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I started an thread on T-9 Powers but then it occurred to me that we should think about the beginning as well. What will be going on right after the players hit the city? Since this is MUCH more likely than getting to the end in a week I suggest we at least give it some thought. Are we going to have missions straight away, a tour of the AH and Training area or what?
Discuss.
I remember when Star Wars was cool...a long, long time ago...
I think I will take a "wait and see" action on this one.
I cant speak to what there WILL be or SHOULD be... but I can think of some things I'd like to see.....
I would love it, if "tutorial" was split into two halves:
In the first half, characters spawn in a private instance (instanced, but an outdoor environment) and engage in their first missions. depending on an initial choice (the kickstarter updates imply that you'll be choosing a "base" alignment choice to start out with, hero, anti-hero, vigilante, villain... or something along those lines... that is then augmented or altered as you make choices in game)
As an example:
as a hero, new on the scene, you encounter a named villain causing mischief on the scene (I have in mind a scene I remember where Spiderman runs into Rhino trying to break into a bank.... that sort of event is what I'm thinking)
Villains might break into that bank themselves (to fund their future crime wave?)
Vigilantes might break into a gang hideout with extreme prejudice
and an anti-hero might need to break out of custody...
basically, a quick, themed series of mission (no more than four) to acquaint new players with the basic controls of the game... and act as a means of how you initially become noteworthy in Titan City (with a simple mission arch and instance rooms.... I could imagine the devs potentially cranking out a dozen or more of these different starter missions... call them "origin" missions or "day one" missions, or some such, and allowing players to choose one that fits their character, given a simple description of each)
After characters "made their name" in the city, they receive their first level up and move on to the open world.
The first "in game" arch would serve as an open world tutorial introducing players to the less overt mechanics in the game (giving them an education on the "process" involved in acquiring new missions and progressing along their desired path (what actions "should/could" produce what results...and what potential consequences might exist)) particularly if the suggested mission-crafting system comes to fruition.
This would be a longer tutorial, that basically fades into the background as levels progress, with updates popping in as new features become available (like power pools or TC's equivalent.)
If players choose to skip the tutorial (which should be possible to do after experiencing it once) they would be transported directly to Phoenix plaza/cityhall/alternative starting point based on "alignment" choice.... with the intro level ready to be leveled up (with which ever system the devs choose for that)
I always felt like COX's tutorials were too long, and involved busy work.... I like Champion's feeling of "fixing a problem" but it's even longer.
As for beyond the tutorial, something I've always wanted (COH soooooooort of tried to do this) is to have different inital mission arch based on the type of hero you are (one reason i'm SUPER hopeful for the mission-generation/creation systems suggested)
I would love for my cosmic hero to be embroiled in preventing an invasion before it begins, while my hometown hero is fighting joberish semi-joke villains (paste-pot pete... mirror master, anyone?) and my vigilante works his way up the ranks of a corruption conspiracy....
yes, over the course of the game they'll likely all get wrapped into more universal threats, but I would love to be able to feel like Batman or the Flash or Nova, or Gambit right out of the gate... not through my power choices, but through the threats I have to face, and how I have to face them...
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
I wouldnt mind seeing AT based tutorials, one for Controllers, Blasters, etc... where you are challenged to use a certain power at a critical moment.
Ex: to Immobilize a foe and in sucessfully doing so, a cutscene shows the Foe standing in a spot right under a Piano and the rope breaks... falls on the bad guy... and he is halled away in a patty wagon. :)
Things like that to show how important it is to use good timing and good judgement when using certain powers. But that might get boring if done for each new power you get. I would just try it for the 1st 2 or 3 powers that the players gets by default for the super short tutorials.
Champions Online had short cutscenes for learning how the mechanics worked, but honestly... i watched them like 8 times and I still only understood 80% of it, until i actually tried it. If we could blend 20 to 30 seconds CutScenes with Try It right after approach, it might lower the lurning curve for n00bs.
I started an AE Mission Arc that was basically a teaming tutorial. The player (it was intended for solo) was grouped with a Tanker in the first mission, a Defender in the second, a Controller in the third and a Blaster in the fourth. This let you see how your character would work with each of the primary flavors of teammate. What if the Tutorial was something like that? You get teamed with someone with a very specific powerset and you need to help them defeat or accomplish X.
I remember when Star Wars was cool...a long, long time ago...
+1 for This ^
You could even get handed off to different AT's as you go through the tutorial. I don't mind it taking a bit of time if you're actually learning useful techniques and, coincidentally, you're gaining enough experience to level and get another power at the end. Always seemed worth it to me before the advent of Sewer Runs. This would be especially true if it's different for each AT.
Hey...one thing the Devs have been saying is they want to avoid Sewer Runs and do real content. In CO the tutorial gets you to like level 5 IIRC. Why not spit the difference? The tutorial would get the character to lay level 2 (first new power), walk them through combat with a couple of different ATs to let them get their feet wet and then turn them loose.
I remember when Star Wars was cool...a long, long time ago...
That's sort of what I was calling for.... but I want the "true tutorial" to be super straightforward... just a quick "fight" of some sort that establishes the game mechanics (imagine if all you did was go across the grounds to escape the prison... or just went to the end of the first street, hero-side, or in Champs if you only took on the Champs HQ instance)
then you go to the real world and can choose to just go find your own missions, or follow a starter arch that gives you a more in depth instruction on the game's features. (like your AT missions)
..actually, sort of like a quickie version of how EvE did it's tutorial/early missions...
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
"Origin" based tutorials... not magic, tech, etc. but hero, villain, antihero, volunteer, whatever...
The first part would be different, but a little ways in they merge.
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
Oh, I was just theming the initial instance so people who claimed to be villains or anti-heroes wouldnt get stuck with a 'save the citizen' mission as a tutorial... my thinking was that this themed instance tutorial would be exceedingly brief.... the barest minimum to show how to use abilities, move, etc...
...THEN, after that very brief instanced tutorial, players would enter the persistant world... there to either play as they will...OR engage further in the 'tutorial' missions, which would consist of these AT familiarity missions...
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
Do [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjXVhA86Vr4]THIS[/url] for a Tutorial and win the internets.
/em impales tongue into cheek
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
Bookmarking this one. I already have a tutorial and intro to the city planned, but I am very interested in finding out what people want.
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IANAL, IMHO, WYSIWYG, YMMV, IIRC, AFAIK, ETC
[color=#ff0000]Composition Assistant Director, Composition Team[/color]
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In which case ... perhaps it would be helpful for us to list out what elements we believe a tutorial ought to include by its conclusion. Things like:
Movement controls.
Interaction with NPCs.
Use of Powers.
[b]BASIC[/b] combat.
Target Dummies.
Inventory.
Use of temporary buffs (ie. Inspirations).
Alignment selection(s).
Instances.
Level Up process.
Can anyone think of other elements that ought to be included in a tutorial?
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
we need target dummies? I always felt like they were a wasted step :-/
maybe have them exist, but not be a specific "mission"
My list would be:
[b]For the basic tutorial--[/b]
movement
interactions (whether it's an instance door or an NPC, it's the same control, imo)
chosen alignment (i'm assuming that we self define in the CC, before we are allowed to make honor/law/violence choices)
powers/combat
Level up process
once you're in the big bad world we can encounter other elements
[b]Things I would include in the "extended" tutorial:[/b]
use of temporary buffs
inventory
AT roles/functions in combat
mission types
What actions (in general) cause what effects to one's chosen alignment
Paths (if they survive the development process)
investigations (if they survive the development process)
Level up process redux (power pools or any ancillary information)
I believe this second portion should be pretty much on rails, for new players to get a handle on the wealth of options the game provides (particularly how Titan's AT's work and how alignment and mission acquisition can function differently) and give a little structure to the game for new players (so the "freedom" of the path/mission dynamic can come at them slower and with less text bricks until they're vets to the concept)
And can be completely ignored by more seasoned players (who can, instead, go off and start investigating or whatever right away)
I can't emphasize enough the value of having a short, private instance to get the basics down, followed by immediate transition into the "real world". Tutorials of the past became little worlds of their own... they were big enough to get comfortable in, enough to make the unseasoned feel "adrift" without a clear cut mission to send them out into the wild.
much better to, imo, keep new players' excitement at it's peak going into the real world, so they feel compelled to "get comfortable" with the actual game world, instead of an instance.
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
I like the concept of a VERY basic intro to mechanics, then the option of jumping into the City or following a more detailed tutorial. Now, if the first few mission arcs/levels of gameplay are segregated by, and geared toward, different AT's/Alignments/whathaveyou, that might accomplish the same thing.
From a design/feel standpoint the main DCUO tutorial level was very effective in that it took place in a very confined place (Brainiac ship interior) with a straightforward path. Then, when you've actually accomplished the set goal, you are sent to the world where the "Great Vista of the City" is presented. (cue the string section with some underlying woodwinds)
It would also be interesting to have the [i]initial[/i] part of the tutorial be generic -- everyone gets the same familiarization with the controls -- and then continue with an introduction to the 'build up a mission from clues' mechanic that results in the character encountering a situation that they can respond to in different ways -- one for each of the initial roles -- so they can either continue with the same role they picked during character creation or decide they didn't really want [i]that[/i] role and choose a different one. So you'd get an instanced mission that would be specific to the role you'd chosen as the conclusion to the tutorial that could all be based off the same general situation -- say, one of the low-level groups hit [facility] and stole [MacGuffin], taking some hostages in the process, and you've found that they've gone to ground in [location]. You would perhaps have the choices of a) teaming up with the hero who shows up to rescue the hostages and recover the item, b) go in by yourself to pound the villains and recover the item, c) go in to steal the item from the villains to keep for yourself, or d) offer to join up with the villains to defeat the hero(s) that show up to free the hostages and recover the item.
War, I think the idea was more a means of familiarizing you with the OTHER ATs, and in the process, getting to know how your new character would "fit" in the grand scheme of things, AT-wise (not so much "this is how you play a Tank" but more "you're a blaster, and this NPC is a tank... see how things work better when you let him take aggro?")
Sr. Malloy, I think that idea would constitute WAY more programing than a supposed "simple" tutorial deserves.
honestly, if you chose "hero, vigilante, anti-hero, or villain" from the CC menu (and we're assuming the Devs give us a basic discription of each) then you KNOW what sort of situations you might be involved in, come tutorial (and it might even be a perk, knowing that the tutorial is different based on that initial character choice)
having it be the SAME mission, just choosing a different path, doesn't have the same freshness too it...
...combined with a significantly more tedious and complicated process of success (having to figure out who to talk to and what options you have to complete the mission... all while still coming to grips with the basic controls...)
...and I just don't see that as a viable option for a tutorial mission (from a "quick/painless/efficient" perspective.)
That said, it could be the basis for an awesome "first time you have to make an alignment choice in game" type mission... where you can choose to go in hard, sneak in, betray your henchmen, or defeat the would-be hero to succeed in your hostage negotiation (with choices that fall along the honor/law/violence paradigm)
perhaps as the culmination of the persistent world's "in-depth tutorial" that can take much longer and progress the new character a couple levels by completion...
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
oh, and War... I actually thought the DCUO tutorial was too long.... if that gives you a better idea of how "short" I'm really thinking, for this instanced tutorial.
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
I'm going to place a marker here.
I think that the [url=http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Precinct_5]Precinct 5[/url] Tutorial released with the all new Nova Praetoria content makes for a decent benchmark for what a Tutorial ought to contain. The one fault I had with it was that at the end of it the choice for Resistance or Loyalist gets pushed upon you with very little understanding of the consequences your choice will entail. For anyone who has already played the Nova Praetoria content, the understanding of the choice is not that difficult, but for anyone who is NEW to the game, it was essentially a forced choice with no understanding of the ultimate meaning of what was being chosen for.
In a City of Titans context, I'm thinking it would be a lot more interesting if Players started out "middle of the road" on all three alignment axes (Law, Integrity, Violence) and during the course of the tutorial you get confronted with Three Choices (preferably at different points and times) where you get to choose to +/- on one of the three alignment axes, which then is enough to tip your character into any particular "camp" of alignment archetypes (hero, vigilante, rogue, villain, anti-hero, anti-villain, loose cannon, etc. etc. etc.). The selection of these Three Choices could be done in much the same style as the Resistance vs Loyalist decision points in Praetoria, although with a clearer reading of what your choices will mean.
Law is Blue.
Integrity is Gold.
Violence is Red.
Low values on the three axes would be darker colors of the base hue, while high values on the three axes would be brighter/whiter colors of the base hue ... with the basic understanding that low values are "villainous" and high values are "virtuous" so as to keep things organized. Although that sounds a bit backwards in the case of Violence, the easiest way to understand and conceptualize a "low" Violence alignment score would be that the character has a low "threshold" for resorting to violence, while a "high" Violence score means that the character is reluctant/resistant to resorting to Violence and needs much stronger/firmer motivations before choosing the Violent solution.
So using such a system, Batman would have a middling Law, high Integrity and low Violence set of scores. He respects the Law, but often works outside of it ... he has great Integrity in that he delivers on his promises and has a code of honor that he lives by ... and he is quick to resort to Violence in order to achieve his objectives, such as pulping street thugs to interrogate them for information. So mid-blue, bright gold, dark red.
I mention the colors because those could be used to help frame the context of the Choices being offered, such that a brighter or a darker shade of the same hue color gives another indicator for which choice results in which direction of movement. Furthermore, the bright/dark shading should always have enough of a contrast to key Players as to which choice does what on the respective alignment axis. Extra bonus points for keying the midpoint between the two shades of color to reflect the character's current position on that particular axis ... so as the character's Violence score gets lower and lower, the coloration of the Two Choices being given to them when confronted with a Violence Decision keep getting darker and darker too (although one will still be lighter relative to the other). You follow me?
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
first off, thank you for using (accidentally or on purpose) "integrity" instead of "Honor"
Secondly.... I definitely like the use of light/dark colors to show positive and negative directionality.... but the rhetoric here is muddy...
Violence is a great example.... it's sort of a squishy subject (HAH!) in that are we suggesting that a character is a "shoot first" kind of character or is this in refrerence to his/her propensity to leave people crippled or dead?
A person who chooses violence over diplomacy is definitely "high violence"
but is a person who is always beating up badguys, but just roughs them up, vs breaking their kneecaps.... "low violence" or "high?"
Law is similar, in that it is entirely dependant on the laws of Titan City.... Assault and Battery are highly illegal.... if one citizen just beat up another citizen, they should go to jail... but do the same rules apply to heroes?
in comic lingo, a Superhero generally works with the authority of the law (wild west sheriff), alongside traditional law enforcement against super-threats.... while a Vigilante works "outside the law" and, if caught, would face all the same legal accountability a criminal would.
So... what makes someone, and more importantly a particular paradigm choice, more "lawful" in this game..... will we know? will there be an outline of "hero laws".... or will it boil down to generic acts (saving people good, robbing people bad)?
Honor is equally mushy, but thankfully you and I, red, are going with Integrity, which is much more cut and dry.
Basically, the problem I see, is that these three categories are not good vs bad... and so the rhetoric of establishing that going in direction X is "dark" while going in direction Y is "light" attempts to polarize concepts that (I believe) were intentionally chosen to NOT BE polarized.
you can be outside the law, and a perfect model of a hero
you can have exemplary honor or never use violence and be the darkest of evil men...
and, just using your example.... intuitively, having "low violence" mean "high propensity for violence" makes no sense. High should always be the greater having/using of a property.
higher use of law
more integrity
more violence.
..and because you've equated more violence with "bad" (dark) rather than "good" (light) your system is forced to be counter-intuitave.... which was the whole value of the colors in the first place
as an alternative... which if "middle" was "low saturation" (i.e. "grey")
and that each choice was more or less "bright"
so, if you are making choices along the same path (more violent) you get "redder".... but ALSO if you follow the path of "less violent" it would grow increasingly red.
it's only when you try to go the "wrong way" that things get duller, greyer...
so you can intuitively register that your choice would move you in the "wrong direction" without ever making a moral judgement about which direction is good or bad.
(so, as you prove yourself more OR less lawful, your color choices following your chosen path become MORE blue... but choices in the opposite direction appear LESS blue (more grey))
This removes any stigmatizing effect of being lawful/unlawful, violent/nonviolent, honorable/dishonorable...... and only informs you that your current choice will potentially negate previous ones.
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
Agreed. I was only using it to illustrate the "Closed In" transitioning to "Wide Open" feel. Psychologically "freeing" the player, so to speak.
I don't see the two as mutually exclusive. What you mention here is what I thought of as the optional "more detailed tutorial". I think this could, and should, take a bit of time. As we get more experienced, or more impatient :), I'd expect folks will want to skip it. That's all.
/em shrug
Unfortunately, the rhetoric [i]has to be muddy[/i] because you aren't dealing with absolutes ... Good vs Evil ... Law vs Chaos ... to borrow the worn out example of AD&D.
Laws can be used to enforce and maintain tyranny.
Integrity (or honor) can be used as a "trap" to manipulate people and coerce them.
Violence can be used to control through force rather than reason, ala Might Makes Right.
All of these principles and concepts are TOOLS rather than fundamentals, and whether they be used for Good or for Evil (or for Order or for Chaos) depends on the [b]character[/b] of the people who espouse them.
City of Heroes tried to set everything up as some kind of Morality Play. Here are the "Bad Guys" and you beat them up, and there are the Civilians and they cheer for you. Paragon City and the Rogue Isles were playing more along the Good vs Evil axis mainly, or if you prefer on the Greater Good vs the Selfish Interests. Praetoria wasn't organized along those lines AT ALL. In Praetoria, the tension wasn't so much as Good vs Evil as it was between Order vs Chaos ... with the Loyalists representing Order and the Resistance espousing Chaos. That's why trying to cast Praetoria in a "good vs evil" light often failed so badly ... because neither side was about "good" or even about being "evil" ... but rather about "control" being in opposition to "freedom" ... even when "freedom" essentially meant death of the human species at the "hands" of the Devouring Earth ... and the Hamidon that lay in wait outside the city's defensive barriers.
Case in point ... I have little doubt that if the Player aided Calvin Scott in [url=http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Dark_Watcher#Finale:_The_People.27s_Minds.2C_the_People.27s_Health]destroying the Enriche plant[/url], leaving people with nothing but "unclean and untreated water" for [i]six months[/i] would have given Hamidon and the Devouring Earth the foothold needed (think spores!) to "infect" the populace of Praetoria sufficiently so as to transform enough of the surviving humans inside the city to "lay the seeds" for the destruction of Praetoria and end of the Cole Administration, toppling the last bastion of humanity that is holding out against the Devouring Earth. That wasn't a Good vs Evil choice, because BOTH choices were "evil" (effectively) ... but rather a choice between Order and Chaos ... with Calvin Scott fanatically in favor of "freedom at all costs!" no matter how many lives were lost in the process, and Provost Marchand on the other side, fighting for "public security" so that mankind could hang on by their bloodied fingernails for just a few more days. There were no "good" choices to be had here ... only Bad and Less Bad ... a decision between the lesser of two evils.
To which I can only sit back and applaud the brilliance of the writing team responsible for crafting those story elements with a heartfelt appreciation!
So when you say that the rhetoric can get a little muddy ... I see that as a sign of setting things up RIGHT. I see that as a Feature, not as a Bug in the formulation.
Perhaps a better way of looking at the question is in terms of Resistance To Violence, rather than as a Propensity To Violence. Frame it as a Resistance To Violence and you have the setup that I was describing, where someone with a low Violence score will be (metaphorically speaking) just as willing to kill you as look at you because their "resistance to violence" is Low. Remember, I did use the term "threshold" with respect to "resorting to Violence" and the implication of that is that if the threshold is Low then the character is in effect quick to resort to Violence to solve problems in a Might Makes Right sort of way in a classic "the strong shall (and should!) rule over the weak" kind of mentality.
I'm thinking this would perhaps be better thought of as how tightly the character "binds" themself to the Law(s) of the City, with the most obvious expression of that being working with Police, SWAT and the District Attorney as well as fighting general "lawlessness" in the streets (aka "street sweeping" in Paragon City and the Rogue Isles) at high Law scores. Think [url=http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Blue_Steel]Blue Steel[/url] ... and especially the [url=http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Blue_Steel#Blue_Steel_Meme]Blue Steel Meme[/url]! With low Law scores, the character might BE the purse snatcher stealing from Civilians on the street, or shooting up cop cars and robbing banks and jewelry stores and so on, rather than just watching all the NPCs have fun doing those things.
Well, I chose light and dark simply because striped vs polka dotted seemed to me like it wouldn't be easily or widely accepted, let alone intuitively understood. As for polarization ... there's going to be high and low "poles" on either end of all three axes, so it's kinda hard NOT to have some sort of polarization on them of some kind. The thing is, it's a mistake to just assume that high Law, high Integrity and high Violence scores mean that your character is (by default) a "heroic good guy" type of person. Emperor Marcus Cole of Praetoria was high Law, high Integrity and high (resistance to) Violence (in that he rarely resorted to it, because he didn't need to, usually) ... and yet that Marcus Cole was [url=http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Tyrant]THE TYRANT[/url] ... proving once again that the road to hell is paved with good intentions (which both Dr. Aeon and Protean, the writers for City of Heroes, affirmed publicly on more than one occasion at the Player Summits).
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
I think we're saying the samething:
our choices won't beinherently polar.
but by making them dark v light, your suggestion shoehorns them into polar dynamism (less violent (what you actually had to call 'positive' on the violence scale) becomes 'good' and more violent becomes evil.... etc et al)
I was merely pointing out this rhetorical flaw, while comending the over all suggestion, and offering an alternative (where 'brighter' color signified greater progress in your already determined path towards one extreme or the other)
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
The problem with THAT idea is ... how does the computer know what your preferred state is on all three axes of alignment? Your system presupposes that a defined "target point" has been defined and the character is working to reach it (or at least stick to it). I'm not sure that's an operative assumption to be making as far as the user interface is concerned. Reason I say that is because I don't want the Devs defining what alignments MY character(s) ought to have into fit into a particular "category" on the Hero To Villain spectrum, mainly because I want the system to be more open ended (and open to interpretations) than that.
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
I just don't want my character to be the 'victim' of a scripted morality.
I see it often enough in SW:TOR, where the answer I choose leads to dialogue that I would Not choose, alienates my companions, and gives me 'morality' points that I did not want. *Surprise!* You've just been pigeon-holed.
No thanks to that.
Be Well!
Fireheart
Uh, very easily. If we're presuming an axis system (so, X,Y,Z) then (0,0,0) is true neutral. I'm going to use law, for my basic example, and use your colors from above
From 0:
+1 law increases the color of positive law choices (arbitrary +/- here, just for the sake of axis movement) from grey to blue to bright blue
- 1 law increases the color of negative law choices from grey to blue to bright blue.
See how it works, it makes no difference if you choose to be lawful or unlawful, what matters is how [i] consistant[/i] you are. If you are relatively inconsistant (in the basic binary terms) then your lawful score would always be "greyish" (fitting, no?) however, as you stick to a particular path, choices along that path become more brightly colored.
Functionally, if you were +5, a +2 choice would look identically, color-wise, to a -5 character making a -2 choice. (of course the "+" and "-" would be hidden to further prevent rhetorical polarism)
essentually, you are either becoming "more blue" or "more grey"... where blue represents EITHER extreme, and grey represents NEITHER extreme.
nope, it merely judges where you are on the scale and increases or decreases saturation of the visual based on the choice you make.
Again, it REMOVES rhetorical definitions, it doesnt add them.
your previous suggestion of "darker/lighter" versions of a color implies a moral statement about such choices... where following the "dark" path of a given parameter (Law, Integrity, Violence) would be viewed as evil/villanous, while the "light" path would be viewed as good/heroic.
what i'm suggesting is seperating ANY good/bad rhetoric from the system you suggested, and so rather than going from "Dark to Light"... in a left-right scale (0-10, or whatever) that, instead, it goes from "Median to Extreme" so Grey defines no proclivity (a "5 out of 10", or a correlation coefficient at or close to 0) while COLOR defines a strong proclivity (1-4/6-10 out of ten, or a correlation coefficient at or close to 1 or -1).
It AVOIDS any sort of role classification based on alignment choices, both real and presumed. It avoids judging a character's actions visually and merely provides an aesthetic guide towards improving or moving away from previous choices.
when I say "path" i do not mean a narrative path, I mean the linear progression of 1/-1 choices made mechanically.
if you choose 1 ten times, then you are at a +10 (so to speak) and choosing -1 would move you the opposite direction along that linear progression ("more grey" in color terms)
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
agreed, and i think the problem with such systems is that often they:
cannot accurately translate connotation used in the delivery (i.e. expected something to be wry/snarky, and it's delivered literally)
or the game intentionally hides what will actually be said, as a means of suspense (ME was big on this, giving you a "guestimate" of what Shepard was going to say, but have him say something that often did not have the same meaning)
personally, I really hope the Development team utilizes alignment through ACTIONS, rather than through dialogue trees.
basically if we could call in the cops, or kill a criminal.... let us choose one.
and make consequences for actions... if there's no reason to fight every goon in the warehouse, give us alignment points for making the extra effort, or avoiding as many as possible.
....that sort of thing.
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
Without giving away much, let me say I am pleased with the general tenor here: we seem to be on the same general page.
It may not make intuitive sense, but we are trying to create an 'alignment' system that is not a 'morality' system. We are actively trying to avoid value judgments on what good and evil are within the system itself.
Expect the NPCs you encounter to have a range of very strong opinions on what good and evil are, however.
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IANAL, IMHO, WYSIWYG, YMMV, IIRC, AFAIK, ETC
[color=#ff0000]Composition Assistant Director, Composition Team[/color]
[img]http://missingworldsmedia.com/images/favicon.ico[/img]
without giving too much away, myself....
... systems should be without moral judgement...... Characters, like people, should be ruled by their sense of morality.
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[i]....Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...[/i]
I would add to this list navigation.
Some games make finding your mission objectives and even, sometimes, the mission door, a real pain.
Also, I wonder if it would be crazy to include something about the mechanics of teaming. How to find a team, how to keep track of your teammates, can you "target through" a teammate and what could be the benefits/consequences, etc.
Teaming in CoH was pretty easy, but there were nuances that took a while to figure out. While everyone is a noob sometime, not everyone likes to have it pointed out the first time they join a group and don't know what to do or how to ask.
"I don't think you understand the gravity of your situation."
Sounds just the way I like it. ^_-
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
Rigel's comment about teaming is a good one. So is the comment about navigation IMHO
I remember when Star Wars was cool...a long, long time ago...