How to kill a game - Remove Twinking/OEing

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Halfnelson


Well...these aren't established game mechanics. The OE patch is CHANGING the game mechanics because of simpletons that don't have the know-how or determination to get the maximum effectiveness out of there character allowed by the CURRENT established game mechanics.

BTW, who's comparing SWG to AO? Not me.

/shout Laugh it up, fuzzball!

SWG

Game mechanics will change based at the developer's discretion based on whatever need they perceive at the time. No MMORPG game developer has ever released a game without changing the game mechanics post released. Whether its in how an item works, a class develops, or how the characters in the game interact with each other. No MMORPG game developer will ever agree to never change the game mechanics found in their game. This is the reality of games and the quicker people acknowledge them, the faster they can get beyond complaining about the games and get to enjoying them (or constantly leaving one game for another looking for that mythical 'perfect game').

I inferred from your "SWG" that you were announcing your support of SWG because of their stance on overequipping. Which seemed odd to me because based on Verant's past experience, they aren't likely to allow overequipping in any sense. Overequipping is about using equipment that you don't have the skills to support. EQ, to my knowledge, does not ever allow a player to use a piece of equipment without meeting the skill requirements.

[______________Jennii]

I over equiped my trader this weekend. It took quite a few hours and alot of planning and even included a calculator.

In about less than 24 hours of real time(about 6 actual hours of playing time), I was able to get my rookie title from not being titled at all.

I was killing people at my PVP cap and who were red to me. Freshman and rookies alike. It was a blast, but I soon realized just how Uber Twinked I was when when I could take on 2 or 3 people at once (some had titles as well). No I would not stand there and duke it out with 3 at once.. I would have died that way. Tactics had alot to do with it, and some of the battles lasted a while and would include some recharge time while still holding aggro.

Even after all of this, and total dominace of anyone near my level, I think this patch will be good. it's to bad, because I really enjoyed twinking my character the way that I did.. but I think that this patch will now allow more people to enjoy PVP, without having to worry about someone like me, with a gun that is almost 3 times my level, attacking them and uterly destroying them in seconds.

[p00finger]

Kuroshio-

You aren't gonna get much arguement outta me on whether or not game developers change game mechanics post release. They all do in one way or another. I'm also not going to throw blind loyalty to the uber-twinked PvP Trader. I don't have one, don't PvP, and personally think the Trader is a broken character (but that's another post).

My concern is more with the fact that a vast number of people have invested a lot of time and energy in creating their characters, based on what has been given under the current game dynamic. It is my understanding that FC's reasoning behind the OE nerf is 1) Forum Folks complaining about unbalanced Pvp and 2) people are leveling up too quickly. (Go figure!) So what is FC's solution? We are going to nerf everybody! That bot you are so excited about because you finally got found a Trader to wrangle it on? Tough noogies...he's going to /behind mode in 3 minutes. Mochams wear off? Oh well, no more demon for you. Hope that Real Mean doesn't kill your whole team. Factor in that FC has announced that they will not be altering mob HPs. Meaning, you will probably be forced to fight greens and yellows and all their crappy XP. Yes, you will be slowed down in the process...like secretly extending reclaim and rez time was not enough. Hmm.

I think there are better solutions than an OE nerf sugar-coated with an IP reset. A change this drastic is just icing on the bugfilled, lack of content cake. There are more pressing issues that are not (probably never will) being addressed. Regardless...

BTW, I am not posting the SWG to show support for Verant's stance on OE even though I do. Just advertising so I'll find ex-AO'ers on SWG.

PS. I have a 132 agent who probably won't feel the sting of the OE nerf, but I'm interested in seeing how my low lvl characters are affected.

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Halfnelson
Kuroshio-

You aren't gonna get much arguement outta me on whether or not game developers change game mechanics post release. They all do in one way or another. I'm also not going to throw blind loyalty to the uber-twinked PvP Trader. I don't have one, don't PvP, and personally think the Trader is a broken character (but that's another post).

My concern is more with the fact that a vast number of people have invested a lot of time and energy in creating their characters, based on what has been given under the current game dynamic. It is my understanding that FC's reasoning behind the OE nerf is 1) Forum Folks complaining about unbalanced Pvp and 2) people are leveling up too quickly. (Go figure!) So what is FC's solution? We are going to nerf everybody! That bot you are so excited about because you finally got found a Trader to wrangle it on? Tough noogies...he's going to /behind mode in 3 minutes. Mochams wear off? Oh well, no more demon for you. Hope that Real Mean doesn't kill your whole team. Factor in that FC has announced that they will not be altering mob HPs. Meaning, you will probably be forced to fight greens and yellows and all their crappy XP. Yes, you will be slowed down in the process...like secretly extending reclaim and rez time was not enough. Hmm.

I think there are better solutions than an OE nerf sugar-coated with an IP reset. A change this drastic is just icing on the bugfilled, lack of content cake. There are more pressing issues that are not (probably never will) being addressed. Regardless...

BTW, I am not posting the SWG to show support for Verant's stance on OE even though I do. Just advertising so I'll find ex-AO'ers on SWG.

PS. I have a 132 agent who probably won't feel the sting of the OE nerf, but I'm interested in seeing how my low lvl characters are affected.

Here's where people lose me. I realize the OE patch will do very little against people around level 125 or so. Most people appear to realize it as well, yourself included. Because around that level, most people will have the skills to equip a ql200 item without going beyond 20% overequipped. So honestly, who are the 14.2 OE changes targetted at? They seem to be balance changes targetted at the low level players and the extreme cases of overequipping (ie: Engineers with pets they shouldn't have for almost 70 more levels without the teammate needed to support their skills). The change made to critical damage enhancing items/nanos is targetted at everyone I think.

In terms of soloing, I've got mixed feelings. Having a 50/50 chance to survive an encounter against an even con mob is good. That's what they're supposed to be. But not feeling like I'm accomplishing something for days while soloing is bad, which is what fighting yellow con mobs at high levels can amount to. But that in turn promotes teaming, which is good. After all regardless of the abreviation people use, MMORPG or MMOG, both have 'Massively Multiplayer' in them. But there are times, sometimes lasting days, when I don't want to team with someone, which is bad...Pretty roundabout arguement, eh?

In the end, it comes down to this:
I doubt the OE changes were trully made to balance PvP. It's too an inefficient change for that purpose. It might affect 1/2 the character's lifetime. It doesn't affect all professions equally (landing hardest on Engineers and their bots). But looking at it from the perspectives of balancing new/existing content and stopping the extreme cases of overequipping (again, in the Engineer's profession with slayerdroids) it does quite well.

[Chidoro]

Originally posted by Flann


Interesting you mention EQ, a game where most people stayed for a very long time and massive twinking of alts was allowed, unlike DAOC, where over equiping was actively coded against and everyone left.

As far as lack of content, well it was mentioned above already, twinking=content to many, many players, many do not even realize they are doing it and that is what is making their alt so enjoyable for them.

I am wondering why you keep using twinking as the most important factor towards customer retention(and I'm sure Funcom thanks you for this enlightenment). You keep using DAoC as the example of players leaving because of this. Do you realize that DAoC recently passed the 200k subscriber mark? Not only that, they are quickly closing in on UO and could be number 2 by this fall.

I don't play DAoC because I found the world boring, but there seems to be a whole lot of players who do. This exodus because of no twinking just isn't happening at all. Come up with a better one

[_____________Eidolus]

Here's a theory for you.

Remember the patches, back in the day, where they changed the damage output on special attacks like Aimed Shot, Burst and Full Auto?

If I remember, it was said that these attacks were doing too much damage.

I think not.

The real problem, I think, was that many people were ridiculously over-equipping. As long as you could farm the credits, you could just buy up the implants, buffs and gear, and I think this speaks for itself. It seems that a level 50 agent, for example, is going to do more damage with a QL 150 rifle than a QL 50 rifle on an Aimed Shot. A higher QL Flashpoint will do more damage with a Burst. Nowhere was this more obvious than in 2ho, where agents on the tops of buildings would shoot people for thousands of points of damage.

Being killed with one shot, repeatedly, is not fun either.

"Success" in a video game, which is played for entertainment, should not depend on who has the biggest credit card to go shopping on Ebay with. Please don't tell me about how many missions you ran to get those credits. I'm not interested.

Don't like the change? Quit. Let your wallet do the talking. Nothing speaks louder to a company than when people refuse to use/buy their product.

And, if the only reason your current character is better than mine is that this is your eighth go-around, and you're OEd as high as OE can go, you suck too. When the playing field is a bit more level, and more than 20% OE is gone, everyone will see who really "sucks." I think this will force people to learn to use whatever capabilities their character has more efficiently, and that's good.

[_______________Kenji]

Your logic is totally flawed. The reason why people leave DAoC and not EQ has nothing at all to do with twinking. It has to do with lack of content.
EQ has a huge world with lots to do, DAoc, on the other hand is a boring piece of junk. All 3 realms combined are probably no bigger than omni forest (the smaller part), and the level treadmill in that game is horrible.
People are leaving DAoC, not because they can't powerlevel, but because leveling takes too long in the first place, and RvR is a joke. The game literally moves at one fps, maybe less during big battles. I actually find AO, using medium resolution textures (try it out), runs 1000x better than DAoC.
Anyway, that's the real reason people are leaving DAoC, not that twinking reason you came up with just to further your own agenda.

I think cheating and OEing are probably two of the biggest things that turn people AWAY from this game. Maybe once they fix this, cheaters like you will leave and honest players will come in to replace you. There's nothing worse than a cheater who tries to justify his actions.

[______________Phenum]

There is a difference between use of tactics and brute force. Tactics requires skill, planning, and a large amount of finesse to execute properly.

Brute force can be done by anyone with the time and or money to acquire the bigger gun. The way I see it this over-equipping patch corrects a flaw in the game design where a person who is lvl 20 can “own someone” who is lvl 40-50.

True most people will they think that this takes talent to pull off. However when you consider that the average user base never equips gear greater than 20% (please remember that Funcom accesses copies of a selected number of random user base accounts for evaluation before implementing any changes), having someone come along who is lvl 20 equipped with a lvl 80 weapon can do some incredible damage.

True this patch will affect certain breeds more than ever. Namely the Enforcer is now more in risk of de-buffs and Nano-tech will have another mark added to there gimp record as over-equipping shotguns was all the poor bastards had left.

Personally I think this is a very business oriented decision and the player base opinion doesn’t matter. I don’t know what everyone else would do if they got grieved by a lvl 20 when you where lvl 60.. But I would flat out quit.

I spent a lot of time leveling my character and to have some lvl20 gank me would be absurd. Your lvl should mean something! Considering the future release of some alternative sci-fi oriented mmorpg on the horizon Funcom is doing the best they can to keep what few paying customers they have left.

[Shadelore]

Ppl who complain about other ppl who are overequipped, ingenious, inventive, are the ones who either dont bother, or cant do it, and want everybody else to be helpless....Well, fine by me, but that is communism, and that equals a shot in the neck in the gutter if you ask me,

Long live free enterprise! =)
Down with those who want to drag our twinks into mediocreness!
And very much **** equality & that piss =)

[______________Saruzi]

Well, my first Soldier is the only twink out of my 4 characters. I don't OE, its too hard. Still, at lvl 33 with a ql 55 nova and 51 Omni-Pol, it made the game easier. Twinking helps make it easier to re-roll, yet I only twinked this character at lvl 12, yet it was only with a set of low level implants. I had good fun with my twnk, but my true and honest characters were all suffering because of the OErs who had to get the mob HP risen. Twinking is okay, on occassion, OE however I think will be very well fixed now. If people twink every 10-20 lvls with outside help, now thats is what i consider wrong. Twinking should just be a kickstart to begin the game, not something to do until you hit the high level game just to be bored your ass off. These are my thoughts on this.

[_______________sloth]

Why not just have everyones equip de-equip when you enter a 25% or less zone, even the arena, or just the arena? It's true though, you just can't satisfy both the PvPers AND the regular everyday hunting players. I myself like to OE, just cause its that much more fun to take out an hour or missioning or hunting to sit in the shop trying to figure out how to get the stuff on, then hitting up a mission and busting heads. The PvP part I slowed down alot on, because I don't like hearing people ***** and moan, "Your OED you n00b!!", yes I am because WTF else and I gonna do when I'm sick of missions. Ok anyways my reason for this post got lost here, just make it when some1 enters the arena all their equip comes off and they get, instead of 15 seconds like 2 minutes or somthing to re-equip, whatever they can OE on in 2 minutes or so, power to them, o and in 25% or less zones make implants void...just a though, try working with it, not bashing it...never know

[BGumble]

Actually there is a simple change that allows for a reasonable amount of OE, allows twinkers to still have their fun and keeps things withing sensible limits.

Twinking only works because of big buffs, big buffs only work because you can get more NCU space than you 'should' be able to and NCU can be twinked too much, even without exploiting.

Remove comp lit implants from the game and replace them with a variety of smaller harder to find items, weapons and nanos that give short term increases to the amount of NCU space you have (like borg armour) but the total needs to add up to far less benefit than a set of implants does. Make comp lit skill green for every class (level playing field) then let people do whatever they want to twink themselves within the limits of the NCU you they have.

(You'd probably have to look at the comp lit requirements of higher belts and memories to ensure that higher players losing comp lit implants dont lose any real NCU space.)

Level restrictions on some of the more effective buffs (Mochams, big wrangles, Brutal Thug, High Essences etc) would also help limt the maximum that can be achieved.

I hate the idea of a game where you can twink yourself into 'godmode' and kill mobs or players just by looking at them - thats just silly but what this game needs is *more* ways of twinking (for smaller amounts) rather than less. Fixed percentages are far to dull and remove a lot of fun. I've never bothered creating a level 12 super-twink (I dont see the point unless insta killing noobs in PvP is your idea of fun) but every character I've created since my first has been better and better equipped - thats the fun bit of any new character.

[Razzitazz]

Twinking ruins the game in my opinion. i have never done it, never will.

Never stacked implants, never uber-buffed (outside of HP buff or crit buff), never implanted for NCU, then armor, then weapons.

It will be fun seeing my well equipped, not over equipped, MA fight people who don't have full QL 100 gear on at lvl 20.

[______________Serena]

Originally posted by Flann


As was everything I said. The diffence is I offered proof, facts and alternatives, you just offered your simple opinion. So whats your point?

His point is only his opinion is right hes a sad individual...

Mor that is not you Flann I agree with you completely...
Its also why his posts are on ignore he just doesn't have anything to say worth reading.

Twinking does not ruin the game Twinking ruins pvp something the majority do NOT do no matter what the PvP proponents would like you to believe. Instead of nerfing the hell out of the PvM to knock the gankers down a few pegs lets put in a PvP flag and let people fight anywhere they want to.

No I do NOT OE nor do I twink...

[OneManArmy]

After looking over this thread, I think some people misunderstank a couple of concepts. The words twinking, overequipping and exploiting are used over and over. Many seem to think they all mean the same thing.

They don't!

• Twinking is receiving items from higher lvl chars. Money, equipment etc.
• Overequipping is to get outside buff for equipping items, and when the buffs wear off, you do not have the skills for using that item.
• Exploiting is using a bug in the game to get advantages you are not supposed to have.

You can easily do one thing without doing another.

If I give 20k credits to a random lvl 6 person, that is twinking.
If I give a ql 16 hammer to the same random lvl 6 char, that is twinking. If that lvl 6 can equip that hammer, it is not overequipping as long as he meets the requirements for the hammer. Once the buffs wear out, and he no longer meets the reqs, that is overequipping.

You can easily overequip without twinking.
Just some missions, get some cash (running for ql10 pillows/cushions will give you fast money. Those babies sells for big bucks to other players). With the money, you emply people to create implants, and get buffs and whatnot.

Both things mentioned above is not in any way violating the rules.

Exploiting is another matter.
The old implant-exploit and treatment exploit made people way overpowered without even overequipping (most of them had enough skillpoints to take their 3x ql equipment without the need of outside buffs)

So, you see.... Twinking, overequipping and exploiting is three completely different things. Problem is, many people do two or three of the things, believing it is the same thing.

It is not.


btw: overequipping is still a legal thing to do. You just won't be as effective as you are today. If it weren't, they'd put a hard-cap at ql vs. title-lvl or something.


edit: almost all my chars are twinked (except for one ), but NONE of them are overequipped. Just wanted to add that.

[Razzitazz]

From my understanding you are correct on the over-equipping definition but twinking is doing every single thing in your power to be top-notch, through the use of over-equipping.

You see, I can fight a lvl 20 with a lvl 50 shotgun, he is over-equipped.

But when that lvl 20 figured out how to equip a lvl 103 shotgun by buffing shotgun, getting wrangles and buffing the base abilities to put that on. Then, doing the same thing for NCU and armor. Then, transfering credits -- that is a twinked player.

"twinking" your charecter until you cannot get any more powerful.

Too many PvP'ers are here -- or at least close to here.

[______________Kwoung]

Yup, I understand the terms Mmore and have have alts that are twinked and some that are overequipend now. I have a level 29 enforcer with a QL 65 Katana that took a mid size wrangle to get in to. The NCU he has is not done by exploits, it was all done after the recent changes using nothing more than his own IP, the implants he wears all the time and a +20 expertise buff(self cast) to get them on. I do not think he should not be able to wield the weapon effectively that he is now using.

The recent changes fixed the implant stepping exploit so massive amounts of NCU are no longer possible. I think my enforcer is basically using the very best 2HE weapon a newly created character can possibly use now at his level. This weapon allows him to solo 75% missions in a reasonable manner, he can not do 100% solo missions as he will die numerous times, between fight downtime is way to long and if there are enforcer mobs it is time to just delete the mission entirely so it just isn't worth it.

Is that a bad thing, that I want to play a fun powerful alt I took a serious amount of time to maximize, instead of the monotony of my main doing 50% missions sometimes? If my alt is just as limited as my main, to me there is no point in playing him for relief, so what do I do when I get frustrated with my main now? Which by the way seems to be happening more and more as soloing post 80 is ridiculously slow and I sometimes just do not feel like the hassle of getting a group togethe or I just do not have the time available to group.

In response to the other guy that mentioned how great DAOC is doing, talk to me in a few months after everyones 3 and 6 month subscriptions run out. Like I stated above, I ran a great guild with over 200 members, 175 at least quit because there was nothing left to do once you leveled up once. In most games, people make alts to try out different classes, in DAOC many tried and realized how painful it was, so they quit instead. Where exactly do you think the huge influx of players returning to AO is coming from? As far as saying EQ has content, well I will agree, but once you get high level in EQ also, the content dries up as well. The fun is in making alts and trying new classes for many people, although if they had to grind their way through as slowly as it took the first time they did it, it wouldn't be much fun now would it?

In EQ I tired of my druid, so I made a warrior alt, it took me 2 weeks to PL him to level 52 at which point I could then group with my friends again. I continued to play him for another year and a half before completely burning out on EQ. Basically, Verant managed to keep my subscription for an entire extra year and a half because they made it easy for me to change direction and not lose my friends just because I bored of my current character. In case you didn't know, in MMORPG's, when you are not within grouping range of your friends, they just seem to fade away after a little bit and the game then loses just that much more interest.

Anyways, my entire agruement is for the good of the games longevity. I truely believe that if you limit peoples power to over equip and twink their characters, you will cause them to lose interest in the game over the long term. So while it may solve some short term issues and level the playing field, I think they will find that the customers that may have stayed for many years trying different classes and charactyers, will now instead look at trying different games as a viable option. You see, giving up an account with high level characters and tons of funds/equipment is not easy, you basically have the power to buy your own enjoyment in the game. But if you take away or limit that buying power, you take away and limit the enjoyment, so there is no longer anything holding you here. ie: Its much easy to pack it in and move to the next game now.

[__________Terranigma]

As I am talking my account is going to be deactivated soon. I don't think any of you should pick on DAoC. Alot of players enjoy it .

The problem is no players interestingly in shops trying to figure how to OE. The problem lies in that the new players with first characters like myself do not have a higher level character to give myself money through a friend then OE.

Some of you interstingly mentions this is how a high level player should be able to enjoy himself after playing for so long , but thats a selfish view as to the newer player it isn't fun at all. To either get killed in one shot in pvp , or watch their wepaon do much less damage to mobs during grouping. Isn't it terrible to see a trader MUCH doing more damage then you're soldier with the best equipment you can afford. Sure you can blitz but I don't tihnk alot of newbies know how to do it. Even if they do I think it's a stupid and unrealistic way to obtain money.

Sure I agree that being able to stand out because you're more skilled is right , but being able to stand out because you have been in the game before the other guy the idea is just stupid.

Now going back to DAoC yes it was not as good when it was released , but it is constantly improving , just because AO is imporving doesn't mean DAoC doesn't improve. The patchs are more frequent and they fix alot of problems quickly , they are also oofering housing next patch. The RvR is way better now. The world is small , but why do you care? What use is a huge world like AO when there are little varience of monsters ,you spend msot of you're time just missioning. In DAoC you actually explore the world even thought it's small it's better more detailed and the pets and mobs are way smarter too.

At RvR before it was boring ,but now it's much more better ( at least for my server). They added a new realm where the entrance is open to the realm which is winning the war. This encourages many High Levels to participate in war and it's much more dynamic now. This new realm called Darkness Falls offers stuff for high levels to do that can give them very high level stuff and many new items , like decorative dresses. Do we see this content added on in Anarchy Online? No we don't they work contantly to fix the game and thye diverted their time in developing the expansion pack which offer features I don't really get interested on.

Whoever said the level restriction in DAoC is insane , yes there are restrictions , but you can OE just not Oeing so you can use something loads of levels above you. Most newbies have to use stuff under there level while twinks can use stuff over their level. Now it does make a difference not only so insane like AO. Saying that many players left DAoC is true , but not many and many more are joining them (like me) many of you say it's a crappy world , but whats the use of a much bigger world when you don't use most of it .

In fact a smaller world is better because the players will be more densed in each area so you feel more a part of the community .i'm enjoying myself plus classes are nicely balanced here however many people have different views and likes so please don't get pissed.

The orginal poster said he was saying his stuff based on facts not opinions . He is a total idiot DAoC has recently exceeded the subscribing amount of 200k. Now thats a fact

Guess why Anarchy Online never put their number of players online and has only 2-3 servers? All Funcom's got to boast about is that single award they have been given.

Anyway I disagree that the 20% change is harmfull it does not kill OE it only limits so it can't be used to the extremes people can still OE but just not to become supremly powerful if you want go play CS and use aimbot :P

Yes if players has reached their limit , they can leave , but they shouldn't spoil the newbies fun because they are selfish and dont' want their alt to go through all the trouble again if u get bored just quit new players will come if a games good. IF you say you're experienced and should't go through all the trobule to go back to the top go play a FPS.

[______________Kwoung]

Originally posted by Terranigma
Sure I agree that being able to stand out because you're more skilled is right , but being able to stand out because you have been in the game before the other guy the idea is just stupid.
*****
Yes if players has reached their limit , they can leave , but they shouldn't spoil the newbies fun because they are selfish and dont' want their alt to go through all the trouble again if u get bored just quit new players will come if a games good. IF you say you're experienced and should't go through all the trobule to go back to the top go play a FPS.

You can read my response to DAOC's 200K subscribers twice above. It is much akin to AO claims a few months after it went live.

As far as your statement about a new player should be as well equiped as someone that has played a very long time and has resources behind him. Well that is the attitude that is causing the wimpification of games in general and I am not surprised you enjoy DAOC more. Please give me one good reason why my playing a game for years should not give me a benefit over someone that just started?

Your response also shows a attitude that has nothing at all to do with interest the overall life of the game. Telling folks to leave, new players will come??? That is not realistic, the MMORPG marketplace, while growing slowly, mostly has a limited number of players to win over. It is in any companies(not just game companies) best interest to promote long term customer loyaly and continue to grow at the same time, not turn over their customerbase every few months.

Anyhow, your statement about higher level chars having higher level equipment in DAOC is actually bunk. As a brand new character in DAOC, I rarely had any equipment that did not con red to me. When I tried to make a secondary character I gave him the best of everything, it made zero difference in his abilities over a newbie. I tried using my wifes 50 druid buffs to make my character more powerful, but when you cast them on a low level character they scale down and actually have less effect than characters own buffs in some cases. Darkness falls, yeah that will keep folks interest until they get the new loot and realize that you can only wear a couple pieces before you have capped your AC and it is pointless anyways. Houses, whats the point and I can go on and on.

I can see why you like DAOC, you obviously either do not have the skill, time or inclination to strive to be better but you feel you should still be as good as everyone else and DAOC offers you that with their enforced mediocriity. Nothing wrong with that, but I personally get enjoyment out of striving to be the best character I can with both skills and equipment and I enjoy a game that allows me that option instead of limiting me.

[____________Customer]

um. Newbies ARE Newbies. They know nothing. By definition.
It's ok for newbies to suck. Newbies should suck. Newbies
should accept that they will suck for a while until they learn
the game. Games that require learning are complex and
hold interest. Games where everybody is prettymuch equal
regardless of experience are a waste of time IMHO.
Nothing in real life works that way. Why should MMORPGs?
I know everything seems unfair when you're at a disadvantage,
but stop whining and learn the rules and you won't be at a
disadvantage for long. Players who complain about the
advantages of people who have been playing a year longer
are in for a rude shock when they go to their first job and
discover they won't immediately be given the biggest salary
and the biggest office.

The 'rich higher level art' arguement just doesn't work because
we were all newbies once. I wasnt given a highlevel character
at release. You have to earn highlevel characters.
At least todays newbies have the advantage of asking more
experienced players for advice and can learn the game faster
than our first characters did. (not to mention not having to
live through launch) So just shut up an play.
By complaining, trying to get the game simplified and newbie-friendly,
all you're doing is ruining the game for yourself (and us) later on.