As the title suggests. I've been playing lately a lot of Exterminatus (HL 2 Wh40k mod) which in some respect, to a certain extent may resemble EC.


Well, they're both instanced WH40k shooters\slashers with 2 races available (so far in EC ofc) and despite the mod is done very well and is very fun to play there is one problem I think we might also face in EC at some point (maybe only in the beginning) - repetitiveness of the gameplay schemes.


After not even whole week of semi intensive playing I thoroughly checked out each of the classes of both races and all the schemes for all maps (there are about 10) which are quite big as for a lobby shooter, similar to Red Orchestra one.


I would just like to wonder here what would make EC avoid this problem. Ofc EC is not the same type of game but there will be similarities.
I wonder if bigger number of players, bigger maps and the progression tree will be enough to deal with it.


I'm especially worried about the progression which is said to be about 50 hours for one race or maybe class? - not really sure now, I think race.
If this is the case, it's pretty short, a seasoned FPS veteran will complete it in a week, others probably in around two and then...other races (not in FA and alpha beta ofc) - ok but if somebody wants to focus on only one?


Imo what would be definitely saving here is more classes, subfactions, weapon mods, all kinds of upgrades, loot and certainly the plot element.
I hope these elements will be abundant cos otherwise i feel the game may very quickly become some kind of Exterminatus (or SP2 if you wish). Which is basically...boring.


I have just fully realized that now, I hope what I wrote here makes sense. Comment.

I agree with you dude... the life span of the players interest in the game will depend on the match environmente variation. This can be achieve by how the level is design and how the objectives are arrange.
Or by the number of classes and the weapons with significant difference in the game, as you said.

Now, please consider, that I never give much importance to progression in any game, so... I don't see a problem with the time to progress, even over 50 hours for the entire faction. I would not care. =/

I'm not quite sure what is included in each classes progression and they definately said 50 hours per class, they will divide it accordingly for eldar I assume. Not to mention future dlc which will more than likely add extras to class progression/depth. Not sure weather unlocking weapon attachment unlocks will be seperate to class/race trees so you have that to consider. Then once you have unlocked everything you can try out different 'spec's' so to speak and mix and match what you have unlocked!

Thats just once race and yes, BEhaviour imo are being very vague to keep us on a cliffhanger and I'm optimistic.

By vague I mean all they are showing us on twitch are the updates to systems and one or 2 maps... And now with extra developers in, i'm assuming there are a bunch of maps they are just not showing because how else are we going to be excited for the game if we know how EVERYTHING looks. Plus i'm pretty sure Brent is keeping us from seeing everything the maps we do know about from us. All just teasers for the founders access.

And now there is the Noah addition to the team who was behind the economy of EVE, which is huge!

Maybe I'm being too optimistic and yeh i'm sure I wont get everything I could possibly want.

I'd still be playing space marine if it weren't for my disk breaking 2 weeks agoish ( buying a new one on friday) because I love running around as a quasi super warrior in power armour and that is all I need to enjoy a shooter game. When I get bored which is never for too long I go play a new 'Genre' and when I wanna take a shooter back up I go back to space marine. To me a shooter is a quick 0.5-3 second ( not including cover and mechanics) all out blowing off steam and adrenaline harnesser.

Atleast to me this game will be amazing no matter what cos I love progression in mmo's, space marine has quite a bit but nowhere near as much as I believe EC will have because that was a story driven game over multiplayer so not as much went into the experience. You didn't get elite classes or hero classes either and were limited to a dreadnought in a certain game mode. 2 races were only available too.

Maybe i'm repeating myself but if at minimal this game was announced with being able to look like a space marine and maybe 10 distinct non customizable weapons that would be enough to sell it to me... However I love everything about being a space marine. Plus 3 more races to play with a different feel if you get bored!

God definately lost it a few times writing this, hope I havn't intoxicated you with Optimism

Quite a bit to think about and thats just me... plus the developers seem really motivated and into wh40k so I wouldn't worry cause I mean it's their job to be thinking about the progression and we are only thinking about it for so long a day, week, month ect.

So Dev's +Time, motivaton, experience, loves the WH40K universe and avid gamers = A decent game in the future in my book!

My focus is: will the devs be fast enough with improving\developing the game before the players 'break' it and it becomes boring for them, cos then they're gonna flee. MMOs is a big competitive market, it's hard to find this unique selling point which would really differentiate the game from others and keep players for longer than a year imo.

I'm a bit worried now since what was supposed to be this unique thing for EC is as for now gone - real open world, pvp+pve, serious strategy\economy involved etc. Without this I'm afraid the game won't have much new stuff to offer to somebody who's not a WH40k enthusiast. I don't know if WH40k fans themselves will be enough to keep the game alive for long.

I was thinking that when the basic core gameplay will become boring for me I would just take a break doing some pvp or simply get in a predator and sightsee the world and admire a sunset (or several ones actually), seriously. These elements were for me very enriching (in my imagination), if they are not implemented i'm afraid repetetiveness may overcome and that would mean the end of interest for me.

These are just my worries, doubts but I prefer to let them out so maybe somebody takes them into consideration.

Yeah... the game lost some of his glow when they announce that, at launch, we will not have a open massive game.

But considering the present game features: four very different classes, equally horizontal and vertical maps, veh
iches ( please in the next twitch), plus the game style of each individual, it may create variation and emotion enough to keep people in the game.

only metagaming or competitive play can help to ignore repetitive gameplay.

and EC can potentially have both.

So I've been playing some Mount and Blade recently because a friend of mine pretty much conscripted me into it, but the depth of play generated by having options / sandbox play almost ensures things aren't going to get too repetitive any time soon. Things like EvE with it's massive economy, and freedom to generate your wealth your own way allows for creativity - hopefully the exact opposite of getting repetitive.

This was the general idea of having racial identity using Magic the Gathering as an example. Here in terms of both gear and gameplay, players would seek their own style within the constraints of their race.

• Like Magic, each element of your loadout has a "state"/Weapons, Equipment, Armor, or "condition"/Skills, Talents, that will alter what you do as a character.
• Like Magic, you have the freedom of being able to choose these alterations as part of your strategy.
• Like Magic, half the pleasure should be in the planning (especially the capabilities of your character).
• Like Magic, there should be few, if any items that are made obsolete by future editions of the game.
• Like Magic, not all of the strategy should be put into direct combat - there are other ways to play the game than getting a Treefolk to crush his loins - or EC translation: Using the Assault Class. (though it is immensely satisfying).
• Like Magic, do not be afraid to break the game with these ideas. Instead, allow Founders to discover the broken combos and from there repair them. If you do break the game, apologize, fix it, and we will love you for it.

Speculating here;

Assuming that the game has a large amount of PvP(with varying game modes) and a modest amount of PvE(with variable dungeons), an economy (of some sort), War Council, Strike Forces, Cruisers/Guild Housing, HQ's, Heros/Elites, Territory Control, Horizontal Progression, Talent/Skill Trees, and Horizontal Gear, there's a lot to work with to "play your way", especially with 4 unique factions.

Using Chaos as an example, let's break down their core identity and see what their range of gameplay would entail at "launch".

Level 1 - Individual
Starting with the Characters themselves, they have the basic class options of Raptor, A. Sorcerer, Havoc, and Traitor - each with weapons and talents that separate them further from their loyalist brethren the further they progress into the game. Combat is combat through and through and players will eventually get a sense of ennui at some point, but the search for interesting combinations to explore your freedom of style cannot be understated - that is entirely the point of Sandbox's after all. For now let's assume that after an exhaustive search we've chosen an Aspiring Sorceror and wanted to explore his offensive abilities by igniting the souls of enemies with a certain loadout. That's the only thing we'll be playing this week, but that's ok, it won't be boring because of the other levels of gameplay. First, we do everything we can do on our lonesome until we get bored of crushing Eldar Soulstones beneath the treads of our tank.
Level 2 - Squad
Moving up from the core elements of combat (because we got tired of all the variants of burning things on our own), on a squad level we invest some time into the in game economy to help unlock the Elite version of the Sorcerer, allowing his allies Bolters to ignite their enemies when they strike. It's incredibly satisfying burning down underhives and doing whatever we can to inflict carnage in PvP, but we eventually tire of watching others slaying for us, and move on to another level.
Level 3 - Strike Force//War Council
Retreating to the Strike Force Cruiser, we observe Chaos's unique resource in the economy - Blood - gathered by the gallon with each execution to fuel Rites that will grant you favor among the War Council and even our own Strike Force, because they will be aware of who takes the time to supply them with their precious Demonic Favor - their own resource to unleash the Warp on the battlefield. For now, we're more of a logistics, behind the scene's character. Hell, we don't even need to go into combat at the moment, we can work on a bunch of different things here depending on our own goals and ambitions. We can attempt to rise through the ranks and earn a seat on the War Council. We can focus on hoarding or denying an enemy resources in order to gain an advantage to be used at a critical time, such as being able to take our Sorceror as in his Ascended Hero Form and cracking the very earth with his Pyker might, or we can show our loyalty to the faction at the next level:
Level 4 - Faction
We can try to manipulate the Favor of the Dark Gods to put misery on another faction-especially one that really pissed us off in the beginning of the week. We can attempt to influence the campaign on a territory level, utilizing Chaos's strength of capturing territory as far away from friendly territories as possible (since their faction strength is to corrupt unfriendly territory.) We will need others to cooperate with us to do this, but that only adds to the interest/complexity/creativity.

TL:dR/Conclusion
Now that's four levels of example gameplay that any class on the Chaos Faction can do, all of which is loyal to Chaos's identity. All of that is totally independent of the gear and perks available to them, which I know was your original fear, but here's my solution:

These three elements:

Economy
Resource Gathering is not grinding if it's given to you freely over a duration of a campaign. Getting it faster can be influenced by what you do in the game (conquering things like the Promethium Refinery) as well as how your racial identity: Orks naturally ramp up their resource gain in a campaign very quickly, while the Eldar must capture objectives in order to sustain major losses and use cool things like Hero classes.

The Meta Game
Abilities that support intelligence gathering, being a saboteur, covert ops, or counter intelligence, strengthening defenses (even things as simple as influencing the spawns in a match in FA/FB by adding or subtracting from the pools), Warlord Abilities, War Council Abilities, Strike Force Abilities, Resource Denial, ability combination, "stacking your deck", ect.

Character Customization
Want to reap souls from afar with pinpoint accuracy? The items: Reaper Autocannon with Targeting Auspex (funded by Economy Resource) and a talent point in Deaden Grip to reduce your recoil. Want to set the world on fire? Cloak of Burning Æther and the talents of Soul's of Fire to keep things hot even after you've set them ablaze, and perhaps Tzeentchian Instability to spread the fire to nearby enemies when you've already run away.

Are all combined.

The Economy, fuels the Meta Game, which in turn influences how players will react in Customizing their Characters. This creates a wheel with players fueling the economy, changing the state of the Meta Game, and then reacting to the state by changing their characters again. Most people think this way, in that order, which gets repetitive and creates ennui. What needs to happen to beat the repetitiveness of the game is for players to be encouraged to think in free-from between all the points of this cycle and realize they can traverse it in any way they choose. EvE may not be the game for me, but Magic is, and totally incorporates this idea - allowing a player to approach the game in any way they like.

You described what I liked on EVE. But what I hate was the slow game time, it takes hours to get together alliance fleet and then hours until you finally fight with someone. (nobody want's to lose they shiny ship and implants for training and take hours to get together some defensive fleet).
Other think I didn't like on EVE was piracy. You are not safe anywhere in space and when you are playing only 1 hour a day and you can't undock because pirates then you stop playing after some time.

If the devs implement what you described in the game (without thinks I described above), then I don't need any other MMO in my life.

Allot of this will ride on how well they approach the actual campaign system.

One can only play one same thing so many times before they are bored to tears, this especially true when your efforts are purposeless. In Planetside 2 you capture a continent and wow, you get a discount of vehicles or MAXes or consumables, then the map just unlocks and everything is gone like you didnt do squat before. Everyone gets their third of the map and its back to square one.
This purposeless meta is also seen in Guild Wars 2, matches that last a week only to be reset with you having nothing to show for it. You climb the ladder as a server but that was fun for the first 1 year or for some 2. Now its just Groundhog Day made into a game.

With the campaign system Eternal Crusade has a chance to break this giant issue plaguing RvR games. The dev team said a few times how the actual campaigns, and the actual story of the game by relation, is "written" by the players. Meaning that who won and lost, who completed their personal little objective and agenda, it will all meld into the campaign system and reflect its evolution.
Plus the fact that if the "players make their own story" bit still stands from the days of Miguel it means that there will be little dev influence in the matter, making it in most part a player driven experience.

Its a chore and a half for sure, and im very interested to see how the devs approach this monumental task. But it has the potential to kill the said repetitiveness issue emerging in other games that give its players no purpose.

yes gw2 wvw is a sorta of "show who have the largest Epenis" "if we transfert the server crumble" drama etc etc...

so it's no more about what change in the world when a server win, but about "we are better wvw players than others"

and that planetside 2 failed to obtain.

if EC keep track of the campaign victory can help create a competitve enviroment.