Pariah (.hack//SIGN-inspired RP) — Discussion & Interest Check

[Rune_Alchemist]

Yeeah...sorry fam, not all that interested in what I'm seeing here.

Apologies, but I think I'll be stepping out. I'll keep an eye on it, but from that intro alone I'm not too keen on this.

Especially the being forced into some sort of guild/affiliation at the start. Never was fond of being in one of those in MMOs.

[Gowi]

@Rune_Alchemist

Most of the ideas are up for discussion, but if you don’t really wish to discuss it— fair enough, but maybe we’ll see each other somewhere else. Have fun with your ventures. Affiliations/Guilds is actually more an idea I gathered from Familia Myth, and is one of the weakest ideas I have so far.

[Rune_Alchemist]

@Gowi

Well, just to make sure - explain what these 'roles' are.

Are they hard set classes that determine what your character is capable of doing? And maybe expand more upon this leveling system and how skills/attributes whatever will play into that. To be perfectly honest, everything seems to be set up to be incredibly complicated, and I'm not a huge fan of that.

[Gowi]

@Gowi

Well, just to make sure - explain what these 'roles' are.

Are they hard set classes that determine what your character is capable of doing? And maybe expand more upon this leveling system and how skills/attributes whatever will play into that. To be perfectly honest, everything seems to be set up to be incredibly complicated, and I'm not a huge fan of that.

@Rune_Alchemist

The idea behind roles are to be the antithesis of defined classes— I suppose the best way I have it down at the moment is they represent what you are out to do and confines you little. Want to be more of a defender? Well, pick a role (perhaps ‘Tank’) that suits that definition and means. Understand that these concepts are still very loosely defined as I was not really able to conceptually finish them before the conversation of getting a new interest thread going while the iron was hot came up.

Your belief that this “complicates” things when they are meant more to simplify them is confusing to me, but as I said—

Pariah is not like conventional virtual reality modules and as such does not use traditional leveling systems.
Instead, Pariah’s framework has programming designed to attribute things to benchmarks, achievements, and attributes.

A basic benchmark could be rank accumulation (such as “novice swordsman”) and achievements could be as simple as well (defeated ‘100 Monsters’). The programmed framework recognizes your achievements, benchmarks, and attributes to increase what you are able to do. I gather this idea from Familia Myth’s main character and the growth of their abilities in the course of the first six episodes. Experience and accumulation of knowledge gains you power. Power gains you special abilities.

At least, this is my current train of thought.

[Rune_Alchemist]

@Gowi

Okay, what if someone decides they want to be a 'defender' to start with, but later on decide they want to play more offensively if they're not satisfied with the 'class?' I assume/hope they'd be able to change that play style to adjust accordingly some manner, through gaining skills/abilities with their desire for such a change? Trade their sword and shield for a lance, for example? And still have the abilities to use said weapon?

And what I mean by complicated, is that how would one even begin to keep up with all these achievements/skills/ranks and whatnot? There are a lot of things like that out there, that the list could get comically long and keeping up with them would eventually become a hassle.

Plus, how would we clearly RP out such levels of skills/ranks and whatnot? How would it inherently 'increase' what you are able to do and how would we quantify that fairly in an RP?

Also, that achievement system seems incredibly...silly. It would reward achievement hunters, wouldn't it? What about people who don't particularly care for such things? I personally, would hardly care about such arbitrary achievements. I know some people do, but to penalize those who don't, seems odd.

[NarcissisticPotato]

I think the affiliations/preset-guilds should be thought over. They don't offer a great deal of advantages and they sort of contrast the freedom presented to the player initially. Guilds and the like should be a fluid thing, not a thing you're just thrust into. Or at least, that's my opinion! c:

[Gowi]

I think the affiliations/preset-guilds should be thought over. They don't offer a great deal of advantages and they sort of contrast the freedom presented to the player initially. Guilds and the like should be a fluid thing, not a thing you're just thrust into. Or at least, that's my opinion! c:

@NarcissisticPotato

The idea is they provided the player with a residence, a base of operations, and access to information— a MMO-esque version of familia’s from you guessed it, Familia Myth. It’s definitely a central influence but not a well developed one of which I will admit. Affiliations, or Factions— are not decided for the player after all, they are chosen. I suppose they could go “unaffiliated” if desired, but I am not sure why that would be desirable. It is just a rudimentary thought.

[vietmyke]

<Snipped quote by NarcissisticPotato>
The idea is they provided the player with a residence, a base of operations, and access to information— a MMO-esque version of familia’s from you guessed it, Familia Myth. It’s definitely a central influence but not a well developed one of which I will admit. Affiliations, or Factions— are not decided for the player after all, they are chosen. I suppose they could go “unaffiliated” if desired, but I am not sure why that would be desirable. It is just a rudimentary thought.

@Gowi

the whole guilds thing reminds me of Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash. I'm about it. But I do agree that it would be a less freeform and classless system, because many people may be inclined to stick to the guild they started off in instead of go explore around. It depends on how we want to go about the 'player experience' in this RP- the player as in the player in the VRMMO world, not necessarily us.

[Damiann47]

Well I'm interested, it sounds pretty different from your standard VRMMO RP so far, I'll at least be keeping tabs on this.

Anyway about the whole talk with preset guilds I think makes complete sense from a game's perspective. In MMOs today there are sometimes starter guilds you automatically start in, they're nice for getting to know the community and get some help when learning how to even play. I don't see any reason why that wouldn't work here, sure this is all actually a RP in reality, but I don't think its a bad thing to build it as if it were a MMO. Guess the difficult part is trying to balance MMO elements and RP ones.

I get a feeling I don't completely understand what's the topic of discussion, but hey wanted to get my two cents out there.

[Gowi]

For those keen on Discord, I have a rudimentary one setup but it is not a requirement and the OOC in the to-be thread will still desired to be lively. discord.gg/ndmfvNg

[Thecrash20]

Ok im with it so far. The starter guild thing is well... There had been enough posts about that.

Im still a little confused about the benchmarks and achievements. I understand how it works, but how do you plan to keep track of our character's accomplishments? Also just for clarity, are the players going to be stuck all together and we play as a main group or are we kinda all just are own thing?

[Gowi]

@Gowi

Okay, what if someone decides they want to be a 'defender' to start with, but later on decide they want to play more offensively if they're not satisfied with the 'class?' I assume/hope they'd be able to change that play style to adjust accordingly some manner, through gaining skills/abilities with their desire for such a change? Trade their sword and shield for a lance, for example? And still have the abilities to use said weapon?

@Rune_Alchemist

This is an actually good question— I suppose if this is a concern by the general RP’s population I could shift it to more general settlements of classes or to remove it entirely.

And what I mean by complicated, is that how would one even begin to keep up with all these achievements/skills/ranks and whatnot? There are a lot of things like that out there, that the list could get comically long and keeping up with them would eventually become a hassle.

@Rune_Alchemist

This… is not a good question. There are no statistics or logs of your abilities unless you mean on the character sheet, which would be pretty clearly cut.

Plus, how would we clearly RP out such levels of skills/ranks and whatnot? How would it inherently 'increase' what you are able to do and how would we quantify that fairly in an RP?

@Rune_Alchemist

I imagine by keeping everyone in the same level of competency— new players, relatively new players. As for how it would inherently increase what you are able to do that all comes to what happens in the RP, so I cannot adequately answer this question without basis.

Also, that achievement system seems incredibly...silly. It would reward achievement hunters, wouldn't it? What about people who don't particularly care for such things? I personally, would hardly care about such arbitrary achievements. I know some people do, but to penalize those who don't, seems odd.

@Rune_Alchemist

No, it really wouldn’t. Here’s the thing— this whole misunderstanding of the benchmark system is not meant to be the equivalent of achievements in World of Warcraft. There are no leaderboards in Pariah, there are no atypical statistics in Pariah, and there is definitely nothing that is arbitrary. The benchmark system rewards accumulated experience; if you keep working to get stronger it will show. It is as described by McHaggis a “virtual reality with game influences” and not the other way around. Ultimately we are reflected on focusing on the characters and what makes them. Their personalities, experiences, tensions, griefs, anxieties, fantasies, and goals.

The RP is not a stat simulator.

[Gowi]

Ok im with it so far. The starter guild thing is well... There had been enough posts about that.

Im still a little confused about the benchmarks and achievements. I understand how it works, but how do you plan to keep track of our character's accomplishments? Also just for clarity, are the players going to be stuck all together and we play as a main group or are we kinda all just are own thing?

@Thecrash20

If we do a more sandbox approach we can have multiple parties— but it would require the right amount of approved characters. If we go linear, it could become difficult; but that is why I’m going to elect two AGM’s to help balance me out and get the ideas figured out so we can do this quickly and concisely.

[McHaggis]

.

[Rune_Alchemist]

<Snipped quote by Rune_Alchemist>
No, it really wouldn’t. Here’s the thing— this whole misunderstanding of the benchmark system is not meant to be the equivalent of achievements in World of Warcraft. There are no leaderboards in Pariah, there are no atypical statistics in Pariah, and there is definitely nothing that is arbitrary. The benchmark system rewards accumulated experience; if you keep working to get stronger it will show. It is as described by McHaggis a “virtual reality with game influences” and not the other way around. Ultimately we are reflected on focusing on the characters and what makes them. Their personalities, experiences, tensions, griefs, anxieties, fantasies, and goals.

The RP is not a stat simulator.

@Gowi

That is not what I was asking at all.

A basic benchmark could be rank accumulation (such as “novice swordsman”) and achievements could be as simple as well (defeated ‘100 Monsters’). The programmed framework recognizes your achievements, benchmarks, and attributes to increase what you are able to do. I gather this idea from Familia Myth’s main character and the growth of their abilities in the course of the first six episodes. Experience and accumulation of knowledge gains you power. Power gains you special abilities.

At least, this is my current train of thought.

@Gowi

I didn't ask about leader boards and things. Obviously there wouldn't be leader boards or something such as that as there is no menus.

I asked -using the example you used- how is saying things like 'killing 100 monsters' fair to people who don't go around doing that? People who go around killing monsters and doing extraordinary feats get rewarded by becoming 'stronger', In your own words

The programmed framework recognizes your achievements, benchmarks, and attributes to increase what you are able to do.

@Gowi

so people who go out and do certain things, would become stronger and gain more 'power'

That, my friend, is rewarding achievement hunters, is it not?

But eh, I don't care at this point, so whateves. The tone of this Int Check is pretty much gone exactly how I expected it too. Sorry fam, but I'ma be pulling out again.

I wish everyone fun with this, but I'll not be participating.

[Gowi]

Well I'm interested, it sounds pretty different from your standard VRMMO RP so far, I'll at least be keeping tabs on this.

Anyway about the whole talk with preset guilds I think makes complete sense from a game's perspective. In MMOs today there are sometimes starter guilds you automatically start in, they're nice for getting to know the community and get some help when learning how to even play. I don't see any reason why that wouldn't work here, sure this is all actually a RP in reality, but I don't think its a bad thing to build it as if it were a MMO. Guess the difficult part is trying to balance MMO elements and RP ones.

I get a feeling I don't completely understand what's the topic of discussion, but hey wanted to get my two cents out there.

@Damiann47

Any two cents are valuable as long as they are constructive and helpful, so don’t be bothered by it all too much.

And yes, I suppose it is a bit difficult to properly balance the two— and many people want different directions which is why I made this a discussion in the first place; especially when a lot of the ideas are in their infancy. The dynamic of roles and affiliation/guilds/factions are certainly the most vital ones that need a lot of work, and I understand that. My idea going forward with the affiliation system is it gives a good central resource hub, learning center, and basic community to a reality that is all so wondrous and new to newcomers. If I went with a guildless system wouldn’t that effectively give the player absolute no guidance? I don’t know, maybe I liked Familia Myth way too much!

[NarcissisticPotato]

<Snipped quote by Gowi>

That is not what I was asking at all.

<Snipped quote by Gowi>

I didn't ask about leader boards and things. Obviously there wouldn't be leader boards or something such as that as there is no menus.

I asked -using the example you used- how is saying things like 'killing 100 monsters' fair to people who don't go around doing that? People who go around killing monsters and doing extraordinary feats get rewarded by becoming 'stronger', In your own words

<Snipped quote by Gowi>

so people who go out and do certain things, would become stronger and gain more 'power'

That, my friend, is rewarding achievement hunters, is it not?

But eh, I don't care at this point, so whateves. The tone of this Int Check is pretty much gone exactly how I expected it too. Sorry fam, but I'ma be pulling out again.

I wish everyone fun with this, but I'll not be participating.

@Rune_Alchemist

I apologise for pressuring you into giving this a go, Rune; I don't think you wanted to play in it from the start and I should have realised. I'll address the points anyways for anyone else interested.

The example you used is, if you pardon me, an example. I'll give some background for it then explain why it is simply an example. So, in the last few years there's been really big demands for sandbox MMORPGs and they've been somewhat answered by indie titles like Crowfall and Camelot Unchained. I'll explain Crowfall because I'm familiar with it. It works that you choose a skill (like sword wielding for example) and the game will passively increase that skill but you can also increase skill from doing things (like using a shield or crafting a sword for example). This is a somewhat more realistic approach. It isn't an achievement in that "if you slay 100 monsters you level up" and more that "if you slay 100 monsters, you're better at slaying monsters and using the weapon you used to slay them". This is realistic in that in real life, you don't just get a skill point and learn something new. Learning a martial art or an instrument requires repetition and that's reflected in the game. The more you use your sword, aka the more monsters you kill, the more proficient you get.

This is an obvious progression but it doesn't just apply to killing monsters. It can work with anything - blacksmithing, alchemy, stealing. All these can be learned by simply doing them. Forging a piece of equipment, making a potion, robbing a shop. Like the indie MMORPGs, Levelling is no longer about quests and the like. Levelling is simply a marker for the extent to which you have practised something. I don't believe we will measure how many monsters someone kills or indeed, be awfully pedantic about levels of things.

Also your point about rewarding achievement hunters is a bit of a non-point. In nearly every system I've ever seen, the people who do go out and level up and gain more power get rewarded. As opposed to the people who do nothing getting rewarded. I think you meant professions here but as I said, you could be high level and never touched a sword in your life under that system. But in the same regard, it's only fair that someone who has realistically spent a lot of time learning how to use a sword becomes better at the sword and more powerful. This isn't rewarding achievement hunters, it's rewarding people who play.

Anyways, sorry for wasting your time Rune - this response was sort of just to answer your questions for others!

[Gowi]

<Snipped quote by Rune_Alchemist>

I apologise for pressuring you into giving this a go, Rune; I don't think you wanted to play in it from the start and I should have realised. I'll address the points anyways for anyone else interested.

The example you used is, if you pardon me, an example. I'll give some background for it then explain why it is simply an example. So, in the last few years there's been really big demands for sandbox MMORPGs and they've been somewhat answered by indie titles like Crowfall and Camelot Unchained. I'll explain Crowfall because I'm familiar with it. It works that you choose a skill (like sword wielding for example) and the game will passively increase that skill but you can also increase skill from doing things (like using a shield or crafting a sword for example). This is a somewhat more realistic approach. It isn't an achievement in that "if you slay 100 monsters you level up" and more that "if you slay 100 monsters, you're better at slaying monsters and using the weapon you used to slay them". This is realistic in that in real life, you don't just get a skill point and learn something new. Learning a martial art or an instrument requires repetition and that's reflected in the game. The more you use your sword, aka the more monsters you kill, the more proficient you get.

This is an obvious progression but it doesn't just apply to killing monsters. It can work with anything - blacksmithing, alchemy, stealing. All these can be learned by simply doing them. Forging a piece of equipment, making a potion, robbing a shop. Like the indie MMORPGs, Levelling is no longer about quests and the like. Levelling is simply a marker for the extent to which you have practised something. I don't believe we will measure how many monsters someone kills or indeed, be awfully pedantic about levels of things.

Also your point about rewarding achievement hunters is a bit of a non-point. In nearly every system I've ever seen, the people who do go out and level up and gain more power get rewarded. As opposed to the people who do nothing getting rewarded. I think you meant professions here but as I said, you could be high level and never touched a sword in your life under that system. But in the same regard, it's only fair that someone who has realistically spent a lot of time learning how to use a sword becomes better at the sword and more powerful. This isn't rewarding achievement hunters, it's rewarding people who play.

Anyways, sorry for wasting your time Rune - this response was sort of just to answer your questions for others!

@NarcissisticPotato

I couldn’t have stated it more eloquently then you have here— are you sure you aren’t campaigning for that AGM spot? Anyway, I’ve bolded some key points I’d like to really “drive home” as the expression goes.

The idea here was to create a dynamic yet efficient and easy to understand system. Ideally I could’ve went the route of Overlord over Familia Myth and .hack//SIGN with gamers being effectively transported to an actual fantasy world, but I wanted to do something a bit different since that was another individuals suggestion for their own prospects. I didn’t want to create a sort of rival game with more similarities than I needed to have.

[Damiann47]

Hmm, it is interesting that @NarcissisticPotato decided to use Crowfall as an example. I don't think it necessarily a good choice of games because if I remember right the way a skill is increased is done passively but you set them up in a queue sort of like EvE Online. Plus the way classes are handed are fundamentally different than I imagine how Pariah would, but that also isn't exactly relevant at the moment either so I won't go any further into it, my point it Crowfall I found to be a weird comparison to use. Although I guess a lot could have changed by now, it has been a while since I last looked at the game's development.

Anyway I would say a system like this would be more comparable to say... uh, well an elder scrolls game is what comes to mind so I'll go with Elder Scrolls Online. Where you increase skills through constant use, now ESO is a poorer example since you still deal with traditional levels and traditional EXP bars, still it was the way that skills are improved is what I'm looking at.

Also on the subject on achievements I don't have an issue with them, the way I say they should work is progress in a logical way that compliments normal development. So the achievements you get for just practicing a skill, like say "kill 100 monsters with a sword" eventually every swordsman will achieve this, but perhaps not this specific one. Another game I can point to is would be Civilization 6, weirdly enough, with the eureka system. You get a research boost for completing tasks that you would probably do anyway, just replace the research boost with another reward and those eurekas with achievements. Then totally there could be real difficult achievements out there, stuff that takes real work and danger to achieve. The bottom line though is while I completely believe Pariah should be built like a MMO, I don't know how in depth in achievements that would be practical for a roleplay.

Edit: Oh wait you did mention how Crowfall has the passive training... opps. My bad.

[Dionysian Puff]

Umm, question. What's preventing players from turning the entire game into EvE Online and all the clusterfuck of IRL relations that implies?

Beware, stream of conciousness ahead.

Also, there was this manga I read somewhere, can't remember what it was, but essentially it was about a new classless VRMMORPG where you define you character by your initial skills you choose at the beginning. Players are literally incapable of doing anything outsie of those skills. The MC takes the most useless skills (I think those were potion-brewing, cooking, crafting, kicking and Archery) and made fortunes because none of the other players invested in any of those and relied entirely on the npc merchants after the devs decided to fuck everyone by closing all potion merchants for an extended period and making food give bonus after a meta had already developed. He literally became a meta trend setter because he didn't try to build for PVE or PVP

As well, the crafting system was completely bull. First, items created by players could be more powerful than anything created by the devs. Second, each creation was unique to the creator. It relied entirely on player's "discovering" their own unique creations through recipes that only worked for them and they had to spend time and in game currency to create. Wanna make a health potion? Hope you like experimenting and resource gathering cause that's what your gonna have to do. Wanna make food to buff you stats? Hope your creative and determined enough to combine arbitrary ingredients and cooking styles for hours. Like, he created his own fucking tier system of bows for himself. He also made bladed shoes, fucking bladed shoes to enhance his kicking ability.

I'm just putting this here because I feel that having a game rely entirely on skills would logically conclude in either everyone doing one meta, or having the Devs fuck with every so often to radically change the meta of the game.

Actually, now that I think about it, and as much as I loath to mention it, Re:Monster has an interesting system, only for monsters mind you but the idea counts, where the combination of achievements decides what you level into. For example, say we have two physical "Warriors", designated A and B. Like a Fighter from D&D, they start off similar.

A takes a more aggressive style, focusing more on dealing damage. He goes full Conan and decides Shirtless Murder is always the first option. Commits Genocide against everything, they respawn it doesn't matter. Learns how to channel his bloodlust or some shit for huge crits. He would level up into a class that focuses on melee damage, like Barbarian in D&D or the Marauders from FFXIV or whatever you want to call it. Or he decide Don Quixote had the right idea and puts on heavy plate and steals attains a magic horse and decides that being taller than everyone is cool and stays on it 24/7. But since he's taller and needs to control his horse, he can't swing his great axe anymore. Oh well, a lance is cool to, kebabs are always good. Voila, you have a D&D Cavalier or something.

B takes on a more defensive stance. Gets a fuck huge shield and some heavy armor, cause if they can't see his flesh they can't hurt it. Probably feels that having a puny sword looks weird and is hard to swing with a big shield, a so clearly he should get a fuck-huge flail or something to complement the ridiculous space marine pauldrons he has. Now you have your Meatsh-I mean Tank. Maybe he finds Crystal Dragon Jesus or something and starts dabbling in religion. Learn to recite some litany against constipation and use to buff himself, or, God-forbid, his allies. Now you have a Paladin or some other intolerant zealot.

huh, I swear I was more coherent when I was typing that.