These Are My Issues With This Dying Game. What Are Yours?

ogunernile

1. SIN/PSY issue: the inclusion of the new skills were meant to bring balance but in truth only 4 classes got any real help. archers, barbs, bm's and wizards all made out okay but everyone else got fail skills. the most fail was clerics. psys and wizards both have a heal. even seekers got on a crappy one with the expansion, but clerics being the best healers in the game, can't heal during metal mage form? and to add insult to injury their hp is decreased on top of that. did anyone even play test these skills? why not disallow the heal over time heals and the aoe heals and allow them to use blessing of the purehearted [a skill that no cleric i know has found a use for] or wellspring surge? the idea of a cleric in pk is pointless. the sin attacks with aps are just disgusting. who's bright idea was it to include zerk on a aps weapon for a class that has high crit/damage? PK is dead....aside from a few enterprising individuals or a full r9+12 barb you play a psy or a sin to pk. why? cause there are sins with scrupulous morals that enjoy farming people for kicks, so to be able to defend yourself from overpowered stealth attacks you need to be one of these classes: psy, sin or barb. i would say tone down the tideborn but that leads to the next issue....

2. lazy gm's/code monkeys: As a fledgling code monkey i understand the intricacies of game design [fatal conflicts, coding issues, priority command resolutions]. you can't fix the classes because the original team of designers are no longer employed there. so what's a guy to do.....CHANGE THE BROKEN MIDWARE.......yes this means practically a complete overhaul but honestly are you just gonna keep trying duct tape to fix a leak? all these little anti sin additions are great [theater of blood was sin owned before] but until you redesign the concept to tone down the tideborn and aps dominance over channeling, whatever you do will be a stop gap measure.

3. scaled xp: it should not take you a year to gain a level. the goon glitch was abused and those without the moral strength to resist are all level 105. i personally quit the game during that time. so how does PWI reward those that abstained from cheating? [crickets echo]. make quests level specific with diminishing returns if you chose to do them past the level you are able to obtain the quest. for instance, quest x becomes available from level a-e. if you do it at level a you get 3% of your xp bar filled, for each level past you lose .5%. so if you decide to wait til level e to do the quest you will only get 1%. [you can tweak this of course, but this is just to explain]. the oht and culti's could be changed not to give xp but give a decent amount of rep and lots of spirit instead since those you'd want to remain open so they could be done whenever the character got around to it. this way even if you make the quests at level 100 plus give .5%, people will do them cause the can see an end [dangle the carrot in front the mule].

4. community care: you need GM's that aren't here for a paycheck. it is extremely frustrating to have an issue and plead for a gm only to find out there are none on. there used to be a way to call in an issue. you removed it. then you could talk online to a person, you remove that too. anyone with a lick of common sense will view this as disinterest. if you continually keep creating distance between you and your fan-base, why would we put food on your plate? no interaction eventually boils down to no money going in the game. MMO's aren't supposed to last forever, i get that. if you are trying to keep the party going however, you can. I know personally 50+ qualified people [understand the game, hold a college degree, certified in conflict resolution] who absolutely love the game because of what they remember and what it could be and that would be GM's for free. i convinced about 20 of them to apply. not even a thank you for submitting your application, blah blah blah...... was sent. people post on forums all day. but giving us a place to vent without any follow up is simply a means of placating someone with an issue. that may work on kids and even adults that act like children, but for the rest of us.......we see you. you're not fooling anyone. at this point i play when i am getting ready for bed or have nothing [and i do mean NOTHING else to do. is that what you want?

5. server accessibility: this one is big. the market is uncontrolled [big mistake] so greedy merchant and scams are overly abundant here. way more so than in any other game i've played. because of this the economies of different servers are at different inflation levels. e.g. item x cost 3x as much on server a as it does on server b. this in turn restricts you from moving you account to a different server if your lifestyle changes [work/school schedule, you moved cross country or any other real life event] that would alter your playing time. end result? people leave when the events the are interested in no longer fits into their schedule. who wants to take forever to level a toon only to not be able to play the events because of the time the are given? i used to live on the west coast, now that i am in new york i find that doing an event means staying up late during a work/school night so i don't get to do them as much anymore [which is why i play before bedtime]. even if you had to put a charge on the cost of moving an account you would find doing so will only help increase the interest since now you could pick a server based on your needs and move it when your schedule demanded it. in other words, fix the market so players can travel.

these are the main issues i have come up with after conducting over 100 surveys with players off-line [both active and non-active]. i have all the contact info for these players and am willing to share any and all information gleaned from the results. the opening question was has the game gotten better or continued it's decline. the answer: no, the game has not gotten better and aside from those that enjoy bullying people or don't care about pk and events and tw and....well, basically aside from those that don't care about a thriving game community, the game is already dead. once enough of my friends on here leave i will be leaving too. i invested hard core but because i wanted a challenge [i didn't r9+12 a psy or sin] i find i have no chance in events or pk against someone who did. so no pk, no leveling [my main toons are all at 102 w/o goon glitch], no events. my friends are what keep me here but more and more of them leave each day so very soon...no me.

I'd like to see your responses and gm's [past and present] are encouraged to shed some light on this. Let's make some real resolutions instead of just complaining all day.

Safeng - Sanctuary

My issue are people that torture me with run on sentences and only use enter every 10 lines. b:surrender

SashaGray - Heavens Tear

no way am i reading that

BlissherFX - Harshlands

ogunernile wrote: »

1. SIN/PSY issue: the inclusion of the new skills were meant to bring balance but in truth only 4 classes got any real help. archers, barbs, bm's and wizards all made out okay but everyone else got fail skills. the most fail was clerics. psys and wizards both have a heal. even seekers got on a crappy one with the expansion, but clerics being the best healers in the game, can't heal during metal mage form? and to add insult to injury their hp is decreased on top of that. did anyone even play test these skills? why not disallow the heal over time heals and the aoe heals and allow them to use blessing of the purehearted [a skill that no cleric i know has found a use for] or wellspring surge? the idea of a cleric in pk is pointless. the sin attacks with aps are just disgusting. who's bright idea was it to include zerk on a aps weapon for a class that has high crit/damage? PK is dead....aside from a few enterprising individuals or a full r9+12 barb you play a psy or a sin to pk. why? cause there are sins with scrupulous morals that enjoy farming people for kicks, so to be able to defend yourself from overpowered stealth attacks you need to be one of these classes: psy, sin or barb. i would say tone down the tideborn but that leads to the next issue.....

I stopped reading there. Seeing sins your level is a fail skill?

PotatoHeadQR - Dreamweaver

clerics got really nice skills. yeah if you have the midset of "clerics should always be able to heal because this is the word of pan gu" it might be useless.

basically a lot (most) of skills are a copies of sin-psy skills....
even violet dance reminds me of black voodoo. and btw black voodoo = -11 attack lvls

Tsukyini - Raging Tide

ogunernile wrote: »

CHANGE THE BROKEN MIDWARE.......yes this means practically a complete overhaul but honestly are you just gonna keep trying duct tape to fix a leak?

As long as the money keeps rolling in with duct tape in use, yes. They will happily just keep sticking duct tape on it.

3. scaled xp: it should not take you a year to gain a level. the goon glitch was abused and those without the moral strength to resist are all level 105. i personally quit the game during that time. so how does PWI reward those that abstained from cheating? [crickets echo]. make quests level specific with diminishing returns if you chose to do them past the level you are able to obtain the quest.

Or, they could just reduce the amount of exp needed to level. Or take the 90+ quests and shove a few extra zeroes at the end of the exp reward for each quest.

4. community care: you need GM's that aren't here for a paycheck.

I'd rather have GMs that are here for a paycheck as opposed to GMs that actively play and may have a personal interest in seeing players from opposing factions get the banhammer.

it is extremely frustrating to have an issue and plead for a gm only to find out there are none on. there used to be a way to call in an issue. you removed it. then you could talk online to a person, you remove that too. anyone with a lick of common sense will view this as disinterest.

Do you have any idea how many stupid reasons (as opposed to legitimate reasons) people have for wanting to page a GM? After reading posts on the forum for over a year, I can only begin to imagine the horrible tickets GMs get, let alone what they would have to deal with if players could just summon them at will.

SylenThunder - Twilight Temple

My biggest issue is not really the game so much as the community within the game.
It's damned hard to find a decent squad for anything that isn't BH or farming vana. Unless, of course, you're just looking to buy heads in FCC.

Teamwork has really dropped off. Too many people out there don't have a clue about how to play their toon properly, much less how to play in a certain squad makeup or instance.

THe main goal of the game lately is just greed and e-peen. It's making money for the sake of bragging about it, or getting super-uber gear so you can feel good about ganking anyone you sneak up to and then bragging about how pro you are because you have this awesome gear.

The biggest problem that upset the balance is that you have tons of people with marginal gear that actually know how to play being smashed down by people with super expensive heroic gear that don't have a freaking clue. Of course, there is the small sector of people with super gear that actually know how to play, but the problem is that the majority of the are just a-holes out to smack everyone else down anyway.

I play for myself, and for my faction. The rest of the server can pretty much go to hell. Sure there's some decent people out there, but they are few and far between lately.

krisnda

ogunernile wrote: »

i personally quit the game during that time.

Stopped reading here. Why do you still care where this game goes if you quit? Better yet, why complain over trying to fix a "dying game"? Just leave if your unhappy and think that nothing will ever change. At least the people who do complain legitimately have (somewhat) of a decent reason (and haven't quit the game entirely).

VenusArmani - Dreamweaver

I think, if i'm not enjoying the game, I'll just leave. But then, I'm not someone who plays video games they hate all day and then complains about it.

Quilue - Sanctuary

My issue is hyper frost, that is all.

Half of the QQ flying around these days wouldn't exist without hyper frost.

Tsukyini - Raging Tide

Quilue - Sanctuary wrote: »

My issue is hyper frost, that is all.

Half of the QQ flying around these days wouldn't exist without hyper frost.

I'm pretty sure people would just find other things to complain about.
b:chuckle

Quilue - Sanctuary

Well the problem is this:

Players reach 100+, but they are not ready for lv 100. That is why they're called hyper babies.

Before, players grind and farm with each other and level up together. You get a generation of high levels that know each other and have accumulated some wealth in-game from the leveling up. When these players play, they have at least a basic gear requirement to do what they want and they have a network of friends to play with. Friends teach you how new instances work, friends take you to instances regardless of gear, and you don't let friends down because you know what you're doing as a class.

So along comes hyper babies. They reach 100 and expect to play with other lv 100s, but they are very ill-prepared. I've had time to get what I have, but these people don't. They reach lv 100 and get one shot and look like noobs. Whether it is PvP or PvE, they are not ready, and then the realization comes to them that they need to either

cash shop

or spend time getting what other players have, they can't accept that. They think they reached lvl 100+, they should be able to do lvl 100+ content just like everyone else. They started from nothing, and suddenly they have to compare themselves to people who have had time to get...things.

This is the biggest reason why you have all these people complain about cash shoppers and R9. Of most of the older players that are still active and are competitively TWing, they have R9...or some equivalently decent gear unless they've had periods of inactivity. I don't know where this "cash shoppers OP" **** in big factions come from...There are old school players that came back from a hiatus...in the TT90 that was so competitive at their time...and now they have R9. It's not always because they cash shop, not many people pop 2 thousand bucks into a game - some just farmed with their friends like before.

There is such a big discrepancy in how we see things, and how some players see things. We've had the time to accumulate wealth and to know people, that is why we get into NV squads despite not being 5aps sins, that is why we take all classes to NV once we have the good DD to do a painless run, that is why we don't world chat looking for 5aps sins for anything and everything instance-related. I've seen some players actually post that archers don't get into NV runs...that simply doesn't happen nor does it make sense to me.

There is certainly value in having a low level player base. It allows you to enjoy the game without gear pressure. Lower level players don't care about 10x people in R9, they play their own thing. When leveling was slower, I wasn't dismayed about TT90 barbs and archers in gear crackling with lightning because I wasn't playing with them. I was playing with the players around me, and they had gear similar to me. I accepted that players that have played longer than me, or have spent more than me, will have better stuff than me. When I leveled up, I was ready to face lv 100+ content with my friends. Suddenly thrusting newer players to a lv 100+ playerbase causes grief and QQ.

Well the question is, how slow is too slow? 9x used to miji grind a day for 20% and that was SO AWESOME. I don't think we need to go back to that. BH, cube, hyper grind on open map should all be good enough. We have plenty of options to gain good exp if we didn't have Hyper FCC.

Blows - Dreamweaver

Only problem i have with this game is the greedyness of players these days.. It seems nearly impossible now to get a nice end game gear without spending hundreds of dollars.. I don't mind a lil charge here an there but GEEEEZZZ!! If plan to cash straight through you may end up spending enough to buy you a brand new car.. Another thing i think they should BAN players who use obscene language out in WC,if have some negative to say go to PM's

Sometimes I wonder if it be the Gm's who is responsible for the ridiculous prices these days,like coming into game seeing what people looking for most in WC an what cat shops don't have. then come on another toon an set cats with items most wanted by players an set stupid prices.. Which then when the pack openers start winning things an notice that price it causes all want to sell for that same price also..Forcing people who really want good end game gems to cash more.. just an opinion hope noone take offense

ogunernile

by not here for a paycheck, i mean here because they are doing what the love, not someone who is biased or here to get paid only. and no, i did not say anything about players summoning them, i mean patrol the server, someone makes a complaint, you as a GM zip yourself there see what's up, respond if necessary. pk in banned zones would stop immediately if stuff like that happened.

ogunernile

lol ok just for you.

psys and sins are too strong, the new skills reduce but do not fix this issue.

the game is in dying need of a midware overhaul.

it takes too long to level after reaching level 101.

the community needs to be monitored better. there should be more interaction between players and staff.

we should be able to move to another server, if we need to and keep our account.

Xx_BeLLa_xX - Harshlands

ogunernile wrote: »

lol ok just for you.

psys and sins are too strong, the new skills reduce but do not fix this issue.

the game is in dying need of a midware overhaul.

it takes too long to level after reaching level 101.

the community needs to be monitored better. there should be more interaction between players and staff.

we should be able to move to another server, if we need to and keep our account.

Its funny to see how many people who say the game is dead continue to come on the forum of a ''dead'' game. b:chuckle

ogunernile

thank god you did cause i was inviting an open debate, not trolling. one good skill out of six, means they got a good skill, doesn't mean the class as whole was made better. on top of that the sight lasts 8 seconds and the cooldown of 2 minutes? yeah useful for one combro sting, versus being able to see like that all the time at one level less? if you see that as balance [which is what the were aiming for] go back under your bridge. i bet you don't read much there either.

ogunernile

it's funny to see trolls complain about complaints. i am doing this cause enough people asked me to. what's your excuse?

BerserkBeast - Sanctuary

If you quitted the game you should really get-out-of-here.

People are so narrow-minded,they think that

---

>

I don't enjoy/like this game anymore = The game sucks//its dying!

While the way simpler fact is

---

>

I don't enjoy/like this game anymore = This game isn't made for me // I should go play something else

There are lots of online games I don't like which I barely played,but I never complained on their forums.To each game its playerbase,you don't like the game,get-the-heck-out.

ogunernile

Amen....

ogunernile

so if you are dining at a restaurant you like and they change the menu to some that disagrees with the majority of patrons [yourself included] you'd walk out and never come back instead of try to convey to the owner your displeasure? oh wait i get it, you work for PWI, they put your kids through college and now you wanna show them loyalty. or maybe, you're an r9 that is happy being unkillable and don't care if other classes suffer. which is the most likely of the three.

TunaMan - Heavens Tear

the pre-purchase is available guys, you know what to do... b:cool

ogunernile

i came back cause friends i have in real life that play kept begging me to. as for the forums, a letter i sent in to the costumer support was similar to this one. when they replied they said, "you should post this on the forums, some ideas that players post make their way into the game." so if your bosses are telling me to put this out there why do you have a problem with it? more importantly, discuss with me how these issues are illegitimate?

Safeng - Sanctuary

ogunernile wrote: »

so if you are dining at a restaurant you like and they change the menu to some that disagrees with the majority of patrons [yourself included] you'd walk out and never come back instead.

Exactly. Restaurants are like games. There's enough of them.

And the rest of your post is just whiny troll-QQ.

BerserkBeast - Sanctuary

ogunernile wrote: »

so if you are dining at a restaurant you like and they change the menu to some that disagrees with the majority of patrons [yourself included] you'd walk out and never come back instead of try to convey to the owner your displeasure? oh wait i get it, you work for PWI, they put your kids through college and now you wanna show them loyalty. or maybe, you're an r9 that is happy being unkillable and don't care if other classes suffer. which is the most likely of the three.

Not R9,not unkillable,Im a PvE player(Not PvP).

There are issues with PvP in this game,thats also why I picked PvE.

So as you can see someone can be "happy" without killing others all day to feeling yourself great and cool like you would like to.

Get over your big ego already,you can't own others because they put more money/effort on the game,they aren't cheating or anything,you're just weaker,as simple as that.

ogunernile

Exactly. Restaurants are like games. There's enough of them.

And the rest of your post is just whiny troll-QQ.

whiny and troll qq, lol. i love it. i surveyed a microcosm of the populous for these reasons and posted them because they were the most frequently talked about. left to me i wouldn't post anything but both a reply from a ticketed i submitted and friend who help tabulate the response urged me to post this so i am. i asked for an open debate not a troll tackle. if you got solid points that would contradict my findings the please let's talk about that. the name calling and diversionary insults do nothing to further the conversation. unless of course you're not that intelligent, which in that case troll away.....

Yindra - Sanctuary

ogunernile wrote: »

4. community care: you need GM's that aren't here for a paycheck.

They should work for free? Have fun trying to find employees that work for free.

Other than that, none of your stuff actually rings a bell for me. I just solo stuff, so it dies off like every other MMO"RP"G since I'm out of things to do. Some features died earlier than that, because they were locked away behind bosses or in the cash shop, but that is too be expected too. Some stuff never got used at all, due to bad cost/performance ratio --- I tend to put that into the "incentive for cash items" category, though, which means 'it's to be expected'.

As for dying... hard to tell from my perspective. I see far fewer people in the newbie areas, or on the world map in general; even Archosaur is less crowded than it used to be. However, none of this really means all that much; it appears the cash shop is doing extremely well --- there are all sorts of mounts and fashion, and every veno I see with an active pet uses a hercules. This does not look like a dying game, and it's just the tip of the iceberg (i.e. the stuff you just see 'from the outside'). Besides, MMO'RP'Gs are generally working towards a setup where the world map is just for some minor quests, and everyone only plays instances --- so you could run across the globe without meeting anyone, yet the server could be overcrowded with players.

Safeng - Sanctuary

ogunernile wrote: »

the name calling and diversionary insults do nothing to further the conversation. unless of course you're not that intelligent, which in that case troll away.....

I never saw someone contradict themselves that badly in two sentences. b:chuckle

ogunernile

Not R9,not unkillable,Im a PvE player(Not PvP).

There are issues with PvP in this game,thats also why I picked PvE.

So as you can see someone can be "happy" without killing others all day to feeling yourself great and cool like you would like to.

Get over your big ego already,you can't own others because they put more money/effort on the game,they aren't cheating or anything,you're just weaker,as simple as that.

take a look in the mirror buddy. the results are representation of the people i interviewed. 20 different people each from 5 different servers. i play a r9 cleric as my main. i don't care about being the best, i like to help people. i made my cleric r9 just so i could help anywhere when needed. you can attack me all you want cause i am not looking for complaints about the complaints i listed. i am looking for a debate to widen my point f view or viable proposals that will be seen by devs when they read this.

BerserkBeast - Sanctuary

Read your title again

"Dying game"

Doesn't really sound you're fair an neutral with it,despite how much you try look"professional",your point of view its clearly biased.

ogunernile

I never saw someone contradict themselves that badly in two sentences.

since you seem to be a simpleton i'll explain:

slinging insults to turn attention away from the intent of the discussion doesn't help us discuss where i was wrong in my assertions [and those of the other 50 interviewees who helped form them] unless you don't care and are simple minded enough to enjoy online arguments versus debate. if you are that simple minded then please continue. i'll just keep that in mind.