The inspiration for this post is the comments section from a Broken Toy's post titled Darkfall Improving, Now In 1999 Instead of 1997. I've only been following Lum's blog for a few weeks now but I get the sense that he and many of his readers are of the mentality that games with full loot and limited in game systems to protect players (a la UO in 1999) are destined to fail because the PvPers will run everyone out of the game... This is an argument for another day but for now I just want to tie this into some of my current experiences with Darkfall.
To start, what's wrong with '99? I like playing Darkfall because it does remind me of UO pre-trammel. I quit playing WoW two years ago because it was so carebear (boring). I tried to get into WAR but its just one giant instanced battlefield in which there is no risk and no player investment. I canceled that account before my three months was even up.
Darkfall is an entirely different story. The game is fun even if it lacks a little polish and carebear content. Even mundane tasks can be entertaining and exciting because of the risk vs. reward aspect inherent in a full loot game with open PvP.
For example, the other day one of my guildmates decided to pick up armor smithing. Since the change to make nodes global instead of instanced it is no longer easy to farm crafting materials without leaving the safety of guard towers. Most of the nodes in town are always tapped out. A lot of carebears complained about this change but really it makes sense. A lot of people also complain about how long it takes to harvest a node, 10 seconds per attempt and each node contains around 40 resources. Factor in failed attempts and a single miner could easily take over 15-20 minutes to tap out a metal spawn. That is a lot of time to be standing out in the wilderness in an open PvP game. Add to that that you can't free look while in the middle of mining and you're very vulnerable.
From the perspective of a gamer who has only played single player games or an MMO like WoW which (outside of raiding) are designed to be easy for a solo, casual player, I can see how this seems like bad game design. The perspective of someone who played UO in '99 is very different. Back in those days you had to take your mining alt outside town guard protection with a pack mule. In other words, you had to take a risk (getting PK'd) in order to obtain a reward (ore). Risk vs. reward is essential to MMO games. If there is no risk to gathering crafting materials, then everyone will do it causing a massive imbalance on the supply side. Excess supply in turn depresses the final value of crafted goods. How can crafting be a viable objective for a player if the market is flooded with cheap goods and they can't get any return on their investment of time and materials? This is Macro Economics 101.
We've already seen the positive effects of the resource changes in Darkfall as iron and steedgrass prices have risen since the change to global resource nodes. Armorsmiths and tamers are already seeing higher prices for their finished goods. I'm only speculating but I imagine the net effect here is that crafters who know what they are doing will benefit in the long run from these design choices in Darkfall.
Back to my anecdote... so the three of us grabbed some pick axes and set out to gather some ore to help get our guildmate get started with armor smithing. By working together three of us were able to tap out each metal node we found in about 5 minutes and quickly move on. Staying mobile is a good way to survive in Darkfall. We were also able to position ourselves around each node so that we had complete 360 degree coverage keeping an eye out for hostiles. Just hearing footsteps or a spell going off in the distance kept us alert and raised the tension level. More tension = more fun, even if it is mostly false alarms, like someone running by naked on a mount, etc.
We were attacked once towards the end of our run though. At first we even spotted a lone Maharim trying to sneak up on us. We stopped mining and assessed the situation. Then more bogeys showed up behind a few trees in the distance. Playing it safe we sent our crafter running in the opposite direction with all of our ore. Two of us stayed behind to make sure he got away and before we knew it six Maharim we're charging our position. Six on two odds with just our newbie weapons, some crappy armor and no food, pots or regs against equipped players is a losing battle. Our main objective was to ensure our compatriot made off with the goods so we rush into the middle of their group to get their attention then went into parry mode forcing them to waste tons of stam to take us down. I finally ran out of stamina and died in a hail of arrows but it took them over a minute to kill me and our guildmate was already halfway to the closest bank with a backpack full of ore. Even though two of us died, getting our ore out safely made it feel like we had won in the greater scheme of things. Especially since they wasted a ton of arrows for a couple of pickaxes!
Too long, didn't read version: Risk vs. Reward is good, even crafting/gathering can be fun in open PvP games!
Related posts: Broken Toys - Darkfall Improving, Now in 1999 Instead of 1997
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