Improving new player experience

[Daza400]

Neocron is an oldie and for the most part it's not going to capture the attention of the average MMO player but I believe there are some things that could help improve the first time players experience (and likewise improve the experience for all players).

1. Early Combat
   
   Issue 1: Early combat is slow and tedious, where the 'optimal' means of leveling a character is essentially attacking enemies that should be far too powerful for you to handle (Aggressors), this leads to you spamming your starter weapon for a ridiculous amount of time that is more of a grind than actual enjoyable gameplay. This occurs even with mobs that are more on your level (such as the stuff at MC5).
   
   Solution: The HP of low level mobs should be reduced, it shouldn't take an entire magazine of pistol ammo to kill a cave crawler, combat should be fast paced and lethal like high level PVP is. Similarly the XP gained from low level mobs should be increased so you don't have to immediately rush to the Aggressor sewers after leaving MC5
   
   
   Issue 2: 'Bad' store bought weapons is something that's needed in order to give a real job for constructors, however the CST change has left low level constructors to essentially be a waste of time and it's always better to find a maxed out one.
   
   Solution: If a player needs a weapon built, a constructor the same level as him should be able to build a high quality weapon for him. Right now at best they could make a 'good' or 'cool' weapon with zero slots. The quality should be based on mostly the construction skill but have a Intelligence level softcap so a 0/20 constructor can't craft an outstanding rare or anything like that but wouldn't have any issues with a TL20-30 one.
   
   Addendum: This might be stretching it a bit but I think that up to a certain tech level store bought weapons should be at a 'cool' or better quality to allow people to ease into the game more and to slowly understand the concept that you need to get things built, instead of immediately forcing it on them after they leave MC5.
2. Mr. Jones
   
   Issue 1: Friends of mine that started playing the game have quit during the Mr Jones quests because the majority of them are incredibly samey errand runs where you go back and forth between your apartment and a starter mission location or whatever. This is irritating and makes the quests take much longer than they should
   
   Solution 1: Remove and redo the Mr. Jones quests, new players start with the Mr. Jones item at MC5, switch it back to the old way once they've been redone to be more interesting and varied and less of a chore to play. Making it feel like less of an errand run would be a plus. They should introduce people to the game proper and give them an understanding of game mechanics not bore them to death.
   
   Solution 2: Modify the current quests, however instead of having to return to your apartment to speak to Jones directly have him message you directly after you complete the objective so you immediately move onto the next part of the quest. This keeps the game play fluid
   
   Issue 2: Some of the quest rewards are much better than others
   
   Solution: Rather than nerf the quad/PE stealth tool etc, buff the other items or replace them with something better. Particularly useless rewards (in my opinion) are:
   

   • All of the soldier quest rewards
   • Hackers TL90 hacking tool that doesn't do anything a TL30 one can't do
   • The Assassin's sniper rifle seemed incredibly glitchy last time I used one (when Reakktor was still around mind you)
   • The fact you can't blueprint the droners reward makes it trivial at best.

   
   I think the Melee reward isn't particularly good either but that goes with the rest of M-C

This is an incomplete list so far but to sum up a few that aren't in the list yet:

Low-Mid levelling areas need to be improved (right now the best one is MB bunker but there should be more and Outzone should be probably the best place for levelling a character but right now it's slow due to the low XP)
No low level combat vehicles (and everything that isn't a Rhino is pretty atrocious since 2.2)

Some of these solutions might be dumb so let me hear it if you think so, but I think all the issues are legit ones as they're stuff that i've picked up playing with new players and it's usually the same complaints everytime

[Torg]

I believe youre critizising the wrong things. aggressors too hard? try mutants. xp gain too slow? get a better weapon. have to run back and forth to the pleasure of Mr. Jones? this is a MMORPG, which means it has RPG elements. have you ever played an MMO without errands? have you ever played a complicated game successfully without asking more experienced players for advice? i think the problem here is expectations. you just cant start playing Neocron with nothing but the endgame in mind. youll need to play the game as a weak and growing char for quite some time. just as in any other RPG or MMORPG. so please tell our friends to come back to NC, and have them talk to people. talking is the key, not tweaking game stats. if you dont like to talk to other people, a MMORPG isnt the right kind of leisure activity for you. good luck.

[Daza400]

I believe youre critizising the wrong things. aggressors too hard? try mutants. xp gain too slow? get a better weapon. have to run back and forth to the pleasure of Mr. Jones? this is a MMORPG, which means it has RPG elements. have you ever played an MMO without errands? have you ever played a complicated game successfully without asking more experienced players for advice? i think the problem here is expectations. you just cant start playing Neocron with nothing but the endgame in mind. youll need to play the game as a weak and growing char for quite some time. just as in any other RPG or MMORPG. so please tell our friends to come back to NC, and have them talk to people. talking is the key, not tweaking game stats. if you dont like to talk to other people, a MMORPG isnt the right kind of leisure activity for you. good luck.

This isn't my own experience this is what I've picked up from playing with people who have never played it before, aggressors aren't too hard it's just that they shouldn't even be the 'starting mob' so people are engaging them with their starter weapons which takes an enormous amount of time to kill them with.

Running back and forth (usually to the exact same place) isn't exactly a good experience, and seeing as the entire quest is completely linear, errand runs are the elements of a *bad* rpg.

[Dribble Joy]

PvE balance, especially at lower levels, is completely screwed. Mobs aren't a threat at that stage; back in NC1 a /6 rat was a serious challenge to a fresh runner, I recently started leveling a char in MB and was standing in front of a /28 mob with a TL 2 rifle, taking it down far too quickly and not dying during the encounter.
An aggressor should destroy anyone under /10.

And the point about missions is completely valid. There is no choice or multiple paths to any of the missions. This makes them quickly boring paper-chase quests. Not to mention that, aside from the epic runs, there is almost no connection between runner and faction. All the missions are far too self contained.

[AlvaroT]

Well, start of the game is very...odd. Tutorial explain a little what you can do in-game, but few elements are easy to miss(like PSI and crafting part; I didnt saw it first time). Then game throws you at MC5 for no reason, and then even more no reason Mr Jones appear offering you job for "his organization". Storylines are too rare and spreaded too much. Game should have reasonable logic storyline connected with all factions and should point to multiple places around world and it should advertise that its content is only for training before PvP.

[Netphreak]

Mob damage at all level's is completely screwed. Even when capped with good resists some mobs can destroy you in seconds with their damage. Fire mobs are a perfect example of this.
And all of this is compounded by the health bounce issue that still happens all the time, were you take a lot of damage in a hit then after a second or so the actually damage you should take is calculated and your health bounces up to that level.
If you take 2 hits before the bounce/real damage calculation happens you die.

[hatmankh]

If you take 2 hits before the bounce/real damage calculation happens you die.

I'm not completely sure about this one, I sometimes see my health go down to 0 and stay like that for some seconds before it bounces back to the real value. It's happened enough times that I wouldn't write it off as co-incidence. I seriously doubt the game thought I had taken enough damage for exactly 0 health 20 odd times, it probably thought I took more damage than that but it can't display -300 for example.

[Dropout]

I'm not completely sure about this one, I sometimes see my health go down to 0 and stay like that for some seconds before it bounces back to the real value. It's happened enough times that I wouldn't write it off as co-incidence. I seriously doubt the game thought I had taken enough damage for exactly 0 health 20 odd times, it probably thought I took more damage than that but it can't display -300 for example.

If you get hit while at 0 health you die, eventhough it would otherwise bounce back, so you wouldnt have.
The same thing happens with Ionic weapons.

[Doc Holliday]

If you get hit while at 0 health you die, eventhough it would otherwise bounce back, so you wouldnt have.
The same thing happens with Ionic weapons.

Crawlers in regants are the worst offenders for this. They have done it to me on both a tank and a pe before. I have survived due to the fact i was wearing camo pa. The health bounced down and then back up to full again.

[Dropout]

Crawlers in regants are the worst offenders for this. They have done it to me on both a tank and a pe before. I have survived due to the fact i was wearing camo pa. The health bounced down and then back up to full again.

Yeah thats about the only scary thing about them
Its a really scary part about them though..

[Trivaldi]

As much information as possible regarding the mob damage / health bounce bug would be appreciated in the relevant bug report thread.

[Cursed Shadow]

- Please just amalgamate the weapons into the standard shops.
- Get rid of this 'bad' gear, shop-bought weapons should be between 60% and 90% with some element of luck required.
- Scale the price of gear according to affordability - I mentioned this in a previous thread, the cost of outfitting your character for the actual length of time in which you require those items does not scale.
- Stop making people run to the arse-end of nowhere for level 2 brain implants, which you would not know how to locate as a new player. At all.
- Remove the need to travel to Canyon Facility, Techhaven or MB for armor sets. Just bring them into all standard shops.
- Get rid of Hacknet database items. It's a boring dredge of a task. Just make them FSM.
Oh FSM. Good point. Most MMOs have factions which require different levels of Loyalty to purchase, not just one solid value. Different items at different levels of Sympathy please.
- Same goes for Jones items. Stop ramming this down a fraction of new players throats. Instead allow people to run each of the Jones missions once per character. From some guy called 'Mr Jones' who should live in Plaza 1. This would allow people to get both a Quad and a PE Stealth tool without having to create multiple characters to fill the purpose.

Just some ideas above to stop screwing new players over.