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Hey guys/gals, I am starting this thread to hopefully gather some good info on MMO's. I think a resource like this could prove valuable to anyone looking to make there own custom add-ins to the EMU. These questions apply to more than just EQ/EQ2.
My three questions are quite simple:

1) What were the things you LOVED about your favorite MMO?


2) What were the things you HATED?


3) What were the things you wanted to see implemented but weren't?


Thanks in advance to those who post useful info.

Hope my message can help.

1- I think after people the most i like on mmorpg is HUGE WORLD, size of world is very important for me : i like to be lost and explore :)
2- I dislike pvp (sorry :p) but i hate stupid player, i think programmer can't make anything against that.
3- Best implemented ? Design my zone on the world !, If each player can design or manage a zone, world can be bigger and more interesting :)

Large range of zones/mobs/plots


LOL so much to say here:

1) AI that sucks. FYI I have a background in the application of ALife to modelling Ecologocal Systems. I was pretty excited back in 2000 when a mob in WF seemed to run away from me, circle around behind me and attack again. Alas it was only an atrifact... If I ever get hold of a machine with the balls to run the server cleanly I intend to see what I can do about this in EQEmu, focusing on:

a) Mobs that learn to deal with players.
b) Mobs with goals and strategies to try to meet those goals

2) Ecological failures. Mobs that survive long enough could "grow" (increase in levels) and "advance" (Orc Pawns -> apprentices or centurions, apprentices -> Oracles, Oracles -> Priests, Centurians -> Legos/smiths, Legos -> Chiefs, Chiefs -> Lords). Mobs should rely on food species (spiders eat beetles). Mobs should react to population pressures (If Deathfist population gets strong enough they should attack Freeport/Neriak)

3) reliance on Guilds (and raids) to advance beyond a particular point.


1) Players having opportunities to create persistant changes in the world (note that I'm not talking about one-off quests etc).

Understanding that the concept is severely limited by serverside hardware, what about taking a game with play area equivalent to the size of EQ and all the expansions and making it into one, seamless, no-zoneline style game? Forgetting about all the other problems it would create by doing this to EQ, is a super-large seamless world preferable to a zoned one?

To what extent? I used to be a huge Shadowbane junkie till the lag and bugs forced me to quit, but in that game you can build cities, destroy them, own buildings, etc. Is this what you are talking about?

He he, ignoring all the points you listed above (all of which are very real problems), I think that there would be a problem with a "giant seamless world" whenever you cross an ocean or sea. Zoning allows you to create an illusion of scale which I can't see any way of getting in a seamless world without introducing exceedingly boring boat rides. Not like the old boat rides from when the boats worked - I mean incredibly, mind-numbingly boring. Mind you, perhaps a lot of work could be done to make boats interesting, but I don't think it would work. To those who say "just use the translocators", the TL Gnomes shrunk Norrath, and IMHO really hurt the immersion.

I think there'd have to be a pretty novel approach to pre-loading textures and models at the client end to do it properly as well. Not impossible, but probably very very tricky. Can we say laaaaaag....?

On persistant player caused changes....
I can imagine a game where:

a) Players can "carve out" a kingdom in the wilderness. Forget little Guild Halls in PoK, Guilds could get their own "kingdoms" . See (c) below for an interesting approach to this.
b) Mobs "conspire" to deal with those pesky players who have built a reputation for messing with them. If "Bunty, Slayer of Faeries" is high level, surely any and all Faeries anywhere around Bunty would be fleeing and hiding from him. Perhaps they'd even be recruiting other mobs to deal with Bunty... I'm talking about something way beyond any simple "faction" based system here.
c) The ability for player created "mini-zones" to be added into the world. Lot's of issues about balance, moderation etc here. Also the question of where is the server-side for this "mini-zone" hosted - with the main server, or as a feature of the client, in which there are obvious bandwidth and hardware limits to consider.
d) When Patricia, who single handedly turned the tide in the Undead Invasion of Qeynos arrives at the city gates, why arn't the locals throwing flowers, young men and strong drink in her direction?
e) In a PvP twist, could a city/town/culture offer rewards for slaying a notorius evil-doer? Imagine if the young inkies could get rewards for taking out that dirty Human Paladin who keeps killing the Guards at the Bridge in Nek? i.e. Certain patterns of play could enable you to be flagged Red in certain zones or situations - but only to the right races/classes/levels.

I could go on, but my wife is beating me with a stick for giving away my ideas for a great MMORPG... Ouch! Ouch! Not the electrodes!!!!

ZZAAAAPPP!

I'd like to point out that during the dot-com bubble days I was CTO of a cpy that was supposed to be marketing a cunning statistical approach to limiting what info is sent to the client in "wide zone" games. There are ways to select what should be pre-loaded and notified, but doing it reliably (without warpage) is tricky. To be blunt, doing it right is a technique that should be worth money (I dodge the OSS purists at this point) because (1) it involves some damn cunning thinking from (2) someone who has spent far too much of his life in school and reading maths books. I was doing it on a scale of a motor race or sports field (so a max of about 20 mobs [AI and players] to contend with). Doiing it when you might have (say) 50 AIs and 100 Players to contend with is much harder (read polynomial time - cubic with massive shortcuts and assumptions, and O(x)=x^2 lg(x) for space requirements, which adds up damn fast, and I never considered what spells might do to my algorithms - probably horrible things).

Hmmmm, I think I might have to remove my parenthesis keys...

1 - I loved EverQuest in the Planes because as an Enchanter I always had a place in the group, my job was flexible but I did not have the capability to do anything everyone else could do (Sony's way of balencing, give everyone everything). I could solo and get extremely decent reward in certain spots and I could group in certain spots and get even better, instead of setting group as the standard and solo as anything less.

2 - When other classes abilities destroyed the abilities of other classes. For instance, if there is a Ranger, Cleric and Tank, the Enchanter's main ability is destroyed. Sometimes this is inevitable, but it was an annoyance.

3 - Family guild oriented events. Content for the fun of it and not for the reward l33t 300+ STR stats of it. And not repetitive LDoN content.

I loved Kunark.

I hated all/any expansion after Scars of Velious(ruined classes)

Only thing they should have changed ASAP was the Complete Heal spell.