True, but Skyrim's dungeons were not randomized- they were hand crafted and hand placed out of tilesets their artists built. 1) We're still investigating all of the global-and-faction economies, so I can't say at the moment- but we do intend for doing PvE to contribute to your faction's war effort. 2) If you leave that mine and then immediately re-enter, you will be in a completely new randomized mine. Think of it more like... "I'm going to an unexplored section of this mine" rather than "I'm going exactly down the path I just went, but it doesn't look the same." 3) Because of 2), we don't have a concept of dungeons "respawning"- that's more of a classic MMO thought. If you leave the mine and then immediately turn back around and enter again, the idea is that you're going to a new unexplored section of the mine- so yes, it has new enemies to fight, new chambers to discover, new loot. It's not "the same mine, but reinfested" - it's "a completely new and unexplored area." 4) Dungeons have a chance to spawn big objectives for you to accomplish down in the depths- like recovering a powerful Relic and returning it to your faction. We are also looking at having Maps that lead you to specific dungeons in enemy territory, and show you where powerful rewards are in exchange for extra danger. So I guess in that way, they're kind of like missions, yes! *** I'll poke Michael Chan to come give you his thoughts on the way loot will work!
Talked to Michael- When I said good loot and rare items, those things will exist- there will be things in the game that you really want to get. Those may-or-may-not be weapons though! We may decide that it makes sense to drop a Boltgun that's slightly more powerful than your first Boltgun. We may decide that we want none of that! To answer the core of your question: There will be small increases in power as you advance. That could be tweaking your boltgun with mods to increase its firing rate or accuracy. That could be finding a slightly better boltgun and exchanging your equipment. This will not be a big increase though- banish from your mind all thought of classic MMOs. We're still evaluating the way progression and itemization will work, but hopefully this gives you a good understanding of our thoughts.
I think we'll have to agree to disagree on some parts. Procedural generation doesn't have to be based off a static seed so that its effectively always the same - you'd have to do some tinkering with thresholds to ensure broadly consistent difficulty levels for any individual dungeon, but everything else is fair game for random generation. Yes, you could develop strategies to cope with the game lobbing a horde of hormagaunts with two tyranid warriors at you, versus six tyranid warriors, or a single elite lictor, or an endless swarm of rippers...but if the spawn points, enemy attack strategies, and composition of opponents are random then you're having to consistently react and adapt your execution on the fly to both the enemy and the environment. I personally find that model more satisfying than learning a strategy and then being asked to replicate it flawlessly each time you enter the dungeon, as if its a dance routine lasting a couple of hours. Make-one-mistake-and-your-dead is a lazy method of increasing difficulty / adding artificial tension in my view. The enjoyable part of overcoming a challenging boss is working out a viable method of doing so and then executing it effectively. If the second attempt has none of the first, and simply requires you to repeat the second then I'd expect it to be a lot less enjoyable the second time around - particularly once you've learned the strategy fully and are merely executing it like a performing monkey to farm the dungeon in the hope of getting a drop. Making any failure punishable by wiping also removes any possibility of enjoyment from finding an alternative strategy to pursue on the fly should something go wrong, like your healer biting the dust. This is why I referred to it feeling like a time sink, which generally isn't the case during the more unpredictable nature of PvP combat - and the reason for my interest in comments from the devs about procedurally generated dungeons. If you have to learn and overcome a different problem each time, and you don't always know what abilities a boss will come in with, or how or when it will use them, I think that's a much more interesting approach.
Btw if it comes to stuff like Item exchange etc. Why is nobody thinking on Space Marine? There are weapons that are just different. In melee you have chainsword, axe and hammer.... Yeah the hammer makes more damage, but it's also muuuuch slower! I think we are supposed to think a bit also in these parameters so instead of just getting "better gear" we might get "other gear" which is better suitable in different situations. So a faster firing Bolter may be faster.... but is it as accurate as a slower but stronger bolter? In which kind of situation are you? Close Combat or Long-Range? Are you rather doing a few but precise hits or are you hitting a lot but only quick? I think what the developers try is also to animate different playing styles with different equipment. So the one bolter fires faster, less accurate -> Awesome for Close Combat. Oh I found a bolter that's slower but has higher accuracy and does slightly more damage like that fast firing bolter -> awesome for long-range combat I hope it goes somewhere in this corner, because that would make best sense to me!
how is transition from battlefield to underworld gling to happen? i klick on the sealed door and get a loading screen ?
This is great to read. This helps create an equal playing field for folks. If I might suggest, look at the concepts that LOTRO uses with their Skirmish system? There are different & scalable skirms based on the number of folks in your group, the tier (difficulty) you want to run, and it all scales pretty well.
