Living Settlements: Design questions, and considerations

So - I am sitting here thinking about the “proposed” Living Settlements… and I am just sitting here gnashing my teeth. I truly worry about the development and design direction for this game. Because as was seen in so many other times recently - the people working on this game truly operate in an ECHO CHAMBER. In ADMIN MODE. With no points allocated.

So - I have some questions and considerations. I would love to hear if @den , @AndyB , or if anyone supporting the @Community leveled these questions at any point during the design phase and during the decision making process to proceed with Living Settlements.

I am certain that I WILL NOT HEAR. Because Funcom does not give a Shaleback’s cloaca about player community feedback. Because they are too busy giggling at their purple smoke blob in their ECHO CHAMBER.

But - I will ask the questions anyway. With the hope that one of them trips on this thread, reads, and then things: “Oooooh! We never considered that!”

Living Settlements

The observed goal of the “Living Settlements” system is to make artisan (bench) thralls a more active part of the player’s base or city. The added interactions will hopefully make the game feel more “alive.”

Questions

  • How will this change bring positive change for all modes and all maps of Conan Exiles? PvE, PvE-C, AND PVP? Exiled Lands AND Siptah? How will this be a good addition for both the Official servers, the private server communities, and the RP communities?

  • How will the now “killable” thralls respond to threats from all ranges of players? Will they be robust enough to avoid being killed easily by griefers? (Think mounts, and the mounts’ massive HPs. These HP pools were boosted to make it more difficult for mounts to be easily merked.)

  • When the “killable” thralls are targeted, what methods will all ranges of players use to kill them? Which of these methods are acceptable? Are there any methods that our system introduction might garner that are not positive, or might negatively affect gameplay?

  • Have we considered that players will routinely play for long periods of time seeking rare thralls? And that these thralls can now threatened and removed instantly by a wandering bear mob (PvE) or a focused PvP player? Are we okay with this? Are there other balance considerations that we may need to make in order to address thrall rarity as we implement this new system?

  • Does the entire player community want this change? Do we need to consider a means of making this an optional change? So that players who do not wish for their precious/rare thralls to wander and run amok do not have to allow them to do so? Can we implement this system in an “opt-in” feature fashion, were the player flips a switch to send their Shieldwright to the kitchen to make a snack?

  • Is there already a mod that does exactly what we are seeking to implement? If so - do they already do it better than we could do it? Should we consider absorbing or purchasing the mod? Would the game, and the ENTIRE player community (PvE, PvE-C, PVP, sweaties, RPer’s) be better served leaving this kind of a system interaction as a mod-only enhancement that they can introduce if and when they see fit?

  • This system sort of looks like the TAVERNKEEPER SYSTEM. Are we copy/pasting the Tavernkeeper System in a way where we will be using that core system to deliver the Living Settlement System? If so - are we sure that the Tavernkeeper System is FULLY OPTIMIZED and FREE FROM BUGS before we compound our extensive bugs list by multiplying the current bugs? If the Tavernkeeper System is already poorly optimized, and brings server performance to its knees when 10 players have a Tavern running… what will server performance look like when 10 players have a Tavern AND a Living Settlement running?

  • What current bugs that we still have not yet solved will potentially impact and ruin the launch of the Living Settlement System? What can be done to reign in all of the game-breaking problems before we give the player community another potentially broken thing to contend with? How can we solve some of the game’s current issues so that we can make Living Settlements a success?

  • Is there critical feedback on this system that we need to evaluate from the player community before we continue forward? How can we properly communicate with the player community, and encourage them to be positive about our new system? How can we swiftly vet and incorporate their feedback so that we can launch the best possible new Living Settlement System ever?


Anyway… thanks, Funcom. For what it’s worth - I totally DO NOT expect to hear back from you. That’s the communication standard you have set. So… good luck. And I really really really hope that you don’t once again screw things up. :rage:

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This is an interesting question. And to those who engage into the game in this manner… there will be no acceptable answer or explanation.

When you play most MMORPGs you have a sense of permanence. Items respawn with you, broken items can be repaired, unlocks are always available, housing is instanced and available, and unless you are farming something like tokens or specific drops, content cleared doesn’t need to be revisited.

This is not the direction Conan Exiles is going. If you look at the language being used in past devstreams, statements used, and actions taken from one update to another. They are not looking for much permanence in the game. Equipment, items, materials, buildings, and followers are being made easier to get and easier to lose. I would wager we will see followers get an update that allows for them to be leveled up much quicker. The champion system may even be the first step in that regard. Instead of grinding out exp, you simply do some fetch quests and choose the perks you want. Being as followers only get three perks, we can probably assume that there will be three questlines per champion.

So if someone plays on a PVP server and their crafters get attacked… they should expect to have to replace them. For a PVE(C) player they should expect to protect their crafters with their structural design, or expect to replace them should certain events happen.

I’m not saying this is a good thing, nor will I say its a bad thing. This is simply the direction Funcom is taking for better or for worse. Being as the update will hit the test server in a few days, we simply need to prepare for it, test it, and then provide feedback. But I wouldn’t expect any 180 degree deviations from what we’re getting, when we hear about such changes, they are already months into development of said features.

You’re absolutely right on no 180s. They’ve already committed. And whats worse is that they ALWAYS operate like this. And their echo chamber behaviors put them out of touch with the players. So they seem to always think that everyone wants what they are pedaling. Even if many of us have concerns.

I do think much of the problem is actually from the timing. Its not so much that they don’t listen to the feedback. The issue is if they do (in most cases), they lose thousands of man hours. Which isn’t possible to do.

If they are introducing Feature A, and we don’t like it. We’re getting it hell or high water because they aren’t going to revert 3-6 months of development (just an estimate).

It would probably make better sense for them to talk about such a feature like settlements back in February. Or whenever the design parameters were being finalized and getting ready to go to development. I understand that many features like this are a bit more nuanced than that, and may even go back years in some cases.

Much of the arguments against that are that they don’t always have all the features fleshed out and things may change as development goes, so they only want to bring forward and announce the stuff that are just about to hit. But if you want community feedback you gotta get these out earlier so the feedback can actually matter.

As it stands now, I don’t even think they should have announced it in the latest devstream or even bother with the public test. Instead let it simmer in QA till October or December and just announce it on the same day as the live patch.

This cuts down on the speculation, people login to see the changes, and get invested since they have to learn how to deal with them immediately and not simply relying on influencers who did closed or open beta tests. Not unless they wish to be a few days behind. Course the influencers don’t like that, but game development isn’t for them, its for the players. And getting a more polished update out of the blue is more acceptable IMO.

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