Sword of the New World: Exclusive Developer Diary #2
By
Phil Maurer, Operations Team Lead, and Jon-Enee Merriex, Senior Game
Master
As a follow-up
to our first developer diary, which ran a few weeks ago, we sent in a
set of questions for the developers to look over for their next
developer diary. The SotNW team responded with an onslaught of
information, wrapped into their own wit and humor. Please enjoy the
article!
TTH:
Sword of the New World: Granado Espada offers multi-character control
which has been referred to as having a
“family”. What does that mean? What is
the difference between having several characters and switching back and
forth between them and controlling all of them at once? How does it
manifest in gameplay?
style="font-weight: bold;">Jon: Sword of the
New World allows players to create their own unique families.
Ok, I know we have said that A LOT. But what does all that
mean? What is a ‘family’? Basically a
family is a collection of characters that lets you, the player, create
unique and interesting “builds” of teams.
A TEAM is the three characters you take with you when you travel into
the new world of Granado Espada. Because you can control up
to three characters at a time and have a total of 36 characters in your
family’s quarters to choose from, you have the ability to
create your own specific and individual team.
alt="Focusing her power" title="Focusing her power"
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A family consists of the characters that you collect
and/or create.
In
addition to that, your ‘family’ is your persona in
game. In other games you have one character, but in Sword the
possibilities are limitless. Your family can all be known for
one thing (mine are known diplomats) or each member of your family can
have a different outlook on life. Either way the choice is
yours. As I always say, your family will live and die by your
hands and their reputations are no different.
style="font-weight: bold;">Phil: I
would like to add that the control scheme is one of the best I have
ever used. You have the ability to control your family using
just three keys and a mouse. The controls scale up
and allow you to gain as much control as you want, down to
controlling one character at a time, and using hotkeys to switch
between your characters and trigger abilities. The players
that master the hotkeys will do much better in dueling PvP situations.
TTH:
How do you build a family? Is it totally up to you to do any
combination of characters that you want or is there direction given to
people who do not know how to build a strong family? What is the best
combination of classes? What if you build a family and find that you
are terribly lacking in a certain area. Are you stuck?
style="font-weight: bold;">Phil: This
is one of the great aspects of the game. Families tend to
reflect the play styles of the individual player. If you notice that
your family is weak in a certain aspect you can look at other available
stances and find out how address the hole, so you will never become
“stuck.”
In
our testing we have not found any one set of characters that will be
game breaking or too weak. Some builds definitely have
strengths, but I have found that very narrowly focused families also
tend to have big weaknesses that need to be monitored to prevent
getting wiped. For example, three Elementalists generate a
huge amount of DPS, but at the cost of lower hit points and
armor. You need to be incredibly aware of your surroundings
and you end up using a lot of health potions, which costs
money. Is this build stronger then a more balanced group that
includes a fighter and a scout? Yes and no, it is a trade off
that tends to reflect the play style of the player.
style="font-weight: bold;">Jon: To add to what
Phil said, stances themselves are fairly give and take. If
you put a Musketeer in the Kneeling Shot Stance, she will do more
damage than any of the other stances save one, however, while he may be
dealing more damage she cannot move… because she is
kneeling. Also, she attacks MUCH slower than the other
stances. But every hit is deadly.
TTH:
During the localization of the game I am sure you have had the
opportunity to build and play with a family of your own in the
game. What is the makeup of your family? Have you been
surprised about how your family has progressed?
style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Jon
style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">: Personally I like the
Musketeer class. Being the individualist I am, I usually
leave town with a Fighter and two Musketeers. I let my
fighter aggro a number of monsters to a central location and use my
Musketeers to take them all out at once. I think a lot of
people are afraid to play without a healer but I rarely get into a
situation when I need one in solo play and in squad play there is
usually at least one person with a healer that can heal my characters
as well. Also, potions are a life saver. Whenever I
get in too deep, I can always just quaff a potion and stay in the
fight. I think the thing that usually shocks me the most with
my build is how different each stance is. Even within the
same class.
For
example, I have two Musketeers. One of my Musketeers is
leveling his Kneeling Shot Rifle Stance while his counterpart is
leveling her Double Pistol Stance. Their play styles are
completely different. She is rather active and will move
around to get her ‘perfect shot’, while he is
constantly aiming on the ground, unable to move, but still dealing
massive amounts of damage. All the while my Fighter is
holding aggro with his Provoke Class Skill and several of his AoE
skills from his Back-Guard Stance. For me, not having a
healer is all about risk. It’s the exhilaration of
beating a monster before they beat me. That last moment when
it looks like the fight is not going to go my way… but I
still win… just by luck.
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Families are different than the multi-character groups
and reflect all the characters you have to your name.
style="font-weight: bold;">Phil:
Perhaps I am a care bear… My personal grouping
uses a Fighter, Elementalist and a Scout. Like Jon, I use the
Back-Guard stance on my fighter, but I am leveling High-Guard at the
same time, I am able to do this as both stances use a shield and a
sword and I switch between them as needed. Sure my bonuses
for the stances are not as great as I split my stance leveling across
two stances, but I have access to two sets of skills and I have a few
more tricks up my sleeve to deal with situations as they occur.
My
Elementalist is currently ice speced. The ice skills, while
not doing as much damage as the fire or lightening, allow for a chance
to slow the enemies down, and tends to be a little more focused on AoE
type spells. I use the Provoke class skill the Fighter has to
gather mobs, but then I unload on them with the
Elementalists’ AoE spells. And yes, I do use a
Scout…
While
my Scout primarily heals my family, when I group up I throw two daggers
on him and he becomes a wicked little damage dealer. I let the other
families’ scouts assume the group healing duties.
style="font-weight: bold;">Jon:
You’re just a chicken, not playing risky…
style="font-weight: bold;">Phil:
Alright let’s settle this like men and duel!
(After the interview Jon
beat Phil 3 out of 5 times with the 5th matching deciding the victor)
TTH:
Finally, how do stances fit into the equation? Tell us a
little bit about how to best utilize each character’s unique
stance and how to anticipate the stances needed in battle.
style="font-weight: bold;">Jon: Taking things a
little deeper, each of your characters has their own individual
stances. Your choices with what stance each character is
using and which ones you put in your family’s team increases
your ability to customize your team even more. When choosing
characters to put on your team you can do almost anything: You can take
three damage dealers and cut through monsters before they cut through
you, or you can take 2 healers and a tank and battle your way
to glory with your fighter leading the way. You can even make a
balanced team - like a tank, a damage dealer and a healer - and play
the “Classic build”. In the classic
build, you use your tank to gain agro and take damage while your healer
heals him and your wizard deals vicious amounts of damage to all
targets in her path. Any course you choose is never wrong
because if you don’t like the class or character you pick,
you can just make a new one.
style="font-weight: bold;">Phil:
Since I play the “Classic build” are you implying I
am old?
style="font-weight: bold;">Jon: I
don’t have to “imply” that…
style="font-weight: bold;">TTH: Thanks again
to Phil and Jon
for answering our questions and giving us a behind the scenes look at
Sword of the New World: Granado Espada!
Ten Ton Hammer is your
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