Thank you for all of your support of BSC Days 07/14/14-07/17/14


The BSC (stands for Bat-Shit Crazy) Days were an event with a set of video and text presentations, updates, and reveals held by City State Entertainment on 7/14/-7/17/2014. For Camelot Unchained, BSC is often used by City State Entertainment to refer to the slightly off-the-wall, maybe a little "crazy" ideas of Mark Jacobs and the City State Entertainment team about our own game mechanics. The BSC Days event was a major early content and gameplay reveal for Camelot Unchained.

Progression System Presentation

Introduction – Trouble in River City

  • Leveling up in most modern MMORPGs has become too easy, lessening the players’ sense of accomplishment
  • Typical theme-park style MMORPGs push players through their linear content too fast; players don’t have time to enjoy the world around them
  • Some modern MMORPGs’ streamlining actually increases the “grindy” feeling, due to constant progression feedback with little downtime
  • Players are encouraged to rush their way through the game, leveling quickly to get to the “end game” or to “cap out” their characters

Our Solution – Part I

  • As per the Kickstarter, we are designing our game so that players don’t reach the soft cap in a short period of time. Our slow but steady progression system uses individual stat and ability progression instead of generic EXP
  • Our mantra is “Use it to improve it!” If a player wants to get stronger, he must do things that increase his strength. This system enhances immersion by tying the players’ actions directly to their character
  • In Camelot Unchained, players gradually improve their performance by small amounts
  • Character progression in specific areas allows players to unlock access to new skills and ability components

Our Solution – Part II

  • Players receive their progression rewards based on a “Daily Report,” rather than instantaneously
  • At the end of each “game day”, players are rewarded with improvements to their character’s stats, skills, and abilities
  • Players even get bonus resources based on heroic achievements and defensive actions, such as guarding player caravans

Character Progression Rewards

  • Players improve a stat by performing actions that use that stat: Swinging a heavy sword increases your strength, allowing you to use heavier swords
  • Players increase proficiency with ability components by using abilities that contain them: Using Fire Ball increases proficiency with the Fire and Ball components
  • Players improve passive skills by using abilities that trigger their effects: A skill which reduces enemy fire resistance when a player deals fire damage becomes more effective through use of fire damage abilities

Progression Limits

  • As per our Kickstarter campaign and updates, a small amount of vertical progression will reward players for using stats and skills
  • No hard limits! Stats, skills, and ability components have soft caps for progression, after which advancement slows considerably
  • Even with unlimited advancement, vertical progression is carefully designed so new players will always be competitive with veteran players

Daily Report – Welcome to BSC!

  • Each player gets an email (and/or in-game) report that shows what they accomplished during the last day’s play session. Everything that the player did is listed in the report: defending, killing, mining, building, crafting, destroying, and more!
  • You see a list of rewards that you earned from the game (stat and skill gains, new unlocks, etc.) and from the king of your Realm (gold, medals, honors, etc.)
  • The DR also shows the overall accomplishments of your Realm, its status (for example, the number of players that signed on), and other factors of the overall reward calculation
  • The DR shows only the aggregate reward, not the rewards for individual actions

Daily Report – BSC Benefits

  • Because rewards are daily instead of immediate, exploit detection is easier, and we can punish destructive behavior such as “Keep Trading” between Realms
  • Thus, rather than only caring about your own personal gains, you have an incentive to have fun, go where you want, and become a productive member of your Realm
  • The actions of every player within a Realm count toward the rewards of Realm-mates. Helping out your Realm-mates and cooperating to achieve goals means better rewards for everyone!

Realm News

  • A daily email with server-specific and Realm-specific news keeps players in touch with the world
  • The Realm News will change every day, based on the Realm’s challenges and accomplishments
    • Unlike the DR, this is focused on your Realm’s activities, and highlights some of the top players’ accomplishments during that cycle
  • The game’s story is not written ahead of time in a series of quests like a theme-park style game. Instead, the players are in control of their stories
  • News headlines recognize important events and player achievements in a more meaningful way than simple leaderboards

Summary

  • CSE’s experience point and progression systems are unique among MMORPGs and most, if not all, computer RPGs
  • By tying players’ actions directly to their progression in stats, abilities, etc., we add fun and increase immersion
  • The aggregation of data over 24 hours allows a very realistic snapshot of what occurred over that period, and advanced data mining brings scaling rewards based on that data
  • The progression system rewards players for playing the game as it was intended (no cross-realm Keep Trading), and rewards based not only on individual actions but those of the Realm