The Forum

VISKAH

I actually love the idea Lupi made earlier...

Everyone can upgrade at 0 skill
the 70 - 100 - 130 - 150 craft skill just increases success rate chance slightly (so the hard work already put in still has benefits - oh and SR too)
When an item is upgraded it becomes untradeable - PERFECTO!

-edit-
Due to the amount of amazing items in game already, you may say the above idea is pointless, however if this was brought into live for the cap raise, with a new amour / wep tier - then yes the items will still exist, however any new dropped tier'd items would only be upped by the current player. Damage limitation at this point i'm afraid.

a +8 stinger is great, and is it legit? Who knows, i don't expect Dan to spend hours of his own free time trying to investigate.
Best way to fix it would be to add a new bow that has better attack and then everyone is at a level playing field at making their own +5 +6 +7 +8 version.

Yes Chinese could start to sell the raw upgrade materials, the DT's / ToE's / intense stingers etc however that's a heck of a lot better than selling the finished article

"CUPID"Yes we bought items.. do we care? noo.. did we learn a lesson? yes.. did we get banned? yes.. move on idiots. Old.news.

"JACKELPUP"Sorry it has taken a while to reply to your podcast. It was very long and I have not been able to listen to all of it (until now) and compile notes.

I mean this post to be constructive, please do not take is as negative. I appreciate we all have different ideas and the most important thing to keep in mind, when making suggestions, is the effect on the “big picture”. That includes all other characters, the game play and the effect on the “real” person one the other side of the screen.

I won’t comment on anything in part 2 of your podcast – that was your commentary on the forum posts.

I will try to keep the order the same.

Outsourcing Coding
Obviously we would all like to see more activity “behind the scenes” to give us “more” on the screen. We also must be mindful that “we” don’t own the game. How would we feel if someone tried to tell us how to run it if it were ours? How would we feel if someone offered to do some of the work because they didn’t think you were doing enough of a good job? (even if you don’t mean it that way).

My understanding (happy to be corrected if I am wrong) is that Finito is one of the original programmers and iSylver one of the original crew (sorry, I don’t know much more).

There is nothing particularly wrong with offering to help but when “people” (I don’t mean you two, plenty have said the same)” shout out to the world” I can only imagine the game owners will feel peeved and undervalued.

Nothing wrong with dropping a conciliatory private PM.


Esoma Barr
The barr in Esoma was fine until duping came along. It was only the dying days of the server where it went haywire.

Barr is less valuable on this server for a different reason – the market is flooded with it. A trading place of commodities relies on supply and demand. Currency value is dictated by inflation. If the UK government gave us £1million each – would the local shopkeeper be bothered selling you a loaf of bread for £1 tomorrow? (No.) So how much would you need to pay him to make it worth his while – there you have inflation. That exact process occurs all the time all around us both in real life and in Soma.

As soon as you start using items as currency, the same will happen (and has already).

I am not advocating any change, just trying to shine some light.


Magma Beasts
Quite an amount of (part 1) podcast focused on these.

Before considering making a change to them, we should understand where they came from.

Originally they were introduced for parties to attack. They were not intended to be solo’d. Not long later some folk were capping INT and could solo them leading to calls that it was unfair on melee players. The response was to drop the magma melee attack.

They were considered the “end game” mob but that is now debatable with the introduction of the Enraged Boars and Shaman Valkyries.

In the “here and now”, many people still cannot hunt them (neither of my characters can). I saw you both killing them in the podcast as though you were taking afternoon tea playing lawn bowls. Fair do’s you have created characters that can do that.

I saw you leaving bone and weapons on the floor. Items that a lot of us are incapable of getting. I still have never had an untagged stinger drop – ever. I don’t think it is unusual or unfair, just a product of what my character can (or cannot) do. There are many more people in the same position.

Then we come to the proposal that the drop rates should be increased for Magmas. Doing so means that all the people who cannot hunt them still get “0” drops and people who can get a greater amount.

That’s what I meant about the disparity widening.

By the time the rest of us become capable of hunting them, they will no longer be relevant and their drops will be worth a lot less (the inflation that I talked of at the outset).

Which means the “rich” get richer and the “poor” get poorer (the top end players benefit and the low end players do not).


Balancing Magmas
To balance the effect you have to either make Magmas more accessible to lower levels (which has obvious negative implications and is a bad idea) or you have to increase the benefits for lower players on lower mobs.

You can’t do a straight % across the board, you have to stagger it (like has just been done with gaining experience – Dire wolves +50% Boars +6% etc). That would also increase inflation and the effects are already visible in your video.

Before Magmas and before cap raise, Bone had a value. Now it is left on the floor. There are a great many of us cannot yet hunt the mobs that drop it and when we level enough that we can, it is now worthless.

You mentioned you ripped 9 weapons at the anvil “yesterday” and only 1 upgraded to +5. Most of us have not acquired enough tablets to even think about doing that over the years we played. Yet, tablets and EPs have already become “currency”. A currency the rest of us cannot reach. The proposal to increase drops will de-value that currency pushing the rest of us further away.

Magma’s already have a substantially more generous drop file than other mobs of their level (BLGs, Drazil, NMs).



Maxed Items
I am delighted you both have maxed items. Again, most of us have not. I have never had a single “maxed” piece (armour, weapon or accessory) and I doubt most other players have either.

Of course we would all love to own such stuff.

You did say that you traded for a great many things to enable you to do it (like the Hero 2 essences). By inflating the economy and drowning values it becomes harder for the rest of us to trade (because trade currency tumbles in value and is worthless when the rest of us reach it).


Usercount low because of drops
It is certainly a good bet that some people have stopped playing because they have become disenchanted with drops. I sympathise that you have spent hours not achieving the level of drops that you want (I saw the fortified plate drop for you at the end). I am sure you can imagine the frustration the rest of us have at the BLGs, NMs and lesser mobs that don’t even have such things in their drop files.

Tom plays 3-4 hours per night, sometimes 6. Can I go out on a limb and suggest that there are not many other people who play that length of time per day (or can). I have no doubt that playing for such a long time every day when you have maximum everything can be tedious. It is not reflective of everyone though and nor do I think it represents the “average player”.

Can I also venture to say that there are many other reasons why people don’t play when they hit cap (other than for drops). I don’t need to list them, we all know them.

I know you both said you enjoy levelling – why the race to get max level with all the max gear (having three people on Subxero all the time)? There are a great many of us that take the game as it comes in the time that we have (and never make it to cap). Apart from being splattered, I think we all enjoy it the same way you do.


Daily Quests
The idea of a daily quest (you suggested killing 1000 of something) for a weapon (chance of, say, hard+ Stinger) is very good. It could be balanced easily with all levels of characters, mobs and rewards. No get rich quick scheme and no dis-harmony to the economy.

I would put it forward to the game owners and hope that they adopt it.


Magma Fragments & VOD
I had wondered about these – it is awesome that you have discovered their purpose and thank you for sharing that information.

Your efforts (and tacit confirmation you would share too) in VOD with the crystals are very appreciated. Listening to your attempts, it has caused me to start thinking about them and I hope others do too.


Criticism
Before the Podcast, you did ask for feedback, thoughts and so on for the event. Many people posted but I noted you were selective about them in your discussion.

The only way to properly deal with criticism (I don’t mean that in the negative sense) is to

1) Take it on board
2) Evaluate it
3) Accept it, adjust it or Dismiss (or any combination thereof)
4) Act

What we (humans) tend to do is ignore it or dismiss it (without consideration). When we do that, we are poorer for it.

I listened to everything you said in the Podcast, agreed with some of it and thought about the things I didn’t initially agree with. I changed my mind on several points while chewing it over – mostly because I looked at the points through your eyes as well as my own.


In Fine
Your ideas are essentially good. They would be excellent if you viewed everything through the eyes of the differing players on the server.

Of course people play for different reasons, have different amounts of time available, have different enjoyment factors. Very few are in your position.

Then there is “Cause and Effect”.

Any change in the game is a “Cause” which leads to an effect. Understanding how the “Big Picture” changes were a proposal come to fruition will better help you understand where everyone else is coming from.

I also see iSylver has responded by increasing levelling speeds and drop rates from CTF. I would take that as a significant success to your endeavours.

Thank you iSylver and Finito.

Thanks for the Podcast and for being Somarians. Keep up the work guys.

8)

Jac

PS. Has anyone got any spare +8 dex accessories (I need 4) and maxed out evasion gear( 4 pieces) for free to help out a poor sap please?