Would you play a challenging server?

[Flatlander]

Hello everyone!

You may or may not know that I have been working on an insanely custom project.

But I have realized that the server I have been making is... well really challenging.

Mostly because I like challenging things. I feel it is more fun to be challenged than to just complete easy repetitive tasks over and over again. (Sadly most MMOs are exactly that, repetitive easy tasks that you do over and over again)

My questions is, do you like challenging servers. Would you play a game if...

• If Monsters had better AI, they could work together, decide who to attack based on Threat Analysis, choose to use Area spells when players are grouped.
• If Quests were randomized, and you didn't know exactly what to do, or exactly what was going to happen, AND you had a time limit.
  
• If there were no set spawns, each time you go to a mountain, you never know what will be there, or what challenges you will face.
• If monsters patrolled, and you could sneak past them, meaning just because you run into a extremely dangerous monster, doesn't mean you have to fight it, you could possibly sneak by it, or retreat before it notices you. (This also means monsters that are too dangerous for normal players could be anywhere, or spawn anywhere, without it being truly unfair)
  
• If Abilities and Spells required skill, you had to aim your heals, use barriers at the right time to block incoming attacks, and so did the monsters you fought. (Simulated intelligence)
• If you had to eat food, drink water, and rest to survive, and you can die to starvation, dehydration, and lack of sleep. (Survival gameplay)
• If there were no protection zones, not one place on the server including the temple and depot where you are 100% safe. (There will be town guards, and a protection spell cast on anyone inside of a town, but it DOES NOT make you immune or completely safe)

The goal is to make a fun, challenging, server where there is TONS to do with no limitations, but this also means there is no protection zones, skull system, or easily obtainable blessings/AoL.

So I ask again, would you play a challenging custom server?

(I don't make Polls because I don't really care about the majority, I'd rather people actually voice their opinions, give feedback and constructive criticism)

 

[owned]

I'd play. Sounds intense. With the right systems it would be really exciting. Although "

• If there were no set spawns, each time you go to a mountain, you never know what will be there, or what challenges you will face."

I think when it comes to this, each spawn of monsters should maintain a certain criteria. So you don't go to an area one time and it's easy, then go back and it's impossible.

 

[Evan]

Holy cow, are we talking Dark Souls challenging?

Interesting concept; probably a bit too hard for the average Tibians, though.

Monster AI is always a cool thing to explore, I have this boss called Brother Tree, which is two tree-looking creatures that work together and push the player into certain positions to allow easy trapping with wild growths. I wish CipSoft did more AI stuff, but since we're in OT, we should be able to do some too.
I'm a little worried how you're gonna do point #3. I think it's best to associate different areas with different difficulties.
The kinds of creatures spawning in an area may be different, but the difficulty wouldn't change. For example, a small cave in an area designated for extreme difficulty would only spawn extremely difficult creatures, but the specific creature would vary.
In point #7, I don't think this is a great idea. I can see where you're coming from with this idea, but it just doesn't work well in Tibia.

 

[owned]

Holy cow, are we talking Dark Souls challenging?

Interesting concept; probably a bit too hard for the average Tibians, though.

Monster AI is always a cool thing to explore, I have this boss called Brother Tree, which is two tree-looking creatures that work together and push the player into certain positions to allow easy trapping with wild growths. I wish CipSoft did more AI stuff, but since we're in OT, we should be able to do some too.
I'm a little worried how you're gonna do point #3. I think it's best to associate different areas with different difficulties.
The kinds of creatures spawning in an area may be different, but the difficulty wouldn't change. For example, a small cave in an area designated for extreme difficulty would only spawn extremely difficult creatures, but the specific creature would vary.
In point #7, I don't think this is a great idea. I can see where you're coming from with this idea, but it just doesn't work well in Tibia.

It would work well under one condition. Very large map.

 

[Zasranets]

Hell yeah I would play a challenging server, those are the best kind!
I love a good old challenge, tibia is to easy and very repetitive. I would have to agree with Evan though, it would be to hard for most Tibians and they will complain...
I would still love to see it, cause all the servers you've made in the past were fun, and awesome, even though they never got completed XD

 

[Amusement]

I doubt half your suggested ideas are even possible without creating from the ground up & even if you did attempt that, a few of them wouldn't even look right on a 2D top down game like Tibia, such as stealth.
The only ones with any real value that are probably possible are the last 3, except the simulated intelligence, in fact there was a thread a good while back on here that discussed the topic of changing Tibia's AI & it's highly unlikely without working from the ground up, might as well create your own game.

 

[Flatlander]

I'd play. Sounds intense. With the right systems it would be really exciting. Although "

• If there were no set spawns, each time you go to a mountain, you never know what will be there, or what challenges you will face."

I think when it comes to this, each spawn of monsters should maintain a certain criteria. So you don't go to an area one time and it's easy, then go back and it's impossible.

Holy cow, are we talking Dark Souls challenging?
I'm a little worried how you're gonna do point #3. I think it's best to associate different areas with different difficulties.
The kinds of creatures spawning in an area may be different, but the difficulty wouldn't change. For example, a small cave in an area designated for extreme difficulty would only spawn extremely difficult creatures, but the specific creature would vary.

To answer your concerns, there is no linear progression currently in the server.

Leveling does not give health, mana, cap, soul, there are no vocations, if a Level 1 and a level 20 both had no equipment on, they would be exactly the same.

I can't easily explain the current equipment system, but basically your equipment, armor, and weapons all level up as you use them, and any item can only equal the current level of your character. (If you have a level 20 sword and you are level 20, it will not gain experience as you use it, until you reach level 21)
Each time an item levels, it gains a "Reforge Point" which you can use to adjust the stats on the item slightly. (Make one stat increase, and all other's will decrease)

This does 2 things that I think are necessary for such an unforgiving server.

1. You will never log in, and be "so far behind" the current players that you have no chance. (As soon as you obtain a set that works well together with it's stats and abilities you can compete, especially since skill matters more than numbers)
2. You will never encounter a monster that is unfair for your current level. There will be hard monsters that players will have to team up to defeat or there could a monster that isn't easy to kill with your current equipment set, but since monsters have an aggro system and you can sneak by them, you could avoid them and only pay attention to monsters you can kill.

I know this is HUGELY different than tibia, personally I don't even think about tibia at all when I'm working on this. It is simply a open world challenging survival MMO with lore/rpg elements poured in based on tibia tile-based mechanics.
To me, it is fun, I have fun while testing it, sometimes I end up just playing it rather than working on it, (Expecially since everything is so randomized, every day I log in, even I do not know what to expect, so I can have surprising moments, even during quests, where fun things happen I didn't even know were possible or probable)

 

[Flatlander]

I doubt half your suggested ideas are even possible without creating from the ground up & even if you did attempt that, a few of them wouldn't even look right on a 2D top down game such as Tibia, such as stealth.
The only ones with any real value that are probably possible are the last 3.

I scripted Line of Sight months ago, and everything I stated is already in the game and playable.

TFS is just a tile-based open-world MMO server. It doesn't have to have anything to do with tibia, and if you use the OTClient, you can literally acheive anything you want, there are no limits really.

Oh and you can just click on "Customizing TFS" in my signature, I've done things much more interesting than what I've stated above already, and I plan to do more.

 

[Amusement]

I scripted Line of Sight months ago, and everything I stated is already in the game and playable.

TFS is just a tile-based open-world MMO server. It doesn't have to have anything to do with tibia, and if you use the OTClient, you can literally acheive anything you want, there are no limits really.

I'd like to see how well it worked, I'm skeptical.
I'm sure there is a few on here that would try it without a doubt, that said doubt many would stay active, I've always found from my time playing the majority of the people who play Custom OTs from OTland are quite casual, but maybe I'll be proven wrong.

-I'd play it if it was challenging & engaging. It would also need decent PVP.

 

[manix11]

I love the idea with monster patroling certain areas, lol
Also the AI living town in the video ^
Thats some great ideas bro!
i will follow ur work from now on!
good luck with everything

 

[Flatlander]

I'd like to see how well it worked, I'm skeptical.
That said, I'm sure there is a few on here that would try it without a doubt, that said doubt many would stay active, I've always found from my time playing the majority of the people who play Custom OTs from OTland are quite casual, but maybe I'll be proven wrong.

-I'd play it if it was challenging & engaging. It would also need decent PVP.

I agree, PvP is important, I did take out "Find Person" since I think it is just way too powerful of a spell.

Instead every time a player walks on a tile they leave a timestamp, and other players can use "tracking spells" to see where other players have walked and what direction they went.
Most likely my server will not be hugely popular, honestly if I'm the only one that enjoys it that is fine with me, I simply have fun making things.

But who knows, maybe people will like it as much as I do. Once it is ready for beta we will see.

@manix11
Thanks .
I made the patrol routes for NPCs in preperation for my new NPC system.

NPCs have houses, go shopping, visit the tavern, go to sleep at night, have shifts at work, they can die and respawn in the temple, and walk back to their daily lives. They remember your interactions with them, and they keep stock of everything sold to them and have a bank account. They can fight, call the town guards, and they can even belong to a religion (were making up new in-game religions that go along with the game-world)

 

[owned]

I scripted Line of Sight months ago, and everything I stated is already in the game and playable.

TFS is just a tile-based open-world MMO server. It doesn't have to have anything to do with tibia, and if you use the OTClient, you can literally acheive anything you want, there are no limits really.

Oh and you can just click on "Customizing TFS" in my signature, I've done things much more interesting than what I've stated above already, and I plan to do more.

That is pretty awesome. Although your idea towards "equipment leveling" quite a bit off from a standard MMO I would think a system like that would draw a lot less players and players that would join wouldn't stay long. From experience talking to many people over the years of playing open tibia servers, players like to have the chance to be number one on a game, and the reason tibia has such a large player base is because there's no real level cap (except 9999x exp servers). Even when there is nothing to do they can level to try to be number one. With your system they have the best equipment, makes it a lot less appealing in my eyes and I'm sure in many others. Some things have to be constant in tibia and I think player leveling is definitely one, otherwise it's no longer tibia.

 

[Flatlander]

That is pretty awesome. Although your idea towards "equipment leveling" quite a bit off from a standard MMO I would think a system like that would draw a lot less players and players that would join wouldn't stay long. From experience talking to many people over the years of playing open tibia servers, players like to have the chance to be number one on a game, and the reason tibia has such a large player base is because there's no real level cap (except 9999x exp servers). Even when there is nothing to do they can level to try to be number one. With your system they have the best equipment, makes it a lot less appealing in my eyes and I'm sure in many others. Some things have to be constant in tibia and I think player leveling is definitely one, otherwise it's no longer tibia.

I agree, but my server offers different "Number Ones" than other MMOs.
I find once one guild, team, or player establishes they are number one, it is very hard for anyone else to EVER obtain that position until that player/guild/team quits the server. So basically of all the people playing to be "Number One" only one person will actually get to be in that position.

Instead of this, I'm introducing reputation, house building, and history all into the server.

When you log in for the first time, you actually have an age, you are 16 years old, and hurray it's your birthday. I invented a new time-scale, (7 hour days) and basically every "real life" year includes 3 "in-game years".
Now lets say you log in, and you first meet a group of bandits. Of course you can attack npcs and npcs can attack you, or you can talk to them.

So through dialog with these bandits, you could technically befriend them, join their camp, the monster-bandits would see you as friendly (unless you attack them) and even defend you if you are under attack by other monsters/players.

Now the bandits will have quests just like any other NPCs, and you will go do bandit things. From this, lets say you plunder a town, well if any NPCs in that town saw you, they would recognize you as one of the bandits. Over time you could even become a widely known legendary bandit, and the town could even present a mission to capture you and put you in jail (then a bandit quest could be break you out of jail). and so on.

The point is, no one should EVER be so powerful no one can touch them, you can legitimately build your own mansion, have 10 NPC guards follow you around at all times, own a Tavern, and be the Mobster King-Pin of a town, but that doesn't mean someone that started the server after you, and joined the Town Guard, and has started his career for Justice couldn't battle you on equal terms (after he gained a bit of money, supplies, and equipment of course)

**EDIT for PvE Number One Mechanics**
Also there will be dungeons, that I am kind of modelling after Zelda, where a unique item will be introduced in a dungeon where you will have to do puzzles to reach the end and then defeat the boss, and the first player(s) to defeat these dungeons are recorded in history, and certain legendary dungeons will have each player recorded that completes it.
This is saved in a way that NPCs can pull up the information of when and who completed which dungeons or events, and even bring it up in conversation, or recognize you on the street. Think of the barmaid being excited that she is able to serve a celebrity that helped push back the goblin armies and defeat the goblin king in the last war.

 

[owned]

I agree, but my server offers different "Number Ones" than other MMOs.
I find once one guild, team, or player establishes they are number one, it is very hard for anyone else to EVER obtain that position until that player/guild/team quits the server. So basically of all the people playing to be "Number One" only one person will actually get to be in that position.

Instead of this, I'm introducing reputation, house building, and history all into the server.

When you log in for the first time, you actually have an age, you are 16 years old, and hurray it's your birthday. I invented a new time-scale, (7 hour days) and basically every "real life" year includes 3 "in-game years".
Now lets say you log in, and you first meet a group of bandits. Of course you can attack npcs and npcs can attack you, or you can talk to them.

So through dialog with these bandits, you could technically befriend them, join their camp, the monster-bandits would see you as friendly (unless you attack them) and even defend you if you are under attack by other monsters/players.

Now the bandits will have quests just like any other NPCs, and you will go do bandit things. From this, lets say you plunder a town, well if any NPCs in that town saw you, they would recognize you as one of the bandits. Over time you could even become a widely known legendary bandit, and the town could even present a mission to capture you and put you in jail (then a bandit quest could be break you out of jail). and so on.

The point is, no one should EVER be so powerful no one can touch them, you can legitimately build your own mansion, have 10 NPC guards follow you around at all times, own a Tavern, and be the Mobster King-Pin of a town, but that doesn't mean someone that started the server after you, and joined the Town Guard, and has started his career for Justice couldn't battle you on equal terms (after he gained a bit of money, supplies, and equipment of course)

**EDIT for PvE Number One Mechanics**
Also there will be dungeons, that I am kind of modelling after Zelda, where a unique item will be introduced in a dungeon where you will have to do puzzles to reach the end and then defeat the boss, and the first player(s) to defeat these dungeons are recorded in history, and certain legendary dungeons will have each player recorded that completes it.
This is saved in a way that NPCs can pull up the information of when and who completed which dungeons or events, and even bring it up in conversation, or recognize you on the street. Think of the barmaid being excited that she is able to serve a celebrity that helped push back the goblin armies and defeat the goblin king in the last war.

The majority of the ideas here I really like and agree with, but the leveling thing I don't. Honestly the only server I ever played where players could reach a point where no one could touch them was deathzot and that's for obvious reasons, I believe with a well balanced pvp system and leveling system, nobody can ever get to that point, unless you have a server that adds in ridiculous stats to gear. Almost everything you've mentioned adds great changes to the game of Tibia, but something everyone knows is that a lot of people hate change and when it comes to a change as large scale as this, it deters people quickly. When it comes down to it, I don't consider everything you've said to even be changes, just additions to Improve gameplay for everyone which is awesome. You have some brilliant ideas.

 

[SpookieGamer]

I would be more than happy to play something like this.
I'm tired of the same things over and over again...

Best regards,
SpookieGamer.

 

[MysteriousDot]

I would totally play this. Damn Flatlander you are an amazing scripter o,o

 

[Aeroo]

I just skimmed through the thread and the initial points in the opening post all look amazing. I'd defs play based off the systems you described.

Although, the post where you described the Equipment System makes no sense to me. Having your equipment level up in place of individual skills of a character is a terrible idea imo. Your characters strength should rely on the particular skills the character has focused on raising and obtaining throughout experience. Equipment should play a part, but overall, a character's potential should rely on the customization of the character itself and not the set of items you could switch from one person to another.

With this system, I probably wouldn't play the server, knowing that the time I spent playing is portrayed in the set of EQ I'm wearing in substitution of my character itself.

I did just skim through the thread, if I misunderstood the system you described, my apologies.

 

[Flatlander]

I just skimmed through the thread and the initial points in the opening post all look amazing. I'd defs play based off the systems you described.

Although, the post where you described the Equipment System makes no sense to me. Having your equipment level up in place of individual skills of a character is a terrible idea imo. Your characters strength should rely on the particular skills the character has focused on raising and obtaining throughout experience. Equipment should play a part, but overall, a character's potential should rely on the customization of the character itself and not the set of items you could switch from one person to another.

With this system, I probably wouldn't play the server, knowing that the time I spent playing is portrayed in the set of EQ I'm wearing in substitution of my character itself.

I did just skim through the thread, if I misunderstood the system you described, my apologies.

I work 40 hours a week, and I have friends that don't, so when we play almost any game with progression, we all start at the same time, but after even a few days, I can no longer play with ANY of my friends. They are higher level, in different areas I'm not allowed in, and experiencing different content than me.

So one of my goals was to fix this problem. How can I make it so people playing still gain, and progress, BUT also make it so almost anyone can play together, fight together, or even PvP together and be useful.

Imagine you are playing tibia, and you have to go to work for 8 hours, but your friend keeps playing for 8 hours.
When I get home, he will be 8 hours ahead of you. Which isn't THAT bad, you could probably still hunt together with 2-3 level difference. But this will add up every day until maybe you are level 30 and he is level 60.
Now a level 30 and a level 60 simply shouldn't hunt together, they are basically in different WORLDs. A level 60 can destroy a level 30 in PvP, and fight monsters a level 30 would have no chance against.

Having an advantage over new players is PERFECTLY FINE, but being so powerful they pose no threat is a problem. Trust me, it works, it's fun, and collecting different items is addicting. (Expecially getting a rare item no one else has, with an ability or passive no one else has ever seen)

 

[Eldin]

It all sounds great, Tibia is not for people who want a hard game but the key is always to make they game fun.
I hope you'll complete it.

Kind Regards,
Eldin.

 

[Flatlander]

It all sounds great, Tibia is not for people who want a hard game but the key is always to make they game fun.
I hope you'll complete it.

Kind Regards,
Eldin.

In my opinion all games are made for entertainment purposes (also known as fun).
Some people enjoy watching sports and it is fun for them, some people don't. Fun is a opinion, and not everyone will agree the same things are fun.

I am making a server for people who like exploration, challenging quests, and RPG/Lore.