The Future

[merchantmace]

This thread is set up to spring thought. Nothing i say is going to happen or even might happen. It is to get creative juices flowing and i am adding my first thoughts to it as i go.

Shards have ups and downs. we kinda hit a low here lately.... and with my personal game im wondering if the infrequency of veteran... or players in general stems from a feeling i have from time to time. Sometimes i feel like we have been given too much. Like the combination of gear, abilities and being able to 120 all skills (though in the short term is exciting) doesn't take something away in the long run. Don't get me wrong.... i have benefited greatly from having all the possibilities i have. Probably more than most. Do we make things too available? are things too easy? I have heard our shard called "mickey mouse" many many times. That pains me for our dedicated owner and staff. They pour into this all they have.... and even writing this i feel like i may come off as ungrateful... which is completely not the tone i wish this to give.

I was a huge non supported of dumping the shard and starting over just to gather the most up to date version (still am). Its not for personal loss... but for history that would be lost. Is it time to create a new history? Are there ways to bring some of it with us? Ability to compensate players for their time they put in? for their donations and contributions?

This is what i submit to all of you... and feel free to put in your thoughts.... not simply to bash mine... be constructive.

1. If we were to start a new.. is it best to use our current client and revise how things are done or go up to date? I personally feel like we get more people in here that say they havnt played in 7 plus years and are looking for this age in the game... also could be because we are an aos period shard and thats what they wanted to be here.

2. We not be given the ability to have 120 all skills. Perhaps be allowed 2-3 chars per account. 700-900 skill cap.

3. Not have godly gear that allowed all great things and be medable. Perhaps spread it out into class form. Such as there would be a set up to make for a very nice tamer... and equally nice pally/dexer... and to create equal damage per second for mages. I understand how hard it is to balance melee and mage fighting style... uo has been doing it since it came out. I also understand the research and time it would take to figure out distribution methods total stat and buff points... im not saying its not a headache.. just a possible direction to seek.

4. Maybe take out the golden twiggy being lootable. I know its on individuals to control themselves with it... but everyone wants to keep up with the Joneses.

5. I completely like the easy gains and easy start... most hate starting alllllll over.... again.

and if we were to restart.. i personally would like to just get the bare bones structure of the world... and start in it... and have it populated with whatever the added content may be.. we will have to regain skills and abilities before we are ready to take on most of the specials we have.

I would love to hear thoughts (constructive) from everyone.. please take a moment to think and then respond. it is a serious subject... and maybe many of you have already have had many thoughts. I love the staff... the players and the world we play in.. i guess the question is... is wp not marketed to enough people. I would most of all like to hear ghosts thoughts on the subject...

And happy to remove post if it is a cause of an uproar.

[Ash]

Well i had it all laid out and hit the wrong button so you will just have to wait to see what i am thinking. i will say thanks to Ghost and crew for the shard and work they do. Also to all the players.
cya in game don't forget to vote

Ash

[Ash]

first thank you Ghost for the shard. I would also like to thank merch, avan, ghost and other players for making my game play so enjoyable. This will be the forth time i have started this, and yes the first was a wrong button. I think the game mechanics of skill caps and gains are fine. People should be able to enjoy the game without the grind of training or just having everything handed(not fun in my mind) to them. the ability to max all skills on a player is more of a bonus then a drew back to keeping players active for a longer time. There will always be an in balance of some sort warrior/mage, weapon damage/magic damage. The need for players to vote often is in part part of the problem. With the number of shards/games available the only way for others to know how good your shard is by letting them know hence voting. I think some new/visiting players my be put off by the low numbers of players. New content or a restart with the newest client may be the way to increase active players. I see that many have looked at this post and yet no one has posted a reply yet. i hope that will soon change.
cya n game Ash

[Dispiro Malas]

I'm the "Queen" of having to start over again.Its seems to be a pattern with me over the years, so I wonder who the "King" of starting over is lol. Anyways I'm dealing with a bad wifi.. its free and I have communication to the outside world, but I cannot stay in the game for 5 minutes w/o a disconnect and it really drives me crazy. not to mention the freeze ups cant move etc.. so thats one reason you havent seen me in game.. Im also a GM elsewhere and I dont last there for more than a hot minute w/o a disconn. maybe its due to all the content that they have all the SA and below.. tons of customs and its not liking this fair connection to well. so unless its a nice sunny day and with the window open, I might stand a chance to play wp wish me luck on that! . (i do have the full celtic desktop background art on my end with the normal black "transparency". background... with only one overight which is the female unhooded robe. i thought that was the problem but its not its the terrible connection.. takes pages minutes to load. and lots of timeouts)

*waves*- Dispiro

[Avanthar]

this is such a difficult question...one we have pondered for months. I do not have an answer..I do not know if an upgrade would bring in people..I do not know if a change in skill etc would bring in and keep people..I truly have no idea what motivates anyone. I wish I knew a method to bring in new players.

everyones motivation to be here is different and i can only speak to mine. i have been here for over 4yrs on and off depending on employment situation. currently i am in a state of unemployment hence my ever suffocating presence here. when that changes so will my time here. i play here because i can...it is free...there is no pressure...it is easy...essentially its a good place to spend my time when i am not doing anything constructive. i have accomplished probably 80% of what there is to do..i still have peerless to finish..still have to figure out Chuck Norris without Merch propping me up...these are personal pursuits that if finished are great if not...meh.

i have self styled and self appointed myself resident tour guide, counselor, body guard, meddler, and search & rescue. to that end i have made myself into as near as superman as i can...there are obvious flaws in my efforts as death still haunts me and my effort to assist often result in my death...i consider it the duty and honor of NPG to do this...again self appointed....i log in every day to be of assistance to others and not to further my own game...for whatever that is all worth.

if we were to scrap the system and restart with limitations and lesser toys...I would stay and rebuild accordingly...after being here for 4 yrs i am inexplicably honor bound to stay and do what i can to help. if this thread leads to action by ghost then i support any decision he would make..after all he is the one doing all the work.

i am not even sure anything i wrote here even follows the theme of Merchs post or really why I wrote it...Merch is trying to help and trying to make this shard successful and his posts should be treated with that level of respect.

[merchantmace]

I appreciate the tone and the words with the responses so far.

In my list before, those were just ideas to spin on... I do not want to play in a world i create... thats why i play here. I love the staff and my fellow players... I commend both Avanthar and Ash on their time contributions to new players. I obviously dont have "the answer" either. I guess from my side... i do see new players long in almost every day.... ever other day... not on a grand scale... but here and there. And they came here from seeing our ad or finding the web site. Most of them leave within the first few minutes. I guess im trying to find the key to keep those people that ultimately chose WP from the others... then decided not to stay once they get here.

The reality i uo is a fading game. And WP looks for a certain type of player. As Avanthar stated... this is almost a weekly powwow from those of us that are there. I just want to encourage people... new or old.. to put ideas... thoughts... or just things you notice... or the lack of something you notice... just put it out there and let our great staff take it from there.

[GhostRiderGrey]

WP was created as a place where we (the creators) would like to play. Some have commented that we have made it too hard, others, too easy. The upshot of this is that everyone has different skill levels, tolerances and abilities and, because of this, we will never please everyone. We do listen to player input and tweak where appropriate. As such, WP is always evolving and developing.

GhostRiderGrey

[SlickBlade]

hi all

Just my random 2 cents. Ive played here for mmm 2-3 years previously. Quit once then came back. I don't play here any longer so my opinion is based on where I left off and why. Hopefully this comes off as either a constructive criticism or just a blank rant to be ignored. No offense to anyone.

Very very few suggestions by players were actually implemented or considered. The veterans I played with all left mainly because of this. I understand this shard was created the way the creators want it... and the way the shard is now is exactly that. What creators want not so much players. To increase the number of people that stay it cant be that way. Its like running a store but you only sell what you need... very limited customer base who once purchase the few things that are offered go else where to shop.

Lack of regular events is another big draw back. There were times when events were run a few times a week and there were times where no GM was available for days. Doing champs and bosses is fun until you get all the rares there possible. But while doing so you collect way too much gold , there is no balance. Its possible to have more gold then you will ever need and every rare piece within a few months. There is no economy for veterans who have everything within a few months.

Player base is a big issue for drawing in new players. When someone starts out and sees there are 3 people online.. they will get bored quickly and leave because at that rate might as well setup your own RUNUO server and run by yourself. Voting is one way but there are other tactics. Ghost accounts although might seem lame is fairly effective. What I mean by that is either players or creators have chars logged in that arent doing anything but for online statistics so it looks like there are more people playing.

Donations are bad for low population shards (again these are just my opinions from playing on different shards). Main reason is the people who do give donations cut down their play time as the tokens , gold , items or whatever they would of gotten in the game over time are handed up front.

Skill caps are no fun but they are effective. The current shards with high player numbers do still use 700 cap system. I would name a few major free shards but I'm not here to advertise just pointing things out. I personally like the idea of having all skills on one character but 1200 cap was my pref.

Nothing personal (so no names) but I know some people quit because of a particular person who would camp all the champ spawns and bosses daily. This selfishness caused other players new and old to not be able to get their chance. You miss a boss once , fine.. twice, fine... a whole week in a row and they call it quits.

There is no balance with weapons or armor. There is high end and there is junk. No one touches junk -- this junk is in fact what ultima online was all about. The craftable armor is junk. Anything player crafted for armor or weapons is junk. The reason is the rares are much better so there goes anyone that wanted to be a crafter. This also affects resource gathering which is what drives a lot of UO economies. There is almost no point to gather resources.

Skill gain is very important for keeping long term players. If skills are too easy to raise, there is a cap on time spent developing them. Once the cap is met player goes farming. Once all farmed there is nothing to do. Here you can have everything you want. Not everything the shard has to offer but you can have all the tokens , gold , armor you'd want and then what? No player base to socialize with... player is done - gone. Skill gain should be hard BUT that is useful only if there is already a decent player base. With 3 people online the only chance they might stay is if everything is easy but I can guarantee you they will stay for a very short lived time.

Those were just my thoughts. As well as input from veterans before they quit, who did put in 1-3 years of their time here. Biggest reason was creators want the shard they way they want it not the way players want it, yet the shard is supposed to be for players? Ultima Online is a very old game now and the fans are looking for shards where there is population. I'm still playing UO almost every day on a shard with 100+ real accounts logged in daily so I'm not just popping in to flame rant. I liked it here but I mostly played because of friends whom I've met through here... all of them left

Oh another input. A lot of shards are running IRC with access available from the main website. This seems very effective as well as people can get a feel for the community before creating accounts and those that are starting out can login to ask questions and interact.

Ghost we had our good and bad conversations in the past. I'm in no way saying that you guys don't know what you are doing and whatever but as a UO player who put in a good amount of time here previously what I have said has been thought by many that I've played with.

If you were offended by the time you read this line do not read the rest please. The last paragraph is a bit of a rant.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

By no means do "creators" have to or should change anything if you want the shard to be the way you guys want it to be but reality is there will never be 50+ players here. Shards are dying off or being bought out by other shards so the number of shards is decreasing. The number of players is and has been decreasing consistently as the game is very old. Ultima Online was created as a world where players LIVE. Thats right a place where people LIVE not play. That set this game apart from any other game that has ever been created there is no game and doesn't look like there will ever be a game like Ultima Online. What you have here is WoW. Take away the resource gathering and crafting and all it is , is a 2D version of world of warcraft... kills monsters over and over and over ... with 2d graphics... might as well go play world of warcraft that looks better. I hate WoW personally played it for a week and thought it was garbage as I was expecting something close to UO.

[Yordor]

I'd like to see an example of a shard with high population and no pvp.

I've tried a few other shards in the past few months and wouldn't stick with any of them. One had between 50-100 logged in at all times but continues to have huge issues with player churn. As people create a char they get the basics down and then the rest is so stacked against them they quit after a week or two. This was with pvp btw, and all the players it brings. I recognize less than 10% of their online players names now since last logging in last Sept.

I don't see much advantage from having a skill cap. Having to log off my crafter so I can grab my warrior (or mage) just means I have to change chars before doing certain tasks.

Balance is always good. We could cap various buffs and make the current content much harder to defeat. My issue is that I'm not really interested in fighting stuff as much anymore so it would mean that I just hung around my smithy even more.

[merchantmace]

Not here to slam anyone... and for the most part have enjoyed reading the thoughts here.

I would like to first say... Ghost has taken MANY ideas from the players. There have been many changes to how things are done. Keep in mind they may not happen the way a suggestion has been made. But things have been done in one form or another. When staff is on i think they do a great job of being personal with the players. This is something you don't get at a lot of shards (in a fair manor) There is no favoritism (that i see) but there is always a smile and patience from Ghost at least. Since he is pretty much the only staff i see... its service with a smile as far as im concerned.

Ghosts comments were that this world is created as they would like to play. When i have talked to ghost about things in live chat... no matter what i have suggested i have always said " stay true to the spirit of the shard". I do not expect anything i say to become law. I simply have an idea... think about it... and present it. Its up to staff to say " great idea"... " ok idea... but..." or "that just wont work".

I have seen good ideas and some good points in EVERY post here so far.. I may not agree with everything that was said... but thats not the point.

I do have faith in populating the shard. i have seen over 25 players... PLAYERS... not ghost accounts on at one time... add some ghosts accounts here and there and we would be at the 50 or so. When we had those players we had a strong showing of staff... sometimes 3 on at a time... 4 i believe i saw at once. This was just over a year ago..I guess that is one things i would like to see more of is interactive staff. I agree in a shard like we have, we need a sense of community... a place where people come to play... and get there socializing in. A place to hang and get a laugh... or your 20 minutes of fun... along side active game play. I think the staff we regularly have on and the players we have are great.. social and helpful... and i believe the goal is quality... not quantity.

This post wasn't to bash anyone or put anyone down. Im not attacking the previous posts so please don't take it that way. I guess from some of the things i have read they were inaccurate from the way i see things and my experience here. And many things have changed... To include the bosses being constantly taken down. The change was due to player intervention... sometimes we as players need to keep each other in check... and create awareness.

I am sticking around regardless if things change or not... And the shard has my full support in whatever way it asks for it. And if that is to keep quiet... they just need to ask.