Mini Neocron

[Zeninja]

This is not a suggestion since it's not possible (or even desirable) for obvious reasons... just a thought :

Imagine a new (merged ?) server turned into some "mini-neocron" server !

It would only contain the "city" parts of the game (plazza, viarosso, pepper park, outzone, subway, and maybe the industrial zone etc). A couple of "redundant" dungeons (like plazza 1 and plazza 2 aggies which are identical) would be turned into higher dungeons (like chaos caves) thus allowing everyone to get capped without the need of going out the city.

With only 200-300 persons connected you wouldn't have to worry anymore to find a team, a tradeskiller, opponents, events, people to talk with etc.

The faction relations (F6) would have to be brought back to what they were in NC1 (or else it would be a permanent war with no room for diplomacy and honor). Epics adapted, safe slot removed, etc (whatever you like).

- Pepper park full of gangstas, people in clubs, dealers around every corner, crahn preachers in front of their church, non-npc prostitutes at Veronique, industrial sector arena access temporarily secured by BD thugs for a tournament...

- Plazza crowded with businessmen, noobs asking for advices, Reza doing a speech at Con Center (bah... already forgot he was dead), criminals being judged at some court, non-npc cops patroling around plazza3/pp1 limit, terrorists being caught planting a bomb in some trashcan near CA HQ, diplomats busy at plazza 1 citycoms writing an important note in the political section...

- Viarosso shops full of tradeskillers and customers, nice people having a good time chez Sypher, some gorgeous chick you'd have to convince not to commit suicide from sector-3 cornice, weekly auctions for awesome guns taking place at TT HQ, Black Dragons enjailed in NCPD waiting for their judgment cause they were naughty boys...

- Outzone infested by mutants, being actually a dangerous and badly famed area where you'd better not walk alone when your main appartement is a Viarosso lvl 3, and a meeting place where the worst plots are taking place between highly dangerous criminals and anarchists...

- Wagons in subway with so much people that you'd often have to wait for the next one cause this one was full, exceeded N.E.X.T security guards calling the CA for reinforcements, yet another hot chick that you'd have to prevent committing suicide (hehe)...

- Rats sewers with dozens of noobs, low ranks killing each others for a ridiculous loot in aggies, higher dungeons permanantly full of people to help you cap your char, fights or talks at some cave's entrance between two large clans to decide who's going to camp it for a while...

This reminds me of my newbie days (and hopes) in NC : it took me almost 3 weeks to figure out there was something past the city gates lol (and I know I'm not the only one, I even knew someone who spent his first week in MC5 newbie area ^^). My runner's life was all but empty in these days though :)

[Necpock]

Can you imagine 200+ people confined to only the city?
its an OKISH idea though. But tbh, clipping will almost kill all posible PvP, and OP war teams in PP1?

I think if the NC1 or pre NC2.2 server was rereleased, pops would shoot back up ;P :angel:

[Seraphin[69]]

Indeed but that won't happen ! (Like KK giving out the code of his NC1 and NC2 servers would blow)

[Terror_Nonne]

haha - dreamers.

[zii]

The whole of the NC city map would be fine for this including the Ind.Zone/outzone and Sewers.
High level dungeons could be in the outzone/Sewers etc. The sewers could connect into the low level PP/Plaza sewer dungeons. Low level dungeons in Plaza could be left the same as these are so that people could level.
This won't happen.

[Selendor]

In essence there is now one server, Terra, as a lot of the German clans moved over to get some action. The trouble is that even that one is getting too quiet to get anything done. Making a smaller game would never work, however I think KK are aiming for a similar thing by changing the factions to be based from Neocron City / Canyon / TH again.

[Zeninja]

That's true, and I just can't wait before all factions are back in city.

Thinking of upcoming MMOs (e.g Fallen Earth), most of them are going to be giant areas and if the idea looks great in theory, they will meet the same problem as NC imho unless they are the leaders on MMO market to pretend on engouh players to fullfill them.


The sewers could connect into the low level PP/Plaza sewer dungeons.
I love the idea. That's already the case in outzone and indus sectors (in a certain way), but they're desperatly empty of people.


But tbh, clipping will almost kill all posible PvP, and OP war teams in PP1?
Not really cause in my dream, we assume the clipping problems would have been fixed first. Dozens of runners could stay in the same zone (or better : no more zones at all, which is ofc impossible without writting a new game they said).

Imagine a server of 1000-1500 players concentrated in the city ; at first sight, it could lead to problems with pvp (or simply make it look ugly and uninteresting), but I think it would auto-regulate cause not everyone would play a fighter char 99% of the time like we see at the moment, while paradoxally permitting much easier access to pvp.

[Kanedax]

Can you imagine 200+ people confined to only the city?
its an OKISH idea though. But tbh, clipping will almost kill all posible PvP, and OP war teams in PP1?

I think if the NC1 or pre NC2.2 server was rereleased, pops would shoot back up ;P :angel:

Dude I have only one thing to say to you about this.

No Fat Chicks!

[CMaster]

It's actually a really interesting idea.
With elminating the wastelands, you get rid of the "post apocalypitc" side of Neocron's duel genres, and focus on the cyberpunk half, really. (Certainly, if I was making a cyberpunk MMORPG it would be restricted to just within a city. If a post apoc, I probably wouldn't have toucehd the cyberpunk style, but there you go.) You cram people in a lot more - but there won't suddenly be any more newbies in the sewers than there are now, considering the sewer-levelling people don't leave the city anyhow.

You do have the issue of "something to do". The ability to explore is limited (although hands up how many people have PROPERLY explored mainsewers and outzone). You certainly have less (at least short term) caves and stuff. But a couple of levleling places (the village undergrounds certainly, Regant's lab with a link into the mainsewer, possibly crystal caves wouldn't feel too out of place (easy to imagine a bat cave under the city, no?)). As time goes on, a few more areas of the city could be added (abandoned places which are "opened up?" - possibly reusing some of the DoY levelling area maps and so on). Certainly many more missions with a cyberpunk theme could be added, perhaps in a similar vein to the "Reza's Calling" (NCPD) run. And as for op fights - although it starts to restrict it to the bigger clans oinly, maybe we could have few. Industrial Area 2 could be the Lab, with a hack term and maybe some "private offices" being equivillant to a UG. Ind A 1 could be the factory with a "storage room" as a UG-equivilant. Create a new, "arms factory" zone as the Fortress, somewhere in outzone. Stick a "workshop" somewhere that gives repair bonus. A "waste processing plant" for the recycle bonus (mine).


Never going to happen, but interesting no?
And Neocron is huge, easily hold the current playerbase.

[Serious_Sam]

And here i was thinking you wanted Neocron on your mobile phone!

[Zeninja]

Never going to happen, but interesting no?
And Neocron is huge, easily hold the current playerbase.
Quite interesting yeah, very good analysis of yours, I'm glad we share the same spirit in this thread mate.

You've just put it in a nutshell : NC has its butt on two chairs, Post-Apoc and Cyberpunk. And that's probably its weakness and its strength at the same time : although the two genres aren't incompatible (and far from it, especially in litterature and cinema) and even similar in a certain way, that's a bit ambitious for a niche MMORPG, considering inter alia people are supposed to regroup in dense communities while having to travel over miles of no-man's lands to find the ressources.

On a side note, this reminds me of the excellent work that Alchemic Dream, the regretted subcontractors for animation and forum community on Venus/Pandore, has done ; they were clearly focused on the cyberpunk aspect of NC (the leader GM being himself a great fan of William Gibson and Cyberpunk 2020). During the first months of Venus, you always found some GM walking the streets selling some Tiger Blood, interviewing people for newspapers, or preaching the Truth, adding a lot to the big-brothered megapoles atmosphere.

Back to the topic, like you said it the city would have to be moderately extended (in size) so as to keep the exploration side of an MMO (I hadn't anticipated this aspect thx), not only by opening/developping closed area (e.g PP's shooting area and different Jones quest locations) but also by building large places the size of a soccer ground that really lack in NC's City and could easily fit OP-fights current function.

Introducing the use of vehicules inside the city would be a must.

Not to mention, certain underexploited features like the subway and taxis would regain interest. Roleplaying a guide/merc/cop/thug/driver helping other runners find their way through the maps (for neocredits of course ;)) would be much more gratifying and pvp-oriented. In the current NC's situation you're only really useful as a driver through the wastelands or as ppu to help them achieve some quest, which not only is barely ever a challenge for pvp lovers, but also a considerable time investment (rejecting even the most devoted ones) leaving no room for meticulous exploration.

Current NC's playerbase (imho) is mainly focused on the cyberpunk aspect too, not only for its ultraviolent aspect (set up on a pedestal by anti LE'd clans in a recent thread), rather than the post-apoc one which involves more "humanist" values like helping each others, small welded communities, harvesting, recycling, and ressourcefulness. For this reason, and considering that its current amount of players regrouped on one single server (or maybe two at the maximum), NC's playerbase would perfectly meet the requirements.

This won't happen, but I can't erase my dreams. And I'm bleeding my heart out of seeing my nightmares populated with fucking elves who made the grade in chimeric universes such as Daoc's and now Wow's (Blizzard can thank the free ad from productions like LOTR and ofc all the money they got from their past RTS games). At least they still don't have my soul... but for how long ? o_O


Ind A 1 could be the factory with a "storage room" as a UG-equivilant.
That's funny cause the very first time I've ever heard of "factories" from a conster, before I even had any idea of the wastelands existence, I thought these were buildings inside the outzone :)


And here i was thinking you wanted Neocron on your mobile phone!
Nice one :lol:

Wait a minute... you already can, by using Cronalyser (http://forum.neocron.com/showthread.php?t=134850) with a wap server. Frightening isn't it :eek:

[William Antrim]

Stick your op fights into hacknet but lower the hacking TL required to enter it and make the god-awful narrow bridges a lot wider - in fact redo hacknet so that it is as viable for fighting in as the "real" world and you would prolly have something which would wipe the floor with MxO along with it. (op fights in hacknet could/would prolly remove the ppus too as they wouldnt be needed any more).

Lack of exploration is cack and you would need to have some SERIOUS amount of xp bonuses for the various caves but on the whole i can see the sense in the idea. As for bats in the city, yes this could be done easily but personally I would just DOUBLE the amount of outzones there are and make more of the "boss" characters human for special missions.

Shame really. This idea had potential.