Suggestions/QoL improvements

I just want to say I am having a blast with the game so far. Completely hooked on everything. However, I do have some suggestions and QoL (Quality of Life) improvements to suggest for the game. I see there is a lot of potential with the game, but at the same time, I also see a lot wasted or not done. I hope the devs see this and take this into account with both improvements to be made and my suggestions. I really really enjoy the social aspect the most about this, but there is a lot to be done with that as well.

As it stands right now, this game is an unpolished gem. It’s the ONLY MMO and has so much potential to be much more. I would never even write a response like this if I didn’t feel it was worth it. Anyway, onto the suggestions. This will be a long one and I will bump this post every 20 days if a response hasn’t been posted to keep it alive. I’ll also update it to keep things in align if anything. Pretty much ALL of the suggestions come from my experience playing other MMOs since they contain the same thing. This game really needs it if it wants to keep up with the rest.

I’ll leave out the numerous bugs that I experienced since the forum is flooded with them.

GUI/HUD (Graphical User Interface/Heads Up Display):
• Change the location of the Health bar from the weapon to another location. A lot of the time it’s hard to see what health % I am at if I am constantly swinging around the weapon. Place it near the “belt” area closer to the field of view to make it easier for the player to see OR place it near the top near the EXP bar, but also lower that down a bit more so we don’t have to look directly up to gauge it. This also applies to buffs, other status effects, etc.

• A lot of classes it gets hard to see what health they are at AND also if you are in a party. Along with the placement of the bar, also add the ability to see what the party’s health is (especially as a healer).

• In the world map that can be brought up, please a level range that players should be in for each region. I know a lot of players are confused as where they can/have to go since there is no indication as to what areas are meant for what levels.

• Allow the ability to send voice messages to other players in the mail. It takes a long time to text out a message since we are not using a keyboard.

• Have a separate voice chat for party or someway to filter it. It get’s really hard to communicate as EVERYONE uses voice.

• Have the HP total (a number) alongside with the bar so we know the total amount of HP we have.

• Have the names of the monsters displayed over them. There should be a way to know what monster is what since there is are many different types of the SAME monster.

Base Character:
What I’d like to see is a stat system put in place. Right now, I have no idea what class main stat is and which does which. There’s no way to find out. It’s very confusing and makes no sense a lot of the times. This is what I suggest since each level is tied to a class independently.

• With each stat, or with a tool tip, it’d be nice to know what each stat actually does and which class uses which stat. There’s nothing like that. At. All. Just place a (!) icon near the stats that pops up a tooltip explaining what the stat’s do and other useful information that goes along with it. Don’t make the user look for it. That’s just bad design.

Classes:
It’s nice being able to switch classes and have each class has its own independent levels. This brings a lot to the table since the player can do what they want without starting over or making a new character.

• Each class has its own stat allocation. For example, every time a player levels up they get X amount of stat points to distribute to their stats accordingly (STR, INT, WIS, CON, etc). As it stands right now, there is no diversity and it’s pretty plain. These stats only go with the class they are using and does not transfer between other classes. A lot of the buffs from classes are meh. They don’t really do much and are pretty much useless since they raise the stats listed, but because of the low numbers, they hardly mean anything without this. This system is meant to promote builds and individual play style according to the user’s preferences and to help the long-term growth of the game (Raids, other forms of combat content, etc). The base is already there.

• Along with the skill system, implement a skill point system along with the class levels. Right now, it’s select and forget. In the long-term of the game, it would be nice to “upgrade” skills to higher ranks to increase their effectiveness. 99% of all other MMOs do this to some degree. Since we only have two choices of “trees” the max rank can be either 3 to 5 since we max out at lvl 30 with 5 tiers to choose from. I propose 3 skills points per level to put into the skills. This will give an option to choose from both skills and to increase the others from the tiers below instead of only selecting just one and then that’s it.

• Paladin: The amount of charges you can gain is awful. Certain monsters I cannot kill since I cannot deal enough damage before they heal themselves. It’d be nice to have other ways to gain charges since a lot of the other skills use them as well. I’d suggest decreases the amount of damage needed to gain charges from 500 to 250 and/or decrease the light charge skill from 2 to 1 second. I am spending a lot of the time waiting to gain charges since I only have an effective 3 charges to use at a given time (5 charges I take double damage and no charges I take full. I have to hover around 2-3 at all times.) Yes, Tanks are not meant to deal a lot of damage, but they should still assist the other members with damage output. You can also use this suggestion to add more skills/abilities such as more Librams that use charges for effects. Other abilities already do this, but they really need more ways or better ways to gain charges.

• Bard: It’d be really awesome for the ability to add our own music and play it during battle instead of the normal way. OR you can also cash this system in by adding new music in the store to purchase. I’d be also great to select 4 orbs to use rather than 3. Adding 4 adds more complexity to the playing and adds more of a penalty for missing beats in exchange for the added effect.

• Runemage: I see a lot of people have trouble with drawing Runes. Though, I do not have issue and I do not know if they know you have to take into account 3D space, but it would be nice both eye-pleasing and helpful to have a tome offhand that comes with the wand. This tomb can contain your spells “runes” and when a button is pressed (like the trigger), an outline is drawn in the user’s field of view to help them draw the runes. You can also “flip” through the book to select which spell by holding down a button and use the thumbpad to select by spell in a list format. Up/Down select the type (Firebolt, Frostbolt, Affliction, etc) while Right/Left selects the grade (1st,2nd, 3rd, etc). This gives the ability for the user to select which spell they want to cast instead of having them remember every rune AND to draw it. This only applies to Runes/Spells the players has found. It does NOT contain the spells other players have taught them. This also gives the option if more spells are added down the line.

Items:
• Each weapon and armor should have an “enhancement” bonus to it ranging from +0 (normal) to +10 (Epic). Right now, each armor or weapon is pretty plain and there is only 3 (sometimes even 1 actual choice!) to choose from for each level. There’s very little options and it’d make sense to have something like this especially if a blacksmith profession is added (See below!).

• As far as I know, I have only been seeing uncommon weapons/armor being dropped from monsters with only 1 or 3 possible “enchantments”. Two things: have more rarity of the drops added to the items being dropped and increase the “enchantments” types. You can also tie this in with the Enchanter Profession (Again, see below!) to add “runes” to weapon/armors to change their bonuses.

• If this is added, allow the items to be sold on the market and/or auction house. Right now, it’s only potions and such. There’s very very little reason to even purchase anything from these and there is not much reason to use really any Dram to purchase stuff.

Professions:
With each profession, there’s a lot of potential since we have to manually add or make things. It’d be really cool to add a leveling system to each profession. This way it adds some level of end-game goal to get each profession to the max level. Also, each item being crafted should be tied to a certain level or skill to be made. There is so much potential with this game since it’s VR with each profession. Same goes for existing professions right now.
Some suggestions for other professions are:

Blacksmith: crafting custom weapons and armor from materials gained from quests, events, monsters. This profession should also be able to enhance weapons to a higher enhancement level (+0 to +10). This gives players the option to both help and/or charge people for the service. You can make it like you have to “strike the weapon” on an anvil a certain amount of times or a certain way. This can certainly be another type of Minigame to be added.

Enchanter: Adds Runes to items to increase or change their effects. Think of it like Skyrim. Just do something like that where you have to manually draw the runes (like the runemage) or something of that sort. Adds a huge amount of depth to the game if each rune had a historical meaning or if you have to find them (like the Runemage does!).

Activities:
Dungeons should have a level requirement. I can’t tell you how many times I have been stuck with an awful party due to level 6s or 8s joining the queue and not being able to do a single thing. It’s awful. The level adjustment that is done with the game seriously ruins this in my opinion. Level 8’s cannot do any dungeons. Also, allow us to select WHICH dungeon we’d like to queue for.

4 Likes

Hopefully the health bar situation will be settled with a placement option in the UI settings. Since I hunt with a bow, the health placement works well for me since it’s in front of me for the entire fight. Adding options is always the best move.

You’re pretty much on point with the major things needed to make this game hard to compete with. Some other company will eventually make a competing vrmmorpg with these features and options, so I hope orbus takes care of that before they do.

Exactly. All it will take is a single VRMMO to be made that’s in-line with all other nonVR-MMOs on the market to snatch pretty much all of the player-base. Now that Occulus Quest is a viable way to play this game and among others, the market is opening up widely. I’m sure they see that with the sales of their game during the christmas/holidays season.

I really want the devs to see this so I will for sure always be updating this and bumping this post.

The devs see all the posts, no worries there. They don’t post on all of them, but they see them.

2 Likes

Some of these suggestions have been brought up in the past (just so you know). Paladin for sure is on the list of people’s complaints x3

As for party chat: holding the compass up to the mouth and talking is your party chat.

3 Likes

Also, the devs don’t really like people bumping their own thread :3

I’d definitely like to see the base game get some more polish and QoL updates. With the quest and holiday sale now is the time to put content patches on hold (dungeons, quests, etc) and make the bare bones as solid and friendly as possible (tutorial, new player experience, voip issues, networking, etc.).

The devs read everything on the forum. The more suggestions put out there the better. I’m sure a lot of people have QoL ideas the devs haven’t thought of or really considered before. There are a few other vrmmos being made that haven’t even hit pre-alpha yet, so Orbus has a nice window of time to improve and solidify its base.

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Every class has a way to stun the monster so it won’t continue healing itself. That is how you kill that monster type. For paladin you have to have at-least 1 orb available and throw the hammer against the monster to stun it.

Has been suggested multiple times; two of the dungeons are level 10, two are level 20 and it does make a difference since level scaling is putting players x levels below or above mobs (I believe currently it’s +4/+6).
However, it is well possible finishing a dungeon with 3 or 4 level 30 players no matter what level the other members are, I did that many times. The player count is very, very low at times, like no queue popping at all in some timezones already. So if the restriction is too strict you’d likely not get any group anymore; same with everyone queuing for different dungeons.

So I’d suggest to make the level requirement 8 “achievement: dungeon ready” or 6, so players at least got basic movement and class controls down for their character.

And a preference to be matched for certain dungeons would also be nice, so if, say, more than 1 of the players in the group got same dungeon preference, then the whole group goes to this dungeon.
This would also allow parties of 2 or 3 to get a group to finish certain quests etc.

I knew about the stun, but no matter what I do even with charges, no monster is ever stunned by me throwing my hammer. The skill icon has always been stuck in 3/4 charge the moment I created my character.

Regardless, it would be different if I could keep up the damage. The mage type of mobs that run and heal I have a really hard time killing since they do not do damage once they get to a lower amount of health then just heal once they get to a certain percentage. My damage output is not enough for it to be possible.

While I see your point, we should not rely on having level 30’s in the dungeon just to make it work. That’s just bad design to begin with if we have to rely on that. I’m all fine with lower levels being in the party, but it’s mainly about them BEING lower level that their damage is not enough, nor their health, to be able to sustain themselves or keep them alive.

I’m mainly referencing basing the dungeons around a certain level and either buffing everyone to that “level” needed or something along those lines. A party should not rely on max levels to complete any dungeons unless they are designed for that to happen

I had no idea that was even a function. It would be nice if there was a tool-tip explaining that since I’m sure I am not the only one who doesn’t knows that. Maybe do it when you first join a party as a popup or a tool-tip that shows what to do.

All dungeons in the dungeon queue are level scaled. A full party of 1s can complete each of them. I queued up on my alt as a level 4 and contributed far more than I would have otherwise.

I’ve been threw shard runs with lvl 1s and came out fine. Course we had to pick up the slack but that’s due to the nature of a shard, no level-scaling.

A dungeon with a lvl 1 shouldn’t be any harder than a lvl 30 - in theory if the lvl 1 is not a dps and they are competent enough to learn.

Regarding paladin, it would be nice to have extra damge but aggro retention is the tank’s job, not damage. The Paladin does a good job at lower shards and dungeons but - in theory since I can’t say for sure myself - lacks due to the “must get hit” mechanic and low reliable aggro pulls. Since worrior can spam provoke all day long, they don’t have a cap on aggro - untill other factors come into play. Paladins on the other hand have a heavier aggro cap based on the timer.

Onto the topic of killing a healer before the heal. As Scott stated, every class has a stun. Be it charged shot or throwing your weapon. Yes, the flying healers are a pain for paladins - I wish the shot from the hammer could act as a stun for that matter for those pesky flyers.

I don’t understand why the “Dungeon ready” for lvl 8 is a thing since lvl doesn’t determine skill. My point: someone who does critter captures to that lvl doesn’t mean that they are “dungeon ready”. Practice makes perfect and there’s no real way to determine if someone is ready based on lvl.

The reason for this is the first oldgame dungeon was designed to be able to be completed with 5 level 8’s before level scaling.

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Ah, that makes sense. But that was before level-scaling then, it wouldn’t matter now what lvl you are.

I know tanks for NOT supposed to be damage dealers. This isn’t my first MMO lmao, but the difference between warrior and Paladin for aggro retention is too much. In any game a class for should roughly equal the other roles that it falls into that other classes go into as well, Warrior and Paladin (tank roles) for example.

Tanks in other mmo’s do have lower damage compared to other classes. They are meant to soak up damage and pull/maintain aggro for the party, but when a class fails to do it’s main job a lot of the time due to it’s class mechanics, I think it’s time to either change or go back to the drawing board. Some of the suggestions I mentioned above (reduced damage threshold 500 to 250 and delay for charges gain 2 to 1 second) should help out the class immensely. I don’t remember if gaining charges also helps with pulling/retention, but if it doesn’t it should.

To be honest, this is my biggest issue with the Paladin apart from the charge generation. Though, don’t get me wrong I enjoy the class more so than the warrior, but this hurts more so than anything.

I do wonder if the devs didn’t account for the mage spammers that have become the norm. I hear they have a testing server to test those types of things. The better casters can cast 2-3/sec and with x3 damage when using triplicity, they put a lot of pressure on tanks in general. The only times I hear dps pulling from a paladin (and worrior at times) are from mages and shamens, but mages most of the time.

I’m getting a bit off topic from the original suggest mind you and I’m not suggesting a nerf in dps. but paladins not being able to retain aggro has been submitted so many times now, I wonder if the devs think paladins are ok based on what they test.

To get back on track, damage for paladins should be more convenient. But I say it should work like the ranger, a timed swing gives x more damage.

I do think that the devs intention is for a warrior or paladin to lose aggro if they don’t play their class as good as the dps dealer they have to keep aggro on. Also giving incentitive to get a higher weapon and better skill to keep aggro.

I saw Scott pull aggro as Scoundrel hitting near 50k dps. Turns out, we’re all playing it wrong and he figured it out. The man is a like a Western Shootout character. John Wayne over here, is Scott.