Game Guides Archive

Ok, well at least "how to have fun, for me"

I am an engineer with pretty poor combat skills. Anyway, I was on my way out to tend to my harvesters. To my dismay, they were surrounded by shaupauts (sp?). These are the large monkey-looking highly aggressive creatures on Naboo.

[side note: has anyone ever noticed they seem to use hand signals that look like a baseball coach giving signals to the base runners? I wonder if they're communicating this way?]

Well, at this point, I could have logged out and posted a bitter post on the forums about how crafting sux because you can never get to your machines without dieing. Instead, I stayed in character (and in my character's mindset). In other words, instead of thinking about spawn rules and how the game should be programmed, I thought, "I am trying to get to my machines and there are creatures there!"

So, I then tried to sneak up to my machine. Suprisingly, it seemed as though I could get pretty close by clawling prone and stopping when it looked like they were looking my way. But, alas, one noticed me and I had to flee.

So then I looked about for some muscle. Fortunately, an adventurous soul was passing by. I asked him if he might help a poor artisan to reach his machines. This fellow was a martial artist and was happy to help. [note: THIS is what a REAL mission is all about] So then he began to lure them away and fight them. With what feeble blaster skills I had, I tried to lend support. Unfortunately, both of us were injured in the process.

Then a large wookie fellow came along and joined in. Before long we had wacked most of them (there were a LOT). Then the wookie set up camp and we talked about our adventures a but while we rested up. I then tended to my machines while they wiped up the rest. I offered them a reward for their services but they refused and we went our separate ways.

[I added them to my friends list - perhaps we shall meet again?]

Then, upon returning to Theed, I found myself in the midst of a major battle! It seems rebels had taken the streets and were killing Imperial aides. I had seen some minor outbreaks before but nothing of this magnitude. At least for that night, rebels had taken the day. I fell prone to avoid the shots. Once the rebels had won, I tried to ask them why they broght disorder and chaos to our streets and they berated me. [these were mostly low-level rebel sympathizers who saw me as an Imperial supporter, although I'm actually just ignorant of the Empire's treachery and have fellen prone to the Emperor's propaganda].

Then I turned in for bed, concerned about the state of the galaxy and the disorder I had just witnessed.

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All in all, a fun adventure, and I never once went near a mission terminal. The mission terminals are a nice addition, but I've been playing UO and having fun for years and there are no mission terminals at all there. People who look at the mission terminals as "content" are missing the point. These are "extras" or "filler". YOU all are the content.

The best advice I can think of for having fun in a MMORPG is: roleplay, stay in your characters frame of mind, and interact with others.

Nice post.

Good post. It's always good to see someone help each other out. IMO, it's part of the game.

Thanks for the comments. I also meant to mention in my post that, while at camp, the martial artist and I were talking. Out of character, he told me that he was once another profession but it got "nerfed". I told him I think people should just be what they like doing and trust that over time everything will be balanced out. If you feel nerfed, they'll probably level out the other professions or raise it eventually. But if you pick a profession because it seems to be the most powerful, then it will probably seem that way to others and when the dev's notice this they'll fix it - then where will you be? In-game fun-factor should be more important that "credits, kills,or experience per hour" or something like that.

I had a similar experience when trying to get to my (one, lonely) harvester yesterday. I had just passed a camp with a couple of people and knew I could go back and ask for help, but tried to sneak up on it as you did. I was patient, and waited for the critters to move off a little and was eventually successful. However, I envy your adventure and probably would have had as much fun if I'd gone back to that camp for help.

That's the "coolness" about open-ended genres as this- you can do whatever YOU want to make the game enjoyable for YOURSELF.

I agree Ilog. A friend of mine I tried to get to play UO a while back got on and played for like a week, then decided to quit. I asked him why and he said he was bored. Turns out all he was doing was going into the forest and fighting goats and stuff. Well no blame there since that's all he could do at the time skill-wise, but he didn't really interact with anyone. If he had, he could have even fought more interesting things. Without interaction though, MMORPG's cannot by definition have the sort of individualized content you get from a solo game - it's impossible to have a universe full of "main characters" saving the galaxy and killing darth vader. So someone who's not interacting with others is just cruising around in a "skeleton" of a game and will never be satisfied for very long.

That's unfortunate if you want a Fett-type character that is a "solo" kinda guy, but not when you think about it. Even Fett had his contacts and sources for special equipment and such. Even he would have to interact with people and sometimes even regular contacts - we just didn't see much of it onscreen. When we saw Jango interacting with the changling (I can't recall her name - shame on me!!!!) that was a good example of the sorts of things Boba probably had to do later as well.

I think, when you interact with someone you have fun with, you should add them to your friends list. Try to make contact again later. Roleplayers should also use the "Search" feature for others who have "roleplayer" marked on their sheets and introduce themselves.

Another thing we need more of are Gamemasters. Roleplaying games go nowhere without a gamemaster to orchestrate events - and here's a secret: you don't have to be getting a paycheck from SOE to be a gamemaster! All it takes is to get together a group of roleplayers and construct an interesting story for them to take part in. You can have mysterious contacts give them messages, and put up a website explaining how the character's interactions are having effects on your story.

Very nice post

Although I'm surprised you haven't gotten any replies about how *we* as players shouldn't have to come up with the content and that the devs have failed us, blah blah blah.

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CaptOnamor wrote:

Although I'm surprised you haven't gotten any replies about how *we* as players shouldn't have to come up with the content and that the devs have failed us, blah blah blah.

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I disagree, I think that whatever content is created by players as we go has potential to be more engaging than any quests or other forms of content the devs have the power to create.

A great mind is a toy forever.

I know, I agree...I was pointing out that these threads are usually hijacked by whiners that *want* the devs to spoon feed them all the way rather than this game's *intended* purpose, which you hit right on the head.

CaptOnamor,

Yeah I kinda feared such a response as well to this. They probably only got part way into the post before realizing it was something about actual roleplaying instead of skill/credit-grinding and stopped reading. I think such people mainly though don't understand how such a specifically tuned content you get from solo-games will never be possible in a MMORPG and that all they need do is provide a world for us to interact and make our own adventures in.

I DO think SOE bares some responsibility for these misunderstandings though. For one, they completely disregard roleplaying. Although it says that SWG is a roleplaying game in the service agreement, it doesn't say it anywhere on the box. What's worse is that they give it only one line in their guide book, saying something like, "some people like to pretend that they are their avatar." As if we were some oddball side-group and not the inspiration for the entire industry.

But me being offended is not the point. The point is that SOE needs to understand that no one is going to play a game for years with an "avatar" where skill points and mission terminals are the main attraction. The only way to stay involved in a MMORPG for a long period of time is with a community of roleplayers (be they hardcore or easy-going). You can't really form communities if your only interaction with people is shooting them and saying "hey dude - what's up?".

SOE needs to...

1) Provide an explanation of what a MMORPG is and is not, and explain how the primary content is with interaction among players, the rest just being considered a framework. Also, the important differences from both solo-adventure games, with custom-made advertures where you are the main character, AND the differences from a simple first-person shooter.

2) Emphasize that, in the long run, your characters backstory and personality will become far more important that his/her skill points anbd bonuses and give some examples and help in this.

3) Explain what roleplaying is and is not, and how it is integral to longterm enjoyment of any MMORPG.

Granted, I would like to see more role-players around, but it's difficult with computer games. They're simply not as suited to it as old-fashioned pen & paper RPGs and they attract a much younger audience, many of whom are not familiar with RPGing in general. I try to educate and bring them into the fun by RPing as much as I possibly can.

Even the mundane tasks can be made more fun. I met a Wookiee doing some artisan missions the other day and we chatted a little. The next day, much to my surprise, I saw the same Wookiee running around the wilderness when I was checking my (one, lonely) harvester. He was doing the same and had the same plan as I did after running back to town- more artisan missions. Since they're not the most exciting missions, we sort of started racing. Grab two missions, craft the items, hop the shuttle and run as fast as possible to deliver the items and catch the same shuttle back! At which point, we would get two more missions and spend the next few minutes before the next shuttle just hanging out. He'd sample, I'd craft, we'd chat. When the shuttle arrived- the race was on again!

i totally agree that the content needs to be made up... as for the raid last night hehe that was us we did it about 2am... rebels for life!!!!!!!!

Genco-gorath