Comments

First. Can I vote for pvp quests on their own?

Outdoing yourselves again folks! Amazing stuff to read up on. Can't wait to see it drop!

 

Thank you for including non-pvp methods of earning this.

I am one of those players that 100% does NOT enjoy PVP at all and appreciate a the method of playing without touching pvp

 

Wow, so much stuff to play!, amazing! And awesome looking new gear!

Probably mostly looking forward to the mini quests and tough leg quest ^_^

Glad to have something to grind towards, keep me busy for awhile and I might... just might look at pvp depending on rewards

 

I feel like this should have been a private/direct message. But seeing as you made it a point to publicly chastise me for my opinions, I feel I have to respond publicly as well.

Do you like being pressured into things? Do you like having the most efficient way to earn something being a method that is the opposite of enjoyable for you? Do you believe that the primary focus of development should be for a "small fraction of the total playerbase"?

The main dev team has the belief that a strong PVP community is reflective of how active and alive a game is, which is something many, Many, MANY games I loved that died also also believed.

Firefall, a MMOFPS killed itself by focusing so much of it's dev time on PVP, when less than 10% of the player base ever played it -- dooming that game. That MMOFPS, much like this MMORTS, attracts the PVE crowd far more than it does the PVP crowd. That is why an entire booster pack was devoted to coop missions, as well as an entire other booster pack devoted to Skirmish mode (vs AI instead of other players) which was (and still is) the most played mode for AOE2.

It isn't that I am not good at PVP, I played competitive Starcraft 1 for years. But I firmly believe that PVP development is being over emphasized when what will draw (and keep) AOEO players is not a thriving PVP community, but instead fun/rewarding/memorable coop PVE content.

AOEO has a serious edge over SC2's coop mode, and that is the major selling point. The ability to play fun and interesting missions with your friends, family, and even children (as my 7 year old can play and beat some of the coop missions in AOEO). Trying to compete with other RTS games on how perfectly balanced the PVP is, is not a good time investment -- in my opinion. It is to that end, that I want to voice how PVP is not my thing and how I APPRECIATE it when I can earn the same things as PVP players.

 

We would never ever ever do an event without putting PvE first. PvP has zero rewards last Halloween and in winter, the dominant strategy still was to PvE.

Let’s say we ran an event where in 5 weeks of regular casual PvEing you could earn 15 legs. If you hate PvP, whether an equally engaged PvPer could earn only 5 legs is not an insult to PvP. And for the same reason if that PvPer could earn 25 legs it’s not an insult to PvE.

 

I'm on it as soon I get home!
(even if my wife starts complaining)

 

I, for one, appreciate the inclusion of PvP into the event because, as Andy mentioned, the previous events have appeared to be largely if not entirely PvE focused--which is, no doubt, the larger portion of the player base, so rightfully so, but us PvP peeps need some love too! So I definitely love the approach of giving the event both PvE and PvP elements. And I'm excited to see the "mini-game" quests! If they are similar to the ones in Babylon like wrecking the temples and whatnot, I will very much enjoy that; it's a shorter, entertaining PvE experience that doesn't take as much of a time commitment and understanding of the known strategies.

Once again, everyone working on Celeste blows me away! Y'all rock.

 

Oh, and Kenji, you are right that most players play PvE and thus, to keep the game thriving, PvE should be developed. But I think both are absolutely critical because the PvP fraction also help promote the game, probably more so than the PvE crowd (at least publicly through streaming, tournaments, etc.). So both depend on each other and I think it's important that we stay united as one playerbase, not a PvP playerbase and a PvE playerbase. You're definitely right that players shouldn't feel forced to play a mode they don't enjoy, but I think most of the development from Celeste that I've seen has been PvE focused, right? I could be wrong.

But the bottom line is, both are equally important and I appreciate the development team giving love to both sides... really, it seems like they are developing the whole game in a very balanced way, which is amazing given how they're doing this on their own time.

And PvP and PvE players can both rejoice in...

THE ROMANS yeeee hawwwww

 

Another thing to note is that there are tons of players who dabble in both PvE and PvP. Because PvP is dependent on somebody else also looking to PvP at the same time as you, it requires a certain threshold of active players in order to maintain critical mass. So lots of PvP players go to PvE when the queues have been slow.

We've seen before that when we dangle some PvP rewards, lots of people return and the PvP community quickly catches fire again.

If we run a limited time event and make it wildly easier for PvE to get the rewards compared to PvP, the PvP population will fail and everyone will just PvE.

 

I prefer PvP and helped designed the darn Halloween Event, so I cannot complain. But because of how we rewarded Zahhak's swords last fall, I basically quit PvPing to grind in PvE.

 

Agreed, I do both too. I mainly consider myself a PvP player because that's what I prefer and enjoy the most (despite my mediocre-at-best ability), but I also (shamelessly) love the dang Capital City building/managing and enjoy dabbling in some PvE. Both are important! I think Kenji was just stating his appreciation for PvE content as a PvE player, which is definitely understood. But us PvP players are also thankful for the PvP content!

Again, y'all rock.

Also again... ROMANS

 

Awesome work all. On PVP/PVE ye seem to be striking a good proportionate balance and talking about it in sensible ways. More donations incoming, keep up the good work.

I loved AOEO when it was out and kept a copy of the game to hopefully crack one day so I could play. Came across Celeste a couple of years ago but didn't' have time to play, got back into it a few weeks ago and can say Celeste has exceeded my wildest hopes.

 

This looks fantastic. My first event in AoEO and now I can't wait to get into the game later today and check all this out. Great work to all.

 

I always liked vanity gear skins type thing.