Opuses and Class 3/4 tomes suggestion.

Because eventually they will run out of the opus to do after they get them all

It has been implied by various people that once people had access to opus's they would just burn through them in a short amount of time and then say "I have nothing to do"
Not everyone plays like a "hardcore player" and it seems to be being portrayed that way.
With this mindset why make anything at all? People will just do it and say they are bored again, Especially in the case of hardcore players who are renown for burning through things as fast as they can.

Yale
 
It has been implied by various people that once people had access to opus's they would just burn through them in a short amount of time and then say "I have nothing to do"
Not everyone plays like a "hardcore player" and it seems to be being portrayed that way.
With this mindset why make anything at all? People will just do it and say they are bored again, Especially in the case of hardcore players who are renown for burning through things as fast as they can.

Yale

Because the hardcore players will continue playing because they enjoy the game and enjoy hanging with friends.
 
It has been implied by various people that once people had access to opus's they would just burn through them in a short amount of time and then say "I have nothing to do"
Not everyone plays like a "hardcore player" and it seems to be being portrayed that way.
With this mindset why make anything at all? People will just do it and say they are bored again, Especially in the case of hardcore players who are renown for burning through things as fast as they can.

Yale

Also your use of hyperbole is starting to get annoying.
 
Also your use of hyperbole is starting to get annoying.

Its not Hyperbole when you are applying the same logic to refuse to let people have access to tomes that you use to justify giving "hardcore" people more things to do.

Yale
 
Here is my suggestion,
Put them on a vendor, incrementally higher than the #2's, not absurd though.

1. It would put a demand on tomes and also keeps the market from flooding (with these new tome dropping zones now)
2. Have a translation cost that is more than a normal tome, which pulls some money out of economy, again not absurd
3. People who could not or are having no luck getting opus's now could get them and people who do not raid can also
4. Take the "lesser opus's out of the raid zones and replace their "drop time" with "good ones".
5. People who raid get them for free (also translated) when they drop and they get silly loot from the zone as well.

This seems win, win to me

Yale

Again, here is my suggestion
 
PER WALD

As for your question, it does drop Opuses. It is the way we are hoping to allow lower end guilds access to Opuses when they have the chops for hard content earlier on. Putting them on something as low tier as crumbling maps really is not on the agenda, though. We are unsure if future content is going to continue putting them around t10 after thaz, though.

If you want Opus raid around T10
 
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Also per Wald:

No problem. I appreciate that it is annoying when single progression like tomes is tied to certain tiers, but that is partially by design. Originally, Tur Ruj was going to drop nothing but tomes. Even though that idea was later unimplemented, it still is a very large part of the reward for both of the zones that now have them in it. Adding them to easier content means that those with high end gear would have a lot of their reward shifted away from the high content, and would instead farm the hell out of the maps or w/e we put them on.
 
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Warning: rather long post incoming...

OK, let me preface my statement (and beat some to the punch) by pointing out my own lack of tomes done. I am fairly neutral to this whole discussion, I see both sides here.. I have a handful of 65's (and a ton of adept alts), and have barely touched tomes. I am (by virtue of a busy real life with wife, kids, and job) a casual player. I have taken long absences to play other games or because real life events demanded it. I will likely never get to the point of having nothing to xp, and I really don't care, it is a game, I play to have fun, and hang out with friends. hanging out with cool people knows no tier or play-style. Hell, I have an assload of quests I will likely never finish (lore, vah, diety, etc.), because I often find hanging out for xp with people x,y,and z far more fun than farm this zone hoping for rare mob to pop, and have my rare loot drop also. I also just can't devote the time to play that I once did, and have.

Now, what we need is solutions for every player. Not just casual players, not just hard-core players. The honest truth, is that you need both, especially for a small server based on a game that turned 16 this year. There is a very good reason so many games are F2P/P2W (free to play, pay to win) these days. It is because that system a) makes the company supporting them far more money than a monthly subscription, and b) it easily supports both play styles. Casual players can still play and have fun, experience content, and improve their toons, while hard cores can make their toons "the best their is" in the game. So, the solution here should mimic that style of game creation, if possible. Am I suggestion micro-transactions (p2w)? Heck no, but suggestions of a vendor selling tomes you xp to gain a mob spawner, a clickie, or a consumable, as was suggested a couple pages ago, comes close. Also, those wanting these extra tomes to do, will eventually use them up also, and still want something to do. So any changes to the status quo should have a far more "permanent" solution, that satisfies all on a lasting basis.

So, with that in mind, here is what I suggest, incorporating stuff from this thread, and elsewhere.
A) Add a Bounty Quest giver and merchant in Ikisith, the best place being refuge, though an argument could be loosely made for Murk. These bounty quests can be a mix of spawn "Rare Mob A" and "Slay 300 of X mob". Give it several tiers of bounties, like Thurg, but the bounty tiers just provide more tokens per completion. Tier 1 bounty is one token, tier 4 bounty is 4 tokens, for example. Tier 1 bounties could be in places like murk, or remanats, where tier 4 might be Citadel or BQ elites. Or make those tier 3, and make t4 bounties in raid zones (like spires and tur'ruj), though those should probably be just be body count style bounties. Set the bounty token cost for 3/4 and opus tomes to some high value the staff can be happy with.
Also, make it so that you can trade tomes that dropped in those raid zones to the vendor (or another bounty-related npc) for bounty tokens equal to what it would cost to buy it, so that those raiding the zone could trade in a tome that dropped that nobody needed for one that he/she does need. For example, if you decide Class tome 3 costs 30 tokens, then a player could trade in one for 30 tokens, to go buy a tome he can use. This helps both people that can't raid the tome-dropping zones, and those that can, but have horrible luck getting what they need.

B) Add in a merchant that sells tomes that can be traded in for items. Best place for these guys are Sadri, Athica, Newport, places that most guilds use as their launch points. Their would be five tome types on the vendor, consumable(20aa's), charged clickie(50 aa's), aug/expable gear piece(80 aa's), clickie(125 aa's) and mob spawn (200aa's). (Costs for example only, could be changed up or down as staff sees fit for balance, of course.) On completion, you would hail the merchant for a dialogue, where you hand it in, and are given a /cm list of options to trade it for.
Or, it could also use the token system, and just have a Tome of Tokens(20 aa's) on the merchant, and you build up token to buy the item you want, and tier the costs as 1 token, 3 tokens, 4 tokens, 6 tokens, and 10 tokens.
1) Consumables would be one-offs, like single charge gate, illusions, damage/healing boosts, etc.
2) Charged clickies could be 5 charges of whatever is on the consumables list.
3) The augs could give worn effects, or slightly better stats than what TS-ers make (prefer not stats, as that could hurt the TS market).
4) Expable gear could be similar to the seeds, they start with minor stats, but can grow to be great. To not have to create gear for each class type in each slot, perhaps just make it by archtype (tank, healer, dps) and make it slot all? (Though maybe not, I could see abuse to that, all gear slots are not stat equal.) Perhaps give them a new aug slot, and make some of the token augs only good for this new gear?
5) Clickies gained could all be ones that exist in game already, tboots, melwin's idol, toll, etc.
6) I am unsure if the mob spawn item can even be coded, but I could easily forsee that being limited to the 6-man mobs, and only stay up for a limited duration (say 1 hour?), at their normal spawn point of course. All loot would be random from it's normal loot table, and normal loot amounts. If the mob spawn thing can work, and the staff wants to even allow it, perhaps raid mob that are quest related could be added, at an even greater cost?

Obviously, the system to include more tomes, and more items to be gained. But even this basis should be comprehensive enough to give everyone something to do for a long, long, time.
 
As usually Rans you have some good ideas.

Like I said previously in this thread I am not opposed to giving the masses access to books but it should be costly...very costly. I would not mind something like the vendor that sells a book you exp turn in for a random opus/class that you have not yet completed or something like 2-3x the exp for a book of your choice. I think the book should be somthing roughly equivalent of 1-2 CoP's in rough order of magnitude range.
 
I wish the five of you that keep this thread going would have just agreed to disagree 8 pages ago and dropped this until some new people weighed in. This is like the worst thread I've read on these boards ever and that is saying something.

My own personal opinion- I did pretty much every non-opus that would benefit my character, and did not win enough raid books to keep me going. I quit pretty shortly after finishing my available books because of a lot of reasons, but one of the biggest was definitely that I could no longer advance my character in any meaningful sense outside of raiding for several items I still needed, or books that were highly contested. If some alternate method of acquiring books had been available to me, I most likely would have pursued that and continued playing. Or if I had a few expable items, or something else in that vein. When I play a mmo, I tend to lose interest if I get to a point where theres nothing for me to do other than log in for a three hour raid once or twice a week.
 
Hi Everybody... Ishlana here :)

To be fair, I stopped reading at the end of page 4, because, tbh, it turned into more a fight and less a progression/evolving discussion. However, I feel I am kind of in a unique position and therefore will lend my two cents.

I am a level 65 paladin with max AA's and 10 banked to boot. I also have 47 completed tomes (granted, none of which are Emberflow - i'll get to that in a minute... OR opus's/3's/4's) and I have the other 12 of my buyable/tradeable tomes in the bank just waiting - point being that they will all get done in due time. I also have the Vah quest completely completed; I have Silver Crown completely completed; I have (I think) 22 ways to get myself (some of them being a whole raid) around (it is at least 20 ways...); I have the 5th seeker aug; my murk faction is maxed; my refuge faction is maxed. I am second in command of my guild. We have seen Yclist (not conquered it, but we ARE flagged to enter it); I have travelled to the end of HMal B and won; I have travelled to the Claw Commander and held my own well, and won; we have seen Sanctum (not beaten it, but we are flagged as a guild to enter it). We are progressing through ToT and Abyss and Emberflow, we have beaten Valor B, we have conquered the easy side of Frost. I have an eternal. I do not have an alt to speak of (just a little fisher bot who is now a tracker strategically placed in a zone to track for the guild). Other than charms and my seed of energy (which is maxxed), I have not bought a single piece of actual gear for Ishlana - I prefer to earn my way and kill for my stuff. That is my choice, and I've lived it well... it taught me to appreciate the things that come to me - it also taught me to appreciate my character that much more. Not boxing taught me how to play her to the fullest capability (and so I KNOW how to play her to her capacity, even if I don't actually engage in that behavior as often as I should...).

Other than farming for my supreme, which I am not able to do near as often as I'd like b/c of real life commitments and guild commitments (which I don't mind AT ALL) all I really have is tomes and exploring new places and figuring out new strat. Certainly, once the tomes run out (and they will) exploring and helping guildies will be enough for me.... for a while. But then what?

Yes, my guild is progressing. We are doing it at a much slower rate than others - but we are also not falling apart at the seams. If that means that Ishy takes a back seat for a while, then that's what that means -- and I'm fine with that, personally. But I could see how others in near the same position could not be. Every once in a while, everybody needs SOMETHING to keep them going, otherwise, what's driving them? The thing you don't want to see is people who get lost in the shuffle. And, believe it or not guys, there is a WHOLE OTHER SECT OF FOLKS WHO ARE VERY MUCH RUNNING OUT OF THINGS TO DO.... and you WILL lose these people. And eventually, you will lose the higher tier'd folks as well - because what good is a fun game with no competition to drive them?

Here's the thing about Emberflow tomes that I said I would get to in a minute. I am half way thru collecting the frags to make an emberflow tome. Do i think i will ever see the other encounters in emberflow that would get me tomes, or tome pieces? Not really. Why? Because of the high tier 6 mans who have those encounters so locked down that it doesn't allow for anyone else to get a foot in the door. Do they offer to bring others? No. You know who did, rarely? Sacred Band. Where are those characters now? Dunno.

My suggestion for the devs and GMs is to find a feasible option to bridge this gap. You are rapidly approaching a situation that will quickly become wildly out of your control and you WILL start losing players at a faster rate than you've already seen... Why? Because what is there for them to play for? Some really cool suggestions have already been made.
  • I particularly like the idea of adding opus 1/2 and the 3/4 tomes to the logistician and putting in repeatable token quests to refuge (and possibly to murk as well)...
  • I also particularly like the idea of Refuge Bounty Hunting for tokens!
    • But, to refute that, some good points were made about making things far too easy for up-and-coming-toons and negating the work-progress of those that came before. Surely though, there is a way to balance this. Maybe the refuge bounty hunting is the way to bridge that gap.
  • Also, something Kero mentioned has real merit: extending the emberflow tomes to the new zone Windstone.
  • In a previous thread, I suggested that some of these tomes be added to Crumbling T-maps with the drop rate of the Vah Sword on ED Maps, but that was effectively shot down by Woldo and Tao, as far as I remember....
The point of all this is that we're not asking for ease of access to the harder stuff... Or, well, I'M not, anyway... We ARE just asking for more options before we run out of options all together. And i'm speaking from the perspective of someone who could be approaching this scenario sooner than I would have liked. My guild, though progressing, will not see Spires/Tur'Ruj for quite some time... and we don't have much desire, at this time, to encroach on Prophecy's Thaz territory - we are already learning so much in other zones as it is :)

-Ishlana Constianna
65 pretty paladin, Lead officer of Dragonkin
Max +10 AAs, 47 (and counting) completed tomes
 
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My own personal opinion- I did pretty much every non-opus that would benefit my character, and did not win enough raid books to keep me going. I quit pretty shortly after finishing my available books because of a lot of reasons, but one of the biggest was definitely that I could no longer advance my character in any meaningful sense outside of raiding for several items I still needed, or books that were highly contested. If some alternate method of acquiring books had been available to me, I most likely would have pursued that and continued playing. Or if I had a few expable items, or something else in that vein. When I play a mmo, I tend to lose interest if I get to a point where theres nothing for me to do other than log in for a three hour raid once or twice a week.

I am not close to running out of stuff to do, but I was on live. And I don't play alts. I 100% agree that not being able to progress your main character in any way could be a legitimate reason to move to a new game. Most MMOS put out new content much more regularly. The new content usually includes ways for all gear levels and play styles to upgrade their characters. SoD doesn't push out new content that often, so it makes sense to implement even more ways to give veteran players some progression paths for character advancement.
 
Making them droppable is an option. It would not make those who worked hard to raid them get anything less, and those who do not want to put the time into the raid scene could spend the time to get the money and buy them.

The only problem would be making sure the fights that dropped them required enough characters that they could not easily be farmed solely for plat.

As for them coming off things that are not raid mobs, I do not see that happening. Hell, Thaz has made them much, much easier to get and lowered the required "tier" substantially. Also, I think the prevalence of people not in the raid game who have nothing more to put exp into is much lower than people are espousing in this thread.

How many of the people posting here are lower than tier 9/10 and honestly can say that they have no where else to put experience into other than Opus'? And of those people, how many are not currently raiding to progress to that level?

I am sure there are a few, but at the end of the day, there is always going to be some limit to what more experience nets you. Whether you come to the end of the current itemization, or can not get that last tome, or get a 1.2 charm and have no further to go - there is some limit. Even if we implement expandable experience rewards, which we want to do at some point soon, it will only mitigate the fact that there is some end to experience progression that only moves when new high tier content is added.
 
Whether you come to the end of the current itemization, or can not get that last tome, or get a 1.2 charm and have no further to go - there is some limit. Even if we implement expandable experience rewards, which we want to do at some point soon, it will only mitigate the fact that there is some end to experience progression that only moves when new high tier content is added.

This has been my thoughts during all this. There will always be an endpoint and the endpoint of higher tier things should be accepted as part of the design. Clamoring for change because you reached your character's endpoint doesn't mean things should actually be different. Obviously my opinion isn't the popular opinion otherwise expressed in this thread but it's still my feelings on it.
 
So... can I finally get my 3/4 class tomes as an asian-time only player without raid guild? If so, I'll be so happy. If not, well... I don't care anymore actually because I gave up a long long time ago.
 
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i can understand how some of you all feel about tome 3/4s. it took me almost a year and a 1/2 to 2 years to finally get crippler 3. a couple or few more sources of class 3's and lesser opii would be nice but not sure what would be the best way to do it. hopefully some good ideas are actually taken from this and considered for sure.
 
Making them droppable is an option. It would not make those who worked hard to raid them get anything less, and those who do not want to put the time into the raid scene could spend the time to get the money and buy them.

The only problem would be making sure the fights that dropped them required enough characters that they could not easily be farmed solely for plat.

As for them coming off things that are not raid mobs, I do not see that happening. Hell, Thaz has made them much, much easier to get and lowered the required "tier" substantially. Also, I think the prevalence of people not in the raid game who have nothing more to put exp into is much lower than people are espousing in this thread.

How many of the people posting here are lower than tier 9/10 and honestly can say that they have no where else to put experience into other than Opus'? And of those people, how many are not currently raiding to progress to that level?

I am sure there are a few, but at the end of the day, there is always going to be some limit to what more experience nets you. Whether you come to the end of the current itemization, or can not get that last tome, or get a 1.2 charm and have no further to go - there is some limit. Even if we implement expandable experience rewards, which we want to do at some point soon, it will only mitigate the fact that there is some end to experience progression that only moves when new high tier content is added.

What you could do is pull an EVE online and make an AA or tome or whatever that you can do many times for the same benefit but the amount of xp required is exponential. EVE stops at lvl 5, but you could do to lvl 1000+, each tome or AA taking more xp to fill. Eventually a single one of the tomes would take trillions of xp to fill, but at least you could always be putting your xp towards something, even if it is very slow.
 
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