Hey,
I've noticed that there's many threads on suggestions for the travel system, such as making the brooms faster, lowering the price of the floo or adding more warps to the warpkey and even reworking it.
(Overall suggestions, Thoughts On the Revelius Update..., Warp (Hear me out pls), A structured Critique of Revelius... these are just a few that mention the travelling/exploration of the map).
In this thread I'd like to propose a different take on the issue of exploring. (TLDR at the bottom)
Under most of the mentioned threads, the answer/reason the travelling hasn't changed is "To encourage exploration" but it's more like forcing exploration. No teleports/expensive floo dust, slow brooms all sound like "let's slow the player as much as we can so they're stuck in one location for a long time because that's what exploration is".
Sidenote: Most of the new players want to experience Potterworld in a Harry Potter way, basically go sightseeing, however this isn't possible with the current system and due to the sheer size of the map, but this is a discussion that's meant for the other threads.
Most players that have a broom and want to travel between the towns just fly up, well above the trees, align themselves to the coords and fly holding W, that's not exploration.
There's also the saying that it wouldn't be fair to those people that built the map to enable warping, because players wouldn't see the world. To be honest, I would agree with those statements..... IF THERE WAS SOMETHING TO EXPLORE !
The map overall
The current map is really barren, it feels like the terrain was done in World Painter and the towns were copied and pasted and then someone with World Edit painted the paths between the towns.
Here's the map with a highlighted area, where there's nothing. Just the same trees copy and pasted and a few hills. Nothing interesting. Note, that the distance between Appleby and Griffin's Hollow is rougly 3000 blocks, 30km, 18.6mi, with nothing in between those towns.
(Maybe founding a player town between Griffin's Hollow and Appleby wouldn't be a bad idea. Similar to how players can buy housing theme, they would be able to buy a parcel in this town, Other players would want to visit player's houses without using commands.)
Towns
In real life, most cities and towns were founded near a river, due to the access to clean water. Some have been founded in the hills where rare materials have been found and so mines were made, or on vast plains where the soil was rich enough to start farming.
But when it comes to Potterworld a town is just a few houses. It just... exists. And seems to serve one purpose - make the map feel a tiny bit less empty. Let's look at Appleby village for example
There's 9 houses, they all look similar.
The same can be said about Edgebrook and Wightwaye.
Small note: Idk if it's in the Harry Potter books or the last movie, I haven't read them and watched it and I'm avoiding spoilers.
Edit:
NPCs
Towns and villages are really empty and even IF there are NPCs, they usually have one of the two skins. Outside of Hogsworth castle, there's around 8 NPCs in total. The whole Hogsworth has around 8. NPCs. Outside.
Most of the places look like there's a lockdown happening or a mass extinction when they should be booming with life instead.
Let's look at Diagon Alley for example, here is how it looks like in the movies:
and in the game:
Here's the current NPC skin variation in Diagon Alley - spoiler: there is none, it's the same in Hogsworth
(Maybe the situation is the same in more towns but I don't know, because due to the current travel system, I can't easily go there)
(Click to open a higher resolution image)
Kinda weird seeing the same skins over and over when there's a staff role specifically that is dedicated to making skins - Skin Arithmancer. Does PW even have any ?
What I propose is to add more NPCs along with more NPC skin variety to the towns and places so they'd feel more alive.
Forests and paths
There's usually no grass in the forest and everything looks like a football (soccer) field that's been cut and trimmed before a match. And the only moving thing in a forest is usually a player, sometimes an NPC that spawned and attacks the player.
The map lacks foliage, dead trees, small caves, abandoned houses....
Making forests more life-like would help with the immersion and explorability, a video from Dukonred1(now retired from YT) describes it perfectly. (Really worth a watch, please watch it):
What would also greatly help with explorability is adding random "mini stories" to the map. Like it is in Kingdom Come: Deliverance with Interesting Sites (abandoned bandit camps/houses, mini water wheels, stone carvings... basically things that make the world feel alive)
Few examples:
You are walking on a path in the forest, between towns. You notice there's a wagon/carriage with a broken wheel and blood (redstone) on the ground. You decide to follow the blood and...
Or you come to crossroads, there's someone standing there, you decide to approach him and say hi to him. He tells you he's a traveller and asks you if you can point him in the right direction. He's looking for one place, but he doesn't know what is it called, but he can describe it to you. He mentions a few things and then you can guess or know the answer and say the place he's looking for is (choose in the menu) A, B or C. If you're right, he decides to give you a rare gift from his travels. Basically a game of trivia, but not in class.
---
Or maybe you come to a place, where the the trees are tilted, fallen, broken. Something big must've done this. You decide to check it out and find a few trolls......
---
Destroyed house with hidden treasure ?.... the options go on and on
What the forests also lack is wildlife. It would be nice to see wild hogs, deer or bunnies in the forest.
TL;DR:
I've noticed that there's many threads on suggestions for the travel system, such as making the brooms faster, lowering the price of the floo or adding more warps to the warpkey and even reworking it.
(Overall suggestions, Thoughts On the Revelius Update..., Warp (Hear me out pls), A structured Critique of Revelius... these are just a few that mention the travelling/exploration of the map).
In this thread I'd like to propose a different take on the issue of exploring. (TLDR at the bottom)
Under most of the mentioned threads, the answer/reason the travelling hasn't changed is "To encourage exploration" but it's more like forcing exploration. No teleports/expensive floo dust, slow brooms all sound like "let's slow the player as much as we can so they're stuck in one location for a long time because that's what exploration is".
Sidenote: Most of the new players want to experience Potterworld in a Harry Potter way, basically go sightseeing, however this isn't possible with the current system and due to the sheer size of the map, but this is a discussion that's meant for the other threads.
Most players that have a broom and want to travel between the towns just fly up, well above the trees, align themselves to the coords and fly holding W, that's not exploration.
There's also the saying that it wouldn't be fair to those people that built the map to enable warping, because players wouldn't see the world. To be honest, I would agree with those statements..... IF THERE WAS SOMETHING TO EXPLORE !
The map overall
The current map is really barren, it feels like the terrain was done in World Painter and the towns were copied and pasted and then someone with World Edit painted the paths between the towns.
Here's the map with a highlighted area, where there's nothing. Just the same trees copy and pasted and a few hills. Nothing interesting. Note, that the distance between Appleby and Griffin's Hollow is rougly 3000 blocks, 30km, 18.6mi, with nothing in between those towns.
(Maybe founding a player town between Griffin's Hollow and Appleby wouldn't be a bad idea. Similar to how players can buy housing theme, they would be able to buy a parcel in this town, Other players would want to visit player's houses without using commands.)
Towns
In real life, most cities and towns were founded near a river, due to the access to clean water. Some have been founded in the hills where rare materials have been found and so mines were made, or on vast plains where the soil was rich enough to start farming.
But when it comes to Potterworld a town is just a few houses. It just... exists. And seems to serve one purpose - make the map feel a tiny bit less empty. Let's look at Appleby village for example
Are they supposed to be medieval themed, or is it a work of a modern developer that uses one visual language.
There's 2 stands to imply a market. However with 9 houses and the nearest town being Hogsend, I doubt that it's prosperous to be a trader here. So, what is or was the village's purpose, why was it founded here ? Was it because of mining ? Can't see no mines. Maybe forestry ? Nah, trees are standing tall and strong.
Appleby doesn't expand the lore, doesn't tell a story, it just exists.The same can be said about Edgebrook and Wightwaye.
Small note: Idk if it's in the Harry Potter books or the last movie, I haven't read them and watched it and I'm avoiding spoilers.
Edit:
NPCs
Towns and villages are really empty and even IF there are NPCs, they usually have one of the two skins. Outside of Hogsworth castle, there's around 8 NPCs in total. The whole Hogsworth has around 8. NPCs. Outside.
Most of the places look like there's a lockdown happening or a mass extinction when they should be booming with life instead.
Let's look at Diagon Alley for example, here is how it looks like in the movies:
(Maybe the situation is the same in more towns but I don't know, because due to the current travel system, I can't easily go there)
(Click to open a higher resolution image)
What I propose is to add more NPCs along with more NPC skin variety to the towns and places so they'd feel more alive.
Forests and paths
There's usually no grass in the forest and everything looks like a football (soccer) field that's been cut and trimmed before a match. And the only moving thing in a forest is usually a player, sometimes an NPC that spawned and attacks the player.
The map lacks foliage, dead trees, small caves, abandoned houses....
Making forests more life-like would help with the immersion and explorability, a video from Dukonred1(now retired from YT) describes it perfectly. (Really worth a watch, please watch it):
What would also greatly help with explorability is adding random "mini stories" to the map. Like it is in Kingdom Come: Deliverance with Interesting Sites (abandoned bandit camps/houses, mini water wheels, stone carvings... basically things that make the world feel alive)
Few examples:
You are walking on a path in the forest, between towns. You notice there's a wagon/carriage with a broken wheel and blood (redstone) on the ground. You decide to follow the blood and...
- you find a small cave, you decide to enter it, you use your Lumos spell to see, because it's really dark. You go deeper and deeper into the cave, then you see a big black blob of something. It's an aggresive bear[Insert any dangerous animal] ! But also there's something shiny behind him. You can decide to either run away from the bear, or fight it and take the loot that it has been hiding.
- you find more blood, the trail seems to be longer than you expected, but you decide to stick to it. You go further, but you suddenly hear voices, you decide to be more careful and try to check it out. It's a dark follower camp and they seem to be guarding someone in a cage ! Do you go back where you came from or do you fight your way to the prisoner ?
Or you come to crossroads, there's someone standing there, you decide to approach him and say hi to him. He tells you he's a traveller and asks you if you can point him in the right direction. He's looking for one place, but he doesn't know what is it called, but he can describe it to you. He mentions a few things and then you can guess or know the answer and say the place he's looking for is (choose in the menu) A, B or C. If you're right, he decides to give you a rare gift from his travels. Basically a game of trivia, but not in class.
---
Or maybe you come to a place, where the the trees are tilted, fallen, broken. Something big must've done this. You decide to check it out and find a few trolls......
---
Destroyed house with hidden treasure ?.... the options go on and on
What the forests also lack is wildlife. It would be nice to see wild hogs, deer or bunnies in the forest.
TL;DR:
- Map right now isn't interesting at all, feels "plastic/fake", there's no point in exploring
- Maybe add a player town with player houses between Griffin's Hollow and Appleby ? (I am not too sure on this)
- Add "purpose" to some places that need it - by purpose I mean some kind of lore or grounding it to real life (?) Like "this town's purpose is farming, this one's is trading", not just random houses in the middle of nowhere
- Add explorable details to the map - "accidents" on the road, animal dens, caves, hidden camps, random miniquests(?)...
- Add immersive details to the map - wildlife, bushes, grass, foliage, dead trees...
- Add more skins for NPCs - there's like two, maybe three different NPC skins. It really feels fake
- Add more NPCs in towns - so there's some variety and make the places feel more alive
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