1.7.1 Content Update (57007)

[Ellyidol]

If I wanted my spells to be queued, I'd go play a bunch of other boring unimaginative games. I understand STS felt there needed to be a fix to certain aspects of the game, but dragging it's uniqueness down and rep for speedy game play if you wanted and only had a few minutes, just to add in a huge altering factor that makes it more like all the other games, was a questionable decision in its approach.

PvP does seem better...win. PvE not so much...fail. I can adapt, but it doesn't mean I think it made the game better for the reason (PvE) that I play.

I like everything else about the update, minus the failjoin button, but not a fan of GCD in its current 0.5 second state, and they seem hell-bent on keeping it there instead of exploring tweaking it down.

I can see where you're coming from too, I get those moments when I just want something quick and on the go.

Hopefully they'll add something that will cater to those needs. My guess is they will nerf mobs/bosses somehow, to speed it up. I don't know about them adding a VL type of map, since that'll just put the whole campaign to waste, IMO.

I think I read an interview or the presentation of Cinco somewhere, in one of those game conferences, that he said that STS learned that a balanced PvP is more important than a balanced PvE. I could be wrong, don't quote me, I seem to remember reading that. I'll try to dig it up.

Edit:

Found it :

"However, Barnes admits that the team made a key mistake when it came to Pocket Legends' PvP gameplay: It focused on PvE first and then tried to tack on PvP later. Trying to balance PvP after the fact became extremely difficult, which is why Spacetime decided to focus on PvP first in design for all future titles."

Taken from : http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/03...n-pocket-mmos/

http://www.blogcdn.com/massively.joy...03/pocket4.jpg

And

"Something Spacetime Studios defintely want to do differently in the future is the way they approach balancing the game. Pocket Legends’ PvE gameplay got balanced before PvP – under the assumption that PvE is more important to casual gamers than PvP it sounds logical but according to Barnes this was a huge mistake. Balanced PvP is critical and now has priority over balancing PvE content. Experience tells us that from a player’s perspective imbalanced PvP is considered unfair and frustrating while imbalanced PvE – to a certain degree – is a tough challenge and it can even be rewarding to beat the AI as the underdog."

Taken from : http://www.icopartners.com/blog/archives/2102

Both are pretty recent too.

[markus]

A new person to the game would not have any problems with GCD and will buy plat. They will play PL as is, as they don't know any other version of PL. Only the existing players are the ones having a problem with GCD.

so your saying sts should only screw there current player base? ok sounds like the way to go.......

[Moogerfooger]

I won't quote your whole post Elly, but if "PvE was balanced" but there was a problem with PvP (agreed).....apply GCD to PvP only. Simple. And doable fairly easily from a developing standpoint, since they already have the code to do it.

I think the general consensus is that they dumbed down PvE for the sake of PvP. I bet if you pulled numbers for number of players who stick to PvE and will always stick to PvE even if PvP was improved, they would still easily outwiegh the number of PvP players.

Good articles though, thanks for the links

[Ellyidol]

so your saying sts should only screw there current player base? ok sounds like the way to go.......

No, that's not what he's trying to say.

What he meant is, if you just started playing PL now, you wouldn't even know what pre-GCD was like, so they can't complain.

I won't quote your whole post Elly, but if "PvE was balanced" but there was a problem with PvP (agreed).....apply GCD to PvP only. Simple. And doable fairly easily from a developing standpoint, since they already have the code to do it.

I think the general consensus is that they dumbed down PvE for the sake of PvP. I bet if you pulled numbers for number of players who stick to PvE and will always stick to PvE even if PvP was improved, they would still easily outwiegh the number of PvP players.

Good articles though, thanks for the links

Yup, in some extent I agree, I honestly initially thought that GCD would be for PvP only. Knowing how it's changed PvP now, and how fun PvE was before, I would say it would have been a good move.

One of their reasons for GCD in PvE was also, although I don't really notice it or know how to notice it, to reduce lag from all the spells going off in the screen. I'm not sure whether they meant graphical lag (that I can understand) vs actual ping, since I don't really get spikes from all the skills, but just from internet issues - but then again, maybe I think its internet issues when its actually the skills that load up the server.

Who knows, maybe soon enough they'll decide to actually just implement it for PvP. That's one of the reasons why I take it quite lightly, since they haven't said "Nope thats it, it stays that way.". Experience has also told me that they still will tweak stuff, especially on that 2H weapon speed issue during the rebalance, I think it was initially 2.4 (?) then they tweaked it down to what was acceptable now.

But yeah, thanks! Found it useful too

[Raazesk]

I just want to thank the Dev Team for making such a great update!
I really appreciate all of your time and effort.
Thanks!

[Duke]

Yes, the interface portion of GCD is improved. I was playing last night on WiFi, though, not 3G, so I don't know how much my issues with longer ping times and lagginess of controls was fixed, but I'm guessing it's a lot better because of the immediate response. I'll try to verify today when I get a chance.

I still think the GCD delay is too long. I'd rather see the GCD time dropped by at least half, if not more, and extend the individual skill cooldown timers (except for emergency skills like Heal and Revive).instead. This would allow skills to be fired off in quick - but not immediate - succession but also provide a tactical reason to not fire off every skill in a row.

Has anyone noticed if enemy damage, armor, health, and speed has been corrected yet to compensate for players having lower DPS, fewer buffs/debuffs, and less reliable access to heals? I was focusing on low-level play last night (starting Questius over again to see how well the questing/XP system works for smooth story-based leveling) since GCD has made high level play so much more of a grind, and at those low levels, there simply aren't enough buffs/debuffs available to really notice the difference. (Although even as early as level 3 or 4, I was finding GCD annoying, which surprised me.)

[Riccits]

@Elly, like this:



@Devs, me and a few friends have been playing a while. The only bad thing we noticed is that it's now very stressful for the eyes. It's not as ergonomic anymore that you have to watch the skill map every second to catch the GCD. I still push for queuing if that is something you can try and see if it can give the same result as the GCD model now.

ya true... we have to watch more the skill side now... we decide in miliseconds wich skill to use.. watch skill bar this miliseconds, skill is gray, is it grey bcz of GCD or bcz its not restored from last use..?
its a bit much of jumping from non usable to usable.. we all pressed skill buttons so fast and now with pressing a bit to early nothing will happen and wating for GCD restore and pressing after is a loss of time.. i think so most ppl presses many times at one skill until it can be lounched.. may a little queue would help to avoid hurting fingers..

[Luchta]

I think I read an interview or the presentation of Cinco somewhere, in one of those game conferences, that he said that STS learned that a balanced PvP is more important than a balanced PvE.

That's what I keep saying in a recent thread. People shouldn't be too focused on mechanical, timed and redundant runs. Test you gear and PvP is the only way to test what you think you're actually good at. No pun intended.

[Ellyidol]

That's what I keep saying in a recent thread. People shouldn't be too focused on mechanical, timed and redundant runs. Test you gear and PvP is the only way to test what you think you're actually good at. No pun intended.

True, in most games PvP seems to be the end-goal, PvE is for helping you get better in PvP through gear, levels, etc.

BUT, have to say that PvE here is very fulfilling, if not, more fulfilling than PvP though. I know I used to be PvE only, it was only recently that I got into PvP, still not fully, but getting into it.

[Duke]

@Devs, me and a few friends have been playing a while. The only bad thing we noticed is that it's now very stressful for the eyes. It's not as ergonomic anymore that you have to watch the skill map every second to catch the GCD.

I have to agree. I have to keep sweeping my eyes around the outside of the display to watch for skill cooldowns, see if my basic attack is enabled, and check on the status of team members. While all that is going on, I find it hard to keep an eye on the action that's actually in the middle of the screen.

I suppose some of this comes down to simply not being used to the GCD yet, but for now, at least, it's quite awkward.

[Luchta]

I can justify it's awkward at the moment because now, I fold my thumb towards my palm to get a clearer view of the screen. pre-GCD, you already know which skills cool-down faster and which skills will be reserved, be used and what not. I'm sure this will need getting used to but I am worried about new players getting the negative reaction that this game is hard -and tiring?

[Ellyidol]

I can justify it's awkward at the moment because now, I fold my thumb towards my palm to get a clearer view of the screen. pre-GCD, you already know which skills cool-down faster and which skills will be reserved, be used and what not. I'm sure this will need getting used to but I am worried about new players getting the negative reaction that this game is hard -and tiring?

Hopefully not, like Morawk said earlier, the newer players won't have the experience of pre-GCD anyway, so whether they find the game too hard or tiring, it will probably stem down to their personal preference of which game they're looking for.

[Luchta]

Come on Elly, support my protest to test/implement queuing here. LOL!

[StompArtist]

My main issue is with the graying out and flashing at the moment it is way too distracting.

Could there be a way to have a little "progress bar" on top or on the side, like the one above our weapons? Seems to me that it would make for a much smoother display instead of this huge skill flashing thing? I think that part of why some people really dislike the GCD is not the cool down itself it's the fact that it's currently over "stated"... this should be very discreet as it will not be important to game play once people get used to it. Just like the weapon cool down period indication is discreet and something you can look at when you need it but not "jumping out of the screen at you".


Thank you.

[CanonicalKoi]

I'm really not seeing much, if any, difference with the update to GCD. Game-play still seems very jerky.

[Echelong]

To be honest I don't see much of a difference between yesterdays patch and the first one, but that is maybe because of my way of playing pressing skills before GCD was over. As for the additional challenge it can be great with a good group but if you have 1 or 2 members that don't pull their weight you are gonna die a lot and the gameplay will slowdown to a crawl.

This happened to us last night at first we had 3 good players but we had 1 so-so player and a bad one. I died like 4 times in one game not to mention another fellow bird that tried like 3 runs with us (I can't blame him because after he left DT and I said screw this!!!) They where very frustrating runs and I know for a fact that gear doesn't make the player because we had a full fury bear that didn't had the minimum clue on what tank means and how to play the game, needless to say he even left when we reached gold fever. After we did a couple of pugs we gave up, I don't want to keep adding worthless deaths and losing elixirs. PUGs are now worse than they ever where taking 2 to 4 minutes to kill gold fever and more than 5 to kill K&Q. That is not counting that they take more than 5 minutes to clear the area before the boss.

After those horrible horrible pugs DT and I decided to lock down a game and just get good players. We then made less than 5 minute hideout runs and a bit more than 5 minute stronghold runs. We had a very solid group (Jaytb, Neko, Mits, DT (doubletime), Apollo, Raevyne and I think a few others that joined once someone logged) We rarely died and GCD was fun with that group, it didn't mattered to any of us we where clearing runs very fast and had a lot of fun.

My argument is that GCD can be a lot of fun but it doesn't feel casual now it feels more hardcore than it ever was. Some tweaks will have to be made either to mob health and damage or players damage output as well as the duration of buffs and debuffs and add some time to the combo time-frame to execute them. If something is not done soon I think there are gonna be a lot of broken phones while doing pugs because I just wanted a facepalm emote last night.

[Blayzn]

Devs I love you. Now gcd is the way it was supposed to be. Played a few runs and absolutely love it Don't listen to trolls and flamers that just whine for the sake of it. Other people will give you REAL feedback, as for me keep gcd as it is now.

Your point is that the only REAL feedback is that which agrees with you!? Anything else comes from trolls and flamers!? Are you serious.... Gameplay. Has. Changed. Dramatically. I have been playing for quite some time and have only come to these boards to post my opinion. Certainly no troll or flamer.

[Ellyidol]

Come on Elly, support my protest to test/implement queuing here. LOL!

Ahh, I really want to, but I don't want PL to turn into an almost turn-by-turn type of game, especially since it's supposedly (from my understanding) a real-time MMORPG.

From my experience after the recent patch, there seems to be a really small queue on skills already. While your character is doing a skill animation, you can tap on your next skill and it'll follow shortly after. Barely noticeable, but when you look carefully at your character instead of the skills flashing, you'll see.

[Duke]

I can now confirm that my ping-based problems are gone. That makes it a lot more playable on 3G, although I'm still not fond of the GCD in the first place.

[Lesrider]

Ahh, I really want to, but I don't want PL to turn into an almost turn-by-turn type of game, especially since it's supposedly (from my understanding) a real-time MMORPG.

From my experience after the recent patch, there seems to be a really small queue on skills already. While your character is doing a skill animation, you can tap on your next skill and it'll follow shortly after. Barely noticeable, but when you look carefully at your character instead of the skills flashing, you'll see.

I tried that, and I don't think you're right. If I tap a skill while it's still flashing, it's still bright (not grayed out) when the flashing ends.