Patch Notes 25/3/2017

[RyanMakara]

Dunno how many times we gotta say suggestions like this are useless and we're not interested.

As many time as someone asks? You have no manifesto about what you interested, for us this change looks, like you want to slow lvling in t1-t3 in any possible way.

We express no 'manifesto' towards leveling progression in T1-T3 because the one thing we always hear are suggestions that relate to instant leveling/powerleveling, as some people cannot be arsed to spend time progressing their 5th alt. Perhaps if we got some decent feedback and suggestions on how to properly address experience gains while also stimulating the population to commit to RvR combat in T2 and T3, there could be something the devs would listen to and work towards.

The bottom line of the BO XP gain nerf is the fact that no matter how hard we try to make T2 and T3 have a semi-active population in which people can level and learn their career, people will always seek the path of least resistance to get to T4, simply because that's where the majority of players is at. Asking for instant leveling is going to get you nowhere, as the team leaders have stated multiple times that this will not happen. They do not want to hear it. Suggest something else instead, like better influence rewards, more RvR quests, incentive to debolster, or a better condensation of the population in the lower tiers.

Also, by the term manifesto I presume you'd like to hear the team's grand vision of how to deal with T2 and T3. The closest thing to that would be another dev diary, with potential aims and angles at which to address the problem, and other than that, simply reading the patch notes every week to see what we're changing and working towards, to ensure the given system can be worked with. This is a work in progress game, in every aspect. Handing out instant levels to 31 would mean we could simply get rid of all the content that's not T4. It makes you wonder why we even spent the first 2 years of this project on fixing the game from the ground up, from T1, through T2 and T3, just to throw it away in the end due to the laziness and unwillingness to find a suitable solution to this problem.

[wargrimnir]

Dunno how many times we gotta say suggestions like this are useless and we're not interested.

As many time as someone asks? You have no manifesto about what you interested, for us this change looks, like you want to slow lvling in t1-t3 in any possible way.

T1 is fine. All we really want there is to have the zones rotate and be meaningful. They flip too fast currently, and need a bit of attention. You get about 10 hours of play time before you hit R16, just by doing RvR and scenarios, if not less. We're going to end the constant Nordland grind.

Mid tier suffers this perception that it's dead, when clearly you have too many alternative ways to grind out as fast as possible. This was champ rats people ignored RvR for, it was the 63k XP quests people were exploiting with quest resets, and it was exploiting BO mobs for extreme amounts of XP instead of flipping them as intended. Yep, we got rid of that stuff, because it was not contributing to our goals. This is an RvR game, not a PvE grinding game. If we need to continue to take the hammer to the new and creative ways people would rather grind to T4 as fast as possible, then so be it.

That's just the stick aspect of it, and some of the carrots have already been added (pointlessly and ignored btw) with more stuff on the way. Give in to the despair that you will be doing RvR, and we can all get along just fine.

[flatfoot1987]

Dunno how many times we gotta say suggestions like this are useless and we're not interested.

As many time as someone asks? You have no manifesto about what you interested, for us this change looks, like you want to slow lvling in t1-t3 in any possible way.

We express no 'manifesto' towards leveling progression in T1-T3 because the one thing we always hear are suggestions that relate to instant leveling/powerleveling, as some people cannot be arsed to spend time progressing their 5th alt. Perhaps if we got some decent feedback and suggestions on how to properly address experience gains while also stimulating the population to commit to RvR combat in T2 and T3, there could be something the devs would listen to and work towards.

The bottom line of the BO XP gain nerf is the fact that no matter how hard we try to make T2 and T3 have a semi-active population in which people can level and learn their career, people will always seek the path of least resistance to get to T4, simply because that's where the majority of players is at. Asking for instant leveling is going to get you nowhere, as the team leaders have stated multiple times that this will not happen. They do not want to hear it. Suggest something else instead, like better influence rewards, more RvR quests, incentive to debolster, or a better condensation of the population in the lower tiers.

Also, by the term manifesto I presume you'd like to hear the team's grand vision of how to deal with T2 and T3. The closest thing to that would be another dev diary, with potential aims and angles at which to address the problem, and other than that, simply reading the patch notes every week to see what we're changing and working towards, to ensure the given system can be worked with. This is a work in progress game, in every aspect. Handing out instant levels to 31 would mean we could simply get rid of all the content that's not T4. It makes you wonder why we even spent the first 2 years of this project on fixing the game from the ground up, from T1, through T2 and T3, just to throw it away in the end due to the laziness and unwillingness to find a suitable solution to this problem.

Well, I've suggested this earlier (spoiler below). And Wargrimnir also said somewhere that the devs have some plans for T2-3, he didn't provide anything else though.

Spoiler:

How about merging T1 and T2 and separating T3? It just feels more natural as the game is more similar in T1 and T2 while T3 is more like mini-T4. The ranges would look like 1-25 for T1/2 and 25-39 for T3.

Just think of this. Right now people in r3x range are in the middle of nowhere. When someone hits r31 he's supposedly moving to T4 yet he's not welcome there at least until full ruin and r38+. And that means he's welcome to temporary pve rush. It's a grey zone from both orvr and scenario perspective.

Say, if I had the chance to compete against similar players in 30-40 range I wouldn't rush it to r40 because it's not as miserable as r1-r30 range where you have no class abilities, no builds and no gear/looks to choose from. We've all been through leveling dozens of times and to me no class feels appropriate until r30 at least.

You can slow down and enjoy your class in 30-40 range. This where you have most of your tools at your disposal — you can actually learn how to play in endgame. You can also catch up you renown rank if you poweleveled through T1/2.

All of that above plus some T4 starter gear rewards given in T3 (upgrading the existing inf rewards or just T4 currency). It would make sense to stay there for a while.

Combined T1/2 would work like this: you gotta cap T1 pairing in order to access corresponding T2 pairing and so on.

[zumos2]

Spoiler:

Dunno how many times we gotta say suggestions like this are useless and we're not interested.

As many time as someone asks? You have no manifesto about what you interested, for us this change looks, like you want to slow lvling in t1-t3 in any possible way.

T1 is fine. All we really want there is to have the zones rotate and be meaningful. They flip too fast currently, and need a bit of attention. You get about 10 hours of play time before you hit R16, just by doing RvR and scenarios, if not less. We're going to end the constant Nordland grind.

Mid tier suffers this perception that it's dead, when clearly you have too many alternative ways to grind out as fast as possible. This was champ rats people ignored RvR for, it was the 63k XP quests people were exploiting with quest resets, and it was exploiting BO mobs for extreme amounts of XP instead of flipping them as intended. Yep, we got rid of that stuff, because it was not contributing to our goals. This is an RvR game, not a PvE grinding game. If we need to continue to take the hammer to the new and creative ways people would rather grind to T4 as fast as possible, then so be it.

That's just the stick aspect of it, and some of the carrots have already been added (pointlessly and ignored btw) with more stuff on the way. Give in to the despair that you will be doing RvR, and we can all get along just fine.

The team seems so focused on punishing people powerlvling through T2/T3 while not dealing with the underlying problems: By making it harder to power level, people will not suddenly go into T2/T3 RvR. They will find another way to level because they simply don't care about T2/T3. Some ways to make people do these tiers is to make doing RvR the fastest way to level (or at least close to farming mobs) or second give significant rewards that are also usable in Tier 4. Currently if your goal is to get a character optimal gear in tier 4, it really is the most efficient to power level from lvl 1 to 31 and start doing tier 4 to get tier 4 rewards.

[wargrimnir]

The team seems so focused on punishing people powerlvling through T2/T3 while not dealing with the underlying problems: By making it harder to power level, people will not suddenly go into T2/T3 RvR. They will find another way to level because they simply don't care about T2/T3. Some ways to make people do these tiers is to make doing RvR the fastest way to level (or at least close to farming mobs) or second give significant rewards that are also usable in Tier 4. Currently if your goal is to get a character optimal gear in tier 4, it really is the most efficient to power level from lvl 1 to 31 and start doing tier 4 to get tier 4 rewards.

I bet you'll give up on this before we do. But let's keep having at it anyway.

[zumos2]

The team seems so focused on punishing people powerlvling through T2/T3 while not dealing with the underlying problems: By making it harder to power level, people will not suddenly go into T2/T3 RvR. They will find another way to level because they simply don't care about T2/T3. Some ways to make people do these tiers is to make doing RvR the fastest way to level (or at least close to farming mobs) or second give significant rewards that are also usable in Tier 4. Currently if your goal is to get a character optimal gear in tier 4, it really is the most efficient to power level from lvl 1 to 31 and start doing tier 4 to get tier 4 rewards.

I bet you'll give up on this before we do. But let's keep having at it anyway.

Honestly what kind of comment is that ... I simply explain the behavior of people and based on that what you would have to do to make them play tier 2/3. So far the team has not shown any other solution and you should know by now you cannot change the way people think.

[wargrimnir]

The team seems so focused on punishing people powerlvling through T2/T3 while not dealing with the underlying problems: By making it harder to power level, people will not suddenly go into T2/T3 RvR. They will find another way to level because they simply don't care about T2/T3. Some ways to make people do these tiers is to make doing RvR the fastest way to level (or at least close to farming mobs) or second give significant rewards that are also usable in Tier 4. Currently if your goal is to get a character optimal gear in tier 4, it really is the most efficient to power level from lvl 1 to 31 and start doing tier 4 to get tier 4 rewards.

I bet you'll give up on this before we do. But let's keep having at it anyway.

Honestly what kind of comment is that ... I simply explain the behavior of people and based on that what you would have to do to make them play tier 2/3. So far the team has not shown any other solution and you should know by now you cannot change the way people think.

Oh, but we have shown solutions. Several of them. We have taken quite a few steps to straighten this out and have RvR be desirable, time will tell if people want to play ball or if we need to keep beating on the grind aspect of the game with the stick some more. I don't mind. Grinding is ****. RvR is love, PvP is life.

[Aurandilaz]

I don't have any issues with midtiers for now, but I understand the feelings some people have, and how it can be very problematic to new players or NA players with low populations.
I have so many alts, either I play T4 on some "main" or hop to T3 if there is good action or I feel like leveling some char, or I make and level newer chars in T1. When you spend 5-10 hours a week in midtier, and only when there is action, it feels quite enjoyable.
However if you playing your first toon and are new to the game, facing many quiet hours in midtier can be somewhat demotivating.
Back when I returned and started levelling again (December - though I tried game on first day of release when it was way too buggy for me to enjoy), I started by chewing out 3-6 alts during first 2-3 weeks. (and within month of returning I had 4 chars at r40 with decent renown ranks, because of main focus on RvR leveling)
If my high level alts had good action in T3, it was okay. If T3 action was meh, I would just enjoy lower level alts in T1. I never had to resort to abusing quest exp eploits and if I hit a BO guard I would do it to get the renown from the flag capture.

If leveling and focusing on one char is becoming too troublesome, go with many alts, that can provide alternative sources of enjoyment.

[altharion1]

Seriously, you couldn't even get people to pvp outside of nordland in t1

You won't change people's attitudes towards t2/3 either.

[wargrimnir]

Seriously, you couldn't even get people to pvp outside of nordland in t1

You won't change people's attitudes towards t2/3 either.

So I should get triggered by you pointing at things that haven't worked? If you don't want to be part of the project, take it upon yourself and leave. We're pretty engaged in getting things done. You don't like it? Good. This probably isn't the place for you. There's plenty of MMO's out there where you can grind and powerlevel to your hearts content.