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Any ideas to bring back players?

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Shogun4138
Posts: 119

Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#1 » Thu May 26, 2022 12:29 am

Just curious, are there any ideas by the Dev's or others players suggestions to help lift a lagging population?
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CountTalabecland
Posts: 979

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#2 » Thu May 26, 2022 12:45 am

For me it was destro zerg, city grind, Order RDPS spam, and choppa pull, in that order that convinced me to quit/made the game no longer enjoyable. It has become one predictable slog from zone to zone.

Currency changes were good but it was too little too late. The two odd years of grindy sov and city siege grind killed the casual interest in the game.
Brynnoth Goldenbeard (40/80) (IB) -- Rundin Fireheart (40/50) (RP) -- Ungrinn (40/40) (Engi)-- Bramm Bloodaxe (40/83) (Slayer) and a few Empire characters here or there, maybe even an elf.

havartii
Posts: 423

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#3 » Thu May 26, 2022 2:00 am

Leaving the game in a broken state to push an agenda that is not even close to helping anything, instead cripples the gameplay and player interest. For a player with many alts, the currency exchange gimped most of my toons under 60 and left them with nothing. If they gave a month of 2x rr and let us run around as champs. I might reinstall. Something tells me they don't want us back!
Order: 70 AM / 76 RP/ 72 Knight/ 58 WH
Destro: 82 Sham / 79 Zealot/ 70 DoK /70 Magus /68 Mara
Many alts on both sides now ruined by new currency change

Arla
Posts: 40

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#4 » Thu May 26, 2022 2:21 am

Shogun4138 wrote: Thu May 26, 2022 12:29 am Just curious, are there any ideas by the Dev's or others players suggestions to help lift a lagging population?
Remove WE/WH from game

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Morradin
Posts: 218

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#5 » Thu May 26, 2022 2:36 am

Arla wrote: Thu May 26, 2022 2:21 am
Shogun4138 wrote: Thu May 26, 2022 12:29 am Just curious, are there any ideas by the Dev's or others players suggestions to help lift a lagging population?
Remove WE/WH from game
I think I speak for all the WE/WH in game when I say;

Learn how to protect yourself better.

Never the less, thank you for your free renown.

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wonshot
Posts: 1101

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#6 » Thu May 26, 2022 2:54 am

The simple answer content or getting a better reality check on what RoR is doing, that other mmos cant compete with.
Pretty much anyone who has watched the 2021 RoR promotion video will notice what area of footage the server is promoting and adverticing, while also having different other gamemodes involved to add for a better overall player experience. But mostly what RoR has an advantage on in my words would be;

Classic RvR, pvp from lvl1, keepsieges and duo faction realm warfare, excelent performance pretty much unmatched in any other mmo attempting to do largerscale pvp battles, and a vast big gaming world to explore with unmirrored classes.

On top of that, the game does cater to some of its lesser gamemodes to keep a broader audience interested and provide variety.
The main issue imho has been the main-game neglect, wrong development focus, and a newplayer experience which is outdated heavily.

Starting with the new player experience, some abilities and builds need to be adjusted when you learn and get build-defining abilities, tactics and unlocks to make them function and be fun.
This game is unique in its way that it doesnt show enemy castbars, yet interrupting and preventing enemy actions is a core part of the game, which new players will struggle with and could use some new player tutorial when starting out.

As for the content and last 1-2 years of releases, the roleplay cities have offered very little to none replayability and just serve as glorified questhubs. I understand the bragging point of finishing and publishing something the original game didnt have, but for gameplay these cities are doing very little to add to the game on a week to week basic. Garden of Q was annouced as the biggest addition yet to be seen on RoR because it was homemade, but has since been long abandonded by devs and communite alike despite pulling articles and could have been a good population magnet, yet right now its not worth mentioning on any mmorpg platform in its current state.
LOTD with a modern twist is the closest we get to a good new content release, but at the same time the classic rvr campaign has never been less appealing or interesting.

As someone who sent Lazypeon a buisness email offering to sponsor a "return to return of reckoning" video to help boost the awareness, there honestly have never really been any content releases or time periode since his last visit where i though "wow now is a good time to tell the world about how great RoR is becoming".

The every day action will attract the same usual crowd, summer period will hit as it does every year, and players will come back in the Fall. But for any new player to hear, or try the server if they dont have the nostalgia from Live I simply struggle to see how they are going to get hooked and stay with the current newplayer experience and if endgame doesnt get more exciting in the maingame, as even the currentplayerbase seem to be loosing interest in Citysieges, LOTD & ranked. And as long as the career changes approach is to nerf the top instead of buffing and bringing up the underpopulated specs and classes, the playerbase will more likely be scared away with changes instead of encourage more playtime and those shoes are not exactly getting filled with fresh players coming in by the dusins. Hopefully the future is bright though!
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Amdus
Posts: 115

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#7 » Thu May 26, 2022 3:36 am

wonshot wrote: Thu May 26, 2022 2:54 am The simple answer content or getting a better reality check on what RoR is doing, that other mmos cant compete with.
Pretty much anyone who has watched the 2021 RoR promotion video will notice what area of footage the server is promoting and adverticing, while also having different other gamemodes involved to add for a better overall player experience. But mostly what RoR has an advantage on in my words would be;

Classic RvR, pvp from lvl1, keepsieges and duo faction realm warfare, excelent performance pretty much unmatched in any other mmo attempting to do largerscale pvp battles, and a vast big gaming world to explore with unmirrored classes.

On top of that, the game does cater to some of its lesser gamemodes to keep a broader audience interested and provide variety.
The main issue imho has been the main-game neglect, wrong development focus, and a newplayer experience which is outdated heavily.

Starting with the new player experience, some abilities and builds need to be adjusted when you learn and get build-defining abilities, tactics and unlocks to make them function and be fun.
This game is unique in its way that it doesnt show enemy castbars, yet interrupting and preventing enemy actions is a core part of the game, which new players will struggle with and could use some new player tutorial when starting out.

As for the content and last 1-2 years of releases, the roleplay cities have offered very little to none replayability and just serve as glorified questhubs. I understand the bragging point of finishing and publishing something the original game didnt have, but for gameplay these cities are doing very little to add to the game on a week to week basic. Garden of Q was annouced as the biggest addition yet to be seen on RoR because it was homemade, but has since been long abandonded by devs and communite alike despite pulling articles and could have been a good population magnet, yet right now its not worth mentioning on any mmorpg platform in its current state.
LOTD with a modern twist is the closest we get to a good new content release, but at the same time the classic rvr campaign has never been less appealing or interesting.

As someone who sent Lazypeon a buisness email offering to sponsor a "return to return of reckoning" video to help boost the awareness, there honestly have never really been any content releases or time periode since his last visit where i though "wow now is a good time to tell the world about how great RoR is becoming".

The every day action will attract the same usual crowd, summer period will hit as it does every year, and players will come back in the Fall. But for any new player to hear, or try the server if they dont have the nostalgia from Live I simply struggle to see how they are going to get hooked and stay with the current newplayer experience and if endgame doesnt get more exciting in the maingame, as even the currentplayerbase seem to be loosing interest in Citysieges, LOTD & ranked. And as long as the career changes approach is to nerf the top instead of buffing and bringing up the underpopulated specs and classes, the playerbase will more likely be scared away with changes instead of encourage more playtime and those shoes are not exactly getting filled with fresh players coming in by the dusins. Hopefully the future is bright though!
It's impossible to not agree with everything that you are saying but there's also a lot more to be said, such as censorship, pettyness, bias and many more... I'd like to vent/give my oppinion as well, however, I know that it will lead nowhere.

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WaaaghBoy88
Posts: 41

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#8 » Thu May 26, 2022 5:34 am

Gruzzug here. Some suggestions:

1. Fix class balance. Choppa/Slayer is a literal one spec class. C'mon. It'll be easier than designing new content. I'm thinking also working on other class related issues, but I dont know any other than WH/BW has severely unbalanced crap mechanics (You know EXACTLY what I'm referring to. WH killed soloing, it's not fun for anyone anymore).

2. Work on bugs that matter. Like how Gunbad kicks you out of the instance when you zone into a boss room all the way back to IC (or Altdorf).

3. New content/reworked. I still dont have my RR70 massive black-iron cleavers the one random in K8P has, with the jagged teeth. A fully-rebuilt LOTD, Tomb of The Vulture Lord, unique collectables and all, publically accessible 24/7, as it was meant to be, is a mandatory demand, and provided fun endgame content. The influence -farming that would provide the Cape of Sahkmet and cool purple weapons. Something to make it really worthwhile would be to introduce a system regarding TOVL weapons from influence rewards, like modifiable passive perma-effects you can afford to buy with scarabs/cartushs that you can change out like Sentinel jewels, except these are expensive and let you improve your combat experience in different ways?Would be fantastic.

4. A free-for-all scenario that gave you access to unique rewards anyone 40/40+ can participate in and have fun, would be cool. Or improve Ranked so people actually want to do. I can never get Ranked ques.

5. Focus on small/solo content. Give us reasons to RP in a RPG game, so it's not RVR or bust only.

6. Make the face modifications RR80 requirement, not 85. It takes too long, and most don't play past RR80. Unless you're dedicated or a nostalgia-fan, of which I am both, I speak for all when I say it's the best and fair choice for all.

7. Re-increase city rewards. The reward-nerf just make being kicked around the instance not worthwhile by those who aren't playing in Discord-led 24mans.

Honestly, features that give people a reason to play past RR80, focus on solo/sixman content, make rewards more worthwhile, work on potentially new, unseen content. I know there was a Vampire Counts expansion planned in the works back in the Live days. Why not give that a try and see where that goes?

Gruzzug, signing off. 8-)

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Foxplay
Posts: 9

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#9 » Thu May 26, 2022 7:19 am

First and foremost in a PvP game players are the content. You need a healthy population and reasons for them to continue fighting one another in order to create content for themselves. When they are given reasons not to fight each other then you are potentially removing "content" from the game. In order to have a healthy player base you cannot focus completely on the most hardcore players...they will continue to play regardless. And this is not me saying a PvP game needs to be hold your hand casual friendly, no it simply must be accessible and fun even if loosing as unless you are the most hardcore and pick your fights specifically to stack your deck in any PvP game is nearly impossible to win "all the time" people are going to loose, but it still must be a fun enough experience for them to want to continue playing. So lets go over the reasons why people may quit playing RoR. Also keep in mind many of the more casual players seldom ever post or even read the forums, it is very possible to loose player-base without ever hearing opinions from some players for different reasons, but typically the ones that read forums / post are what most players would view as a bit more invested so to speak...But also keep in mind a private-server like this also attracts many players who had played AoR previously

1. They loose all the time / too much; Pretty much nobody likes loosing, even people who learn from mistakes and see it as a opportunity to learn and improve are going to have a limit especially for a video game that's supposed to be for fun. There is multiple reason why this could happen. But chances are pretty high if somebody logs on and goes 0 to 500 in scenarios 10 times in a row (or less) and the RvR lakes are just a deathtrap to them or being heavily zerged by one side, then chances are they are going to log off or switch sides.

2. They are playing a class / build that is weak, or playing it poorly- The whole "git good" or don't play argument doesn't work as I previously stated PvP games players ARE the content you want these players to play and take part in the community. So even if they are not the Navy-seals of RoR it still needs to be fun and rewarding for them even if they loose.

3. They struggle or cannot get good group composition- Even the best players are going to struggle to win with terrible class composition, no tanks/ no healers is ALMOST always a free-win for the opposing side and 3-5minutes wasted (scenarios) or more (RvR) for the loser's and that is if they even decide to participate (often they do not because loosing rewards are not good enough). While it is not impossible to win with bad composition it is a up-hill battle and typically just doesn't happen without a large gear/renown imbalance on a bunch of DPS carries (Example: 5+ Sov+ slayers obliterating a scenario with no tanks and only 1 healer because even Destro's tanks couldnt survive more than a couple seconds.) When this happens several times in a row well often you see people logging off...

4. Limited play time + lack of quick accessible "balanced" pvp (Scenarios) *population issue*- If you only have an hour or two to play per night and it takes 20+ minutes to get one scenario, and then you go out into the lakes and the opposing side has 3:1 or more your numbers most casual even a lot of the hardcore players just don't play at this point. Or switch sides to they can at least progress their characters with Doorhammer. Its frustrating and boring but without rewards that can help players progress very few people want to just get zerged over and over or loose over and over, especially when they know the opposing and winning side is getting rewarded better for far less effort (on a individual level)

5. Winning Rewards v. Loosing Rewards- People are reward driven, but they also understand the concept of fairness. 8:1 reward is a joke, and its often worse in RvR if you are getting zerged if you are not a gank class or a solo kiter it can sometimes be impossible to get a kill and the AAO is just not rewarding enough for the vast majority of players (clearly) to want to play when they are heavily outnumbered. Which leads people to que for scenarios and often face 8:1 crest compensation. I know to many people it may be a foreign concept that in a PvP game/mmo you need to adequately reward the losers, believe me I know the "they lost they deserve nothing mentality" I am not saying the winner shouldn't get more. But you have to look at the losers as valuable to keep playing because they ARE the content, scenarios don't pop if they stop queing. RvR quickly becomes Doorhammer if they log off or switch sides. Its that simple, the few hard-headed stubborn people that don't care and just keep loosing over and over anyway are not enough to keep that engine running. Simply put loosing has to be rewarding enough to players to say in their minds "Oh well at least had some pvp and still making progress on my character".

I have seen this countless times on my Slayer running as a pre-made. Literally win 2 or 3 times in a row in a absolute blow out and then suddenly as if on que scenarios just completely stop. Nothing really going on in RvR no forts etc...... Does not take a genius to figure out what happened, opposing side group falls apart or people log off because they don't want to play 3-5minutes at a time for 1 War crest, and honestly I cant really blame them, I have been on other end plenty of times when I solo que.

6. Class / Mastery Balance- Too many classes are 1 trick Meta ponies. And while enjoyable it makes the game very shallow. Balance could be so much better. NO CLASS not a SINGLE ONE should have a mastery tree that is nearly or completely unused or an absolute joke when compared to their meta build. Ive played nearly every single MMO under the sun so I know one build etc will always be the most "meta" you cant balance every build perfectly. But currently many mastery trees / abilities etc are too far off or not attractive enough to give players the "I wish I could have that but not enough points" feeling. One major thing see time and time again is Single target mastery tree's are far too often second fiddle (heck more like 3rd for 4th fiddle) compared to the AE mastery tree. (In short too many classes mastery trees are largely ignored and simply put inferior for how the game works and how pvp-meta works. This is not a strengths and weaknesses argument its a simple (hardly anybody picks these talents / abilities / mastery points because they are just worse than other options) Each class only has 3 trees so need to make sure each tree is attractive enough for people to play and fit / do its role properly and not be miles behind in performance to its other mastery trees

7. Faction Balance- This goes into population balance which is something very hard to do as you cant really force players to play X or Y faction, but also feeds into population problem. This has happened in countless PvP games (WoW biggest example) and AoR was one of them too.... Servers crawl and then eventually fall off a cliff to be one sided. AoR had server mergers to quell the bleeding (for a time), so did WoW but time and time and time again we have seen mergers where a band-aid solution if one side wins too much without ample reason(reward) for players to play the other side.....they don't which creates a huge population problem and thus due to being a PvP game content problem. AAO needs to be a global system that ups-rewards (not just renown) to constantly seek closer and closer to 50/50 as possible. This would help scenarios pop as well as RvR. Just logging onto the side that's winning at any current time only helps individual players looking out for themselves (reward triggers) and does absolutely nothing to create content (pvp) by bringing the server closer to 50/50 as possible

8. Mirror Balance - (related to faction balance) While it is fine to have small differences between the faction need tighter balancing of class mirrors. Certain classes being strictly better on one faction or the other especially on key roles such as Tanks/healers leads to class role composition problems which was covered earlier as a reason people will quit / log off for a day, etc.

9. Reward chasing with 0 PvP (PvP Aversion for rewards)- If one side is outnumbered 3:1 or worse, but the winning side decides to only do RvR (and not que scenarios) where they have the clear advantage and easy no-resistance path to reward (bags, zone flips) and the under-populated cant even get scenarios to pop where they can fight with even numbers then just like that you have people logging off or switching sides and perpetuating PvDoor even more. I am not sure how to fix this other than a global AAO system which hopefully make runaway numbers advantages from happening. Another idea would be to make RvR rewards even worse for the overpopulated side if they are not queing for scenarios. I have played plenty of times when one side has a clear advantage yet on the underpopulated side cant get scenarios. Not hard to figure out why they are pushing super fast zone flips / forts and getting bags with 0 if any resistance. It does not happen all the time, often will still get scenario pops, but it DOES happen. This effectively makes the winning side in charge of where the content is. (Don't want to fight 3:1 in RvR? Well too bad we are knocking down keeps forts for free rewards and no queing in order to force the pvp content into the lakes where we have the advantage)

In my opinion not queing for scenarios when you are PvDoor with a huge advantage is JUST AS MUCH pvp aversion as the underpopulated realm not trying to defend RvR and staying in the warcamp / main city when heavily outnumbered.

billyk
Posts: 146

Re: Any ideas to bring back players?

Post#10 » Thu May 26, 2022 7:48 am

Simple, just nerf destro.

The pipeline is like this:
Newbie finds RoR -> rolls Order because Warhammer fluff -> gets ground into fine red paste by the destro zerg -> learns to play -> still gets ground into fine red paste -> voices his dissatisfaction on the forums -> notices this is working as intended because devs play greenskins -> either rerolls destro or quits

And that's the whole root cause for this issue. So, devs, what shall it be? Uber-r0XX0r everyone or having a healthy server? Your choice.

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