Realism in Mortal Online

[Aziraath]

I don't know about you, but I want MO to be as realistic as possible. I compiled a list of features that would make the game much more realistic, in almost every aspect of the game. First of all, I know this would take a lot of work, and some features may take a lot more than others. Feel free to share your thoughts though. This will be a very long post, so don't read unless you really have the time. Within the post, is suggestions about Exploration, Combat, Economics, and Miscellaneous.

Exploration/User Interface- Exploration is a huge part in any MMO, and if put together well, could make a huge difference in how the game plays, here are a few features needed to make it as realistic as possible.

User Interface- There shouldn't be any mini-map in the user interface. The only map should be a static map, one that looks similar to a real map. As you explore, the map automatically fills in. If you want, you could sell maps to other players. A map shouldn't be an automatic part of the game. It should be inventory based, so if you want a map, you have to have it in your inventory. To create a map, you would need a piece of parchment.
Also, since it is a first-person game, there should be no floating names! We've seen them in almost every other MMO, and they are just not aesthetically pleasing. I think MO should implement a huge character creation process, that way you could make your character individual. If each player were unique, you could recognize them by their face, not have to look at some ugly floating name.
Video effects would also be great, since it is a first person game. First of all, this could get rid of the health bar. Instead of a health bar, your characters vision might start to blur, and eventually go dark(near death). Also, sounds could become faded, and seem very distanct. It could also be used for fun, say you go to the tavern with a few friends, and you want to buy a couple drinks. After you have a few drinks, your vision should become very blurred, and your character should stumble around, and if you've had enough to drink, actually fall over. It would be quite funny, perhaps not for the player it happened to though, to watch some drunk guy fall down while hes walking across a bridge and drown in the water. This feature could also be used once you get poisoned, and have a similiar result as the death one, where your vision slowly becomes darker.

Swimming- Swimming should be very realistic. I've seen the ugrades to Unreal 3, and it should make the water very nice. The water shouldn't just look nice though. Weight should be a huge issue for people swimming. If some huge warrior wearing 200 pounds of steel jumps into water, he should sink, and drown most likely. On the other hand, if he took his armor off, or at least enough to make hima reasonable weight, he should be able to swim properly. Inventory weight should come into effect as well. If that same warrior took his armor off, but left it in his inventory, the weight of it should still weigh him down, preventing him from swimming. If he really wanted to get across, he could leave his armor on one side of the beach, and come back for each piece, making several trips, or he could find a boat, and boat across to the other side.
Underwater swimming should be a huge part of the game as well. Although it's nothing, having the ability to explore whats under the water gives you a huge feeling of adventure. Stumbling upon a hidden cave at the edge of a lake could be a great feeling, locations like that could be crucial for assassin guilds, or guilds pertaining to evil magic. It could work well for crafting as well, certain plants may only grow under water, or certain types of minerals may only form underwater. It would be a great feature, and it could be a lot of fun. Another example, is a lake where a huge aquatic beast lives. That way, some innocent alchemist looking for plants to brew a potion could be gobbled up in seconds.

Climbing- Climbing should be a huge part of the game as well. There should be a wide variety of things to climb as well. Such as mountains, trees, walls, houses, and even large creatures.
I don't know if mountains should be fully climbable, seeing as they are the things used most often as borders. But you should be able to climb quite high, and there should many hidden caves scattered among the mountain. They could become the new base of a guild, or they could be the domain of a huge demon. There should also be a lot of nooks and crannys, so that there are places to rest when you are climbing.
Climbing trees should work similarly. You should be able to grab from branch to branch, and make it towards the tops. This would be a great aspect for rangers, seeing as they could fire arrows at unsuspecting opponents. It could also be good for explorers who get lost in the middle of a forest. If there is no mini-map, which would be great, and they are without a map, they could climb a tall tree, and look for the way out. Trees would also make great cover if you were being chased.
You should only be able to climb walls with a huge climbing skill, seeing as there generally aren't a lot of things to grab onto. It could be great though, as an assassin, climbing over a wall into a rival guilds castle, avoiding guards completely, and then climbing up the keep wall into the guild leaders bedchamber, and stabbing him in the back. Houses could be easier to climb. It wouldn't serve a huge purpose, except for chilling on your roof, maybe with a buddy and a few beers.
Climbing creatures would be great. Say your fighting a huge lizard, and you have two swords. You use the swords as handgrips to climb the lizard, by repeatedly thrusting them into the creatures leg, you climb to the top of the beast, and make your way to its head. From there you stab both swords into the creatures head and watch as it tumbles to the ground. Or perhaps you attempt this, only to be flung off, falling over 100 feet to your death. Either way, it'll leave players with a "Wow, that was ****ing awesome".

Travel- There should be many, many, many different types of travel in this game. The three I'll be going over are land, water, and air based transportation. Each one has a seperate use, and seperate costs, I think that prices should change depending on the method. For example, a horse would cost less than a mammoth, and for water, a little rowboat should cost less than some sort of water creature, and air creatures, I think some should have to be captured, which would be incredibly difficult. For example, you may be able to buy a gryphon, but unable to buy a dragon.
For land-based mounts, I think that there should mounts dedicated to speed, and then other mounts dedicated to power. Depending on your playing style, you may want one or the other. However, the power mounts should generally cost more. For example, a horse should cost much less than a mammoth, or a rhino. Also, mammoths and rhinos would have to be bought from exotic dealers, hence the higher price. Mounts should react realistically, such as for horses, turning while running full speed requires a large area, since they're turning radius is so wide. Also, acceleration speed for a mammoth should be much slower than a horse, simple things like that would make them feel much more lifelike. There shouldn't just be mounts either. Someone a little wealthier may want to take a carriage for example, or maybe some other similar mode of transportation. Summoning your mount shouldn't be anything like WoW, where you do some gay magic animation, and then appear on your mount. Perhaps, this is just a suggestion, you could whistle, and then, the creature will come from somewhere jusbeyond your sight, in a low density area too, because people don't want to see horses appearing out of nowhere.
Pretty much the same for water mounts. There should many types, from little boats, to huge ships, to aquatic animals. The animals should be quite rare, and should be summoned similar to the land mounts. Instead though, you have to be near water, and instead of a whistle, it's some sort of words spoken, perhaps similar to elvish in LOTR. Just a few words, and then your creature comes out of the water, and approaches the shore, so you can mount it. Boats and ships would have to work much differently however. I'm thinking for smaller boats, you could leave them wherever you get out of them, so perhaps if you leave your boat behind a rock next to a river, that's where it stays, unless someone else discovers it. Or, for a small fee, you could keep it stored in a building at a harbor, where it's safe, until you use it next. As for ship. you would definitely have to keep it in a harbor, and pay a fee for it, unless it was a harbor within your own player-city/house/fortress.
Air mounts are another huge thing, they should definitely not be common, as having overcrowded airways could get annoying. Plus, it'd be better if they were hard to aqquire, that way, if you see someone flying a dragon above the city your in, everyone runs out of their houses to watch it, it could just be a cool thing to experience. Perhaps, there is some place in the mountains, where you could purchase smaller flying mounts, such as gryphons, large birds, etcetera. But if you wanted something such as a dragon, it would have to be very rare, perhaps only one or two people could.
The thing about flying mounts is, if they can go where ever they want, can't they get past the game borders? You could easily get rid of this, and implement a sort of Ace Combat style thing. If any of you have played any flight games, you know that when you get the edge, the game makes you do an automatic turn. This could work perfectly in MO. Flying mounts should also be able to travel along the ground, at a much slower speed than flying however.
Another thing, is mounts should be able to die. If your riding your horse, and someone fires an arrow into its leg, it should tumble over, possibly killing you in the process. Larger mounts would be much stronger, taking many more blows/arrows to kill. A thing like a dragon would be near impossible to kill, seeing as it has rock hard skin, and since it is flying, it would be almost impossible just to hit. With this in mind, all powerful mounts, and all mounts for that matter, should have a weak spot, but I'll get to that after.
Mounts should also be upgradable. Both for aesthetics and performance. For example, aesthetic ugrades for a mammoth could be paint on the tusks. Performance ugrades could be barbed wire between the tusks, increasing the range of damage. There could also be ugrades for both, such as an improved seating area, so you could have multiple people on the mount, although your the only one driving. With this ugrade though, it could become like a mumakil from LOTR, and you could have archers up on the mammoth as well, firing clouds of arrows. For a ship, ugrades could be endless, from paint and banners, to extra cannons and a thicker hull.

Naming of Locations/Things- It's already been stated on the website, that if you are the first to discover an area, then you get to name it. This could be great, as long as players don't abuse it. I would hate to be exploring, only to stumble upon Penis Mountain. I want to make sure that people will choose according names. I was also thinking that if a player stumbles upon a huge beast that nobody has ever seen before, that they could name it. This could be a cool feature as well.

Combat- Combat will be a huge part of this game, and they say they want it as realistic as possible. I have a few suggestions towards combat.

Realistic/Location Damage- Location damage should defiitely be a part of this game. First off, there should be natural location damage, such as stabbing someone through the heart, cutting off their head, etcetera. There should be armoured location damage as well. For example, if someone is wearing a breastplate, it should protect only their chest, not their entire body. Therefore if someone isn't wearing a helmet, they are very vulnerable to head attacks. Also, for ranged weapons, if you shoot someone from close range, it should do far more damage than if you shot them from far away, although either one should nearly kill them or kill them.
No matter what, attacks should be fatal. I am not a fan of games like Halo, where it takes hours to kill the person. I think in MO, one good blow should kill an enemy. This way, if you sneak attack someone, they're done.
However, if you can die from one or two hits, there should be something to combat that, see below.

Parrying, Deflecting, and Dodging- If it is this easy to kill somebody, then you should be able to block attacks, dive out of the way, or parry attacks. This would make it great, this is as realistic as it gets. This way, a swordfight could go on for minutes, even hours, but not because your health is slowly going down, but because your blocking all of his/her attacks.
If the combat system works this way, then it would be way too fun to fight people. It would also make it extremely difficult to take down huge monsters. Say your fighting a huge snake, if it lunges at you, you obviously can't parry it's giant jaw, but you could dive out of the way, and maybe strike it afterwards. This, with the creature climbing ability, would be amazing. Fighting a beast would take true skill and luck.

Mounted Combat- Mounted combat could take a huge part in this game. The combat would have to vary from mount to mount though. Combat on a horse would involve you using your own weapon, while mounts such as mammoths would attack using their tusks. Different weapons would work better than others, and the speed of your mount would affect the damge you deal. As for water mounts, the majority of creatures would fight using their bodies, not weapons. As for boats, well, there isn't much you can do there. But for ships, you could man the cannons, and take down other ships, or if you were an archer, you could fire arrows, and try to take down people on the enemy ship. You could also swing across on ropes/grappling hooks, and mutilate people on the other ship. You could also man the wheel, and control your ship. Flying mounts would attack using their bodies. For gryphons, they could doa large sweep, ripping people apart with their talons, for creatures like dragons, they could sweeps as well, or they breath huge streams of flame. When flying mounts were travelling on the ground however, they would work the same as land-based mounts.

Decapitations/Dismemberments- There should be dismemberments/decaptions in the game. I'm sure nothing would be more thrilling than slicing off someones legs, only to watch them crawl away, only to finish them by decapitating them with an axe. I'm not sure what would be required to program this, but it would be sick.

Economics- Economics are huge in this game, and play a huge role in gameplay.

Trading/Player Shops- Trading will be a huge part in this game. There are a lot of features that could make this really great. For example, if in each city, there were buildings that players could buy. The player could use this as a shop. They could put items up on display, and set a price. If a player wishes to buy this item, they simply walk up to it, click it, and confirm the purchase. Now, there wouldn't be unlimited display cases, so these would only be for featured items. However, there a could be an NPC cashier of sorts, so the player could also set up items that the NPC would sell. This way, they could sell as many items as they can. The NPC cashier would work just like a vendor, so players would have no problem adujusting. Player shops should be fully customizable. You could choose everything from the layout, to the flooring, to the amount of display cases, to the location of them. You could change your sign, you could even change location of windows and doors. However, player shops should be quite expensive to purchase.

Player Cities- Player houses and cities will be a huge part of the game. There should be certain areas for building houses and cities, so the aesthetics of the game are not broken. They should both be very expensive, cities much more so. They should both be fully customizable.
You should have to gather a lot of wood to build a house, and there should be funiture stores throughout the game to purchase things for your house, or perhaps you could craft furniture. Either way, you should be able to choose absolutely everything about your house. You should be able to landscape as well, and place trees, bushes, even rare plants, that way you could have your own garden of rare herbs and plants for your alchemy hobby.
Player cities would be very similar to the houses, except it's at a much larger scale. You should be able to customize everything, the same way you can a house. Except, in a city, you should be able to build everything, such as a keep, houses, shops, towers, walls, gates, monuments, gardens, smithies, stables, a harbor, trees, bars, restaurants, civic centers, parks, and the list goes on. It would be the ultimate status symbol. You could sell off shops to other players, so that way you don't have to run everything. It would be a market economy, all you have to do is sell of properties to determined entrepreneurs, or sell houses to those looking to live in your city. Afterwards, you could collect a tax on all sales made by the shop, and collect a property tax from homeowners. That way, you could have the money to expand your city. This could make this game absolutely crazy.

Crafting- Crafting will be a huge part of the game. Animations will also be a huge part. If someone is crafting a sword, I want to see them crafting a sword, I want to see them pounding red hot iron on an anvil, I don't want to see them rubbing their hands together like in some MMO's. Also, weaker items, such as basic swords, should be extremely easy to make, and you should be able to mass produce them. More rare weapons however, magical weapons, would be very difficult to make, and players should be able to name them. Magical weapons should be rare in this game, and players should have to resort to using normal weapons. Same goes for all other crafting, you should be able to mass produce less potent items, but the higher quality items should be difficult to produce.

Caravans- If you want to transport a large amount of goods, you should be load them up into crates, and load them onto wagons or ships. This makes it much riskier to make big buisness deals, seeing as other players could raid the wagons/ships. You would need a lot of guards for a large delivery like this. However, they would definitely pay off in the end.

Miscellaneous-There are a lot of random features that would make this game much more fun to play.

Leisure- It would be great to have features like fishing in the game. Sometimes, you just want to relax with friends and live the easy life. If boats were implemented, players could just row out into the middle of a river pull out their fishing rods and worms, and enoy themselves.

Gambling- Gambling could be a lot of fun in this game. Simple games, such as card games, dice games, etc. It would be a fun way to gain money as well.

Substances/Drinking- It would be great to go to the tavern and have a few beers, and then start stumbling all over the place, this would make the game much more realistic.

Travelling Gear- It would be great if you could gather logs, and start up little campfires. Not only would it be a nice light source at night, or in a dark cave, but you could cook food, and if your going on a huge journey, you need to take breaks every now and then. There should be other things as well, such as tents, or cots.

Resource Gathering- Resource gathering should be realistic. If your gathering wood, you should have to cut down trees. If your mining, you should have to discover ore, etc.

Farming- If you have a potion shop/tobacco shop, etc. and you have high demand, you have to gather a lot of supplies. It would be good if rather than searching for plants all day, if you could grow certain plants, perhaps in a garden, or on a decent sized farm. Realistic farming though, it should take a while to grow these plants.

Realistic Physics- Realistic physics could be a huge part of this game. I would love if there some bouncer standing in front of a tavern. He doesn't let me through, so I run as fast as I can and knock him right over. Also, if a tree branch snaps off and hits me in the head (a large branch), it could possibly kill my character.

Non-Combat Kills- I know you can poison weapons in this game, but it would be great if you could poison someones drink at a party, and then watch them slowly succumb.

Magic- I would like magic to be something that is difficult to obtain. Perhaps people can learn a little magic, but the most powerful spells should be taught to players only by mages hidden deep within caves or mountains. I would like to see someone walking around with magic that no one else has, perhaps a poweful shockwave that sends people flying, or a huge meteor that he calls forth from the sky.

Just to let you know, I made most of this stuff in the hopes that the Devs will look around, but you are welcome to say whatever you want about these ideas.

[Sivvy]

ok, lot to go over, one thing I will comment on is the floating name thing...

I think nobody should have a floating name until you "meet" them (maybe have an introduce action or something), but trying to recognize someone by just their in-game appearance is going to be incredibly hard.

There are other devices used to recognize people that you can't use in an MMORPG, such as their voice, the way they carry themselves/mannerisms, their smell - I think the floaty name is just the way to go.

[Landor]

First off I would like to say welcome to the forums.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Exploration/User Interface- Exploration is a huge part in any MMO, and if put together well, could make a huge difference in how the game plays, here are a few features needed to make it as realistic as possible.

User Interface- There shouldn't be any mini-map in the user interface. The only map should be a static map, one that looks similar to a real map. As you explore, the map automatically fills in. If you want, you could sell maps to other players. A map shouldn't be an automatic part of the game. It should be inventory based, so if you want a map, you have to have it in your inventory. To create a map, you would need a piece of parchment.
Also, since it is a first-person game, there should be no floating names! We've seen them in almost every other MMO, and they are just not aesthetically pleasing. I think MO should implement a huge character creation process, that way you could make your character individual. If each player were unique, you could recognize them by their face, not have to look at some ugly floating name.
Video effects would also be great, since it is a first person game. First of all, this could get rid of the health bar. Instead of a health bar, your characters vision might start to blur, and eventually go dark(near death). Also, sounds could become faded, and seem very distanct. It could also be used for fun, say you go to the tavern with a few friends, and you want to buy a couple drinks. After you have a few drinks, your vision should become very blurred, and your character should stumble around, and if you've had enough to drink, actually fall over. It would be quite funny, perhaps not for the player it happened to though, to watch some drunk guy fall down while hes walking across a bridge and drown in the water. This feature could also be used once you get poisoned, and have a similiar result as the death one, where your vision slowly becomes darker.

You got to remember that there will be a lot to handle on the server. And the more objects in the world, that includes faces, it would mean that more processing for your computer, the server and more info being transfer between the 2 causing more lag. So it would be have great looking faces and have the right to look different from everyone and have a small pop on the server, or have some people looking the same with a huge server pop.

For the health bar, there will most likely be a health bar. Due to the fact of what I said above.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Swimming- Swimming should be very realistic. I've seen the ugrades to Unreal 3, and it should make the water very nice. The water shouldn't just look nice though. Weight should be a huge issue for people swimming. If some huge warrior wearing 200 pounds of steel jumps into water, he should sink, and drown most likely. On the other hand, if he took his armor off, or at least enough to make hima reasonable weight, he should be able to swim properly. Inventory weight should come into effect as well. If that same warrior took his armor off, but left it in his inventory, the weight of it should still weigh him down, preventing him from swimming. If he really wanted to get across, he could leave his armor on one side of the beach, and come back for each piece, making several trips, or he could find a boat, and boat across to the other side.
Underwater swimming should be a huge part of the game as well. Although it's nothing, having the ability to explore whats under the water gives you a huge feeling of adventure. Stumbling upon a hidden cave at the edge of a lake could be a great feeling, locations like that could be crucial for assassin guilds, or guilds pertaining to evil magic. It could work well for crafting as well, certain plants may only grow under water, or certain types of minerals may only form underwater. It would be a great feature, and it could be a lot of fun. Another example, is a lake where a huge aquatic beast lives. That way, some innocent alchemist looking for plants to brew a potion could be gobbled up in seconds.

I take it you haven't done lifeguarding. Someone strong enough can carry someone that is 200 pounds of just muscle a long way.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Climbing- Climbing should be a huge part of the game as well. There should be a wide variety of things to climb as well. Such as mountains, trees, walls, houses, and even large creatures.
I don't know if mountains should be fully climbable, seeing as they are the things used most often as borders. But you should be able to climb quite high, and there should many hidden caves scattered among the mountain. They could become the new base of a guild, or they could be the domain of a huge demon. There should also be a lot of nooks and crannys, so that there are places to rest when you are climbing.
Climbing trees should work similarly. You should be able to grab from branch to branch, and make it towards the tops. This would be a great aspect for rangers, seeing as they could fire arrows at unsuspecting opponents. It could also be good for explorers who get lost in the middle of a forest. If there is no mini-map, which would be great, and they are without a map, they could climb a tall tree, and look for the way out. Trees would also make great cover if you were being chased.
You should only be able to climb walls with a huge climbing skill, seeing as there generally aren't a lot of things to grab onto. It could be great though, as an assassin, climbing over a wall into a rival guilds castle, avoiding guards completely, and then climbing up the keep wall into the guild leaders bedchamber, and stabbing him in the back. Houses could be easier to climb. It wouldn't serve a huge purpose, except for chilling on your roof, maybe with a buddy and a few beers.
Climbing creatures would be great. Say your fighting a huge lizard, and you have two swords. You use the swords as handgrips to climb the lizard, by repeatedly thrusting them into the creatures leg, you climb to the top of the beast, and make your way to its head. From there you stab both swords into the creatures head and watch as it tumbles to the ground. Or perhaps you attempt this, only to be flung off, falling over 100 feet to your death. Either way, it'll leave players with a "Wow, that was ****ing awesome".

The devs have said the world is going to be seamless if they could do it. We are not sure if they have. But we guess so. There will be climbing in the game too.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Travel- There should be many, many, many different types of travel in this game. The three I'll be going over are land, water, and air based transportation. Each one has a seperate use, and seperate costs, I think that prices should change depending on the method. For example, a horse would cost less than a mammoth, and for water, a little rowboat should cost less than some sort of water creature, and air creatures, I think some should have to be captured, which would be incredibly difficult. For example, you may be able to buy a gryphon, but unable to buy a dragon.
For land-based mounts, I think that there should mounts dedicated to speed, and then other mounts dedicated to power. Depending on your playing style, you may want one or the other. However, the power mounts should generally cost more. For example, a horse should cost much less than a mammoth, or a rhino. Also, mammoths and rhinos would have to be bought from exotic dealers, hence the higher price. Mounts should react realistically, such as for horses, turning while running full speed requires a large area, since they're turning radius is so wide. Also, acceleration speed for a mammoth should be much slower than a horse, simple things like that would make them feel much more lifelike. There shouldn't just be mounts either. Someone a little wealthier may want to take a carriage for example, or maybe some other similar mode of transportation. Summoning your mount shouldn't be anything like WoW, where you do some gay magic animation, and then appear on your mount. Perhaps, this is just a suggestion, you could whistle, and then, the creature will come from somewhere jusbeyond your sight, in a low density area too, because people don't want to see horses appearing out of nowhere.
Pretty much the same for water mounts. There should many types, from little boats, to huge ships, to aquatic animals. The animals should be quite rare, and should be summoned similar to the land mounts. Instead though, you have to be near water, and instead of a whistle, it's some sort of words spoken, perhaps similar to elvish in LOTR. Just a few words, and then your creature comes out of the water, and approaches the shore, so you can mount it. Boats and ships would have to work much differently however. I'm thinking for smaller boats, you could leave them wherever you get out of them, so perhaps if you leave your boat behind a rock next to a river, that's where it stays, unless someone else discovers it. Or, for a small fee, you could keep it stored in a building at a harbor, where it's safe, until you use it next. As for ship. you would definitely have to keep it in a harbor, and pay a fee for it, unless it was a harbor within your own player-city/house/fortress.
Air mounts are another huge thing, they should definitely not be common, as having overcrowded airways could get annoying. Plus, it'd be better if they were hard to aqquire, that way, if you see someone flying a dragon above the city your in, everyone runs out of their houses to watch it, it could just be a cool thing to experience. Perhaps, there is some place in the mountains, where you could purchase smaller flying mounts, such as gryphons, large birds, etcetera. But if you wanted something such as a dragon, it would have to be very rare, perhaps only one or two people could.
The thing about flying mounts is, if they can go where ever they want, can't they get past the game borders? You could easily get rid of this, and implement a sort of Ace Combat style thing. If any of you have played any flight games, you know that when you get the edge, the game makes you do an automatic turn. This could work perfectly in MO. Flying mounts should also be able to travel along the ground, at a much slower speed than flying however.
Another thing, is mounts should be able to die. If your riding your horse, and someone fires an arrow into its leg, it should tumble over, possibly killing you in the process. Larger mounts would be much stronger, taking many more blows/arrows to kill. A thing like a dragon would be near impossible to kill, seeing as it has rock hard skin, and since it is flying, it would be almost impossible just to hit. With this in mind, all powerful mounts, and all mounts for that matter, should have a weak spot, but I'll get to that after.
Mounts should also be upgradable. Both for aesthetics and performance. For example, aesthetic ugrades for a mammoth could be paint on the tusks. Performance ugrades could be barbed wire between the tusks, increasing the range of damage. There could also be ugrades for both, such as an improved seating area, so you could have multiple people on the mount, although your the only one driving. With this ugrade though, it could become like a mumakil from LOTR, and you could have archers up on the mammoth as well, firing clouds of arrows. For a ship, ugrades could be endless, from paint and banners, to extra cannons and a thicker hull.

A couple of topics already on this, which almost all of us agree we don't want flying mounts at all in the game. Instant travel we're about half and half on. The devs have stated in the Q and A's that travel by boat will not happen at the release of the game, but will come later.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Naming of Locations/Things- It's already been stated on the website, that if you are the first to discover an area, then you get to name it. This could be great, as long as players don't abuse it. I would hate to be exploring, only to stumble upon Penis Mountain. I want to make sure that people will choose according names. I was also thinking that if a player stumbles upon a huge beast that nobody has ever seen before, that they could name it. This could be a cool feature as well.

Been talked about already and we found out that you can name anything in any game. Right now we are thinking that the naming locations will just be word of mouth. So if you find it first, you can tell your friends what you call it. It may be overheard by someone else and spread like wildfire.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Combat- Combat will be a huge part of this game, and they say they want it as realistic as possible. I have a few suggestions towards combat.

Realistic/Location Damage- Location damage should defiitely be a part of this game. First off, there should be natural location damage, such as stabbing someone through the heart, cutting off their head, etcetera. There should be armoured location damage as well. For example, if someone is wearing a breastplate, it should protect only their chest, not their entire body. Therefore if someone isn't wearing a helmet, they are very vulnerable to head attacks. Also, for ranged weapons, if you shoot someone from close range, it should do far more damage than if you shot them from far away, although either one should nearly kill them or kill them.
No matter what, attacks should be fatal. I am not a fan of games like Halo, where it takes hours to kill the person. I think in MO, one good blow should kill an enemy. This way, if you sneak attack someone, they're done.
However, if you can die from one or two hits, there should be something to combat that, see below.

Parrying, Deflecting, and Dodging- If it is this easy to kill somebody, then you should be able to block attacks, dive out of the way, or parry attacks. This would make it great, this is as realistic as it gets. This way, a swordfight could go on for minutes, even hours, but not because your health is slowly going down, but because your blocking all of his/her attacks.
If the combat system works this way, then it would be way too fun to fight people. It would also make it extremely difficult to take down huge monsters. Say your fighting a huge snake, if it lunges at you, you obviously can't parry it's giant jaw, but you could dive out of the way, and maybe strike it afterwards. This, with the creature climbing ability, would be amazing. Fighting a beast would take true skill and luck.

Combat is in Realtime so you will be able to parry, block, and dodge in the game. Most likely there will not be realistic/location damage due to the fact that you can only have so many hitboxes on an object, which it also has something called hitbox lag.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Mounted Combat- Mounted combat could take a huge part in this game. The combat would have to vary from mount to mount though. Combat on a horse would involve you using your own weapon, while mounts such as mammoths would attack using their tusks. Different weapons would work better than others, and the speed of your mount would affect the damge you deal. As for water mounts, the majority of creatures would fight using their bodies, not weapons. As for boats, well, there isn't much you can do there. But for ships, you could man the cannons, and take down other ships, or if you were an archer, you could fire arrows, and try to take down people on the enemy ship. You could also swing across on ropes/grappling hooks, and mutilate people on the other ship. You could also man the wheel, and control your ship. Flying mounts would attack using their bodies. For gryphons, they could doa large sweep, ripping people apart with their talons, for creatures like dragons, they could sweeps as well, or they breath huge streams of flame. When flying mounts were travelling on the ground however, they would work the same as land-based mounts.

Devs have said the mounted combat will handle like the game Mount & Blade. And as I said before there are no boats on release.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Decapitations/Dismemberments- There should be dismemberments/decaptions in the game. I'm sure nothing would be more thrilling than slicing off someones legs, only to watch them crawl away, only to finish them by decapitating them with an axe. I'm not sure what would be required to program this, but it would be sick.

Talked about already. Not going be seeing something like what your are thinking about.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Economics- Economics are huge in this game, and play a huge role in gameplay.

Trading/Player Shops- Trading will be a huge part in this game. There are a lot of features that could make this really great. For example, if in each city, there were buildings that players could buy. The player could use this as a shop. They could put items up on display, and set a price. If a player wishes to buy this item, they simply walk up to it, click it, and confirm the purchase. Now, there wouldn't be unlimited display cases, so these would only be for featured items. However, there a could be an NPC cashier of sorts, so the player could also set up items that the NPC would sell. This way, they could sell as many items as they can. The NPC cashier would work just like a vendor, so players would have no problem adujusting. Player shops should be fully customizable. You could choose everything from the layout, to the flooring, to the amount of display cases, to the location of them. You could change your sign, you could even change location of windows and doors. However, player shops should be quite expensive to purchase.

We think we are going be getting player shops. But this is a sandbox game so you can set up a player shop in your house.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Player Cities- Player houses and cities will be a huge part of the game. There should be certain areas for building houses and cities, so the aesthetics of the game are not broken. They should both be very expensive, cities much more so. They should both be fully customizable.
You should have to gather a lot of wood to build a house, and there should be funiture stores throughout the game to purchase things for your house, or perhaps you could craft furniture. Either way, you should be able to choose absolutely everything about your house. You should be able to landscape as well, and place trees, bushes, even rare plants, that way you could have your own garden of rare herbs and plants for your alchemy hobby.
Player cities would be very similar to the houses, except it's at a much larger scale. You should be able to customize everything, the same way you can a house. Except, in a city, you should be able to build everything, such as a keep, houses, shops, towers, walls, gates, monuments, gardens, smithies, stables, a harbor, trees, bars, restaurants, civic centers, parks, and the list goes on. It would be the ultimate status symbol. You could sell off shops to other players, so that way you don't have to run everything. It would be a market economy, all you have to do is sell of properties to determined entrepreneurs, or sell houses to those looking to live in your city. Afterwards, you could collect a tax on all sales made by the shop, and collect a property tax from homeowners. That way, you could have the money to expand your city. This could make this game absolutely crazy.

Guilds are the ones that we are thinking that will be making the cities due to the fact that it would take a lot of resources to collect to build.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Crafting- Crafting will be a huge part of the game. Animations will also be a huge part. If someone is crafting a sword, I want to see them crafting a sword, I want to see them pounding red hot iron on an anvil, I don't want to see them rubbing their hands together like in some MMO's. Also, weaker items, such as basic swords, should be extremely easy to make, and you should be able to mass produce them. More rare weapons however, magical weapons, would be very difficult to make, and players should be able to name them. Magical weapons should be rare in this game, and players should have to resort to using normal weapons. Same goes for all other crafting, you should be able to mass produce less potent items, but the higher quality items should be difficult to produce.

Once again having to many Animations take up to much resources of the server and your computer.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Caravans- If you want to transport a large amount of goods, you should be load them up into crates, and load them onto wagons or ships. This makes it much riskier to make big buisness deals, seeing as other players could raid the wagons/ships. You would need a lot of guards for a large delivery like this. However, they would definitely pay off in the end.

Some of us want this in game like me. Been talked about in one of the instant travel topics.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Miscellaneous-There are a lot of random features that would make this game much more fun to play.

Leisure- It would be great to have features like fishing in the game. Sometimes, you just want to relax with friends and live the easy life. If boats were implemented, players could just row out into the middle of a river pull out their fishing rods and worms, and enoy themselves.

Gambling- Gambling could be a lot of fun in this game. Simple games, such as card games, dice games, etc. It would be a fun way to gain money as well.

Substances/Drinking- It would be great to go to the tavern and have a few beers, and then start stumbling all over the place, this would make the game much more realistic.

Travelling Gear- It would be great if you could gather logs, and start up little campfires. Not only would it be a nice light source at night, or in a dark cave, but you could cook food, and if your going on a huge journey, you need to take breaks every now and then. There should be other things as well, such as tents, or cots.

Resource Gathering-
Farming-

We believe that there will be farming and resource gathering and travelling gear. The drinking part we may see. Hopefully it will be like LOTRO drinking.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Realistic Physics- Realistic physics could be a huge part of this game. I would love if there some bouncer standing in front of a tavern. He doesn't let me through, so I run as fast as I can and knock him right over. Also, if a tree branch snaps off and hits me in the head (a large branch), it could possibly kill my character.

Most likely not going to happen.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Non-Combat Kills- I know you can poison weapons in this game, but it would be great if you could poison someones drink at a party, and then watch them slowly succumb.

Where did you hear that you can poison weapons in this game?

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Magic- I would like magic to be something that is difficult to obtain. Perhaps people can learn a little magic, but the most powerful spells should be taught to players only by mages hidden deep within caves or mountains. I would like to see someone walking around with magic that no one else has, perhaps a poweful shockwave that sends people flying, or a huge meteor that he calls forth from the sky.

Magic has to be learned, by learning it from a book, someone else, or learning it on your own. And you need the stats.

Originally Posted by Aziraath

Just to let you know, I made most of this stuff in the hopes that the Devs will look around, but you are welcome to say whatever you want about these ideas.

The game is already in mid alpha stage so they will most likely not be adding some stuff. Due to the fact that they are on a timeline.

Ps I had to cut some stuff out due to their is a character limit.

[Thalras Naeblis]

I love all of the features you talked about, another feature I think they should add to make it more realistic is Voice chat right on the game. Instead of typing to people they should be able to talk to people in there proximity. And I know this sounds a bit in the modern age but if they want to talk to people far away, there should be something like a voice message that they can send and the recipient can open and listen to it. That would be really cool.

[OMGPIE]

While I like some of these ideas that was horribly long and my eyes hurt. I also must say that floating names is bad. I would like a system to recognize people after a meet interaction like Sivvy said but without floating names idk how that could work.

[baranecro]

Originally Posted by Thalras Naeblis

I love all of the features you talked about, another feature I think they should add to make it more realistic is Voice chat right on the game. Instead of typing to people they should be able to talk to people in there proximity. And I know this sounds a bit in the modern age but if they want to talk to people far away, there should be something like a voice message that they can send and the recipient can open and listen to it. That would be really cool.

How'd you avoid abusing that "ingame-voice-chat"?
e.g. yelling/singing people

[OMGPIE]

Kill the people yelling and singing? Maybe they are proffesional? Heralds and musicians?

[Aziraath]

Yes, I know. It was pretty long. Well, a way for recognizing guild members could be through the use of guild tabards and or cloaks. You know, have a unique design imprinted on the tabard or cloak. Unfortunately, this will only distinguish between guilds, not individual characters. Mixing this topic with the in-game proximity chat, you would be able to distinguish people by their voices as well, which could help..a lot.
Also, with the voice chat, they would have to implement some sort of mute, so you could block spammers.

[OMGPIE]

Secret salutes FTW?

[Thalras Naeblis]

Originally Posted by Landor

The game is already in mid alpha stage so they will most likely not be adding some stuff. Due to the fact that they are on a timeline.

If you guys can not add those features since it is in mid alpha stage. Hopefully, then there is going to be expansion packs or patches with some of those features mentioned by Aziraath, that would be really great!

[Necromantic]

Voicechat just uses performance needed in a high end game. Even while muted it will take some of those ressources. While leaving it out and letting those who want join their own would take nothing from those not wanting it and will leave everyone the choice to choose whatever syste they want.

And as long as I see where I am on the big world map I don't have anything against any map ideas.

[Belblind]

When talking about realism, maybe mounts (like these two horned beasts from the vid) should be able to ram player's so they fell over and yaou get an advantage in melee combat until they get back up. Every one should be able to do that, whatever it is.
Horse, giant lizard, raptor, moth or bull.
The different mounts should be available to everyone and not belong to a specific faction.

And you shouldn't be able to run through any living creature, like in WOW where you just run through your opponent and backstab him.
As in the real world everyone and everything is massive. When you move through bushes they can move a bit or something that would be okay.

[Thalras Naeblis]

Originally Posted by Belblind

When talking about realism, maybe mounts (like these two horned beasts from the vid) should be able to ram player's so they fell over and yaou get an advantage in melee combat until they get back up. Every one should be able to do that, whatever it is.
Horse, giant lizard, raptor, moth or bull.
The different mounts should be available to everyone and not belong to a specific faction.

And you shouldn't be able to run through any living creature, like in WOW where you just run through your opponent and backstab him.
As in the real world everyone and everything is massive. When you move through bushes they can move a bit or something that would be okay.

I definitely like that, and I hope damage is realistic, because when that two horned beast rams your opponent he should likely be dead or unconcious for a bit, giving you time to dismount and do an animated finisher, which would be cool.

The part about the different mounts being available to everyone sounds good too, but it would be cooler if a human tried to ride a raptor and just gets killed by it, because it is not tamed by humans.

Yeah hopefully bushes do move and you are able top climb trees. Hopefully when you are scaling a mountain sometimes little rocks fall down the mountain when you slip your footing.

[OMGPIE]

Originally Posted by Belblind

When talking about realism, maybe mounts (like these two horned beasts from the vid) should be able to ram player's so they fell over and yaou get an advantage in melee combat until they get back up. Every one should be able to do that, whatever it is.
Horse, giant lizard, raptor, moth or bull.
The different mounts should be available to everyone and not belong to a specific faction.

And you shouldn't be able to run through any living creature, like in WOW where you just run through your opponent and backstab him.
As in the real world everyone and everything is massive. When you move through bushes they can move a bit or something that would be okay.

I love when mounts can attack it makes it so much more realistic. The collision of people and animals and stuff is another thing that is awesome I hate it when people are running through each other all the time and all of that it just annoys me a lot. Hopefully MO will have these things.

[Thalras Naeblis]

Yes, OMGPIE I hope they do too.