(....)
If your humble fellow member may comment on this trully glorious turning of the tables, this once in a lifetime, unexpected turn of events, why, what words with which to describe what we've all just read. No one could have anticipated it ladies and gents, but there you have it.
An EQ model to be copy-pasted straight into Pantheon, albeit with a shiny new shield skill! Let us all take a moment and shiver in awe.
Aenra, reporting live from Brad's basement.
I quite enjoyed the read. This part, esp:
- Even with this innovation and evolution, class interdependence is still extremely important. In recent years many MMOs have steered away from those core roles. Allow me to quote from the FAQ: Pantheon does indeed use a class based system, and those classes do fulfill roles, especially in group and raid contexts. There will also be opportunities to focus each class on more specific and specialized roles, especially at higher levels. That said, because we feel it’s important that classes fulfill distinct roles, creating interdependence is vital to a fulfilling social and cooperative experience. If everyone is the same, this simply cannot be achieved. Likewise, if every class is absolutely unique, grouping can become overly complicated and, in some cases, certain classes could be less desirable to have in a group than others. To avoid this, Pantheon will use a ‘quaternity’ system consisting of tank, healer, DPS, and crowd-control.
Seeing as I played a ranger almost exclusively from 1999 to 2010, I kind of have a feel for this. The only other class I played substantially was a paladin. Both were hybrids, see. SO this read raised some eyebrows and I have lots to talk about.
First, this:
We want our classes to be both traditional and iconic.
Translation: We can please everybody. While I want to believe it, I don't. Nuff said.
Next:
We then want to build on the traditional class and evolve the role in new and exciting ways without changing their core identity. A lot of this will be accomplished by adding flavor and distinctive abilities to those classes.
Same. So you like pasta? We're going to give you some fries and a burger with that.
Ok now I'm going to talk about the first quote up above because that's the next thing. This is where I start to fall into agreement and support them, but with some caution. The bolded part is specific to my experience. The Ranger was not always a welcome member of the group. Oftentimes, groups were looking for the bedrock: tank, healer/support, dps, cc. Rangers--because they're so spread out--did not fit nicely into that paradigm. It has more to do with HOW they're spread out. Some points were taken away from one category and placed into another. This means if you want to be a jack-of-all-trades, you end up with something like "tanking: moderate, healer/support: poor, dps: good, cc: poor". This can't compete in a group with someone who has "great" or a couple good. Groups desired specialists, so rangers and other non-specialists became hte 6th member or aren't invited.
Now, spreading out "points" to define a class into categories is not in itself a bad thing. In the perfect world, a jack-of-all-trades can always find worthwhile work by doing a patch heal here or a buff (sow anyone?) there or a superior camo here or a snare/root there or a offtank here or some tracking there. Indeed, rangers did a lot of that. It felt great! BUT this specific part of the quote addresses the problem: "
if every class is absolutely unique, grouping can become overly complicated..." For every thing that made the Ranger unique
and costed points, there had to be a compensating element in grouping to keep them desirable. So you can cast firefly and have a light source, but how does that help you in a group? You can track? What if nobody in the groups needs it? So you can root and snare, but how does that help you if nothing needs to be rooted or snared? So you can superior camo others, but how does that do a lick of good if nobody is needing it at the moment? You can heal for 400, great, but if the cleric has things under control then you're taking time away from DPS, so using your time ineffectively. See, these thigns DO add value to a ranger and I employed there use numerous times. The SHTF on many ocassions, but my Ranger talents could not always save the day, given a 400 pt heal is like healing a scratch. All of that variety was inconsistent and unreliable in groups, making the ranger mediocre in the most crucial element of the game. It didn't compensate enough to make our uniqueness justifiable in groups.
I still loved the Ranger and continued to play it. Got as high as 85 and thousands AA. I never gave up on it and still to this day believe in uniqueness. But I get it. The quote goes on to say "
To avoid this, Pantheon will use a ‘quaternity’ system consisting of tank, healer, DPS, and crowd-control." What I think this means is not too different from what EQ tried to do. It TRIED to have roles like these, also including the support role. There were many varieties of support in EQ; buffs/summon corps/tracking/etc. Take the rest on faith. What Pantheon might be trying to do is tune the class abilities and roles. Clarify them. Clean away the dirt and fuzz. Why? So they can make sure everything has a explicit consistent value in the group. Will it work? Unsure.
I like the idea of combining powers of multiple classes. But to some extent that already occurred in EQ. The cleric enabled the warrior. The warrior enabled everybody by keeping the threat on themselves. The enchanter enabled everybody. And so on. However, these relationships, if I can call them that, were very limited. If Pantheon can find a way to give it more depth, it might be a nice idea, IF they're careful about not causing the very problems being outlined in this news.
I still plan to be there if this game launches. I don't want a repeat of Vanguard. See, back in the day, I kept playing EQ. I didn't try Vanguard for a couple reasons. As the months became years I was jaded and didn't want to play it anyway. I look back on all that unhappily. In sum, I've concluded no MMO will ever be perfect. They'll all die slow groggy mudflated or otherwise obsoleted deaths. The wisdom is in appreciating them when they're in their finest moments. Live life while you can! If I'm not playing Pantheon soon after or immediatley after it goes live, the gods shall strike me down where I stand.
