Discussion: The Intrepid Informer: Issue #11
By
Aggelakis,
Posted on: 2011-09-12 17:35 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
"It was great to finally achieve the goal of a Rocket Board travel power and deliver it to the players in a fun and functional manner, we hope you love it! We hope to provide the same kind of "magic" that we did with Rocket Boards in the future."
I'm guessing broomsticks or mystical-looking hover discs are on the horizon with that "magic"-al hint. 
I thought "magic" carpets.
Sermon
@sermon
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Will the "Rocket Board" have multiple 3D models/animations to choose from like guns or claws? Seems to be there could be all kinds of versions of this... rocket board, magic carpet or in terms of characters we know... cosmic surfboard, fantasticar, goblin glider whatever, MANY possibilities.
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Originally Posted by Sermon
I thought "magic" carpets.
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Pixelforge: Currently, there is one board. It's red and white striped, looks like a bulky surfboard with some tiny engines on it.
I would buy Rocket Board in an instant if it meant any future "similar technology flight powers" ("Vehicular Flight"?) came free when released as a "customization" of my original purchase. I would have it grant different flight animations, e.g. a rocket board, a broomstick, a flying carpet, an energy disc, etc., based on different toggles ala Swap Ammo/Prestige Sprints.
If I have to separately purchase every single different vehicular flight "individual power", especially at close to a thousand points EACH, there is no way in heck I'm buying multiples. I might not even buy Rocket Board, just on principle.
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Originally Posted by Dispari
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...You want to ride on a gun?|
Originally Posted by pixelforge
Will the "Rocket Board" have multiple 3D models/animations to choose from like guns or claws? Seems to be there could be all kinds of versions of this... rocket board, magic carpet or in terms of characters we know... cosmic surfboard, fantasticar, goblin glider whatever, MANY possibilities.
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Oh wait, I see what you mean.
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I get the animation argument for walk, however I'm not sure how it applies to the rocket-board.
If the rocket-board animations are based off of the power slide animations, that have been in the game forever, and able to use with other power animations just fine...why is it unreasonable to just use the same animations that you would use with the power slide with the rocket board?
Skateboards should be cake (or pie). 
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I want it but I want it to be colour customizable at least 
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*taps fingers*| fly around the world at Level 2 if they chose to and would be faster than running or flight |
Yeah, so let's talk about this. Why faster than flight?
I can somewhat deal with the concept that flight should be the slowest travel power of the four 'standard' travel pools. I don't agree with it, but I understand the rationale.
But why gimp flight to such a degree that even prestige powers like the Rocket Board are faster?
When I think of Super-heroes flying, I think of heroes who can race jet airplanes and frequently win. The CoH engine certainly isn't going to support Mach travel. However, flight doesn't HAVE to be quite so slow. At the very least, a player who's willing to spend slots on flight should be able to be faster than mechanical conveyances.
Afterburner is really a lame solution to this problem. I don't like it, but I'm going to have to deal with it if I want to fly like a real superhero.
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The difference is that you're flying on the Rocket Board, and on the ground for Power Slide. Thus, any powers you activated would use the flying animations, which aren't "rooted" to the ground - or, in this case, the board.|
Originally Posted by AquaJAWS
I get the animation argument for walk, however I'm not sure how it applies to the rocket-board.
If the rocket-board animations are based off of the power slide animations, that have been in the game forever, and able to use with other power animations just fine...why is it unreasonable to just use the same animations that you would use with the power slide with the rocket board? |
You would need to add a genuinely new "travel mode" to the game, and then duplicate all the animation data for every power, and then redo the animations where the ground versions wouldn't do (I imagine many of the melee sets would need substantial work). This would let you do "standing on" things, but wouldn't work for "riding on" things, barring yet-another-redo-of-animations. Prospects of riding a broom/vehicle/board while being able to use powers are dim for the foreseeable future.
If it was easy/simple to do, they'd have done it. It's not. But if the statement of one of the senior animators for the game isn't good enough for you, I'm not sure anyone's will be.
Customizable Rocket Boards won't happen until after pool powers are customizable - which they're (probably painfully) aware we all want, and haven't ruled out yet, so that might actually happen someday. At the moment, the best they could do would be to make different versions, separately purchasable, for each desired option.
Not only do they have to find a way to add customization data for pool/temp powers to your character data, they need a UI that allows you to select and customize the powers you have - look at incarnate customization, for example. Currently you get the list of all possible powers for each slot you unlock. That's already awkward enough, without adding every pool, epic, patron and temp power to the list...
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Are you sure? (Yes, it does enable them to fly on it too)|
Originally Posted by DarkGob
...You want to ride on a gun?
Oh wait, I see what you mean. |
I'd rather have the Lunar Cape, though. But if I could have both that wouldn't be bad... (Lunar Cape is where she pulled that out of. Another character in that packs picnic baskets in hers...)
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I had fun with the rocket board on Beta and fully intend to get it on Live as a vanity power, which I may very well use on some alts as their primary travel power.Yet a follow-up item in a similar vein, may not illicit the same response from me, unless it's design really suits some alt(s) that I do have. I also appreciate the amount of work which would have to be put into making it into a fully functioning travel power and so am not too put off, with it being solely a non-combat power.
However, I would like to say that as I see the only reason for it being a non-combat power, as resource based, I hope that NCSoft and Paragon Studios recognise the strong customer desire to have these travel powers and by extension, power pools, be fully customisable and combat compliant ,then take steps to get these moneymakers to us asap. =D
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I still don't get why it was designed this way. If its due to animations then why not simply have you stand normally when you are just hovering in the rocket board but the minute you move forward or backward it changes to the prestige power slide animation like it always does now. So you can still use powers when you aren't moving. This way you don't need to suppress toggles or anything.
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Like motorcycles? Please say motorcycles. I understand if it's other stuff that's basically a reskinned board, but a motorcycle would be boss.
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Originally Posted by Avatea
But now that we have this system, we'll be able to use it for other projects we've got coming soon.
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There's at least one bunny girl looking for sword surfing.
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Honestly, I tried it out, but it is really so niche, I probably won't buy it. Not even being able to color it is a big draw back.
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Sword surfing would be hella cool. So now you have a bunny girl and a skyscraper-girl both wanting it
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I hope the Rocket Board is not the gateway to things like players driving cars in CoH.
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Jigga what?
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Originally Posted by Amanita
Sword surfing would be hella cool. So now you have a bunny girl and a skyscraper-girl both wanting it
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I've wondered two things, ever since I first saw it:
1) Are they red because Da Red 'Unz Go Fasta?
2) Can you please, please, please change this (and Walk!) so that they suppress instead of detoggling?
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^ This. It is a great power, but the detogling can become problematic. I sudder to use it for example on a tank or brute.|
Originally Posted by InfamousBrad
I've wondered two things, ever since I first saw it:
1) Are they red because Da Red 'Unz Go Fasta? 2) Can you please, please, please change this (and Walk!) so that they suppress instead of detoggling? |
Other problem is the price. 600 is a lot considering that we only get 400 each month.
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Originally Posted by Aggelakis
Pixelforge: Currently, there is one board. It's red and white striped, looks like a bulky surfboard with some tiny engines on it.
I would buy Rocket Board in an instant if it meant any future "similar technology flight powers" ("Vehicular Flight"?) came free when released as a "customization" of my original purchase. I would have it grant different flight animations, e.g. a rocket board, a broomstick, a flying carpet, an energy disc, etc., based on different toggles ala Swap Ammo/Prestige Sprints. If I have to separately purchase every single different vehicular flight "individual power", especially at close to a thousand points EACH, there is no way in heck I'm buying multiples. I might not even buy Rocket Board, just on principle. |
This is where I am with it. It looks horrible and there's no way to customise it.
I suspect they are planning to release each vehicular flight as a separate purchasable temp power, which means I'm not bothering with it at all.
The fact it's faster than flight is just ridiculous.
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Moo has a point. "Purchaseable" travel powers are becoming an epidemic in this game, and they really ARE starting to crowd out the powerset travel powers by being free and now BETTER. Yes, it's true that you can fight while using Fly and you can't while using Rocket Board, but who honestly fights with Flight anyway? It suppresses, it costs too much and you have Hover which does so much better. What's to stop one from using Rocket Board/Hover instead of Fly/Hover?|
Originally Posted by AmazingMOO
*taps fingers*
Yeah, so let's talk about this. Why faster than flight? I can somewhat deal with the concept that flight should be the slowest travel power of the four 'standard' travel pools. I don't agree with it, but I understand the rationale. But why gimp flight to such a degree that even prestige powers like the Rocket Board are faster? When I think of Super-heroes flying, I think of heroes who can race jet airplanes and frequently win. The CoH engine certainly isn't going to support Mach travel. However, flight doesn't HAVE to be quite so slow. At the very least, a player who's willing to spend slots on flight should be able to be faster than mechanical conveyances. Afterburner is really a lame solution to this problem. I don't like it, but I'm going to have to deal with it if I want to fly like a real superhero. |
Remember, a travel power is a build investment. It takes a power pick and it's level-gated. Unless you plan to one day GIVE us a travel power for free at character creation (just one), then this influx of out-of-build travel powers needs to stop. The whole build system is already bastardised enough with temporary powers, veteran powers, purchaseable powers and more. We should be making player build MORE important, not more irrelevant.
A long time ago - before Incarnates - Castle said that if we did get more levels, they would NOT give us more power picks and slot pics because of how much this trivialises and unballances the system. Yet practically every three months since he said this, we've been getting more and more powers in Booster packs that our builds don't account for. Right now when I start the game my character is born with the Nemesis Staff, the Sands of Mu, the Ghost Slaying Axe, Assemble the Team, a Base Teleporter, a Mission teleporter, the Pocket D teleporter, a power which resurrects me, a power which hides me, a buff pet, two types of jump packs, Ninja Run, Beast Run and I forget what else. Enough powers to crowd out my powerset powers from off my ID card. This isn't good for game balance.
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Originally Posted by Noyjitat
I still don't get why it was designed this way. If its due to animations then why not simply have you stand normally when you are just hovering in the rocket board but the minute you move forward or backward it changes to the prestige power slide animation like it always does now. So you can still use powers when you aren't moving. This way you don't need to suppress toggles or anything.
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The problem with using Prestige Power Slide as a base stance is that there are no animations to blend in with it. Ground-based animations solve this by knocking you back into standard left-foot-forward stance when you fight, retaining only the leg glow, but airborne animations can't afford to fall back on aerial animations since those don't have the character standing, and they can't afford to fall back on ground animations since the rocket board isn't wide enough to accommodate the wider, less central stance.
For a rocket board, I get the design decision. However, this doesn't mean that a flight-type power can't exist that has the character standing on a platform large enough to accommodate animation footing while allowing the reuse of practically ALL ground-based animations, and possibly even allowing for a few ground-only animations like Tremor and Foot Stomp, per chance stomping on your own flying machine mid-flight is not a bad idea.
Honestly, this should happen. There's an almost indescribable variety of stable platforms that one can ground-fight while standing on, from floating a rock/ice/crystal/cloud to a solid metal disc, to some kind of technological hover platform to a large flying carpet an energy field. Anything that's big enough for a character to hop around on without stepping overboard will do, and variety there is massive.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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And that is the huge problem for me: it detoggles you. I don't know if this changed in late beta, but when I tested it, I instantly lost enthusiasm when I turned on the rocket board power and my brute's 7 toggles all turned off. If they changed it to suppress toggles, I'd enthusiastically buy it in a heartbeat. But the fact that it detoggles makes it incredibly annoying and of very limited benefit, at least to my toggle-heavy characters.
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Originally Posted by Avatea
...we decided to make it similar to "Walk" in that it turned off all powers...
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Love the board... it goes great with alot of my concept characters who only relied on ninja run, because they're concept is non-super powers based, ala Batman.
Honestly, I don't see the detoggling an issue. I'd only use it to get me from point A to B. Even if it only suppressed, what what would be the point, you can't fight with it on... yet.
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Rocketing in the Future
By Colin Brown, Senior Animator
The idea of putting Rocket Boards in our game started long before Going Rogue even came out, the basic idea was "could we give players a travel power Rocket Board that they could fight and fly on?" Unfortunately every attack, reaction, movement has to blend into ground and flight, adding a completely new travel power would require us to blend 7 years of animations into a new travel power, which could take up to a year's worth of animation time, so the idea lay dormant until we started planning for Freedom, when the idea came up again and we started brainstorming ways we could still give it to the players as a fun method of travel.
So one day while in-between tasks, I decided to challenge myself and see if I could get a "proof of concept" Rocket Board into the game, just to see what people thought. I took the animations and movement from Prestige Power Slide, and moved the animations up in the air slightly, as well as modeling a basic rectangle Rocket Board to appear below the player. After a few hours of setting it up, texturing and animating, I had the player on a Rocket Board in the game flying around Atlas Park. After sending the video around, it went viral at the studio and interest peaked again "Could we give a Rocket Board to players?"
Finally we decided that we could give the Rocket Board to players as a travel power but, again, because putting in a new travel power would mean re-animating every single animation in the game to blend into it properly, we decided to make it similar to "Walk" in that it turned off all powers but let the player fly around the world at Level 2 if they chose to and would be faster than running or flight.
After we decided to put Rocket Board into the game, we had David Nakayama (Lead Concept Artist) create new concept art. Then Leo Braz da Cunha (VFX Artist) modeled, textured and created visual fx for the Rocket Board, while I made new animations and Adam Kay (Lead Sound Designer) created new sounds to make it even more awesome.
The biggest challenge for Rocket Boards was having it interrupt various motions and powers in our game, since we have so many different things you can do while on the Rocket Board, we didn't want you to get knocked off the Rocket Board or switch to swimming when jumping in the water or switching to regular flight powers by accident, so that took a lot of testing to make sure you stay on your Rocket Board at all times when turned on. But now that we have this system, we'll be able to use it for other projects we've got coming soon.
It was great to finally achieve the goal of a Rocket Board travel power and deliver it to the players in a fun and functional manner, we hope you love it! We hope to provide the same kind of "magic" that we did with Rocket Boards in the future.
Colin Brown
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