[TERA PC & Console] En Masse is closing, but TERA lives on! We will continue to support TERA PC (NA) and TERA Console until service is transferred. Stay tuned for more information.
[TERA Console] The Grotto of Lost Souls update (v85) is now live! Read the patch notes here: https://bit.ly/TERACon_v85
[TERA PC] The 64-bit update (v97) is now live. Check out all the changes delivered on August 11 here: https://bit.ly/tera64_patchnotes
[TERA PC & CONSOLE] Summerfest Part 2: The Beach Bash is on from August 11 until September 1! Participate in event activities to earn tokens redeemable for costumes, consumables, mounts, and more! Details: https://bit.ly/tera_sf20
Comments
To be fair, Tera doesn't have options. It has situations and tiers that create sub-meta's. Some(like keen charm for healers) are optional because it's less convenient and the benefit is relatively minor but they are not build/playstyle-based choices that you make on the road of improvement.
If I knew (or thought) I'd be fighting someone that casts wind spells, I'd get wind resistance buffs before showing up, which would reduce their damage by like 75%. It could have been the best wind mage on the server, but my strategy/foresight trumped his abilities.
In Tera, this type of thing may be less pronounced, but it still applies. Having different options to choose from, allows for strategy and flexibility, and the ability to prepare and adapt to situations.
Sure, someone could complain that I only won because I had certain consumables used, but I would respond by saying that I won because I was more prepared.
It adds another facet to the game. And it's not something that is gated by heavy cost, or time investment. Anyone can come to a fight prepared, if they actually take the time to do so.
This new system will just reward the lazy players, and will hinder strategy and foresight.
You might say "well, the game should have methods to introduce all the layers and teach players how to use them effectively," and you're not wrong. But if I were asked to actually sit down and try to do this, I would quickly ask myself the question: "wait, why do we have so many systems that do variations of the very same thing? Can't we accomplish the same goals with a lot less layers?" And that is what I'm talking about. The fact that any given system on its own is not complicated isn't the biggest issue. It's the amount of layers of redundant systems that introduce needless waste and complexity on the whole.
(And again, I'm not saying that people are kicked specifically because stamina/charms and these particular consumables are themselves too complicated, but because there are too many layers of systems that people are expected to understand to demonstrate competence in end-game, and these systems were part of that entire layered package.)
What most people want in an MMO is flexibility and player control. But this doesn't mean "let's keep adding more and more separate systems that each allow separate additive minor tweaks done in lots of different ways, from different screens, at different times, and in different durations," particularly when the vast majority of the introduced options are ineffective anyway. This is just complexity for its own sake, and that is not what is best for a MMO (or any game/software product). You can have plenty of flexibility without needless layers of redundancy.
When it stops looking like a jumbled mess that was cobbled together by competing departments and rotating development teams, and looks like a cohesive system that is comprehensive and follows from end-to-end, providing all the functionality and flexibility it needs but in a way that makes sense. In other words, when the entire system on the whole has a cohesive, unified design that makes sense. Removing stamina/charms and streamlining consumables doesn't get us there on its own, but we have never needed so many layers in the first place. As I've been saying all along, if we can identify the few specific things people wanted to do outside the norm with these systems, they could potentially find a way to introduce those unique, useful options into one of the other remaining systems. That way you can still accomplish the same objective, but in a more streamlined way.
Anyway, again, I'm not saying that I want them to dumb down the game and remove options or flexibility. I'm just saying that the way they went about doing this in the first place was never all that efficient or logical (in my opinion), and they could very easily do everything they doing now with way less redundant systems. That's why I'm not at all sad to see these particular systems go. But for the few things that were actually useful that are no longer going to possible, I think those specific requests/needs should be brought forward. The function is more important than the specific form.
(At the end of the day, we just may have different philosophies about game design and there may be no reconciling, so anyway, I've at least tried to explain where I'm coming from. I respect that others won't feel the same way.)
And you said it yourself - Yes, they could add ways to teach players about these systems better. You say, "Why bother?" I say, why not bother? Especially when you haven't even tried!
And again, I fail to see these systems as being too complex or too difficult for beginners to understand. They aren't. Lazy people don't deserve to be coddled this much! It's a detriment to the game.
I didn't say "why bother?". I said, first, re-evaluate whether we even need so many systems in the first place. Then, once you eliminate redundancy, focus your efforts to train people on the systems that matter. It's a more efficient use of everyone's time, and still has the potential to provide the same degree of power/flexibility, if done properly.
But anyway... it doesn't matter. The systems are going to disappear no matter how much we argue about it. That's the main reason I was suggesting to focus on the specific problems people want to solve (like healers preferring Keen Charms for specific reasons), because that's the only thing that has any hope of making any difference. Maybe BHS can provide a different way to do those specific things with what remains.
Removal of stamina is okay I guess, not super necessary but not a bad change.
No more eclipse potions? GG good luck for dps running with a lesser geared/not good tank, and rip back crit brawlers. Maybe the back crit brawler thing is okay because they're not intended to be dps, but still.
No option for healers to keen or PvPers to use charms that are better for PvP.
So you want those really good mana/health pots, and even the crafted X ones don't even fill you up all the way? Don't worry, we'll make it so those don't work anymore but you can buy worse versions from NPCs.
Furthermore, if we can't use onslaught scrolls anymore because they'll just be combined with the everfull.... I'm going to be screwed for island of dawn/soloing on my healers. I always use a crit power scroll for them if I'm doing BAMs, and since the everfull gives attack speed to healers, my damage will go down considerably. rip.
Also canephora potions aren't in the list of unusable consumables, but they are also not on the list for useable ones. While I prefer bravery the hour long cd but 30 minute duration gives me a reason to use canephora.
Don't even get me started on the changes to vow of rebirth/priest buffs. Oh my god I can't even start. It's such a terrible idea. And the nerfs to double healers is bad news as well, given that we will have raid dungeons where we'll need more than one healer.
Most of all, why is this necessary at all? No one was having problems with consumables. They weren't complicated, even stamina was easy to have. None of these changes are really improving on anything, they're just taking away much more than they are adding.
For once I hope we somehow are really, REALLY far behind KTera because all of the patch notes and updates I've read so far have made me very nervous. Especially sorc changes ahah.
Please explain to me how noobs are running into barriers of acceptance, over their knowledge of charms and consumables?
They're running into barriers, because the game can be hard, and they don't yet have the gear/skill. Not because they don't have the right bloody charms, or consumables.
Again, I will ask you. Please explain to me how the consumables and charm system is too difficult to understand?
How much hand holding do you want in this game? Tera already has a very dumbed down, hand holding type system, because of its focus on the action combat, instead. I'd rather it not be dumbed down further...
EDIT: And as for us wasting our time trying to prevent this change from happening - bull freaking crap. I'm sure they are just as pissed over in ktera, and the more outrage we can express, the more chances they will take a step back and rethink.
I do like the updates to the login buffs though.
Edit: sorc changes look not good to be because the new overchannel has such a long cd and BoC seems to have less attack speed. That being said I've only played sorc at 65 a little so I might not know about something that makes these changes actually good for sorc.
The frak are you on about?! The game introduces you to most of the layers(excluding event items and some "rare" consumables like heaven's elixir) as you level. You get charms and a campfire in the mail, crystals, scrolls, etchings and a variety of other stuff from the VG story part. The better gear rolls for your class are also coloured differently. All of that comes in pieces so anyone who's not a complete idiot has the time to figure it out or, heck, even just read the description. If someone feels thrown in the deep-end it's because they either chose to ignore all those things or they are mentally challenged. I'm not sure which one of those types you think would be a great addition to a party and will know their class very well. It takes a special kind of gaming genius to shows 0 interest in the game and still be amazing at it.
We have had many threads on this forum over the years that discussed at length how bad the game and leveling process was at explaining anything that truly mattered in endgame, how it really takes player guides to make sense of everything, and even people in this very thread who admitted that they were wholly ignorant in their early days and look back on it now with embarrassment. To act like it's all super-obvious and easy to anyone "who's not a complete idiot" or not "mentally challenged" is a pretty remarkably different view of TERA than what I've ever seen or experienced. Of course, I'm not saying that charms or consumables have ever been themselves a primary point of contention, and I've never argued they were. But if your honest view of new players in TERA is that anyone who isn't up to speed on all the layered systems is just that stupid because it's just that obvious, then I guess I see where the fundamental disagreement comes from.
I never saw a problem with them. If it was brought up so much in the past, why have I never heard it complained about?
And I am saying that I don't see the problem. What is the problem? Other than you wanting a dumbed down system that a gorilla could understand?
The problem with what BHS is doing right now, specifically, is that they've eliminated a system without adequately considering some of the nuances that people were using the old system for, and they haven't proposed alternatives that serve the same purpose. That's why I've been asking over and over for those nuances to bring forward. I think that sort of feedback has the highest degree of likelihood to be considered, if anything. But everyone's so focused on the fact they're dumbing down the game, that these things were fine as is (or at best needed tweaks), that they shouldn't mess with it, "what was wrong with it"/"no one was complaining", and so on, and not providing actual constructive arguments about the specific benefits being lost. If I had to go into a boardroom meeting with the designers who already have their reasons to make this change (or with EME who has the potential to voice the concern to BHS), my experience says the arguments raised in this thread will lose because no one has actually said why these systems were good, essential, and needed. Outside of very few edge cases, people have only said why it wasn't bad and just assume that BHS are idiots or catering to idiots for removing it. Those arguments always lose.
Anyway, I'll keep my eye on this thread if anyone can actually articulate good usable arguments about the benefits of the old system that threaten to be lost, but I'm done arguing in circles about it.
Hopefully they're stripping it down to build it up a little again, one step at a time. Sometimes to fix stuff, one needs to just scrap what you have.