OpenSesame - House PWs Stray MO from its Roots

[Godly]

In my opinion, the modus operandi of Mortal Online (The MO of MO if you will) has always been about the possibility of mischief. That's what Starvault has always used to allure new players to their game: mischief. Thievery. Murder. Player houses with keys that can be stolen or looted. Loot bags dropped by any entity who can carry loot and are lootable by all who peek inside. PKs, horsekillers, siege weapons, whatever. There was mischief around every corner and you had BETTER keep your eyes peeled AND your ears open. At least that's how it used to be.

Personally I'm pretty disappointed to see this player housing password system get implemented. I know I may be a little bit biased because I had a nice collection of keys that I looted from players and knew of at least six houses that I was occasionally checking. Yes, the doors still opened days after I looted the keys, lmao. I lusted to PK someone inside their house with no warning but unfortunately it never came to fruition-- all I got was a few desert horses. In MO1 I would have gotten the entire contents of the house chest, but that's a bit harsh I must admit.

Doing away with keys removes yet another aspect of mischief, eating away at the heart of Mortal itself. There will no longer be the excitement and mystery of looting a player's key and going about searching for the lock in which it fits, even though in this softened state of Mortal it just meant entering the player's safe space as an act of dominance. Now we can't even have that. Not only will we not have that, it now isn't even somewhat safe to enter a player house with the door open. Before, if you entered and they closed the door you could kill them and loot the key and let yourself out. Now if you go in and they shut the door you're stuck. Only a fool would enter any player house of which they do not know the password.

I do understand what the password system is though, it is subservient catering to large guilds who desperately needed a way to share their structures and chests with each other. I get it, I really do, but a password system isn't it, bros. This isn't Rust. (And speaking of Rust, friendly reminder: hackers have in the past hacked the codelocks on bases (in Rust) and were able to steal everything. Tick tock.).

I am genuinely surprised that SV has decided to take this password route in a seemingly hasty unimaginative reaction to player demands. If it were up to me I would have kept standard keys but added a new type of key generated from the structure in the same way that the standard keys were made, except the new key would be called "ethereal key" and it would not drop upon death or /droploot but would cost 20g or so to generate and disappear after 30 days or so. Allowing the keys to be renamed or have some sort of note attached to them so the player would be able to remember which is which would also be imperative. SV bros you missed a really good gold sink opportunity and chipped away at your foundation while doing it, sad to say. Hope you guys reconsider.

Thanks for reading.

-G

TL;DR
Remove passwords, restore free standard keys and also implement a new key that is tradable but isn't dropped on death or /droploot and costs gold to create but disappears after a fair amount of time.

 

[Amelia]

While I am not a pk, I must agree with you. I likes the old mo1 Key system and chests. I find The actual One confused and complex ( password, different tyoe of chests). Another try to make this game more Easy and safe to play. Onestly I dont like It.

 

[grendel]

I remember looting keys and having fun trying to find the house, before the owner changed the locks. Much fun. Lootable keys please.

 

[ThaBadMan]

Little by little, meaningless change by meaningless change. The true MO dwindles into something unrecognizeable.

A shame.

 

[Raknor]

I remember keys in MO1. Basically the whole gameplay around keys was
1. leave house
2. lock door
3. delete key
4. come back and create new key

Or if you actually played in a guild (lacking the inability to create keys) it was even better to leave your alt on the other side of the door so you can dual box inside the gate. No one sober ever lost a valuable key.

It was a nice idea that didn't work, this system also sucks - sharing any type of house with a guild and a global password without any granularity is terrible. Pretending keys were cool or solved anything doesn't help.

 

[KebekLorde]

I can't really say since I haven't experienced any of that but to me at least it seems completely the same.

Any player with half a brain deletes their key after leaving the house if there is anything valuable left inside (horse) and even if he keeps it, once he gets killed, the first thing you do is to change locks so that stolen key is worthless. And who would be dumb enough to try to get inside a stronghold that much less a keep when swarms of players guard that area.

This is imo a QoL change to somewhat eases the management of really large guilds and allow them to properly share their guild halls as they should be allowed. If it stole some super niche aspect of MO2's gameplay that happened very rarely, I dare say that's not a big deal considering it makes far more people happy.

 

[Tzone]

The reason given to stop freindlist premisions was performance. They said that houses would check the permissions of who ever entered the node. Stuff similar to this caused issues in other games, so I will lean on their reasoning here.

I cant argue a better way to code like maybe only check perms when you attempt to access the house since Im not a coder.

IDK why putting in the code would not just make a key only for the door because house fighting right now is death if they close the door on you.

The current password system reguardless of all its preceived faults is still so far more conveint then no password.

 

[Midas]

the password thing is lame , i understand the idea of mischief but theres a difference in hardcore and a brutaly unforgiveing world that makes you do hours of chores for ten minutes of play. the problem with the key system is similar too alot of things in this game that need to be changed. full loot must stay full loot of course. however alot of things in this world are HUGE oversights and inconvenience causing the player to NOT HAVE FUN in a GAME. the whole point is for it to be fun for everyone BOTTOMLINE. Quaility of life is a huge things in this style of game , YES let it be hardcore but dont make the game a chore to play or its simple.. people wont play only those with "no lifes" or just horrible lives can play 24/7 dont get me wrong i wish i could but its not realistic. people generally want to join the game with their friend build a house and use the house to play out of , alot of people dont wanto go into town they wanto use a house "guild house" as there base and only go to town to trade. the password system is super janky , it just needs to be a list you can add friends too so they dont hafto keep re entering passwords and such also allowing owners other commands. For a game based off alot of uo its missing alot of the things UO DID RIGHT. the ability to use a house with my friends and guild is a huge bonus to the game and WILL RAISE its popularity. SV also needs to consider the addition of Ankhs like UO had as placeable furniture in homes to recall too and rez on death. when i die id like to start back at my house and gear up not run from the bank or a camped fort waiting for players to rez just to kill them and dance on them. for instance , the map .... give players GPS on the map seriously the map is huge and its not real and everyone has different graphics setting as far as rendering distance dont make me use landmarks to determine where i am 95% of the people playing this game cant use a real map let alone one thats made up and has horrible road design. these are the things that will hold players back from playing the game , make the game as "hardcore" as you want but make the shit fun or no one will play.

 

[Godly]

I remember keys in MO1. Basically the whole gameplay around keys was
1. leave house
2. lock door
3. delete key
4. come back and create new key

Or if you actually played in a guild (lacking the inability to create keys) it was even better to leave your alt on the other side of the door so you can dual box inside the gate. No one sober ever lost a valuable key.

It was a nice idea that didn't work, this system also sucks - sharing any type of house with a guild and a global password without any granularity is terrible. Pretending keys were cool or solved anything doesn't help.

You're right, that's how it worked in MO1 where house locations were pre-determined on the map by developers and very sparse; there was maybe only 1% of the player housing that exists now. Having a house on MO1 was a VERY valuable thing, and most people knew the locations and their owners. Naturally they were treated as such.

If you take a good look at how those variables have changed in MO2 though, you'll notice that houses now are a dime a dozen. There are easily 100 houses just by GK alone. Surely with this new system of low-value housing a large guild would most likely set up a house or two designated as the "shit-shack" where miners and other gatherers would store their piles temporarily. It's likely keys would have been shared and it would have been possible to loot a key and go find some low level loot inside a player house if the systems were similar.

I never said keys were cool but I know that handing complete convenience and safety to large guilds on a silver platter at the expense of freedom (outside of insiding) is not cool.
He who would trade freedom for security or convenience deserves neither liberty nor safety.

 

[barcode]

what if passwords had to be spoken, like in local chat (or perhaps a bit less far ranging but if you were hidden near the house you could possibly overhear)

-barcode

 

[Kaemik]

I know. Truly disappointing to see MO2 take after such carebear titles as Rust, Ark, ATLAS, Conan Exiles etc. in giving us a step closer to a proper permissions system.

The key system was just annoying. Especially when you're now able to hire permanent NPCs for your houses it doesn't even make sense and actually harms immersion. If I have a full-time staff of guards I would tell them to let certain people in and keep others out. A gate guard is a far superior system of access control to a freaking key which is why they were generally the ones controlling access to fortresses and the manors of important individuals. That's basically how perms systems work.

So we're supposed to accept a system that is a WAY bigger pain in our butt and limits the usefulness of structures we own significantly. Is NOT realistic, and has rightly been rejected by every other hardcore title on the market because some people think the game is too carebear without it? Nah, screw them. Honestly, I think the password system is a halfass compromise. Would really prefer a regular permission system like actual successful PvP titles ALL have.

Do we want hardcore? Destructible doors are pretty standard. That's an acceptable compromise.

 

[Xunila]

what if passwords had to be spoken, like in local chat (or perhaps a bit less far ranging but if you were hidden near the house you could possibly overhear)

Great idea to get even more load to the server with a voice recognition system. And players have to contact GMs because their password doesn't work when they have a cold or when they change the microphone.

 

[barcode]

Great idea to get even more load to the server with a voice recognition system. And players have to contact GMs because their password doesn't work when they have a cold or when they change the microphone.

yes, perhaps i left it ambiguous but i meant that when someone used their password their *character* would /say it in local chat

-barcode