Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
- 6.2K All Categories
- 3.1K Everything Achaea
- 1.5K North of Thera
- 26 Archives of the Terraformer
- 257 The Matsuhama Arena
- 885 The Golden Dais of Creation
- 299 The Scarlattan Theatre
- 149 The Blank Canvas
- 2K Getting Help
- 412 General Questions
- 258 Quick Class Questions
- 1.3K Tech Support
- 313 Client Help
- 486 Curing Systems and Scripts
- 841 Off-Topic
- 255 The Wander Inn
- 586 The Universal Membrane
- 298 Class Discussions
- 298 Individual Class Sections
- 20 Alchemist
- 9 Apostate
- 30 Blademaster
- 9 Depthswalker
- 14 Druid
- 4 Infernal
- 20 Jester
- 19 Magi
- 34 Monk
- 11 Occultist
- 8 Paladin
- 7 Priest
- 29 Runewarden
- 18 Sentinel
- 26 Serpent
- 20 Shaman
- 9 Sylvan
Comments
Additionally, with most promotional items not being available for bound credits, people will still want the newest gadget, collectible, cosmetic, or circumstantial bonus that's being pushed on the market for the month. The tokens are a perfect example. Paux can't do very many adventures do to the being around during off-peak hours and the fact that I don't have my marque, seafaring, a ship, a pebble, or agith'maal card. So When I look at that list, I see 287 items I just can't do and a few that I can do if I'm careful and if the opportunity presents itself (eg, the mob isn't dead). After finally completing an adventure, I eagerly went to spin the wheel. I watched as someone spun the wheel and got a set of artefact bracers and thought "Wow, I could get something awesome!". I spun the wheel and got a critical bonus. Frustrated, I purchased a token for $9.99 to spin again and got an artefact vial- something I would have never bought for myself and adds little value to my character. So I spent $9.99 to get 26bcr in value.
And if someone does hit 20bcr a day for 2 years and amasses a good amount of credits, then they'll feel like the game is rewarding them for playing and they'll keep playing. I know Druids who logged in religiously to get their lessons from their Grove Hive because it was adding value to their time. And there were times they popped in to get them and left, but sometimes they logged in thinking they were going to just leave and found something interesting that kept them there and they continued adding to the live atmosphere of Achaea. And they still bought credits to get the newest pet crate!
In my opinion the problem with the market isn't that young free to play players can make credits everyday and work toward becoming established characters- it's that established characters can do it faster, easier, and more efficiently, choking out the new players from getting them. Which is a balance, because you want people to feel they're getting value while also protecting the interests of young inexperienced players.
Love the adventures thing, I just wish I could do more of them.
The only issue I have for me personally, is that I can only play a few hours a day after work and getting renown as a lvl 82 with practically zero artifacts or ship/seafaring, is stupidly hard solo, I barely get 300-400 and that's if I manage to kill someone in Annwyn and get some spars in, else It's much less than that.
If I can get to do a foray it all changes, many have and you are amazing. However, that is dependent on people actually being around that are strong enough and willing, as they may be wanting to do something different with thier own login time, which is completely understandable.
I'd like to see the PK adventures buffed up a bit now that they can't be farmed on citymates. As well as the detonating/disarming tanks. Not much really compares to voyages/hunting ones right now.
Could also expand the lists. Add the UW Ur'vamps/Kemnast to the list. Contract adventure for marks, one for relinquishing essence during a crusade. I'd also like to see exploration given some more options if it is to remain a theme. And I do think quests should be buffed up a bit. The UW quests are the only ones that feel worth it for renown, would love to see things like the Elemental faction quests raised to the same standard for renown, as well as places like Tir and Annwyn.
But, I've been having a damn blast with this system thus far.
They immediately got slaughtered. To the point that they weren't even able to kill the mobs to get even close to the boss. Maybe the scaling has actually been fixed... but the difference between level 80 and level 99 isn't just level. It's a TON of arties.
Unless you mean 4 overall vs 6 overall.
If we're adding stuff to a wish list, I'd like to see Creville added personally.
→My Mudlet Scripts
→My Mudlet Scripts
I login and I'm not motivated to even try because 90% of them are kill X mob (that's already killed). The rest being fight players or do seamonster hunting are not the easiest or most possible to do. I'm probably missing an untapped portion I could be accessing that isn't on the list.
Other IREs are doing it so much better than Achaea. Maybe there's limitations or something I'm not aware of but even when adventures existed before there were more choices. Can we involve things like gambling, or actual exploration (like discovering a location you've not been before, like a new room), or hitting a certain rank on a ranking, or a hundred other aspects of the game that are being ignored.
Here's a few more: Submitting a crafting design, approving one, having one approved, crafting an item via a tradeskill.
BIG SUGGESTION: Have the theme make ALL adventures tied to it double renown. It's not going to break the game.
Secondly, I do not see where the arguement before makes any sense. The basic idea of buying credits and things for online games has always been that you can work for it, or take this easier root to get it quickly. This simply allows this choice to be struck, instead of forcing people to pay or end up weaker. Thanks to the admin for making this system, I look forward to working my through each of these tasks and exploring what happens.
The system is just not engaging because the types of things you can do to work for it are tedious and uninteresting. It's not enjoyable to use.
Most of it requires teamwork or significant financial investment (ships, pvp), which is fine. But if you have limited time to play, different hours than most people, or you're relying on this system to get you going, you're pretty screwed. I'm a loner and socially awkward in real life - I'm writing a post about a MUD at 2 AM! No matter how hard I try to roleplay the opposite, I'm still going to struggle to make friends and do these things. This point is personal to me so it most likely doesn't apply to anyone else, but that turns this system into a major obstacle for me to overcome daily.
What I would like is more things added to it that are engaging and rewarding. If they're easier to do, then do what other games did: all of the easy stuff (like exploring a new room, playing blackjack, doing a daily quest) will only ever reward you with 10 credits total out of the 20 possible. Converting the adventure system seems to be more of an issue than help.
This system has three major problems:
1. You have to EMBARK before accomplishing a task.
2. The renown amounts are secret.
3. There are not enough choices.
Expanding on that:
Renown should be something that happens passively and naturally to you playing and not an incredibly unwieldy list of stuff you have to hope you don't type the wrong number for and screw yourself. Have the EMBARK part changed to DISEMBARK and allow people to claim adventure renown. That's thematically more appropriate, too. Not knowing the renown amounts makes picking that ONE-TIME double bonus even harder. The majority of the people who are doing them successfully each month have hit a rotation of doing the same thing each month and that leaves certain adventures harder to accomplish for others. This is mostly mobs being dead and people constantly seamonstering.
I don't want it to be easy to get 20 credits every day. That would be bad for a lot of reasons. I want it to be fun to get a good portion without making it your only goal for the day. I want it to feel like a reward for playing and not a chore. Getting that taste of bound credits doesn't allow you the luxury of Maya Crowns, Talismans, or selling them for heaps of gold. There's still a lot of reasons to spend money.
Click the spoiler for my thoughts on game design:
---
I have a game you can play for free called "Chess" and when you manage to move one of your pieces to the opposite side of the board, a slow and arduous journey which requires a lot of planning and work, you can promote it to be the most powerful piece on the board (or one of many). Thankfully, you have 8 pawns and 8 other uniquely powerful pieces ready to go to help you accomplish this task.
Now imagine that same game but this time, you only have half as many pawns and that's it. However, you can spend money to recover the pieces you're missing and even promote your pawns right away. You can still make your way there with the pieces you want and it is still possible, just difficult.
---
Just being able to "Work for it" is not enough to be a fair, engaging, or worthwhile. The point is to make that "Work for it" fun enough that when a roadblock comes up, the money flows easily. It's a balancing act to fill your world with players and give a means for more people to gain investment in the game. Investment into the game usually brings about spending by forging a connection. It takes the game and turns it into a valuable hobby which the player wants to support.
Why would you want more people to have more stuff? There's always more stuff to be had! The world is filled with people who are taking part in it also gives players more confidence when buying. If more people are invested and playing, then there's more content being created by the player base and more of a reason to invest. This is why MMOs go free-to-play and find themselves even more profitable than a subscription model. Achaea has existed this long because it was always a free-to-play microtransactions game. It suffers from the niche type of game it is and the competition between itself and the other top-ten muds on the voting site.
I don't believe getting 20 credits a day should be easy and take you a few minutes. That would be a bad thing. It would be bad for the same reason this being too hard and unengaging is bad: It would mean playing for the login bonus(Renown) and logging out. This is what a lot of people are doing currently.
Think of any other microtransaction game you've ever played. You have a login bonus just for playing. There's a lot to do that's free and engaging. Eventually, there's a sale for premium content/currency. Then you hit a roadblock and either spend your accumulated login bonus or purchase.
Now to look at that in Achaea terms: You have a login bonus just for playing(That's supposed to be the renown system). There's a lot to do that's free and engaging(Talk to people, quest, hunt, city/guild/order, Roleplay, fishing, etc). Eventually, there's a sale for premium content/currency(Monthly promos). Then you hit a roadblock(Needing an artefact or trying to learn a skill) and either spend your accumulated login bonus(About 290 credits for one major skill, 15 days worth of maximized renown) or purchase(Membership/Promo/No-Brainer).
Right now, when you login, and if you're trying to get the maximum free credits, it could take your entire available playtime. You may never get to the other free and engaging part of the world. (I would give 10 renown for people doing a custom EMOTE, for example. You can only earn renown from a source once per RL day anyway.) The HOOK is the roadblock.
And the greater the rewards for this are, the more problematic this becomes. This month we even have a promo that is based on reaching the renown cap - something that really requires you to abandon your normal playstyle and simply spend all of your play time renown-farming. I know this is entirely optional (I, for one, won't be doing it), but I still dislike how it encourages a very one-dimensional form of playing.
→My Mudlet Scripts
I started playing a short time before the adventure system was implemented and during that time I had the opportunity to participate often in raids, defenses, and other group content because quite simply they were always occurring. While I think that the addition of alternative credit avenues, especially for novices is GREAT, now it seems that this system has caused a steep decline in the amount of time I've spent doing... anything, with anyone. Everyone is always busy doing forays or things that require being a dragon, spending the majority of their time trying to cap at 2000 renown each day and I find that rather disappointing when I compare it to the experience I had in my first month.
Personally, I don't understand why such a system favours the long-term players that are in less dire need of credits compared to the need of newer players.
If you are not Dragon and don't have many artifacts and don't have ship/seafaring, then you'll be hard pushed to get 200/300 renown a day. Need to be more choices for us little people.
This. And it isn't usually hard to get enough people to go bash Mhunna or Khulhedra (easier than Mhunna) for enough to get a free spin. You can even hit and run with relative ease. You may not cap out, but it's enough for a couple credits and a spin. Honestly, I like the system. You can put as much time/effort in as needed/wanted. For the tougher ones it requires interaction with House, City, Order, etc. 3-5cr a day is not bad for a newbie honestly. And it only gets better up to 20 as you go along. I think it's at a decent balance point.
The one thing I think would be nice, if changed, is that resolutions should be swapped over to be adventures. Maybe even keep the token prize for the resolutions since it is it's own currency. And maybe make it so that adventures are auto-completed without embarking.