The Codex

Malefactour · **Joined:** Fri Jan 14, 2011 4:13 am **Posts:** 503

As has been previously discussed, one of the best features to come out of WAR was the Tome of Knowledge. It has been such a glowing success that its functionality has been co-opted by other games. Now were Vigil to implement something of this nature (hint, hint) there are some features I think could make it the next great innovation in the MMO genre.

Map: Our codices should include user editable maps. When we find interesting things, let us notate that in our maps. When we enter the randomly generated Space Hulk to fight the 'Nids and 'Stealers (hint, hint), give us an "Auspex" function that lets us record the levels and tunnels we've explored to find our way back to our beamout points or boarding torpedoes. I wouldn't care if Vigil did away with the minimap in our U.I.'s completely, as I almost always defer to my main map and rarely use a minimap. Most mini maps in MMO's just take up valuable real estate on my screen.

Record: One of the most talked about but, sadly, not implemented features of the Tome of Knowledge from WAR was as a living record of what your character did. The example given in the press was you come across a man in the woods with a quest to kill bears, but you'd already killed a slew of bears getting to this hermits cabin, your ToK would have recorded the bear kills and you'd be able to take credit for completing the quest immediately instead of having to turn around and go kill more bears. This one feature was one of the things I was most looking forward too in WAR and it never made it. It's been theorized that the reason this functionality didn't make it into release was because the ToK information and the quest completion conditions were in different databases so never the twain would meet, so to speak. Vigil, take a lesson, marry these databases and allow the Codex to bring TRUE innovation to the questing mechanic.

Book of DEATH: Wow has this add on, WAR has the Dammaz Kron add on. Vigil needs to put this into the Codex as a standard feature. It simple records everyone that you have killed, or has killed you and keeps track of it, thats it. It's an awesome tool for keeping track of your frienemies, smack talking, and general epeen swinging. All good things for a game with pvp. :twisted:

These are the big 3 that I could think of to make our Codex the best data recorder of any MMO developed. Heres hoping that Vigil is on top of it.

Exthalion · **Joined:** Sun Feb 06, 2011 8:56 am **Posts:** 32

I agree with everything you said there Mal, its worth repeating again that the Tome of Knowledge was one of the best idea's to come from WAR.

Another aspect of it i would quite like to see is *grimaces at the word* "Achievements", and before anyone strings me up for saying this let me explain. I feel that this is a natural extension of the "book of death" and player record, and should offer decorative and ornamental unlocks such as purity seals for space marines, certain shoulder pad designs perhaps.

I also feel that in the Warhammer 40,000 Universe and with a game that is touted to be alot more "actiony" than a standard MMO, that these Achievements, (or Battle Honours, Marks of Service, whatever you want to call them) could be used to facilitate social engineering of players, and encourage particular paths of gameplay instead of the typical Achievement whore ratrace.

Example Achievements

"Battle Brothers" Fight in more than 100 battles against the Xenos with two fellow Space Marines from your Codex List (Friends list)

"He who fights with me shall be my Brother" Fight in more than 1000 battles against the Xenos with a fellow Space Marine from your Codex List (Friends list)
Reward : Veteran Shoulder Pad Design

"Your Duty is not yet done Brother!" Revive a brother Space marine in battle.

"The Emperor Protects"
Survive a critical blow with less than 5% of your health remaining
Reward : Purity Seal of Fortitude

"Might of the Chapter"
Fight in over 20 battles in a party made up entirely of Space Marines
Reward : Helmet Design X12

Malefactour · **Joined:** Fri Jan 14, 2011 4:13 am **Posts:** 503

Great idea with the achievements. It's not a dirty word, us first adopters called them tome unlocks.

Hopefully in DMO we'll just call them Codex updates.

Yellow99 · **Posted:** Thu Mar 17, 2011 6:00 pm

Exthalion wrote:

I agree with everything you said there Mal, its worth repeating again that the Tome of Knowledge was one of the best idea's to come from WAR.

Another aspect of it i would quite like to see is *grimaces at the word* "Achievements", and before anyone strings me up for saying this let me explain. I feel that this is a natural extension of the "book of death" and player record, and should offer decorative and ornamental unlocks such as purity seals for space marines, certain shoulder pad designs perhaps.

I also feel that in the Warhammer 40,000 Universe and with a game that is touted to be alot more "actiony" than a standard MMO, that these Achievements, (or Battle Honours, Marks of Service, whatever you want to call them) could be used to facilitate social engineering of players, and encourage particular paths of gameplay instead of the typical Achievement whore ratrace.

Example Achievements

"Battle Brothers" Fight in more than 100 battles against the Xenos with two fellow Space Marines from your Codex List (Friends list)

"He who fights with me shall be my Brother" Fight in more than 1000 battles against the Xenos with a fellow Space Marine from your Codex List (Friends list)
Reward : Veteran Shoulder Pad Design

"Your Duty is not yet done Brother!" Revive a brother Space marine in battle.

"The Emperor Protects"
Survive a critical blow with less than 5% of your health remaining
Reward : Purity Seal of Fortitude

"Might of the Chapter"
Fight in over 20 battles in a party made up entirely of Space Marines
Reward : Helmet Design X12

Achivement: Zog yer bitz!: "blow up an enemy vechical"

Rethos · **Joined:** Thu Mar 31, 2011 9:24 pm **Posts:** 27

I liked almost all of the ideas here.

Maps: I loathe the minimap as well but think it should still be an option should you need to keep an eye out for nodes of gatherables should that be a part of the game. ORRRRR

Have a heads up display style of the map a.k.a. Doom 2. that might be more appropriate to the theme.

Records/Book Of Death: All great ideas.

Achievements: I agree that there should be many many 'achievements' that offer real tangible rewards. Equipment, Experience Points, Character Progression, etc. Not silly superficial achievements that do nothing for you unless the achievement in and of itself is reward enough. For example, an achievement for 1000 killing blows in PvP is a recognition of skill and likely to be its own reward. An achievement because I looted 1000 gold is meh.

Since this this is about solo PVE another implementation i like are in those quests where you have to go and kill a particularly hard mob and and it takes more than one player to do so. But you show up at said mobs location and there are two other people there already trying to kick its butt. Not having to group with those players in an actual party and all 3 of you still getting credit for bringing it down is a nice feature.

Malefactour · **Joined:** Fri Jan 14, 2011 4:13 am **Posts:** 503

Rethos wrote:

I liked almost all of the ideas here.

Maps: I loathe the minimap as well but think it should still be an option should you need to keep an eye out for nodes of gatherables should that be a part of the game. ORRRRR

Have a heads up display style of the map a.k.a. Doom 2. that might be more appropriate to the theme.

Records/Book Of Death: All great ideas.

Achievements: I agree that there should be many many 'achievements' that offer real tangible rewards. Equipment, Experience Points, Character Progression, etc. Not silly superficial achievements that do nothing for you unless the achievement in and of itself is reward enough. For example, an achievement for 1000 killing blows in PvP is a recognition of skill and likely to be its own reward. An achievement because I looted 1000 gold is meh.

Since this this is about solo PVE another implementation i like are in those quests where you have to go and kill a particularly hard mob and and it takes more than one player to do so. But you show up at said mobs location and there are two other people there already trying to kick its butt. Not having to group with those players in an actual party and all 3 of you still getting credit for bringing it down is a nice feature.

Oooo, I like this! Something akin to a public quest dynamic that engages because of your proximity and quest prerequisite. Excellent idea.

Rethos · **Joined:** Thu Mar 31, 2011 9:24 pm **Posts:** 27

Malefactour wrote:

Oooo, I like this! Something akin to a public quest dynamic that engages because of your proximity and quest prerequisite. Excellent idea.[/color]

yes exactly.

Malefactour · **Joined:** Fri Jan 14, 2011 4:13 am **Posts:** 503

Dirty Bioware/Mythic bastards! Stealing my good ideas!

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/4218159#4218159

redshift2234 · **Joined:** Wed Apr 06, 2011 6:38 pm **Posts:** 158

This sounds awesome but the way you intend records to work, could really make quests/missions trivial.

You could for example, perform all the objectives in a high leveled area, normally not accesible to you, and turn it in when you get there.

What I mean is, you'd be able to be able to complete the objectives for every quest, then turn EVERY one of them in, in a large swoop, and it sounds a bit lazy tbh.

Malefactour · **Joined:** Fri Jan 14, 2011 4:13 am **Posts:** 503

redshift2234 wrote:

This sounds awesome but the way you intend records to work, could really make quests/missions trivial.

You could for example, perform all the objectives in a high leveled area, normally not accesible to you, and turn it in when you get there.

What I mean is, you'd be able to be able to complete the objectives for every quest, then turn EVERY one of them in, in a large swoop, and it sounds a bit lazy tbh.

IMO, "kill x" quests should be trivial. I think it would be really liberating to know that upon entering a new zone, I would be free to explore, get a feel for the place, instead of just searching out the first quest hub. To me, thats one of the things thats stagnant in the current questing mechanic used by virtually every game every released. As an example, one of the things I've always liked to do upon entering a new zone in a game is making a circuit of the border to unlock all the map locations, this inevitably ends up with lots of random combats along the way. Why not give players credit for quests if they've met the objectives already? Wheres the harm in giving quest completion for the "kill x" quest if you've already killed "x" getting TO the quest giver in the first place?

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