Initial observations/suggestions/et al

[thedudeabides]

First off, and I know I mentioned this in chat. But well done. The game layout is extremely nice, and at least for someone who's played a few online games, any time I look for something, it's pretty obvious where to find it. Which makes it easy to start up, and that's a good thing.

In any case, I'm sure most of the following are either on the drawing board or there's a reason why you don't want them, but hey, maybe something fell through the crack somewhere.

Suggestions:
Minimizing back and forth in Inventory Screens:
Is there any reason why Consumables and Misc are on 2 different pages? The reason I ask is this: At least early on (read:constantly) I spent a lot of time Snotless and out of health. So I have to go to Consumables, resnot, then go to Misc and heal. I don't know if the reason for the 2 pages is to minimize server strain loads but it seems like having to go to both might cause more. Maybe make another readily available healing item that isn't a combat item that will appear in the Lotions and/or Potions sections. Or maybe consider just merging the 2 pages altogether? Or putting a link on each linking to the other as well as the Equipment page. While this is still some back and forth, it minimizes having to go up to the drop down.

Recipe Fails:
Is there any way to keep the failed attempt ingredients on the Recipe side? Most of the time it's just the matter of tweaking one item but having to go back and add up to 12 items each mistake is a lot of extra clicking. Especially if you have to do this a few times. I know it's not supposed to be easy to figure out the recipes but extra clicking is bad on the digits

Equipment and Currently Equipped:
A couple things here would improve my gameplay experience. 1) possibly have the headers on the currently equipped area link to the headers in the unequipped equipment area below. 2) Possibly have the currently equipped items displayed in the list, maybe on the side and designated as such.
The reasons for these is that most of the time for newer players we don't have any idea what any of these items do so I'm spending a good deal of time examining the item above then moving to the items below. I'm sure as I get more used to the items I'll use the change equipment dropdowns more and then the saved outfits, but for now I'm relying on clicking and remembering.

Blinking New Mail Notification:
(Previously mentioned to Gobberwart in chat and told it was on the to do list) Just suggesting here in case someone else had an idea that would be better, but I just suggested either blinking the top dropdown or maybe making the link on the side more vibrant.

More Turns!!
Obviously you don't want people with a million turns since they'd have an unfair advantage but a couple ideas. Maybe a semi-rareish Diuretic and Laxative that would knock off stomach and bladder so you could drink or eat more. Or an item that would increase the size of your gut so you could eat/drink more. Or these could be possible idea for an IOTM. Portable Toilet? Or maybe just at a certain level you gain capacity, I guess similar to the 'X of Steel's in Kol. Perhaps an Installed Device = Toilet. But the turns burn through really fast...and I think I have been eating/drinking pretty optimally.

Avatar:
Perhaps consider allowing the first avvy for Free. Then the next batch of however many could be for a token. This would allow people to customize their character initially which would allow them to develop more affection for their character...before buyer's remorse kicks in and they have to add more. lol

Well that's enough writing for me for one post. lol Probably tired of reading it too!

- The Dude

[stroby]

Just thought I'd add my spin on each of these

1. I think the idea of adding links in inventory to different inventory parts.

2. Perhaps not necessary but its a nice idea

3.1. I like that just to let you jump down to points in inventory
3.2. Not so hot on this one

4. And the beast shall come forth surrounded by a roiling cloud of vengeance. The house of the unbelievers shall be razed and they shall be scorched to the earth. Their tags shall blink until the end of days.

The Book of Mozilla, 12:10

5.

Spoiler:

http://www.paradoxwiki.com/index.php?ti ... _o%27_dice

6. The reason avatars cost for the first one is because most will only want one so you pay for the first and the rest are free

EDIT: Gobb - Added spoiler tags to the.. well, to the spoiler. Bad Stroby!

[Gobberwart]

First off, and I know I mentioned this in chat. But well done. The game layout is extremely nice, and at least for someone who's played a few online games, any time I look for something, it's pretty obvious where to find it. Which makes it easy to start up, and that's a good thing.

Well, thanks

In any case, I'm sure most of the following are either on the drawing board or there's a reason why you don't want them, but hey, maybe something fell through the crack somewhere.

Indeed. It's also good to have a perspective from someone whose primary game *isn't* Kingdom of Loathing. My experience in various RPG games comes down to pretty much KoL and Diablo II, with random dabblings in a couple of others (SSW, Twilight Heroes and, everyone's favourite game, Muffins). What that means, however, is that there are some things that have been done in a particular way just because it's what I'm familiar with, and therefore just to get something out there.

Suggestions:
Minimizing back and forth in Inventory Screens:

The reason for the separation comes down to server load, yes, but that's an interesting one. Your point about potentially INCREASING server load from having to load multiple pages is very valid though and definitely not desirable. The healing items are both usable in combat AND consumable, which means they'd be suitably placed in either area. In the short term, perhaps I should add a flag to those miscellaneous items that could be placed in a "Miscellaneous Consumables" section, and have those items then display on both pages?

In the long term, of course, I want to ajaxify the inventory pages, so that using/equipping/whatevering an item doesn't actually require a complete page load, and then take that even further and allow people to script item use combos (eg. use 1 snot, use 3 healing items) with a single click. Or maybe I'll let the greasemonkiers play with that one

Recipe Fails:
Is there any way to keep the failed attempt ingredients on the Recipe side? Most of the time it's just the matter of tweaking one item but having to go back and add up to 12 items each mistake is a lot of extra clicking. Especially if you have to do this a few times. I know it's not supposed to be easy to figure out the recipes but extra clicking is bad on the digits

Ohh come on, surely mindless repetitive clicking is all part of the fun </tongueincheek> Seriously, though, that's come up before and, while it wasn't on the to-do list, it is now. What I'll do is provide a "repeat last combo" (or something) button you can click that will populate the recipe list with whatever you previously tried, then you can tweak it however you like and retry.

Equipment and Currently Equipped:
A couple things here would improve my gameplay experience. 1) possibly have the headers on the currently equipped area link to the headers in the unequipped equipment area below.

Sounds reasonable. In fact I remember back... ohhh ages ago, attempting something like that but running into a problem related to ajax and the use of HTML anchor tags. I'll revisit it though, because now I have a vague idea of what I'm actually doing

2) Possibly have the currently equipped items displayed in the list, maybe on the side and designated as such.

Again, sounds reasonable (and just FYI I'm adding these to the to-do list as I go)

Blinking New Mail Notification:
(Previously mentioned to Gobberwart in chat and told it was on the to do list)

It is indeed on the to-do list (currently there are 32 non-content-related items on the list, and growing). I actually want to reduce the amount of clutter in the sidebar, so I'd probably remove it from there and have some kind of indicator for new mail/trade show up on the menu bar. Whether or not it'll blink is something else again. I hate stuff that blinks, but that's a personal preference. Anyone have any thoughts?

More Turns!!
Obviously you don't want people with a million turns since they'd have an unfair advantage but a couple ideas. Maybe a semi-rareish Diuretic and Laxative that would knock off stomach and bladder so you could drink or eat more. Or an item that would increase the size of your gut so you could eat/drink more. Or these could be possible idea for an IOTM. Portable Toilet? Or maybe just at a certain level you gain capacity, I guess similar to the 'X of Steel's in Kol. Perhaps an Installed Device = Toilet. But the turns burn through really fast...and I think I have been eating/drinking pretty optimally.

There are in fact already items in-game that reduce your bladder/stomach fullness, and there will likely be more. You just need to find them

That said, the current turn/stomach/bladder model is very KoL-like, although the actual numbers are marginally higher. Until now, this issue hasn't really come up, because the vast majority of the playerbase has come from KoL and they are very much used to it. That said, that doesn't necessarily make it the "right" way to do things, and there's no technical reason why we couldn't revisit that and consider something different. Changing it would mean some of the established game mechanics would be.. well, not broken per se but definitely different.

Whatever changes we may or may not make on this front will have to be carefully considered to ensure the game remains playable, competitive and fair. I've raised it for discussion with the dev team.

Avatar:
Perhaps consider allowing the first avvy for Free. Then the next batch of however many could be for a token. This would allow people to customize their character initially which would allow them to develop more affection for their character...before buyer's remorse kicks in and they have to add more. lol

Bear in mind that, when using a token of appreciation to acquire avatar support, that you're getting avatar support, rather than "an avatar". Basically, once you've got it, you can store up to 5 avatars that can be switched at will (poor Will again) and can be removed and replaced with new ones at any time. Pending admin approval of course.

With that in mind, the cost seems pretty reasonable, especially when compared with some other games where the cost for a single custom avatar is significantly higher, and it does give people something to work towards.

What I *could* perhaps do, however, is add a limited range of "default" avatars to choose from, rather than just having the current two, rather bland, silhoutte images. That would provide some customisation initially, with the option to work towards something more personalised down the track.

Well that's enough writing for me for one post. lol Probably tired of reading it too!

- The Dude

Quite a good read actually. Thanks again for your input

If anyone else has any thoughts, they're more than welcome.

[stroby]

Re: More turns

I had a very good idea put to me in chat yesterday, that we have a slow turn release system, so that say over a period of and hour (or more) you would acquire say 15 turns as well as the 50 at intermission, I quite liked this idea because it still stops full time bots from just playing forever but mean you can play for more time. Its just an idea and the rate of turn release would be subject a bit of fiddling at the start to work out what works well and there could also be items which affect the rate.

[Gobberwart]

Yep, that's pretty much what we're going to be discussing in the dev group shortly. From a technical perspective, there's no reason why I couldn't run a scheduled task to add a very small number of turns every, say, 15-20 minutes, and reduce stomach/bladder by one per hour. For example. We're just looking at the pros and cons of each, because doing that does significantly change the way the game's played.

[SportGuy]

I think this is a double-edged knife. Yeah, it'd be nice to actually have more turns to actually play the game everyday but at the same time depending on what the capped turns on puts people who log on say once a day for twenty minutes at a significant disadvantage. Besides, the fact I think a few of the turn whores already have multiples characters and would think that's good enough. Just my two cents.

[Spiff]

ooooh i really really really like this idea. Ive played a few game that do so and its awesome, cause you can come back anytime during the day and play more hence keeping more people on and playing the game. I really really really hope this happens

[Blaize]

This does sound like a really interesting idea, I have never played a game that works that way, it really does change the game quite a lot. I don't think that turns are everything the game has to offer, I enjoy the chat side of the game. Would more turns distract from the other parts of the game?

[SportGuy]

I have played games like that and the effectiveness of it really depends on things like max capped turns, amount of turns you get vs. how often (time intervals), how active the playerbase is, etc. etc. It can get complicated.

Like, I've said I have my reservations on the idea...but who knows. Although shadow, I think more then likely as the player base grows and the fact the turns out likely to be too exorbitant it would likely have little downside negativity on the community functions itself.

What I think would be a good possible alternative to people who are bored out of turns but want to be on here anyway (people far entrenched into this community like myself and many others ) would be little side games and stuff that don't require turns but you can earn relatively small amounts moolah or items on. This is just me throwing out ideas right now though and has no real bearing on anything. There *is* always multis too...but I'm not a huge fan of playing more then 1 character generally myself.

[Reenix]

Remember that the game is still very much in its early stages, the limit-increasing items will almost certainly be released when the open beta comes out - maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think the idea right now is to finish all the quests and ask for everything that Kingdom of Loathing has - we're our own game, and there are ~250 of us - when Gobber thinks of stuff, we get it.

Personally, I'm just happy exploring, being a member, testing things to make sure there are no bugs. We'll look back at this stage in a couple of years and think...something. I hope so, at least

[Gobberwart]

Thanks Reenix, and yep that's pretty much right. It IS still a small game, and it's going to take time - a lot of time - before Paradox reaches anything like the kind of completedness that games like KoL are at now.

The gradual restoration of turns and emptying of bladder and stomach, however, is an interesting one. Assuming that the cap remains where it is now (250) and that turns are restored every 20 minutes, I'm not sure it would have a significant impact on gameplay one way or another.

I'd love to hear more ideas on this.

[thedudeabides]

Well, to give an idea of another way this is done, SSW knocks off a fullness and drunk every hour and you also get 2 turns an hour. There are no rollover turns given. Almost all food and drinks give 1 full or drunk. The number of turns these give is typically dependent on how hard it is to make the items. And there are no turns used for cooking/mixing. The turn cap there is 1000 turns.

But there are a lot of turns used there in space and I don't see that number as being needed here. Though I do really like the way you can eat/drink every hour if you'd like for turns. Or just eat to capacity and not worry about it for 10+hours.

[Gobberwart]

2 turns an hour? I'm sure someone said it was 2 turns every 15 minutes which, to be honest, seemed excessive.

It's interesting how such a seemingly simple issue can be so controversial, and I guess there are really TWO issues, which people aren't quite able to separate:

1. Should a player's daily turns/stomach/bladder be restored gradually or in one hit at intermission?

2. What should the frequency, number of turns, caps etc. be?

Does that help anyone?

[thedudeabides]

I prefer the hourly gradual idea personally. It really marginalizes the importance of rollover which as a game played around the world, it's probably a good thing.

Additionally I like the 1k cap turns, b/c even eating/drinking optimally you can't accrue that many in a day, but it allows people to leave for a weekend or not play for a couple days without being penalized vs everyone who plays daily.

As for how many turns you give out a day, I think it's just a matter of figuring out how many turns it takes to farm for food/drink, cook, and then still have a fair amount of turns. KoL players are probably used to running 250ish turns a day, fewer in ascensions. And I think that is a fair amount for that game. You have enough to do what you need to do each day and you can roll over 200 if you have to.

Here the only thing I'd worry about would be how extra turns per day would affect ticket acquisition. If there were more turns, you might want to nerf the ticket output on the middle values if you want to keep the timeframe to acquire the ticket items what it is currently. Other than that, I'm not sure there would be a huge affect on current gameplay. Though I'm sure there are things up your sleeves that'll have to be taken into account too.

[mastechno]

ok a very good example of the turns gotten every so often would be travian http://www.travian.us/ granted it's an RTS vs this sort of game, but same idea/concept. I think both the way it is and what we are semi proposing have major pros and cons for both sides. I can argue both sides if need be, but don't want to current... let me know if you want to here pros/cons for both sides Gobb.

[Reenix]

I like the idea of having regular intermissions of restoring turns/stomach/bladder capacity, it means that if you've used up all your turns for 'one day', you wouldn't have to spend the rest of the day doing nothing, game-wise. Obviously there would have to be some sort of restriction to stop turn-grinding, but I agree with TheDudeAbides about letting casual players gain the turns without penalisation. If someone's going to neglect to play for 20 days, then they're not likely to use 1000 turns anyway. Something to mill over, anyway.