Sign in to follow this  
Retrograde

Valrei International. Cadence Rising

Recommended Posts

10 hours ago, Marlon said:

The snowflakes don't know how to survive if they aren't on the coast. No idea why it's such an issue, the magic of inland settlements seem to go over most heads. Well, spreading thinner, could have sworn this mistake was made and lamented before... enjoy it anyway. Im sticking to indy and harmony (indy became glorious now that all the right people left)


You heard it here first folks, new players are snowflakes and should recognize the magic of the land that the 1400 other people who placed deeds on harmony and melody before them didn't want. 

 

Brand new to the game? Not a fan of getting run down by hellhounds, trolls, or even wolves and bears because you can't ride a horse, and practically anything but a tortoise can chase you down on a cart and kill you? Snowflake
 

Enjoy the idea of building a little harbour or port with a view over the water? Learn the magic of inland.

Want quick access to water trade, which almost every other deed on the map is set up well for? Snowflake.  

 

 

I do not give Zander permission to repost this message elsewhere as his own. 

Edited by Arronicus
  • Like 6

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Concerned:  All this talk about deleting the old servers and Retro specifically saying they don't want to encourage new players going there is worrying.  He's not exactly discounting the idea.

  • Like 4

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

What concerns me are the signs that the devs are aware of serious, systemic problems within Wurm, and that they are walling those problems off because they don't have a good solution. I don't see signs of any of these being investigated, much less of a solution being developed.

 

  • Players and goods from Freedom servers won't be allowed on the Northern servers, for years, possibly never. Why is this? Because established players are detrimental to a balanced game somehow? Has anyone got to the bottom of this? (Please don't say "it would destroy the economy" because right now the economy is only good for the players who lost the most sleep in order to be able to price gouge items that are temporarily scarce.)
  • Various mechanisms that work on Freedom servers are disabled on the Northern servers. For example, you can't buy gift boxes or moon metals as a subscriber reward (although some people have, and are now selling moon metals at price gouging profits). Why is this? Is something broken with moon metals or gift boxes? Or did the devs recognize that the subscription rewards system was a mistake? Will we ever be able to spend the Marks on the rewards we were led to believe were available?
  • Are we going to go through the same process in a year or two, or five, when established Northern Isles players are selling high quality enchanted tools and weapons for a few silvers?
  • Is there going to be a mechanism to allow new players an informed choice when picking a server to play on? For example, information about size, age, recent population levels, and where new players are going.
  • Is there going to be a mechanism to reclaim, naturalize, erode, weather, or otherwise restore long-abandoned deeds? Will there be any incentive for players to do this work manually?
Edited by Sheffie
  • Like 3

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
32 minutes ago, Sheffie said:

What concerns me are the signs that the devs are aware of serious, systemic problems within Wurm, and that they are walling those problems off because they don't have a good solution. I don't see signs of any of these being investigated, much less of a solution being developed.

 

  • Players and goods from Freedom servers won't be allowed on the Northern servers, for years, possibly never. Why is this? Because established players are detrimental to a balanced game somehow? Has anyone got to the bottom of this? (Please don't say "it would destroy the economy" because right now the economy is only good for the players who lost the most sleep in order to be able to price gouge items that are temporarily scarce.)
  • Various mechanisms that work on Freedom servers are disabled on the Northern servers. For example, you can't buy gift boxes or moon metals as a subscriber reward (although some people have, and are now selling moon metals at price gouging profits). Why is this? Is something broken with moon metals or gift boxes? Or did the devs recognize that the subscription rewards system was a mistake? Will we ever be able to spend the Marks on the rewards we were led to believe were available?
  • Are we going to go through the same process in a year or two, or five, when established Northern Isles players are selling high quality enchanted tools and weapons for a few silvers?
  • Is there going to be a mechanism to allow new players an informed choice when picking a server to play on? For example, information about size, age, recent population levels, and where new players are going.
  • Is there going to be a mechanism to reclaim, naturalize, erode, weather, or otherwise restore long-abandoned deeds? Will there be any incentive for players to do this work manually?

 

 

Its simple, RMT kept accounts alive that should have died, that is and was a long term problem, northern servers will never have that problem. I would vote in a heart beat to never merge the cluster's and I don't mind one bit losing whet I have on the old servers

  • Like 5
  • Cat 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
35 minutes ago, Sheffie said:

Players and goods from Freedom servers won't be allowed on the Northern servers, for years, possibly never. Why is this? Because established players are detrimental to a balanced game somehow?

For me personally, I hope the servers never merge because of the amount of character sales and item-sales-directly-for-euros that went on, on the southern freedom isles. I'm only interested in playing on a cluster that is free from that taint. You may not mind it, many others may not, but it bothers me immensely, and I've met many others who have similar feelings about it. I want to play with other characters who have been trained up only by the people who are playing them, and who are using tools, equipment, food, etc, that was acquired only through ingame currency, and not by way of people using the game to make a few extra bucks IRL. Similarly, a lot of people want to feel like they're part of something new and fresh. When you merge the islands, you irreparably take that away. I can definitely sympathize with people who want to see new life pumped into the servers they love, to see new players roaming and settling near them, and taking advantage of the large amounts of wilderness on some of the old servers. But this should not come at the expense of the many of us who are on the northern cluster specifically because we want to be separate from all that.  
 

What I personally would do as a compromise is the following: "One way" portals are established on harmony, travelling through one of these portals to the southern freedom isles will clone all of a characters skill levels once only. If that player wishes to return to northern freedom isles, they can return via the portal in haven that they arrived through, but any gained skills/items will not return to the north with them, nor will their skills clone again if they then come back to the south again, in part to prevent any sort of sleep bonus abuse. This would only be available to northern freedom isles created characters, also in part to deal with concerns of bringing old names to the new servers. This would allow new players to safely check out the old maps, without becoming permanently trapped there, or having to start completely fresh, but would prevent any of the old-world problems from infecting the new-world. 

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Icarium said:

Concerned:  All this talk about deleting the old servers and Retro specifically saying they don't want to encourage new players going there is worrying.  He's not exactly discounting the idea.

Lol

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I didn't like real money trading either. I didn't now anything about it when I started playing Wurm, and I had nothing to do with it in all the years of developing my main character and the various deeds i was a part of. So to be told now that my character can never join the new islands, because of some "taint" that I can neither see nor understand, doesn't seem fair.

  • Like 5

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
48 minutes ago, Badvoc said:

Its simple, RMT kept accounts alive that should have died, that is and was a long term problem, northern servers will never have that problem. I would vote in a heart beat to never merge the cluster's and I don't mind one bit losing whet I have on the old servers

RMT is now gone, and the old accounts are locked at the actual holders. Some of the money making players and player groups have left Wurm since. And the advantage of those old accounts is overestimated. Feel free to check my stats on Niarja, I am only on since December, 2017, and premed in January, 2018. My account is not old nor bought, I trained all my skills on my own, long time even without any enchants and ignorant of the advanced grinding tricks and ruses.

 

A significant number of players will come equally far, even much further in single skills when specializing more than I did (I concentrated on being independent, so developped a broad range of skills). And few old players, RMT traded account or not, are much better than me in a number of skills. Of those who are better, it is not their level, but their more intricate knowledge of the game and its mechanics compared to a relative noob like me that counts.

 

This means, in a year, maybe bit more, the field will be evened out between north and south. Then, there is not much of a point to keep the clusters separate. Not that I care a lot about. Maybe it is even more pleasant to never meet the "never merge" fanatics.

Edited by Ekcin
  • Like 7

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
23 minutes ago, Sheffie said:

I didn't like real money trading either. I didn't now anything about it when I started playing Wurm, and I had nothing to do with it in all the years of developing my main character and the various deeds i was a part of. So to be told now that my character can never join the new islands, because of some "taint" that I can neither see nor understand, doesn't seem fair.

You, like me, are part of the group that helped keep Wurm alive through all the years and I'm sure Wurm appreciates your service but our time has passed.  RMT or no, the old servers are dead and are an inconvenient anchor around the devs neck now.  If they starve the old servers of new players, the hope would be that most old players will either leave or start new toons on the 'money making' servers.  I just hope they give us the option later to relocated to the new servers when they close the old ones.  I really don't mind starting a new deed just hate the idea of grinding the skills again.

 

I'm just speculating though

Edited by Icarium
  • Like 2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
22 hours ago, Retrograde said:

We have several tools at our disposal, including dumps that cover ALL deeds. This data, plus the growing reviews that finding suitable land is becoming more and more difficult as we continue to push to grow Wurm tells us that we need to be future-proofing. 

 

Wurm servers need a specific density to flourish, and that is hurt by players being spread out too far, but also by being too tightly packed together. The current density and growth mean we need to have more freely available land for players to travel, hunt, and skill without stumbling across other deeds. 

 

To clarify, Harmony has more settlements than Xanadu, which is 4x its size, and melody has almost as many settlements as Independence.

 

Both servers are reaching a point where finding suitable land for deeding is growing tough and discouraging new players. 
 

 

Please reconsider the map. It could be so much better if some time were taken to tweak it. All of the small disconnected lakes is going to make it very difficult to traverse. This thing is going to be there for years. Take a couple of weeks to make it right. Connect the lakes so travel is possible by boat around the whole server instead of just locally.

Edited by Hanel

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 hours ago, Brash_Endeavors said:

I doubt "much" of melody is "abandoned to decay"  at all at this stage, and I certainly doubt this is anything you have any privileged information about.

 

In addition, a lot of people who are unsure about the game, are likely to have held back on putting any money in. If they are so new they do not know whether they even like Wurm or not, then unlike the hyperlevelling vets they are going to be a lot slower to hit level 20 in anything, you can pretty much play Wurm free for a month if you are a casual player.

 

Where are you getting this information that "much" of melody is already "abandoned to decay"?

 

Or this was just a guess based on "Most people don't like Wurm anyway and quit within three hours"?  Are the people lacking a good space supposed to twiddle their thumbs for 3+ months to see whether those spots are in fact abandoned?  Because refusing to make needed room for new players "because they probably will quit anyway" becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. 

It's not so much a matter of "privileged information" but rather the inherent nature of games releasing on a platform almost always witnessing a rush of new players and a slow decline before leveling out which we can watch play out just from the server status page. My basis for the statement that deeds have been abandoned to decay stems from visually watching tokens vanish outwards from overture and watching buildings rot. I did not say "most" because I'm not insinuating that it leans one way or the other. I said "Much" because it IS happening, it is perceptible, and I believe its an important factor in deciding to open up more servers.

 

If players are planning on playing the game for free for awhile, which I'm sure many understandably are, I also don't fully understand how that factors in to a demand for more deed space? Free players are pretty much able to find any area off deed (or in between the gaps of deeds which cant expand due to overlap). Players looking to hermit can. Players looking to hermit within their own 20x20 deed...unlikely, again a new 8x8 server for more of those folks I can understand.

 

This game though I love it, is absolutely an acquired taste, I'm not going to insinuate that your average newcomer trying out the game is going to last for x amount of time but to think that there isn't going to be a high turnover rate on new players is misguided, if this wasn't the case the active population between ALL of the legacy servers wouldn't have been totaling in the low hundreds prior to the steam launch. I don't believe that  new player turnover rate is going to be attributed to not being able to spend their money on a deed, in a significant enough capacity to warrant another 16x16 server. I absolutely want new players to come into the game and stay. I'm concerned that spreading players too thin will create an artificial feeling of emptiness when a new player joins the game.

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Hanel said:

 

Please reconsider the map. It could be so much better if some time were taken to tweak it. All of the small disconnected lakes is going to make it very difficult to traverse. This thing is going to be there for years. Take a couple of weeks to make it right. Connect the lakes so travel is possible by boat around the whole server instead of just locally.

 

When I see unconnected lakes I see a tunnel or canal project waiting to be done, why do you wanna ruin the fun?

  • Like 3

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Why all this crying about and 'please reconsider the map'? You don't have to go there! 

  • Like 4

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Vilgrith said:

My basis for the statement that deeds have been abandoned to decay stems from visually watching tokens vanish outwards from overture and watching buildings rot.

 

 

Just to point out, people pay three months advance upkeep, maybe 45 days if they had a guard, and any vanished tokens/rotting buildings at this early stage, especially right close to the starter town,  suggest people who disbanded because they found a much better location.  I doubt that qualifies as "much of the server".

 

 

 

Edited by Brash_Endeavors
  • Like 2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I wonder if all the people complaining about the new server, saying that new players should be forced onto existing deeds would be willing to give up their deeds and live that kind of life?  Or maybe they're just upset that all their indentured servants will get their own place and they'll be stuck chiseling their own bricks.

  • Like 4

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
6 hours ago, Icarium said:

You, like me, are part of the group that helped keep Wurm alive through all the years and I'm sure Wurm appreciates your service but our time has passed.  RMT or no, the old servers are dead and are an inconvenient anchor around the devs neck now.  If they starve the old servers of new players, the hope would be that most old players will either leave or start new toons on the 'money making' servers.  I just hope they give us the option later to relocated to the new servers when they close the old ones.  I really don't mind starting a new deed just hate the idea of grinding the skills again.

 

I'm just speculating though

 

The last sentence was the one and only reasonable statement in your post except the part about "the group that helped keep Wurm alive through all the years".

 

First of all, obviously most of you seem to lack a short/mid range memory. The "dying southern servers" have a participation at this time which is ways higher than in the previous summers since I started playing. It is not to see that they are "dead". There has been a clear net increase of newly founded vs. disbanded deeds on several of the old servers (I observe it on Xanadu) since the launch. All predictions that the old servers would be abandoned have been proven wrong so far. There hasn't been a mass exodus of old players nor a mass abandonment of existing deeds.

 

Second: While the team and company haven been overwhelmed by the scale of influx, if I understood the statements of Retrograde and other team members right, the number of subscribers has more than doubled. In other words, still bit less than a half of Wurm subscribers are "old players", they are the base of the company's bread and butter, even given that most or all of the new subscribers will stay. I well recall a statement of Retro in the discussions after the announcements of the steam move, that the project would be considered a success when they would win several hundred new subscribers. Well, it seems that this target has not only been met.

 

But certainly the company will not cut off what was the base of her existance so far. And with the last community stream it was made clear that there are no plans to abandon the southern servers. I hope that this may be a sign that they are considering ways to promote settling in the south.

 

One thing I can say for sure: A closure of the "old servers" and forced resettlement would spell my end of playing Wurm.

Edited by Ekcin
addendum
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
9 hours ago, Icarium said:

Concerned:  All this talk about deleting the old servers and Retro specifically saying they don't want to encourage new players going there is worrying.  He's not exactly discounting the idea.

We have zero intentions on closing any servers. 

 

I specifically traveled Xanadu and Independence in today's dev streams to cover just what is good about the older servers, space, cheaper grinding, and player history. 

 

Ultimately it's player choice and should not be dictated by us, if players feel they want new land then they should feel free to go there, I don't believe we should be forcing them one way or another.

 

It's the game game on both clusters, but it's not the same environment, and we all know that. 

 

Also, for those commenting about "spreading the population too thin" please remember, this is for incoming players, not existing players. 

  • Like 6

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
10 minutes ago, Retrograde said:

 

 

Also, for those commenting about "spreading the population too thin" please remember, this is for incoming players, not existing players. 

Can we take this to mean players on harmony and melody will not be able to move over to cadence initially?

edit, from discord: 

Rudie:

@ʀᴇᴛʀᴏɢʀᴀᴅᴇ your comment on the forums about cadencee being for new players, will the server be available to travel to by boat/portal from melody/harmony?(edited)

ʀᴇᴛʀᴏɢʀᴀᴅᴇ:

Yes

Rudie:

Ok

ʀᴇᴛʀᴏɢʀᴀᴅᴇ:

It's more that it's not designed for everyone currently playing and spreading everyone out

We still have new players coming in and we'll be continuing to push wurm to get new players

 

Edited by Arronicus

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
26 minutes ago, Arronicus said:

Can we take this to mean players on harmony and melody will not be able to move over to cadence initially?

edit, from discord: 

Rudie:

@ʀᴇᴛʀᴏɢʀᴀᴅᴇ your comment on the forums about cadencee being for new players, will the server be available to travel to by boat/portal from melody/harmony?(edited)

ʀᴇᴛʀᴏɢʀᴀᴅᴇ:

Yes

Rudie:

Ok

ʀᴇᴛʀᴏɢʀᴀᴅᴇ:

It's more that it's not designed for everyone currently playing and spreading everyone out

We still have new players coming in and we'll be continuing to push wurm to get new players

 

Correct! I mean our plans are adapting to accommodate new people coming in rather than focusing on the existing population. We still have plenty of new players every day and we intend to keep that going! 

  • Like 5

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
On 8/15/2020 at 4:59 PM, Retrograde said:

Priest faith
After announcing our intentions to merge faith, we have been listening to your feedback on the matter. We spent time discussing this internally and have decided to not go forward with the merge. Our initial goal was to address the meta of skilling on PvE servers while being priests within PvP, but given your feedback, we're willing to change our plans. We want to encourage priest play on the PvP server rather than skilling off the server and will work on a more agreeable solution. 

 

Whatever thise changes gonna be, will it hit the south freedom as well? And if not, why not?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
On 8/15/2020 at 7:59 PM, Retrograde said:

Priests, links, and favor
As we have worked on addressing balance issues with priests and linking, we have spent considerable time reading through your feedback on the forums and in-game. The appeal of linking multiple priests is due to the way the existing favor regeneration and sacrificing systems work. With this in mind, we will be introducing a new system to address those weak spots within playing a priest. 

Expect to see a discussion post regarding that soon! 

 

I dont like the idea change battery alts on crafter alts in order to supply with good amount of things for sacing, but looks like ill be forced to turn my batteries to this kind of abuse if you will focus channaling leveling gamplay around it...

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
4 minutes ago, Nelsy said:

 

I dont like the idea change battery alts on crafter alts in order to supply with good amount of things for sacing, but looks like ill be forced to turn my batteries to this kind of abuse if you will focus channaling leveling gamplay around it...

 

Are you aware retro is saying that they think that the favour regeneration/sacrifice mechanics are problematic to the point where it's just driving so many people to using link alts instead? What he's saying is that a new system will be introduced in part to address those problems, specifically so that people are not feeling compelled to link up for favour. 
 

Quote

if you will focus channaling leveling gamplay around it...

 

He's saying the exact opposite of this

 

Edited by Arronicus
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
45 minutes ago, Arronicus said:

favour regeneration/sacrifice mechanics are problematic

But the fact he write about it means they thingking how to improve regen and sac, so if they gonna remove links this only way how we going to do our leveling, and in this message they let us know that they know it and will work on it, and actually they thinking about how to improve it. So when they improve sacing it will be more delicious for abuse than it sounds even now after links nerfed... that what im talking about.

 

45 minutes ago, Arronicus said:

specifically so that people are not feeling compelled to link up for favour. 

Second case they going to improve regen and make priests so easy, so it will be not interesting to play, every one gonna be high skilled, they dont want it too. That means for me, there willbe abuse possibility for hardcore players anyway even if they dont want it, overwice it going to be too simple and easy for everyone. I dont think anyone of old players will agree with that, when in wurm every one have perist and able to cast everything - this ruin wurm gameplay where every one work togeter, that why they actually nerf links, to make priests harder then it is now even if it means remove system that allow people work together, they told it from the begining if we throw away every other words, so if they will go against it and make it even more easy but for every one ill be surprised and upset even more, because I will lose my point to play priest and will turn to beverage master in irl ^_^. If now we have many priests but almost every one threw it on half way, then we will get army of leveled priests, thats not interesting at all, and what will feel about that old leveled priests, i dont think they will feel better than me... Thats simillar if we make weaponsmiting leveling fast as carpentry skill, that will means that all old and all new high skilled weaponsmith will be depreciated time and sleep powders they spent to level it, as i spend many sleep poweders and many time to level my channaling ill feel bad if after patch every one can raise higher and faster even without sb.

Edited by Nelsy
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Retrograde said:

Correct! I mean our plans are adapting to accommodate new people coming in rather than focusing on the existing population. We still have plenty of new players every day and we intend to keep that going! 

I'm sure it is not intended, but that actually sounds rather ominous...

 

I think a lot of older players are spooked by the incoming changes, and not in the "change is bad" kind of way, more the "they're literally kicking us to the curb like epic" kind of way.

  • Like 3

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Etherdrifter said:

I'm sure it is not intended, but that actually sounds rather ominous...

 

I think a lot of older players are spooked by the incoming changes, and not in the "change is bad" kind of way, more the "they're literally kicking us to the curb like epic" kind of way.

Epic had a different rule set and was all pvp. Comparing how epic was treated to how northern/southern exist is wrong. I fully expect the systems disabled on northern (rifts, moon metals) will be turned on in time when players can handle the events. Any changes to northern will effect southern as well, and probably epic too.

Edited by Kelody
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this