Shattered Kingdoms

The world is so big. I want to believe that there is other scripted loot out there. But we want what we know exists. And if it doesn't exist to Patrisaurus, Finney, OA, Syn, Ardith, Peso, etc.. then it isnt worth having.

It is just weird to me the way items are limited in this game. It makes equipment feel fake and temporary. I played dragonrealms 10 years ago and items felt real because you could buy something rare and cool from a traveling merchant and sell it a year later for a nice profit. If I lost something like that it would be a tragedy. In this game if I find something nice I just need to know who to kill in case I ever lose it.

It also discourages exploration because unless someone recently lost their equipment, you're not likely to find anything good lying around and there is no indication about what could potentially pop up.

It comes back to the info wiki thing for me again. If more people knew where things came from they would be less likely to always end up on the same characters. Further, you'll never find out what magic devices do in character if they are always hoarded so how would my mage even know what to locate for? The guy who holds it knows what it does and where to go to get another. He also knows when is going to repop because the game waits until he uses it up to make more. Even if I kill him and take it, I can't "explore" to figure out where it repops unless I junk it, but while I am randomly searching, he knows where to go.

I'm excited to see if spreading knowledge around changes anything around here. Maybe we can work together and find out how much we actually know about pyrathia.

Amen

Holy spirit got you Aelandron?

I've said several times now that's not true, but oh well.


This is now in-progress. Stay tuned for more info soon.

Drifter's point is valid in that if you go around exploring an area whose gear is being hoarded, you aren't going to find anything useful, nor will you even know that you found someone who ordinarily possesses something beyond the mundane. That's at the moment just the price that is paid for having limited items.

I understand his point and it's partially valid. But it's also partially not valid. Because you don't expect to find anything, nobody goes out exploring anymore, and therefore don't discover tons of stuff that are still sitting on NPCs in areas that are no longer well understood.

That's an optimistic interpretation.

I think the point should be raised that true exploration is usually a slow and solo venture, but many new areas seem to be designed to challenge brisk groups of players in order to give out the good stuff. The solo player would thus see any knowledge as a resource that's advantageous if kept secret, and the risks to obtain new knowledge may not be attractive to certain playertypes who, nonetheless, like having nice things. Said another way, one of the iconic features of exploration games, in my experience, is a pause button.

Most of the time I found new-to-me areas in the game, I was in a group and had to go back and read logs to even understand where we were going and what we were pulling and turning and pushing to get there. The areas I've explored solo have either been empty and dry of engagement (segments of the underdark,) inaccessible through what might be age (a certain dwarf city), or Gygaxian death traps (Temple of Spiders.)

If you explore one fruitless area, you learn to not try to explore others. It's an unexpected (or perhaps unintended) consequence of item scarcity. Looking at it from a player perspective is different from a designer perspective, I think, and can yield to a different prognosis for exploration.

Also, to keep the ball rolling, is there some problem with the locate object spell? Because looking for mithril and energy and such do *not* give the impressions that you report...

What got me to explore back then was when I located something I knew it was in a certain area. Like when a new area opened, you would know the new stuff you had located would be there. Knowing there is something is what drived me to explore areas and get to know a couple of areas - some now removed - inside out.

Currently I don't have time to explore areas that -may- have items, that -may- have secrets to unlock etc. It needs to be suggested that the things are there when they are there if you want to wake my exploration gene. Like have NPC's tell you that they heard that this Mr. Nastyfoot in the Scout Camp is said to have regained his adamantite boots, for some money. Then I'd maybe go looking for this Mr. Nastyfoot.

Writing about where you can find certain loot in books is cool as well, like it was done with a lot of the old loot.

Oh, and then again there the problem of the low the nymber of players are. Some areas take numbers, or a certain combo of players to explore.

I'm pretty sure I've died at least10 times trying to explore the orc hive. I finally made it through the whole thing when I made a mr barb. I tried exploring with priests and sorcs but I found several random no magic rooms that drop charms and sanctuary filled with aggro NPCs with reaching weapons. That's why I never got big into exploring.