ARGHHHH

Music for the Article : Slipknot – People=S**t (Something new I am trying here heh!)

I recently read the new Vanguard Producers letter to the community. Many important points were brought up. But one point has me all freaking pissed here. Maybe I am being childish or being a troll. Which I fail to see as this is my friggin blog.

The newest Vanguard producer PhAtHoM had this to say:

(Feel accomplished

Whether you log in and play for 30 minutes or for 3 hours, you should see and feel that you advanced your character. Now don’t get me wrong. We don’t want to create an “easy button” when it comes to leveling up but we definitely need to expedite the experience gain cycle to increase fun factor. We’ve made some steps already by adding Rest Experience and the ability to share experience within your Brotherhood, so we’ll keep those in mind when discussing the percentage increase that we should take it up to in the near future.”)

I am perfectly fine with this. I don’t have a problem with the actual quote. Let me get to what I do have a problem with. THE community!!

As soon as his really interesting producers letter was done people jumped on that statement like flames to a fire. (Now that is fast) People in the community went nuts over it complaining that it was already to easy to level in Vanguard. There must be 40 posts in the thread crying over this topic.

Personally I am of the frame of mind if it takes 1 hour to 50 I don’t give a crap if I had fun getting there. (Portal anyone) Who are these masochistic people that love the grind? I know in the past that I have mentioned the fact that I love group grinding in FF11. I feel that is because the combat is so fun and tactical in that game with the Renkei/Magic Burst system. In Vanguard it isn’t. It is like every other MMO whack that mole and watch your xp bar move. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

I know there is a weakness system that can be used in the combat system for more dps but for the most part they are hard as hell to follow so most groups just ignore it and go back to whack a mole. Hell I bet most people who play Vanguard don’t even know the system is there. /sigh The weakness system works the same way as EQ2 and FF11. You start with a special attack, lets call it Sparkling Strike. That starts the weakness Blindness, but to finish it off like baking soda to vinegar (Try it if you don’t understand) another class has to finish with Slash of Darkness which completes the weakness system. Next thing you know the mob is blind for a couple seconds lowering it’s accuracy.

I bet you could make the combat as difficult as hell and people would love it if every time the exploit weakness system was really easy to spot like FF11’s or even EQ2’s (which is also horribly forgotten about for the most part.) Making combat part of the game instead of having it as a barrier between you and completion of a quest, should be part of the Vision for Vanguard. It seems the devs are trying there best to cater to all the crowds and they are going to get drawn and quartered. 75% of the community even have there horses ready for the devs. In the four pages I could get through only one person made a reasonable response. That was this post by Brash Endeavors: (Who by the way is seems to be one of the resident unofficial tech gurus)

(“Apologies for copy/pasting my remark from one of the other threads, but I really really really hope they think about and discuss whether the real issue is how one gains experience and not simply how FAST one gains experience.

There is a WORLD of difference there.

Also, “Thank You” for posting this. It’s courageous to put it out on paper instead of taking the easy way of saying as little as possible in order to avoid debate and controversy.

The new proposed feedback forum is a very good thing.”)

This is the very point I am trying to make here. It isn’t how fast you gain those levels it is how much fun you had doing it. I constantly hear “It’s about the Journey to 50 not how fast you get there.”

Great so some of the MMO community gets it let’s just hope Vanguards Devs get it, and the community come up with useful posts instead of crying about the subject. PLEASE!

My idea is to raise the experience needed per level by 3%, but add a group bonus based on group members. If people knew they got a bonus for grouping you would see a lot less soloing and more grouping. And with a more visible, useful weakness system people would be more inclined to use it.

Hailin signing out, drinking gin and tonic to chill out after a stressful day. Peace!