I think you should consider changing the nature of these areas, or scaling them down slightly to make them more accessible to the playerbase. I actually like the dragon lairs as designed, I think they are a tough and difficult challenge without being overly impossible, and having enough randomness that there is an ever-present element of danger. Similarly, hell does a really good job of creating the same effect although through different means.

However, I think that Tiamant himself is basically too tough. I like the idea of having an ultra-tough challenge, but having nobody able to do it in a year sort of suggests that the difficulty is too high, especially considering the ever-declining playerbase lately.

One thing that I don't like about it is that you only get one shot, so even if you were able to assemble a group that could take him down, once you failed the first time he is essentially undoable the second. I think you should take all the bonuses away from Tiamat for a failed attempt against him. Also, I think he is just slightly too strong in general. As you describe (I don't remember exactly your quote), you need 5 players minimum to take him down. Getting 5 competent players is very difficult, only having one opportunity to take him down is even more trying, and the fact that this assumes all the characters do what is optimal and have favorable synergy is a bit much, don't you think?

Also, I feel like only the first part of this will be responded to, but I'd like to bring up Hell too in it. It's a lot harder to do things in there now that there aren't groups of 10+ going down there all the time. I would guess that there has not been one item retrieved from 8th-9th in the last 6 years. I doubt those items will ever be gotten again unless a highly experienced group of vets consisting of characters designed specifically for Hell surfaces. I don't like the idea that you'd have to go to those lengths of OOC planning to possibly go there. Hell was designed with 100+ players online, not 40.

I like the idea of those Herald cabal powers to enhance exploration making a big difference in these parts. I REALLY like the idea of letting a Herald set a "waypoint" or campfire, a temporary altar, in an explore area, so that you will go there when you die instead of your pit as long as you are in the group when it is crated. I understand it's not really in the spirit of the whole place, but this would really give a chance for people to explore the area through attrition, and not discouraging people to not explore due to the time sink, the incredible cost of a mistake, and the fact that it is incredibly newbie unfriendly.

Also I was going to add something about ST, but I'll boil it down to this.

Some of the secrets, even though they are secrets, aren't worth very much individually. Some of them are worth a lot. Some of them have never been discovered. Many of the things will still kill you even if you know the general nature of what's coming because you aren't familiar with the area itself, or the various nuances. I just don't think the area is significantly diminished by the knowledge that is circulating out there. I would guess that me and Daevryn differ on that point. Anyways, I think it's certainly one of the most well written areas in the game, I think you should just put it back in instead of trying to preserve the mystique of it. I think it's more fun for you to watch players try your puzzles and for players to be challenged by your puzzles than to try to create a secret area in a game that just doesn't lend itself to secrets.

The other alternative is to just make it a brute force challenge. I don't really like that idea.

I've always been more of a lone wolf than anything, and probably due to that I've never explored much of the Inferno in all the years I played CF. ST was perfect for me, in that regard. It gave me an escape from the endless raid-and-retrieve cycle and ultimately kept my characters around longer. As a matter of fact, if I think back to pre-ST years, I rarely had a character last over 250-300 hours (with the exception of Urden). Once it came in, 350+ became the norm. That's no coincidence.

My string of more recent short lived characters likely die more to hero boredom than anything.

I tend to reflect Meks tendancies to wander around alone, and miss silent and its quirks.

I do think certain parts could use some revisting, and the items that can be brought from it. Mostly because they compared to some pretty awesome stuff from the depths of hell that could be achieved solo for certain combos, potentially any with some assistance.

But overall I can't think of many reasons not to deviously tweak some of the posted information give some items a downgrade and let silent live again.

To be honest, edges also make me keep going a lot longer. Plus getting edge points gives me something else to do in quiet times (although very repetitive, unlike ST which was often new and surprising, even if I didn't understand a lot of it).

are the main things in this thread that, to me, are an argument for doing something with the area vs. continue to find something else to do with my time.

Mostly from the angle of "Hey, some people do enjoy this kind of thing even if not everyone does or thinks it has a point."

I'd probably make an attempt to hero and explore the area again just for the fun of that and hell. I hate that the two characters I was able to get in there made foolish mistakes and wound up being unable to explore (for all I know).

I've identified a handful of pieces of equipment from Silent Tower, and I like to think I enough quite a bit about what's available to players and how to get it, even if I'll never have a character strong enough to do so.

Even so, every time I've gone into Silent Tower, I've done it completely focused on exploring, learning, and discovering not just the puzzles but the story.

While the equipment and various artifacts are some of the best in the game and are sought after by people for a competitive edge (which is part of the problem, IMHO), there are definitely those who go there and spend a lot of time there simply because it's a lot of fun whether there is a prize at the end of the rope or not.

The bottom line for a lot of players is that getting into, exploring, and learning about Silent Tower is simply a ton of fun, and a kind of fun that isn't available through most other parts of CF.

I don't know if you're ever going to open ST again, but if you do, the first time I hit an entry quest prog, it's going to be like a embarrassingly dorky but awesome Christmas morning.

Perhaps you could significantly de-uberfy the upper end gear before changing the area? People who solve puzzles will still be able to pick up edge points, but it won't be the most efficient way of doing so, so abuse becomes less likely.

Because of the history of the tower, I'd actually go back there (depending on my existing character build), just to figure out stuff. I mean, there was a lot of stuff in there that was nifty for strategic reasons but didn't boost overall power.

It's not ideal, as I personally liked the prospect of getting my hands on some of that upper end gear, but it is a lot better than not having the tower at all.

I don't know how often areas induce people to roleplay, but in the years I have played CF, nothing has caused me such pleasant pain as the exploration of the Silent Tower.

--------------------------------------

Having a strong dependence upon the acquisition and destruction of magic to appease my goddess and a personal interest in extra-dimensional existences, my studies of the tower necessitated that I research alone and with the assistance of others. Had it been closed during my lifetime, I likely would have had to take up something constructive, like knitting baby quilts.

- Nerisa Bonraphinu, Voice of the Mistress of the Veil



It was so refreshing dying to something other than Hunsobo, Waserax, and the rest of the Empire. Thank you for the Silent Tower experience. But next in my next lifetime, please inform me that parachutes are not included.

- Xinrithil


There was this bartender friend, a guy with a magical mask that allowed him to change his face to look like other people, and he walked up to me and gave me a piece of paper with a word on it. He winked, put a finger to his lips, and without a word more granted me access to the Lyceum. A whole new world opened up to me that day.

- Anonymous


------------------------------------

Thanks Nep, for the story, the mystery, and the challenge of it all.

...if you do return it. IE The moment you leave Silent, all the protections you had in there (from there) drop.

The fact someone could pop out near Galadon with 20 hr haste and sanc and go to town really soiled Silent for me.

Also, like Daurwyn said, keep the uber Archmage gear, but maybe de-uberify some of the other, easier gotten pieces?

...Pretty sure it already works like that.

I don't recall my sanc + haste + insane resists holding over after leaving.

NT

Well, at least, haste did. Heh.

nt

At some point most of what you're probably worried about was changed to go away as you left. I don't remember exactly when that was.

That whole thing's another great example of "the players are more clever about finding broken uses for my cool ideas than I am."

...if I ever started my own MUD, I'd grab 2-3 of CF's biggest cheaters just to de-cheatify my MUD.

You need a cheat on your IMM staff to give you all the cheat 411.

Think of it like the FBI hiring Leo DiCaprio to help with catching forgers in Catch Me if You Can.

Eh, I don't necessarily think it's the end of the world if a couple people figure out something clever and get to run with it for a while before it's made more fair.

Although those people sometimes get surly when it's changed.

I deal with at least two of them on a semi-daily basis.

I'm pretty sure I showed everyone I knew the nifty sanc thing, GUESS who showed me that it was possible as Krundig?

But Cabdru of course! So don't try and lay this one on us bub!

I don't remember the first people I saw doing that, but it wasn't me. :)

With a cloud giant warrior called Muug. Using a certain means to refill the mana. The huge mana cost was no longer an issue after that. I also used it for the haste mentioned above, at least once. Muug killed a certain D-Elf warrior with it who attacked him in Galadon. I didn't really solve any puzzles in there beyond getting in to the first room.

And much as ST is about the one fresh aspect of CF for me, opening it is unhealthy whilst people will cheat to get gear from it.

People who want solutions posted aren't exactly looking for puzzles.

Im currious for i have never been in ST but I have heard of it.... BUt how did people cheat?

Well in my case, I was contacted by a player and invited to go to ST to help him get nice gear (with the implication that I'd get nice gear too).

It's a puzzle area, so sharing answers to puzzles ooc would mean that it is then set up to be brute-forced by above said ooc groups.

Basically it was the area I found most interesting in cf, because I learnt something new about it with each character. But it is very tough to figure things out.

.. is that ST is, as you said, a puzzle area. Unfortunately, while being good at the puzzles can make getting the sweet loot easier, most people still need help with the mobs with the gear. So it basically goes like this: Arrive -> solve puzzles -> fight -> g all corpse.

The problem is people started figuring out the puzzles but still needed help with the actual fighting so they brought other people to help them and breezed through much of the puzzle aspects (the parts you can "solo") to get to the meat of it (the phat loot).

I guess it sucks that people shared info OOC, but honestly, it happened just as bad "IC" too. IMHO, there is really no difference between someone smart dumping all the knowledge and their pal via AIM and then running through ST together like they both know what they're talking about and some vet grabbing a bard/healer/whatever who doesn't know anything about ST and walking them through it "IC" to get the gear or explore, which happened quite a bit. While the latter is more legit, I suppose, neither scenarios really help maintain the secrecy and mystery of the area.

Maybe if the gear was more attainable solo to more players wouldn't be pressured into spilling the beans because they want it so much.

--

Note: By sharing info I mean telling your pals a decent amount about how it works, what to do, etc. not posting giant word docs with pages and pages info specific notes.

If you get it with your buddies, then it gives you and your buddies a competitive advantage.

If you get it with strangers, then there's give and take at play. It also enables newbies to roll support characters and get to go to these places, rather than being excluded because a group doesn't want to share the gear.

That doesn't change the fact that people who don't know anything about ST basically get schooled about it in a couple hours just so I can get a couple pieces of eq. Now one more person knows a bunch of stuff about ST without having to figure anything out, which seems to be what Nep cries foul about.

The point? The premise of secrecy just doesn't work and it's still to expect people to adhere to some kind of honor system when the area itself encourages them to take actions that seem to make Nep frowny.

>That doesn't change the fact that people who don't know
>anything about ST basically get schooled about it in a couple
>hours just so I can get a couple pieces of eq. Now one more
>person knows a bunch of stuff about ST without having to
>figure anything out, which seems to be what Nep cries foul
>about.

It's nice if people get the chance to figure things out for themselves, but that kind of IC transmission of information never especially offended me.

Well, it's nice you feel that way since I'm sure more people have and, Nep willing, will discover Silent Tower's secrets either on their own or that way rather than through leaked spoilers on the Internet.

... Learned most of ST the hard way. I found the first clue to even get there by myself but a coinsidence, and later I was told ICly where to go from there. After that I mad a char mostly made for the exploring of ST and hell. (Deiha the scion healer under Igbah.)

I got a bunch of IC hints etc but none of them were really "spoiling" things, just hints. I found the are to be awesome even though it costed me a bunch of deaths + some super gear several times. When I returned from my (very short) break I planned on making a char just to explore the place. Unfortunatly it was closed by then. :(

I actually don't mind if other people have some cool kickass gear that I don't know how to get, it just gives me even more of a reason to either PK them or learn how to. It sort of inspires me. It really sucks that someone decided to post it on Dios as it destroyed so much for so many. (Mostly for you though as it must have taken A LOT of work to get that area going.)

I can only hope that it will eventually be reinstated in some form and I don't mind at all if all the hours I've spent there to learn things are wasted, as exploring the place was so much fun.

All in all I just wanted to say that I actually don't mind if it was reinstated in it's current form despite of the spoilers posted on Dios. I doubt that many managed to get a look at them before they were brought down, and I doubt anyone would do it again.

Why would you possibly think that no one would do it again?

There have now been multiple occasions where players have got pissed off and hit out by posting stuff they know the imms don't want posted.

Wands have been posted, and got redone as a result.
ST got posted.

The fact that it would get removed is hardly a deterrent to someone who got banned and doesn't care about the rest of the community.

N/T

Wands got posted. Was maybe a couple of years before ST stuff did,.

Wands got posted at the same time (by the same guy) as the ST stuff as well, in addition to the incident earlier you referred to.

I don't think any of the sleek locations changed as a result of the most recent case.

It stands for The Little Bitch, meaning the person who did it. There have been three incidents like that (discouting the Wiki saboutage), all of which took place before I started playing CF in 2004.

Shadowmaster/Deathweaver, who was responsible for the Wiki saboutage has thus been called TLB4 for a few occasions after the previous ones. This particular occasion was a posting of a ST walkthrough of sorts and wand lists into the Diku Wiki. I e-mailed the wand lists with related IPs to the imps. I had already deleted the ST walkthrough from the Wiki past revisions and thus couldn't send it to anyone, as it was before I thought of sending information to the imps.

I suspect talk in depth about all these things. Just use google and you'll come up with something.

Because I did Google and didn't find a single CF site in a language that is something else than English. I searched for Carrion Fields and went through ten first pages.

Try adjusting your Google search preferences to include non-English results.

While I'm sure sites like these could exist, I doubt they would appear in Google. I'm sure even the Russians (or whatever) want their info private, and aren't putting up .com's for CF cheats.

My guess is they cheat with chat programs, emails, file sharing apps, little notebooks, and all the same tools everyone else uses to share the information they swear to god they never share but do. It's naive to think otherwise.

PS: If you really care, search for phrases that only appear in CF, like questy mob names, etc. If that doesn't work, try doing it again in another language.

I tend to always do that to include the English ones. That includes everything else too. Pro should back up his claim with evidence, otherwise I won't believe it.

>I doubt that many managed to get a look at
>them before they were brought down, and I doubt anyone would
>do it again.

It's happened about three or four times over the years, so history doesn't much support that.

If I'm recalling all the "major" spoiler leaks since I started playing correctly, three or four cases over about a decade is a pretty solid track record for the level of secrecy and cooperation you guys expect.

Having a relatively small community probably helps quite a bit, but even so, I'd say given your expectations of people, especially as they go periods of interest and disinterest, satisfaction and dissatisfaction, etc. over a long period of time, you've been fairly fortunate.

I mean that in a purely pragmatic way.

das

>If I'm recalling all the "major" spoiler leaks since I
>started playing correctly, three or four cases over about a
>decade is a pretty solid track record for the level of secrecy
>and cooperation you guys expect.

I sort of agree with you, and yet, it's still enough that I might be reasonably discouraged from trying to hold up my end of it after a while.

At least, I am discouraged, and I usually pretend to be reasonable.

There will always be petty people.

I guess I don't see it as a big problem that nobody's killed Tiamat, or that nobody's gotten gear from the lower levels of Hell in quite some time.

If killing Tiamat (or reaching and kill mobs on the lower levels of Hell) is made easier, then the gear payoff should be reduced by a commensurate amount.

It's on the Long Term list but a "good" alternative to go through the Inferno that doesn't forcefully change your alignment would also open up the Inferno to a lot of people.

To make it happen you need reasons for goodies to go into the Inferno. And no, going to battle demons doesn't necessarily hold weight because that's the freeking plane of demons...it's where demons and bad people belong.

I could see something really interesting happening like a war between heaven and hell spilling into the mortal world (more than normal), resulting in people having to go down there to knock some heads or rescue Peach. Etc.

It would require considerable work, but it would provide a good opportunity to make the Inferno fit a little more seamlessly with Theran mythos. To be honest, though I'd never wish the area to go away, in truth it makes as much thematic sense as the whitecloak encampment.

>I think it's more fun for you to watch players try
>your puzzles and for players to be challenged by your puzzles
>than to try to create a secret area in a game that just
>doesn't lend itself to secrets.

This sentence doesn't make sense to me. How am I going to watch people try puzzles and be challenged by puzzles that have the solutions circulating, excepting the very occasional new player who doesn't know the solutions yet and isn't inclined to seek them?

What about simply reopening it unchanged for a while and observing what happens? How bad the damage done by the leaked info is a matter of opinion, but you've got the ability to simply watch people inside and decide for yourself if, after a year (or more?) it's as bad as you think it would be.

The worst thing that could happen is a few sweet pieces of eq end up in circulation for a while and you have to comment out a handful of entrance quests again.

I'll buy you champaign.

I didn't feel that the area was overwhelmingly compromised. You might feel differently (and are obviously going to be a better judge of that than myself), but knowing how to get to an actual archmage does exactly squat. It's not like you get to 3 secret archmages and then get some golden sword of dragon slaying. Also, the tower is quite dangerous in of itself, not knowing that x mob is going to drive or y mob is going to jump out of the wall and disarm you or that you better not die in this room etc. can really put a damper on your day and your character. I think if something ever becomes "mainstream" that you will make it a little trickier or can add a twist to it or whatever, so it's not like it's totally static.

I think you've treated this area in particular with less objectivity than you normally approach the game with. For example, full loots as a response to people brute forcing an area? Bad change, because every "new" player who comes in will get smacked with it and instantly have a terrible taste in their mouth, only severely punishing those people who tried to tackle it without anyone else's help IC or OOC. I know it's your pet area, and I understand, but I still think I make valid points.


Your vision for the area cannot really exist in the game as it is today, and I assume by now you realize that. Even if you spend hours coding up new puzzles, it only takes one guy who feels slighted to put your time to waste. Also, when you create an area like this, you create an incentive to cheat because if player A knows something, but needs player B and C to get it, but knows that if he shares it with other people it will eventually get out and be changed, he really benefits from having people who he knows won't tell their friends IC/OOC. I realize that there are always incentives to cheat, but just thought I'd make the point. Also, before anyone makes a snarky comment, when you have a 300 charge whip you don't need players B or C.

I feel like your position is clear from other times you've posted on the subject, that you are unwilling to let it exist in that fashion, that if it can't be as you imagined it then the structure will have to be dramatically changed or it won't be part of the game at all. I don't feel the same way though. I don't think ST will ever become so simple to the point that people will farm it for EQ or that most of the archmage equipment will be out. If you feel that way, you can always bring the rewards in line with the difficulty, or reduce the power of more commonly known items.

In the end, it's a game and having the area around makes it more fun. Obviously, if having it in its current state makes the game less fun for you, then you shouldn't put it back in. Just my opinion.

You had a lot to say, and it's interesting and worthy of consideration in its own right, but it didn't answer the only question I asked.

I have a hard time believing that if Silent Tower were open today you would only see the “occasional” player struggle with it.

I've positive you would observe people stroll through the tower with ease, deftly dodging its traps and manipulating its widgets and gizmos to do their bidding. Most of these people would be doing so with or without shadowmaster's leaked information.

I'm also positive you would observe people who are using the leaked info as a crutch getting wasted in the tower because, while it was certainly a lot of important information, it wasn't quite a full blown walkthrough either.

Sometimes it feels like you have some arbitrary number in your head and once that many people know so many of the areas secrets, it must be closed until some of them die or quit forever, regardless of how they came to have that knowledge.

Are you still competing with Andaren on the PC kill counter for your areas?

that you and I were past pretending that there was anything that I would say that would make you happy.

I really think he made some valid gameplay points though. Meh what ever I guess.

I feel like it's kind of an unreasonable expectation. Assuming that all other games allow walkthroughs and strategy guides to circulate (which... they do), almost no other game on the market offers that kind of an incentive to its creators (the ability to watch people run through its areas uninformed repeatedly).

This is because, in most other games, the designers acknowledge that walkthrough and strategies guides do more good for the game and for the players than secrecy, which really only exists so that... the designers can enjoy themselves.

I wouldn't suggest that you guys don't deserve to derive enjoyment from your areas in these ways, but I think it's obvious to anyone with an outside perspective that it's a self-interested motive, that creates with it complicated and unnecessary social structures and stigmas and problems. Secrecy is a big part of what keeps CF inaccessible to outsiders, and I think that's the primary point of it, despite our efforts to market over the years, we still maintain this attitude of being an exclusive community with exclusive rights and priviliges. We're not; we're a game, a game that will eventually cease to be fun if we can't replenish the playerbase.

These kinds of policies benefit the designers, and hurt the players and the game. And I understand why you don't want to give them up (because you, the designer, would be losing a perceived bonus), but I think you should understand why most people viewing this forum wouldn't consider what you wrote to be very important in the grand scheme of things.

Other designers for most other games, free or not, don't get the privilege you're standing up for. Why should we (as players) care? We love and appreciate you and want you to enjoy what you do, but this particular privilege that you're clinging to hurts us and only helps you. It's hard to just sit back and be okay with that, just because you (the staff) are irreplaceable.

What you're saying is only true if you assume that no players are interested in exploration, but rather that it is a chore that they suffer through to gain more power.

Players that are interested in exploration won't read walkthroughs and strategy unless they get stuck, or simply not at all. It's the way we play every other game on the market, too. I certainly didn't purchase strategy guides or maps to Oblivion or Fallout, even though I could have and had an easier time at those games. That's the great thing about information; you only get it if you want it.

When I was a kid I used to be obsessed with Zelda for the Nintendo 64. For anyone that doesn't remember or didn't play it, getting through the various levels often meant employing specific tactics against certain bosses or solving puzzles to unlock doors, etc.

This was also right around the time we got our first dial up model and I could get on the Internet. I do remember being stumped a few times and after asking a friend or two, I hit up the internet for the answer.

Obviously, you can't find information about ST on Google, but you can ask your pals. Honestly, I don't have a problem with asking a buddy for a clue on a specific puzzle once I've finished wracking my brain over it.

I think the thing to remember, in regards to traditional video games and in CF, is that there is a difference between following a walk-through or habitually referencing a guide and occasionally asking for a hint from someone more knowledgeable than you. The latter being perfectly acceptable as far as I'm concerned.

Another thing to consider is that while most games these days have guides, it's probably because they generate revenue, not because the creators really think you need them or should have them. The information is going to get out there anyway, so they might as well profit from it. In CF, that aspect doesn't exist.

"Another thing to consider is that while most games these days have guides, it's probably because they generate revenue, not because the creators really think you need them or should have them. The information is going to get out there anyway, so they might as well profit from it. In CF, that aspect doesn't exist."

That doesn't really account for free, user-generated walkthroughs. Even when games don't publish their own walkthroughs and guides, users inevitably will. The difference is the creators of CF actively try to discourage this activity through community pressure and in-game repercussions, to preserve their own interests.

Frankly, they're blackmailing the playerbase, and getting away with it because they're irreplaceable. Unfortunately, players are hard to replace, too.

(I'll edit this to add that I am still playing and enjoy the game; not to be a fatalist but I post these kinds of concerns in the hopes that I can still play and enjoy it in ten years.)

I think you're ignoring the role that secrecy plays in game balance. I'm not sure what other "walkthrough games" you're talking about are, but CF is a multiplayer competitive game with playerkilling and limited items.

One of the ways to limit the items that are released into the PK environment is to attach exploration/secret barriers to those items. If you remove the exploration/secret barriers entirely, suddenly there are no costs to attaining the item at all, and it is released into PK at will. Which means the item may have to be rebalanced to account for its ease of availability. ST items (along with a lot of other items) haven't been balanced to account for that.

Also, one of the main draws to exploration is learning to overcome those exploration/secret barriers and gain a competitive edge over other PKers. If you publish walkthroughs, you remove any competitive edge over other PKers. In fact, you are effectively rewarding walkthrough players with a competitive PK edge over non-walkthrough players. Because while the non-walkthrough guys are still trying to solve puzzles and challenges, the walkthrough guys are maxing out limited items, removing all the rewards and using them in PK. There would be a heavy incentive to use walkthroughs to compete in CF which means that exploration-type players would, in fact, be penalized.

Anyway, my point is that the "area designers interests" are not the only - or even primary - consideration.

.

So the solution would be to get all the info on it that's been posted, let everyone who puts forth significant effort to get a walkthrough get it. So as to not provide additional advantages to old timers who have the info from before.

Maybe attach a much faster purge timer to the items from ST so that those mysterious gear whores with the best items wouldn't be the only ones getting benefit.

Face it, nobody with the wherewithal to get to ST is not going to be looking for and using a walkthrough. Not with our playerbase. There may have been an ooc info less minority when CF had a playerbase, but now you should do one of two things: 1. Increase the playerbase (do you guys even want to do this? If I see you guys actually trying hard to do this I will try hard, otherwise I'm not going to bother) 2. Make ST available, it's a shame to let it go to waste because of vindictiveness.

>I think you're ignoring the role that secrecy plays in game
>balance. I'm not sure what other "walkthrough games" you're
>talking about are, but CF is a multiplayer competitive game
>with playerkilling and limited items.
>
>One of the ways to limit the items that are released into the
>PK environment is to attach exploration/secret barriers to
>those items. If you remove the exploration/secret barriers
>entirely, suddenly there are no costs to attaining the item at
>all, and it is released into PK at will. Which means the item
>may have to be rebalanced to account for its ease of
>availability. ST items (along with a lot of other items)
>haven't been balanced to account for that.
>
>Also, one of the main draws to exploration is learning to
>overcome those exploration/secret barriers and gain a
>competitive edge over other PKers. If you publish
>walkthroughs, you remove any competitive edge over other
>PKers. In fact, you are effectively rewarding walkthrough
>players with a competitive PK edge over non-walkthrough
>players. Because while the non-walkthrough guys are still
>trying to solve puzzles and challenges, the walkthrough guys
>are maxing out limited items, removing all the rewards and
>using them in PK. There would be a heavy incentive to use
>walkthroughs to compete in CF which means that
>exploration-type players would, in fact, be penalized.
>
>Anyway, my point is that the "area designers interests" are
>not the only - or even primary - consideration.

So then balance the items. You're right in one sense. That's the reason for secrecy. The reality is that either the secrets are too hard in which case only Imm-chars and people who pool OOC resources to explore get them (unfair to game balance obviously) or they're too easy and they become instantly widespread knowledge. Therefore the idea that it is balanced is wrong to begin with. You're either going to keep it closed and out of the game or you're going to keep it open and rebalance the items so that they aren't so overpowered as to feel like its game breaking for people to possess the items.

Of the two I'd rather the area and puzzles be open but without game breaking unique items as rewards.

If walkthroughs are posted, then people who like exploring will find that things aren't around when they explore.

>What you're saying is only true if you assume that no
>players are interested in exploration, but rather that it is a
>chore that they suffer through to gain more power.

There is a gameplay concept that amounts to "people who explore can get things people who don't explore, can't." That gameplay concept is totally destroyed if information is freely shared. However, as splntrd noted, players who like exploration for the act itself aren't affected negatively.

So let's differentiate players who like exploring for exploring's sake, and players who like exploring because they like the dynamic of having the possibility of getting phat loot other people can't. Note that doing it for the (semi) exclusive phat loot is not the same as thinking exploring is a chore. You can enjoy exploring *because* of that feeling of unlocking special things nobody knows about. And it's absolutely true that this latter type of player loses a fun part of the game if information is completely open.

However, if you were to argue that allowing total sharing of information hurts all those who are interested in exploration, *then* you really would be implying that no players are purely interested in exploration. The real situation is that total information sharing hurts only those who like exploring, but only if there are rewards. Now the question is, how many of those players are there?

Ultimately the balance may be: If having open information sharing would bring in and retain more players (an unproven assumption), does the fun created by having those extra players outweigh the fun lost by allowing sharing of information?

Who posted about leaving because they couldn't find walkthroughs of explore areas?

Seriously, when you are new, the Battlefield is confusing enough, so you aren't overly worried about explore areas, in general!

I think this is a really good post. I also like the idea of Heralds having a useful ability.