Suggestions for Fixing Unnecessary Muflation

[eqjenius]

If you don't want people commenting on your ideas, maybe you shouldn't post in a public forum.

 

[Kazimir]

First, this argument is based on the fact that you feel something is a problem, others may not have that view.

I should clarify my stance on ringers. I actually don't really have a problem with somebody taking his uber-geared T11 tank to DHK and helping a bunch of newer players stomp out a bunch of dragons. One of the pleasures of SoD is going back to content that used to pwn you and absolutely destroy it. ......Buffbots...I don't have enough...

There is really no difference. I started this game with about 7 RL friends 5-6 years ago, am I allowed to let them use my chars if i take a hiatus?

If there was nothing wrong with the use of these tools, then I would simply recommend that the devs set up a few NPCs in each city to give players whatever buffs they want whenever they want. At least that way, the capability to maximize a character's power would apply to everyone equally, not just the people who've lucked into still having the account information of a player long-gone.

Already said no to several times.

Here is another idea to tackle the problem: e-mail each player every six months, and ask them to confirm their account is currently active. If a player doesn't respond or responds in the negative, that account is suspected until further notice.

...then perhaps a periodic security question can be posted to the user of the account or the person trying to log in, in much the same way that banks or Facebook occasionally ask you to verify your information for security purposes.

Not worth the effort to implement and emails change as stated previously. For the other, I don't think the client can be modified in this way...also people forget answers occasionally, talk to anyone who has worked an IT help desk.

It's true that it hadn't crossed my mind that FWF's existence is dependent on inactive accounts. That isn't true of CW (although we use lots of old buffbots, particularly for SB Emps). If FWF as a guild has devoted a lot of time into a character from an inacive account and they cannot continue without him, then it seems to me that they've assumed de-facto ownership of the account. Perhaps an exception should be made for raiding toons that a longstanding guild has essentially claimed ownership of.

I specialize in automation and process improvement with a focus in engineering. Systems with oh this case breaks x and that breaks y generally fail no matter how rare the occasion. But its only 1 a day, week, month... GMs dont want to deal with this.

I don't think people would ever stop using guest-lock because there are too many ways to inconvenience your character that the GMs (I assume this still holds) won't fix for you.

Guestlock was also introduced as a check for player against themselves so they didn't accidentally delete items. Adding explock to guestlock breaks this function. Also, if you add explock, and someone has it on when they log in, then go xp a bit. Then realize they forgot to turn it off, they will most likely never use it again.

I'm not sure this is a plausible scenario. Why would you give your character info to a lower tiered guild? Out of spite for your current guild? So that your character is even further behind the curve should you ever choose to unretire.

There is no reason both cant have access. Also, how are you further behind the curve? You got some xp, and when you come back, those players will be better off and probably group with you. Also, guilds normally bring in alts for rots before retired players, unless the char required.

Overall, I disagree with pretty much everything you have posted in this thread. You need to make a thread about something and stick too it. You have introduced upwards of 10 separate threads worth of content in this one trying to keep it alive. BTW, each of those 10 threads has existed several times over and died because players don't like the idea.

And for your well inactive chars getting xp is bad, to max a char in this game takes over 5000AAs. I don't think a couple tomes finished hurts anything

 

[eqjenius]

First, this argument is based on the fact that you feel something is a problem, others may not have that view.

Indeed. In fact I find I'm fighting two battles: one about whether there's a problem, the other about the proposed solution to said problem.

There is really no difference.

There is a difference. Access to tools (toons) owned and created by active players who you interact with, versus tools owned by someone who left the game long ago and no longer has any interest in the maintenance of their character(s). All inactive accounts do is create higher thresholds upon which the Devs determine how to create new game content. I.E. mudflation.

The difference is this: devs creating content based on the sum total of the capabilities of active players, versus the sum total capabilities of all active players AND all inactive players whose accounts are still in use.

I started this game with about 7 RL friends 5-6 years ago, am I allowed to let them use my chars if i take a hiatus?

EDIT: Sorry, I didn't see what you were getting at the first time I read this.

IF a system were put into place where inactive accounts would cycle out of the game, then the answer would be that it depends on the type of solution that was implemented. It would probably also depend on how long you went on hiatus.

Already said no to several times.

You misunderstood my meaning here. I wasn't proposing this idea by any means.

Not worth the effort to implement and emails change as stated previously. For the other, I don't think the client can be modified in this way...also people forget answers occasionally, talk to anyone who has worked an IT help desk.

"Worth the effort" in this case depends on whether or not you think there's even a problem. Since you don't, then nothing I proposed would be worth the effort to you.

You're correct that there are potential complications when it comes to addressing the issue.

I specialize in automation and process improvement with a focus in engineering. Systems with oh this case breaks x and that breaks y generally fail no matter how rare the occasion. But its only 1 a day, week, month... GMs dont want to deal with this.

The idea you're responding to here was a hypothetical of a hypothetical. Since someone mentioned a potential complication to removing inactive accounts from the game, I suggested that perhaps an exception could be made for a few of FWF's raiding toons upon implementation of the hypothetical new policy. After implementation, there would be no more exceptions granted, so it's really a one-time deal - NOT something the GMs would have to concern themselves with ever again.

Guestlock was also introduced as a check for player against themselves so they didn't accidentally delete items. Adding explock to guestlock breaks this function.

The confirmation dialogue box for item deletion existed well before the guest-lock feature, AFAIK. It can be turned on or off as you choose.

Also, if you add explock, and someone has it on when they log in, then go xp a bit. Then realize they forgot to turn it off, they will most likely never use it again.

I don't find this to be a likely scenario. I've already stated reasons for using the guest-lock feature, none of which have to do with when you're using your own account. Secondly, unless your UI is very different than mine, I have no problem seeing whether or not I'm getting XP from a kill. It's in big yellow letters and I notice it every time I kill something. Thirdly, you would almost surely notice if you left your guest-lock on before you start to kill things, not only because it tells you as soon as you log on a guest-locked character, but also because you likely tried to trade/use a vendor/delete before you even attempted to engage something.

Overall, I disagree with pretty much everything you have posted in this thread.

Noted. I appreciate the thoughtful replies.

You need to make a thread about something and stick too it. You have introduced upwards of 10 separate threads worth of content in this one trying to keep it alive.

I don't think I've gotten off-topic, though perhaps I've bitten off more than I can chew. Do you think I'm trying to keep the thread alive, or responding to the fact that there are 10 threads worth of content?

BTW, each of those 10 threads has existed several times over and died because players don't like the idea.

Not unexpected that some players don't like the idea (already mentioned in the OP), but the fact that these ideas have been bandied around "several times over" means that other people feel the same way I do. Some of them have even posted in this thread.

 

[eqjenius]

If there was nothing wrong with the use of these tools, then I would simply recommend that the devs set up a few NPCs in each city to give players whatever buffs they want whenever they want. At least that way, the capability to maximize a character's power would apply to everyone equally, not just the people who've lucked into still having the account information of a player long-gone.

Already said no to several times.

Actually, we may have some common ground here. If you think it's a bad idea to give players free access to any buffs they want at any time (I'm assuming you do since you posted a counter-point to an idea you thought I was proposing), then at least in this regard, we agree that a problem exists.

 

[Dimmi]

How is having a buff-bot any different than "RAEGO AT ATHICA STEPS"?

And more importantly, in fact MOST importantly, how does anything you've brought up make the gaming experience worse for anyone? That's the final yard stick for making policy in game-land. If something makes the gaming experience worse for anyone, then it's worth looking into making a policy. If it makes the gaming policy worse for enough people, it's worth making a policy. The only way any of the points made in this thread make the gaming experience worse for anyone is on the imaginary "I had to do XXXX so everyone else should too" level. None of this makes anyone's experience less enjoyable outside of the ego-factor. It's like asking for Federal Regulation to be instituted because "when WE play dodgeball if you catch the ball the other guy's out, but when THEY play dodge ball if they catch the ball nothing happens!!!"


All that being said, this game has had a LOT of its policy post-Wiz made based off of player-base reccomendation. Players voicing their opinions and observations and the results there-of is one of the three hundred twenty four thousand nine hundred and eight things that make this server amazing. The reason it's one of the things that makes this server great is because most of the server's population base is made up of people who are willing to step back and say "Does this affect the game? Or does this just upset me?" when faced with an issue. A lot of things upset a lot of people, but they don't affect the game enough to warrant policy change. As the perfect example I give you bank-blocking. THOUSANDS of threads have been started about ways to "fix" bank-blocking AFK characters. Make an NPC that you can use to send them to jail/port them out/shrink them/punish them/make them pay/take the life of their first-born. An issue that upsets LOTS of people. But it doesn't affect the game, and there are like 40 ways to not be affected by it in any way shape or form. Now we get down to the nitty-gritty: relevance.

When you make a post, honestly...HONESTLY answer this question: Does this "problem" REALLY make the game less enjoyable for the playerbase, or does it just piss me off?

If you don't know, post a thread asking the playerbase and staff. "Hey, I've seen a lot of XXXXX lately, so I'm curious, do you see it too? How does it make you feel? Does it change your play-style or experience?" and go from there.

If you KNOW it affects a portion of the player-base's experience, post a thread, "Hey, I've noticed XXXXX and I've heard complaints from several players about it making the game flat-out not fun for them, thoughts/feelings/opinions?"

If it just pisses you off, go to chillville and prepare for a lot of Fuwok's silly goddamn something4chan.forums.php/giflibrary.mylittlepony.com intervention.

I'm willing to go out on a limb here and be the first to apply this logic. Hold on to the seat of your pants, it's a wild bumpy ride.



Q: How does someone using another person's account affect the playerbase?

A: Well...if they weren't using that high tier SOB-machine to farm *any zone*, I'd be competing with someone else...so no change there. If they weren't PUGing *any raid zone* using their ringer tank, any other guild might be doing it anyway...so no change there. If they weren't using *buff bot army* to buff their group/farming duo/whatever, they'd be getting the same buffs from someone in Athica...no change there.


And as a final point to cram into this wall of awful damn text: the reason there aren't "gimme buff" bots in major cities and never will be: SoD is a unique MMO these days. It's not a 1-player game. Having access to every relic buff in the game whenever you want? No problem. But to get there, you will have to have friends. Access to a buddy's enchanter, friends with a relic shaman, a mage you spent at least 30 seconds talking to in Newport to score some summoned peridots, it all requires interaction of some kind at some point. Nobody with their own personal home-made relic buff bot army did it without making a friend or interacting with other people. Maybe not even the original owner of the toon, but somewhere someone made a friend or joined a guild or did something socially interactive, and that's the name of the game.

tl;dr: SoD is a place where you make friends to slay dragons. Stop trying to screw it up.

 

[eqjenius]

Maybe you guys should re-read the title of this thread, and then maybe you'll figure out what it is I'm trying to address. You can keep accusing me of being jealous or pissed off or fun-hating if you want, but it's so asinine I don't even bother to roll my eyes anymore.

Ever increasing power can quickly cause issues with game mechanics,

I can only apologize... it's difficult to tell what effect an item will have on the game as a whole until it reaches a certain saturation point.

while rapidly declining value may serve to alienate and drive away players.

At some point in the game, you start needing (at least in the minds/eyes of guild recruiters/leaders) lots of exp to continue progressing in the raid game. I have known numerous people who quit SoD because they didn't have the time or didn't want to commit the time to gain the exp points "required" to continue raiding.

I would argue that the problems I originally identified contributed to both of these situations. Resolving the issues identified would help to keep these situations from occurring while having negligible negative effect on the SoD experience, because if you haven't worked in order to attain progression, you've lost nothing when it's taken away.

 

[Silosobi]

"I would argue that the problems I originally identified contributed to both of these situations."

Yes, but only to a very very tiny degree.

"Resolving the issues identified would help to keep these situations from occurring"

Not really, Nobody has gained any significant amount of experience "for free", and arguably, whatever they did gain for free, they probably would have attained regardless because they would just put in a little extra time to reach w/e goals they have/had. Additionally, I have seen countless people in leach exp groups who weren't even afk, they just felt like hanging out and chatting, and there is a fair chance that if they didn't have that option, they would have just joined a legitimate group and progressed 5x faster.

"while having negligible negative effect on the SoD experience"

Did you really just not read anything anyone has said in this thread other than yourself? Half the posts in this thread outline in detail why one or more of your ideas would cause significant damage to the SoD experience.

"because if you haven't worked in order to attain progression, you've lost nothing when it's taken away."

There is always some degree of work in anything. Its funny, all my friends who just banded with their alt instead of whoring them out are exp'd way more than mine. It actually was a fair amount of work to whore out Grupo to the point that people actually played him regularly. I'm not doing it again for no reason other than it's just way easier to use the exp band mechanic to get him lots of free exp (a mechanic you support). I already addressed leaching. Ringers would not get any "free" exp if they did not put in tons of work to make an awesome character worth boxing, and put in the effort/risk to share their info with people who might exp the character.

If you want an explination as to why so many people disagree with you on so many levels, check out the LP Grupo thread. ALSO, among all the MMRPGS I have played, SoD is by far the best about keeping mudflation to a minimum. By far, the biggest cause of mudflation in SoD is Ikkisith tomes, which may or may not be a regrettable change. The problems you have identified are probably responsible for less than 1% of the mudflation on the server, and every solution you have suggested would cause damage to other aspects of the game in one way or another.

 

[Cinn]

if we had the playerbase to support getting rid of old accounts and buff bots and ringers and dual boxing we would have gotten rid of it but we don't so it's there.

isn't that the conclusion we reached as a community like 3 years ago what is even going on here?

 

[Silosobi]

isn't that the conclusion we reached as a community like 3 years ago?

what is even going on here?

Yes.

A guy doesn't seem to listen or understand people explaining things to him.

 

[eqjenius]

if we had the playerbase to support getting rid of old accounts and buff bots and ringers and dual boxing we would have gotten rid of it but we don't so it's there.

isn't that the conclusion we reached as a community like 3 years ago what is even going on here?

First of all, I have never once suggested getting rid of dual boxing. I don't why you would even bring it up.

Secondly, if you can find a single reference to a single dev agreeing with the logic that the server would be crippled if old accounts stopped being whored around, I will cease posting on the subject immediately and donate 10kpp to the SoD charity of your choice. I'm willing to bet you can't.

 

[Rorne]

Secondly, if you can find a single reference to a single dev agreeing with the logic that the server would be crippled if old accounts stopped being whored around,

The server might not be crippled but some playstyles might be

 

[Wulamdar]

First of all, I have never once suggested getting rid of dual boxing. I don't why you would even bring it up.

Secondly, if you can find a single reference to a single dev agreeing with the logic that the server would be crippled if old accounts stopped being whored around, I will cease posting on the subject immediately and donate 10kpp to the SoD charity of your choice. I'm willing to bet you can't.

Dual boxing is another topic that's been brought up many times. What he's saying is that IF WE HAD THE PLAYER BASE the game would allow for retired characters/buff bots to fade away and dual boxing could be disallowed. But we don't, so they're accepted and tolerated. It has little to do with you bringing it up or not and just a general statement of things that have been discussed in the past.

I'm surprised you haven't brought up dual boxing, though. It allows 1 person to progress 2 characters at the same time (something for nothing by your logic). It creates this issue of 'ringers' and 'buff bots' and allows people to progress much quicker. Those sound like all the issues you're trying to address. I'd love to hear your argument of how you're for dual boxing but against all the things it creates.

 

[eqjenius]

One of the people who's disagreed with me in this thread was kind enough to message me in-game and explain that the people who don't think there's a problem are either being snarky or don't know what they're talking about. It's hard for me to gauge exactly what I need to explain to different people, so I appreciate the heads up.

1. I won't address the guest-lock feature again, because I think that a viable solution was proposed that the devs can choose whether to impliment or not.

2. I won't address the AFK leeching issue again, because different posters convinced me that it's probably not a huge factor in the total amount of xp gained on the server. I suspect that the problem has worsened since PL was resolved, but by how much I couldn't say any more than I could estimate how much xp is gained from AFK leeching on the average day.

Additionally, there are social elements involved in AFK leeching which are not present in the other two scenarios: You have to form a group in real-time, which means getting your toon to the correct zone for an invite, and there's often chatting and/or buffing going on while a person is "AFK."

Finally, the experience gained from AFK leeching is finite: you can only leech as much xp as the person doing the work is determined to grind. Also, the fact that you have to log on in order for an AFK leech to take place limits how much can be gained in this way.

That doesn't mean I don't think AFK leeching is a problem, it's just that a solution might be more of a hassle than its worth. The tradeskill macro-check is a good example to go by here: it's not too much of a bother, but it's annoying enough that if it was more of a hassle, people would be discouraged from mining or fishing. I wouldn't want to discourage people from grouping or socializing for the limited effect it would have on curbing mudflation.


3. The only remaining issue to address is the issue of inactive accounts not cycling out of the game. Most MMOs don't have this problem, because it costs monthly fees to keep an account active on for-profit MMOs, which the primary account owner would choose not to pay if he/she stops being active in the game. SoD is unique in the aspect that an old toon whose owner quit the game long ago is part of the game indefinitely. I always thought that server-wide content altering effects would be cool if they could be designed (like, what if you could actually WIN the war with Kaezul?).

However, I can see no benefit to having old toons available indefinitely in a game based around character progression. They increase the rate at which everyone reaches the end-game, which I see as neither beneficial to the developers who have spent their time creating content for players that players are able to skip or rush through, nor is it beneficial to players who've run out of game content to busy themselves with.

As such, here is my proposal: if the devs would like to see the issue of inactive accounts not cycling out of the game addressed, offer 50 fame points to whoever can come up with a technically viable solution. The devs can then determine whether that solution is worth the effort to implement.

 

[eqjenius]

Dual boxing is another topic that's been brought up many times. What he's saying is that IF WE HAD THE PLAYER BASE the game would allow for retired characters/buff bots to fade away and dual boxing could be disallowed. But we don't, so they're accepted and tolerated. It has little to do with you bringing it up or not and just a general statement of things that have been discussed in the past.

I'm surprised you haven't brought up dual boxing, though. It allows 1 person to progress 2 characters at the same time (something for nothing by your logic). It creates this issue of 'ringers' and 'buff bots' and allows people to progress much quicker. Those sound like all the issues you're trying to address. I'd love to hear your argument of how you're for dual boxing but against all the things it creates.

Dual boxing, like adventure banding, cuts the experience for your characters in half, so you're not really getting something for nothing.

I agree that getting rid of dual boxing would break the game. All upper tier content is designed around the idea of having a certain number of toons involved in the conquest of monsters. If dual-boxing was outlawed without a significant increase in the size of the player base, it would be impossible to do most of the game's content unless you're vastly overtiered (and if you're overtiered then there's no incentive to kill the monster because the loot is designed for lower tiered characters).

I'm not convinced that we don't have the player base to keep the game afloat if we weren't all running around with JBs and Emps and Raegos that we buffed ourselves with in Athica. With the exception of raiding, I could kill all of the content I typically engage without JB, Emp, Raego, Focus, or any of the other buffs I typically roll with. It would just take longer. And in a raiding situation, there are usually enough players around to hit the raid with everything it needs, regardless of buffbots.

My only problem with ringers are the ones that are no longer active in the game. Grupo? Fine. Ringo? Not fine.

 

[Wulamdar]

Dual boxing, like adventure banding, cuts the experience for your characters in half, so you're not really getting something for nothing.

In Grupo's case someone was dual boxing him yet you seem to think he was getting something for nothing. I just bring that up because not everyone who dual boxes only plays by themselves (which I know you're aware of). Your main gripe with Grupo getting "something for nothing" is made available because of dual boxing. No one is sitting out their character to play Grupo while 5 other people get experience.

Anyways, it already takes 1-2 years of 40h/week play time to get anywhere near max experience and you would like to remove bots to make that slower? So people will be able to play all of the games content?

Where's the smile emoticon that blows his head off? I would like to insert that here.

 

[eqjenius]

In Grupo's case someone was dual boxing him yet you seem to think he was getting something for nothing. I just bring that up because not everyone who dual boxes only plays by themselves (which I know you're aware of). Your main gripe with Grupo getting "something for nothing" is made available because of dual boxing. No one is sitting out their character to play Grupo while 5 other people get experience.

The owner of Grupo's account got something for nothing. He got free xp on Grupo while maintaining 100% of the xp on his other characters. The only person sacrificing xp or doing work in this situation is the person who's boxing with Grupo, and that person isn't doing it for Grupo's benefit. He's doing it for the benefit of the other people in the group/raid.

Anyways, it already takes 1-2 years of 40h/week play time to get anywhere near max experience and you would like to remove bots to make that slower? So people will be able to play all of the games content?

I think people should level up their own buffbots. Or make friends with people that have. People that actually PLAY the game, rather than people that quit the game.

 

[Wulamdar]

Where the hell do you think buff bots come from? They didn't just magically appear out of thin air and were only handed out to a select few. People have been playing this game for a while. Me, personally, for over 5 years off and on. I have a number of logins to characters that are no longer played; former guildmates/friends. So since they stopped playing, and I continued to, I should no longer be able to use them because they're retired? I should make my own?

I'll get right on that. In the mean time I'll use my buff bots to buff my newly formed buff bot and box him with Grupo to get access to content tiers above him while leeching as much experience as possible to get them to the current status of the bots I already have access to.

 

[eqjenius]

If you ever lost access to your regular buffbots, Wulamdar, I'd let you use mine.

<3

 

[Dimmi]

And I'd pay you 10k pp to log them in from 10 different IPs and make them disappear

 

[Wulamdar]

...and that person isn't doing it for Grupo's benefit. He's doing it for the benefit of the other people in the group/raid.

This is not relevant. A boxed character is a boxed character no matter who benefits. If someone boxes you in a raid to loot a rotting item, you just got something for nothing. If a friend boxes you on an experience group, you just got something for nothing. Anything gained on your character while you are not playing would be considered 'something for nothing' by your view. Yet you seem to only apply that thought to Grupo/ringers/bots because of the intentions of the person boxing them?