Reviving The Game

JanusZeal - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Wrong. New players not being able to hyper/hyper FF won't "open the game up to them" in any way, shape, or fashion that isn't open to them now. They will still push to experience endgame in the fastest manner possible and bypass as much content as the game allows them to, which won't change with limiting hypers and FF. Short sighted idealistic nonsense is short sighted.

Nastiness does nothing to promote your argument.

It strikes me that you're assuming everyone has the same goals and styles as you. I see nothing to convince me that he's wrong. That's not to say that he's certainly not wrong but snarling at him and calling his argument nonsense is not convincing either.

I believe most players enter an MMO without the urge to race to endgame, but want to explore and experience the virtual reality. It is later in the game when they get caught up in the current sweeping everyone to the end.

I can't say that with any real certainty because my observation may be as tainted as yours, but therein lies the basis for my opinions that we've already spent far too much time debating.

JanusZeal - Heavens Tear wrote: »

What you believe is wrong given how the populace plays, hence why the premise of the OP is to change the way people play. If people played the way you asserted, this thread would be absolutely moot. Just logic speaking here.

As for the post I'm responding to, I wasn't trying to convince anyone, just be as condescending as that poster was being so we're on equal footing. b:cute

Aren't you just an adorable little boy!

I decline the childish provocation and I decline your declaration as the arbiter of all interpretation.

Dismissed. Go play.

Lets just enjoy the game for however long it has left safe in the knowledge that we can debate, belittle, argue all we want as it won't make a bit of difference to where the whole lot is heading.

WE can all agree to come back at the end with any warranted I told you Sos

b:bye

Selak - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Short sighted, idealistic nonsense comes from those who have given up on finding a better solution and revert to spouting what little they know for sure to comfort themselves, and to refuse to listen to any idea which conflicts with there personal internal beliefs.

I hear you when you say this will not save the game and agree these changes will not save the game alone,
but definitely sitting back and saying just to Suck it up and deal with it, seems a lot more Idealistically shortsighted than asking for some change, It seems, you the individual are the one putting limits as to what is possible in the real world.

Yet you try to make us sound Shortsighted. b:chuckle

Because this isn't a private server, it isn't sensible from a business standpoint to gamble with a playerbase like that any more than has already been done. The short sighted part is the belief that this will only do positive, without the consideration that it might backfire and do far more harm than good.

At least when make suggestions, like merging servers, I acknowledge that it has it's pitfalls too. I also wouldn't sit there and campaign about it, make polls, and argue with people endlessly who suggest my ideas are short sighted because they might be right. The rabid posters in this topic only suggesting their idea is a fantastic one are like religious people in a church, hence why they only want like-minded people in topics like this.

Apostasy - Raging Tide wrote: »

... such as... people that want to be able to play an RPGMMO? b:puzzled in a game advertised as such and could actually draw in and hold a large population long term? b:question especially given the potential this particular game has which is being simply flushed down the toilet? b:lipcurl

it is funny i should find myself playing a free trial on a very old subscription per month game as of today... and from what i can already see, i will be playing that game for quite a while... their lowest leveled population/starter zone areas after 15 YEARS still have people starting new characters as of TODAY... and i played multiple starter/races areas... in that game, i already found that building up tradeskills from even level 5 = making in game coin, and a nice amount too for that level.

PWI should place YOU as their direction supervisor... from what i have seen, you probably already are b:bye

First off, compare apples to apples -- PWI is not a P2P MMO. I've worked for a competitor to PWE, their lack of concern for their playerbase and quick money grabs at the cost of their game's integrity is not uncommon in this industry -- the only thing that distinguishes PWI from the vast majority of other F2P MMORPG's is the ability to outright buy gear in the cash shop.

Of course, this was in 2009.. I can only shake my head as you use "is being flushed" in the present tense when it was flushed years ago.. hence why I suggest to people to enjoy the game as much as you can now while it's still around on this stage. The game will commence on private servers after PWE dumps PWI, where you are more likely to get them to implement the suggestions you have (regardless of it's merits which I find to be unsubstantiated here) than in this version.

Here's a suggestion.. I don't know if something like this already exists in the game as I'm new so don't flame, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't.

You should introduce something like a duel arena, something that can be entered all day long when ever you choose to and it will attempt to place you in a fight with somebody your range level. maybe even settings to restrict certain gear?

why I think this is a good idea is because a lot of the games I play the be all and end all of the game is people like to pvp.. get better and richer and pvp more lol

Offering a duel arena like this would allow people to learn what the pvp system is like.. have fun doing it but fighting fair fights is the most important thing rather than getting one shot by somebody in R9 gear which I think is ridiculous..

Someone told me its like 1500$ for a full r9 set.. wtf? don't pay those stupid prices to ruin the game for everyone else cuz now nobody can kill you.. fair enough if you can grind the r9 gear yourself but I doubt you would have a full r9 set if you did >.>

Just my opinion guys love it, flame it whateverb:pleased

JanusZeal - Heavens Tear wrote: »

The provocation wasn't toward you anyways (read again if it evades you), you can remove sand now and take some courses on English comprehension.

Yep. No rebuttal from me. I read it completely wrong.
I won't remove it. I'll let my foolishness stand as concession. When I'm wrong I'm wrong.
Apologies for letting hostility leapfrog logic.

Athrel - Raging Tide wrote: »

Thought I'd share a nice little story now how FC power leveling affects.

Ok, so here's a little mishap.

I decided to start on an older server. I had been on one of the newer servers, but I decided I wanted to start fresh and try a relive a few noob memories.

First off I was expecting the new areas to be empty. Ok sure no biggie I can live with that, after all I know how to play. My problem was when I hit level 65 or so. Up until that level I had been living off quest reward armor and whites, which I had no problem with but I did need better gear. Kinda realized that when I only lasted for 2 hits without plume shell on Wyvren in BH51.

When I first started out years ago I of course had no idea Twilight Temple even existed. So I got all my gear out of the auction house. Now back then it was not hard to find anyone selling random drops that had decent stats, because back then everyone was still questing and sold off the gear they couldn't use. Guess what? ........nothing, not a single piece of gear. (forget the caster packs, no way in hell am I waiting weeks for a code)

My next option? Make my own gear. Maybe some TT70s. Now I had not gotten around to my crafting yet because of course, no one was selling the lowest tir mats and I had no interest in spending my time to farm them. I get plenty of coin off the JJ coin quests so it was no problem money wise. I look in the shops and AH for the mats....again....nothing....

Well I had to get the stupid mats, but I didn't want to farm, but I had no choice because the farmers for low tir mats and gear now are non-existent. Another choice is I get the mats out of cash shop......nope...not happening.......

Before this stupid FC that has NO level restriction what-so-ever, before the Earthguard expansion when the power leveling became popular, before any of this ever happened, there were MORE options for players to update gear wise that liked to level THIS way instead of speeding into end game! Thank God I'm moving out of this game next year!b:angry

This is a pretty crappy story. The vast majority of populace were lower level back then and if you did actually play (and pay attention) they were primarily in TT (and mold/legendary) gear because there weren't really any other good options.

It doesn't take a genius to see most of the demand is for endgame mats/gear, that sort of populace progression is commonplace.

You still have the option to move at your own nostalgic 2008/2009 pace. You can farm the mats to upgrade your manufacturing skills, you can farm/buy the mats and make them at dirt cheap prices, etc. No one is stopping or hindering you whatsoever.

Also consider the game's population (especially active pop) has sharply declined since then. It doesn't require someone with an economics or business degree to understand lower population/less farming TT/less making gear + less demand = less available supply because fewer will see a profit in making said gear.

To blame this all on hyper FF is quite superficial/topical and asinine. It's a sh***y theory for people who have no ability to dig deeper about what this game's problems are, and just want to blame the most convenient and simple thing that goes with a simple mind.

as everyone else you bring to the table opinions not facts. Try come to terms with that.

Again, this is because of the power-creep, and the fight for endgame 100+. Not everyone wants to be there in a week. Some people prefer to actually play the game.

then let those people play the game. They can still play it like back in the days.

Try to get this through your thikish skull: whoever wants to powerlevel will powerlevel. And whoever wants to do that will not socialize with other players on the map because they have a goal.
Even back in 2009 there were people that powerleveled: Stoney, Qultor, VictoryPets, ProGrinder (just to name a few on my server). And no, they did not socialized with anyone. They had their goal, they followed it and yeah, if it happened that you would be around them doing the same quests they sometimes will squad up with you. Same thing with Delta/Gamma squads, there were some set squads that rarely had a spot opened. They were running 2-3-4 deltas/gammas /day and it was fun being into one, but was not fun trying to get into one and it was the only way to basically get some relevant xp from 97 to 100.
The game was always divided between casuals and powelevelers, between cash shoppers and merchants/farmers.

This topic and the idea behind it is absolutely non sense and just plain bull ****.Whoever came up with it just does not understand the game. I said it before, I say it again. I don't care how much experience you have in the game, you suck at understanding it.
Beside you have some issues making a distinction between opinions and facts...

You want an opinion that you could use as "fact"? here it is: 90% of the players in the 1-90 lvl range are alts of someone who has an endgame char already ( lets say lvl 100 , r8 endgame). 50% of the lvl 60-95 chars are buffer alts. You don't believe me ? do a poll ingame, ask in ever squad you are how many ppl have alts and what levels. WC for big room sale and ask everyone that PMs you how many alts they have and what level. After a few days and a few servers come back with the result. Then you'll understand how stupid of an idea is limiting FC and how it won't actually change anything to improve midgame presence.
Now another simple "fact" for you: you know why midgame is dead? I'll try to explain it very quick and simple, because in fact there's nothing complicated in it.
The short answer: the gear progression in this game.
The Long answer : the gear progression in this game is too long and the progression is not linear it's exponential both cost wise and power wise. Take a new char: getting to level 90 lets say, getting culti as sage/demon, what are the options now (I want to ignore the pre90 gear)? lets see
1. TT90 green
2. TT99 gold
3. Get some R8 pieces
4. G15
6. G16
7. R9rr
8. R9rrr

so, do you see the problem here?
TT90 gear - useless outside of FC. Abba/SoT are pretty much off limits in that gear. WS? not even think about it.
You get to 100 - full TT99 on non-rank pieces but you're useless.
you make the effort of getting r8 - well, you're still useless but you have better stats.
you go to NW more and more, get tokens, sell, get some **** together and get G15 - now you become somewhat useful.
G16 - biggest boost so far. Endless WS runs for badges/molds, Lunars for EOD. There , 6 pieces of G16 you feel like a king. You go in NW and get 1 shotted....Same for TW....
Now you start the R9 farm, right? Endless months of actually getting the gear, NW where you're lucky if you can kill someone lower geared cause those r9rrr are still 1 shotting you. But you grind and grind and finally you have enough to do R9rr.
Now you're R9rr....but just a bit better than G16. So the road to R9rrr starts. Endless WS runs for badges + molds, EoDs and EoO, rerols to get decent stats.
Finally, you're in R9rrr...WOHOOO!!!
You go in NW and you're a 1 shot. Why? because R9rrr is nothing without refines.
Than the long grind/farm for refine money, hunt those elusive tisha/tienkang sales, get to +7 and now you feel like doing something. Still can't do PvP or actually do something relevant in NW because hey, those +12 R9rrr are two shotting you.

When whatever new player we might get in this game realizes the above abomination is actually the progression in this game, that's the moment he quits.
Midgame is dead because there is no reachable endgame for a newly started char. Money or GTFO.
Limiting access to alts in FC will not solve the gear progression problem, it's just turtling in the past. Thinking Amish is not the solution to the game/world problems.

Barbarz - Dreamweaver wrote: »

as everyone else you bring to the table opinions not facts. Try come to terms with that.


then let those people play the game. They can still play it like back in the days.

Try to get this through your thikish skull: whoever wants to powerlevel will powerlevel. And whoever wants to do that will not socialize with other players on the map because they have a goal.
Even back in 2009 there were people that powerleveled: Stoney, Qultor, VictoryPets, ProGrinder (just to name a few on my server). And no, they did not socialized with anyone. They had their goal, they followed it and yeah, if it happened that you would be around them doing the same quests they sometimes will squad up with you. Same thing with Delta/Gamma squads, there were some set squads that rarely had a spot opened. They were running 2-3-4 deltas/gammas /day and it was fun being into one, but was not fun trying to get into one and it was the only way to basically get some relevant xp from 97 to 100.
The game was always divided between casuals and powelevelers, between cash shoppers and merchants/farmers.

This topic and the idea behind it is absolutely non sense and just plain bull ****.Whoever came up with it just does not understand the game. I said it before, I say it again. I don't care how much experience you have in the game, you suck at understanding it.
Beside you have some issues making a distinction between opinions and facts...

You want an opinion that you could use as "fact"? here it is: 90% of the players in the 1-90 lvl range are alts of someone who has an endgame char already ( lets say lvl 100 , r8 endgame). 50% of the lvl 60-95 chars are buffer alts. You don't believe me ? do a poll ingame, ask in ever squad you are how many ppl have alts and what levels. WC for big room sale and ask everyone that PMs you how many alts they have and what level. After a few days and a few servers come back with the result. Then you'll understand how stupid of an idea is limiting FC and how it won't actually change anything to improve midgame presence.
Now another simple "fact" for you: you know why midgame is dead? I'll try to explain it very quick and simple, because in fact there's nothing complicated in it.
The short answer: the gear progression in this game.
The Long answer : the gear progression in this game is too long and the progression is not linear it's exponential both cost wise and power wise. Take a new char: getting to level 90 lets say, getting culti as sage/demon, what are the options now (I want to ignore the pre90 gear)? lets see
1. TT90 green
2. TT99 gold
3. Get some R8 pieces
4. G15
6. G16
7. R9rr
8. R9rrr

so, do you see the problem here?
TT90 gear - useless outside of FC. Abba/SoT are pretty much off limits in that gear. WS? not even think about it.
You get to 100 - full TT99 on non-rank pieces but you're useless.
you make the effort of getting r8 - well, you're still useless but you have better stats.
you go to NW more and more, get tokens, sell, get some **** together and get G15 - now you become somewhat useful.
G16 - biggest boost so far. Endless WS runs for badges/molds, Lunars for EOD. There , 6 pieces of G16 you feel like a king. You go in NW and get 1 shotted....Same for TW....
Now you start the R9 farm, right? Endless months of actually getting the gear, NW where you're lucky if you can kill someone lower geared cause those r9rrr are still 1 shotting you. But you grind and grind and finally you have enough to do R9rr.
Now you're R9rr....but just a bit better than G16. So the road to R9rrr starts. Endless WS runs for badges + molds, EoDs and EoO, rerols to get decent stats.
Finally, you're in R9rrr...WOHOOO!!!
You go in NW and you're a 1 shot. Why? because R9rrr is nothing without refines.
Than the long grind/farm for refine money, hunt those elusive tisha/tienkang sales, get to +7 and now you feel like doing something. Still can't do PvP or actually do something relevant in NW because hey, those +12 R9rrr are two shotting you.

When whatever new player we might get in this game realizes the above abomination is actually the progression in this game, that's the moment he quits.
Midgame is dead because there is no reachable endgame for a newly started char. Money or GTFO.
Limiting access to alts in FC will not solve the gear progression problem, it's just turtling in the past. Thinking Amish is not the solution to the game/world problems.

I have no idea what you're responding to but +1 for the good post.

Athrel - Raging Tide wrote: »

Hey ridiculous little person with a tree stump for a brain. I just gave an example of what a person that starts out with ABSOLUTELY NOTHING finds when they enter the game like this. Oh and FIY, not everyone likes to farm! Did I not just state that I couldn't find ANY lowest level tir mats ANYWHERE for sale?! I find it sad that you are stuck in your high level heaven and can't see the bigger picture here.

Namecalling won't undo your argument being destroyed.

If you don't farm, then complaining about lack of mats (which I haven't seen on HT, especially going to the forges at south arch) effectively shows your inability to deal with what's in front of you. I found at least 6 shops selling TT60 and 70 after reading this nonsense before I decided to call BS on your post.

Btw, as a high level, if there weren't anyone selling low level mats, I would, why? Because it would represent a decent niche for profit. However, there are plenty of sellers, so I'm not going to bother.. you're just caught up in your little rage fit and want to embellish things+namecall like a ten year old as if that helps your argument whatsoever.

Barbarz - Dreamweaver wrote: »

as everyone else you bring to the table opinions not facts. Try come to terms with that.


then let those people play the game. They can still play it like back in the days.

Try to get this through your thikish skull: whoever wants to powerlevel will powerlevel. And whoever wants to do that will not socialize with other players on the map because they have a goal.
Even back in 2009 there were people that powerleveled: Stoney, Qultor, VictoryPets, ProGrinder (just to name a few on my server). And no, they did not socialized with anyone. They had their goal, they followed it and yeah, if it happened that you would be around them doing the same quests they sometimes will squad up with you. Same thing with Delta/Gamma squads, there were some set squads that rarely had a spot opened. They were running 2-3-4 deltas/gammas /day and it was fun being into one, but was not fun trying to get into one and it was the only way to basically get some relevant xp from 97 to 100.
The game was always divided between casuals and powelevelers, between cash shoppers and merchants/farmers.

This topic and the idea behind it is absolutely non sense and just plain bull ****.Whoever came up with it just does not understand the game. I said it before, I say it again. I don't care how much experience you have in the game, you suck at understanding it.
Beside you have some issues making a distinction between opinions and facts...

You want an opinion that you could use as "fact"? here it is: 90% of the players in the 1-90 lvl range are alts of someone who has an endgame char already ( lets say lvl 100 , r8 endgame). 50% of the lvl 60-95 chars are buffer alts. You don't believe me ? do a poll ingame, ask in ever squad you are how many ppl have alts and what levels. WC for big room sale and ask everyone that PMs you how many alts they have and what level. After a few days and a few servers come back with the result. Then you'll understand how stupid of an idea is limiting FC and how it won't actually change anything to improve midgame presence.
Now another simple "fact" for you: you know why midgame is dead? I'll try to explain it very quick and simple, because in fact there's nothing complicated in it.
The short answer: the gear progression in this game.
The Long answer : the gear progression in this game is too long and the progression is not linear it's exponential both cost wise and power wise. Take a new char: getting to level 90 lets say, getting culti as sage/demon, what are the options now (I want to ignore the pre90 gear)? lets see
1. TT90 green
2. TT99 gold
3. Get some R8 pieces
4. G15
6. G16
7. R9rr
8. R9rrr

so, do you see the problem here?
TT90 gear - useless outside of FC. Abba/SoT are pretty much off limits in that gear. WS? not even think about it.
You get to 100 - full TT99 on non-rank pieces but you're useless.
you make the effort of getting r8 - well, you're still useless but you have better stats.
you go to NW more and more, get tokens, sell, get some **** together and get G15 - now you become somewhat useful.
G16 - biggest boost so far. Endless WS runs for badges/molds, Lunars for EOD. There , 6 pieces of G16 you feel like a king. You go in NW and get 1 shotted....Same for TW....
Now you start the R9 farm, right? Endless months of actually getting the gear, NW where you're lucky if you can kill someone lower geared cause those r9rrr are still 1 shotting you. But you grind and grind and finally you have enough to do R9rr.
Now you're R9rr....but just a bit better than G16. So the road to R9rrr starts. Endless WS runs for badges + molds, EoDs and EoO, rerols to get decent stats.
Finally, you're in R9rrr...WOHOOO!!!
You go in NW and you're a 1 shot. Why? because R9rrr is nothing without refines.
Than the long grind/farm for refine money, hunt those elusive tisha/tienkang sales, get to +7 and now you feel like doing something. Still can't do PvP or actually do something relevant in NW because hey, those +12 R9rrr are two shotting you.

When whatever new player we might get in this game realizes the above abomination is actually the progression in this game, that's the moment he quits.
Midgame is dead because there is no reachable endgame for a newly started char. Money or GTFO.
Limiting access to alts in FC will not solve the gear progression problem, it's just turtling in the past. Thinking Amish is not the solution to the game/world problems.

Excellent, extremely accurate and intuitive post.
I started playing a diff game during a break from PWI. Even though in that game all of the top gear are DROPS from dungeon bosses (100% FARMABLE) refines, gems, all those equivalents do come down to dollars or coins. After playing for about a month I amassed 40 mil, which was a lot to me, but still less than 1% of what I would need to become a viable end game character. I lost interest pretty fast as my level advanced and my gear disparity grew and I was less functional in a squad of my "peers." I feel bad for new people starting PWI.

Wtf does frost have to do with reviving the game???? ridiculous.

Make R9 actually farmable, MoG and chip chests from repeatable quests. More accessible ways to get event gold, which help people to refine their gear and get charms. FCC doesnt really affect game's overall state.

Deceptistar - Sanctuary wrote: »

b:chuckle this part was funny
and yeah i feel sorry for the pple who came in mid way and had to experience it. For the older players, this gear setup was a gradual transition >.<

Oh my that sounds like ridiculous gear treadmills are actually content. I'm not surprised at all why the whole power creep impossible paying-for-power game has been deteriorating sine about 2010. b:laugh

gear progression is the biggest problem in this game, and it goes hand in hand with the low amount of new players coming into the game.
No matter how many expansions/new content PWI will bring it will not increase the user base by more than 10%, and even that is only temporary.

This game had it's back broken when 5 aps toons were possible because of some half-brain wart what thought putting endgame gear in packs was a good idea. It was financially for a few months, look at PWE stocks prices from September to December 2009.
What they did then was to trade a long time constant income for a short term spike income. I know a lot of players that back in those days were farming map3 for hat+boots (best possible), lunar was sort of incomplete and maybe for a good reason. No one had level 7 tomes, it was outrageous to even think of the cost of such a thing. But the player base was spending money on the game: for refines, for mounts, for fashion, for charms and God knows what else. PWI was a flourishing game at that point.
Then they put everything everyone was actually working for in packs, straight out of boutique. People spent thousands, (some close to US 40k) on gambling. I still think PWI should be prosecuted for conducting an illegal gambling scheme in this game because I don't think they actually have a licence online gambling activities and that's what packs are.
At that point PWI changed from a squad based game to a solo based games.
No one was interested to farm anything in squads, because a 5 aps char could farm everything about 4-5 times faster than any non-aps classic squad. Archers and BMs were the most favored in this regard.
The cherry on top of the cake was the release of sins, that for months went stealth through instances, farming only bosses for incredible amounts of profit in basically 1/3 of the time an old APS char (archer, BM) could do it.
By the time PWI figured out what they did it was too late. The game was broken because of the difference between farming toons and the rest.
The "normal" gear progression would have been quite ok as concept, the problem was (and somehow still is today, but not as big as before) aps farming. The G13/g15 gear set was introduced by someone who did not understand what the problem of the game is. A toon in aps gear was good in both PvE and PvP. 2-3 classes were dominating the game, the others were trying to play catch-up but never actually succeed. This interval here is where a lot of the players that sucked it up when the packs came out first time actually gave up on this game.
R9/G16/R9rrr were introduced to actually make farming chars good only for that part of the game: farming. But to make that they had to up the ante so much that in PvP now the difference between people in different level of gear is actually 1 shot.And if it's not one shot it's something close to it, because you pretty much can't win a 1v1 unless the better geared player is braindead.
Because of the ungodly amount of money the farmers made in the years before this break happened they had to make the gear cost also exponential. So now we're stuck with an exponential gear cost for exponential power increase. This is not good and no successful MMO ever was based on this model. The successful model is a linear increase in power with exponential increase of the cost. Unfortunately because of the aps domination for so many years it was impossible to actually handle the gear progression better than they did it (well, maybe not impossible but very, very hard).

fixing/reviving the game is not possible anymore, unless you make everything below and including R9 dirt cheap and easily farmable. That would give a common offset for everyone/new players and it would not take long until the gear interval endgame will shrink enough to make this game fun again in both pve and pvp.
Rich players will always have the edge based on refines , that is no doubt, but the rest of the masses would have a chance to compete.

Maybe a lot of people won't agree with me, but just look and what they are trying to introduce in game: an instance where gear does not matter: chariot race. Why do you think they do that? They are trying to patch this leaking rusted bucked of a game now to somehow work around the gear differences.