Reckoning represents the largest change to Mortals fundamentals since the games inception, more impactful then Ele, Necro and mastery combined. Lets look at the changes together and identify the effect that they've had on the game and its ecosystem. I will go over the changes and conclude each individual change with overall "Good" or "Bad" rating while considering the Pro's/Con's.
Combat abilities:
1. Lowered the skill floor/Raised skill ceiling - A novice player with high ping can now apply pressure to a veteran player with low ping. Previously, a novice player would often not be able to land a single hit against a veteran, essentially providing a risk free engagement for the veteran. Though not all veterans are equal and not all abilities are equal. In my testing, the highest skilled veterans can still shrug off abilities through active mitigation either by using movement, forcing handle hits or using parrys.
2.The TTK has now been lowered across the board for all players. Higher TTK's always benefit number disparity (zergs) and lower TTK always benefit skilled gameplay; positioning and isolating enemies before their reinforcements can arrive. It's why its not uncommon to see a 1v5 in a game like CSGO or RUST or other types of games with insanely low TTKs. The current TTK in Mortal is still higher then its competitors(OSRS/Albion) and Mortal still has the longest average 1v1 TTK in the genre. The previous TTK was anywhere from 5-10minutes for a 1v1 among veterans, completely unsustainable.
Con's:
1. A segment of the veteran population has felt disenfranchised with the changes as abilities have chipped away at their advantages in the game over less skilled players. But we must remember, MMO's can not be built on veteran populations alone, they have natural attrition and without a constant flow of new blood into the game, these types of games will eventually succumb to that attrition. If new players can not compete without sacrificing thousands of hours to practicing, they will not play. This is a problem that all non-matchmade global games have to reconcile with. Veterans still enjoy a comfortable advantage over new players, though less oppressive then before.
2. Unbalanced abilities: Some weapons stand out as "overpowered", but for the most part all weapons feel strong in my testing, with exception to 1h sword which stands out as the worst weapon in the game. Balancing is a constant unending battle, it's to be expected with such dramatic changes to the game. SV should continue to make gradual tweaks to bring weapons as close to a state of balance as possible but recognize that "true balance" is impossible and to not get too lost in this. Treat balance like you treat your workouts, consistently work to improve but realize perfection is impossible.
Conclusion: Good for the game, work to balance the weapons gradually.
Reputation changes:
1.Sweeping changes to reputation loss on murder has radically changed how many players engage in PvP now. Gone are the days of careless murder around blue zones while still utilizing guard protection as soon as your criminal flag has expired. Reputation has erected a clear barrier between blue and red players, with co-mingling being made extremely difficult. It is acting as a defacto faction system, with a "Red vs Blue" dynamic. I have personally witnessed random blues and reds collaborating and cooperating together now when they would of not done so before.
Cons:
1.Some veterans feel disenfranchised with this change as their previous game loops revolved around a casual hybrid PvP approach. They would murder in blue zones, do tasks and still enjoy the benefits of blue towns, all on one character. This game loop is dead now. PvP in blue zones is now for committed players only, and wilderness zones are too unapproachable for casual PvP. SV should work to introduce a "quick action" solution for these disenfranchised players to fill the void that the new system has introduced.
2.Reputation griefing, a very hard issue to tackle. I have no insight on how to deter this.
Conclusion: Good for the game, but the casual PvP archetype needs a replacement solution. Rep griefing presents a unique challenge.
Tagmaton Invasions:
1. Mechanically impressive technology unseen in any other MMO. Invasions in other games are static, with minimal pathing and especially not pathing through collidable objects. I am surprised at just how well these invasions are working, despite the hurdles they face. Every single day they invade blue towns and random people collaborate together to deal with their threat. It has introduced new game loops for many players seeking cosmetics or riches.
Conclusion: Good for the game, organic collaboration, excellent.
Outposts:
1.More time and data needed to understand the mechanic and potential long-term effects. At first glance, seems great. Organized and incentivized large group consensual PvP.
Next steps:
The team will now likely be working on Sarducca, which is a ambitious and high intensity update. But I want to emphasize the importance of some smaller more value driven changes that will result in solid growth with minimal effort.
Bridging the gap between guilded and unguilded players.
Almost all new players will start the game as unguilded, and they will start as casual. These players often do advance over time and start their exploration into the world. However, they are met with the reality they cannot explore the world due to resurrection and banking restrictions as these mechanics are relegated to guilded only in many areas of the world. This is a pain point and it's a point where we lose many players. The game presents an ultimatum to continue progression; "Join a guild" or "Leave the game" and most players are uncomfortable with this choice as the games they have come from do not confront them with this. Joining a guild in Mortals competitors is a more organic and natural process, not one of necessity for basic function.
Solution: Intermediate construction. More accessible then small house/priest but with heavy restrictions and downsides.
Campsite: Players can build a campsite for 2000 wood, 2000 metal and 1000 stone and 5gold. This is an action menu process, no deed is required. Upkeep 10g per day, Max upkeep 7days. Limit 1 per account
A player may resurrect and bank at the campsite, as well as craft armor and weapons. Only the owner can utilize these menus, the campsite cannot be password shared like a house. The campsite can be immediately destroyed by 1 mang, no siege declaration, if destroyed the campsite is lootable immediately. After destruction the campsite will have a 24 hour cooldown before the player can place a new one.
Subscription Token:
A highly contentious topic, but one that has been solved by decades of trial and error. During the mid 2000's, MMO's had a renaissance period where various studios tried to eliminate RMT from their games. Namely Blizzard and Jagex(Runescape). Runescape incorporated the most drastic and restrictive changes of any studio ever to combat RMT, but still failed. Jagex enacted a trade restriction, completely restricting one sided trades with the infamous value of "76k" with items being assigned value from the "Grand exchange". Making it impossible to trade any disparity over that value. Though RMT persisted; through exploitation, account trading and Grand Exchange manipulation they were able to undermine Jagex's efforts and because of the restrictions, the value of RMT gold skyrocketed, making it so profitable to RMT that more players did it, resulting in a net negative RMT dissuasion.
Eventually Jagex succumbed and added a subscription token to the game and removed all trade restrictions. The subscription token actually ended up doing more to fight RMT then the trade changes as it undermined the value of the RMT laborers, making their time worth less and making it harder for them to recoup losses between bans. Many RMT'ers were simply put out of business, unable to make enough money to be practical for the time they spent in labor.
Blizzard later followed suit.
Conclusion: The most logical solution to RMT is a subscription token with a side of active moderation. This also has a added benefit of increasing the population and making the game more accessible to low income players.
Expanding on abilities
I'm not going to harp on this too much as i've already expressed the importance of "pick your fight" utlity mechanics in the past. Abilities are currently lacking in the utlity department. Consider looking for opportunities to expand on this, using genre standards as inspiration if you cannot find any of your own. Also consider incorporating abilities into new PVE challenges if you see the opportunity.
Combat abilities:
1. Lowered the skill floor/Raised skill ceiling - A novice player with high ping can now apply pressure to a veteran player with low ping. Previously, a novice player would often not be able to land a single hit against a veteran, essentially providing a risk free engagement for the veteran. Though not all veterans are equal and not all abilities are equal. In my testing, the highest skilled veterans can still shrug off abilities through active mitigation either by using movement, forcing handle hits or using parrys.
2.The TTK has now been lowered across the board for all players. Higher TTK's always benefit number disparity (zergs) and lower TTK always benefit skilled gameplay; positioning and isolating enemies before their reinforcements can arrive. It's why its not uncommon to see a 1v5 in a game like CSGO or RUST or other types of games with insanely low TTKs. The current TTK in Mortal is still higher then its competitors(OSRS/Albion) and Mortal still has the longest average 1v1 TTK in the genre. The previous TTK was anywhere from 5-10minutes for a 1v1 among veterans, completely unsustainable.
Con's:
1. A segment of the veteran population has felt disenfranchised with the changes as abilities have chipped away at their advantages in the game over less skilled players. But we must remember, MMO's can not be built on veteran populations alone, they have natural attrition and without a constant flow of new blood into the game, these types of games will eventually succumb to that attrition. If new players can not compete without sacrificing thousands of hours to practicing, they will not play. This is a problem that all non-matchmade global games have to reconcile with. Veterans still enjoy a comfortable advantage over new players, though less oppressive then before.
2. Unbalanced abilities: Some weapons stand out as "overpowered", but for the most part all weapons feel strong in my testing, with exception to 1h sword which stands out as the worst weapon in the game. Balancing is a constant unending battle, it's to be expected with such dramatic changes to the game. SV should continue to make gradual tweaks to bring weapons as close to a state of balance as possible but recognize that "true balance" is impossible and to not get too lost in this. Treat balance like you treat your workouts, consistently work to improve but realize perfection is impossible.
Conclusion: Good for the game, work to balance the weapons gradually.
Reputation changes:
1.Sweeping changes to reputation loss on murder has radically changed how many players engage in PvP now. Gone are the days of careless murder around blue zones while still utilizing guard protection as soon as your criminal flag has expired. Reputation has erected a clear barrier between blue and red players, with co-mingling being made extremely difficult. It is acting as a defacto faction system, with a "Red vs Blue" dynamic. I have personally witnessed random blues and reds collaborating and cooperating together now when they would of not done so before.
Cons:
1.Some veterans feel disenfranchised with this change as their previous game loops revolved around a casual hybrid PvP approach. They would murder in blue zones, do tasks and still enjoy the benefits of blue towns, all on one character. This game loop is dead now. PvP in blue zones is now for committed players only, and wilderness zones are too unapproachable for casual PvP. SV should work to introduce a "quick action" solution for these disenfranchised players to fill the void that the new system has introduced.
2.Reputation griefing, a very hard issue to tackle. I have no insight on how to deter this.
Conclusion: Good for the game, but the casual PvP archetype needs a replacement solution. Rep griefing presents a unique challenge.
Tagmaton Invasions:
1. Mechanically impressive technology unseen in any other MMO. Invasions in other games are static, with minimal pathing and especially not pathing through collidable objects. I am surprised at just how well these invasions are working, despite the hurdles they face. Every single day they invade blue towns and random people collaborate together to deal with their threat. It has introduced new game loops for many players seeking cosmetics or riches.
Conclusion: Good for the game, organic collaboration, excellent.
Outposts:
1.More time and data needed to understand the mechanic and potential long-term effects. At first glance, seems great. Organized and incentivized large group consensual PvP.
Next steps:
The team will now likely be working on Sarducca, which is a ambitious and high intensity update. But I want to emphasize the importance of some smaller more value driven changes that will result in solid growth with minimal effort.
Bridging the gap between guilded and unguilded players.
Almost all new players will start the game as unguilded, and they will start as casual. These players often do advance over time and start their exploration into the world. However, they are met with the reality they cannot explore the world due to resurrection and banking restrictions as these mechanics are relegated to guilded only in many areas of the world. This is a pain point and it's a point where we lose many players. The game presents an ultimatum to continue progression; "Join a guild" or "Leave the game" and most players are uncomfortable with this choice as the games they have come from do not confront them with this. Joining a guild in Mortals competitors is a more organic and natural process, not one of necessity for basic function.
Solution: Intermediate construction. More accessible then small house/priest but with heavy restrictions and downsides.
Campsite: Players can build a campsite for 2000 wood, 2000 metal and 1000 stone and 5gold. This is an action menu process, no deed is required. Upkeep 10g per day, Max upkeep 7days. Limit 1 per account
A player may resurrect and bank at the campsite, as well as craft armor and weapons. Only the owner can utilize these menus, the campsite cannot be password shared like a house. The campsite can be immediately destroyed by 1 mang, no siege declaration, if destroyed the campsite is lootable immediately. After destruction the campsite will have a 24 hour cooldown before the player can place a new one.
Subscription Token:
A highly contentious topic, but one that has been solved by decades of trial and error. During the mid 2000's, MMO's had a renaissance period where various studios tried to eliminate RMT from their games. Namely Blizzard and Jagex(Runescape). Runescape incorporated the most drastic and restrictive changes of any studio ever to combat RMT, but still failed. Jagex enacted a trade restriction, completely restricting one sided trades with the infamous value of "76k" with items being assigned value from the "Grand exchange". Making it impossible to trade any disparity over that value. Though RMT persisted; through exploitation, account trading and Grand Exchange manipulation they were able to undermine Jagex's efforts and because of the restrictions, the value of RMT gold skyrocketed, making it so profitable to RMT that more players did it, resulting in a net negative RMT dissuasion.
Eventually Jagex succumbed and added a subscription token to the game and removed all trade restrictions. The subscription token actually ended up doing more to fight RMT then the trade changes as it undermined the value of the RMT laborers, making their time worth less and making it harder for them to recoup losses between bans. Many RMT'ers were simply put out of business, unable to make enough money to be practical for the time they spent in labor.
Blizzard later followed suit.
Conclusion: The most logical solution to RMT is a subscription token with a side of active moderation. This also has a added benefit of increasing the population and making the game more accessible to low income players.
Expanding on abilities
I'm not going to harp on this too much as i've already expressed the importance of "pick your fight" utlity mechanics in the past. Abilities are currently lacking in the utlity department. Consider looking for opportunities to expand on this, using genre standards as inspiration if you cannot find any of your own. Also consider incorporating abilities into new PVE challenges if you see the opportunity.
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