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majestyk

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Posts posted by majestyk


  1. I think this day will be used - however and this is a big caveat I think this will destroy the schools being used on normal days.

     

    That is people will wait for this day to come to go to a school and train. Thus this will help people to gain levels faster and they will save the money and they will buy less leather and thread from the shops - thus this new day will become a negative money sink.

     

    So from a game perspective this is not a good idea. It will hurt the game and add inflation.

     

    This is exactly how am I doing it even now, with scholars day. So for people like me, this will make schools used more. :laugh:


  2. I think most players that care about the issue were able to vote, the poll was open for a few days. Yes, not everyone has a forum account, but the fact is, those who do represent a pretty homogeneous sample of all the players in the game. In my experienced based on similar polls we had in the past, once ~50 people vote, the results will not be very different than when 400 players vote.

    There were a couple polls in the recent past where Europeans could not participate due to the time the poll was started and the short duration of the poll. This time, the poll was open for almost two days, which is a great improvement. Even if the vote of 50 players is a good sample, it feels good to know you're not left out. I was on the brink of thanking you in the poll thread, but I didn't dare to be off-topic. Now that you mention it I feel a bit safer, so thank you for letting me participate in the last poll :P


  3. I wasn't going to bring it up again, but it's true, people leaving the game seems (only Ent can tell from the data for sure) to become a real problem. Right now, I belong to a small but dedicated guild where most of the members are mainly mixers and logged on every day. For the last 3 weeks, I'm the only active member left. Hence I voted no, as most of the new features seem to harm the "harv and mix" aproach to the game, leaving the a/d trainers virtually in peace. Maybe the developpers are aiming for a more a/d based game, I don't know, but I agree that actions which are likely to take away the fun for a certain number of players don't really seem a good idea to me.

     

    There is no doubt that some people left. It happens in any MMO.

    The problem is not retaining enough new people.

     

    Which is a problem that already persists since I am playing the game. The player structure is very centered on veterans; those that make it over the first couple of weeks/months are likely to stick here for years. In the past 2 years or so, the newbie inflow has been just about strong enough to counter the veterans who departed.

     

    I'm just wondering how the depletable resources feature is going to make this game more attractive for newbies?


  4. Could you also elaborate on the features of this medallion, please.

    Without any combat stats this would seem to only be worthwhile when killing invasion monster much weaker than yourself and I doubt there's a real desire to promote that.

     

    As far as I recon this would make collecting animal parts much easier. I can already see people "farming" beavers, rabbits and rats on IP ..


  5. First, thanks for answering my question above.

     

    So far, I mostly focused on keeping the veterans happy. But after realizing how hard to please they are, I am seriously starting to focus on newbies. I am going to make a new server for newbies sometime this year, where the economy will play almost no role, sort of like most of the other games are. Also much more experience and drops, so the gold will never be a problem.

     

    According to Richard Bartle in Designing Virtual Worlds, the so-called "newbie hose" (which depicts a constant inflow of new players) is vital to any MMORPG. EL has a very small newbie inflow - the player amount has not changed significantly for quite a while, the inflow is just strong enough to counter the leaving veterans (which are not too many, anyway, which is a good sign). While focusing on newbies is a good thing, I think it would be beneficial to this server if they would start to play here. Sooner or later they will turn into veterans too, it won't stay the newbie server forever :P


  6. Most of the farmers made money by selling to players, not to NPCs. However, this does cause inflation, because the players are making finished goods with those items and sell them to the NPC.

     

    OK, so inflation is not good and you're working against inflation. According to the Wikipedia (which cites various resources for this)

    Inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time

    Don't you think that limiting resource inflow will cause further inflation? Since the base ingredients are harder to obtain, their prices will probably rise, followed by the prices of all compound products. Or do you think that the prices will stay the same?


  7. mayestyk both options would be bad, maybe people want to buy gold membership for their alt(s) too, which would double his income from memberships

     

    If you buy a gold membership for your alt(s) then that's even more bricks for Entropy, which is exactly what he wants to achieve with this suggestion (but as I said, this will not help the economy at all). If you implement both (This and Asgnny's suggestion), then this would reduce the possible bricks from gold membership for alts (but then, why would an AFK harvesting alt char need gold membership?) but still provide money inflow from other players while also helping the economy which will further increase shop sales again.


  8. Well, one way to partially solve the problem with the gold farmers is to have a "Gold Membership" thing, just like some other free MMOs do.

    There are many advantages to this idea:

    1. If we get a lot of gold members, we will depend less on rostos and rare item sales, so I can increase their rate.

    2. The economy will be less affected by gold farmers (see #1).

    3. Will give some advantages to those who pay for the game.

     

    You'll be making more money (which is a fine thing), but I can't see how this is going to help the economy or reduce inflation? There will still be gold farming, lots of resources entering the game, resulting in inflation. How are more rostogols and rare items helping the economy? How will the economy be less affected by gold farmers? IMO, the only valid point is #3 - people pay to play and get certain advantages, and you get some regular income. That's ok and valid in itself, so there's no need to advertise it by saying it will help the economy.

     

    Asgnny's suggestion does get more to the root of the problem - it will reduce resource inflow and thereby reduce inflation. How about going for both options? :D

     

    Cheers,

    majestyk


  9. Edit - found an explanation of the goldfarmer problem in asgnny's thread.

    I prefer asgnny's suggestion, too bad I missed the time slot for the vote again. I said that in the past, I'll say it again: please don't lock votes after not even 12 hours of time, because not every player is reading the forums 24/7!


  10. I still can't see the point of this thread - prices will always be what people are willing to pay for an item, if resources are abundant prices will fall, if resources are rare prices will rise (economy 101). I can't see any rift between consumers and manuers, and I can't see any problem in prices rising for goods like HE. If the price is high enough to lure people into making HEs it will fall again, and if not the price is probably just right. If there is enough gc in the game to be wasted on hoping to get a rare great sword, so be it - the price won't fall below the magical NPC price (this will prevent newbies from running around with Orc Slayers), and another hundred of them in any storage won't hurt anyone either (and will prevent the price rising). If that's the favourite money sink for some players, so be it.


  11. Once the current stocks dry up, we, teh ebul fighters, will finally be able to push up the price of the Ti long! mwahahaha.

     

    ...in fact, i think i'll stop my bot selling them at 700gc right now, and just stock-pile for a while :P

     

    .. and if ti chains are needed to harvest Irilium, you're in for yet another profit.

    I hope you have an alternative plan for your retirement pension :)


  12. it all depends on supply/demand again (*repeating it over and over*).

    In ancient times supply was probably higher. Nowadays way more high level players need HE and are bored by making them.

    So the price goes up, until more and more of those people think it better to make some on their own.

    I'd think that Newbies will not change much in this particular thing. Advanced players can make way more HEs in the same time.

     

    That's exactly the same argument. In ancient times supply was higher because there were more players for whom it made sense to mix HEs. Those players all leveled up while not enough newbies entered the game, which increased demand and reduced supply. Advanced players can make more HEs in the same time, but are reluctant to do so because it's just tedious work with low benefit to them.

     

    Edit: made clear that I was referring to Gilrain, and thanks Cruella for chiming in :)


  13. One begins to wonder how the price for HEs could have been 6gc MAX before it became possible to harvest on C2 at all. IIRC, all silver harvesting was done in MM caves then. Nowadays this is considered ridiculous, tedious and not enough profit.

     

    Maybe silver mining exp was OK then because there were no plants harvestable for uber-exp without requiring knowledge or tools. Maybe it was because there were more newbies in the game, for whom it was good alchemy exp to mix HEs - I remember a time when I was gladly mixing my own HEs, when FEs were too easy and bars still too difficult to reasonably make. I can see why HE mixing is not thrilling when your alchemy level is 103.

     

    IMO it all boils down to this - this game needs more newbies for whom it makes sense to mix HEs.


  14. I can use 7-10 nexus or 70 to 100 hydro bars.

    Each hydro bar takes 2k iron bars, 8k steel bars and many FEs.

     

    That's a misconception: each hydro bar takes 20 iron bars and 160 steel bars (10 ores = 10 swords). A hydro nexus costs 50 hydro bars, therefore it requires 1k iron bars and 8k steel bars.

    A useful tool: GWaR breakdown calculator


  15. What I would find intresting is how many rare items are in storages of inactive players?

     

    People that havent played for say 1 year or longer? I bet there are a few nmt's and rostos kicking around

     

    Goods of inactive players have no impact on game economy since they are not being sold nor used.

     

    And that's exactly my point too. Goods being hoarded are not sold nor used, so they have no impact on game economy. Why is the sheer number of anything in game relevant at all?


  16. In order to stop hoarding you need to reach a balance of availability and demand. When people realize that they can get what they need any time at reasonable price, they will automatically stop hoarding.

    Indeed, like NPC selling them ;)

     

    Please tell me one good reason why hoarders should sell their rare stones now. Even if it is sure that they can buy them back at a reasonable price when they need them, why should they bother? It's more work to sell and re-buy than just to keep them.

     

    IMO for most hoarders this is not related with financial reasons or the intention to make a profit. It's about "I have what I have" and "too lazy to bother".


  17. I don't ever sell rare stones/essences, so I am always able to aquire a new item should something I deem useful enter the game, or to replace losses (mostly training gear). The money I have is used to buy raw materials I don't want to harvest myself (sulfur, mainly) and to buy things that can be rarely aquired differently (thread, leather). IMO, it only makes sense to sell rare stuff if you buy from bots (they don't sell for ingreds) which I rarely do. Even if the prices for rare stones should triple, there's no reason for me to sell them: things usually require rare stones, so the price in gc for them would rise accordingly.

    The bottom line of this is - according to your poll options I am a hoarder, but I have no financial interest in this at all. All the things I have hoarded are for my own personal use, and I do not intend to sell them no matter how the prices develop.


  18. Now that it has been removed for being "too good" I feel like an idiot for not using it while it was still possible. :brooding:

     

    On a different sidenote: I thought map changes would need to be approved by entropy before they get in, I wonder how things like this or the diamond behind the chest in Irinveron (where it was really obvious that this was too convenient) slip through.


  19. If an "Unequip All" message is added, I suspect this would enable players to build up tons of poison damage (i.e. from toadstool), and quickly unequip all && store all. This may be the desired effect on the programming side, but it should at least be considered (might be too powerful, imo).

    They would still have to take the penalty of having to walk back from the underworld, therefore I don't think this button would be abused as a cheap poison cure. If you have the time to unequip and store all you can as well just take a potion.

    I definitely would use this button more than the drop-all button, as elg3neral pointed out it would make swapping equipment for different tasks easier. I often wished I'd have that button when finishing fighting training and going back to doing other things.

     

    Aside from the pure programming task (I know that this is not possible with the current framework), I think it would make the interface much more beautiful if we could get rid of those text-style buttons. If we had nice icons for store all, drop all, etc. it would look much better and would be easier to see the difference on the first glance, reducing mis-clicks. Just wanted to add this so it might be considered for the future.

     

    Anyway, I love the get-all store-all buttons. Thanks for the great work!


  20. Same for non-fighting chars - the easiest way to raise OA and to get pp's is .... to train a/d :confused: I didn't see a single mixer complaining about that though :icon13:

     

    Oh, I did. I'll use this chance to do so again :)

    - to level alchemy, you mix iron/steel/ti bars (base exp 120-180)

    - to level manuing, you mix leather helms (base exp 45)

    - to level potioning, you mix SRs (base exp 65)

    - while leveling a/d you can constantly advance to the next monster in row, which makes for a much faster exp gain. Yes, it's still hard, yes, it is more risky, yes, times between gaining levels still grow longer and longer. And yet there are more people having a/d 100 than potioning 100, or manuing 100, and that is not because mixers are lazy. Does that sound balanced?

     

    The second problem here is that all the other skills lack perspective. With a/d, you can make progress - you can fight harder monsters, beat more other players, maybe even work your way up to dragons. With other skills, you can ... well ... you _could_ make high level stuff, but you actually don't. You just got that high level ... to get a higher level. You can't put that higher level to use for improving in that skill, and that's what I complain about.

     

    And yes, I know I could play another game. I am just hoping someone comes up with a good idea. I'd love to make something else besides leather helms.

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