Cloud Serpent Mount, Dynamic Quest Rewards, Blue Posts

[brok3nh3lix]

edit: gah, clicked wrong reply... this is in response to an early post about how mobs use green fire, and that all spells arnt one color...

your missing the issue entirely. The spell effect is tied to the spell, its not they cant change the color, its that they cant do so with a glyph easily or in a way that does'nt involve a bunch superfulus code, which is inefiecient from a programming stand point, something they have to be cautious of. It may also require changes across classes and possibly mobs as well. When you see the green fire from say a mob, its not casting the same spell in the database as your warlock is casting, it just may have the same name in the dispaly field, but the spell it self is a different entry.

They could make the glyph remove the current spell from your spell book, and then give you a new idetical spell with the exception of the color, but then that can lead to having to make changes across the class for all sorts of other effects like procs and such that need to referance this new spell as well, not to mention twice the work when changes are made to it.

they dont want to just give all warlocks green fire period because some warlocks might still want red fire.

if you understand how programing and tables work, its easier to understand how it could be an issue for them if it wasn't something that was considered when the spell system was created in the first place. They can of course write new code, but as they say, its alot of time as it affects more than just warlocks, and that means man power and money. Yes they have alot of that, but its something they have to take away from work on something else they may consider more important at thist time. Its not like they have programmers just sitting around on the bench, they are working on things. And simply hireing more only to lay them off later when the work ammount goes down isnt a great plan either, and can lead to quality issues. Not to mention, even when you hire an experienced programmer, they have to learn the ins and outs of the engine before they can work on an overhall to a core system like this.

So its not that its impossible, they dont say that, only that under the current system used, theres not a good or in thier view acceptable way to do it.

[Spellweaver]

Not quite. There is nothing innovative about this. You can implement questing and be innovative (TOR, for example.) But to change your own quest rewards after years and years to follow a model that others have been doing for a few years now is a blatant rip off. It's like the first couple "goth" kids had an innovative style. Everyone who came afterward were following the trend....i.e. ripping them off.

And I'd be more willing to accept the idea that they are flattering their competitors by stealing their ideas if it wasn't for the continued assault by higher ups in ActiBlizz ripping these other games. Or the continued assault from WoW fanboys about how these other games are "WoW clones" or "WoW ripoffs".

How exactly is TOR's questing innovative? It's still the basic ''Kill this, collect this, click on this thingy to activate something'', the only difference being that instead of reading the quest text, it's voiced over.

I like how you mention that it's just ActiBlizz ripping off other games, while the whole MMO genre is about looking at what good ideas your competitors have, and trying to implement said ideas into your own game to improve it. Else everyone would be ripping off from EverQuest anyway (or any other mmo games before that)

While I think it's silly that there's people (or fanboys) that call every other MMO a WoW clone, this isn't something exclusive to WoW. Or do you honestly think Rift, SWTOR, GW2 and other MMO's don't have these kind of fanboys?

[brok3nh3lix]

Edit: wrong reply again... in response to the post about a mod that chances the color of the flames.

the issue is its modifying a game file so that the effect it looks for on your computer is edited to look for a file with the green version instead. I havnt seen said mod, but my guesse is that it effects ALL warlocks on your screen when they cast said spell, and not just your self.

Editing the game files in this way has ben around for a long time, and when its done, it effects every one useing it from your POV, not just your self. For instance before blizzard made it so you couldnt do it, people edited the color of items such as dragon stalkers. It didnt just make your armor look black instead of purple, it made all dragon stalker armor look black instead of purple.

totaly differnt than make it so that warlock x's fire is green, but warlock y's fire is red, and thats the way it looks to every one.

[Deleted]

Small problem with them automatically chosing your quest reward for you: un-even selling price.
Scavenger's Crossbow sells for 16g73
Scavenger's Greatsword sells for 27g30
So every 2h melee toon will end up with an extra ~6g from that single quest compared to. Add that over hundred of quests and that will become noticable for the more casual players.

[Lolsteak]

I sorta lol'd at the "dynamic rewards".. it's basically EXACTLY the same as it is now except you get given what they want you to have.

[Kuja]

Heh. One more feature stolen from SWTOR, quest rewards change that is. Wonder why they are coming up with these changes just when swtor did? People have been wanting aoe looting for years. And changing quest rewards like that could also have been done years ago. What gives? Out of ideas? ;o

[Spellweaver]

Heh. One more feature stolen from SWTOR, quest rewards change that is. Wonder why they are coming up with these changes just when swtor did? People have been wanting aoe looting for years. And changing quest rewards like that could also have been done years ago. What gives? Out of ideas? ;o

Yeah, totally!

Not like Rift (or other games before that) had AoE looting. Nope, invented by SWTOR.
(same goes for the quest rewards change)

[tenzing21]

Bwahahahah.

This Blue Post is ~exactly~ why I quit playing this awful game. BILLIONS of dollars in cume profits from all IPs, and yet they can't have a colored, skinned, and animated wire-frame model ready to go before December 21st. You have got to fucking shitting me.

[Liliris]

All the things that WoW apparently didnt needAoE lootingclass specific quest rewardsSWtor brings them in at launch and they are a huge success, wow follows with "new" things......yh right

This is pretty much what I thought when seeing both AoE looting and this new class specific looting. Although this expansion has been in the works for a good year or so (it's not like they started developing right after SW:ToR came out or anything) but still, calling this all "new" makes me giggle a little. I'm sure there are TONS of other games out there that have either and or both of these options as well, but as SW:ToR is the biggest and most recent and as stated in a blue post last month a lot of the WoW dev team plays SW:ToR so it strikes me as funny that this is all "new" and "flashy" as far as anyone, including the blues are concerned.

I know a lot of people (especially fanbois) like to bash SW:ToR but apparently they did something right seeing as WoW is putting a ton of things into their next expansion that is the same or at least mimics their latest competitor. I love them and play them both so it's really a luxury to have both my mmo's work relativity the same as far as basic mechanics go.

[notorious98]

How exactly is TOR's questing innovative? It's still the basic ''Kill this, collect this, click on this thingy to activate something'', the only difference being that instead of reading the quest text, it's voiced over.

I like how you mention that it's just ActiBlizz ripping off other games, while the whole MMO genre is about looking at what good ideas your competitors have, and trying to implement said ideas into your own game to improve it. Else everyone would be ripping off from EverQuest anyway (or any other mmo games before that)

While I think it's silly that there's people (or fanboys) that call every other MMO a WoW clone, this isn't something exclusive to WoW. Or do you honestly think Rift, SWTOR, GW2 and other MMO's don't have these kind of fanboys?

I didn't say the questing DESIGN was innovative, but adding actual voice overs instead of just quest text = innovative. And, no, I never said it was ONLY ActiBlizz ripping off others, that's an insinuation that you created all on your own.

Other MMOs definitely have their fanboys and the ones that are making the assumption that TOR created AOE looting would be among them. Also, I rarely ever see Rift players showing the same type of misguided fanboyish nature that I see from WoW fanboys and, to a slightly lesser extent, TOR fanboys.

GW2? They don't have any real fanboys because the game barely even exists.

[ganush]

Obviously I wanted them to add them to the game 10 years ago, and am bitching about how long it took for them to add it.

So you admit you are complaining for the sake of being a whiner then.

"OMG, Blizzard is adding something I've wanted in the game for 10 years! They are so terrible."

Makes you sound very rational.

[Lolsteak]

Obviously I wanted them to add them to the game 10 years ago, and am bitching about how long it took for them to add it.

Umm...the game wasn't out 10 years ago

[Azrile]

Not quite. There is nothing innovative about this. You can implement questing and be innovative (TOR, for example.) But to change your own quest rewards after years and years to follow a model that others have been doing for a few years now is a blatant rip off. It's like the first couple "goth" kids had an innovative style. Everyone who came afterward were following the trend....i.e. ripping them off.

And I'd be more willing to accept the idea that they are flattering their competitors by stealing their ideas if it wasn't for the continued assault by higher ups in ActiBlizz ripping these other games. Or the continued assault from WoW fanboys about how these other games are "WoW clones" or "WoW ripoffs".

I think you are seeing things that didn´t happen the way you think.

Blizzard implemented ´story mode´ raids in order to get more people into endgame content
Immediately ´loot´ problems arose because need-greed just does not work with 25 strangers
New Technology is developed that allows that identifies class and spec and their appropriateness for rolling need.
The same technology is used for quests to identify your spec and offer you appropriate rewards.

My guess is this change has more to do with tech becoming available because of LFR. Blizzard tends to do that a lot.. they develop a new tech and then find everywhere possible to add it.

There are obviously 3 different issues that need to be addressed. The first being off-spec, the second being vendor sell prices and the third being RP and Transmorging.

Honestly, even though I am personally hit by the off-spec thing.. I welcome this change because there was nothing worse than playing a low-gear spec like moonkin and seeing great, end-of chain blue quests not offering you any suitable rewards.

[Kortiah]

Dafuq i372 dagger with 300dps more than the legendaries

I think there's a problem in balance between DPS & Stats! Too much DPS, too few Agility (as for the others weapons)

[Azrile]

I didn't say the questing DESIGN was innovative, but adding actual voice overs instead of just quest text = innovative. And, no, I never said it was ONLY ActiBlizz ripping off others, that's an insinuation that you created all on your own.

Other MMOs definitely have their fanboys and the ones that are making the assumption that TOR created AOE looting would be among them. Also, I rarely ever see Rift players showing the same type of misguided fanboyish nature that I see from WoW fanboys and, to a slightly lesser extent, TOR fanboys.

GW2? They don't have any real fanboys because the game barely even exists.

Age of Conan had a large amount of voice overs also... it was as slow and boring in that game as it is in SWTOR. it was also in about 10,000 other non-mmorpg games before AOC.

Voice-overs in a video game is not innovation. SWTOR is showing exactly why most MMORPGs don´t have voice-overs... there are simply too many quests, most of them actually pretty boring. Adding voice-overs does not make the quest less boring, it just makes ´getting´the quest much longer and painful.

[Glub]

I think Blizz introducing class based loot (a *really* wellcome feature, IMHO) has more to do with Raid Finder than SWTOR. Loot in Raid Finder (or actually all loot in Wow, for that matter) didn't have an associated spec. The consequence was the massive QQ from Raid Finders not getting their loot, or me getting blue crap while leveling alts with Dungeon Finder, or getting quest rewards that had absolutely nothing to do with my char. Now that Blizz introduced a spec tag to the loot (solving the biggest complain in Raid Finder), why not use it to retrofit those quest rewards? Which is what I think they did.

Now, the green fire issue. I may be wrong, but I can't remember a single spell effect that has a different look according to user preference (aside from mage's polymorph, but that isn't the kind of effect we're talking). Considering Wow's engine complexity, I assume that it's not a simple matter of having a flag and dupplicate spell effect files for each Warlock spell (and which they would have to keep in synch from now on to the end of Wow). It would also mean having different spell Ids, so the other players would see that you were using a different set of spell effects (otherwise, what would be the point of having it?), and/or changes to the underlying combat messages to accomodate that (which could potentialy break addons and internal features that rely on those messages). All that considered, if and when they put in the tech to give spells a distinct color, I suppose you will be able to pick specific colors for your fire, not only green. Black fire, anyone? =))

[SinR]

totally getting the green one once MOP goes live.

Also, I love the new music that's coming out this expansion, anyone know what to type in to be able to play them in-game?

[notorious98]

I think you are seeing things that didn´t happen the way you think.

Blizzard implemented ´story mode´ raids in order to get more people into endgame content
Immediately ´loot´ problems arose because need-greed just does not work with 25 strangers
New Technology is developed that allows that identifies class and spec and their appropriateness for rolling need.
The same technology is used for quests to identify your spec and offer you appropriate rewards.

My guess is this change has more to do with tech becoming available because of LFR. Blizzard tends to do that a lot.. they develop a new tech and then find everywhere possible to add it.

There are obviously 3 different issues that need to be addressed. The first being off-spec, the second being vendor sell prices and the third being RP and Transmorging.

Honestly, even though I am personally hit by the off-spec thing.. I welcome this change because there was nothing worse than playing a low-gear spec like moonkin and seeing great, end-of chain blue quests not offering you any suitable rewards.

What the hell are you talking about? Other games had this "tech" long before Blizzard decided to implement LFR. It's not "new tech".

---------- Post added 2012-04-02 at 02:31 PM ----------

Age of Conan had a large amount of voice overs also... it was as slow and boring in that game as it is in SWTOR. it was also in about 10,000 other non-mmorpg games before AOC.

Voice-overs in a video game is not innovation. SWTOR is showing exactly why most MMORPGs don´t have voice-overs... there are simply too many quests, most of them actually pretty boring. Adding voice-overs does not make the quest less boring, it just makes ´getting´the quest much longer and painful.

Then no game has created much as far as innovation, have they? We're not talking about regular video games, we're talking about MMOs and, no, AoC did NOT have this high level of voice over acting. And it only makes the quest much longer and painful to the short attention span crowd, such as yourself. Ones who wish they could space bar through the dialogue of any video game they play.

Quite honestly, the fact that you would even considering lumping MMOs and regular console games together is completely ridiculous in and of itself.

[Deleted]

I hope the Dynamic Quest Rewards won't affect the means of leveling Enchanting. (That picking weapons often grants better enchanting mats etc.)

[Guddonof]

I'm gonna get motion sickness riding that mount... =)