Scarred unatractive worlds. (worries)

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    • #2710

      Hi there Oortians and devs,

      I am worried about something that’s not a problem right now, but may become one in the future of oort online.

      So it’s an open world sandbox game, wich is a very cool and awesome concept.
      But imagine this.

      Game launches with 50 worlds, at launch there will be 10.000 players.
      that’s 200 people on 1 world.

      Those 200 people start exploring and mining and building. more people join in on these worlds what gives more mining and building.

      At first this seems like a normal thing but in a years worth of time, what would the worlds look like. My fear is that there will be worlds that are scarred and with very little recources. And that’s very unattractive for new players and future players.

      “but they’ll probably bring out more worlds then.” This is no solution. reason is once a new world opens allof the people start diging and exploring leaving that world scarred too after a few weeks or so.

      So i was wondering on how we could solve this problem with the dev’s and the oortian community.

      I thought about regenerating land. That basicly means that everything that is not claimed or privately owned get’s randomly regenerated over a certain amount of time. Or even a more extreme measure partial world resets where the upper layers (above sea level) remain the way they were but to regenerate the layers below. with the beacon areas excluded.

      I think we might want to tackle this problem before it exists.
      What do you guys think, what would be do able solutions (i’m no programmer so don’t know if my solutions are do able)

      POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS UPDATE #1

      So to sum everything up that has been disscussed up to now.

      The possible solutions(ideas) are:
      For Land and world:
      -Auto regenerationg land (after X amount of time)
      -Auto reseting land under sea level( beacon areas excluded, after x amount of time)
      -protect places where players tend to pass through alot in a 10x10x10 area.
      -EQ land marks with an up keep fee (not paying the fee = land reset + all blocks in mail/inventory)
      -Injecting the land with recources by events like giants/titans destroying a hill or a meteor shower.
      -Npc for land resets
      -Natural terraforming the nature reforms itself after the way the world looks now
      -different types of worlds with protection against destruction (read the topic: http://oortonline.com/forums/topic/how-will-the-world-look-after-players/ )

      For trees and wildlife(not yet discussed :)):
      -Automatic tree regrowth
      – Planting trees using the sapling method like in minecraft.
      -tree leaves regrow if trunk remains

      kind regards

      Phazer

    • #2712
      Bojeya
      Member

      This is actually a really, really good point which you are mentioning here.
      I like the idea of the regenerating land/reset for below sea level areas (excluding beacons of course)
      Im not quite sure if this is do able either. But it definitely would be a great way to keep the worlds friendly for new players.

      /discuss 🙂

    • #2720

      a little problem i noticed by regenerating terrain below sea leavel would be trees… they would not be regenerating. maybe make them drop saplings or make them auto grow after a while?

    • #2730
      mr.stuff
      Member

      I agree with the under sea level regen and if used with auto grow on trees it could work well together. I don’t know how any one else plays but on Minecraft If I fell a few trees I replant the saplings in the area meaning more trees would be growing so if players think about this then we shouldn’t have any major deforestation issues, it’s what is currently done excerpt they don’t take 20 years to grow.

    • #2734
      mr.stuff
      Member

      Just another thing on trees I as have others are using the red foliage as roofing for my castle. It would be nice for the trees to grow back the foliage if the trunks are left in place.

      • #2737

        i like this idea of leaves growing back!

        Give that man a cookie!

    • #2739
      Grimoire
      Participant

      What about players that build towns and homes underground? I know there are some dwarf goers here.

    • #2744
      Rukio
      Member

      I suggested something of the sort. Allow trees to grow back within a certain protective radius around beacons. That way trees aren’t growing inside your sacred temple!

    • #2747
      Zouls
      Participant

      some of us are going to build underground so that would be a pain, you could make it so that dirt and wood would regenerate and stone wouldnt, that way we wouldnt have to waste a beacon for a free pass through a mountain.

    • #2748
      upsio
      Member

      I think the idea of using saplings is a good idea because when people build sometimes they want some controlled foliage in their area and if you make a sapling drop then that means if you live in a yellow world you could bring back red and orange tress from another world to spice up your home. after all you did have the talk about bringing colored grass from other worlds so why be able to bring over the different plants as well? but I do think that auto regrow outsides beacons will be needed because there will be the people who carelessly clear out a forest and do not replant and then that will cause a problem as when they need to gather wood they will go to another world and do the same.

    • #2760

      I think the beacons protect the underground part too, unless i’m mistaken…
      maybe put some sort of a timer there… wherever a player passes through wont regenerate. in a 10-10-10 area or so, that way tunnels and passages used frequently won’t just dissapear but tunnels and other things will slowly.

    • #2763
      azro2000
      Member

      Anyone familar with EQ Landmark? Its already being handled in that and Wonderstruck would be wise to mimic it.

      Basically, Beacons are like Claim Flags in EQ. You set your area and then it doesnt get regenerated over time. BUT, you have to pay an upkeep on it. If you fail to pay an upkeep, all blocks and items in that area are returned to you viz mail (along with the beacons themselves) and the land is set back to original state.

      If you dig, build, damage, etc land outside the beacons, the land goes back to its original state within (lets say) 30 minutes.

    • #2773
      mr.stuff
      Member

      This could work but it would have to be a larger period of time like a month. You would at least want to be able to find temples/caves systems/ dungeons and be able to explore with friends/guildies if it respawned in a small period of time u would not be able to recognise soundings in caves/dungs etc. I like the idea for the use of flags/beacons apart from the paying for up keep. I’m in the army so spend large periods of time away so would expect my beacon and building/base I’ve spent time and effort to build to stay In place for large periods of time 6 months or better indefinite.

    • #2782
      Hummel
      Member

      What about world events that ‘inject’ new materials/change landscape?

      I am absolutely NO fan of some magic suddenly building new blocks, ressources or similar under- or over ground. Trees and all sorts of greenery are not the problem, but dirt does not simply spawn, covering my ore vein i digged out the last days. On the other side, ressources are not endless, especially in multiplayer.

      Besides the idea to let the players fight for the ressources (which i am not a fan of either), why not let some world-events happen.

      Giants smashing a mountain, cracking the hull of the hills and doing believable changes to the landscape. With this happening, new ressources and specials can be “injected” to this area withoud having to explain a non-contextual ‘sudden-spawn-magic’

      My favorite (i’ve suggested that back in the early days of minecraft) would be some kind of “meteor storm” or “thunderstorm”. Those could hit areas that are not owned by players (beacons). Those meteors/lightnings could easily inject new materials to the world: deep in a small crater and the layers beyond (a meteor “melts” everything, so this is easy to have a reason) + material/blocks (maybe rare blocks!!) scattered around on the surface (more or less close to the crater area).

      Two easy, believable ideas..but i can see, this won’t be easy to add it to the game 😉

    • #2786
      mr.stuff
      Member

      I like the meteors idea it’s used in Terraria it drops in the area and changes the terrain creating creators etc and an influx of new resources.

    • #2789
      Thorbjorn
      Member

      http://oortonline.com/forums/topic/how-will-the-world-look-after-players/

      Also you could get some kind of Fea Npc doing some strange magic and then the nature repairs itself.

      • This reply was modified 9 years, 7 months ago by Thorbjorn.
      • #2791
        Thorbjorn
        Member

        Please guys remember to check around the forum before you make any new topics it is gonna become very crowded with topics if people keep starting new ones.

      • #2824
        Grimoire
        Participant

        I agree, too many people are starting new topics for suggestions and such that have already been brought up and are just cluttering the forums.

    • #2811
      QuilkSilver1
      Member

      This is one of the best points i have seen on the forum.

    • #2852
      Karko
      Member

      This is the biggest problem for the developers to solve. Beacons will not fix this problem no matter how they are implemented. The space between the claims will be strip mined into a mess of utter shit. If you have ever played on a minecraft factions server that has been online for a year you know exactly what it looks like. I think regenerating unclaimed land over time is the best solution I have heard so far. Slow resource re-spawn might work, something like rats and asteroids in EVE.

    • #2858

      So to sum everything up that has been disscussed up to now?

      The possible solutions(ideas) are:
      For Land and world:
      -Auto regenerationg land (after X amount of time)
      -Auto reseting land under sea level( beacon areas excluded, after x amount of time)
      -protect places where players tend to pass through alot in a 10x10x10 area.
      -EQ land marks with an up keep fee (not paying the fee = land reset + all blocks in mail/inventory)
      -Injecting the land with recources by events like giants/titans destroying a hill or a meteor shower.
      -Npc for land resets
      -Natural terraforming the nature reforms itself after the way the world looks now
      -different types of worlds with protection against destruction (read the topic: http://oortonline.com/forums/topic/how-will-the-world-look-after-players/ )

      For trees and wildlife(not yet discussed :)):
      -Automatic tree regrowth
      – Planting trees using the sapling method like in minecraft.
      -tree leaves regrow if trunk remains

    • #2905

      I ran a minecraft server for 6 years, longest time up was close to think I believe and even though we only had 20 members, man the area around where we started was stripped and full of random half made creations it was very ugly.

      I am curious to see how the developers handle this. There is no quick and easy fix to this.

    • #2971
      Master_Chill
      Participant

      I’m not sure as to how much people have thought about this, but people could study the ancient ways of The Oort and become a powerfull wizard who can unleash the power of nature over certain area’s? Or create some potion to fasten the growth process of plants and trees so they’ll grow more quickly over certain area’s?

      Another thing I had in mind for this was the natural crumbling down of artificial buildings. This way, we’ll have to craft specific tools to maintain our (many) buildings, perhaps create specific jobs for them in cities. People would feel less inclined to build so much and would think things more through instead of building stuff willy-nilly here and there (like I saw happening so much in Minecraft). You could even go so far as to apply the real world gravity laws, this to further improve upon the experience. Meaning, add support beams, erode and maintain the roofs of buildings and so forth ..

      • #3014
        Kuma
        Member

        I usually build very much but never unneeded things and I wouldn’t want to have to look after every single building because it could dekay or erode.
        I also think that some physic laws are good in such a game but I wouldn’t try to make them as “hard” as in our real world. I would hate it if I were not able to build some flying stuff just because it would fall to the ground in the real world. If you want to have support beams you can “simulate” them.
        This way you can also show how much detail you can spot and bring into your buildings.
        Maybe you could have erosion to a certain degree if a player is away for more than a few months or longer. That way the game and the players would create new things to explore on their own.
        But on the other side would it be great if the landscape would “heal” itself. Holes would vanish and like said before only tunnels which are frequently visited would stay.

      • #3079
        Thorbjorn
        Member

        Well if the tool to maintain it was the beacon it wouldn’t be a problem 😉
        Also i agree in it would be a problem if you need to maintain your buildings.

        The idea of magic you could use to reset the world is cool but it is important it doesn’t work on ore. The low tier ones should re-spawn after a longer period of time and the rare ores should just be gone for sure

      • #3114
        Master_Chill
        Participant

        The whole idea behind the erosion of buildings, is that when players don’t take care of their stuff or are away for months or even years on end, the buildings become ruins/haunted. Creating new opportunities for other players to enter those ruins and raid them on their turn.

        I mean, imagine an entire town/village that’s been left to it’s demise after a few months. Vines and weeds growing thourgh/over the rooftops, lanternposts slightly flickering in the night, casting eerie shadows on the streets that are slightly being taken back by mother nature as buildings crumble down brick by brick. I’d love to stumble upon a village like that, at some point.

    • #3037
      Raymond
      Member

      Hi guys. Saw the comments here and just had to chip in. What I’m about to say may offend some – for that I apologise in advance.

      My views of the worlds are a little different from some that I’ve seen above.
      My ideas are based on the portal concept currently implemented in game. I see that every ‘player’ would start in their own ‘world’ that would have resources etc (think of it like a generated mine craft world). Now the player will have the ability to build/craft/mine etc and they would get to a stage where they can build a portal. The portal then becomes the gateway to the ‘main world/s’. This way the main worlds can have build restrictions so that the ‘nuke’ effect just cannot happen. I can merrily build/craft etc in my own world and then when I’m ready I can venture forth into the main game questing/exploring/fighting bosses/players etc. When I need to restock etc I could travel back to my world and sleep in my little old house I built. Next day I could craft myself up some new equipment and set forth again.

      Other players can venture into my ‘world’ and with permission I could allow them to build and mine etc. But this would be at my discretion. This would allow players to combine forces and ‘guild’ etc helping each other to build whatever they wished. Having players come in and grief is a MAJOR problem in mine craft. I realise that not having the ability, or restricted ability, to build in the main world/s may not be what some signed up for but I want a GAME. Not just a sandbox. Minecraft is a great sandbox without a game. Cubeworld is great little game with level progression/combat etc but there is no building. Having both is going to be a REAL challenge.

      Anyway – like I said – this is just a simple guys view on what I’d like to see. Hope I didn’t offend anyone.

      cheers,
      miniwrecker

      • #3078
        Thorbjorn
        Member

        Sadly you only get your own world if you rent one else this would work fine.
        We are discussing the problem of the worlds where the players spawn which should start to get messy quite quickly.

      • #3080
        Raymond
        Member

        Thanks for the feedback Thorbjorn. I can’t see why this couldn’t be part of the game. The player starting area doesn’t have to be a server, it can be an area controlled by the software to simulate your own world.

        I did not mean for each player to have their own server. 🙂

        Why couldn’t we have the option to expand the starting area which will be kinda like having your own server. I’m sure there are plenty of players that would like to build on a much larger scale. Look at the proliferation of Minecraft servers.

        For this game to be popular it needs the sandbox, but nobody wants to just make a prettier Minecraft.

        Anyway – these are just thoughts… 🙂

      • #3113
        Master_Chill
        Participant

        It’s why we have the beacons, mate. They’ll put an end to all the griefing problems, since nobody will be able to enter the perimeter inside the beacons when we are out to explore, raid and whatnot.

    • #3093

      for each player to have his or har own world will require alot of seerver space and computing power. if we get a palyer base of a thousand when beta launches ( wich is not alot) that would mean 1000 words and some world to explorer and battle pve. it’s better to have a world 20.000 by 20.000 blocks for example and put one player on each 1000 by 1000 blocks it might not seem much but still takes less server space and less computing power.

      That’s my point of view about it.

    • #3252
      Karko
      Member

      The Enlightened One is correct, let me expand on what he is saying. The game is an MMO and a single universe, and on top of that they want items to be of value and traded. So this pretty much rules out people running their own servers that are connected to the universe, because there will have to be a database backend to keep track of the items for players to travel between servers, and they can’t leave the door open to trusting information sent to them by third party servers, IE dupped items. And the game state can not be run locally for the same reason, data integrity. So we have to play in their environment to make this work.

      Now for each player to have their own environment this would require cpu to render the chunks of the world, RAM to keep track of the world around the player, and storage for the chucks to be unloaded into as the player walks around, and logs off. Server resources cost money whether you pay for them or not. The problem is the amount of resources required to give each player their own starting environment will not make business sense. That is why if you just buy the game you will have to play on public servers or on someones that is paying for it, because all of the players being on the same servers helps to reduce the cost maintaining them per player. However if your willing to shoulder the ongoing cost they will provide you with your own environment.

    • #3256
      Nyuudles
      Member

      I think this is where the developers are trying to solve the issue of mass-beaconing (or riddled blocks) by implementing guilds and cities. grouping the players together to create less clutter and more order. I’m still wondering how they’re going to work that out though… not all players are friendly once the official game is launched.

      Still, Guilds could be one solution to controlling (hopefully ATLEAST) the population from filling the world with wooden houses and mini villages, but not so sure about the resources. We’re stronger and faster in numbers after all.

      @Karko: My bad, I thought we were also discussing about the possibility of overpopulation since it also plays a role in keeping other players from finding resources (such as walling off every cavern of ores with beacons). I guess I was just imagining the world to be a lot smaller.

      • This reply was modified 9 years, 7 months ago by Nyuudles. Reason: replies
      • This reply was modified 9 years, 7 months ago by Nyuudles.
    • #3302
      Karko
      Member

      The problem is not what happens to protected land. The problem is what happens to the space between in protected land. Walk around these servers they are huge. Factions don’t claim land by spawn. They do about as far away as they are allowed. All the space in between is what we need a solution to.

    • #3370

      I think we can all agree on one thing, if this game gains the popularity of minecraft or even more; then a solution to this problem will decide wether the game will continue to grow and gain more players, or simply die after a few months.

      I hope to get a response of one of the devs on this topic.
      It would be very interesting to hear their take on this matter.

      I really want this game to remain for years. 🙂

    • #3394
      steen
      Member

      there is somthing i like to say also about the reg is that if you build underground like i do must of the time xD i think that the block you set well not be reg back to the normal state

      p.s sorry for bad english

      im from Eu

      also what about greifing i hope you make so other ppl cant remove your stuff :/

      i realy like the game it is looking good 🙂

      • This reply was modified 9 years, 7 months ago by steen.
      • #3423

        beacon can solve this, if you are buiding within it’s range ofcourse. ^^

    • #3436

      Here is another issue that I think has largely gone unnoticed. Resources and adventure sites.

      In a Traditional MMO when someone mines an resource plant or mineral it comes back after a cool down time.

      However in a game like this they are finite. Once you remove that block it is gone. This can create a strip mining effect. Imagine you spot the perfect piece of your land for your castle. You plop your beacon and drop a mine shaft only to discover the area below your beacon has been stripped of resources.

      Or worse still, imagine you go out on adventures and to look for resources and unless you walk an hour or so in other directions you will not find anything. No trees, or random holes in the ground. Adventure sites that held strong monsters have been stripped including the bricks that made up the temple. Treasure chests have been griefed and hidden by someone else placing blocks around them.

      Beacons are a way to prevent griefing in your territory. But imagine looking out your window around your beacon and seeing the griefing around it. Trenches built around your beacons influence. Giant walls put up around it. Offending structures. Etc.

      This is not so much an issue now, $95 keeps some scrubs out. This will not always be the case.

      • #3438
        Zouls
        Participant

        Dude. they quote on quote said ”Beacons can even be used to secure strategic resources or locations. Find a rich resource deposit and claim it before anyone else then set up a shop on the surface and sell the goods” so i think they are going to make like everquest next mines where they respawn after a day or so.

      • #3442
        Kuma
        Member

        I’m not so much a fan of infinite ressources but it might be the best choice in this case.

      • #3443
        Karko
        Member

        Infinite resources can be balanced in an MMO, the key is there must be a mechanism of removing them to control the rate of inflation. In EVE this is achieved by losing the ship permanently when its destroyed, and about 75% of items on it being destroyed. This becomes a little more complicated in a PVE environment more EQ or WoW where players are not accustomed to losing their gear permanently when they die, and the player base for this game looks pretty diverse. So the devs are kind of in a bind.

      • #3445
        Kuma
        Member

        Well PVP is planed but we don’t know where and how and how much you will lose if you die in any situation. A real challenge for the devs.

    • #3623
      James
      Keymaster

      This is a great thread – lots of ideas <3.

      Now don't take this as an official answer for the game – big caveat there – but I’ll personally be campaigning for a few things within the dev team:

      1. All players can build stuff (solo or with friends) and not have it messed with.

      2. All players should be able to feel like they’re exploring the environment for the first time. It’s no fun going down into a cave if there are torches everywhere, an empty chest at the bottom, and a stairlift back up again.

      3. All players should be able to explore other people’s creations (without messing with them.)

      4. All players should be able to join together if they want to build grander ambitions.

      5. The game should give players a reason to explore, a reason to go to other worlds, a reason to connect with their friends, a reason to explore their own surroundings and world.

      6. I want to avoid the issue that all types of resources are within a 200 block radius of any starting position. Get out there and find what you need.

      7. I want to avoid the issue of all creates spawning within a 200 block radius of any starting position.

      8. I want every world to feel unique and special. So that every time you step through a portal into a new world you think “Wow! I wonder what I’ll discover here?”

      9. The configuration of the game needs to encourage (require?) players who want to see / build / defeat / capture / explore / craft everything the game has to offer – must go beyond their starting horizons.

      10. Everyday a player signs into the game they should feel like there is a new world / dungeon / cave to go and explore. Maybe this means daily worlds, weekly worlds, etc.

      Finally, I’m not exactly sure what our final world size will be, I imagine it will be dependent on how memory efficient we can make the servers. But I expect that many of the concerns here might be alleviated if players were to spawn 1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 km from anyone else. The way players spawn is not what I would expect in the future. A diverse player spawn spread would reduce the density issue – unless players wanted to go find others to build with.

      Then there is a list of world expiration issues we can explore. From easy stuff such as: torches expire outside of your beacon, to tress regenerating, to landscapes and resources regenerating.

      Any concerns / additions with this?

      • #3624
        Kuma
        Member

        This is the first time I have nothing to add. I like how you have such detail in your ideas yet it’s still pretty general. This makes me think my expectations for this game could really be met.

    • #3628
      Karko
      Member

      Yeah, I really like the high levels goals being laid out rather than just details. I feel very satisfied with this answer, and it’s vision. Thank you for taking the time to respond.

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