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Upcoming/Recent DAoC Changes--Will They Also End Up in UO?

Skalazar

Journeyman
Stratics Veteran
Not to mention the FEW folk I've gotten to look at it find it TOO complicated... They are SHOCKED by the Economy of the game seeing prices... then PISSED finding you have to pay to get anything on ATLANTIC... and not even on other shards... Can't buy anything at all worth anything it's all there... and so either you have to know someone with Shields willing to go buy the item for you ..... trust them to take your money and bring back the item... as well or pay to buy a Transfer token to go there get it and pay again to come home... They are NOT amused... and say things like good god in WoW or in FF you can do this that and the other with vendors and auction houses... etc... They are surprised there isn't a global auction house or anything...

Those rose colored glasses have also held UO back soooo many times...
You just summed up why shard mergers are a necessity but unfortunately someone might lose a castle so the whole game has to suffer. I find it to be a huge mistake going into the 20th anniversary with all these dead servers because anyone that does come back will just leave again due to the population being so spread out.
 

Kirthag

Former Stratics Publisher
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"Global" is loosely used for auctions in WoW.
WoW auction houses are server specific and then are kinda based on alliance. A Paladin cannot see what an Orc is auctioning. Oh, if my pally could buy some of the gear my orc gets off of raids and pvp I'd be stoked!

I rather like the UO vendors. I have to travel around and I see some awesome home designs and deco plus I can use the search if I really wanted to find something specific. Sometimes, I find something on a vendor I didn't really think I needed. ;)
Implementing a server/facet auction system in UO is kinda unecessary and would kill what little player interaction/activity there already is on a shard.
Besides, imagine the cries of foul if such a system was put into place. PvMers would cry for the PvPers have their own "global auction system" and vice versa.

There are only a few limited "free for all" auction houses in WoW, in neutral towns and cities - but again, would open up a player to open pvp on the outskirts and that is something ppl don't like in UO. And also runs into the issues of "ghost" auction sitters, which is an issue in WoW. Ppl who sit and wait for certain items to appear in a neutral auction house and then mail it off to their favored toon.
 

Skalazar

Journeyman
Stratics Veteran
"Global" is loosely used for auctions in WoW.
WoW auction houses are server specific and then are kinda based on alliance. A Paladin cannot see what an Orc is auctioning. Oh, if my pally could buy some of the gear my orc gets off of raids and pvp I'd be stoked!

I rather like the UO vendors. I have to travel around and I see some awesome home designs and deco plus I can use the search if I really wanted to find something specific. Sometimes, I find something on a vendor I didn't really think I needed. ;)
Implementing a server/facet auction system in UO is kinda unecessary and would kill what little player interaction/activity there already is on a shard.
Besides, imagine the cries of foul if such a system was put into place. PvMers would cry for the PvPers have their own "global auction system" and vice versa.

There are only a few limited "free for all" auction houses in WoW, in neutral towns and cities - but again, would open up a player to open pvp on the outskirts and that is something ppl don't like in UO. And also runs into the issues of "ghost" auction sitters, which is an issue in WoW. Ppl who sit and wait for certain items to appear in a neutral auction house and then mail it off to their favored toon.
first off Paladin's can be horde so they can see what orc's are auctioning. also auction houses in wow are cross faction so alliance can sell to horde and vice versa.

You should really know how WoW operates before using it as an example though.
 

Lady Storm

Grand Inquisitor
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Stratics Legend
While Broadsword has both games firmly in hand... and the Dev of UO have had personel of DoaC 's horde of dev help at publish time... it is highly unlikely of any cross game contamination. Though you can at any time ask Mesanna if some of the ideas can fit in... she has many times asked for your input.
The lady is always open to new ideas..
 

Kirthag

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first off Paladin's can be horde so they can see what orc's are auctioning. also auction houses in wow are cross faction so alliance can sell to horde and vice versa.

You should really know how WoW operates before using it as an example though.
forgive me...

my ALLIANCE Paladin. :p
Yes, I know they can be Horde. I've been playing WoW since vanilla so I do actually know what I'm talking about. Just didn't clarify. I get bored with it rather quickly after each major update and always come back to UO.
tyvm.
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
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Stratics Legend
While Broadsword has both games firmly in hand... and the Dev of UO have had personel of DoaC 's horde of dev help at publish time... it is highly unlikely of any cross game contamination. Though you can at any time ask Mesanna if some of the ideas can fit in... she has many times asked for your input.
The lady is always open to new ideas..
Then based on what I see is being promised for DAoC and therefore knowing that someone at Broadsword has a clue how to make these types of things happen, this is what I'd like to ask @Mesanna about with respect to UO:

- Could UO get a "patterning" system so you can copy the look of existing items on a character to the character's other items, e.g., make sandals look like boots, make a bandana look like a floppy hat, etc.

- Will the UO website or the account management website ever provide us with the ability to log in and review appearances, skills, and stats of characters on our UO accounts?

- Are there any more revisions in the works for the UO website?

- Are there any revisions in the works for the UO account management site?

- Will Broadsword ever sponsor an official forum for UO account owners?

- Are there any plans to include semi-dynamic VvV-related stats/scores by shard and for the game overall on the UO website, like we used to have for the faction system?

- When can we expect to read more about the "endless journey" changes to UO?

- Are there any plans to offer new UO servers with alternative rule-sets, e..g., pre-AoS, all-Fel with insurance, all-Trammel with no insurance, etc.?
 

MalagAste

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Then based on what I see is being promised for DAoC and therefore knowing that someone at Broadsword has a clue how to make these types of things happen, this is what I'd like to ask @Mesanna about with respect to UO:

- Could UO get a "patterning" system so you can copy the look of existing items on a character to the character's other items, e.g., make sandals look like boots, make a bandana look like a floppy hat, etc.

- Will the UO website or the account management website ever provide us with the ability to log in and review appearances, skills, and stats of characters on our UO accounts?

- Are there any more revisions in the works for the UO website?

- Are there any revisions in the works for the UO account management site?

- Will Broadsword ever sponsor an official forum for UO account owners?

- Are there any plans to include semi-dynamic VvV-related stats/scores by shard and for the game overall on the UO website, like we used to have for the faction system?

- When can we expect to read more about the "endless journey" changes to UO?

- Are there any plans to offer new UO servers with alternative rule-sets, e..g., pre-AoS, all-Fel with insurance, all-Trammel with no insurance, etc.?
Much as we'd ALL like to see the answer to most those questions you know it'll never happen.... we asked about the account MisManagement site at the last Meet and Greet and got a LOL Have a nice day... your done... next.

If that tells you how "seriously" they take these issues... they don't care... not going to do it and doubt they could if they wanted to... highly doubt they have the skills and it's totally obvious that the team at DAoC don't care... and aren't helping UO...
 

Lady Storm

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Well I can submit for your general information a few small facts that might help understand a small bit of why it might not be possible.
Broadsword's head honcho was the creator of DacC at Mythic. So right there is a small point of they wrote DaoC not on the Origin platform of machine language.
When Origin Systems was swallowed up by EA, the game language was totally different then the next big game that came out..
While Mesanna may borrow a few people to help on a publish from the DaoC staff it does not mean they can come right over and start to code the game...
I agree we need some of the spicy things DaoC is getting or can get.... its getting enough of the people who can work in OUR games code...
I do not envy Mesanna in her job of keeping track of all the ideas or bug reports that cross her e mail or desk a day! Much less a week!

I personally feel that for her teams size and time frame for doing all that use to take 25 to 40 people on 5 now is amazing we got so much in the taming publish.
She deserves a break in the thinking of many for what seems like her lack of output... its not as easy in her shoes as it looks.
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Well I can submit for your general information a few small facts that might help understand a small bit of why it might not be possible.
Broadsword's head honcho was the creator of DacC at Mythic. So right there is a small point of they wrote DaoC not on the Origin platform of machine language.
When Origin Systems was swallowed up by EA, the game language was totally different then the next big game that came out..
While Mesanna may borrow a few people to help on a publish from the DaoC staff it does not mean they can come right over and start to code the game...
I agree we need some of the spicy things DaoC is getting or can get.... its getting enough of the people who can work in OUR games code...
I do not envy Mesanna in her job of keeping track of all the ideas or bug reports that cross her e mail or desk a day! Much less a week!

I personally feel that for her teams size and time frame for doing all that use to take 25 to 40 people on 5 now is amazing we got so much in the taming publish.
She deserves a break in the thinking of many for what seems like her lack of output... its not as easy in her shoes as it looks.
Thank you for taking the time to add your thoughts to the thread, Lady Storm.

I understand that DAoC and UO are programmed differently. However, what I would like to understand better is why Broadsword doesn't have DAoC and UO share staff to do things like the following that don't involve actual game programming/coding:

- Improve the the account management system. Both games share it.

- Support and manage official forums. DAoC already has an official forum and I strongly suspect that the UO EMs/advisors and focus groups are already on the same software.

- Provide public relations support and manage the user community. DAoC has had one or two or maybe even more people who handle these functions and at one point after Jeremy Dahlberg left, DAoC and UO did share a community management person. And for many years, it seemed like the producer letters issued for both games were very similar as well. However, at this point, only DAoC gets producer letters. Why DAoC and UO can't share PR/community management staff again is a mystery to me and I think many other UO subscribers.

- Website development and management. The DAoC and UO websites already look like very similar so it would seem like major changes such as pulling in character info or leaderboards should be similar work for both games.

It's been 3 1/2 years now since Broadsword was formed and to this day, UO subscribers still haven't heard anything from Rob Denton and I suspect many of them don't even know who he is. And when players try to ask about Broadsword's support for improving aspects of UO outside the actual coding of the game, the replies (if we get any) really leave the impression that UO is treated by Broadsword like a tag-along product that they really don't want to deal with.

You look at the page on the Broadsword website showing individuals whom I suspect are "key" members of the staff and the majority of them have names we never hear with respect to UO, e.g., Collin Viteri, Greg Grimsby, John Thornhill, Mark James, Marty Brown, Talal Saad, David Scott, Ryan Gallagher, Christian Balzhiser, Casey Mitchum-Logue, Gabe Carter, Kyle Barnes, Jon Malloy, Will Austin, Tori Guarino, Nicole Behrendt, and Brendan Elliot. As far as we know, UO apparently has Mesanna, Kyronix, Bleak, Misk, and Jim Crawley. So for lack of any additional information on who, if anyone actually supports BOTH games, it really looks like Broadsword has allocated 17 people to DAoC and 5 people to UO.

Do you know if there's anything that UO subscribers can do to get Rob Denton to allocate more people/resources to UO?
 

Uriah Heep

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You would think, coming up on the 20th anniversary, even Rob Denton would want to crow a little bit, since he does 'technically' oversee UO too. Point out the positive and awesome things that ahve been done lately, without bugs.

Wouldn't take too much of his time...
 

Lady Storm

Grand Inquisitor
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I have never understood the way large businessmen think... when you think they have it all working right they blow it and do the exact opposite.
EA has rarely done any promo for the games age ... we do milestones and its "oh them...... "
be it Madden Football..... the tv ad's, news shots, and promo for it is double what we cost to run in a year
To be honest Tina I have no clue why.
The crew he has for DaoC is way more then we have.
As for Mesanna hiring more, she has tried.
I have asked my nephew who is back in college for advanced new programming to keep his skills up to date.
He tells me the guys and ladys he talks to when he mentions UO they ether don't know the game or are amazed it isn't dead yet.
Telling me many would not even think to waste their time on a game so old that it would fold in a few years and waste their early credit time that would lessen them getting a juicy top line job with a big name company on a new game.
I expected that answer btw.
UO is not a young puppy... and by the looks of it we are thinning out.
This would give many a pause to reflect on if its a good idea to join.

Lets face it we are playing a real antique.
 

Tyrath

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I have never understood the way large businessmen think... when you think they have it all working right they blow it and do the exact opposite.
EA has rarely done any promo for the games age ... we do milestones and its "oh them...... "
be it Madden Football..... the tv ad's, news shots, and promo for it is double what we cost to run in a year
To be honest Tina I have no clue why.
The crew he has for DaoC is way more then we have.
As for Mesanna hiring more, she has tried.
I have asked my nephew who is back in college for advanced new programming to keep his skills up to date.
He tells me the guys and ladys he talks to when he mentions UO they ether don't know the game or are amazed it isn't dead yet.
Telling me many would not even think to waste their time on a game so old that it would fold in a few years and waste their early credit time that would lessen them getting a juicy top line job with a big name company on a new game.
I expected that answer btw.
UO is not a young puppy... and by the looks of it we are thinning out.
This would give many a pause to reflect on if its a good idea to join.

Lets face it we are playing a real antique.
Yet every day millions of people sit down to play chess, now there is a real antique :)
 

Lady Storm

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My son plays it a lot too it was something my hubby and I taught him when he was 4 playing with his grandparents. yes its truly an antique, but a good one to study and play.
 

Tina Small

Stratics Legend
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I have never understood the way large businessmen think... when you think they have it all working right they blow it and do the exact opposite.
EA has rarely done any promo for the games age ... we do milestones and its "oh them...... "
be it Madden Football..... the tv ad's, news shots, and promo for it is double what we cost to run in a year
To be honest Tina I have no clue why.
The crew he has for DaoC is way more then we have.
As for Mesanna hiring more, she has tried.
I have asked my nephew who is back in college for advanced new programming to keep his skills up to date.
He tells me the guys and ladys he talks to when he mentions UO they ether don't know the game or are amazed it isn't dead yet.
Telling me many would not even think to waste their time on a game so old that it would fold in a few years and waste their early credit time that would lessen them getting a juicy top line job with a big name company on a new game.
I expected that answer btw.
UO is not a young puppy... and by the looks of it we are thinning out.
This would give many a pause to reflect on if its a good idea to join.

Lets face it we are playing a real antique.
Well, Dark Age of Camelot is a bit of an antique as well. It's only four years younger than UO! Is its platform that much more "modern" than UO's that people working on DAoC don't feel like they're harming/stalling their career working on it?
 

Dot_Warner

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Well, Dark Age of Camelot is a bit of an antique as well. It's only four years younger than UO! Is its platform that much more "modern" than UO's that people working on DAoC don't feel like they're harming/stalling their career working on it?
Isn't Wombat exclusive to OSI and its only remaining extant game? What up-and-coming whippersnapper would want to waste their time learning a language only useable for a single game - a game that is poorly managed, unadvertised, and swiftly slipping into irrelevancy as its playerbase...uhm..ehem...ages out?

DAoC, even at 16, is light years ahead of UO technologically. Being fully 3D comes with massive advantages over crappy 90's era sprites. They can change the look of something, adding patterns etc., simply by adding a new skin to already-existing polygons. UO has to render sprites for every available movement in game, with less than stellar results (I refer you to the twitching hats in the EC).

UO won't benefit in-game from many (if any) things created for DAoC as the two games were literally created in two different millennia.
 

Lady Storm

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Exactly Craftsman.
Dot is quite right.
Very much different.
I have played both over the years, and the short gap of time much changes in the gaming world happened.
I went to see the changes myself a few months ago in DaoC, I must commend Ron and his people in the great work they are doing.

Don't get me wrong our UO team is doing super for being a 5 person power house.
 

ShriNayne

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Pre-AoS... I just remember there being so much more of a community spirit back then, people seemed to interact so much more, almost overnight things just went downhill. Maybe I am just wearing my rose tinted glasses, but meeting smiths and tailors, getting repairs was just so nice, everyone chatting. Now all we have is repair deeds. Simpler times...
 

petemage

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DAoC, even at 16, is light years ahead of UO technologically. Being fully 3D comes with massive advantages over crappy 90's era sprites. They can change the look of something, adding patterns etc., simply by adding a new skin to already-existing polygons. UO has to render sprites for every available movement in game, with less than stellar results (I refer you to the twitching hats in the EC).

UO won't benefit in-game from many (if any) things created for DAoC as the two games were literally created in two different millennia.
Yea, the design decisions taken there are not the same, but funny enough UO EC and the DAoC client are both based on the same game engine (Gamebryo - Wikipedia). I guess most gamebryo knowledge is with the DAoC team, so in theory they can provide some help with UO EC.

Even in a more general sense, like from a career standpoint, I think UO's technology is not *that* bad as many might think. Experience with a professional game engine as well as experience programming in C++ can really land you a good job in some more serious industries too (think automotive, robotics, etc.). BMW keeps pushing those ads into my facebook stream: "THESE DAYS, AUTOMOTIVE HISTORY IS WRITTEN IN C++.".
 

Tyrath

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Apples and oranges.
Not really both are games, although Chess would be probably the original RTS and not a MMORPG. All a matter of perspective and from my perspective I don't see anything being made or invented today that will still be around in 1500 years as chess has been.
 

The Craftsman

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Not really both are games, although Chess would be probably the original RTS and not a MMORPG. All a matter of perspective and from my perspective I don't see anything being made or invented today that will still be around in 1500 years as chess has been.
I agree with you on the last part. Chess is an ancient game, as is the game of 'Go' (which has been around for 4000 years). Chequers is another game with longevity at around 800 years. All three will be around long after any modern MMORPG.

To try to compare a two player board game with a modern multiplayer computer game, simply through the 'game' connection, is asinine. As I said ... apples and oranges. If you'd tried to compare UO with one of its contemporaries you might have had an argument, but your comparison was simply a weak attempt to defend your position with little foundation.

Check mate.
 

a slave girl

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I did not play UO when it was Fel only, I do not PvP, but I would still love to see dead bodies stewn from Brit moongate all the way to Brit bank at least once before it's all over.

I have houses and banks full of stuff, just sitting there, and I like to look at it, but I would gladly let it all go for a do over.

Wipe it all and start over (and lose the enhanced client somewhere along the way).
 

Tyrath

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I agree with you on the last part. Chess is an ancient game, as is the game of 'Go' (which has been around for 4000 years). Chequers is another game with longevity at around 800 years. All three will be around long after any modern MMORPG.

To try to compare a two player board game with a modern multiplayer computer game, simply through the 'game' connection, is asinine. As I said ... apples and oranges. If you'd tried to compare UO with one of its contemporaries you might have had an argument, but your comparison was simply a weak attempt to defend your position with little foundation.

Check mate.
Not a very broad perspective with you as usual :) My position since you are missing it totally is......... Nothing being made in recent history is made with a eye to the long term future, just for the near short term gain. The throw away society based on instant gratification and moving on to the next shiny is the problem Chess was simply a example of something that has endured. You may now continue with your insults ;)
 

The Craftsman

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Not a very broad perspective with you as usual :) My position since you are missing it totally is......... Nothing being made in recent history is made with a eye to the long term future, just for the near short term gain. The throw away society based on instant gratification and moving on to the next shiny is the problem Chess was simply a example of something that has endured. You may now continue with your insults ;)
If you determined anything I said to be insulting then you are a very thin skinned individual indeed.

The further chess treatise is an interesting one, which I actually agree with. Im not missing your position at all. UO is nothing like chess and in its current state is a prime example of something that is for near short term game as EA milks it to death. UO wont be around for long, comparatively speaking. Unlike chess. That doesnt take away from the fact that your initial chess reference made a direct comparison to UO that was a poor one. I simply pointed that out. They are very different (to which your response was that they are 'both games'), which if its the best link you can come up with demonstrates that it was indeed a poor comparison.
 

Lady Storm

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Those of us who have been with UO from the very beginning might at times have rose colored glasses on...
But not all the time.
We have bad and good players, todays players would baulk the first 5 minutes back then yelling how could we have put up with all the barbaric limits.
Let's get a bit real here.
The past was a different time and people were new to computers.
How many of you remember your parents who now enjoy a cell phone were scared to own one or have a computer?
I remember a commercial about a elder version of a simple computer.. that they were showing a scared grandma pecking on a keyboard.
The look was of a elder lady scared it would bite her!
My goodness, rose colored glasses hide a lot of the odd or off times of people and their mental standing even in a game.
We tend to forget 20 years ago the internet was young... cable modems were a dream to get, even out there dial up was the normal...
People were different in how they acted.
More civil.
Anyone who has been in UO for the last 20 years " think" did you ever in your wildest dreams think you would talk to foreign people every day?
You do in UO.
Its no longer your neighborhood or town you talk to or trade with... your now global.
Now you understand why your mom said be on your best behavior as what you do will effect the world... Mom was right.
 
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