VBU First Impressions

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Ezor Edwickton
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VBU First Impressions

Post by Ezor Edwickton »

Today was the first day of the VBU and I logged in to play for a few hours as many of you have also done. Needless so much is different and really very little of it remains the same as the old game that I haven't really managed a firm grasp of what this game is yet. But I just wanted to start this to share some of my positive and negative first impressions and hope you will do the same.

I'll start with the positives:
+paper-dolling/unique character look
+nifty combat animations
+much quicker map exploration with the new ability to run
+many new monster types
+scrolling through merchants lists is nice, but how buying and selling works can be unclear at first

and some negatives
-New depot system actually manages to be much more frustrating then the old one (Use SHIFT key to break up your stacks ppl)
-New walking interface is hard to use, my character often goes on his own or where i don't want him to
-new typing interface is a pain and I'm often walking around town blurting out random strings of numbers or typing nothing because I did not activate the window by pressing ENTER first.
-Far too many hostile npcs (good luck leaving town non-combatant chars) Even for a combat character it's just annoying when there are npcs littering the map
-no list of commands yet
-no way to name other chars as before, can only rely on "#i" now

So what do you guys think? How long have you played yet? What were the first things you noticed? Liked? Disliked? How long did you 'wrestle' with the inventory system?
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Ufedhin
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Ufedhin »

Have to agree with your observations Ezor.
I really like it overall, but have exactly the same troubles that your having.
My main character a crafter could fight well after 3 game years of training off and on.But since
his thumping at the hands of a single bandit on the road i will not be leaving town except in a large group.
Have differculty imagining how noncombatant characters will fare.

Overall i like the new game bugs and all :D
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Hew Keenaxe
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Hew Keenaxe »

Have not spent much time IG due to the bugs, but I hate the mouse walk system and I was one that wanted it. It just dont work right, and maybe I got used to the old way.
I have had many troubles IG now, but I am still hopeful. I think they are on the right path, we just have to wait and catch up. I had serious trouble tonight and the one that came to my rescue could not help me in the end. Still I admire his effort and have high hopes for this game
Thargon
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Thargon »

Well i felt like a total noob when I got murdered by a few wasps I mean a former lieutenant gets his ass handed to him by a few bugs come on!
But after i got around and sorted through a few things with the help of friends the game became really quite enjoyable, because now you are literally forced to walk around the outskirts of town in a party and have some Rping fun. as it should be in a dangerous world full of monsters though i do think some are completely over powered I think a single dwarfen hunter shouldn't give a man in heavy armor in close combat much trouble at all but instead was sent to the cross.

overall is still a great game. and things will get more awesomer.
martin
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by martin »

Thanks for the feedback! That's what we want to see :)

Of course, many things are still not balanced, but be sure that we'll have a close look on these issues and try to find good solutions, tweaks and rebalancements.
Also, you surely haven't discovered all aspects of the VBU, some of them might help you with the issues you name here.

As for movement/mouse handling: I think we are very open for suggestions.

Martin
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Djironnyma
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Djironnyma »

martin wrote: As for movement/mouse handling: I think we are very open for suggestions.
I think its mostly a question of habitutation, anyway it would maybe make more use to switch from walking to running by press a button not hold it. I would preffer to run with ne num-pad and withouth holding ctrl the same time. Just press ctrl to switch between running and walking sounds for me more comfortable.
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Kugar
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Kugar »

martin wrote:As for movement/mouse handling: I think we are very open for suggestions.
Martin
You guys should implement an option to chose from isometric walking to plain old left, right, up, down walking - reason being, it's hard to sit in a chair for example. This would make things easier. Well, it would be if you understand what I am talking about.
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Llama
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Llama »

My biggest gripe is the monster spawns being REALLY close to the town. This is especially a problem for crafters.

To get from Galmair to a particular mine I passed around (21 - recounted, including a dwarf and a skeleton) different creatures. All of them weak, but still. For a journey I'll need to do many times to get enough resources, you can hardly expect to bring a fighter to clear them out each time.
Last edited by Llama on Thu Jan 03, 2013 11:35 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Rhianna Morgan
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Rhianna Morgan »

I haven't played quite that long last night, and I still have high hopes that I might enjoy the new Illarion after I manage to not be too stupid for it any more.

As for now, I am in a lot of trouble. I have no other computer than my laptop, something that up to now never was a problem. But I have no num block and no separate mouse, so when I try to walk, I have to use my touchpad (veeery inaccurate movements, sometimes too many, sometimes none at all... I sat there last night PLEADING my char to please, please move finally!!!) or the arrow keys, which only do diagonal movements, or WASD, which does not work at all for me for some reason.

So... yeah.

I also miss being able to name people, but that is not the worst part, not being able to move around properly kind of ruins the fun for me right now.

Other than that, so far I enjoy the VBU. The grafics are nice, ok the bugs are not that great but they kind of make it funny, I think. I haven't tried selling and I only tried fighting a pig with my mage that kind of healed faster than he was able to hit it... so... that'll be interesting.
I can see that a lot of work went into the VBU, also quite some NPCs I encountered in town were really well scripted. You meet the Queen complaining about where her fan bearer is and then you meet him in the tavern... those npcs are really awesomely funny.

All in all it's like playing a whole different game, just like promised. We'll see if I like it better or less, or conclude that I just can't compare the two versions :D. Thanks to the many, many people who put so much of their time into making this!
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Morbius
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Morbius »

WARNING

MY OPINIONS MAY BE NICKPICKY


Alright, so I played for a few hours today as my former-mage, and my orc so I’ll give you my first impressions. I’ll also acknowledge that some of these things may change the more I explore the game, like discovering more armour, etc.

So, here’s what I think.

Starting with the positives, as well as a few suggestions and thoughts:

The paper dolling is amazing, though a little helmet variation would be nice. All I’ve seen so far has been a bucket helm, and a horned helm... seems to be one or the other for every helm in the game...

The NPC Quests are cool, enjoyable, and easy to understand so far, though some English translations are still a bit rough.

The seemingly huge variation of monsters I have seen so far, I also love the idea of people wandering around in parties/bands so they don’t get eaten and or killed by said monsters. It gives the players a need to work and RP together I think, not just occasionally dropping by for RP after power gaming for several hours. In saying that, for those of us in restrictive time zones, a few weaker beasties for training purposes would be nice too.

Huge fan of the fighting animations! Amazing work and I love it to bits.

Glad to see bows finally working for NPCs! And they don’t only fire point-blank anymore!

Ability to finally outrun monsters! (I never could before with my slow connection.)

Love how the merchants are set up now; browsing through their wares is so easy now compared to awkwardly typing each item you wanted to buy.

The buildings are truly beautiful. I love the Fire Tower in Runewick. Just, wow. I can’t wait to explore more.

The general map layout, having only three main cities instead of one billion is nice, and I think each is very unique and offers a great variation of RP styles to exist.

Alright, so here come the negatives:

Not really a big fan of my characters pants falling down past their arse crack when they run, or the lack of crotch in certain pieces of armour.

The screen goes completely black, a lot. (For me anyway)

Open bags and depot’s will just freeze and not close sometimes.

The monsters, what is going on with them?! I seem to have the same level of difficulty killing a mummy as my maxed out character of four years as a character that is ten minutes old. I just... don’t... understand.

The combat system just seems pretty unbalanced in general. Characters with minimal skill seem to be able to take down fully trained ones now.

The walking! Oh man! This is probably what annoyed me the most! I understand you can use the number pad to walk now, as well as the WASD keys? Which is nice and all and maybe that makes it a little easier, I dunno... but I don’t have one on my laptop. Some control customisation would be nice to see in the future, as I’m sure there are others in the same boat as me.

Loss of the ability to name people, I mean, you need to ask them all OOC now for a #i.

Lack of some type of manual thingy with basic technical functions at least.

We still need that explanation of which attributes do what in the character creation! And if they have indeed changed for the VBU! I still don't properly know what the old one's did even after four years of playing.

Well I guess that’s it for now, or I can’t think of any more right now anyway. Might add more stuff later, after I play more. So... I feel like I’ve been too negative, so I should probably make it clear that I am in NO way trying to bad mouth or put down the amazing work that the developers and GM’s have put into creating the whole, amazing new world. It feels rich, and full. Just ready to be explored and shaped, and I love it, so so so sooo much. I really do. It’s actually reached far beyond all my expectations. So from the bottom of my heart, thank you everyone, thank you Developers, thank you GM’s, and thank you to all the amazing players. Best late Christmas present EVER. :'D
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Llama
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Llama »

Other issue I have is the lack of 'free food' which seems to be around in some areas - as discussed here:

http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=7780
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Ufedhin
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Ufedhin »

Er ...alchemy wots with the old Gobaith alchemists? do we still have our craft even if we dont meet the new requirements?
The herbs look amazing and i like all the new ones. :D
I like the new system... what i know of it at the moment anyway, it will take a bit of getting used to i think but looks very interesting.
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

When you speak about issues with using the text box and controlling, you won't have those issues anymore in a week. I, too, had problems with all that, but a day and a half later I am as fluent in this client as in the old one.
The combat system just seems pretty unbalanced in general. Characters with minimal skill seem to be able to take down fully trained ones now.
The problem here is most likely attribute based. Since the final battle damage formula hasn't changed, this suggests to me that the reason skilled chars were much better before was that their fighting speed increased so much, which is no longer the case. Now your fighting speed is based on what you wear and your agility.

So I think because the fighting speed of two players with the same agl and equipment is the same, regardless of their skill, the contribution from skill towards battle damage needs to be increased, to make skill more important than attributes.

I'll test this.

Thanks for your feedback.
Fooser
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Fooser »

Another nitpick: when you're encumbered you get a "Your burden slows you down" message every time you move a tile, it spams the chat log quite a bit
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

Morbius, I just had a long think about what you said, and I do wonder before I act on it what your attributes are like.

If I increased the importance of skill on damage and decresaed global damage slightly, this would mean noobs get owned even more.

In the fight you mentioned, how many more skill points did the more skilled character have, and what were his attributes? What kind of armour did both chars wear? What kind of weapons?

If it turns out your attributes are really poorly chosen, then this scenario should be alright, otherwise skill on damage will need adjusting.
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Po Will
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Po Will »

The thing about #i seems clear to me, or at least the reasoning behind it.

We no longer all look the same, we don't really need emotes to differentiate between everyone.

"Who was the Halfing with white as snow beard and skin as tanned as the dead of Mas? Oh aye, it was Jimmy!

Who's that in the shadow armour, completely covered? Oh, it cannae be Halfling or Dwarf, it needs to be Human or Elf. Perhaps even an Orc, we ought to talk to them and find out."


The wee examples put aside. With the whole ability to look different, you're not going to magically remember everyone's appearance unless you do just that; remember everyone's appearance, without the slightest bit of trouble.

O' course, I'mma slightly elitist in that kinda way. So I might be a tad bit biased :P
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Ezor Edwickton
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Ezor Edwickton »

I think the naming system should come back. There are some chars out there who don't like using there real name, which is fine, but doesn't work now with the new system. Just because we have paper dolling it doesn't make the character appearances that unique that you should recognize them visually. There are also rp situation where someone may point out a char and tell you their name without you actually talking with them and this would allow you to remember that.
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Llama
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Llama »

I'm with Ezor on this one. Maybe you met a character who you'd think would be useful to remember him later, but don't have his name. You think you'll remember "Guy threatening me"'s appearance in a week?
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Po Will
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Po Will »

And if we were all the same generic height, colour and cloth wearing, I'd agree. In my own opinion - and that's all this is -, there's enough variables implemented now so that you can differentiate between people.

If people don't want to use their real names, no need. They give you the false name, to which it's then upto said character to remember that they're trying to hide their identity.

At the very least, I wouldn't say this is one area that needs drastic attention. :)
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themonk
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by themonk »

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.
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Qeewee
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Qeewee »

I agree with Llama and Ezor about the naming thing.

Two of the stronger first impressions I got yesterday, that has not been mentioned so far, as far as I've seen at least:

1. You seem to be forced into choosing a realm as well as to pay taxes to that realm. What if you wish to play, say a ranger that rarely visits town, and wanders amongst all three of them or such, or a villain that refuses to pay taxes?
2. The world appears to be huge, and it's really very confusing to find anything. Will there at least be a map or somehing like we had of Gobaith with the towns on and such that we could find on the homepage (or is there one and did I miss it?)?

Other things:
I love the paperdolling. Though robes showing as capes is a bit confusing.
Crafting seems a bit easy now, but at least useful for when you want to make a lot of say, arrows. And tailoring is a bit buggy, like you cant craft black shirts.
I really like the music and the atmosphere it gives off.
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Estralis Seborian
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Estralis Seborian »

80% of the issues I read here are bugs, so perhaps we can focus on things that are no bugs? Like, we try to fix all bugs asap, sadly, we did not find them all during the beta test. And some client bugs are really nasty.

So, what do you think about the general setting?

PS: You can leave a faction any time. Just go to the notary!
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Kugar
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Kugar »

Estralis Seborian wrote: PS: You can leave a faction any time. Just go to the notary!
What is that and where can I find it?

I did wonder why I was attacked by friendly npc's after I tried to join Galmair and 'leave' Cadomyr (which I will add was a complete mistake. I thought I was entering the Galmair portal! Alas, a gm wouldn't help me. I had to fight my way to Galmair).
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Llama
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Llama »

Oh I love the setting.

I was a bit unsure about splitting the playerbase, but now there's a real "us or them" and "Good for the town" feel. Plus you can be sure that if you play a greedy little character you'll be in good company in certain places.
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rakust dorenstkzul
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by rakust dorenstkzul »

Why do peaceful beetles attack me?
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Flux »

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.
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Taiah
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Taiah »

On the whole I love the VBU and the looks of it including graphics so far seen... including monsters. Except for females...shoulders are way too big on humans and elves ( I am not familiar with the others ) as if all wearing shoulder pads, I would say everything is great graphic-wise.

I miss the ease of the function keys.. having to retype #me, #w #s etc. for all sayings is not helpful in a roleplay game and I would still like to save a description... the paper doll doesn't show it all i.e. tattoo's and scars.

I would also greatly appreciate a #i alternate function.. not all wish their name to be known by other chars in game and I like to use this for my notes on the char i.e. 'man at depot' if nothing else.
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rakust dorenstkzul
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by rakust dorenstkzul »

Another thing, How the hell do i get NPC's to buy stuff from me? I check the list, it's something they buy, i double click it, and i get line upon line of "I'm not buying this."
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Regallo »

Any Npcs that people like?
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Re: VBU First Impressions

Post by Salathe »

rakust dorenstkzul wrote:Another thing, How the hell do i get NPC's to buy stuff from me? I check the list, it's something they buy, i double click it, and i get line upon line of "I'm not buying this."
Currently, to sell items, have them in your bag then open the trade window, then double click them in your bag. Any items you can sell should have a coin next to them in your bag. Make sure they are in your bag before you open the trade window
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