VBU First Impressions

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Necral
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Necral »

Well, what can I say? The VBU is brilliant. I would play it 24/7, eternally until my eyes bleed, bad sadly I can't because I have to share the good pc and my laptop is a heap of shit that can't even run Illarion.

The graphics are really good, the music sets the scene well and the paper dolling abilities make it even more special. Which I am sure can only get better over time. The fact that the world is bigger, factions are separated, and the wilderness is dangerous, brings a certain reality to the situation. Opening door ways to role-playing possibilities that could have never materialized before.

To top it all off? There are feckin' dinosaurs for christ' sake.

We all know the negatives - Can't open bags, moving takes some getting used to, the game goes black screen sometimes, selling items seems like an impossibility (which is shit considering no one has near enough money to best the extortionate prices!!!), our former attributes are a little messed up because of the changes... But, despite ALL of that - it's all good. It is early days and these problems will get sorted out. We're in the first week of the VBU.

I am really disappointed today as I missed the queen's speech. I keep forgetting the quest times are based on German times and I'm in the UK, thus, it's an hour earlier than the time I think it is. Which is shit seeing as I missed the first ever event.
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themonk
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by themonk »

Flux wrote:
themonk wrote:This issue with "avoiding noobs being owned".

I understand that the game should be more fair but when i first joined three years ago I was owned a lot but I found the world more interesting for it.

It gave me incentive to become stronger. So I took a role as a worker and got trained by certain people then became a guard recruit and worked my way up from there.

If a noob can beat a player that's char has years IG fighting experience well I think it would take away a lot of respect for each other also the most satisfaction I ever got IG was sparing with a old friend whos an awesome fighter and almost winning, I was somewhat proud of my character so to speak.

In RL it would take about five years to become a trained fighter anyway so I don't understand why people should enter the game as tanks on there first day.
That is already fixed, noobs don't come into the game and own stuff anymore, but that doesn't mean that they should get absolutely demolished by the simplest thing, otherwise noone would ever be able to learn skill.

It's all well and good for you, who already have a skilled character with equipment, to complain that it should be difficult for noobs. Have you even tried making a new character yet? They get annihalated in any dungeon.

The problem is attributes.

If you have chosen completely stupid attributes (like you have no str agl con) then it doesn't matter how skilled you get, your character will always be crap. The more I raise the importance of skill in the formula, the less attributes matter.

Damage is mostly based on strength and skill, also based on dexterity and perception to a much less significant degree, and how good your weapon is.
Dodge is based on dodge skill and the stiffness of your armour.
Parry is based on agility, parry skill and how good your shield is.
Damage taken is based on your constitution and your how good your armour is.
Attack speed is based on agility, how stiff your armour is and whether you use a shield.

Tactics currently does not play a role in the fighting system. It only remains as a skill for now just in case we decide to do something else with it, as it would be unfair to wipe it. But tactics was always just a damage modifier. Despite what some players think, it wasn't earned by fighting monsters in groups, and it didn't help you with that. It just an extra damage modifier. This can be done just as easily by tweaking the damage formula, it doesn't need a whole skill for it.

So, really, a good warrior should have a lot of strength and constitution, and then find a balance between agility and perc/dex (which are equally as valuable as each other, neither has presedence). If you're low in str, agl and con, that is why you're getting killed by new chars. I will look at bridging that gap a bit by increasing how important skill is in the damage formula.

Also, note, that intelligence isn't required to learn things. Each skill's learning speed is based on its governing attribute. You don't have to put points in intelligence to be good at fighting.
I choose the battlemage stats when I first joined and relied on the game to balance the stats for me (as I just clicked the battle mage icon and the attributes was set to that class) to take the path I was taking to be a good fighter and mage, maybe not the most powerful of either but a rounded skill non the less.

If noobs are getting owned by everything I can totally understand that because most maxed out characters are getting owned aswel perhaps they can make it a few more yards away from the walls but not much further without aid (I kinda like that though in a way)

I see this stat and skill sets are currently under experimentation and I hope we can chat abit more at a later date. I do think its a shame if somebody has chosen a specific class and they get penalised for it no matter how hard they train I mean your going to have aload of barbarians running around for Pgaming.

The game is harder but I like that, perhaps noobs could make powerful friends or become a squire to a knight and embark out the walls together?

Also is 100skill still the highest or has the cap been risen?
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Jupiter
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Jupiter »

themonk wrote:Also is 100skill still the highest or has the cap been risen?
Still 100
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Llama
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Llama »

Tried some of the quests today. Quite fun, mixture of stuff for everyone I guess.

Are we going to get some sort of quest tracker interface at some point in the future?
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Salathe
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Salathe »

I am loving it. I'm going to have way too much to do this weekend since I haven't stopped playing since I got on and have put everything else aside. Quests are pretty great! I love the sensation of starting a *new* game and having nothing and the excitement of obtaining items for the first time!
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Lillian
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Lillian »

Llama wrote:Are we going to get some sort of quest tracker interface at some point in the future?
yes :)
Procrastinator
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Procrastinator »

I really don't like the new interface, also there's no mouse cursor for me at least, like the old one with the hand. I can't tell if clicks register without it, with the clunky interface. It's too hard to get my guy running, should be a key for that. Also a hotkey to open my bag so I don't have to hit inventory then double click by bag which doesn't register sometimes. The paperdolls are kind of weird, you can make a dwarf with no beard for instance. Heresy. Maybe it'll get better when I don't look like a dwarven hillbilly due to my hat and pants.
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themonk
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by themonk »

another question.

When the game sometimes relogs and sends you back in time about an hour everything is reset except the quests. Is this going to be a problem in completeing them?

For example I completed 2 quests in Runewick and got a couple of rewards but now its been reset back in time I haven't got the rewards and the NPCs just say stuff like "that's all I have thanks for the help" etc.

Im not fused about the rewards but the lighting candles quest in the crypt under Runewick was half finished and now all the candles have gone out but the game thinks ive lit two of them is this going to mess with the missions in illarion?
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Aldan Vian
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Aldan Vian »

We need a message to say when the rock breaks.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

themonk wrote:another question.

When the game sometimes relogs and sends you back in time about an hour everything is reset except the quests. Is this going to be a problem in completeing them?

For example I completed 2 quests in Runewick and got a couple of rewards but now its been reset back in time I haven't got the rewards and the NPCs just say stuff like "that's all I have thanks for the help" etc.

Im not fused about the rewards but the lighting candles quest in the crypt under Runewick was half finished and now all the candles have gone out but the game thinks ive lit two of them is this going to mess with the missions in illarion?
This has always been an issue with Illarion. If the server crashes, your character resets to last login. In 2005 it used to crash 4 or 5 times a day. The solution we used? Log out after every trade.

I still do it to this day. If I do a really important trade, I relog. You can do this if you get a really important quest.

In response to the "skilled fighter gets owned by unskilled fighter" query, the char in question had 4 str, and the one who was less skilled had 18 str. It seems pretty reasonable to me that the one with mage stats can never win a fight against a fighter build who is less skilled, but I may still make a small change once I've simulated stuff.
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Nalzaxx
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Nalzaxx »

Speaking of relogging. Can we PLEASE have it so that when we log out it takes us back to our character selection. Or even the log in screen. Instead of quitting the client completely?
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

I second that notion to a certain extent, Sam.

I would prefer when I press escape for it to prompt me "Quit Illarion" "Character Select" "Cancel".
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Athian
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Athian »

Damage is mostly based on strength and skill, also based on dexterity and perception to a much less significant degree, and how good your weapon is.
Does this hold true in general? I.E. should rogue and archer style characters be packing higher strength to get the best damage out of their weapons as opposed to the lead attribute listed in the newbie section?
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

Athian wrote:
Damage is mostly based on strength and skill, also based on dexterity and perception to a much less significant degree, and how good your weapon is.
Does this hold true in general? I.E. should rogue and archer style characters be packing higher strength to get the best damage out of their weapons as opposed to the lead attribute listed in the newbie section?
The Lead Attribute is the attribute which governs skill gain of that skill.

In terms of actual effect in damage:
Str (major), dex and perc (both minor) improve damage dealt, as well as attacker skill.
Con reduces damage received.
Dodge is entirely based on skill (both the attacker's weapon skill and the defender's dodge), the defender's armour and the attacker's weapon.
Parry is based on agl, parry skill and shield defense.
Speed is governed by agl, armour stiffness, and whether you carry a weapon.

Tactics is currently inactive, but would not be stat dependent if it were activate.

Intelligence, Willpower, Essence do absolutely nothing.

I suggested a different battle formula for each school of fighting (e.g. conc relies on str more, daggers on agl/dex), but it was decided that, in order to keep things more simple and understandable, the battle damage formula should be the same for every school of fighting. So a conc user needs str just as much as a dagger user.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Thargon »

A map! this game needs a map! with the hot key M. or perhaps you could buy a world map and use it too find your location. It's rather hard to find your way to places that quests send you.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

Thargon wrote:A map! this game needs a map! with the hot key M. or perhaps you could buy a world map and use it too find your location. It's rather hard to find your way to places that quests send you.
Yeah, the reason a map isn't implemented yet is because we didn't think to bind it to the key "M" ;) .

Joking aside, a map is something we all know needs doing. And it probably will be bound to M, indeed.
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Athian
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Athian »

Flux wrote:Damage is mostly based on strength and skill, also based on dexterity and perception to a much less significant degree, and how good your weapon is.

The Lead Attribute is the attribute which governs skill gain of that skill.

In terms of actual effect in damage:
Str (major), dex and perc (both minor) improve damage dealt, as well as attacker skill.
Con reduces damage received.
Dodge is entirely based on skill (both the attacker's weapon skill and the defender's dodge), the defender's armour and the attacker's weapon.
Parry is based on agl, parry skill and shield defense.
Speed is governed by agl, armour stiffness, and whether you carry a weapon.

Tactics is currently inactive, but would not be stat dependent if it were activate.

Intelligence, Willpower, Essence do absolutely nothing.

I suggested a different battle formula for each school of fighting (e.g. conc relies on str more, daggers on agl/dex), but it was decided that, in order to keep things more simple and understandable, the battle damage formula should be the same for every school of fighting. So a conc user needs str just as much as a dagger user.
Sounds good! I'll miss the diversity of the old system though. Seems like Maxing out Strength, Agility, Constitution and putting the rest into Dex and perception will become the hard-code of all the most effective warrior's with little else happening in terms of unique attribute settings for different kinds of fighters. Overall though its far less confusing which is a huge improvement.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

Athian wrote:
Flux wrote:Damage is mostly based on strength and skill, also based on dexterity and perception to a much less significant degree, and how good your weapon is.

The Lead Attribute is the attribute which governs skill gain of that skill.

In terms of actual effect in damage:
Str (major), dex and perc (both minor) improve damage dealt, as well as attacker skill.
Con reduces damage received.
Dodge is entirely based on skill (both the attacker's weapon skill and the defender's dodge), the defender's armour and the attacker's weapon.
Parry is based on agl, parry skill and shield defense.
Speed is governed by agl, armour stiffness, and whether you carry a weapon.

Tactics is currently inactive, but would not be stat dependent if it were activate.

Intelligence, Willpower, Essence do absolutely nothing.

I suggested a different battle formula for each school of fighting (e.g. conc relies on str more, daggers on agl/dex), but it was decided that, in order to keep things more simple and understandable, the battle damage formula should be the same for every school of fighting. So a conc user needs str just as much as a dagger user.
Sounds good! I'll miss the diversity of the old system though. Seems like Maxing out Strength, Agility, Constitution and putting the rest into Dex and perception will become the hard-code of all the most effective warrior's with little else happening in terms of unique attribute settings for different kinds of fighters. Overall though its far less confusing which is a huge improvement.
That's what I thought, but now I start to wonder.

For one.. I'm not sure whether at high levels of agility, it might be best to sacrifice agl points for dex/perc, because the extra effect you're getting from that last point of agl when it is already very high might not be as good as the extra battle damage you'll get from using perc.

And likewise, final damage is divided by your constitution at the end. So, just as a rough estimate, look at this graph:
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=y% ... %3D1+to+18

The damage reduction from that last point of con is minimal (It has just 0.6% the effect of the change from 1 con to 2 con).

So maybe those last couple of con points sohuld also go in dex/per instead?

Keep in mind, though: every per and dex point are completely equally weighted. Putting your 18th point into PER from 17 has the same effect as putting your 4th point into DEX from 3. It's not any more valuable to balance them, so simply go for the stat that you think you need more.

Those final tweaks of agl/con/per (or dex) are what will differentiate character atts. Those will be logical tweaks, rather than before, we had lots of people making completely blind stabs in the dark.

And what's more, the mains that should differentiate chars too now:
Since monsters are harder, are players' ability to play in parties. Especially as now you cannot parry monsters behind you. Back to back/side by side fighting may be a good strategy.
Since stiffness really makes a difference to dodge now, it is actually viable to play a character who uses light armour, who will hit faster and dodge more but take more damage. Balancing stiffness/defense.
Which kind of weapons you fight with. Balancing quickness/strength/accuracy.
shields slow you down slightly too now. But they are generally worth having, unless your parry is really poor. Also, there is a minimum parry and dodge rate. You always dodge at least 5% of the time and parry at least 5% of the time.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Hew Keenaxe »

Ok, now that I have full use of the game, I have been trying to venture out.
1st - That compass/map in the corner is useless. It should be able to toggle off or be much smaller.
2nd - The text window is also in the way, if I can see through it I should be able to work through it.
What I mean is, east and west visions are compromised, sometimes at peril.
Even on full screen the window of play is small, and cluttered with text. Not that I wish the text window gone, just that I should be able to work through it.
3rd - Lag lots of lag. This may just be me, but all the double click then wait is taxing, no, annoying. I never know if I did something or not. The right click and chose of the old system was much better.
4th - I really miss being able to face my character by the scroll of the center mouse key. Many times this simple option has annoyed me. Trying to talk with someone, or trade an NPC, but most recently just trying to sit in a chair straight on, not sideways.
Still, I know these are pet peeves, small things considering what you have already done. But small things add up into enjoyment.
I still love the VBU. I love that you have worked so hard for this.
The post was here, this is what I think
Also I meant to put this in
Being able to tell the nearness of time, day/night but also sun going up or down, I miss that and should be included somehow. Any fool can look up in the sky an see what time it is close too. We should be able to too.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

Hew Keenaxe wrote:Ok, now that I have full use of the game, I have been trying to venture out.
1st - That compass/map in the corner is useless. It should be able to toggle off or be much smaller.
2nd - The text window is also in the way, if I can see through it I should be able to work through it.
What I mean is, east and west visions are compromised, sometimes at peril.
Even on full screen the window of play is small, and cluttered with text. Not that I wish the text window gone, just that I should be able to work through it.
3rd - Lag lots of lag. This may just be me, but all the double click then wait is taxing, no, annoying. I never know if I did something or not. The right click and chose of the old system was much better.
4th - I really miss being able to face my character by the scroll of the center mouse key. Many times this simple option has annoyed me. Trying to talk with someone, or trade an NPC, but most recently just trying to sit in a chair straight on, not sideways.
Still, I know these are pet peeves, small things considering what you have already done. But small things add up into enjoyment.
I still love the VBU. I love that you have worked so hard for this.
The post was here, this is what I think
Also I meant to put this in
Being able to tell the nearness of time, day/night but also sun going up or down, I miss that and should be included somehow. Any fool can look up in the sky an see what time it is close too. We should be able to too.
The minimap isn't not as good as a full map but it's really useful. If it's in your way, your resolution is really low (are you running at 800x600 or something)? Same thing with your textbox. It takes up like 5% of my screen.

The scrolling of the mousewheel to rotate your character: I never knew you could do this. I always just used ctrl+button. Now shift+button or shift+direction or click direction within the same tile of your character all do that.
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Hew Keenaxe
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Hew Keenaxe »

I am not sure of game resolution, I run 1024/768, but Illarion resizes on load up. Still this does not change the fact that the compass should be toggled, removed at need.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

It's a minimap. The old client had one too. You toggle full inventory screens, not small GUI parts.

You can change the resolution of your client in the graphic options.
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Hew Keenaxe
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Hew Keenaxe »

The old was a mini-map, it gave time, weather and directions. It also was small. This one is a maxy-map with only two uses I can see, Directions and obstructing my vision. Maybe it can also mop up my blood as a good maxy pad should :)
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

No.. the minimap was a map. The CLOCK gave time and weather.

Old client minimap:
Image

New client minimap:
Image

The new one is 190 pixels wide/tall. The previous one was 170. Now you don't have the huge bars obstructing your view.

If it is obstructing your view, it's because you run in 800x600. Old Illarion ran in 1024x768. You can run any resolution up to 1920x1080 by changing the graphic options.
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Hew Keenaxe
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Hew Keenaxe »

Character was still in center of view, now center includes any other windows, thus reductions in view
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Hew Keenaxe »

I did change to 1024/768 it is much better and no slower. Still I think there should be a toggle for the map, like all other screens
And I still want to know the time of day/night
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Juliana D'cheyne »

Speaking of toggle..it would be nice to toggle the belt/person screen where only the belt shows so items/loot can be picked up. Unless there is a way to do this without the belt being open at all which I haven't found yet, It would take up less space if we didn't have to show what the person is wearing and carrying but could make that screen smaller.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

.. But you were viewing the character through a viewport that covered over 56% of the screen.

Now at the same resolution the textbox and minimap cover <20% of the screen. Even at 800x600 they only cover <43% of the screen. At 1920x1080 they cover 7% of the screen.

Even if you run at a lower resolution than the previous client, the lowest resolution possible, you've still gained 13% more viewspace. At the same resolution you gained over 36%.

It's absolutely irrelevant that your character is in the middle of the screen, when before only 44% your screen had the game in it.

Image

This image shows the entire of the view from the old client in the view of the new client at max res.

Image

This shows the view from the old client in the view of the new client at the SAME RESOLUTION as the old client.

I don't see how you could possible find a problem with this, you can see WAY MORE than before.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Thargon »

Flux wrote:.. But you were viewing the character through a viewport that covered over 56% of the screen.

Now at the same resolution the textbox and minimap cover <20% of the screen. Even at 800x600 they only cover <43% of the screen. At 1920x1080 they cover 7% of the screen.

Even if you run at a lower resolution than the previous client, the lowest resolution possible, you've still gained 13% more viewspace. At the same resolution you gained over 36%.

It's absolutely irrelevant that your character is in the middle of the screen, when before only 44% your screen had the game in it.

Image

This image shows the entire of the view from the old client in the view of the new client at max res.

Image

This shows the view from the old client in the view of the new client at the SAME RESOLUTION as the old client.

I don't see how you could possible find a problem with this, you can see WAY MORE than before.
You can't argue with that. but you can argue with hassan's description that he gives and his paper dolling. Apparantly he has no hair yet a pony tail sprouts from his head
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by martin »

Hassan=orc?
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