[Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5
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I have a few suggestions.
Reputation
- once you take on a mission if you complete said mission (dig up a chest, solve the riddle, kill the skeleton captain, or capture the animals) provide a small one time rep increase prior to sale for that mission. It can be fruatraiting if another just steals it from. Your ship and gets 100% for being a better PvP player. If you break down the award (100%) into 25% upon completion and 75% upon hand in it would sponsor more hunts, collections, etc.
Exploration
- Reputation or gold increase the first time you find a unique area(uncharted island. Provide a title, rep, gold, ability to buy a article of clothing etc reward.
Flagging to team up
Sometimes we like to ally with other players for forts, missions, to fight other ships, etc. It would be nice to flag them as another color then white. Some strategy games let players agree to align and prevent them from hostile actions for a period others just chang their color. Maybe a color change or flag indicator and ability to hear one another beyond area limitation would be great. -
@williamherschel said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
As someone who is a frequent poster on this board, I'm a little confused about the purpose of these "Mega Threads" and how this feedback is being synthesized. In all of the podcasts and videos Rare has released thus far, it seems like they primarily vaguely address user created threads (here and on reddit).
I like the idea of these mega feedback threads, but quite honestly I feel like if I don't get a comment in within the first page it's just going to get buried within the thread. I'll also add that I haven't noticed very many Rare staff actually commenting in these Mega Threads which also makes it feel like these threads are just housekeeping for shouts into the oblivion.
Rare is in desperate need of a community manager person that can bridge the gap between what the development team is actually working on and the community outreach stuff. Don't get me wrong @khaleesibot I think you're doing an excellent job, but so often your work here seems totally disconnected from the type of updates that most players actually want.
I don't necessarily think that is your fault, but Rare should allow you to be more transparent about what's going on behind the scenes. I also think that if we're going to continue with these Mega Threads more Rare developers need to have an active presence here and actually respond to what people are writing.
We refresh the threads every seven-ish days or when the thread has gone over ten pages so that the thread isn't overwhelming to participate in. It makes it manageable for us to read through all the comments and it also allows us to be able to see what our community thinks about a specific topic in one particular place. Just because your post isn't in the first page, doesn't make it lost! I read them all and I pass the key trends to the development team in our feedback sessions. I know lots of team members read the Forums and interact when they can.
Balancing play styles is something our community has been passionately discussing, which is why we're on Mega Thread Five! Sea of Thieves is at its core a game with both play styles in harmony, so before we make big sweeping changes, we want to be sure we understand everyone's motivations for why this is such a hot topic. Much of the frustration around this issue is made up of lots of little frustrations that we're tackling. Griefing, request for more content, more customisation and a host of other things. So while we work away at those, we're always monitoring the overall sentiment and reading your feedback to see if things have improved.
If you look at Customisation Mega Thread 4 you'll notice I posted an update with Patch Notes 1.0.7 updates we made around that issue. For a future griefing thread, I'll post the patch notes about the Private and Public Crews and monitor that mega thread for feedback.
You do make a good point, I will endeavour to make sure with each update I post a little introduction on what changes we've made and what we're currently working on as our focus in regards to the bigger more nebulous topics like 'balancing exploration and player combat'.
These threads aren't feedback graveyards. They are absolutely invaluable to us getting a better understanding of our community!
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@elem08 I agree with this completely. I really enjoy exploring the islands and I do occasionally find things laying around, but I also think the frequency of finding things should increase. And to date I have never found anything on a reef, I remember the one video showing a player finding something on a reef, I have searched but have never found a thing.
The world looks great and it can be fun looking around it when there is a chance of finding something, but there is risk to doing so because you have to constantly watch the horizon for other ships, so you cannot spend a ton of time exploring, which is another reason that increased drops of items would at least make the risk more worth it. -
Here are my two cents regarding exploration and adding island specific collectibles.
- Approach island
- Smuggler's Bay name appears. 0/5 Page Books Discovered, 0/1 Relics Found
- As you step foot in the beach your compass begins spinning out of control to indicate that an item has spawned in the island.
- Work with your crew and team up with other crews to scour the island. Everybody on the island (friend or foe) gets credit for the discovery.
- After the item is found the compass returns to normal. Come back in 1 in game day at a chance of discovering the next page of the book.
Complete all islands in a given area ex. "The Wilds" to unlock a unique cosmetics relevant to the area.
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I appreciate the response! Hopefully, I didn't come across as overly harsh regarding the work that you've been doing. I definitely appreciate the insight/explanation that you have provided in this post. With this explanation in mind, I'll definitely make more of an effort to contribute to this Mega Thread and others, rather than simply posting in the Game Discussion sub forum. Cheers!
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Dedicating a few hours to entertainment a day should be just that an entertaining experience. For EVERYONE! I have come to terms with what this game has become. The motley crews that are out for booty and blood. If you're seen they are coming for you. Period, end of discussion. I did a 7 hour voyage last night into this morning. Trying to stay out of every ones way, giving a wide birth to all ships i could see on the horizon. Trying to pull a PvE during, i would assume, off peak hours. Was a peaceful journey from about 1 - 3am edt. I do not know if the developers changed any server settings because i didnt see many other ships out and about... The ones i did see were peaceful and i believe also PvE. It was hard to determine because NO ONE (for the entire 7 hours) was using game chat. So on i went sailing the seas. Seemed like every time i was heading in to drop off my loot, and trying many different outposts, i was being chased down. One continued for at least 45 minutes before i bored them enough to go harass a different sloop at a outpost i passed on purpose. My voyage was not completed 4 hours in. But finally got my first load dropped off. SOME OF THESE ISLANDS ARE WAY TOO BIG FOR A SOLO OPERATION!!! Then rinse and repeat! Found a ship wreck. Got a Chest of a Thousand Grogs and two other items... Chased down after 20 or so minutes and we sunk each other! Went to the last island i needed to get to so i could complete my ORIGINAL voyage... Didnt care about loot by this point... Left 4 treasure chests on the cliff of the island for the next ship that came in! Just wanted the voyage to be completed. And then another chapter is added, damn.... Got chased by yet another sloop... Had no treasure on me, but desperately just wanted to finish the voyage (now 6 hrs into it). Was sunk! I did however finish the original voyage 7 hours after start. Made, give or take, a FEW thousand dollars.
So it turned out to be the exact same experience that i have become accustomed to in SoT! One that i have come to terms with. But one that needs addressing! NO ONE wants to dedicate themselves to (at minimum 1 to 2 hrs) to be sunk and have either all your hard earned booty laying at the bottom of the sea or having it turned in by salty sea dogs. I went thru being chased for hours, working on huge islands, navigating away from ships, trying to communicate with others, JUST TO COMPLETE A SINGLE VOYAGE. With or without the treasure to show for it, that didn't matter anymore. Who, other than people like me that hope it is going to improve, are willing to stick around to find out? The grind is not worth the reward to most. And definitely wouldn't be considered entertainment currently to PvE players due to the unknown (but more like than not) that someone is coming somewhere somehow to take those hours of work away from you in an instant.
Everyone was doing their own thing last night. No sail by scallywags while on the different islands. But as soon as i was heading towards outposts forget about it.
There needs to be a change in how completed voyages are handled. It takes a fair bit of time (as you increase in the ranks) to get some of these voyages completed. To have it all taken within a minute does not meet any criteria of a positive risk vs. reward system. Having a galleon come up on you and turning your sloop into toothpicks, while you are knee deep in skellys halfway across timbuktu for example, isn't really a challenge to them is it? But they get rewarded nicely (off the backs of the PvE player).
The only LOGICAL way to fix this, without catering to one faction (PvP) or the other (PvE), is use the player data to determine what type of player they are. Overly aggressive? Put them on a server with like minded individuals. Problem solved. PvP should be part of the game. But these "crews" that get rep (or just jollies) by sinking everyone they find let them have a special place in the SoT server room (next to the head).
Long, i know, but it is what it is. Adding new content is a great thing, but IF the PvP goes back to some resemblance of normalcy after your new DLC is released it will just be a null in the sport of sloop hunting and an ongoing rinse and repeat experience until you use the players data to create a SoT microcosm that can be enjoyed by all.
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@chitown-bear said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
@prannon It odd, because I feel like the seas are less aggressive now than they were at launch. But I also almost never come across ships carrying meaningful treasure unless a skull fort just went down.
I think a large number of the PVE players have left already and the ones who prefer heavy PVP now have to do PVE to have any hope to advance. I'm guessing many of them will be gone soon.
I saw a post on Reddit that may not be authentic but if it is, it would be a game changer. Someone claiming to be a Rare employee posted that they were considering PVE servers because 95% of players are no longer active. Too much PVP is the number one complaint.I tried searching for a post like that but couldn't find it. I hope it's true though, that they're considering PvE only, I would come back to SoT right away. But until then, beautiful world and love the lore and the sailing but why would I play the game knowing that there is a chance it will make my day miserable... I really don't find the constant stress fun at all, and losing my chests to other people is just sad.
Honestly, I wouldn't even care if it was a completely separate mode as long as they let me migrate my handsome pirate over... I spent way too much time in the IPG to find him, lol.
This risk-reward thing, and knowing that a friendly crew could kill you in an instant after having been friendly for a while and sink your hours of progress, might be enjoyable for the people defending the game as it is right now but it's definitely not enjoyable for everyone. None of my friends are playing anymore because of it... And because of how unfriendly it is to solo players. A PvE-only mode would fix all that.
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I dont think a pve server will fix anything. The last 2 post i just read were about ppl who dont wanna pvp at all. This is not fair to the devs to try and break the game in half so you can play i peace.
I really hope Rare sticks to their guns and their vision. The entire system is based around a constant threat. Even the way the servers merge prove this.
Balance is the key. Not segregation. -
@mrbrocksego said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
I rarely to never try and attack people. Almost exclusively play pvp. This game would be super dull without PVP.
Also I almost never get anybody harassing me, I think people are either unobservant or too touchy bordering on zero tolerance for PvP interactions.
Is it really that hard to comprehend that people can have different interests and tolerances? And by checking the statistics, a BIG percentage do.
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@navarita Sure, but to some degree you are responsible for that kind of thing yourself. Arguably everyone knew it would be a big open world open server open PvP game from the outset. Plus the PvP is really not hard to avoid, best case scenario it takes 5-10 minutes for a ship to get from the edge of draw distance to an unmoving vessel. Thats a lot of time to get your ship moving and avoid them, this is why I never have PvP problems. Stop trying to force the game to be something it isn't and has enver been advertised to be. Adapt how you play, learn the relatively easy methods of avoiding people, and have a good time.
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@mrbrocksego said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
@navarita Sure, but to some degree you are responsible for that kind of thing yourself. Arguably everyone knew it would be a big open world open server open PvP game from the outset. Plus the PvP is really not hard to avoid, best case scenario it takes 5-10 minutes for a ship to get from the edge of draw distance to an unmoving vessel. Thats a lot of time to get your ship moving and avoid them, this is why I never have PvP problems. Stop trying to force the game to be something it isn't and has enver been advertised to be. Adapt how you play, learn the relatively easy methods of avoiding people, and have a good time.
L**O I don't have to adapt, THE GAME has to adapt or it'll be dead.
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@navarita
The playstyle you want is not in this game. And Rare does not have to cater to your every wish. Nothing is more absurd then gamers nowadays who demand a game change its core or else its doomed. -
@mrbrocksego said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
@navarita Ok one single guy, thats not how any of this works but ok.
Not sure if you're really this unable to see that the game is going down if it doesn't adapt to a bigger amount of playstyles or you just live in a bubble.
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@navarita I think your overestimating the effect on player numbers. There seems like a rather large base of people that understood what they bought and are relatively happy with it.
On a side note I feel like there are better ways to solve that problem than by cutting up the game. Once again creative game design would be key to solving the issues. Not segregating players into different servers.
Ways to fix SoT for people that only want to PvE:
- A certain song that plays when a ship gets within a certain range of yours
- Some shorter mid length voyages between shipwrecks and full on voyages. This would give PvE desiring people some more bite sized stuff to do solo, as well as smaller quests that can be turned in sooner.
- A skeleton crewmate that can be hired (from the OOS) they won't help out on the boat much but they'll follow you around and shoot things. Maybe have them able to do one single task on the boat if you tell them to steering cannoning, sails, etc, but they won't do it very well.
- A hireable NPC for solo players that would hang in the crows nest and scan for ships, notifying you via text chat with a "Ship spotted to the []". For in game flavour the NPC should be a half sized character, a child thats hired on to swab the deck and mind the crows nest.
- A bounty system, as has been suggested many times
- Some type of NPC skeleton ships (would provide some alternative action for PvPers)
- A way for PvE people to connect up with each other and create little PvE fleets. Safety in numbers
- An incentive of some sort to encourage attacks on galleons over sloops. Maybe a golden nameplate or something that could be salvaged and sold.
- A server shared instanced safe zone that has multiple access points on the map. Basically have a bunch of caves scattered around various locations that all lead to tortuga or whatever. A semi safe zone (friendly fire enabled for all), with some big guards to keep people more or less friendly
- Just in general more activities for people that want more action in the game. I don't think its necessarily a problem with people wanting to PvP, they just want to have boat fights and get the adrenaline pumping.
Thats game design. Its always better than an amputation.
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@mrbrocksego said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
@navarita I think your overestimating the effect on player numbers. There seems like a rather large base of people that understood what they bought and are relatively happy with it.
On a side note I feel like there are better ways to solve that problem than by cutting up the game. Once again creative game design would be key to solving the issues. Not segregating players into different servers.
Ways to fix SoT for people that only want to PvE:
- A certain song that plays when a ship gets within a certain range of yours
- Some shorter mid length voyages between shipwrecks and full on voyages. This would give PvE desiring people some more bite sized stuff to do solo, as well as smaller quests that can be turned in sooner.
- A skeleton crewmate that can be hired (from the OOS) they won't help out on the boat much but they'll follow you around and shoot things. Maybe have them able to do one single task on the boat if you tell them to steering cannoning, sails, etc, but they won't do it very well.
- A hireable NPC for solo players that would hang in the crows nest and scan for ships, notifying you via text chat with a "Ship spotted to the []". For in game flavour the NPC should be a half sized character, a child thats hired on to swab the deck and mind the crows nest.
- A bounty system, as has been implemented many times
- Some type of NPC skeleton ships (would provide some alternative action for PvPers)
- A way for PvE people to connect up with each other and create little PvE fleets. Safety in numbers
- An incentive of some sort to encourage attacks on galleons over sloops. Maybe a golden nameplate or something that could be salvaged and sold.
- A server shared instanced safe zone that has multiple access points on the map. Basically have a bunch of caves scattered around various locations that all lead to tortuga or whatever. A semi safe zone (friendly fire enabled for all), with some big guards to keep people more or less friendly
- Just in general more activities for people that want more action in the game. I don't think its necessarily a problem with people wanting to PvP, they just want to have boat fights and get the adrenaline pumping.
Even the slightest chance of me losing my loot to another player is enough for me to not play this game AT ALL. Even if they reduce the chance to the point that only happens once a week. My tolerance for it is zero, null, non-existent, (0). And I'm not the only one, if a game treats you this way they'll just move on and forget about it and if you read all the people that aren't posting in the forums anymore that's what they did. And also
Thats game design. Its always better than an amputation.
L**O back again with the segregation and the amputation and all the ridiculously sensationalist terminology. Of these two options what would you prefer:
-A player doesn't play anymore, moves to a more friendlier game.
-A player comes back to the game and only plays in the "amputate" server, the "segregated" server.
I'll let you know that one of these is beneficial for the game to make profit off microtransactions, and the other isn't. One pays for the server, and the other doesn't. One benefits PvP players, and the other doesn't. -
@navarita If thats the case then you should probably exclusively stick to co op and single player games. I don't know what to tell.
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@mrbrocksego And that's what I do. I'm just here to let Rare know that they could have so, so, so many more players adding an optional PvE server. I find it ridiculous they decided not to.
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@mrbrocksego
Theres nothing you can say. Hes blinded by his own selfishness. Dont let him get u all worked up. He has no suggestions aside from playing alone. These types of players will come and go. Their demands wont be met. And the true fans of the game will stick around. There is always ppl who claim the game will fail, ppl will leave, etc..... never happens. -
@nwo-azcrack said in [Mega Thread] Balancing Exploration and Player Combat - Part 5:
@mrbrocksego
Theres nothing you can say. Hes blinded by his own selfishness. Dont let him get u all worked up. He has no suggestions aside from playing alone. These types of players will come and go. Their demands wont be met. And the true fans of the game will stick around. There is always ppl who claim the game will fail, ppl will leave, etc..... never happens.I feel you are blinded in your selfishness, also. The closest thing to the way PVP works in SoT were the dark zones in The Division. Even though the dark zones were only part of the end game, not the entire game, they almost destroyed the game. It went from being the fastest selling new IP in history to under 0.1% of its player base remaining in 3 months. They couldn't figure out how to make dark zones work even though it was supposed to be the core of the game. Instead, they made the dark zones irrelevant. The game rebounded nicely after that.
I haven't seen the official player count numbers in awhile which should tell you all you need to know. When the numbers were good, they were bragging. Now, they actively hide the numbers.
And when is the last time you've seen a Rare employee say they weren't considering a PvE option? I haven't seen it since launch.
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@chitown-bear The closest thing server wise to SoT is actually DayZ. Persistent character, always on PvP, shared world. They just mushed it in with some semi instancing tech to give a bit more of a seamless (no server screens) world for players.
Maybe they just think they've answered the question and don't see a need to repeatedly tell people they aren't working on a thing.
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@mrbrocksego I've never played DayZ, but I didn't think you needed to take loot through a gauntlet of possible PVP to advance.
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@chitown-bear Thats basically the whole game. You start with nothing, search around for stuff, avoid zombies, get murdered by a player and start again. Gotta love perma death.
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@chitown-bear Aside from the boats the gameplay loop is surprisingly similar. You basically deal with strong stupid AI enemies. Spend most of your time looking for stuff (though the stuff in that game is more useful to the gameplay), then have another player kill you and take the stuff you spent so long looking for. If you stay alive long enough you just haul your character and stuff around to different servers. Its also a similar loop to these battleground style games, they just took out the ai enemies and added in an ever closing circle of death.
I could almost see it as semi inspiration for this games online. The timeline for that would also fit nicely.
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@mrbrocksego I see one big possible difference (again, I have never played). Could you play DayZ for 2 hours, killing AI enemies and collecting stuff, only to have never advanced at all during the play session?
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@chitown-bear Absolutely, more so than this game even. If you die in Dayz you lose everything, the clothes on your back, the items in your inventory everything is open for the person that killed you to loot. Worse you could keep the same character alive for days and when your killed all you've gotten out if your playtime is the experience of playing.
Some games don't reward you for time spent. Sometimes the reward for playing is the time spent. If your having fun the time wasn't wasted.
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@mrbrocksego I thought in Dayz you advanced when you killed stuff and found stuff. For instance, if you find an upgraded weapon, you could use it.
Am I wrong in that?
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@chitown-bear
Well this is not the Division. What may work in one game may not work in the next. Im not being selfish at all for wanting the game stay true to its vision.
But comming to an open world multiplayer game and asking the devs to break the game in half is one of the most selfish acts i have ever seen. Its like begging for multiplayer pvp in a game like Skyrim.
And acting like the game is dying or needs change without proof is pointless. Its just speculation -
@chitown-bear Yeah you can use everything you find right off the bat. Totally level playing field with no level ups or anything just like this game.
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@nwo-azcrack Asking them for it to fail in an effort to stay true to its vision is selfish.
I would even say that the game has failed in the vision Rare laid out. Going back to early in development, they wanted this to be a fun, social experience where PVP was possible.
No where in any of Rare's public statements or in their advertising did they even imply they wanted this game to be PVP dominant.
As for no evidence of dropping player count, there is plenty. The biggest one is that they are not releasing any new information on player count or anything that could correlate to it.
The game is broken into bits of 6 ships. Its broken into much more than half unless you think player count is down to 12 ships.
And there have been plenty more suggestions than just separate servers. I suggested a writ earned through PVE that allows but limits PVP. I've seen numerous requests for players to be at least partially credited for completing quests with additional reward for turn in.
The issue that the Dark Zone in the division had is the same thing that all of SoT has. For some players, there is no positive feedback loop. They can play for hours and have no advancement whatever. If you want this to be something other than a small niche game with a few thousand players, some way needs to be created to allow more players to have that positive feedback. If you think Rare is going to keep this game with a 20,000 player count, I just don't see that happening.
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@chitown-bear
This game is not pvp dominant. I can sail for hours and never be attacked. As a matter of fact i can say 8/10 ppl will avoid me at all costs. Most ppl are doin their own thing and not lookin for trouble.
And again with the population it is still speculation. All games have a player drop the first month or 2. Its expected.
And that is why i feel like its to early to talk about splitting servers or changing the game. -
@mrbrocksego That is the difference. If players got credit for a chest as soon as it was dug up, you would see a lot less complaints about the PVP.