simple math :-)

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Stundorn, Jul 10, 2018.

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  1. Greyfox

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    Kaeshiva,

    I believe my math was oversimplified and I appreciate your valid input. Some place in between insane grind and level 100+ in a month is likely the sweet spot.

    What I think everyone can agree upon, the game population and funding is not at a level of acceptance. So we need change to fix the problem. I believe the game itself is pretty good. Certainly combat, performance, animations, need improvements but those won't bring population and funding to long term viable levels if the game itself isn't fun, challenging and rewarding.

    What we have been given HAS NOT WORKED. Time to reevaluate the game experience itself. The developers have been making a lot of positive changes lately such as Upper Tears, free row deed for quest line completion, double xp to both crafting and adventure, improving quest flow and obtuse story.

    We need further improvements to make the game more fun, rewarding, and less tedious, annoying.
     
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  2. Scoffer

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    The problem of course is that its all subjective. Whats fun, rewarding and less tedious to you will be completely different to someone else.
    I have friends who play this game and grind for fun. Others who have playing for a year and are barely adventure level 50 because all they do is dance parties and hang around town decorating.
     
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  3. 2112Starman

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    Or people who like to go into mines and mine mine and mine all the time. I know a couple of those people :)
     
  4. Scoffer

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    Those folks are just crazy....
     
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  5. Greyfox

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    What we have now isn't working for enough people.
     
  6. Scoffer

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    You are right, at the moment there is a huge push for more PVP content and the devs should be going with the majority of the player base and concentrating on PVE
     
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  7. Greyfox

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    I agree 100%. My experience and the evidence clearly supports the following: MMO PVP players will only spend money in two scenarios. One in a clear pay to win where people can spend money to obtain superior gear giving them an advantage. This can be done with random chance boxes or outright buying gear. Think of a game like Archeage or Black Desert Online. Second scenario PVPers will spend money on cosmetics but your PVP game better be highly competitive, balanced, and not impacted by levels or gear. Think Guild Wars 2 or the MOBA and Last Man Standing games. Everyone is balanced on levels, gear, only cosmetic items sold.

    SOTA is trying to implement PVP where levels and gear influence your PVP strength. The gear and levels are only obtainable with life threatening long grinds. People playing 18 hours+ a day for years to be at the highest competitive levels. No way to buy levels or gear to be competitive. You either spend the hours to be competitive or you just don't PVP.

    Secondly PVP players are fickle, rare for them to stick around in one game for long or spend much money unless P2W.

    PVE players form tight bonds with others in the community. They still play a game even with sub-par performance and graphics due to those bonds. They will spend $50 on a horse with a pretty skin, they will buy $20 virtual dresses, they will spend hours decorating homes, or buy $12000 LOTM pledges and then go to dance parties for enjoyment. UO, EQ, LOTRO, WoW are examples of successful PVE games.

    Portalarium can't afford to make many more mistakes. I hope they chose the correct path going forward. Gear/Level influenced PVP is the wrong path.

    @DarkStarr
     
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  8. Nelzie

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    What does this even mean?

    How big of a spender are you talking about? Someone who's dumped in $10,000 every year? Qualify your numbers, otherwise your counter point is not really useful.
     
  9. Gix

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    There's a misconception that if something is easy, then it must be for casuals. There's an important distinction to be made between something that is easy and something that is simple.

    SotA is not simple.

    Anyone who suggested to read release notes and watch some videos completely missed the concept of what a casual is.

    Giving homework to someone is the least casual-friendly thing there is. Don't get me wrong; it's helpful advice but it completely counters the argument you're trying to make.

    P.S. Drizzt is a snooze-fest.

    I'm willing to believe that but, at the end of the day, all I see is people completely destroying others in PvP and nearly-impossible lichs (and sometimes wolves) spawning on top of players to wreck their faces.

    I've been victim of both of these scenarios on multiple occasions.
     
    Last edited: Jul 11, 2018
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  10. 2112Starman

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    People are dancing around this here but the simple fact is that SOTA *was* not casual friendly at all up until 2x XP (for adv XP). In many other ways even with 2x XP, there are numerous systems that are completely not casual friendly like crafting.

    I finally GM'ed blacksmithing, master crafting and master crafting chain armor last night after 2 years of heavy "hard core casual" attempts at i. Yet I can still barely make a +12 chest armor (believe me, I just made 75 of the things).

    Which leads me to this post today and rants I'll probably continue to post today because as I sat at my chair and continued to fail at least 80% of my "46% chances" making most of everything I made worthless.

    but I have been RAILING on this for 3 years and the dev's are blind and mute to it and this is one of the main reasons why NOBODY is playing this game.

    If it takes me 2 years and what a total of 5000+ hours at least playing in this game to be a mediocre crafter: YOU HAVE A PROBLEM!!!!!

    Adv XP is much better. I made it to lvl 100 in normal xp, thousands of hours of grinding. In the past 2 months I've made it to adv lvl 109 and a lot of that was due to them FINALLY creating an easy spot like Tears and finally created a LFG function.

    STOP listening to the dance party people PORT and start making the game....
     
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  11. Cordelayne

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    This is very true, which is why I don't play much at the moment.

    Now I am just exploring new scenes and trying to mop up any side quests I have missed. I will say I enjoyed doing UT for the first time this past Sunday with @EclipseMaiden @Sher Shadowleaf and my man @Draugur2 :D Definitely a grind, but well worth the exp!
     
  12. Kain Darkmoor

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    I'm no defender of the casino style crafting system, but I've got less than half that time played and I am GM or higher in every producer crafting skill. It's all about priorities of how you spend your time in game. You can spend your time gathering or spend your time killing but you can't really do both at the same time.
     
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  13. 2112Starman

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    Im sorry but comments like this is one of the worst issues. I actually have ~25ish GM's in the crafting trees now. Your making assumptions that I have not spent a lot of time crafting. While I am not a miner (at least serious), I have spent thousands of hours in the past 2 years in Seq coll (long ago), Ulfeim and that forest zone (ack, cant think of name right now) killing ENDLESS numbers of animals for skinning. Up untill 2x XP and Ulfeim, almost ALL of my actual adv XP came from killing animals and skinning for prod XP. I'd bet anyone that if Chris ran numbers on the most wolves killed in this game, I would be in the top 5.

    I had over 10,000 animal heads in my chest 2 months ago (wolf, bear, boar) and 30,000 hides alone. I had 30,000 wood chunks and have burned 10,000K of it into pulp recently, A task that alone probably took a 100 hours of my alts time.. I had a good 10,000 cotton (from harvesting, not agr). That alt has also spend thousands of hours in the Esylum and Epitaph grinding copper while I play my main (and just so I can actually play this game).

    So that is the flip point, even being a mediocre armor/wep/enchanter crafter, my ALT has thousands and thousands of hours just sitting there on a 2nd client grinding the mats. Ore, wood pulp, spools of cotton, wood boards, leather. Why do I need to play a 2nd client with an alt to be able to be a crafter (or at least not dedicate 100% of my time to it and do nothing else in the game).

    All to get where Im at now after 2 years of playing. Sure I can make anything like deco... but who needs that and who cant use that? We are talking gear... chain armor with master crafts and enchants. I have litterally focused the vast majority of my prod XP on doing nothing more then being able to make chain armor, master craft chain armor and enchant it and still can only make craapy stuff that nobody wants.

    there is no way anyone can justify saying crafting is sustainable in this game except the 1% of people who have dedicated ten thousand+ hours in it playing the game on average 12 hours a ay since persistence. I would even bet those people are pissed that they cant craft better gear.

    Simple fix: set prod XP to 4X perminantly. Sure you are gonna tick off 20 people but... hey port listen... you may actually get 1000 people to actually keep playing the game...

    seriously... Back to the title of this thread: SIMPLE MATH

    2 years.... prod lvl 85 lol
     
    Last edited: Jul 11, 2018
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  14. Fungus

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    I don't think this statement is correct, I like others have been shouted down for finally starting to post on forums offering a different opinion in the last few weeks as player numbers have dramatically plunged, so my point is there most definitely are high roller backers or especially folks anti grinders & PvP'rs with their head buried deep in the sand that think there is little that needs 'fixing'. They've even been known to alter peoples wording in quotes to suit their own agenda, it's quite staggering the levels on blind love / naivety out there.

    If you don't believe me look at some of the suggestions to make the game better on numerous threads, 99% total flim flam that doesn't appeal to your average gamer who wants to kill stuff be it human or monster and have a combat / quest system that works or just look at the uproar that R55 questions wasn't updated with questions missed in the live broadcast. Any sane person could see with team reductions certain things have to give.

    I literally laughed out loud at the recent thread re Travian continuing to work with Portalarium and the official response from Cerus having to qualify when asked if this relationship will continue post end of July. I mean really, it just beggars belief if you are deluded in to thinking they will make any really business decisions open and transparent with a bunch of gamers, when the ramifications of a negative quote could cause catastrophic consequences for all parties. Thin of it a bit like why Port didn't tell the community about the redundancies until those concerned knew and all the legal stuff was crossed and dotted; the community 'must know now' response was actually really quite ugly IMHO with the clamor for information that really wasn't anyone's business bar those concerned.

    I'll move over on the naughty step to make room for you sir, succinct and totally and utterly spot on!
     
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  15. Aeryk

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    @Stundorn The team is discussing some of these possibilities with us now, so your post and the discussion is really helpful!

    I'm in the camp of those that probably spends a fair bit of time in the game compared to average but have not progressed far (3 characters -- highest adventure level 70ish -- and no GMs). I do not do many quests and do not feel pressured to (mostly just the ones that come naturally like the bounty quests). I am an early backer (sub 10k overall, sub 1k for my account) so i do have housing already (shared with a friend). This game feels less like standard MMO fare to me where we must rush to end game (with the exception of PvP -- more on that shortly since it sounds like this is a focus for you).

    What i think is missing for the group you mention is not a fast track to a hard cap and end game content but rather more fun and interesting things to do on the way up. Lower level crafters might be able to support higher level crafters. The crafting system might have additional progression (GM gear for GM skills?) so lower level gear has a purpose. Some PvP activities might be adventure level and gear capped (though to be sure, people will game this too). Some PvP activities might raise you up. I'm honestly not sure if we need PvP activities for uncapped folk, there is not much activity now, but we should test it and see. I think the Obsidian Trials definitely show there is interest.

    We need to support both new folk coming in and existing folk. Pushing everyone to 140 skills quicker will only result in more people getting bored more quickly and leaving before exploring other activities. Let's make the journey fun!
     
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  16. Kain Darkmoor

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    Huh? What exactly about my comment makes it one of the 'worst' issues?
     
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  17. Alleine Dragonfyre

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    Counterpoint: The game is actually too easy to the point that its adventuring was boring and still pretty grindy. This game is already really casual with very slow combat. I mean, do you want to put us all to sleep?

    I have never found this game hard and, in fact, started a thread stating "This Game is Too Easy." If you choose your fights and zones wisely, you shouldn't have a hard time. Some places require grouping, bottom line. Not everything here is solo-able.

    Sometimes, no matter how many GM's you have, you're just not that good at playing. That's not the game's fault.
     
    Last edited: Jul 11, 2018
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  18. Alleine Dragonfyre

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    Excuse me but I play this game AND party hard. I was solo-healing Upper Tears all weekend. One of my friends, a music lover and Friday night partier is the TOP PvP'er in the Obsidian Trials. and can probably serve your own butt to you.

    What's your point?
     
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  19. Floors

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    That's exactly what is going on right now with UT tho. Anyone that wants to do any kind of competitve stuff is going to grind that thing endlessly becasue at least during double xp it's not even close how much experience you get with any other scene. I mean I got like several million experience in the course of a week, taking me from mid 60s from doing the PvE stuff to mid 80s, and GMing a couple skills in the process. (close on others). Then, if you've seen the GMs people have in the groups, you start to question what is the actual point of all this. Well, why not I guess, is the reasoning. But I do wonder the effect it will have on the game. And yes the game is way too easy (not from combat but from a content perspective) and it will get boring once you have all these skills ranked up...
     
    Last edited: Jul 11, 2018
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  20. Draylock

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    Prod 85 in 2 years? I did that in about 5 months. Slacker. You suck. sTARMAN
     
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