players for two worlds. For player retention I think it is better to be guaranteed that your progress is not in risk of being merged with another server/world in case of future low population. This is of course very much in a best possible future where game is released with MO1 steam release content. In the most likely scenario I am unable to see how there will be enough players for more than one world.

 

[Kaemik]

I'm talking huge oceans spanning between massive continents so that when you're out doing trade and piracy the world feels as alive on the water as it does on land. Complete with underwater dungeons and stuff out there waiting to be discovered.

If the game is meant to be bigger and better, then it should therefore attract a bigger audience; no?

Yes, and if the game doesn't have the population to make it's larger map feel just as populated as MO1 did after the release of the first continent or two I will consider this entire undertaking to be a failure. Bigger audience, if we're not assuming that we should be looking at other games. Big enough to populate all the continents they say they want to release and the oceans that span between them?

Highly doubtful in my mind. I think we'll start running out of steam by the third or fourth continent even if the game does pretty well. I hope to be proven wrong but I'm not placing any wagers on it.

It's going to be easier to adapt a single server for greater success though, than a second server for lesser success either way though. That much is just a given.

 

[cwall]

As an North American player, I agree with having separate servers for different regions. This was the primary reason that I quit playing MO1 shortly after its release back in 2010, and I knew many other players who felt the same way.

I've invited many friends to play MO2 with me, and almost every single time, their first comments are about how laggy/desynchronized the combat looks. This gives an impression of a buggy or broken system, and it leads to many potential players declining to try it out. It's often the case that they think the game has great concepts with poor execution.

As someone who was willing to try it out, I've rationalized it as "well maybe the lag won't matter so much in group play." I dislike making concessions like this when there are potential solutions to be tried.

The important questions are:

• Will the split in population due to an improved player experience retain players better in the long run?
  • Judging from my perception about the population crash from MO1's release, my assumption is that having a very solid player experience will retain players at such a rate as to outpace a merged server with a poor player experience.
• Are there ways to mitigate inadequate player populations in the worst-case scenario?
  • Perhaps merging servers could be used as a fallback, with some complexity surrounding already-placed player structures. There could be other fallback solutions, too.

I would love to have a single, global server, but I don't think it's worth it, unless a vast majority of players are from Europe and they are the target audience.

 

[[AF]Tyrone]

This is a pretty solid video demonstrating the experience of a low ping player. It's sad to compare his low ping experience to my high ping experience. Low ping players are going to dominate even more than they did in MO1

Like we better have really good PVE if we do that as given the map size that's going to be 95% of our content if we divide the population in half.

PvE content will never be good if you have high ping. Go download warband and then play on one of the european PvE wave servers, and it'll just about be the same as MO. You have to block before the animations are playing if you have high ping, so you're gona just become a tamer and tab out if you're an american.

I'd prefer a game with the population divided in half. It's not fun to play against guilds made up of eurpean players with 5 ping when everyone in your guild is american with 100+ ping.

 

[Kaemik]

Yeah, I'm not going to be playing melee. With or without 2 servers. I have 160 pings but I also hate super breakneck-paced games if I'm playing on a LAN with someone in the same building.

MO1 had ping neutral roles. They were promising those ping-neutral roles when they started selling copies of MO2 and I'm going to have fun playing roles with low ping dependency no matter if this is 1 server, 2 server, or different server every 10 square feet.

Melee is not something a lot of people are interested in for a lot of reasons and so long as we don't stack the cards in melee's favor, people will get used to playing roles that work on their ping until technology advances open up the few roles that should be highly pinged dependent to them.

This push seems to be based on a lot of very rosy assumptions by a lot of people. I think it's something we'll come to regret if they do it.

 

[cwall]

I would rather not see roles balanced around its degree of dependency on low latency. Surely balance can be achieved between every role, archetype, and playstyle in a low latency environment.

 

[Zyloth]

I put agree, but I also think it would be a high risk move by SV. Especially when they have a solution they are willing to test in that new continents will have a new server. Would be nice if we had a population so large 1 server is out of the question though.

 

[Kaemik]

I would rather not see roles balanced around its degree of dependency on low latency. Surely balance can be achieved between every role, archetype, and playstyle in a low latency environment.

Making melee less twitchy to compensate for ping is obviously ticking off many higher twitch melees. But magic was traditionally more hitscan based and dominators/tamers traditionally took very little skill at all.

People looking at those roles don't even want the twitch skill of them raised. That's not to say some of the lower skills roles won't benefit from being higher skill, but there are other ways to make those roles more engaging. Even if everyone's ping is 0 there should be ping forgiving roles in the game because they appeal to the many older/lower reflex players who had viable roles in MO1.