Physics and Punishment in games.

[Lucidus]

Originally Posted by Messianic [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I was wondering if my memory of push stopping CH's was wrong...I seem to remember push as being critical to stopping CH's in Kael.

Your memory is serving you well. It was the most practical of two options, the other being mana sieve.

[stormlord]

Originally Posted by Lucidus [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Your memory is serving you well. It was the most practical of two options, the other being mana sieve.

Too bad that kind of thing couldn't have been used more. I didn't even know it was possible. Insofar as I have played EQ over the years, push was only something I payed attention to when I didn't want the opponent to fall off a ledge or I just wanted to try to keep it in one place so I'd maneuver myself in an attempt to equalize its movement (stop it from moving). That was what happened hte vast majority of time. It was only in late 2009 and early 2010 when I started doing raids that I noticed how much push impacts raids.

I really wish games would make me think more about the environment when I'm playing. In a lot of em, you just rush through and kill whatever it's you're going to kill and then move on. That's not the level of involvement I'm looking for. I'm looking for dangerous cliffs and swinging bridges and slippery things and roots/rocks that snare you and ropes and climbable things and raging fires that burn both opponent/player and so on. I know that WoW has used the environment in some of its instances. So it's not an old idea.

I was thinking earlier about how we struggle so hard to get new weapons and new armor so that we can kill things better but the idea of trying to get weight reduction bags so that we can carry heavier things doesn't seem to interest as many people. I think part of that reason is because loot in EQ didn't scale with each expansion. In expansions the cash loot was mostly gems/ingredients/etc, not heavy things. There were some places where there were heavy things. Killing hill giants in rathe mountains would benefit those who had weight reduction and coin purses (WR), for example. But most of the game, especially at the higher levels, did not benefit those with WR. It was only rare, specific cases. Additionally, I did not ever have much luck in finding WR bags. In all the years I played, I might have only found a couple on loot. Over 95% of the WR bags I got were from bazaar or in trade. In fact, I actually didn't get any WR bags for the first several years. I rarely ever needed them. The question is if EQ had had more heavy cash items in-game would it have made WR more interesting? Could WR have been a more important part of the game? Or is the whole idea somehow not something most players are interested in? Do they like non-combat things to be abstracted?

I think the reason these kinds of things always interest me is because i'm an engineer (software). I look at systems as things to overcome. It's fun. But non-engineers are bored to death when they see detailed systems. This is especially true if it's not combat-related, but evne then it's unwanted. They just wnat to skip it. It makes me feel alone in most circles. I like games that they don't. I'll always be in the minority.

But you know... this world is big enough to have a game for everyone.

[Lucidus]

Originally Posted by stormlord [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Too bad that kind of thing couldn't have been used more ... push was only something I payed attention to when I didn't want the opponent to fall off a ledge

Classic EQ was a game of position. Success and failure hinged on knowing where to stand and when to stand there. The lesson of Velious was that you had to have leaders who understood those rules, and melee who could anticipate and execute the changes necessary to satisfy those rules.

Anecdote: Years ago when Vex Thal was new, we engaged one of the midlevel mobs by pushing him into a wall. However, too many of our melee stood directly behind the mob, so it was pushed into and through the corner, falling to the lower level. The boss then proceeded to run back to the raid from the lower level, building up a train of ~80 spawns plus at least one more boss. Somewhere I have an epic screenshot of that horde running through the door at the far end of the room.

Originally Posted by stormlord [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I really wish games would make me think more about the environment when I'm playing ... I think the reason these kinds of things always interest me is because i'm an engineer (software). I look at systems as things to overcome.

Try out EVE Online sometime. Hidden beneath the gorgeous graphics is a bunch of math equations, and the secret to success is to balance the equation faster than the other guy. Aside from Everquest, it is the only other game I've seen that will actually cause a heart attack.

[stormlord]

I was browsing this thread when I got to thinking about the environment again. I know this might be kind of off topic, but ....

There're a lot of arcade games where the trick is not in how to kill the boss and/or his minions, but it's how to survive pitfalls (traps) and jump at the right time (to avoid falling to your death) and knowing where to go (not to take the wrong turn because you only have so many lives and you shouldn't waste them) and know where the bonuses are (things that give you extra lives and/or points and/or levels and/or gold)... all with the goal in mind of finding TREASURE (or whatever it's you're after). Why don't MMO's have more instances or zones or (insert place that you go to do a mission or task or adventure) where the objective is not to kill things but to survive the environment so that you can collect things (treasure, gold, points, etc). Instead of monsters that want to kill you, there're moving platforms and high cliffs that you must climb and traps that you must avoid or disarm and puzzles you must solve (maybe it has a big treasure inside) and so on.

Why can't it be a combination of monsters AND environment? I know I'm not the only one to bring this up because I see bits and pieces of this in almost all MMOs, including EQ. Just not very much. Mostly, what you find is that the enemy is a monster. The environment is usually just a second thought or worse even.

This same idea of battling an enemy (whatever it's) to get things (treasure, points, experience, gold, etc) can be translated to WR bags and other WR things. We get in the mode of thinking that killing monsters is the only fun thing to do. But it's not. Everything imaginable can be made fun. It just needs to be developed. My mode of thinking is that encumberance is boring to players because developers failed in their job to translate it to something fun and challenging. But I know that this is just me tricking myself. The reality is that I'm an engineer and I'm attracted to things most non-engineers are not. I'm like a man who is sexually attracted to bumps on a log and disliked. They see me with a log and shake their heads and all walk away with shame on their faces.

[EnnoiaII]

Push will be around until forever. Play with less terrible tanks and it becomes a non-issue.