RuneScape Forum Archive | Necromancy Conjures

Jan

2020

Aurelle

Posts: 23 Bronze Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

This seems like the best place to both reach out and start discussion, especially since Reddit, Twitter, and Discord all have their own significant issues as platforms currently.

I'm super excited for Necromancy and I really want it to work out great, both as a skill release and as a test for ideas on making combat more approachable and more fun for everyone. Necromancy's Conjures look like they're going to tick all the "pet class" boxes from other MMOs, and I've learned a lot about "pet classes" from my experience in Final Fantasy XIV - how they can go very right, and how they can go horribly wrong. Jagex, please let me tell you about it! I have way more than could possibly fit in this text box - the neuroscience of combat pets alone is too long - and I'm open to an NDA if needed.

(ETA: As a disabled player, I'd also love to talk about accessibility potential, both for Necromancy and in general! I do Savage and Ultimate raiding in FFXIV, but I don't have any Zuk capes, and the latter is not for lack of trying.)

Anyone else who's played a pet class and wants to discuss in this thread, or offer insights?

23-Jun-2023 11:57:40 - Last edited on 23-Jun-2023 12:24:50 by Aurelle

Jun

2006

Dilbert2001

Posts: 30,176 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

I doubt any specific class will be a thing in a game with so many skills. We can have skill tree, which the RS3 Necromancy is building on. A pet class can be something we spend talents points on getting aid with summoned undead companions. I also doubt if we will call them "pets" as they are our friends, not our pets or slaves. We are communing the undead, not enslaving them as Mod Rowley discussed Necromancy to us.

23-Jun-2023 16:54:45

Jan

2020

Aurelle

Posts: 23 Bronze Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Dilbert2001 said :
I doubt any specific class will be a thing in a game with so many skills. ... I also doubt if we will call them "pets" as they are our friends, not our pets or slaves. We are communing the undead, not enslaving them ...

I agree that RuneScape isn't a class-based game and won't become one with Necromancy, and probably will have its own terms for things. But that doesn't mean we can't learn from other games that name things differently.

"Pet class" is a pretty well-recognized term across MMOs in general for "here's a form of combat that involves managing one or more allied NPCs with their own AIs", and Necromancy not being in a class-based system or lore-wise treating the conjures as "pets" doesn't mean that it won't have similar system considerations to those fighting styles in other games. In fact, it probably will have similar system considerations, because how players learn to use and manage those allies doesn't really change, and certain combat possibilities are opened up by having such allies regardless of whether they come from "classes" or "skills".

24-Jun-2023 12:47:40 - Last edited on 24-Jun-2023 12:50:21 by Aurelle

Jun

2006

Dilbert2001

Posts: 30,176 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

RS3 already learned from other games. That's why we have a full Summoning skill to begin with, which is further expanded with Ancient Summoning thanks to the combination of Invention and Archaeology skills. Communing undead is also going to be an integral part of the Necromancy mechanics. We will also delve further into skill tree which we can further expand the role of the summoner branch of Necromancy.

A lot have already been done to RS3 that other games have thanks to our solid foundations in RS3. A lot more can be done soon too.

24-Jun-2023 18:40:21

Jan

2020

Aurelle

Posts: 23 Bronze Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Dilbert2001 said :
A lot have already been done to RS3 that other games have thanks to our solid foundations in RS3. A lot more can be done soon too.

Then why are you so dismissive of my offering to help Jagex? I'm not denying that RS3 has learned from other games before, but offering help for the game to do so again.

Let's take a small example.

One of the most talked about pieces of playtester feedback is that the Necromancy conjures didn't swap targets while their target was still alive, instead just sitting there when the necromancer needed to deal with adds such as the Solak core - or Zamorak's witches, demons, and runes! Of course, Jagex has taken this feedback on board.

Now Jagex must decide how Necromancy will handle such scenarios. Should it use the "order to attack target" model that Summoning currently uses, despite the longstanding player complaints of familiars attacking the wrong thing? Or should it have conjures attack the last target the necromancer directed non-conjure damage to, thus automatically swapping for adds?

Automatic swapping is intuitive for beginners, and it would probably playtest very well at first. However, looking at the history of FFXIV shows that automatic swapping can't be any more than an introductory mode. Further, it shows that the "order to attack target" model is on the right track, but must be both expanded and reliable to provide a good gameplay experience.

Aside from "feel" considerations, the reason for this is controlled damage scenarios, such as HM Kerapac's clones and Zamorak's runes, where the player must kill add(s) but not too early. As a player becomes more skilled at maintaining their conjures for the ramping damage output, and/or better geared, the multi-hitsplat nature of conjures makes them more likely to kill the add too early / double-kill a rune should they automatically swap targets.

(continued below)

27-Jun-2023 10:49:18

Jan

2020

Aurelle

Posts: 23 Bronze Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

(continued from above)

We're already seeing multi-hitsplat high damage cause problems on occasion at Zamorak, with a FSoA or BoLG user hitting a rune with a single ability and double-killing it. And those are consistent-DPM setups - the backloaded DPM of conjures would be even more liable to this!

Cease is not fast enough to fix this. For a player to control their damage output by skillful play, they must be able to have their conjures attack a different target than that of their non-conjure damage. In the absence of a second target, the player must also be able to have their conjures stop attacking mid-combat while still outputting non-conjure damage.

I've done that in FFXIV, since I can raid there. From 2013 to 2021, they had a class ("job" in their terms) literally called "Summoner" that combined AI ally management with direct abilities, and it showed how to have the necessary high-control interface for the AI allies in an approachable manner. And they have a variety of fights that require multiple enemies to be killed in quick succession, or brought to low HP but not killed, so I got to personally experience the tactic of putting my summon on a different target from my non-summon abilities to split damage.

And this design necessity wouldn't be at all obvious, or even flag itself as an area to look into, from reading about or playing FFXIV on a surface level. Such a reader or player would be mired in things like the controversy over the job being removed, or player perceptions being skewed by level 1 beginners being directed to the equivalent of a PVME advanced guide, or...

By having experienced the relevant systems in depth, I can skip over the need to code the different options to a playtestable level. By having experienced different games, I can compare and contrast the design goals and constraints and see what can't possibly work in RS3 because it violates RS3's design constraints. Such things are useful!

27-Jun-2023 10:49:38

Jun

2006

Dilbert2001

Posts: 30,176 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

We already have all kinds of conjurer features we can see in other games, without classes. Why do we need to create something called a "class" but have no new initiative added to RS3?

RS3 style skills and soon to come skill trees are our RS3 Style classes. It is counterproductive to reinvent the wheel when we have everything in RS3 already.

Necromancy is an 100% new combat style skill. It is by design to be such.

27-Jun-2023 17:42:47

Jan

2020

Aurelle

Posts: 23 Bronze Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Dilbert2001 said :
We already have all kinds of conjurer features we can see in other games, without classes. Why do we need to create something called a "class" but have no new initiative added to RS3?

RS3 style skills and soon to come skill trees are our RS3 Style classes.

You're getting hung up on the terms. I'm not saying that RS3 should have classes, I'm saying that RS3 can learn from other games that so happen to call their combat styles "classes" (or "jobs", or whatever).

Dilbert2001 said :
It is counterproductive to reinvent the wheel when we have everything in RS3 already.

Necromancy is an 100% new combat style skill. It is by design to be such.

I am not proposing to reinvent the wheel, I am proposing to learn from others' inventions in a way appropriate to RS3's systems. Just because we already have the wheel doesn't mean we can't take advantage of new tire materials.

Further, RS3 does not have everything at the moment. Going back to my previous example, we do not have an approachable high-control interface for familiars, and conjures will absolutely need such an interface in order to have a smooth player learning curve.

And when exactly would RS3 have gotten such an interface from other games? The foundations of mid-combat familiar interaction in RS3 have persisted since Summoning's introduction in January 2008 - neither the EoC nor the introduction of new familiars with Ancient Summoning changed that. The June 2021 Summoning rebalance and QoL only added new settings for out-of-combat behavior.

Meanwhile, FFXIV didn't perfect their summon control interface until June 2019, and ripped it out in December 2021. The launch of Summoning could not have learned from it, and the June 2021 QoL didn't go nearly far enough in learning from it.

30-Jun-2023 02:01:12

Jun

2006

Dilbert2001

Posts: 30,176 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

We already have a familiar interface. We also have interface commanding our pets to fight too. We have the tools there. Nobody said we can or can't have a more robust interface. Our summoned dead may be able to wear armors too, not now though, but later.

"Meanwhile, FFXIV didn't perfect their summon control interface until June 2019,"

Good that you realize the other games didn't get summon control interface perfected in years, RS3 have at least another 20 years in their agenda. Plenty of time for RS3 to do even better than the other games they are learning from.

30-Jun-2023 19:11:48

Jan

2020

Aurelle

Posts: 23 Bronze Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Dilbert2001 said :
Good that you realize the other games didn't get summon control interface perfected in years,

Oh, I'm well aware that other games aren't perfect. By now I've probably written over 100k words just on things FFXIV did / does wrong . In fact, the single biggest thing that I want Jagex to learn from FFXIV is how to avoid the horrible mistake that Square Enix made in 2021. But explaining that one would require a bunch of neuroscience background that's not going to fit in this text box, so it's not really a suitable example.

Dilbert2001 said :
RS3 have at least another 20 years in their agenda. Plenty of time for RS3 to do even better than the other games they are learning from.

Regardless of how much longer we have, it's better for both Jagex and players to find out what does and doesn't work early, instead of spending developer and/or player time on systems that just can't work or poor implementations. So why are you being so dismissive of learning from the time already spent by other developers?

Dilbert2001 said :
We already have a familiar interface. We also have interface commanding our pets to fight too. We have the tools there.

Okay, please go to Zamorak phase 7 and have your familiar stand by a rune without attacking it while you're attacking a different rune far away. If you can do it at all, it's going to be very annoying. With a proper conjure control interface, it would be easy.

Dilbert2001 said :
Nobody said we can or can't have a more robust interface.

You did say that when you were insisting that "we have everything in RS3 already" despite my example of an interface that's both more robust and necessary for Necromancy to function well.

03-Jul-2023 04:23:13

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