Key Bindings/Climbing/Character Data/some extra questions for the devs ^,,^

[KRSHDYT]

Apologies in advance to the developers for the somewhat lengthy questions but I felt that I would cram as much as I possibly could into one post now rather than making additional posts later on.

(These questions all apply to the early access state of the game and what we will be experiencing from the moment we log in on June the 2nd).


Questions!

1) Will there be freedom with certain key bindings? I would very much like to be able to crouch, go prone and stand up all on one key. For example pressing shift from a standing position would crouch me, pressing shift again would stand me back up, but holding down shift from either position would send me prone? I have played games where I have had to map three buttons to stand/crouch/prone and found that it became rather tedious and impractical, especially during PvP encounters.

2) Will we be able to see other player's (enemies) names above their heads? And what about people in our party/tribe? Will there be some form of in-game UI for party/tribe members?

3) What is climbing like in terms of things like slopes/gradients? And is there a button we can use to effectively vault over something if it proves difficult to traverse? I understand from the trailer that we will be able to jump, but let us say for the sake of argument that there is a small tree stump/rock in which our jumps just wouldn't take us high enough.

4) How will our character sheet/page/inventory work? Will we have slots? If so how many inventory slots will there be on our characters? For example 'head' 'shoulders' chest' 'neck' 'rings' etc. Also will certain items affect our statistics? For example lighter boots could help us run faster but would be more susceptible to getting wet in the rain and thus catching hypothermia or a similar illness?

5) Are you looking to implement the Allosaurus? According to my little cousin Eddie baby (dinosaur fanatic) they are almost like a mini Tyrannosaurus Rex and are somewhat biologically related. But I am assuming you already know this...

6) I am under the impression that we can transfer our character data from an online server to offline one, and vice versa (I am aware that we will have to travel/battle your way to an obelisk in order to do so and you have stated that it will not be easy).


In all honesty I am not a fan of this (some of you out there may agree), however I am not for one second implying that nobody else will enjoy/make good use of this feature. But I do find that this takes away some of the conceptual/survival aspects, perhaps even the whole immersion/feel of the game and most importantly the buzz of adrenaline you experience when you know that one wrong move will cost you dearly. Losing our inventory when we die is one of Ark's great key features but being able to effectively just back up your character and go on a crazy rampage with no real consequences to your own character's actions and belongings extremely worries me. For this reason I would like to raise two suggestions:

***These suggestions are both assuming you (the developers) feel you have to/would like to leave in the ability to save/transfer character data***

A) Keep the ability to transfer your character data from online to offline but remove only the ability to transfer your character data from offline to online.

This to me seems like a slightly more balanced option because it means you have to actively part-take in the online experience to improve your character. As opposed to being able to play on an offline server alone/with friends and having the freedom/time to build up masses of weapons, gear and dinosaurs before jumping into a potentially worse off (in terms of character progression) online community of players and having that immediate advantage.

OR

B) Segregate the feature itself from the PvP servers so that the ability to transfer/save character data would only be available to PvE servers alone. I am assuming that the majority of players who have asked for PvE servers to be implemented (and were recently granted that request) are already happy with this feature as they aren't that bothered about the idea of other players being ahead or behind in terms of progression ('Who cares?! Let's just enjoy the game?!').

For me and for perhaps many others, I would not like any form of character data transferring/saving in the game as I think the fact that we retain statistics, knowledge and abilities upon death is already enough (but by the same token I cannot speak for everybody here). Anyway, these are two suggestions that hopefully one of which will be considered!


Lastly, I submitted an application for post-early access and have since bought a new graphics card. How do I go about updating this with you (developers) directly?

Thank you all for your time and I sure hope that my questions get some much needed attention ^,,^ x

[Goremech]

Going prone would be excellent, you could use it to sneak past things, or even give us the challenge of crawling though small openings in caves.

I am also interested in the ‘character sheet layout’ and how that will look / feel

[Max Planck]

You can crouch and go prone.

[chucky.t1988]

They should leave the names above peoples heads out as it makes the game much more of a challange and makes you have to communicate with your team mates

[JoeBags]

I'd like to know the answer to these questions as well. And I agree with the poster above, no floating name tags. The character creation/height/weight/colorings should be enough to tell people apart. Maybe if you select them you can get their name, but the less UI the better IMO.

[Dobigs]

Offline or non official to Official servers are not allowed. Official to Official transfers are allow. You won't be able to mod your character with gear and come back to the real game.

[Charnel]

Name tags should only appear for people in the same tribe

[KRSHDYT]

Would greatly appreciate a brief reply from a developer!

[Charnel]

Bothered a écrit :

Would greatly appreciate a brief reply from a developer!

I believe they are asleep atm no dev responses for a few hours..or maybe too busy working haha

[Max]

Toxus a écrit :

Bothered a écrit :

Would greatly appreciate a brief reply from a developer!

I believe they are asleep atm no dev responses for a few hours..or maybe too busy working haha

Yeah, and to be fair their level of response has already been incredible!

[KRSHDYT]

Yes it has! I think I may have just put them off with my collosal post...

[AT]

Having one keybinding for all three functions would be fantastic.

I doubt they'll implement vaulting into this engine... Although it would be handy. They'll probably stick to a basic jump command.

Character transferring is obv a big issue for them so i'm sure they'll balance it properly but interesting to hear what they think

[VoidFish]

Bothered a écrit :

Yes it has! I think I may have just put them off with my collosal post...

Yeh, nothing puts off people more than a bloody wall of text. I suggest you either: 1. search the forums for your answers(theres a search bar for a reason) or 2. Clean up your post and make it more simple and to the point.

[Jat]

Quite a lot here but I'll see what I can tackle

[1] As of right now the way it functions is there are seperate buttons to carry out those functions. So pressing X will do Y and pressing A will do B. Perhaps in the future we can look into having more freedom, though it wouldn't be a priority.

[2] We want to keep the UI/HUD fairly simple to keep the immersion, and it's still in flux. As for how it'll be, you'll be able to tell if they're in your tribe when you approach them and interact with them as their name will be in a different colour. Though this could also change as we continuously work on the UI. As for seeing a list of your tribe members, you'll be able to do that by hitting a button.

[3] You'll just have a jump for now, haven't really had any trouble climbing/ascending - sometimes it may be too high so you'll need to look for another route.

[4] Their will be equipment slots and inventory is weight based. Items providing extra benefits is a possibility, we'll/you'll need to wait and see. :^)

[5] Wait for Dossier drops =P!

[6] We still need to expand and provide more details about the Obelisk system so people need to understand how it works, we're constantly working on it and when we have more details we can share what is possible and what isn't possible.

You can re-apply :)

Hope that clears some stuff up.

[KRSHDYT]

BlackFish a écrit :

Bothered a écrit :

Yes it has! I think I may have just put them off with my collosal post...

Yeh, nothing puts off people more than a bloody wall of text. I suggest you either: 1. search the forums for your answers(theres a search bar for a reason) or 2. Clean up your post and make it more simple and to the point.

First off, much appreciation for your reply Mr. Jat!

Ohh 'BlackFish'... I think you've been in that ocean a little too long... you seem rather salty today :/

Now, if you took the time to read my post you will have noticed that I felt I wanted to put as much detail into 'my' post as possible to save me asking further questions later on (thus saving more time for the developers in the long run). And as it is 'my' post I'm afraid you don't tell me what I should and shouldn't do with it. As you can see, it seems a developer did get round to answering my questions in the end, (as I knew they would) without me needing to alter it.

But anyway! Thank you kindly for bumping my post to the point of recognition by a developer ^,,^

[VoidFish]

Bothered a écrit :

Ohh 'BlackFish'... I think you've been in that ocean a little too long... you seem rather salty today :/
^

Yeh, just havent had the best friday today. Life stuff, sorry about that.