Foundry Player Feedback - From an Author

instynctive

As a fledgling Foundry author, and after reading some of the less-favorable reviews on my foundry, I would really like to share some things with players who may not be familiar with how building a Foundry quest works.

What you see when you step into a Foundry quest is honestly little more than "smoke and mirrors". Foundry Authors are so handicapped and limited in what we can do, that I'm amazed that these quests can be built at all, let alone some of the amazing ones out there. For every minute of playtime that you experience, an Author has put at least an hour of their time into it. That's an hour spent away from their own game time, which can be a considerable in-game sacrifice (invoking, professioning, grinding, trying to improve their own characters, etc.). But we're trying. We're trying to bring you more in-game content for you to play and enjoy, and maybe make a few gold pieces and AD from Rhix's Daily Rewards. No, we're not going to all make 2 minute quickies to facilitate that, however.

So with this in mind, I would like to share some of my thoughts based on "feedback" (I do use that term loosely) on some of my Foundries:

• First off, we, the Foundry Authors, do NOT control the drops. We cannot place profession nodes or chests or say "this mob of zombies is going to drop Dragon Eggs!" It simply doesn't work that way. Why? Because people would exploit that resource by building a Foundry filled with chests that are filled with epic gear or AD. So you can thank the cheaters and exploiters for that. Do NOT leave us bad feedback for the "crappy drops", because we simply have no control over them. Period.
• In that vein of thought, we are also unable to place merchants in our Foundries. Sorry if there are "too many drops" that "filled your inventory" and "there should be a merchant", but that's not something that we are able to do, despite years of begging. An alternative to this is the Shopkeeper artifact. If you don't have one, you may wish to consider investing in one.
• There are no "bosses" made available to us, not in the more traditional sense. There is no way for us to increase/decrease/alter stats on a monster to create a "boss". We have been forced to utilize work-arounds (for most things, actually) in order to create the *appearance* of a "boss". So yes, mob fights will be more difficult that "boss" fights, because typically a "boss" is a "hard" monster with a customized costume.
• Please read the Foundry description before going into it, to include the Author's "out of character" notes. In one of my more recent Foundries, which was actually made as a joke for a friend of mine to enjoy, I actually put in the descrition that there wasn't a lot of combat, and that there was a lot of walking, so a good mount was recommended. The FIRST non-friend review I got dinged me because there wasn't a lot of combat and there was "too much walking". Seriously? Read the description. I didn't write it for my health.
• Please NEVER post quest spoilers in your review of a Foundry. That ruins it for everyone and is just plain rude.
• If you do choose to leave a bad review, please do so if the quest warrants it. However, we appreciate constructive feedback. "This sucks" or "What a pity" are NOT really helpful for we, the Foundry Authors to learn and grow from. Even in higher-star reviews, constructive feedback is appreciated, as are your AD "tips".
• Realize too, gentle reader, that the Foundry is *quite* broken. There are a lot of things within that just don't work, and that's not anything that we can control. Parties are likely to get broken up on map transfers, as an example. No, we didn't do that. The Foundry did.

So long as you enjoy Foundry quests, we'll keep writing them for you! I can safely speak for every Foundry Author, from fledglings like myself to experts like so many others, that being able to create a world for others to explore and enjoy is an amazing thing! But we need your help! Please let Cryptic know that you enjoy Foundries and that you would love for the Foundry to continue to be fixed and updated and made more flexible and offer bigger/better rewards so that we can bring you more, bigger and better quests!

Thank you for taking the time to read through this, and please do take my words to heart.



Other authors: what would you like to say to our fellow players?

valcontar73

IMHO this game is no more a D&D game, it's just a "never-ending-grinding-refinining-online game". So players don't want to play foundries, they only want refining items for their "never-ending-refining-super-mega-awesome-artifact" to reach purple level, and then they "only" want more items to continue refining them to try to reach orange/maximun level.

These type of players don't care a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> about the story they can find in a foundry, they only care about how many items they will get to refine.

Is the foundry giving amazing items to refine? No, so they don't care a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> about the foundry, much less about the authors.

What is foundry for? The foundry is for your friends, for other authors seeking new inspiration and for those players who want to spend their time playing something that is made with soul and sometimes with high sense of art, because few quest in mmorpg games are made with the soul and heart of an author. Example: "Go kill 40 kenkus and come back" x16 times.

In this game, we (authors) sow in stony ground.

Hopefully there are other games coming with the right players and the right tools to build and enjoy new adventures.

instynctive

Unfortunately, I think that the direction the game has gone (the Eternal Grind) is forcing players to adopt this sort of mindset, and that's fine. Something tells me that at some point someone will fix their rectal-cranial inversion and swing the game back in the direction that a majority of players would truly appreciate... and I know that I'm not the only author who will continue to try their best to create alternative routes for adventure and exploration, and this is what keeps around the players who may have more of a D&D bent.

I'm not giving up on players who want and need the creativity and adventure. I will continue to strive to create more and bigger and better quests.

karistiana

I'm not a foundry author, just a player, so I hope y'all don't mind my chiming in.

First, I'd like to say that I appreciate the time, effort, and creativity of many of the foundry authors. I've just started playing foundries again recently, and I have come across some that were very enjoyable to play. Running foundries can be a nice break from the daily grind of repetitive quests. So, thank you for that .

It is, however, rather unfortunate that the there isn't really much incentive to complete foundries, aside from the daily foundry quest. The loot is okay, although event items don't drop in foundry quests. At least you can get a few rank 5 drops here and there. The chest reward, however, is extremely disappointing. I don't recall receiving anything other than one green gear item from the chest. So, in reality, that makes some of the mob dropped loot better than the actual reward for completing the quest. That just doesn't seem right.

I was browsing the feedback thread, and there are some great ideas there on what could be done to potentially revive the foundry. The idea of a foundry campaign peaked my interest the most, but the idea of unique, foundry only rewards, such as fashion items, would be a nice touch as well.

Hopefully, Cryptic will listen and make some much needed improvements to the foundry because there is so much potential there. Although with Strongholds coming, I highly doubt this is much of a priority, but I suppose we shall see.

zachariah92

karistiana wrote: »

I'm not a foundry author, just a player, so I hope y'all don't mind my chiming in.

First, I'd like to say that I appreciate the time, effort, and creativity of many of the foundry authors. I've just started playing foundries again recently, and I have come across some that were very enjoyable to play. Running foundries can be a nice break from the daily grind of repetitive quests. So, thank you for that .

Thank you for your kind words Karistiana, they are really appreciated.

eldarth

instynctive wrote: »

• In that vein of thought, we are also unable to place merchants in our Foundries. Sorry if there are "too many drops" that "filled your inventory" and "there should be a merchant", but that's not something that we are able to do, despite years of begging. An alternative to this is the Shopkeeper artifact. If you don't have one, you may wish to consider investing in one.

If I'm not mistaken, players can also call up the Wondrous Bazaar if they wish to sell things.​​

kreatyve

eldarth wrote: »

instynctive wrote: »

• In that vein of thought, we are also unable to place merchants in our Foundries. Sorry if there are "too many drops" that "filled your inventory" and "there should be a merchant", but that's not something that we are able to do, despite years of begging. An alternative to this is the Shopkeeper artifact. If you don't have one, you may wish to consider investing in one.

If I'm not mistaken, players can also call up the Wondrous Bazaar if they wish to sell things.​​

They used to be able to, however Cryptic did not like that, and so removed that ability a long time ago. (Like a year ago). However, you can still alt tab out to the Gateway and vendor things from your bags there.

mrgiggles65

Yet Cryptic loves the Foundry.

kreatyve wrote: »

eldarth wrote: »

instynctive wrote: »

• In that vein of thought, we are also unable to place merchants in our Foundries. Sorry if there are "too many drops" that "filled your inventory" and "there should be a merchant", but that's not something that we are able to do, despite years of begging. An alternative to this is the Shopkeeper artifact. If you don't have one, you may wish to consider investing in one.

If I'm not mistaken, players can also call up the Wondrous Bazaar if they wish to sell things.​​

They used to be able to, however Cryptic did not like that, and so removed that ability a long time ago. (Like a year ago). However, you can still alt tab out to the Gateway and vendor things from your bags there.

Cryptic loves the Foundry.

maegmaag

Well as for the merchants, i can imagine why there is no such thing, but on the other hand i can imagine a solution, but twould require an implementation of a hidden merchant node (similar to wondrous bazaar), accessible thru in foundry placed special asset (reference to that node, verified during publishing). And with a bit of additional work tcould include zen store references, costumes or whatever ...nvm, not gonna happen. One thing tho, if there is "too much drop" it just means there is too many trash mobs.

But rly, ppl r either trolling or not reading the description sometimes. Its not my issue tho, for even if someone would by some weirdo accident find my project in the catalogue, it requires a specific player type to not give up shortly after start. Wondering how many of u ever tried my quest XD (maybe one day ill make the guide i planned a year back). For now, i take it as just another way to waste real life along with playing the game (its ok, i would not if there were no positives ofc).

instynctive

Now that the Foundry is back up and running (albeit prohibitively laggy), I felt it would be most appropriate to give this thread a gentle nudge, in hopes that more players would see it.