Lord Ser Brightblade Posted July 13, 2005 Share Posted July 13, 2005 Well Ive seen alot of things in Mondain's Legacy both good and bad. It's still the beta so a lot can change but here's a very brief list of what I see as the best and worst it has to offer. The order in which I list things does not denote my preference. Yes I know my spelling and grammer aren't the best but hey I want to get back to testing the game not spell checking and looking for missed punctuation!! The Good: The quest system - It is pretty huge. It encompasses a lot of things from those who wish to explore to those who wish to obtain new recipies or items. Gold Sinks - There seems to be a fair number of gold sinks implemented. These range from the low end of a few gold to the high end 250,000 to 1,000,000. Lets hope they add more. Even better yet lets hope they give us reason to actually want to sink our gold into the system. Races - This allows for some great roleplay potential. While I really dont see the point of many of the abilities you gain by choosing either race it is still early and I haven't played around with things much. I am curious why elven characters that are newly created start in a normal city of Britania though.... Crafting - Wow did this system get a big bump up in the cool factor. Lots of new things to be used in making items. New recipies for all crafters although some got less than others (alchemists only got 4 that I know of). Some of the elven house add ons look great! Dungeons - Some of them look fairly nice. There is a degree of dificulty here that much is certain.....but more about that in the bad section. Monsters - Some look pretty cool. Some interesting things to tame. Definitly some very powerful enemies out there for players to vanquish. Community Contributions - Finally a way for people such as tamers, craftsman etc. to earn credit for working thier skillsother than the *gets sick feeling in his stomach* BoD system. A way for guilds to work on fostering resource collecting for fun and profit! I havent played much with this but I have heard a bit about it from others. Eye Candy otherwise known as Pixel Crack - There certainly is some fun stuff to look at. You might notice many very saught after rares appearing again but under the guise of different names. Good job here of OSI keeping rares, well rare but allowing players to have some pretty things to display in thier houses. Many of the new craftables look great too, for instance the elven forge and arcane circles. The Bad: The quest system - Very one sided with lots for elves to do little for humans (we are talkin specific here). Many quests are repeatable but lack any variety. Get the same thing over and over. Farmers will rejoice. E-bay will flourish. So you want to discover that super duper new recipie well no problem just crank out bascinets and keep handing em in, eventually you'll get that great new blacksmithing recipie you wanted. The quest system really got a huge shot of coolness to it but do not release it this way. PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. Mix things up for repeatable quests where the task which needs to be completed/items collected differs. A recipie for a uber item should not come from the same type of quest that can yield you a low end item recipie. Why not have different quest givers for recipies where checks are made that a certain "tier" has been reached (i.e. certain recipies have been learned already) before quests for the better recipies can even be given out. Why are there no quests for the right to enter a particular dungeon. Does it mean that everyone and Whistler's mother should automatically gain access to new dungeons just because they paid thier $29.95? Make people work a little for access, especially if what is inside is deemed worthy! Gold Sinks - I have seen a few and thats good. What I have seen, for the most part is a lot of one times, or those that will be used infrequently. Lets have more overall sinks and let's have many that players will absolutely want to sink gold into time and time again. Having to pay 10k to enter a dungeon is a good gold sink but come on can't you do better than that to get a sink that people must use time and time again? Races - There is a definite push here for elves and thier marketing potential in the real world. EA smells dollars here which means humans seem to fall by the wayside. A seperation of the races really needs to be made if one wants to go this route. Innate nightsight kinda cool, the rest I can do without I dont see anything here that makes me say definitly elven characteristic or yeah thats a human. I wont even talk about how there shoulda been dwarves with mining smithing and brewing abilities...YES brewing I want my ale ACHH! The new avatars are well interesting. Some of the features are pretty cool and some look like the developers ate the wrong thing for breakfast spewed it back up and said hey wow it kinda looks like an Elf lets use that as an avatar! Oh and if you are an elf there should be a gump to choose if you will speak/translate elven or common tongue. Maybe allow humans to get the same gump through extremely difficult quests. I mean why does everyone need to understand everyone. For role-play it would be nice not to actually have to learn to speak a real language in real life to actually use one in the game. Crafting - Lots of new recipies. Give us more though. Make them hard to get especially the really desirable ones. Right now all the recipies seem to come from a very small handful of quest givers. Why not have more quest givers that only interact if you have done numerous things already and offer higher end recipies. Do not show people all of what they can make in the crafting menu! The ability to see new items that can be made should be a reward only for those that have taken the time to work within the quest system. Why not create guild systems for crafters. So you want to be the uber tailor well pay your dues or you wont even be able to get those new recipies or get certain resources which are required for various cultural items (how bout a special coal to make an elven forge work or special tanins that must be applied to leather....yet another way to add a gold sink) Your status within the crafting guild could help dictate what recipies you are eligable for. Oh yea and guild systems and crafting would create yet another opportunity for community collaboration. Dungeons - They are definitly harder but more a result of packing 100,000 meanies into an area even a pixie could barely navigate. Tossing monsters on top of players is hardly a constructive way to make things more difficult. Making dungeons difficult to navigate while dead is never fun (not saying it shouldnt be hard but what a royal pain in the *** it was to exit the Prism of Light the first time I died....I mean you cant see half the places you need to step on to trigger your teleportation) I'm most upset that all dungeons are accessible by everyone right fromt he start. Some of these should have been worked into the quest system (The quest which begins with the fragmented map would have been a great one to use for entrance into the minotaur caves). People complain that things are too easy well make a dungeon that can't even be entered unless you are a very skilled or in some cases a very lucky player. A dungeon could be made harder by employing things like murder holes that need to be disabled or destroyed by character. Can't get into part of a city well you hadbetter assemble a battering ram to beat down the gates or get your alchemist to lay charges to blow the rubble away all the while monsters attack and try to thwart the construction of such things. Speaking of blown away allow some creatures to fire from murder holes or ramparts that can only be reached by other arrows or craftables specifically designed to counter these new threats (strategy should be desired not hack and slash). Oh and look at that chasm better grab a ballista and fire rope across to begin building a bridge...... Monsters - Move along. Not much to see here other than new graphics (Some of which, once again, look like the developer had a particularly bad breakfast), ludicrous ammounts of hitpoints and the potential to obliterate hoards of players at a time. I saw very little work with the monster AI. The same spells are going to be used against monsters and similar tactics employed, it's just going to take a little longer for some of the deziens of the dungeons to be dropped is all. Oh yea just in case I wasnt clear, packing monsters into cramped quarters does not make for new AI..... Community Contributions- Keep these coming! Let's have more variety. Keep the rewards fresh and change them from time to time removing some from the system completly so that people will want to come back and work within the system to attain things time and time again. Guilds should be added into this system to create an even greater community for crafters. Eye Candy: Some of it could use some touch ups. This is the least of my worries so I wont say much about it at all. Many are complaining that the use of graphics for rare items might hurt the rare item market though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piper Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 Could you get us some screenshots of things like the avatars and monsters? That would be neat for those of us who don't have the beta yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Ser Brightblade Posted July 17, 2005 Author Share Posted July 17, 2005 Could you get us some screenshots of things like the avatars and monsters? That would be neat for those of us who don't have the beta yet. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Ill grab some monster picks tommorow. I was busy in the yard the past few days and looking for an old man in Star Wars today I had to take a day or so break from UO and the beta just to clear my head!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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