A great write up that Blizzard should think about

[Killadrix]

I agree.

Blizzard should bookmark this page for when they need some ideas on how to finally kill WoW.

[Thorngrove]

1. Harsh Death Penalty and Corpse Runs

No. Losing levels is bad. Having to horde your 58 gear because you're worried that your next pug will kill you and drop your recent level will mean you don't take the chance on a pug. and instead only work with a small non-inclusive group. Or solo. FFXI does this and it's a god damned nightmare.

2. Grouping Must be Encouraged and Soloing Must be Discouraged.

See above. Forcing groups on people does nothing but inflate Tank and healer egos, and forces dps to pander to said jackasses. Again, FF XI was a great example of this. If any class under-performs, they'll be shunned, screwing everyone who chooses said class. IE Dragoons pre-blue mage expack. Grouping should be encouraged, but punishing people for soloing, or making it impossible for people to solo, KILLS your player base. Not being able to farm, or re-acquire your lost EXP on your own leaves your game world EMPTY. you stay in the safe zones and beg for parties for hours.

3. Stop the Hero Crap

Your character is meant to stand out. Otherwise you're just another NPC. It should be toned down a bit sure, but the whole damned POINT of fantasy games is to BE the big damned heroes. No one plays a game to be "Random bootblack guy who once beat a rat with a shoe"

4. Let Players Form their Own Memories and Make their Own Stories

So... what the hell do you expect people to do here? With no quests, the story has no real way to progress. You're standing around staring at your shoes. It would be like Dot Hack without the whole Virus thing. WHAT THE HELL DO THOSE OTHER PEOPLE DO?!

5. Quests Should Be Rare and Special

So.. the only way to level is to grind mobs for hours. While if you die, you have the chance to De-level. So.. you're forming super selective groups who never let any new people play with them, unless they're screwed and need a tank or a healer. Because who in their right mind would risk partying with someone they don't know, if they can LOSE the exp they took hours to grind with one fucked up pull?

6. No Instancing

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAHAHAHAHAAaaaa *Wheeeeze* AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAaaaaaa *coughs* AAAHahahahahahahahaa.... *thud*

Okay, I'm good. Just. l... no. NO. this is terrible on every level. not having access to end game because someone killed them before you is stupidity given psychical form. What exactly are people supposed to do in this utopian MMO? there's no quests, no easily found groups, no way to solo, and once you somehow magically make it to max level, everything's already dead because there was a guild there camping the bosses since 2am the night before.

7. Player Drama and Conflict is Good **

No. Players shouldn;t be at each others throats. it's a GAME. A GAME. If you're promoting players to treat anyone else like a dickbag just because it's fun to watch, You should be kicked in the balls by toddlers until you're unable to breed.

8. No Easy Travel

While I'm not a huge fan of flying mounts in wow and agree they make the world feel smaller, having ready ways to get to where you need to go is a good thing. airships, trains, portals and so on are needed, especially if there's no instancing, since you will miss out on every boss mob unless you're dry humping their spawning ground otherwise.

free-to-play is here to stay and is now the optimum method of MMO monetization. The problem remains: how can they implement it with integrity and without offending the players and cheapening accomplishments and avoiding the “pay to win” dilemma.

Free to play is not the best method, it's the best way to fleece the customer base of more money then a sub, without them thinking they've been hit harder in the pocketbook because theres no sub. A subscription system lends itself to a more stable money flow, and it frees your development team to make actual worthwhile updates, and not forcing them to make more fucking hats for the in game store. since updates donlt fucking matter to their paycheck, only the newest sloth minipet in the game store matters so they can get a fucking paycheck if it sells well.

A Dynamic World with Dynamic NPCs

they tried this with matrix online. it failed miserably. You screw anyone who enters the game late. Any new players are forced to play catch up and miss out on the entire beginning of the story. screwing over new players means your game never grows, and as your older players get tired of waiting for groups and missing their chances on the HNM for that week, they get bored sitting in the capitol and making bricks of cheese for the cheesery so people can survive for the winter since while you're not a hero, you're directly responsible for every nPc surviving or getting raped by beastmen in this utopian MMO you've created.

One final thought on a dynamic virtual world is that the players alone should control the destiny of their worlds. Stop with the fixed plot lines dictated from on high that every player must conform to. The best example of this is in MMOs like WoW where the story of each expansion is predetermined as the big bad boss of the expansion is destined to die about 2 years into the expansion. This is what happened in Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm. What if the players can’t or choose not to kill the uber boss? Why does every server have to have the same outcome?
It’s time to stop the on-rails mentality of current MMO design and allow emergent player behavior in a completely dynamic world.

the sheer amount of manpower, hardware and time needed to make something like this work for the numbers needed to make an MMO successful would make the game utterly unprofitable. Not to mention the mass server desertions that would happen once the playerbase destroyed their server, migrating en mass like a locus swarm of shit and angst, to utterly destroy whichever server was considered "the best" after they turned their own into a festering pile.

A Final Warning
*Snips*
Think long-term, not short-term.

There's a reason FFXIV 1,0 died. There's a reason FFXI never got close to a million subs. Those reasons, are all up there. Games should never have to feel like a job. Games should never ostracize it's playerbase and reward excluding people to get ahead as a viable strategy. Games should never make you have to log on at a certain time, on a certain day, and it should never, EVER! penalize you for not being able to play it every day. It shouldn't make a new player scared of playing it, or worried that unless they pick it up RIGHT NOW they'll miss out on the best parts. because then your game never grows, it shrinks until it's dead.

[Faroth]

It wouldn't work for World of Warcraft. The game wasn't designed to be a living immersive world that your character lives in so much as a game. Classic WoW was a pretty good balance of convenience and breathing world, but it's gone so far down the path of MMO-Arcade Amusement Park that it can never go back to its roots. The players would leave en masse because they've grown to accustomed to easy content and hand outs. Even suggesting going back to blues being rare and epics being REALLY rare is met with masses of accusations of elitism (I guess the definition of "rare" changed while I wasn't looking).

But WoW's design is not cancerous, it's different. That's not to say EverQuest Next can't incorporate a more "living in a world" approach and still be successful. In fact, they have designers from Vanguard: Saga of Heroes working on EQNext as well, which is an extremely promising idea. Vanguard, despite its failure, is still possibly the greatest MMO concept of the last decade. The ideas they were working towards are sorely needed in the MMO genre to move it forward to a new age, and if Storybricks proves to be as engaging as it sounds, those are two powerful ingredients towards a new MMO.

1. Harsh Death Penalty and Corpse Runs

I actually agree with the death penalties and corpse runs. Even WoW had these in Classic as the ghost run was longer and did "punish" you for mistakes, but not to a point that it was debilitating. Vanguard has a rather nice solution that offered a middle ground.
Essentially, you could corpse run which was resurrecting at your bind point with all soul bind armor (btw, you CHOSE what armor you soul bound and what you could sell after you were done, it wasn't dictated to you) and upon retrieving your corpse, you got all your loot that wasn't soul bound and took next to no XP penalty.

Or you could spirit rez at your bind point, recovering all of your gear from your corpse with an XP penalty and an armor damage penalty. If you were at the start of a level, you could NOT unlevel (which should never return, ever) but I think you might have taken an XP deficit. You could also split your XP between your XP debt and leveling to how you felt. 50/50, 90/10, 100 towards debt.

It did encourage cautious playing and I felt it did generate some encouragement towards respecting your environment and not doing stupid things for the sake of stupid things because "it won't matter."

2. Grouping Must be Encouraged and Soloing Must be Discouraged.

I agree grouping should be encouraged and soloing should be discouraged, but not punished. EverQuest simply accomplished this with XP bonuses for the more people you had in a group and it's an elegant solution.

Stop the Hero Crap

I think this is worth some consideration. Yes, the player is taking on the role of a hero in an MMO, but we don't need to be the hero of everything. A range of activities, from mundane quests to long, drawn out, roving heroics of epic proportions should all have their place. WoW has become a quest chain where the world exists on the merits of your character. While that's fine in big events and does make your character's participation seem really cool, it can be overdone as well. Balance is all I'm saying.

Let Players Form their Own Memories and Make their Own Stories

and

Quests Should Be Rare and Special

Absolutely, though I disagree that quests should be few and far between. When building an MMO, there should simply be different levels of tasks. You can have jobs, chores, simple things you do for locals. Hunting wolves is not a heroic quest. It's simply hunting. I'd suggest having the majority of tasks such as this be crafting related and things you can do solo. Hunting wolves for pelts to supply leatherworkers or meat for cooking. Quests, on the other hand, should be different and more grandiose in scope requiring a group to accomplish.

That said, I think joining a group and being able to hang out in an area clearing verminous gnolls should likewise be an available activity of reasonable reward. Being able to leisurely farm mobs in a group was one of the most social aspects of EverQuest and if it's a viable alternative to other leveling options, when combined with group xp bonuses, it can have its place alongside other forms of experience.

No Instancing

I don't agree with this one. The concept worked in the days of EverQuest when playerbase was smaller, but with the explosion of activity among gamers in MMOs, I simply don't think servers could handle it.

Final Fantasy XIV ARR has an interesting approach to it where content will be instanced, but after it's obsolete to a point, they will become open world dungeons.

Player Drama and Conflict is Good

To an extent, but not too far. I think LoL's Tribunal system should be considered in future MMOs to contribute to players policing their own community and if so, a little bit of rivalry and squabbling can indeed be healthy for the game (damn you, Warsong Raiders on Feathermoon!). But when squabbling turns to griefing, it's problematic.

However, I did like the idea of being able to build a notorious reputation for oneself and becoming an outlaw not openly allowed in cities and having a bounty on your head that players can collect on.

No Easy Travel

People will hate this, but I completely agree with it. The key factor is making a game that's enormous without end game being the primary focus. The result of slow, sometimes challenging travel mixed with a game design that the entire experience is equal means that slow travel leads to random exploration (and sometimes running away going "oh crap oh crap oh crap!"). And when there are neat things to discover, random treasure that's worth finding, it can make the journey a part of the fun.



I'd also add in the suggestion of looking long and hard at plans for the economy.

I'd suggest having very low money yields from monsters. Humanoids could carry coin, but never should you get weapons, armor, or money from animals. Make jobs around towns (those solo "quests" I mentioned) a decent source of money. Keep the income sources down and make barter and trade a useful form of currency options among players. The grandiose missions and quests could yield valuable treasure for some nice income, but there's no need for cash to be so steady that thousands of gold (or currency type) becomes common.

[MMKing]

All this will lead to is players playing it safe. Player will not take on any challenging mobs or quests unless they feel with 100% confidence they can down the mob or boss and not die.

I found Diablo 2 and 3 to be much more entertaining when playing the hardcore mode. Especially when playing in a group.

And most of these ideas sound apealing to me, in a ''less extreme'' way. WOW players are way to hung up with interacting with the instances. Anything outside is mostly forgotten, including most other players.

[Grogo]

I understand many of these points are debatable and perhaps not that great BUT there is sound advice in much of it. What stands out for me is this:

" I’m fearful that as EQ Next progresses into the future, SOE will fall into the trap of pandering to the ultra-achiever types — you know them as the uber-guild types, the min-maxers, the theory crafters, the number crunchers. The very same thing happened to the original EverQuest. SOE made the mistake of turning EverQuest into a raiding loot fest and forgot about other types of players such as explorers, socializers, killers and role-players.

Ultra-achievers tend to make the most noise in any MMORPG and since they usually kill the most high level and prestige NPC’s they get an disproportionate amount of attention from the devs because these are the players that are defeating the premiere content they created. Devs should resist the temptation to behave like groupies, think about the fans in the audience, not the rock stars on the stage. In other words, make content for everybody! "

AND:

Player conflict is not bad per say. It's a MMO for fucks sakes and i really believe there is a strong kernel of truth here.

[starkey]

I think you should print this out put on a suit and walk to blizzard HQ drop it off at the receptionists desk and walk out.

[Grogo]

This as well stands out big time:

Another warning I have for devs is they need to be vigilant about going too far in the opposite direction and avoid creating an entitlement culture that has saturated most MMOs these days. Being a part of a virtual world is a privilege, not a right. Too many developers in the past — such as Blizzard — have given away the farm in a misguided effort to appease players. In the process they have devalued their own creations by making them so accessible as to be utterly meaningless which is why subscribers are fleeing in droves worldwide.

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avoid creating an entitlement culture

Blizzard — have given away the farm in a misguided effort to appease players. In the process they have devalued their own creations by making them so accessible as to be utterly meaningless which is why subscribers are fleeing in droves worldwide.

I think most would agree this is very applicable to the current state of WoW.

[Valech]

That is like shutting down all airplanes and going back to balloonflight. I mean, balloonflights are awesome - until you have to cross the atlantic. I think almost all of your points have a reason and they might seem viable on their own. But the whole concept seems like too much inconvenience. I´m happy, that games are out of the stoneage of MMORPGs

[Lemons]

It always strikes me how much WoW mirrors reality. I mean, there are always some people who say "man, ya know, things were so much better back in the day before cell phones, and the internet, and social media, and soap...we should go back to those times and everything would be good again!" This is basically the same thing, but with WoW instead of RL.

[Thetruth1400]

The reason for WoW's success is that it did away with everything you just mentioned. Yeah, recently they've taken it too far and need to reel it back in a lot, but to set the whole genre back 15 years to Everquest days are not going to make WoW successful. Taking it back to when the game was successful on the other hand, that being Vanilla / TBC level of difficulty, might just be what this game needs.

[tripleh]

Hope this game crashes and burns hard , the devs need to get smacked hard.

[Glorious Leader]

hahahha virtual socialism hahaahahah oh that's good that's so rich

Please Blizzard developers if your reading this follow this guys ideas. All of them.

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The reason for WoW's success is that it did away with everything you just mentioned. Yeah, recently they've taken it too far and need to reel it back in a lot

No they didn't take it to far, if anything they didn't go far enough.

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]

Blizzard — have given away the farm in a misguided effort to appease players. In the process they have devalued their own creations by making them so accessible as to be utterly meaningless which is why subscribers are fleeing in droves worldwide.

I think most would agree this is very applicable to the current state of WoW.

That's hilarious. Blizzard created an entitlement culture by giving it's customers what it wanted. Now that upset you because it's not what YOU want so you feel perfectly ENTITLED to tell the developers hey cater the development to ME and my merry band of hardcore players. Hilarious. The hypocrisy and irony knows no fucking end.

[Faroth]

It always strikes me how much WoW mirrors reality. I mean, there are always some people who say "man, ya know, things were so much better back in the day before cell phones, and the internet, and social media, and soap...we should go back to those times and everything would be good again!" This is basically the same thing, but with WoW instead of RL.

Soap ruined everything.

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Hope this game crashes and burns hard , the devs need to get smacked hard.

It's not a developer, it's a player's opinion....

[orioxez]

I agree with everything except the harsh death penalties. The question is whether you're gonna have enough people to play it. That's the thing about MMOs isn't it, sure you could make a game like this but will there even be enough players to fill up a server and make it interesting? MMOs are communities, which explains why every MMO has changed to meet player demands and become easier and more casual friendly. Most people are not going to want to play a harsh difficult game so already you have a small community you are pandering to. If this were any other genre we wouldn't even be having this discussion. MMOs are more about the experience you have with other people, and less the game itself - and that can never be recreated no matter how hard you try. That experience is unique, something similar may happen again but it's rare. That's just the way it is, and also why the MMO genre is so powerful.

[Faroth]

I agree with everything except the harsh death penalties. The question is whether you're gonna have enough people to play it.

I'd say that's actually where SOE had some strength even during the height of subscriptions with the Station Pass. I think it was a $50/month model that granted subscription to EverQuest, EverQuest 2, Star Wars Galaxies (RIP), Vanguard, etc, etc.

EverQuest (original) continued to try new things and push the boundaries of what they did. Destructible environments well before WoW released Wrath, climbing, other things that were kinda quirky additions but at least it was experimenting with what they could do, I'll give them that at least.

Remember one thing about all this, even before going Free to Play, original EQ just in the last couple of years was still functioning with a dedicated fan base. You don't need millions to be successful. If you have 1 million, you're doing more than fine on a subscription model to support the game and continue putting out content. MMOs prior to I'd say FF XI ran ongoing at around 300 to 500 thousand players total.

It all depends on what the developers try to do. Develop a quality game and stay true to their vision with a small, yet dedicated, player base just big enough to keep them supported and able to continue operations with a reasonable profit or go for the biggest income possible.

SOE has a huge benefit that they don't NEED the biggest income generated from their next big MMO. They have multiple MMOs contributing smaller shares and it results in enough profit to maintain them all.

I have to admit, the emergent gameplay, sandbox design and bringing the Storybricks team into it has me intrigued. I'm looking forward to Friday to see why 2 sites named EQNext the Best in Show game of E3.

[drake741]

TL; DR version of the whole story:

"I want to go back to 1996 and play UO".

I totally agree.

OP also can't seem to get that WoW and UO are apples and oranges within the MMO sphere. WoW has a fixed story because it is a story-based game. UO had as much of a story as "there is a king", and that was fine. The communities were different because the games were different. It's like saying how awful Mario Kart is because it departed so far from Dr Mario.

[Viradiance]

These would be good ideas if Blizzard wanted to lose as many subscribers as possible.

[RickJamesLich]

Boy blizz apologists were all over this thread fast lol.

[Notos]

I think Blizzard though a lot about this at launch. And decided to go in the opposite direction. Result: most successful MMO in history. How's EQ doing these days anyways?

[Angella]

Responses in red.

This does tie in directly to WoW - Blizzard's direction - and MMO's. I thought it was a great read.

Article here: http://www.wolfsheadonline.com/everq...e-again/#50471

1. Harsh Death Penalty and Corpse Runs

Death in a fantasy virtual world needs to have serious consequences. Without a tangible death penalty players will never respect your virtual world. Substantive loss such as experience and requiring players to retrieve their corpses is a basic requirement of bringing back that EverQuest magic. Without the possibility of loss, a virtual world becomes a safe amusement park. Let’s also not forget that a death penalty can be mitigated by player resurrections and corpse finding abilities given to special classes — both are class interdependence design elements that help to strengthen the community.
Failure is not bad; in fact it makes us better players. Pandering creates lazy and inept players. Sure, some players will hate a MMO company that brings back a harsh death penalty but that is the price of leadership. You’re not here to be popular; you’re here to make the very best virtual world! Uneasy lies head that wears the crown. Better to be hated by many, loved by a few and respected by all.

Dieing is a sufficient penalty. No need to make it worse than it already is.

2. Grouping Must be Encouraged and Soloing Must be Discouraged.

There is no way around the fundamental requirement that at it’s core a fantasy MMORPG should to encourage and promote that players form groups and experience the world together. SOE should reward groups of 2, 3, 4 and more players that band together and give them a synergistic advantage based on complementary class abilities. Grouping creates community. Soloing destroys community.
Needing to group also creates a much better community and better players. Players who behave like idiots soon find out that their reputation will precede them and they won’t get groups. Without groups, they can’t progress. Little Johnny learns a lesson that he has to behave considerately or he will never get a group.
Allowing easy soloing to the level cap will simply not work and will trivialize the entire world. Players already have scores of MMOs and video games they can play if they are looking for a single player video game. Be bold SOE. Do not give in!

Making group leveling content that is optional is a great idea. Mandatory? Hell no.

3. Stop the Hero Crap I think at this point the MMO community is really sick and tired of being spoon fed false praise and constantly told we are HEROES. It’s insulting to our intelligence. EQ Next devs need to focus on the we instead of the me. WoW style quests are a big part of the problem here as they continually force feed players the hero self-esteem mantra. People already get enough bogus self-esteem from parents, teachers and politicians. Telling players they are special breeds self-centered players instead of community-centered players. True heroism is its own reward and a real hero doesn’t require a Flaming Sword of Doom for killing 10 rats.

Meh not a big deal either way.

4. Let Players Form their Own Memories and Make their Own Stories

With WoW, the story became the focal point. The quest designers and storytellers dictated how players should act. Players were herded into an episodic narrative that has no deviation and only one outcome. Players became puppets that blindly went from golden question mark to golden question mark doing the bidding of the quest designer.
Force feeding players stories and that are not their own and instead driving them into the box of contrived narratives is a recipe for disaster and erodes the cooperative spirit which is the bedrock of creating a good community. This is what Blizzard has been doing for years and they have the worst player community in MMO history to show for it.

Making it less understandable isn't better content. Adding puzzles, etc. would be an improvement imo but that's it.

5. Quests Should Be Rare and Special
EverQuest had precious few quests and the ones that did exist actually meant something. Just surviving the harsh world was reward enough. Rarely were there WoW style “to do lists” WoW that distracted players. Nothing will kill EQ Next faster than if SOE inundates players with endless tutorials and quests. Solo quests kill community! Quests have become their own form of transactional grinding in most MMOs that copied WoW.
If there have to be quests, then don’t make obtaining them easy; make players work hard for them by allowing extensive and meaningful two-way conversations with NPCs. With the integration of Storybricks technology hopefully there will be significant opportunity for this to happen.
Also, put expiry times on quests. Give special quests for groups only. Quests should make sense and have a legitimate reason for being completed. If Farmer Brown needs a bucket of water then don’t give thousands of other players the same quest. Make tasks applicable to the NPCs and to the immediate situation around them. If a dragon is burning down the village, don’t allow an NPC to give a quest that has the player going out to collect flowers in the fields.

Aka what swtor tried to do. harder said than done.

6. No Instancing

If I were to blame one single feature for the devastation of the MMO genre it would be instancing. Instancing has been a cancer for MMOs. It’s a design cop out. Nothing has destroyed community and the sense of immersion more than the scourge of instancing. Instancing is an abomination to the notion of status. Instancing is a form of virtual world socialism where everyone is entitled to the same content. Instancing creates a sense of entitlement within players.
You can’t have Lord Nagafen — the famous Norrathian dragon — being simultaneously killed hundreds of times each night and thousands of times each week and expect that to not erode the sense of accomplishment for killing a dragon. Instancing is really a virtual world within a virtual world. Instancing is responsible for a host of evils in MMORPGs: it separates players from each other, it creates barriers, it impedes freedom, it devalues achievements and status, it encourages farming and creates a glut of loot. Community dungeons MUST be brought back into EQ Next!

How do you intend to beat a super hard dragon AND the upteen griefers that would sit there trying to wipe your raid? Not workable. World bosses are as close as you come.

7. Player Drama and Conflict is Good **

Both Blizzard and SOE, with WoW and EQ2 fell into the philosophical trap that held that eliminating player conflict was a good thing in a virtual world. They foolishly believed that when players disagree and fight over various things like contested spawns and resources, kill stealing, and trains that it was a bad thing and the game needed to have built in anti-exploit/anti-conflict mechanics built in to stop it. This had the unintended consequences of sanitizing the MMO and treating players like prisoners by taking away their freedoms. As this MMO design malpractice continued, suddenly trains stopped as mobs were put on leashes. You could no longer attack a guard or member of your own faction.
How a MMO studio can promote a rich fantasy world full of drama and conflict on one hand but be against it within the ranks of your playerbase on the other hand is mind-boggling. Emergent gameplay is all about letting the players work it out on their own. Freedom should be promoted instead of curtailed. Players should be allowed to police themselves. Instead of banning griefers, turn them into outlaws. Prevent them from entering cities and banking. Put bounties on their heads that law abiding players can claim.
Allowing conflict will require more GMs but it’s worth it. I want to be part of a world where there is drama and intrigue going on with players. After all this is supposed to be a massively multiplayer online role-playing game not a supervised day care center.

Probably the only point I agree with. Hard to pull off but would be cool.

8. No Easy Travel

Nothing makes a world smaller than providing fast means of travel. This is true for the real world as it is true for virtual worlds. Easy travel trivializes all of the hard work that environment artists and world builders and designers put into all of the zones.
Fast travel should only be made available to players via special classes such as wizard and druids. This has the wonderful side-effect of promoting class worth and class interdependence. Another benefit was that players would congregate around druid rings and wizard portals areas in hopes of getting ports. Travel buffs such as the Spirit of Wolf should only be available from select classes as well. Again this encourages class interdependence.
Absolutely no flying mounts for players either. Insta-portals such as the ones that the original EQ had in the Plane of Knowledge were a disaster and made Norrath into a joke. Mounts should only be available at the highest of levels.

Yes and no. First round through should be walking. Second round through should be quick travel. I'd be ok with quick travel to a small number of designated locations and players making travel to other locations easier akin to mage/warlock of old in WoW.

Learning the Lessons from the Present

The most obvious lesson culled from the present day is that because of the success of Blizzard’s WoW, players now rightly expect a minimum level of polish in their MMOs. One area that SOE has continually dropped the ball on this issue in their current line-up of MMOs is the creation of hideous character avatars and the failure to update them.
Another lesson I would emulate from Blizzard is that the world along with combat has to be visually exciting and interesting.
The last Blizzard related lesson is this: don’t remake WoW in any shape or form. According to Smed they have learned that lesson. We shall see.
SOE has also learned another important lesson: free-to-play is here to stay and is now the optimum method of MMO monetization. The problem remains: how can they implement it with integrity and without offending the players and cheapening accomplishments and avoiding the “pay to win” dilemma.


A Dynamic World with Dynamic NPCs
But a bigger question is WHY NOT? For example, why don’t we have a virtual world where there is true dynamic content instead of the scripted content we have today?
Why can’t we have dynamic content that responds to the actions or inactions of players? Content such as NPCs, structures found in towns and cities and even nature itself should all be dynamic — buildable and destructible. EQ Next should have landscapes that reflect the seasons as well. We have the technology today to pull this off.
Resources should play a big part in a dynamic world. Food and water should be leveraged as a basic commodity subject to supply and demand– you can build an entire fantasy virtual world around that alone! For example, players could engage in hunting and gathering to keep villagers fed and clothed. If players can help the villagers achieve a certain level of prosperity then the villagers can send more recruits to the feudal lord. If the feudal lord has more soldiers, mages resources, they can protect the villagers actually expand the boundaries of the kingdom. Bring in the importance of other resources such as ore and wood and crafted goods. Of course all of this should fluctuate depending on the level of involvement by the players.
If players choose not to help, the town dies and the feudal lord’s kingdom goes into decline. Seeing weakness orcs and bandits rise from the shadows and dungeons and oppress the villagers and chaos runs through the countryside and to the very gates of the kingdom. Who would not want to be involved in a dynamic world where the contribution of every player was not valued and needed?

One final thought on a dynamic virtual world is that the players alone should control the destiny of their worlds. Stop with the fixed plot lines dictated from on high that every player must conform to. The best example of this is in MMOs like WoW where the story of each expansion is predetermined as the big bad boss of the expansion is destined to die about 2 years into the expansion. This is what happened in Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm. What if the players can’t or choose not to kill the uber boss? Why does every server have to have the same outcome?
It’s time to stop the on-rails mentality of current MMO design and allow emergent player behavior in a completely dynamic world.

A Final Warning

I’m fearful that as EQ Next progresses into the future, SOE will fall into the trap of pandering to the ultra-achiever types — you know them as the uber-guild types, the min-maxers, the theory crafters, the number crunchers. The very same thing happened to the original EverQuest. SOE made the mistake of turning EverQuest into a raiding loot fest and forgot about other types of players such as explorers, socializers, killers and role-players.

Ultra-achievers tend to make the most noise in any MMORPG and since they usually kill the most high level and prestige NPC’s they get an disproportionate amount of attention from the devs because these are the players that are defeating the premiere content they created. Devs should resist the temptation to behave like groupies, think about the fans in the audience, not the rock stars on the stage. In other words, make content for everybody!

Another warning I have for devs is they need to be vigilant about going too far in the opposite direction and avoid creating an entitlement culture that has saturated most MMOs these days. Being a part of a virtual world is a privilege, not a right. Too many developers in the past — such as Blizzard — have given away the farm in a misguided effort to appease players. In the process they have devalued their own creations by making them so accessible as to be utterly meaningless which is why subscribers are fleeing in droves worldwide.

Think long-term, not short-term.