One thing I gots to ask about 14.5..

[Naraya]

Is the XP outdoors going to be more appealing than missions or is it just going to give us an option between the two resulting in the same XP gain over time?

I was under the impression that XP outdoors is supposed to be much better than XP in missions simply because in missions you usually get a reward / token for completing them.

[________________Xira]

When I played the high level camps in a full group with someone else's doc about a month ago, the exp blew and it was much riskier than missions.

Havenm't been on test since then to check to see if they fixed it.

[Naraya]

LOL...figures...

[Thyrra]

at the moment camps don't have better xp than missions and camps are riskier; at least the few i've been to. this needs work.

[________________Xira]

Funcom utterly DREADS the players leveling any faster than they already are, because then they will use up all the content, then cancel their accounts.

What they don't seem to realize is that if they make something other than missions viable, they have created a MASSIVE amount of new content in and of itself with that only little change.


Funcom == stupid. I don't think 14.5 is going to do any good. It's going to blow, just like outdoor hunting blows right now.


People will do outdoor hunts for...ohhh....2 weeks. Then realize that there is better exp to be had in missions, and go back to them.

Then we are back to square one, lack of content except for the fu(king missions....

[gromulator]

Game is dying if FC doesnt nyting

[____________Ejeckted]

Every bad thing that has ever been done to the game
is the result of one misguided idea; that all players want
out of a MMORPG is to reach the highest possible level,
and then as soon as they do that they throw away all they
have accomplished and hit the cancel button.

Funcom is afraid of us leveling, and that puts them in a
position against the players, and that leads to bad decisions.
It's a rediculous situation really.

Developers should realize that leveling is only the begining
of a players life in a game. Only the character-creation and
development process. They should be throwing all thier
resources at implementing post-leveling content, thus allowing
the leveling process to be more fun, without being restricted
from doing anything that helps characters advance.
This is turn helps replayability, and encourages alts,
thereby extending the life of subscriptions.
After seeing what a chore the leveling process currently is
from 150-200, there is no way I could tolerate it a second time.
That's not the sort of thing you should be saying about a game.

[cold]

* Lower xp than missions
* Less loot than missions
* A lot more risk than missions

= You'll still be doing missions in 14.5 and the 140 camps are a waste of time.


I say skip the useless content if you're not going to fix that and fix my weapons already!

[________________Xira]

LOL yea instead of wasteing our money implementing 140 worthless camps nobody will ever use...

FIX BBI's!!!

And bows.

[peterrjg]

Dynacamps in BFE + more save terminals = maybe viable outdoor hunting.

As it stands, I ain't going to SFH to hunt only to fly back from wherever when I die.

You guys gotta up the save terminals in these out of the way places otherwise they're just eyecandy zones.

[Shandrahs]

ya'know.... "content" isnt just where you get the most XP faster...

[Hajkster]

Originally posted by DeKida
ya'know.... "content" isnt just where you get the most XP faster...

Indeedy! New appartments! New cloths! Other sorts of work's (then just bounty killing) BOYA!

[___________Drusillus]

Can you define what you mean by the new camps being "much riskier" than missions? Because, every time I get into a full team to do missions, there's pretty much NO risk at all any more. Most of the time, you're taking on one mob at a time, and he's dead in a matter of seconds, and you move on to to next room, blah blah blah. Part of the idea of outdoor hunting is that it's supposed to be more risky, and therefore more exciting, and therefore more fun.

And what do you mean when you say the "XP blew"? Was a level x mob giving you less experience than the same level mob in a mission? Or did the XP suck because there weren't 150 mobs like there are in a mission?

[________________Xira]

Originally posted by Drusillus
Can you define what you mean by the new camps being "much riskier" than missions? Because, every time I get into a full team to do missions, there's pretty much NO risk at all any more.

I mean exactly that, there is a significant chance of someone dieing every pull.

Make that I doubt anything but a percfect group could possibly go 2 hours without at LEAST one death.

Part of the idea of outdoor hunting is that it's supposed to be more risky, and therefore more exciting, and therefore more fun.

There are certiun things calls risk Vs reward equations. The basic idea(stop me if you've heard this before) is that the more risk there is the more reward there is.

Given that at high levels missions are ZERO risk, they should be taken as an absoulte minimum of the amount of exp given. If you put things in the game that require risk(and lead to fun) they must be given a greater reward than missions, with a high level of risk, they must be given a high level of reward.

And what do you mean when you say the "XP blew"? Was a level x mob giving you less experience than the same level mob in a mission?

They give, over time, about as much or slightly less exp as a QL 190ish mission. Factoring in killing the boss mob for ~150K and getting a 1 million + exp reward at the end.

So the mobs were giveing slightly more exp than a mission mob would have in the time it took to kill them. not much more though.

Or did the XP suck because there weren't 150 mobs like there are in a mission?

Plenty of mobs, Get several adds per pull. Hard as hell without reflect bracers. (i.e. good chance of someone dieing in nonperfect team)

I would say impossible without a CH doc.




All in all: The exp blew, they were too hard for the exp to blow, the loot sucked.

That was ~ 1 month ago, they might have fixed it by now.

[Darkbane]

The problem isn't the new camps or outdoor hunting. The problem is missions. To much reward for too little risk. I did a team mission today, after 5 hours, we had done 63% and I'd levelled 3 times (mission was ql186, I went from 111 to 114, almost 115). There wasn't *no* risk, but it was very low really.

FC should reduce the size of some missions for a start, anything with over 100 MOBs is just silly. At the other end, some missions are just too small. There should be some variation. In fact, there should be a way to select approximate mission size (small, medium or large say) with missions of different sizes generating loot from different tables (small would give common loot, medium less common and large uncommon).

They *might* (and I emphasize that) even consider dropping the xp gained from mission MOBs (except boss in team missions) by 5-10% - though that would be considered a nerf of course...

There are still things that could be done to improve hunting too mind you.

[______________Tahrus]

Originally posted by Xira


I mean exactly that, there is a significant chance of someone dieing every pull.

Make that I doubt anything but a percfect group could possibly go 2 hours without at LEAST one death.


All in all: The exp blew, they were too hard for the exp to blow, the loot sucked.

That was ~ 1 month ago, they might have fixed it by now.

so are you saying that Outdoor Hunting should be just like missions? super-easy? dying is a part of the game, if you and your group is god enough, you can avoid it. There should ALWAYS be a chance of someone dying. that is what makes it challenging. why would you even do anything..hunting or mission, if you KNEW there was no chance for you to die. that is simply boring. it's like playing a FPS with the 'God" code activated. too easy, and not fun at all.

sounds like some are afraid of a challenge, IMHO. I, with my low-level 69 arse, die all the time trying to solo in Andromeda(need i not mention getting waxed at the Hammer camp out there..)..but I still have more fun then following a group around in a mission while the blow every mob to pieces in 3 seconds... I, for one, am likes to be challenged. I don't want super-exp and super-loot just spoon-fed to me. ok..so maybe the exp sucks...but i like the challenge. it would be real nice if they upped the exp for outdoor hunting, and lowered it for missions. but then again..half the population would still do nothing but missions because the outdoors is too hard, and they want it easy.

all in all, missions are no fun, but missions are EASY. and that is why everyone does them. and they offer good exp and good loot. either make the missions harder, lower the rewards for them, or raise the rewards for hunting.

[Epsilon3]

The point is not that missions are easier and outdoor hunting is just too hard. I think everyone likes a challenge....but hunting outdoors is just not worth it. The risk to potential gain ratio is suverely f*ed up. Make hunting worth more experience outdoors and people will gladly accept the challenge.

[____________Ejeckted]

Originally posted by Tahrus
I, with my low-level 69 arse,

this is what you dont understand yet. at your level,
the game is still fun, the XP curve is fair, and advancement
is achievable within a casual players timeperiod.

it's easy to get a bunch of people outdoors at low levels,
infact, it's probably faster than missions with established camps
with similar level mobs and lots of people /s LFG

but at level 163, I need 20 million XP to level, and it gets much worse.
mobs in QL190+ team missions give approximately 40K.
that means I need to kill 500 red mobs to level.

now remember it was the same last level, and the level before that,
and the level before that, etc etc etc etc for months
I'd estimate . . at least 5000 mobs for level 160-170
probably more.

When it takes that long to level, nobody has time to die.
Losing 20min Xp at level 70 sucks. Losing 5 hours of XP
due to a bad pull, LD, PKer, whatever is unacceptable.
There is no reason to risk that when you have Broken Shores
missions with safe zones and escape elevators and a save
terminal 20 feet from the door.

There has to be someting extremely tempting to compensate
if you want players to risk that many hours of thier day.

The "more XP for outdoor hunting" suggestion is good,
because then you're gambling, weighing the odds of (eg)
3 hours and possible death/loss vs 5 hours gauranteed.

There are other things to consider however;
Money, Loot, and Tokens.
Missions = Garanteed token, possibility of valuable boss loot,
and once you stick all the junk in the vendor, you can walk out
of a mission literally a million credits richer.
Outdoor hunting can't really give tokens. .
so that stays a factor pushing people indoors.
The balancing factor would be to make new highly-desirable
outdoor-only loot, just like there is team-boss-ony loot now.
That creates a situation where the market demands both activites.


I'm sorry to give you the "you're a noob, you dont understand"
routine .. but .. the game changes. As of now, the options suck.
It would take you a week of slow outdoor hunting (and lots of dying)
to accomplish what you can do in a day indoors.
Nobody with a real life to attend to has time for anything else.
It's that bad/boring.

[Mercatura]

Sure, gamers can powerlevel there to 99 twice as fast as before...

But its not such boredom and tedium that they're more likely to do it many more times and create numerous high level characters. And end up playing the game far longer.

Only thing is they don't generate any real revenue that way. (ads = crap) But they do create more loyal customers

Odd eh, a game that loses money the more its played (they far underestimated the online demand) does that, and the game that gains money by keeping subcribers retained does the exact opposite

Many patches in AO are seemingly designed to slow us down. Either that or appease the smallest segment of the game. (pvp whiners)

[gwend]

for lower lvls xp in missions is great but i get around 30k a kill the mobs that do give nice xp are in ql250 missions but after you finish the ql250 you can already have finished 3 or 4 190s :/ long as these munstas give me over 40k a kill ill be happy only way now to give a mission a little life is at the start

1. tell everyone to wait in main room
2. proceed to run into every room drawing aggro from 15-20 mobs
3. run back to group and have a nice rumble

from there on its boring as ****

but there is a little work around for getting better xp you team with green teams if theyre actually good you can do a mission in 15min like normal and get over 50k a kill which is alot better than the 30 im getting from killin yellow/orange mobs