Friday with Means - October 28th, 2011 - Happy Halloween!

[Redbar]

About the bad behaviour with training and KSing in S10, I've never experienced that when I've been in there on RK1. Peeling aggro mobs off each other, sure, but I can only remember one time when someone attacked a mob I had already done damage to.

To everyone I shared S10 with: Thanks, it was a pleasure

[Triadninja]

Now that makes me happy.

I'm all for having a player economy, but inflated prices like that are just rediculous. I have acctually been leveling a toon recently with my friend as we have just come back to the game. I discovered that those dungeons you can find lying around the different SL zones are acctually a great way to level up with a keeper and soldier XD

But our biggest issue so far has been armor at the lower levels, as well as weapons. As a soldier, I had to shell out 10 mil for a perennium blaster, because thats whats the "norm" for soldiers around my level. If there were questlines to get full sets of armor + a decent weapon, and make a line like this for each zone, I think it would help the new playerbase with any gear problems they may encounter. It gives them the oportunity to get a decent set of gear, all while not having to farm millions of credits just to be able to progress.

[Siyra]

So is this another case of Funcom "having info nobody else knows about" being used to support their decisions in a fashion where nobody can question the validity, or sanity, of the choice? There's been many player debates of what is or isn't causing inflation, and many times on if there is inflation at all.

What made Funcom come to the conclusion that items prices have done nothing but go up since S10s inception thus irrevocably making it "S10s fault"?

I'm sure you have a bunch of stats there, perhaps the game records more then we think - but whether that's the case or if you have people watching the market where are you seeing the price inflation and how do you say "Prices have gone up it must be S10!!"

There are people out there that while they may not control the market have good sway in it. Hell, ever nub and his wallet can sway a market. Go to GMS, find an item that has 10 copies, buy all the cheap ones and repost for higher. You still get sales because you're lower then some outragious price but you're higher then the original seller intended. Market price is that easy to raise.

As well, there's that saying - Things are worth what people are willing to pay for it. We may not all be adults here but I'm pretty sure we all can understand when something is to highly priced for us and then... just not buy it.

In the other two MMOs I've played recently enough to know their market styles Second Life and Rift both deal with "inflation" except that nobody there runs around crying about how the game is gona die or some such absurdity because of it. Why? Because they cool their heels a bit and realize that it's not inflation, it's some bozo thinking he can make a ton of cash by charging a bunch of money for some crap. Now in something like Rift that's easy to predict because prices invariably drop on the weekends when there's more players and thus more supply. An item that was 2.5 plat drops to 1 plat. And then raises again during the weekdays. In the case of the specific item I have in mind this last week it actually jumped to 4 plat, and you could call it inflation because today now it's 4.8 but remember.. people try to make as much money as possible and it's the smart ones that undercut just enough to drop the price so that people deem it's resonable that make the most profit.

Now, you have enough supply and people undercut each other until price is so low that it's hardly worth selling. But none of this is dependant on some source of money.. but the source of an item.

If we were to keep S10 as it was, if we were to keep credit generation at that level and then introduce a new area that drops lead bots 90% of the time on a boss that any pickup group can kill what do you suppose is gona happen? Are prices of AI armour gona inflate because credits are being made? Or will they drop because suddenly the supply is better?

Removing credits only lowers the cieling of the market, everything is forced down in price because nobody has the money to afford things as they were and this may seem like you've won against inflation. But the ratio of credit influx to item cost is still rougly the same, it's not like prices will drop but money will remain high.

You want things more affordable, you want to combat "inflation" the way is not to remove money sources but to add supply sources.

My 2cr at least - take it or leave it. Clearly the choice has been made already and the game will just have to deal with it. Chances are all that will come of this post is that I'll get trolled by someone who doesn't understand what supply and demand do to a market, or it'll be ignored and forgotten amongst the plethora of other posts attempting to apply logic to the situation.

[LyrLazarus]

I guess I challenge the thought that you have to buy endgame items from someone else that did the content (I mean if you're buying it from someone.. they did the content.. why can't you?).

That's a ridiculous question. They can do the endgame content and you can't because they have the endgame items they need in order to be able to do it, the very items you need to buy from them.

This is exactly the problem. I am a casual player but have been around for years. I only recently got my first toon to 220 but he is an agent and is mostly unwanted in raids, and there aren't enough raids anyway because of the dwindling population. The people that can sell lootrights these days are the veterans that were able to get all their endgame content back when the population was high enough to do the content, or are people that did s10 enough to buy all of it.

With the current low population and my agent unwanted in what few raids there are and no decent source of money with s10 gone, I have very little hope of ever getting a finished endgame toon. This is the same situation a lot of relatively new people will be in. It's why I'm leaving and it's while they'll leave too.


Edit: Also part of being a casual player, I rarely have time to do a raid. They can often take 3+ hours to set up and then do, and I rarely have time to sit down and game for that long straight. Doing s10 I could be on just for an hour a day if I wanted and still make progress. Those days are gone. This is another way this change drives casual players away.

[Shareida]

If I remove the disproportionately large credit reward from the area and you say you won't go back there then we know precisely what part of that "lowbie content" was important to you.

means slaps %t around a bit with a large trout.

[Traderjill]

That's a ridiculous question. They can do the endgame content and you can't because they have the endgame items they need in order to be able to do it, the very items you need to buy from them.

Wow what? Let me give you a head's up here. I didn't have in alphas on my doctor when I was farming the items for my alphas. I didn't even have intels on. You must realize that the first folks to do Xan instances didn't have Xan gear on.. that's kinda impossible. So your logic is a tad flawed.

AO is a progression. You don't have to go from gimp to god. You can ladder up your equipment, improving along the way until you are able to do endgame and get those items. That is pretty much how other MMO's I've played work and it is really how AO works if folks aren't tossing credits at lootright sellers.

Start off with APF farming and Pande farming. Get items/armor from Dustbrigade instances and the appropriate Ofab pieces. Biodome is as old as dirt but the enhanced armor is still good for many professions. Ladder up to endgame.. have fun along the way playing the game and experiencing the content.

[Mastablasta]

That's a ridiculous question. They can do the endgame content and you can't because they have the endgame items they need in order to be able to do it, the very items you need to buy from them.

This is exactly the problem. I am a casual player but have been around for years. I only recently got my first toon to 220 but he is an agent and is mostly unwanted in raids, and there aren't enough raids anyway because of the dwindling population. The people that can sell lootrights these days are the veterans that were able to get all their endgame content back when the population was high enough to do the content, or are people that did s10 enough to buy all of it.

With the current low population and my agent unwanted in what few raids there are and no decent source of money with s10 gone, I have very little hope of ever getting a finished endgame toon. This is the same situation a lot of relatively new people will be in. It's why I'm leaving and it's while they'll leave too.

Lol what kind of madness is this? AO is not that gear dependent. I'll tell you what, go take a team and have them dress up in random stuff, then go do something and see how it goes. I'm pretty sure you'll be heavily surprised. You realise we used to do Beast raids wearing RK armor and assortet bits and bobs of SL gear because there wasn't any AI armor. People actually equipped the Beast armor sets for the bonuses.

It's like today, people just want to skip to whatever is the newest. Oh, you want to do Dustbrigade raids, but you're feeling a bit too gimp? Well, go do a few beast raids, raid some city aliens a while, and get some of those other nice bits of gear that are very easy to come by. Build Tier armor. Go to BS a little or buy some VP from the store, and get yourself some OFAB armor. There's like a billion possibilities for gearing up, and you think that the ONLY way to get it is to ... buy it from the people who already have it because they are the only ones who can get it because they have it? How did they get it in the first place then, if you can't get it without having it?

Seriously. As a casual player, you should enjoy having so much content available to you. Instead, you want to just skip it all and go straight for ... the place that I'm at. Where you have everything and have been forced into a state of casual because there's no longer anything to get and that you have everything in the game except for some stuff that you don't really care for.

AO is a social game. You must be able to make friends. Without friends, you're just better off not playing AO, because it's a frustrating experience as it was not built to support solo play. That you CAN grind money and buy most of the stuff from players is just sort of a benefit to those who for whatever reason think that horrible singleplayer games are great.

[LyrLazarus]

Wow what? Let me give you a head's up here. I didn't have in alphas on my doctor when I was farming the items for my alphas. I didn't even have intels on. You must realize that the first folks to do Xan instances didn't have Xan gear on.. that's kinda impossible. So your logic is a tad flawed.

Mainly I was talking about my experience as a prof unwanted in raids. I'm an agent so no one believes I can contribute to a raid. I have to show them my equipment and setup to prove that I can deal damage and actually be useful, and then there are people that won't even bother to look, they just say they don't want me.

Also, as I talked about in my post, you got your endgame stuff when the population was higher and more people were doing it, particularly when Xan came out everyone did Xan.

[Shareida]

Lol what kind of madness is this? AO is not that gear dependent. I'll tell you what, go take a team and have them dress up in random stuff, then go do something and see how it goes. I'm pretty sure you'll be heavily surprised. You realise we used to do Beast raids wearing RK armor and assortet bits and bobs of SL gear because there wasn't any AI armor. People actually equipped the Beast armor sets for the bonuses.

It's like today, people just want to skip to whatever is the newest. Oh, you want to do Dustbrigade raids, but you're feeling a bit too gimp? Well, go do a few beast raids, raid some city aliens a while, and get some of those other nice bits of gear that are very easy to come by. Build Tier armor. Go to BS a little or buy some VP from the store, and get yourself some OFAB armor. There's like a billion possibilities for gearing up, and you think that the ONLY way to get it is to ... buy it from the people who already have it because they are the only ones who can get it because they have it? How did they get it in the first place then, if you can't get it without having it?

Seriously. As a casual player, you should enjoy having so much content available to you. Instead, you want to just skip it all and go straight for ... the place that I'm at. Where you have everything and have been forced into a state of casual because there's no longer anything to get and that you have everything in the game except for some stuff that you don't really care for.

AO is a social game. You must be able to make friends. Without friends, you're just better off not playing AO, because it's a frustrating experience as it was not built to support solo play. That you CAN grind money and buy most of the stuff from players is just sort of a benefit to those who for whatever reason think that horrible singleplayer games are great.

Precisely. The only thing that is actually gear dependent is pvp.

P.S.: The other endgame gear (I.E. not Combined) is actually far superior in pvm.

[LyrLazarus]

You realise we used to do Beast raids wearing RK armor and assortet bits and bobs of SL gear because there wasn't any AI armor. People actually equipped the Beast armor sets for the bonuses.

I do realize that. That's why I talked about in my post that people could do endgame raids in the past when the population was high and it didn't really matter what prof they were or their gear because everyone wanted to do the raids.

[LyrLazarus]

Have any of you veterans actually TRIED, RECENTLY, to do a raid on a gimpy toon that is a prof people don't want? It's really hard.

Don't lecture me on how easy it was for you to do, because that's what I'm talking about, it was easy when you all did it but it's hard now with a low population.

[Shareida]

I do realize that. That's why I talked about in my post that people could do endgame raids in the past when the population was high and it didn't really matter what prof they were or their gear because everyone wanted to do the raids.

No, you look at it from the wrong angle. There are more than enough people to do endgame raids, but most of them do not want to spend the time in it or are too busy farming S10 with their 150 twinks.

Have any of you veterans actually TRIED, RECENTLY, to do a raid on a gimpy toon that is a prof people don't want? It's really hard.

Don't lecture me on how easy it was for you to do, because that's what I'm talking about, it was easy when you all did it but it's hard now with a low population.

Give me one hour, and I will manage to get a merc raid going with a stripped toon I didn't play since SL came out.

[Autohead]

That teletubby costume is too asian.

[Dagget]

S10 Bountys gone: good

S10 ICE gone: not so positive, needs to still drop -some-

S10 future changes mentioned: need more details

Observations:

We've never had any major issue with training and KS/ODing in S10 but that's mainly because we almost always went in with a full twink team that was proof against such behavior, as 90% of the farmers/griefers are either solo or duel logged and easily marginalised by an organized team. When individuals went in solo with anything less than a top twink, then they usually had major issues with intentional griefing from other twinks/farmers, though.

As for future team and solo boss content in S10, we really need some details -before- it hits so Devs can get constructive feedback.

It might be helpful if the Devs would clearly state what sort of credit amounts they expect solo chars to make at various levels. They can't run an MMO without such data and it would be helpful to the playerbase to see where they are coming from when making changes like this. For that matter, it would be helpful if the Devs would share with us their 'progression chart' showing what timetable they expect a person to get from 1 to 220/70/30. It's another bit of reference data without which they can't plan new content.

On Hecklers fleeing highbies - in the short term that would likely be turned against legitimate heckler teams by having, for example, rogue Enforcers jumping in the middle of teams and mongoing to scatter the hecks temporarily out of spite for the loss of the 'old' ways. Long term, though, it would probably settle down to much more reasonable Ely heckler activity.

.

[Traderjill]

Have any of you veterans actually TRIED, RECENTLY, to do a raid on a gimpy toon that is a prof people don't want? It's really hard.

Don't lecture me on how easy it was for you to do, because that's what I'm talking about, it was easy when you all did it but it's hard now with a low population.

Gimpy toon? That's where you've gone wrong. No, I'm not going to organize a raid on a gimpy toon period.. I don't care what profession it is. That gets back to my comments on laddering up your gear. But to be honest, for most raids.. if you have people that have their profession specific/level appropriate nanos you can pull the raid off. Sometimes there are issues but you can do it.

And as for doing a raid... I just organize them myself and that pretty much insures me a spot on whatever toon I choose to attend with. There's this 220 advy that for the past couple weeks has been organizing a lot of raids on RK2. Adventurers are not one of the 'chosen' professions.. but this guy has taken the initiative to organize and that gurantees his spot in the team. If there is a will there is a way outside of buying lootrights. But, when you can make a crapton of money in S10 doing practically nothing and just buy LR I can see why people don't bother with organizing raids.. they leave that to the professionals, lol. Well that option (farming s10 bounties) is gone.. so just go back to the old way of organizing raids again.

[Ahndracorvid]

Wow... how did a Happy Halloween thread turn so bitter in just 2 pages? o.O

I'm probably going to get flamed for even speaking but for what it's worth... I think it's risky for too many people to try and deny that activity levels as a whole have dropped noticeably in the past couple of years. Because FC needs to realize how badly we need a bigger population, and every time someone denies there's a problem I believe it gives FC the wrong impression.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it's impossible to get activity going right now. But it is definitely not quite as easy as it would have been say three years ago. :/ Some of us are fortunate enough to still have friends/orgs that can do content, but that doesn't change the fact that there are less active orgs/alliances around than there used to be and for a newcomer it can be quite hard to find the right "clique" for you.

Just my 2 cents.

*Executing Nano Program: Augmented Mirror Shield MK IV.*
*Nano program executed successfully.*

/flameshield: ON

Happy Halloween.

[LyrLazarus]

wow... How did a happy halloween thread turn so bitter in just 2 pages? O.o

i'm probably going to get flamed for even speaking but for what it's worth... I think it's risky for too many people to try and deny that activity levels as a whole have dropped noticeably in the past couple of years. Because fc needs to realize how badly we need a bigger population, and every time someone denies there's a problem i believe it gives fc the wrong impression.

Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying it's impossible to get activity going right now. But it is definitely not quite as easy as it would have been say three years ago. :/ some of us are fortunate enough to still have friends/orgs that can do content, but that doesn't change the fact that there are less active orgs/alliances around than there used to be and for a newcomer it can be quite hard to find the right "clique" for you.

Just my 2 cents.

*executing nano program: Augmented mirror shield mk iv.*
*nano program executed successfully.*

/flameshield: On

happy halloween.

Flame!



But seriously I completely agree with you.

[Hulk]

Don't see how this turned into a discussion about end game. lol the conversation kinda shifted to try to prove some other point.
Anyways I have 150's that will not level. Yes I spent a lot of time and effort in making them. It doesn't have to be bounties there but there needs to be something.
I require an adequate reward in order to be motivated to do PVM. whether it's more frequent Relays, lower value or limited bounties, better axp or something else. The relays are too rare to be motivation to farm alone. And the AXP not so great either. So please do something so that S10 doesn't die. It's kinda killing a community by taking out the rewards without replacing them with anything.

[Traderjill]

Wow... how did a Happy Halloween thread turn so bitter in just 2 pages? o.O

I'm probably going to get flamed for even speaking but for what it's worth... I think it's risky for too many people to try and deny that activity levels as a whole have dropped noticeably in the past couple of years. Because FC needs to realize how badly we need a bigger population, and every time someone denies there's a problem I believe it gives FC the wrong impression.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it's impossible to get activity going right now. But it is definitely not quite as easy as it would have been say three years ago. :/ Some of us are fortunate enough to still have friends/orgs that can do content, but that doesn't change the fact that there are less active orgs/alliances around than there used to be and for a newcomer it can be quite hard to find the right "clique" for you.

Just my 2 cents.

*Executing Nano Program: Augmented Mirror Shield MK IV.*
*Nano program executed successfully.*

/flameshield: ON

Happy Halloween.

Ahndra I agree.. its not as easy now to organize raids... there really is no disputing that from my vantage point anyway. The thing is, most of the people I've spoken to that say 'I can't get gear' haven't even tried to organize raids. Their idea of working towards is a raid is doing '/LFT Pande/Xan'. That is really a very passive approach and generally yields weak results.

As for people with orgs and alliances that can't do content.. and here's where I get flamed in game... combine orgs, build stronger alliances or.. at the end of the day change orgs altogether. If the organization you're in isn't serving you any purpose and you aren't able to contribute as well then what is the point of being in it. Being in an org with 3-4 folks online, even if long term buddies, doesn't make any sense.. and a lot of people do just that. Now I know you're an organizer and a leader.. so what I'm saying is pretty much wasted since you don't need advice.. but really the people that just do /lft and then get frustrated and go farm S10 and buy LR are the folks I'm talking to atm.

[Ravenneyez]

Thank you Means for removing bounties... I liked S10 and as a nab it was good way to make some easy credz for my lvl 220 agent that i havent played in months and is totally gimp. Because of this i canceled my sub and will move on to other mmorpg's. SWTOR is on the way and i would rather save money for it then pay 17 euro for this.