91 replies to this topic

[Cinquine]

... gave you a proctology exam with a cactus ...

[Mischelle]

 

Maybe she doesn't feel that way, but I do.  My level of dissatisfaction with renewal, and how my characters are trapped there with no recourse is so frustrating I barely have the patience to used civilized language to express my feelings on the subject.

[Cinquine]

It's not that I agreed or disagreed, it was just the interesting description, haha

[Chipotle]

Not sure what woe xellie has been fighting the last couple of 2.0 but we have had fights with valk and ano both separately,( because they are defending their forts ), but at this time we are pretty much stuck with Valhalla because if we don't we stand to get ganged up on by the only alliance out there. We don't share the same goal as vh in 2.0 and don't really want to be fighting about what is good for us and what isn't, But I would really appreciate quaterly Econ wipes, 10 Econ loss a break, reducing 2.0 castles

Edited by Chipotle, 21 January 2015 - 07:22 AM.

[Scuba]

It seems like the primary concern is being too far behind in terms of God items and MvPs. I have said before that RO has an age-old contradiction, the goal of 70% of activities in the game is to obtain God items or MvP cards in one way or another. (Example: You BG to get gear so your guild can win and get god items). The problem is when people achieve those goals competition is elevated and the people on the bottom are hopelessly behind. It would be great if we could do away with the discouraging impact of MvP/Gods but thats impossible without losing people who worked to achieve them, which is a very difficult dilemma.

 

I can't really think of a good reason to disable God items, they usually don't do too much to impact a player's durability or increase DPS by too-too much. Megs can get out of hand if a guild has enough of them I suppose. MvPs are another story, Tao, Hibram, GTB are all you need to disable. An average guild of 30 people would still probably lose to a 10 man party as long as there was a GTB bomber, Tao Pally, and FBH Hwiz (and strings). Then of course the real advantage big guilds have is the amount of OCAs they get which *should* put them ahead in GR/DRs. Which I have my own opinion on as well. I believe a gfist should kill you, I just do not believe that people should be able to reload gfist every 2 seconds (or it should at least be expensive to do it - see below).

 

However there are a load of other conditions that would discourage me personally from starting a guild. People want to compete where everyone has a frontline of 4 bombers and a guild needs 6 sacs to be somewhat okay. Then there are supposed to be like 8 champs to ground control. Seeds and bombs are used so carelessly its really annoying.

 

You know that feeling you get in battlegrounds when there is one tryhard bombing everyone? And you think, "wtf is wrong with this guy what a waste of zeny, bomb is so OP and he's basically 1 shotting my undergeared character". Thats what I imagine new guilds feel 95% of the time. I'd rather make bomb do half damage and phase ygg seed/berrys out of the game than make any changes to the God/MvP structure. 

[Gn1ydnu]

How would these changes greatly increase the WoE population? 

- It may not grow the population, but it may prevent a hemorrhage.

 

I think there is an over reaction to the decrease in population from November.  A hasty choice to player decline because an alternative to iRO showed up does not make for a good decision in my opinion.  I strongly feel after a few months these players will return to iRO which is the ebb and flow of the game.  Since the November decrease the population is holding at a pretty steady pace which does not indicate hemorrhage to me.  Changes like the ones proposed here could be the thing that drives the server out to pasture.  My warning is to the GM team that this could hurt the server far worse than help it. 

 

Majority will not return. A lot purposely got their accounts banned and/or gave away all gear/accounts. Some would return if pestered enough by others, but the majority wont because of XYZ reasons. 

 

@Scuba, My personal opinion with disabling gods/mvps during WoE is if it was to happen it should have been since day 1. Doing so at this point would only hurt the people that decided to invest years of their life to farming w/e MVP cards they wanted. That would really bother me if I had spent years camping GTB just to be able to use a GTB in WoE then suddenly all that time invested is just wasted. 

 

I agree with the dude that said to just reset the server and "do it right" this time. Wont happen, so wont bother entertaining the thought.

[Themes]

@Scuba, My personal opinion with disabling gods/mvps during WoE is if it was to happen it should have been since day 1. Doing so at this point would only hurt the people that decided to invest years of their life to farming w/e MVP cards they wanted. That would really bother me if I had spent years camping GTB just to be able to use a GTB in WoE then suddenly all that time invested is just wasted. 

 

Ding ding ding. Valk had some limits imposed from its launch and still worked out okay. While I dont agree with the disabling of anything, if you're going to do it, do it at the beginning. If you were to suddenly disable my Hibram I'd be pretty pissed, I worked hard for two years to get myself to a point where I could kill Hibram easily with a couple of players and then farmed away to get a card.

 

A lot of people seem to be looking at the balance side of things, what about KVM gear? Isnt that a huge balance change all in itself? Make the armor available somewhat easily then make the weapons a bit more elabourate or time consuming. Obviously keeping them from being exploited or any such things, but it'd definitely bring the haves and the have nots closer together if it was done well.

 

Also agree with what Scuba said about supplies, endless supply siege really isnt as fun for me. I know exactly how he feels about the "idiots" bombing in BGs, it was amazing, but now its so commonplace because everyone has supplies for ever. It'd be kind of interesting to see how things go over the next few months if a new challenge dungeon with seeds isnt put in as there's a huge lack of them available right now on the market.

[iamvrypwrful]

close all castles except 3 per woe gg

 

make the treasure 10x better

Edited by iamvrypwrful, 21 January 2015 - 11:31 AM.

[Gn1ydnu]

Treasure should be able to "turn in" for GSB or something along those lines (s. chainmail and other useless stuff that is normally NPC'd or given away in huge bulk to new players). 

 

Then replace some crap drops with "tokens" at a very low chance, like 0.5 before gum/vip/events. Have a "cash out" option for tokens, like 100 tokens = d. ring or 150 tokens = god part of choice or xxx amount of tokens for xxx amount of seal stones. The possibilities are endless really. Just need some creativity. 

[ElenaGilbert]

make supplies obtainable from BG, supplies like bombs, edp, coats and everything. make BG better put some custom ones like conquest and rush, close some castle and u might save classic

 

 

no god item/mvp card for woe

Edited by ElenaGilbert, 21 January 2015 - 12:49 PM.

[AlmrOfAtlas]

make supplies obtainable from BG, supplies like bombs, edp, coats and everything. make BG better put some custom ones like conquest and rush, close some castle and u might save classic

 

No, yes, yes.

[TheSputnik]

make supplies obtainable from BG, supplies like bombs, edp, coats and everything. make BG better put some custom ones like conquest and rush, close some castle and u might save classic

 

 

no god item/mvp card for woe

Smart.

[Themes]

If people are still having issues supplying what about adding an NPC in the annex that just trades raw materials for supplies at a worse rate than potting (3:2? 5:3?) and possibly less effective blues/whites. It's so easy to farm the boxes but we cant really improve the potting system and people still seem really unable to spend time potting.

 

While I do want BGs to be more fun and interesting to play, I dont think we should add any more supplies than are already there. Flavius is a -_- hole though and should get changed or removed, bring back Tierra.

Edited by Themes, 21 January 2015 - 02:22 PM.

[iamvrypwrful]

supplies is not the issue with woe lol

[Themes]

It may not be your issue, but it is obviously something other people are concerned with if they're trying to get supplies put into battlegrounds.

[Xellie]

I challenge anyone to name one instance where a server dominated by one guild or alliance changed to an even match or domination by a different guild or alliance under any other circumstances.

 

I'll come back and post more later, but reading this and the word "Afrikan" and "multiple times!" comes to mind. Deity did it too. I'm sure other servers had similar situations.

[Xellie]

Are we doing this to benefit the server or a few guilds? 

 - there only is a few guilds, isn't this question now redundant?

I pose this question because it's a platform you stand on.  The current situation is hurting "small" guilds that want to fight but can never catch up.  You've mentioned you are doing this for future guild leaders which means that these changes proposed are for the good of the server as a whole and its longevity.  This question is not redundant in my opinion and a very important one that needs to be answered.  Perhaps you could explain why you feel these changes would not detract future users from joining and not result in further population loss because the server decided to make decisions that perhaps not everyone wants? 

 

Are these changes really what people want? 

 - The current situation has led to mass quits and loss of population on an alarming scale. Is a lack of changes what people really want?

 

How would these changes greatly increase the WoE population? 

- It may not grow the population, but it may prevent a hemorrhage.

 

I think there is an over reaction to the decrease in population from November.  A hasty choice to player decline because an alternative to iRO showed up does not make for a good decision in my opinion.  I strongly feel after a few months these players will return to iRO which is the ebb and flow of the game.  Since the November decrease the population is holding at a pretty steady pace which does not indicate hemorrhage to me.  Changes like the ones proposed here could be the thing that drives the server out to pasture.  My warning is to the GM team that this could hurt the server far worse than help it. 

 

I believe I already answered the first part before, Flack. Please pretend you're looking to set up a guild. Right now it's daunting, but viable. That could change in a matter of weeks. Changes such as those proposed do not hurt users who are not yet established - they will know what the future holds for them when they start out. The only thing it should do (rightfully so) is slow down the accelerated age of the classic server.

 

I don't think there's an overreaction to the population drop at all. In fact Classic has been in this exact situation before. But each time it gets a bit worse. A discussion like this is over a year overdue. Also, when those players do come back, it's more like the current guilds divide and merge into theirs with the addition of pserver players. Whilst it creates a bit of fun for a while, it simply masks the problem with Classic. Go browse through the timelines of WoE 2, even when wc/hb were active, all the fights were in 1 or 2 castles.

 

I'm going to be bold and make a statement reflecting my guild here. We want more guilds to fight. I'm personally tired of the same stupid crap over and over again. I'm tired of inactivity being rewarded over activity.

 

What exactly are you worried about that would be harmful?

 

 

 

 

words

 

 Your persistence on classic basically heralds shutdown*.  The inevitability of another failed server is just one more opportunity for the dev team to realize what the root problems are, and then to do something about them.

 

*Though were you to disband, quit, or otherwise take a less active role in the server, it would also probably shut down.  If the classic server were a building, you are probably the last structual support for it.

 

It's funny you should mention this, there's been times in the past where people from opposing guilds have credited Valhalla with just keeping the server on life support whilst they are inactive. The worst part? There are people in VH who feel that way and thus obligated to continue playing as there may not actually be a server to come back to should we take a break. We spent some time in Wrecking Crew because I had real life things (along with most of my core) and just wanted to relax. Whilst Valk people sit on the forums and guilt trip us for not wanting to play in a situation that isn't fun or productive - Look I'm sorry, WoE 2 holds very little value due to econ over saturation. They seem to fail to realize we're not obligated to play.

 

I'm referring to the idea of a booking castle so we can tutor small groups. People vocally opposed that because we'd use it to "not WoE" which isn't the case. Are other players actually disturbed by the idea of Valhalla not taking part? Don't try to indirectly guilt trip me into continuing to play in an un-fun atmosphere.

 

 

Not sure what woe xellie has been fighting the last couple of 2.0 but we have had fights with valk and ano both separately,( because they are defending their forts ), but at this time we are pretty much stuck with Valhalla because if we don't we stand to get ganged up on by the only alliance out there. We don't share the same goal as vh in 2.0 and don't really want to be fighting about what is good for us and what isn't, But I would really appreciate quaterly Econ wipes, 10 Econ loss a break, reducing 2.0 castles

 

Remember what happened in the event WoEs? Chip, is that how you want to see real WoE play out? I wish nothing but the best for you and ID, but clearly you working with us gets you bullied by god toting alliances. Also I have your OCAs still from brit 4, are you ever going to find me for them?!

 

 

It seems like the primary concern is being too far behind in terms of God items and MvPs. I have said before that RO has an age-old contradiction, the goal of 70% of activities in the game is to obtain God items or MvP cards in one way or another. (Example: You BG to get gear so your guild can win and get god items). The problem is when people achieve those goals competition is elevated and the people on the bottom are hopelessly behind. It would be great if we could do away with the discouraging impact of MvP/Gods but thats impossible without losing people who worked to achieve them, which is a very difficult dilemma.

 

I can't really think of a good reason to disable God items, they usually don't do too much to impact a player's durability or increase DPS by too-too much. Megs can get out of hand if a guild has enough of them I suppose. MvPs are another story, Tao, Hibram, GTB are all you need to disable. An average guild of 30 people would still probably lose to a 10 man party as long as there was a GTB bomber, Tao Pally, and FBH Hwiz (and strings). Then of course the real advantage big guilds have is the amount of OCAs they get which *should* put them ahead in GR/DRs. Which I have my own opinion on as well. I believe a gfist should kill you, I just do not believe that people should be able to reload gfist every 2 seconds (or it should at least be expensive to do it - see below).

 

However there are a load of other conditions that would discourage me personally from starting a guild. People want to compete where everyone has a frontline of 4 bombers and a guild needs 6 sacs to be somewhat okay. Then there are supposed to be like 8 champs to ground control. Seeds and bombs are used so carelessly its really annoying.

 

 

There's a lot of sensible things being said here. However, we know that Classic is flooded with unpoliced items that shouldn't exist. This is a problem. Also regarding DRs/GRs etc, we can thank the website sellers, duping, bots on GR (lmao yes) and the econ oversaturation of OCAs. Whilst I hate the OCA-> ACA concept, it has a purpose stemming that crap right now.

 

Infinite sp items is annoying as hell. Gfist is stupidly broken on this server. I did the math with mental pots and VOH/EMH etc, and fist is stronger than any pre-renewal iRO server. Right now, a champ with VOH but no dring is as strong as a champ with diab ring on old servers.

 

 

@Scuba, My personal opinion with disabling gods/mvps during WoE is if it was to happen it should have been since day 1. Doing so at this point would only hurt the people that decided to invest years of their life to farming w/e MVP cards they wanted. That would really bother me if I had spent years camping GTB just to be able to use a GTB in WoE then suddenly all that time invested is just wasted.

 

 

make supplies obtainable from BG, supplies like bombs, edp, coats and everything. make BG better put some custom ones like conquest and rush, close some castle and u might save classic

 

 

no god item/mvp card for woe

 

hey, Themes can answer that with the stuff about unlimited supply.

 

Ding ding ding. Valk had some limits imposed from its launch and still worked out okay. While I dont agree with the disabling of anything, if you're going to do it, do it at the beginning. If you were to suddenly disable my Hibram I'd be pretty pissed, I worked hard for two years to get myself to a point where I could kill Hibram easily with a couple of players and then farmed away to get a card.

Also agree with what Scuba said about supplies, endless supply siege really isnt as fun for me. I know exactly how he feels about the "idiots" bombing in BGs, it was amazing, but now its so commonplace because everyone has supplies for ever. It'd be kind of interesting to see how things go over the next few months if a new challenge dungeon with seeds isnt put in as there's a huge lack of them available right now on the market.

 

And what of those wizards that obtain hibram/gtb/hero/hw bio3 mvp card in the space of a month or so? There's been 3 that I can name, I can't really tell if there's more. I know that one has been reported constantly and never dealt with. The difference between hibram and GTB is, you can stack hibram (since MS stacks) and it affects in AOE. A GTB is just one player. In WoE 2, that one player can be a problem, in FE... no. never ever ever.

[Mischelle]

It's funny you should mention this, there's been times in the past where people from opposing guilds have credited Valhalla with just keeping the server on life support whilst they are inactive. The worst part? There are people in VH who feel that way and thus obligated to continue playing as there may not actually be a server to come back to should we take a break. We spent some time in Wrecking Crew because I had real life things (along with most of my core) and just wanted to relax. Whilst Valk people sit on the forums and guilt trip us for not wanting to play in a situation that isn't fun or productive - Look I'm sorry, WoE 2 holds very little value due to econ over saturation. They seem to fail to realize we're not obligated to play.

 

I'm referring to the idea of a booking castle so we can tutor small groups. People vocally opposed that because we'd use it to "not WoE" which isn't the case. Are other players actually disturbed by the idea of Valhalla not taking part? Don't try to indirectly guilt trip me into continuing to play in an un-fun atmosphere.

 

 

 

I would like to ask xellie a question question.

 

Do you ever ask yourself any of the following:

 

"Why aren't more people active in this game?"

"What are the real problems with the game?"

"What are the real problems on this server?"

"What are the real problems with WoE?"

 

And if you do, what answers do you get?  Not the solutions that you always post, but the problems.

 

When I ask myself the same, I get the following answers.

People aren't more active in this game for many personal reasons.

The real problems with the game are it's severe bugs, including but not limited to position glitching, nodelay, instant cast, and packet sniffing (maya purple hack/ROPD account database).

The real problems on this server are the large number of poorly concieved custom modifications and the inclusion of mechanic breaking kafra shop gear.

The real problem with WoE is (barring problems already aformentioned) how easy it is for noobs to die and how hard it is to kill elite players.

 

Then, after you have listed the problems, what solutions do you get to those problems?

I don't know how to get more people active in the game.  Honestly, every person has different preferences.

The solution to bugs is to take the server software back to development and fix the problems.*

The solution to server problems is to ensure that game breaking items are not made available by custom inclusion or by cash shop sale, and to follow the vision of the game's developer with regard to custom modifications.

The solution to the problems with WoE is to use a scaled damage reduction mechanic to ensure it is not so easy to die, but not so easy to tank everything, either.  A dynamic logarithmic reduction based on the damage dealt as compared to the HP of the target would be an effective way to accomplish this.

 

*Postion lag is caused because on move the server only sends a packet of (where you are), (where you are going), and (how long to get there).  RO features the mechanic of "flinching", and while many MMOs offer a visual cue on damage taken, damage rarely impedes movement unless some debuff is also applied.  Only in RO does any damage instance impede movement.  This is a pretty sophisticated mechanic and one that I like alot.  But the server handles it poorly in many situations, going back the the movement packet, your client will show you moving to the desired location, but if you have taken damage or done any number of glitchy things, the server might actually have standing somewhere else.  Likewise for showing where other characters are standing.  A fix to the software need to be applied so that character postions are correctly relayed to the client.

*Nodelay is just a failure by the server to check whether or not information sent by the client is "hacked" or not.  A fix needs to be applied to check whether a character told to use a skill is within their animation delay or not.

*Instant cast is a glitch based on the failure to conserve numbers and the failure to anticipate updates to the game.  A fix to cast time should be implemented by reducing cast time logarithmically.  A mathematically sound method would be to split some value of dex into five time constants (X dex = 1 time constant).  Every X dex would reduce cast time by 63.2% of the remainder (86.5%, 95%, 98.2%, 99.3%).  This would make dex benefit cast time in a manner like agi benefits aspd, where increasing low agi has large impact, but adding to high agi has less.  Cast times in general would be faster, but they would never be instant.

*Packet sniffing is simply a glitch by the server sending out information to clients that they shouldn't have.  If someone is in hiding near you, the server is sending you client information about that character, just as if you could see them, but it includes a tag that tells your client not to display that character.  While having a player database is a very positive tool, the server sends out the account ID of every character and so you cannot keep yourself private when you interact socially in the game with different characters.  It means you can see if a certain character has a GM character on the same account.  This is all information about you that other player's game clients, or the other players themselves, doesn't need to know.

Edited by Mischelle, 21 January 2015 - 07:58 PM.

[Gn1ydnu]

Doing such drastic changes to cast time and damage received would change the game as a whole and turn it into renewal.

Anti ndly software is availible for free. I don't see iro using a program created by another source to counter this. Solutions are availible to block ap, but those won't happen either. If they wanted to do something then they should look up how other servers protect vs cheats. (Not harmony). Server checks client and auto bans if grf is too big or too small aka any modification.

As for why some people die faster then others... I would not expect an under geared newer player to be able to live nearly as long as an "elite" player with gods or MVPs or mini boss cards. I think we should welcome new players and provide them motivation to improve gears to live longer, not reconstruct the entire game do gears are irrelivent.

[Xellie]

Of course those are problems (I don't perceive instant cast as one but that is your opinion and you are entitled to it)

 

But those aren't going away.

 

It means you can see if a certain character has a GM character on the same account.

 

GMs are account based.... you don't know what you're talking about. You can't have a GM "character"

 

 

Anti ndly software is availible for free. I don't see iro using a program created by another source to counter this. Solutions are availible to block ap, but those won't happen either. If they wanted to do something then they should look up how other servers protect vs cheats. (Not harmony). Server checks client and auto bans if grf is too big or too small aka any modification.

 

For ATHENA. Not for the software iRO uses. It's like comparing OSX and windows or iOS and Android.

Edited by Xellie, 21 January 2015 - 08:43 PM.

[Themes]

Do you ever ask yourself any of the following:

 

"Why aren't more people active in this game?"

"What are the real problems with the game?"

"What are the real problems on this server?"

"What are the real problems with WoE?"

 

I dont really feel that a lot of what you're proposing as solutions are even possible, but I'll bite here and answer your questions.

 

 

"Why aren't more people active in this game?"

 

People are not enjoying it for some of the following reasons:

•  They're not having fun
• It's too fast/slow (everyone wants something different)
• It's too old/graphics
• It's too buggy (position bugs, inter server crashes at launch etc)
• Cheats
• It's not "Classic" enough
• Poor management (slow to update, not dealing with cheating, implementing weird things like account bound gear or swapping thors 1/2)
• Cant find people to play with
• Their friends quit because of any of the above

Solution: No idea, try make things fun for people. Get the GMs working on content people will enjoy and start logging on more often. It's hard with the current population but I think players need a good place to meet to find new players or friends. Janeway is a step in the right direction to bring in new or renewal players but it needs quite a lot of work to actually be a solution as players are just sort of abandoned with nothing when they're finished and expected to know what to do next.

 

 

"What are the real problems with the game?"

 

It's over 10 years old. iRO has zero control over source material and can only modify so much. kRO has also refused to support it and will not even so much as find us a proper 13.2 timed client with stat orbs or anything else we dont have but should. The players are more aware and knowledgeable than the support staff. The players have deconstructed the game/client so much and there's all sorts of third party tools to exploit weirdness in the game itself and are willing to use them to win the competitive side of the game.

 

Solution: Nothing, honestly the only thing I can think of now would be some kind of new client built from the ground up to interact with the already existing servers. There's third party stuff for various things but I dont think they're implementable in the current situation, I could be wrong though.

 

 

"What are the real problems on this server?"

 

The lack of players. Due to some of the stuff above. If we were still pulling 1500-2000 people this thread about woe would probably not exist and even if it did there would be entirely different issues to focus on. Inconsistent content updates, we're still missing New World and the fact that there's things like Nidhogg but no KVM, Nidhogg was implemented to buff Champions after the nerf they took with KVM gear. Also the bad reputation the server has gathered over the last year and a half, it started off strong showing lots of promise then theres been hit after hit after hit and people just wont respond positively to it after any of the following: Constant DCs due to inter server problems at launch, super strong rental gear, account bound gear, RWC zeny exploits, recent RMT/dupes the list goes on.

 

Solution: Mostly same as the first one, I dont think changing siege is going to suddenly draw in enormous crowds of players, there's still huge areas of the game that needs change to get the number of players we need to get things to "normal".

 

 

"What are the real problems with WoE?"

 

Lack of players. There's a gap between the guilds who are playing to win and those who are just playing to have some fun. If we had more guilds there'd be a more even balance and probably some intermingling of these guilds, but over the last year smaller/new guilds have just been consumed and absorbed by other guilds because that's the only option available to them as there's not enough options for small groups to participate. Cheating/RMTing/duping/autopotting etc.

 

Solution: Get more players involved, find new players or draw in more people who normally wouldnt be interested towards WoE. Start aggressively banning cheaters/RMTers and exploiters. The GMs still dont know enough about these things to take proper action and because any action is required to be properly documented its just not fast enough, soon as people start to see cheaters/RMTers showing up every week without they just think it's the norm and will join in.

 

 

Edit: Agree with Undying, instant cast is neat. While with all the extra gear we've been getting it's getting easier and easier to obtain I feel that its a neat mechanic and a part of the game at this point. The packet sniffing comes down to players deconstruction of the game, having ROPD and Ragial are neat and having to ask them to hide your dudes is a little annoying if thats what you want to do, but its better than not having them IMO.

Edited by Themes, 21 January 2015 - 09:06 PM.

[Scuba]

I wonder if there are any other RPGs with the same volume of private servers available. 

[Gn1ydnu]

So hypothetically, if we came up with "solutions" how would we deal with increasing the server population?

I'll lay out something's.....

-most of the players that left the sever since November will not come back and if they do it will be for a limited time (see WC).
-is there advertisements for iro? I would assume that most new players come from word of mouth.

Now for the real question, yet again. What is the target audience for attracting players to the server?

-"brand new ro players"? I suppose there will always be some, but tbh if I was new I would join renewal because it has bigger population and drastically more newbie friendly for PvM.

-players who have previously quit iro? They have quit for some reason, most of which I probably shouldn't post lol. Fact is most will not return regardless of changes, if any. Some will come, of course, but how many would leave because of said changes if any? Would it balance out and would it even increase it enough and it wouldn't add (or very minimally) any more guilds to the server.

-pserver player who are bad and all cheat (sarcasm intended)? Why would they join iro even though they have a combined player base in the 10s of thousands?

Just trying to be real here. How many brand new players do we expect to get to make up for the steady decline of players? If we do get brand new players why would they want to play classic and not renewal?

Not my opinion, but rather the logical choice would be to get a fraction of pserver players to come. It offers the best chance for an actual large server population, but then again how do you keep iro as iro and not a pserver?

Unfortunately none of this has clear cut answers, but logically speaking... If we need population boost then stealing pserver players is best option and most realistic but no idea how to do that without modifying iro into another game. There is no easy solution.

I can see some of the ideas in this thread as good for trying desperately to hold onto some current player base. Unfortunately I don't see any changes that would increase the population to a noticeable point where more guilds pop up. It's a start I suppose, but nothing more unfortunately.

Btw, I don't mean to be grim, but we are kind of in a tough spot to be honest.

[Inubashiri]

Doing such drastic changes to cast time and damage received would change the game as a whole and turn it into renewal.

Anti ndly software is availible for free. I don't see iro using a program created by another source to counter this. Solutions are availible to block ap, but those won't happen either. If they wanted to do something then they should look up how other servers protect vs cheats. (Not harmony). Server checks client and auto bans if grf is too big or too small aka any modification.

As for why some people die faster then others... I would not expect an under geared newer player to be able to live nearly as long as an "elite" player with gods or MVPs or mini boss cards. I think we should welcome new players and provide them motivation to improve gears to live longer, not reconstruct the entire game do gears are irrelivent.

 

There is no GRF that is the same as the next one, everyone's is different.  Personally I don't ever want to see an auto banning system...too many false positives.  Anyways those solutions as stated aren't for the server build that official servers use ergo are useless in this case.  Honestly the better solution is to recognize patterns off firewall packet dumps during WoE times to build better cases for permabans.  Person spamming a skill 80 times a second is obviously not achieving it thru normal human means.

[Xellie]

May I ask you a question Themes?

 

There's a gap between the guilds who are playing to win and those who are just playing to have some fun. If we had more guilds there'd be a more even balance and probably some intermingling of these guilds

 

At this point in time, WHO is playing to win? I don't care about winning if it's not fun (never have tbh) and I can only infer from your previous posts that Valk does not "play to win" as they don't care for rosters etc.

 

Point is, we are all here to have fun, aren't we?
 

Cheating/RMTing/duping/autopotting

 

Discouraging this in the community starts at the top. We know it's extremely hard to enforce Autopot. I never intended for this topic to spiral into the cheating issues as well with autopot, we have made some pretty concrete reports and nothing has happened. Autopots can be very advanced and ridiculously hard to identify.

 

So a small confession. Some people in my guild have asked for "permission to use autopot" and others have just gone and googled for it themselves, based on the fact that our reports have done nothing.

Do I blame them?

No.

Do I approve of it?

No.

 

I went there myself, I've done exactly 2 WoEs with autopot. And let me tell you something, it is broken as hell. Whilst it doesn't save me from things like Tarot Coma (where as prepotting does), it's good for those moments when attention slips. Otherwise, and I know a few guildies have dabbled with it... and I agree.... "Using autopot makes me feel scummy and scrubby".

 

I don't use it since then. I tried it out of desperation for even playing grounds and it just isn't the same game to me. You'll also find people who use autopot with very few notable exceptions have poor field awareness, and low attention. You can call me an elitist here, but forcing yourself to multitask will only improve your gameplay. It is stretching your barriers that creates improvement. If I used AP, my gear swapping would be insane as it would be the only thing I would have to focus on (I have 16 pieces of gear to swap during WoE), but I have hp management and sp management to focus on too.

 

And anyone who spends time in Valhalla will notice it, there's a general consensus that it makes players bad and lazy. We have people join us from other guilds who tell us it was mandatory in their previous guild. We have guildmembers who join who are frustrated that most of us don't use a/p. It is a community norm.

 

Are our values old and behind the times? Yeah. I guess. Not using autopot is probably right alongside with not wanting free supplies from woe/bg as woe is supposed to be the sum of all your other accomplishments in the game. Having to level and supply together builds the community blablabla.... Perhaps people who value that are a bit too old school.

 

So it feels like when we log in and play vs these pserver gvg only guilds, that we are talking about different games.

What a side rant.

 

Anyway, think about how to enforce autopot. It's almost impossible. Unless there's a software solution that is calculating the damage a player takes and counting the exact number of healing items used in response repeatedly.... there's nothing that can really be done to prove it. Videoing "afk" players using pots or knowing that people use a/p programs that are maplocked makes it way hard.

 

Thus I feel like we need an official autopot. Feels crappy saying that, but yes.

 

Also an official "tactical" GRF would be cool too. One with minimized storm gust effects, simplified performer song effects and more noticable dispell, etc would be really nice to have and maybe remove reason for people to google up for "bad things"