WOW vs 4D

[Kvetch]

To begin, I'm going to make and announcement and admit something...

I've been playing World of Warcraft.  My friends got me into it.  "Hey.. try this.. you'll like it."  I've actually managed to stave them off for years because of my addiction to MUD's in general in college and I really didn't want to know how much worse that addiction would get if you add the graphics value to it.  And I've got to say, it's good, but I really don't think it's as great as all my friends make it out to be.  Though maybe that's because they said they'd help me (they're level 70) and at level 46 I've still done most (like 45) of those levels by myself and with strangers that I've met online.  Do I think it's better than 4D?  I'd rather not say... No, actually it's comparing apples and.. other apples.. or oranges maybe. 

See.. there are quite a few things in WoW that remind me of 4D which is what makes it so interesting, because I find myself going "I wonder if there's some way I can bring something like that to 4D".  Yes, even while playing WoW, I'm thinking 4D.

What's the same? Quite a bit. 

4D has quests and WoW has quests.  With WoW you can easily find your quests because there's this big yellow exclimation point above the mob's head.  With 4D, not so easy even though most can be found (not all of them) just by asking help?  WoW gives you a quest log that keeps track of the quests you are on.  4D doesn't.  But then again, you can only have 25 quests going at one time on WoW and 4D doesn't have that limit.  Still, I am trying to create some sort of quest log for 4D which is being hampered mainly by the variables that we use and put on players to say where they are in a quest and whether or not a quest has been completed.  I'm going to need a lot of help on this as I don't know all the variables, but along with a few other things I'm planning on doing, going through most of the triggers and finding them (as well as vstating a few people that I know have done a lot of the quests), I have put this near the top of my list to deal with.  I think having some sort of quest log will make it a bit easier for people.  But, then again, I'm not going to have it tell you what quests you haven't found.  You'll still have to ask mobs if you can help them.

Objects:
WoW has a lot of quests that give out objects.  If you do the quest according to the level it's designed for then the object is probably going to be better than one you already have in that slot.  Problem being, some of the quests give out objects you can't use.  For example, priests (yes, that's what I am) can only use cloth armor.  I'm still doing quests that give me leather and mail.  Why?  the xp and because I can sell the other items.  Most of the quest items though end up being soulbound (ie: you cant auction it off on the auction house (AH)) so you just get what vendors will pay for it.  We too have our own type of "soulbound" equipment.  Basically, that eq that you can't use unless you've completed the quest for that item.  Having pointed out the AH here, I would like to mention the possibility of having something like that.  I'm not sure how it'd work with the crashes and copyovers, but if it's doable, it'd be neat to be able to post things for sale (within guidelines - you shouldn't be able to AH anything that another player wouldn't be able to use - no "soulbound" items (or I guess it'd be artifacts)) for a limited time so people in other time zones have a chance to bid on an item instead of just whoever just happens to be online at the time.

Grouping:
There are some quests that you CAN'T do solo.  As in you can not enter the quest zone unless there are at least 5 of you.  Some, you need more than 10.  As far as I can tell, it doesn't take into account whether one of you is level 70 and the rest leve 1.  Perhaps making some areas with quests like that would interesting.  But perhaps not for some of you that can take anything by yourself if given enough time and enough healing potions.

Things i hate of WoW:
Dying.  Dang it.. I hate to die.  I've become awfully good at it though.  Walking back to my corpse is time consuming (depending of course where the nearest cemetary is), but they have given us an option to pay to get your corpse back (if you can get that guardian to talk to you before you give up) and your weapons/armor take damage as well as the fact that you are at minimal power for a certain amount of time (10 minutes for me - yikes).  Having said that, I do like the weapons/armor taking damage.  I think that would be an interesting add on with 4D.  When you're fighting, your weapons, your armor, are getting battered - just as you are.  Since you lose HP, why shouldn't they lose something - wholeness if you will - and have to be repaired.  Admittedly it would cost gold.  But most of us in 4D have enough gold to spare at this time that it wouldn't be a problem for a very long time - at least until we get enough players that the oldbies wouldn't be able to hand out gold like it was water.

Flight time:
I love being able to "fly" to certain areas, but some of those flights take for f-ing ever.  Try to fly from Booty Bay to Undercity and not fall asleep before you get there.  I believe that's a 10 minute trip of.. doing nothing.  YOu can't attack, you can't really look around.. you can't even jump off if you get tired of the flight.  YOu're stuck once you say "I want to go here..."  I know on 4D we do have some "flights" but they don't take a very long time.  The longest one I know of, I think is the one in RIP.
To solve some of this (being able to get from one place to another) we'll be implimenting Dragon Masters (sooner or later - it's going to be a secondary) and the spots they can go will be limited and some of them may be places that only the dragon masters can get to.  Part of this is waiting on me, part of it.. I don't know.. maybe all of it is waiting on me now.

Having listed these things, I'd like to hear what others say.  I know Fizzy thinks that WoW is stupid and others seem to be in that frame of mind too, but what is it you don't like about it?  And.. was there anything you DID like that perhaps we can look into incorporating into 4D that may improve the gameplay and perhaps get us even more players.

Kvetchy

[Molly]

What I personally have against WoW is that it is getting so repetitive after the first novelty with the flashy graphics wore off. Sure, you can argue that 4d can be repetitive too, but a fact is, that it needn't be. There are just endless things to do, if people would just leave their habitual levelling ruts, and get into real exploring, trading and questing. I think only 2 percent of our players really are even getting close to taking advantage of our full potential. At least I can count the ones that do on the fingers of my left hand.

The main problem with 4D is that we don't have enough players for our large world. This makes it hard to get any RP going, it hampers the Clans, and also puts limits to things like creating quests that need 10 people to carry out. The chance of finding even 5 people on line, awake, and ready to go questing, when you feel like it yourself, is not overly great.

So getting more players must be our main priority.

Heh - if your friends got you into WoW, it's their turn to return the favor now.
So tell them all to come and try a REAL mud for a change, and play 4D for as long as you played WoW. 

[Kvetch]

I agree that 4D has a large world and not nearly enough players to populate it.  It would be nice to feel like all of my work in NightDragon Realms will ever be seen, but that's not likely unless there's more than one player at a time in the zone.  (In case you're wondering, this means that I have some echoarounds for my atmospheric script, but they'll never be seen unless someone is near the person that sets them off.  ).

Just an FYI, WoW also has a problem with being able to find people that want to quest when you do in the particular area you want to quest in.  Took me about an hour today (or was that 2 hours as I had to try twice as no-one was biting the first time) to round up 5 people to go into a certain instance... that took maybe 1/2 hour to do.  *mutters*

I've tried real exploring in 4D and I find that a bit tedious having to look under/behind/around/through/at/smell/taste/etc everything.  Unless I have an alias set up (and having lost my zmud (due to new computer and no certification number and not misuse), I don't have one) having to type in each thing all the time...  I tend to get about 5 rooms before my mind is shutting off because of that, but yet, I don't want to miss anything.  And sometimes I make assumptions I shouldn't have.  When the description of the room says a trail goes off to the <direction> and there is an exit in that direction, I ASSUME that the trail is that exit.  Found out relatively recently that I'd assumed wrong and found a whole 'nother part of a world to explore.  Also, knowing that there ARE deathtraps in the world (even though there's only what? 15 in the whole 3000+rooms?) makes me hesitate to explore.  There are some exits that COULD be considered hints for DT's (there's a low branch, watch out) that I nervously hesitate to head in any direction that could possibly be a DT.  Yes, I - and probably many others - have hit the DT of the bridge that isn't all that well marked.

And, for arguement's sake, WoW has more than just the grinding xp going on.  YOu can fish (why you'd want to when it's just as boring in real life is beyond me) which 4D also has (not sure about the tediousness on 4D as I've not fished).  You can collect herbs (and sell them to alchemists if you don't happen to be one yourself), learn how to skin animals (and sell that to leatherworkers, if you don't happen to be one yourself), gather cloth and create clothing through tailoring (and sell them to enchanters if you don't happen to be one yourself...) along with a few other "secondary" skills.  WoW does limit these skills which makes sense so not everyone can be an herbalist/alchemist/skinner/leatherworker/blacksmith/etc/etc.

Another thing I do like about WoW that I'd like to see in 4D is the way it promotes exploring.  Every time you discover a "new zone" you get xp for it.  the xp is based off the level of the zone - not your level.  So lower level zones give less xp than higher level zones.  So, if you could live, you could visit all the high level zones and probably level quite a bit as a newbie... but it's that living part.  I've become an expert on death there - or at least on dying.  Of course, the problem with putting that in 4D would be which rooms to put a check in - my thoughts are enter/exit rooms.  So, if you happen to teleport INTO a zone, you wouldn't get the xp unless you walked out of the zone.

As for my friends coming onto 4D.  NOt likely.  Once I say 'It's WoW without the pretty pictures' they'll look at me like I've grown a 3rd eye and then probably ignore me the rest of the day - not that it's much different than what already goes on, but still...I've got to maintain some sort of image.. not of a person with a 3rd eye.

The not 3rd eye blind,
Kvetchy

[Molly]

I've tried real exploring in 4D and I find that a bit tedious having to look under/behind/around/through/at/smell/taste/etc everything.  Unless I have an alias set up (and having lost my zmud (due to new computer and no certification number and not misuse), I don't have one) having to type in each thing all the time... 

Heh, I'd have thought you could use the alias system provided in the game; can't you just do an alias for listen;smell;l n;l e;l s;l w;l u;l d ?
As for looking closer at things, let alone looking above/under/behind them, I wouldn't even dream of doing that in every room, (except in perhaps a zone like Fenizia), because obviously those descs are used rather sparsely. I'd save it for the 'special' rooms, and it's usually pretty obvious from the descs which rooms are special in any way. For instance looking for stuff like that in wilderness grid zones would mostly be a waste of time. (We are not totally unfair when we create the zones, there is usually a thought behind the design).

As for the exploration exp script, we 're ahead of you there; it's something that I've wanted for a long time too. I actually already 'contracted' Fizban to set it up, and there is even a thread about it in the TBA boards.
But like most other things it needs some inititial research first - a long list of room vnums, (rather like the 'random scatter' script idea that Hesara had before). And that is a tedious task that I cannot palm on Fiz, I have to do it myself.

My plan isn't to give the exp points directly at the entrance though, I've planned to have 3-5 room vnums in each zone that you'd have to hit, before you get the exploration exp. Otherwise it would be way too easy to just go to the entrance of each zone (since we provide directions for that in the Map room), collect the exploration bonus, and then skip the actual exploration part.  I've grown jaded over the years, so I'm pretty certain that is what the majority of our players would do, as soon as the word spread.

So it's either a number of rooms per zone, or hitting the 'core' room, (where the zone flag is). Perhaps the latter would be easier.

As for keeping track of what quests a player has finished, I think that task would be a bit too big to script, since we've probably have over 1000 different quests, if you count all the small ones too.
It might be possible to do it for the more important quests, like the ones that set a questflag to restrict equip wear. But keeping track of every small quest around the Realms just isn't feasible, I think.
There are scores of trading quests to collect herbs or other natural assets in 4D too - ask Hayato, who's been getting stinking rich on both tokens and TP in Prehistoric lately, doing just that. (So I guess WoW stole that idea from us).

[Fizban]

Also, knowing that there ARE deathtraps in the world (even though there's only what? 15 in the whole 3000+rooms?)

Uhh, 3000 rooms? 4D is over 70,000 rooms.

[Kvetch]

Yeah, yeah.. still.    So, I haven't gone and counted to make sure what zones are/aren't in, etc.  Anywho....