I'm guessing July/August, but that really depends on how many stupid decisions the developers make... and how long it takes them to revert/backtrack on them once they are ready to release.

plated.rawr

Norway1676 Posts

January 11 2015 22:33 GMT

#24

No hearthsecret / forced hermiting and socializing will be, if nothing else, an interesting social experiment. Will be amusing to see how it develops.

RagequitBM

Canada2270 Posts

January 12 2015 00:46 GMT

#25

On January 12 2015 00:26 Serejai wrote:
The TL group was pretty fun until all 20-30 of us got slaughtered by a group of three.

How did this happen?

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 01:23 GMT

#26

Well, we were playing somewhere between casual and hardcore. We only had three people in the group with combat skills, as we were teaching a lot of people who had never played before. Two of them were offline when our first few deaths occurred, but we managed to kill one of the three attackers. We tracked them to a base a few minutes south of us, and me and someone else (sorry, I forget the name... Chosen? Chosu?) killed a few of their farmers. All of a sudden a few dozen of them logged on, all with combat gear on, and killed us and the rest of the town.

We did manage to recover a few days later but by then we were down to 5-6 players because everyone else ragequit. This was in Salem, and the problem at the start of Salem is that the no-lifer groups with bots and mass alts had a major advantage, as there wasn't really a viable form of base defense at the time.

This isn't a problem in Haven, as defenses are easier to get than attack for the most part. The TL group did get slaughtered in Haven, too. Someone decided to invite a Russian that nobody knew into the town and he ended up murdering a bunch of us. The survivors all fled in different directions and we went from one village of 1-2 dozen players to a bunch of smaller 3-5 member villages across the map.

Subsequent villages fared better due to more repeat players that knew what to do.

PushDown

Italy208 Posts

January 12 2015 14:42 GMT

#27

^ We were building a Windmill when the onslaugh started... I got recked while carrying a big ass boulder to our base :D.

The second base we managed to built went a pretty long way before the wipe. But we were like 5, 6 ppl on a exiled place forgotten by everyone thanks to the low quality of the place/soil.

From the experienced I had, you can't go full casual (hell even half casual) w/o expecting to get murederer along the way. Priorities need to be set the moment a group stablish itself:
>the group either goes for a ruthless approach for territory domination.
or
>goes for a more defensive stance, trying to make the base/city less tempting to attack by overdoing with defense (not that this really works when the group is small and there is never a retalation squad ready to jump into the game for defense or hunting).

Either approach needs to put the casual experience to a certain halt, until the objetive A or B are done. But if the initial idea was to try out the game and see if it's really worth the time investent, then taking such precautions aren't important at all.

chroniX

517 Posts

January 12 2015 14:54 GMT

#28

Oh man, i remember those crazy russians! Fun times...

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 14:56 GMT

#29

Essentially the larger your group is, the more casual players you can support. Like, if it's just 2-3 players... you all pretty much need to rush combat in order to stay alive. If there are ten of you, you could probably go 3 combat, 3 professions, and 4 casuals that may or may not log on.

I think there are a few critical professions at the start of a Haven world, and if you're playing solo you're basically forced to make 2-3 alts because of it. You pretty much have to have someone with combat immediately, as there will be players rushing combat alts in the first 24 hours. You also really need a hunter, as getting a quick bear cape really helps deter other players from attacking you. Meat is also a really good source of food, and hunting expeditions are incredibly fun.

Likewise, you need a forager for said expeditions. Curios are really important, and so are a lot of the plants and stuff. Lastly, you need a farmer pretty quickly, as food is probably the biggest hurdle early-game.

So, in my opinion, that's four players right there that you pretty much have to have. Then you need to weave in other professions, such as butchering, cooking, skinning, leatherworking, etc. I feel that ten active players is a good healthy amount, and after that you can pretty much have as many casuals as you want.

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 16:51 GMT

#30

If anyone wants to join in, I think me and plated.rawr are going to run Haven 1.0 for a bit just to gather some information and practice a bit. I'd like to put up a guide when 2.0 comes out for any new players, so this will help with that.

Just toss me a PM and I can get you in our group and whatnot. Prefer experienced players since this is more about data gathering, but new players are welcome too if you want to see what the game is like (and it's probably an easy time to learn since the current world is pretty dead, and you're not very likely to get murdered).

Warri

Germany3208 Posts

January 12 2015 17:19 GMT

#31

The more i read from the devs the more i think they are completely oblivious to good game design and just stumbled across one addictive element, which made hnh a somewhat enjoyable game (but still not that enjoyable, hence the tiny playerbase).

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 17:25 GMT

#32

Lol, of course that's what happened. They would be millionaires right now if they had a clue what they were doing

I'm actually shocked that another developer hasn't made a proper version of Haven yet.

Lucumo

6850 Posts

January 12 2015 17:35 GMT

#33

On January 13 2015 02:19 Warri wrote:
The more i read from the devs the more i think they are completely oblivious to good game design and just stumbled across one addictive element, which made hnh a somewhat enjoyable game (but still not that enjoyable, hence the tiny playerbase).

Well, the servers couldn't support more players anyway and they were completely fucked up. The lag often times made it pretty much unplayable (getting killed by bears etc).

Started before there was a TL village and eventually joined with chaokel in world 4. We had some nice claim and each our own territory very far up in the north with ok-ish soil. Unfortunately, he eventually went inactive. From that point I played a more rogue style, stealing stuff from other players or even killing them. After some time, I left my base, looking for other players and then found some Italians and Spanish people. I joined them since they were pretty nice and had a lot of stuff going. Grew bored though and quit some time later.

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 17:39 GMT

#34

Once you hit endgame the game kind of dies. Like, the purity grind isn't a substitute for real content tiers. Once you manage to unlock all of the skills and equip yourself with gear, it's much more enjoyable to go out pillaging and murdering than it is to sit in your town for the next six months grinding purity.

Still, it's free to play and you can easily get a month of gameplay out of it so that's not too shabby. I have paid games that don't last more than 5-6 hours.

The Fish

United States176 Posts

January 12 2015 18:55 GMT

#35

Rainbow here, I'll join up when 2.0 starts.

Remember when our gate got claimed? That was really stupid, we had to wait days before we broke out.

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 19:02 GMT

#36

Hahaha. Funny enough I was online a bit ago and you're still in my friends list from when we played a while ago. Looks like it was me, you, and one other (forgot the name). Was just wondering if you were going to show up or not.

Also I 100% blame KtheZ for that disaster with the gate, as he was both our combat alt and the gatekeeper and he disappeared for like three days right when we started getting walled in.

You're welcome to run a bit with me and plated while we flesh out some things. Trying to come up with a good guide for new players in case shit goes south with 2.0 and we're unable to group up for the first day or so. Want to make sure everyone can hold their own if needed.

ElyAs

France205 Posts

January 12 2015 21:01 GMT

#37

Hey, I remember that game, even tho I was still a noob when we played together. I'm still half playing near the spot we found where we started to build a brick wall, dunno if the wall is still up.

I hope Haven 2 is gonna be decent, even still, 1 month of Haven 2 before it becomes boring should still be fun.

KtheZ

United States813 Posts

January 12 2015 21:37 GMT

#38

On January 13 2015 04:02 Serejai wrote:
Hahaha. Funny enough I was online a bit ago and you're still in my friends list from when we played a while ago. Looks like it was me, you, and one other (forgot the name). Was just wondering if you were going to show up or not.

Also I 100% blame KtheZ for that disaster with the gate, as he was both our combat alt and the gatekeeper and he disappeared for like three days right when we started getting walled in.

You're welcome to run a bit with me and plated while we flesh out some things. Trying to come up with a good guide for new players in case shit goes south with 2.0 and we're unable to group up for the first day or so. Want to make sure everyone can hold their own if needed.

I have a selective memory so please forgive me when I say I dont remember this

Serejai

6007 Posts

January 12 2015 22:12 GMT

#39

You should; it was hilarious. Some Russian down river came and walled in our gate with dozens of alts and hearth fires and you were the only one strong enough to break them, but you disappeared. I think you ended up just giving me your login info a few days later and I cleared it out but it was too late by then lol.