Suggestion : Clarify what a town must do to get a portal out

[Cheopis]

Heather is getting a portal out. Grats to the folks living in Heather!

Now, what I would like to know is what the rest of us folks have got to do to get portals for out towns? There is obviously some sort of decision making process going on.

Is someone throwing darts at a dartboard and making their portal yes/no decisions that way, or is there a logical decision making process going on. Or do we just have to brown nose for a while :P

I went through several communities the other day, and there were 50x50's for sale all over the place in communities without outgoing portals, including one really beautiful plot with a great ocean overlook.

Then I went through the non-guild settlements and communities that have portals. Out of about 20 communities visited, I found three plots bigger than 32x32...

How do you decide on portals? Why is there not a portal in every town.

There are lots of beautiful plots out there, but people won't buy most of them because the town is broken if there is no portal out.

Heather was populated because despite it's lack of sane transport, it is located near lots of raw materials and has a decent number of large plots.

What would, say, Copperton need to do to get a portal? We are a growing town. We have both copper/tin and sandstone nearby.

[AA0]

I'm pretty sure its all in David's head. Based on proximity of resources and other outgoing portals, etc.

[Rhyssa]

I think player requests would be taken into consideration too. A lot of people have suggested that Heather needed a portal out. It's one of the main gathering areas for oak, T3 fungus, glowing essence, granite, kenaf, various confectioner needs and is also close to cotton. It isn't the people who live in Heather that asked for a portal out, it's all the people who go there for resources.

No offense, but I can't see anyone else asking for a portal out for Copperton other than the people who live there.

To put a better perspective on it, it's usage - Heather is an area that sees a lot of usage.

[Cheopis]

I can understand that usage is the key here. If a town doesn't have a portal, or really nice plots, it generally doesn't see usage.

If a town has plots that are sitting right on top of t2 or higher resources, and the plots have open use, of course it's going to get usage, even if all people do is come and grind exp.

If you look at the settlement patterns, you will find a drastic difference between the number of occupied plots less than 60x60 near portals, and he number of occupied plots less than 60x60 that are _not_ near portals.

People will live in out of the way places for the opportunity to own a very large plot. The smaller the plot, the less likely someone is to want to live out of the way.

Why not introduce a real reason to put a portal out in almost every town? Loading times. If I portal into a town that has a portal out, most likely every plot anywhere near the port in will be owned, and built, meaning that loading times will be significant. Portalling into a town with no portal out, there will be few owned plots, and likely they won't be heavily built up, with the exception of plots 60x60 or bigger if they happen to be around. Loading times for entering these places are normally very brief. Why not spread some of the population around some?

The only reason Copperton is growing at this time is that guild communities are not big enough for our guild, so many of us have banded together and started trying to make something of a minor guild community out of Copperton. Others are welcome, of course, but we can work together as well, and organize shops, etc.

I just don't see it. I never have understood why the town portal system is so dysfunctional. I could understand a few isolated communities, places where loners or folks who liked their virtual privacy might want to live, but having so many crippled communities just makes no sense. If contracts the players into tighter mass, clustered around towns that matter. It causes excessive loading times. It clusters the more experienced players together, and gives the newer players less ability to build near and take advantage of the shops and facilities that older players have erected. the lack of portals in nearly all towns is the second worst problem in the game, topped only by the lack of a reverse consignment system. We have been told that reverse consignment is on the pony list. That's great. But there appears to be no plans to change the community-damaging lack of portals in most towns.

[Velea]

There are two issues, as I see them, with a portal in Copperton to port out.

1) The Genevia portal out is nicely centrally located on the island. Genevia is the main city on the island, so it makes sense to have a portal out. Copperton isn't, it is just one of many small towns.

2) There really is nothing to take OUT of Copperton. You're talking about using the portal to help build, but it doesn't help you build any faster really to be able to portal out of somewhere. Bind in Bristugo (or where you are resource gathering) and you would get the same as you'd get from a portal out. Compare that to the portal in Heather, for example, which people have mentioned have a number of resources near it. Those you do carry out of where you'd gathered to other places.

There are T1 resources on the island, granted. But they are all pretty well spread out from the centrally located Genevia. Different resource areas offer different benefits. The benefit to an area like Parsinia is that it has a limited portal out nearby, but during busy times, has many people using the area, and has mobs nearby to bring some danger element (if you are a T1 adv as well that is). The benefit of Genevia is that you can find just about any T1 resource you need, without much if any competition, but you have to travel a bit to leave with your full load. There has to be some 'challenge', if you will, to resource gathering, but different areas have different challenges.

What I'm saying is that I can see that there are "rules". While unwritten, at least to my knowledge, they do exist. Simply put, if the area needs to be a one where players have a need to travel out in such a way that recalling to a bind area isn't viable, and no other way is near, then an outgoing portal might be viable.

A portal in every town isn't nescessary and would create a lot of confusion for players trying to figure out where to go. It also makes the need to explore, just wandering around the world, less nescessary. As it is now you can portal to just about anywhere with only a short run needed.

When you were talking about your survey of non-guild communities, you didn't mention how many very large plots in those areas WITH outgoing portals had already been purchased. While I don't know for sure, my thought is that places with outgoing portals existing already don't have that many large plots.

I guess that I have to disagree that Copperton, and the other small communities on Genevia, really NEED an outgoing portal. The wide variety of portal pads to port into the community seems much more important to me, and that they have.

EDIT: Please note that I am posting as a player, and my opinion expressed here is in no way "official" or at all related to my role as a content tester.

[Cheopis]

Velea,

Firstly I understand that you are not posting officially.

As to your point #1 There is, indeed a portal out in the center of Genevia Island, however "nicely" does not come anywhere near the reality of how annoying it is to get to if you are hauling a disk. Try it. An over-the-mountain trip would be fine, if there was a road into town, but there isn't (the road ends less than halfway to town). Traveling on the road (either way) will take you half the circumference of the island.

As to your point #2 there is a portal into Copperton, from Bristugo, and also from New Trismus. This allows fair access from most places while hauling a disk, with a (for the most part) maximum of two portals to bring t1-t3 materials in, whether purchased or harvested. But, we cannot get these materials back out again. Construction is a big part of the game, and Tarbash disk hauling is critical for moving construction materials in decent quantity. If I fill 12 silos with construction materials in Copperton, I must travel an annoying distance in order to take any reasonable amount of them back out again.

I saw no need to note how many large plots were unowned or owned in communities with (or without) portals, because I saw ONE plot bigger than 60x60 that was unowned - anywhere. (It was in Selen, and has since been bought) Trandalar communities have large plots AND great access to other hub cities. Most of the settlement towns have at least one or two large plots. Large plots will attract players (even without decent transport) because they have greater utility and versatility and they are a prestige issue. A 60x60 plot will allow a player to have more self sufficiency, especially for those engaged in trades which require multiple shops and/or a lot of different silos for storage, like Tinkers, Alchemists or Confectioners.

If you are worried about confusion, there is a simple solution. Nodal structure to teleport systems. The outlying towns in Genevia, or communities like it, could have single destination portals going to the central town, which then has a portal to Bristugo. To alleviate costs, such (single destination) nodal teleporters might take lore tokens or bounties as payment as an _option_ (finally giving high-end players a use for them)

You did not address my issues on how population density in towns with in and out portals adversely affects loading times, experienced vs inexperienced player concentration of population, and the potential benefits to newer players if older players with shops and useful buildings were more scattered through the communities.

You can easily see the huge differences in existing player populations in portal-out towns vs non-portal-out towns. It's a VERY stark contrast when you look at plots less than 60x60.

I wonder, have the devs ever run an analysis of the % retention rate of players who purchase plots smaller than 60x60 in towns with no portal out? If long term existing players aren't happy living in towns with no portal out, why do you think that new players would be? I strongly suggest that the devs run an analysis on account retention vs plot ownership in towns with portals out and those without. I firmly believe that they will find that your retention % is _much_ poorer when a player's first plot is located in a town with no outgoing portal.

There are a huge number of reasons why portals out are critical to the success of any town that does not have massive plots or excellent access to a lot of resources. The biggest reason to add portals to towns is the simple Mark I Eyeball test. Portal towns have people in them, and nonportal towns rarely do. This should be a glaringly obvious indication of player desire, and it needs to be addressed.

[Starna]

Figured I would throw my 2 cents in the well, and see what pops out.

Portals are a great benefit to players. But, too, they can be a drawback to a GAME overall. If every place had a landing pad and outgoing portal, then travel will become too easy. Despite any grumblings of players about 'how hard' something is, there's more retention when it's 'too hard' than when it's 'too easy'. And frankly, travel around Istaria is already fairly easy.

But it's a dynamic world, you'd say, things change, and get added all the time. Sure, that's true. For both ingame and out-of-game reasons, you'll still see new portals from time to time. Heather's the newest example... why? Because the Empire (ingame) and the devs (out of game) have seen the ongoing pattern of use of that settlement, even without an outgoing portal there. This is a historical trend spanning YEARS out of game, let alone 'in game' time. Not to insult the Copperton crew, you're great peoples, but you're a baby as a community. How long did Heather have to show its 'profit' before the investment is made? Likely the same kind of long term commitment will need to be made in other communities to get considered.

Then, too, you point out how some towns are popular for having a portal, simply BECAUSE they have a portal, and wouldn't be without it. Entirely true... but just like any other world, historical, realistic, or fantasy, you're going to have the little villages, small towns, and big cities... if everyone was 'equally desireable', then there is no scale of comparison. Too, if one can come and go from everywhere equally easily, there is no flavor to the world, nothing to compare against... it'd be plain boring.

You comment on 'newbie' retention vs plot desirability... Again, if all plots were equally desirable, there would be no sense of accomplishment to have 'come up the ranks' of plot ownership and graduating from the little baby plots up to something 'prestigous'. Which wouldn't BE so, if everyplace had portals.

Sure, most of my points (if they even made any sense) and the points made by most others can be argued and twisted around and made to speak for the other side of things. But it comes down to, making changes that make something easier in a game like this, if they come too easily, will do it so much more harm than the benefit a few players perceive that they get.

All that said - bring on the campaign! Get petitions signed, invite people to rally behind the banner! Most of the fun is getting there, not the destination. Just keep in mind - don't take it badly if you don't succeed at the goal, and don't let yourself be upset by those who stand against you. That whole, 'how you play the game' philosophy. Too, to the people who read such attempts - don't hate the poster simply because they're trying... if people never tried, we would never get anything accomplished. Not to say you shouldn't try to deflate their hopes and egos, but be gentle and kind about it - in the end, it's up to the Devs to know what's best for Istaria, and hearing ideas (good, bad, and half-baked) from players gives them more insight into that.

[Cheopis]

Originally after reading your response, Starna, I was going to wait a day or so and see what came up on the thread, but I've decided to address it tonight after all.

Travel around Istaria is (mostly) easy. Travel around Istaria can also be excessively boring after you become used to the world. Boredom is by far a greater reason to leave a game than ease of play.

If I have to run 20 minutes with a cargo disk of supplies to go apply to a friends plot some materials that I had stored in a silo on my plot, that's 20 minutes of plodding along, seeing nothing new and encountering few if any risks (in most near-town areas).

I would like to draw your attention to MMO history from a players point of view, when it comes to travel. In EQ1, in the early days, there was a boat. The boat was cool for, oh, the first few times you took it from one continent to the other. It got old fast. Very Fast. Players began avoiding the boat like the plague, spending as little time on it as they possibly could. Character classes capable of transporting other characters from one continent to the other instantly were able to charge very significant amounts of money for transporting players. People would spend hours asking for ports, rather than put a foot on that boat. Level 30+ adventurers would wander around in newbie areas smacking lvl 5-15 critters for practically zero gain just to stay in the zone and hope to hear a wizard or druid announce that they were taking passengers. Right now, every player that gets a plot in a portless town is forced to "take the EQ boat" every time they leave their home with a disk, or every single time they leave their home if they bind themselves at a shrine at their home. There are no porting classes in HZ, so there is no relief.

Some locations are worse than others. Some locations have offsetting benefits, whether they be resources, or large plots of land. Some portless towns are simply taken over by guilds because they want to stay together because they are simply too large for any guild communities.

I fully support there being a few out of the way towns for folks who want to live away from the hustle and bustle of portal towns, but it saddens me to see so many entire towns with nobody living in them, simply because they don't have a portal.

I promise you this, a new player with a 25x25 plot in a portal town IS going to be hungry for a bigger plot, a plot closer to resources. A plot near expert machines. A plot with direct access to trainers that they want easier access to. Simply putting a portal in each town will in NO way whatsoever change the fact that players will want plots with more advantages.

Making changes to alleviate long stretches of boredom in a game is always a good thing.

Once again, I must stress the Mark I Eyeball survey. Go to _portless_ towns with 50x50 or smaller plots and see how many of them are populated with more than one or maybe two players. There are many portless towns that are absolutely barren. The towns with one plot next to the portal, with a single half complete silo and a tent on it just frustrate me to no end, because that is a new player that has left the game, IMHO. They could not afford one of the rare plots next to a portal, so they bought what they could afford, not understanding why their town was unpopulated, perhaps thinking that had found a place where if they started to build, others might follow. They put their all into building their tent and silo, and maybe a beginner shop and/or consigner. After several days and many hours of work, they realized how huge their job was going to be, and that they were alone in a desolace.

There is a reason why players avoid these towns like the plague, and it's not because it's "harder" hard is fun, within limits. Boredom is the killer. Don't underestimate (granted, unintentionally) the player base by assuming that we only live in towns with portals (for the most part) because we want it to be easier. We live in towns with portals because we want travel to be less mind-numbingly boring. There is a HUGE difference between these two things.

[Rhyssa]

People look for different things when they buy a plot. Some want a huge plot and don't care where it is. Some buy for the view. For some it's the proximity to resources that's the major decision-making factor. And some want a plot close to a portal out.

For a lot of people though, it's only a portal in that's important. They're only going to use their plots for storage, or for making items that will fit in an inventory. They can port in and recall out. The only instance I can think of when a portal out is the deal-breaker, is if you're going to want to move large quantities of resources away from your plot. The only instance of that I can think of is if you store a lot of resources on your plot ready to fill construction orders at a moment's notice. In which case I would think that you would look for a plot to buy that is in a community with a portal out.

Thee are a lot of plots still available in towns with portals out, and not all of them are the tiny 25x25's, especially after the last plot reclamation.

If you didn't realise that the portal out was the deal-breaker for you until after you bought the plot, then it would be better to cut your losses and look for a plot in a location that suits you better.

[Cheopis]

Rhyssa, you give reasons why people _might_ buy plots in places without portals out, but you don't give reasons why they _don't_

Large plots, 60x60 or bigger seem to be required in order to draw people into communities with no portals out, either that or very abundant resources close by.

There are plots left in some towns with portals out These are mainly small plots 32x32 or less, and a couple medium plots, up to 50x50. Even the rare large plot, when someone chooses to move to another location, or leave the game - even people who like the game leave over time for various reasons.

None of this changes the very simple fact that, large plots or rich resources aside, (nearly all) people simply do not wish to live in towns with no portals out. Of those characters that do have plots in 50x50ish or less communities that are resource poor areas, large number of them are alts, and at least two of these communities are guild extensions.

Oh, I have two plots. One is a nice size plot in Baker, the other is in Copperton. My argument here is not simply to gain a portal for myself, I don't need it. My construction method does not require huge storage, just folks who want to share the money I make, as I make it.

Why am I doing this then? Because I love this game. I've watched the boards, I've watched mmorpg.com, I've returned, briefly, a couple times. I returned this time and stayed more than a brief time because I can tell that changes are afoot, and what has changed so far has been good, IMHO.

I've done construction work for you as Damascene, do I strike you as being lazy and unwilling to work?

Bind in Bristugo sometime, and take a tour of the portless communities, if you haven't recently.

There is one and only one reason why those communities are not more populated - people don't want to live there (yes, call me Sherlock Holmes). Why don't people want to live in most of these portless towns? Well, because they don't have ports.

HZ has a community of very active and dedicated players, few of which could fairly be called "lazy", so one would expect that if it were simply a matter of some added difficulty, these plots would be populated. The current population patterns are not based on laziness, or looking for the easy way. These things might explain some people only buying plots where there are portals out, but it does not explain such a huge disparity.

So, we have two viable reasons why people won't buy plots in portless towns. Firstly, you can assume that a very large number of players in the game are lazy (And who exactly is building all this stuff, lol) Secondly, running out of a town time after time (with disk or not), is boring and annoying. I would be _thrilled_ if you could give me a third viable reason for why nearly all people don't want to buy smaller plots in non-portal towns. That would be one more thing to chat about here and perhaps the devs could do something about this mysterious third reason.

[Rhyssa]

Rhyssa, you give reasons why people _might_ buy plots in places without portals out, but you don't give reasons why they _don't_

The same reason they don't buy plots in any other place - those plots aren't what they're looking for. For some people it's because there is no portal out, just as you say. For others, it's lack of the resources a person may need in their chosen craft, wrong kind of terrain (ie someone wanting a snow-covered plot isn't going to look at a plot in Dryart, even though that town has a portal out), they want something close to their friends, they don't like the view....any number of reasons, all of which can be applied to a lot of other plots they don't choose to buy too.

I've done construction work for you as Damascene, do I strike you as being lazy and unwilling to work?

Not at all, you strike me as someone who's passionate and dedicated to the game - and has a good head for organisation, you did excellent work and I'm sure those silos will stand up to anything, be it WA attack or a raging cyclone

I would be _thrilled_ if you could give me a third viable reason for why nearly all people don't want to buy smaller plots in non-portal towns. That would be one more thing to chat about here and perhaps the devs could do something about this mysterious third reason.

I think you hit the nail on the head when you say smaller plots - there really are too many too-small plots out there. The only reason there are more unsold plots in portal-less towns is that there are more small plots in them for sale in the first place. But towns with portals out also have unsold small plots. Not everyone wants to build a bunch of shops, but a lot of those plots are too small even for a large house of any kind.

[Cheopis]

Rhyssa, smaller plots, player desire for resources, or a certain type of terrain dont quite fit the mold for the huge number of unused communities out there.

If you run through the barren and desolate non-portal towns, you will see 50x50 plots all over the place. There are some towns that are only 25x25, but there are 50x50's and lots of 32x32+ in many of these towns as well. Plot size isn't what's keeping people away from these towns. On the day that the portal to Heather was announced, there were three 50x50 plots available in Heather, despite it's existing population, and closeness to resources. It's not plot size when people are keeping 25x25 and 32x32 plots in portal towns and avoiding 50x50's in nonportal towns.

Resources are a non-issue with most player towns, whether there are resources nearby or not. There are some resources near some towns, and these towns do sometimes gather people despite lack of a portal (like Heather did) but for the most part, resources are not close enough to player towns to generate much interest due to materials. Sure, some folks might make a decision based on there being some material that they want to work with nearby, but that decision doesn't really come into play in most towns (portal or nonportal)because there aren't enough resources nearby to matter.

As for terrain, I'm sorry but that doesn't make sense either. I'm certain that for some folks it is important, but the terrain types of too many ghost towns without portals match nearly exactly to the terrain of towns with portals and a real population.

It all boils down to the Mark I Eyeball test. Towns without portals are (nearly) all barren and deserted despits having a goodly number of 50x50 plots. Towns with portals are jammed full of people. This is a _extremely_ clear indication of what the players want.

The only counter-argument that I have heard so far that could conceivably have any (large scale) bearing on this situation is that putting portals in would make it too easy and reduce the challenge level. I respond to that, again, by saying that something being boring is FAR worse in an MMO than something being easy. The HZ player base is not full of a bunch of sloths, there are plenty of other sources of difficulty out there. Portals out of towns will benefit the community, not hinder it. ESPECIALLY with the growing population HZ is seeing right now. There are lots of young folks out there coming up the ladder, starting to look for plots.

If older players would spread out some into communities that are currently barren and unused, they would be the foundations for new communities. As it stands now, older players are not willing to subject themselves to the intense boredom of walking 2 miles in-game every time they want to leave their plot with a disk, or if they bind themselves at a shrine in their plot. Extremely large plots and lots of resources close by break this rule, but I do not believe that every town should have huge plots or nearby resources to get people to live there, when all that is needed is a portal.

[Fratricide]

I thought I would toss my 2 pence in here...

I have a few plots myself. 2 of the plots I have I chose soley because of size. Location, proximity to portal or pad, view, etc had nothing to do with it. The remaining plot that I currently utilize is and was chosen in the guild area, as to have a Centralized guild processing/resource storage area. Since then, the guild has grown, and some of the plot choices have changed, but my reasons for holding the plots I do remain the same.

[Cheopis]

*waves*

As an established player, Fratricide, you have the capability of affording those very large plots that you own. Your guild plot is a topic that I havn't brought up, because I have no issues at all with guild plots.

Players capable of making gold, either by adventuring or by crafting and/or construction will tend to move towards larger plots where they can be self sufficient, especially when existence of a portal is not nearly so important as access to space for shops and storage.

Small-to-medium size plot towns are not oriented to players of the age and experience of Granth, they are oriented to the beginner and the middle teir folks - the very people who will, soon hopefully, be pouring into this game with the release of an eventual expansion. The very people we have been seeing quite a number of recently in New Trismus.

I hope I'm not offending anyone with my bluntness here, but it really is a critical issue, IMHO. I love this game, and seeing the utter desolation in non-portal towns, and the vibrant communities in portal towns upsets me greatly, because there is no reason whatsoever that these dead towns cannot be brought to life with the simple addition of a portal. It's blatantly obvious by the settlement patterns that portal existence is a critical decision making point for a vast majority of players that purchase small to medium plots.

[Fratricide]

Cheopis, I don't totally disagree with you on what your discussing here. I do have to say though that perhaps there is more then one way to distribute the population across Istaria. Perhaps a few more portals are required to affect a population growth in certain areas, but perhaps another thing would be to increase some of the plot sizes in some of those areas that are not "necessarily" the ideal place to live. Perhaps if there were a few less plots that were 25x25 - 35x35 around the realms more people would be more then happy to move into the neighborhood.

[Rhyssa]

Cheopis, I don't totally disagree with you on what your discussing here. I do have to say though that perhaps there is more then one way to distribute the population across Istaria. Perhaps a few more portals are required to affect a population growth in certain areas, but perhaps another thing would be to increase some of the plot sizes in some of those areas that are not "necessarily" the ideal place to live. Perhaps if there were a few less plots that were 25x25 - 35x35 around the realms more people would be more then happy to move into the neighborhood.

Reading Fratricide's post made me think, I'm probably coming across as totally opposed to what you're saying too Cheopis, which I'm really not. There are different ways available to increase population distribution. Personally I'd rate increased plot sizes as the first and most important of them, a close portal in as second and probably a reasonably close portal out as third.

[Cheopis]

Increasing plot sizes would help, I'm sure, but you would have to increase them to 60x60 plus to reliably attract people to non-portal towns, based on the plot usage I've seen

Great, except that young players can't afford the 3-5ish gold that a plot that size normally will cost. It would also mean fewer plots, and/or a lot of redesign work for terrain by the devs.

The towns that are exclusively 25x25 plots should probably see some plot size redistribution. Every town should have at least 1 or 2 50x50ish plots, because that gives experienced players enough room to plan out a plot with a couple shops that will probably be made public for the young ones. 32x32 plots are good sized for young characters, and in the 150ish silver range if I remember correctly. Expensive, but doable for a lvl 30ish crafter or adventurer that works for it. 25x25's are in the 100ish silver range, but they are cramped, and can't put much more than one shop and a couple silos, maybe a tent on them. Or one racial home, I think. A character that is mostly an adventurer could put a single house on a 25x25 plot and be happy with it as gear storage. A young crafter would very quickly grow out of such a plot, but if they could move up incrementally into bigger plots over time, they probably will. Novians and selling back to the community make this not such a huge deal.

A well designed community, with a mix of small to medium plots, would be the ideal place for youngsters and experienced, but not high level players. The bigger plots would serve as community linchpins, and accessable shops for the youngsters in most cases. These communities do exist, I visited a few of them the other day that were ghost towns.

In essence, yes, I agree that plot resizing could work to address the issue, but I don't think plot resizing would work _without_ drastic resizing that would reduce the number of plots that are actually in the price ranges of youngsters and less advanced characters.

On the day that Heather had it's portal announced, there were three 50x50 plots available in Heather. No portal, true, but there are rich resources around, and a goodly number of the town plots were in use, and built.

[Cheopis]

Heh just checked before I logged out of HZ and there are still three 50x50 unowned plots in Heather :P Apparently nobody is even willing to buy them early until the portal goes in :P

[Salis]

Making a new portal system in Istaria:

Basic rules:
1. Each community has an active shrine where you can bind.
2. Each community has an inactive to be build arrival pad.
3. Each community has an inactive to be build portal gate.
4. Each community should consists of at least 10 plots.

Rules for community pads.
1. Once a plot has been sold in a community the arrival pad is marked as a buildable community project. Once completed it gets activated.
2. Once 25% of the plots in a community are bought the portal gate is marked as a buildable community projects. Once completed it gets activated.

Rules for adding arrival pads to a destination list of a certain portal gate.
1. Racial cities have each other as destinations.
2. Special islands and communities as Bristugo, Trandalar, Drakul, ... are only added to the destinations list of portal gate s of the developers' choice.
3. Once 1 plot has been bought in a community the arrival pad is put on the closest racial city's destination list.
4. Once 25% of the plots has been bought. The arrival pad is added to 5 destination list of the travel gates of the closest communities. If those portals are inactive that is to bad.
5. If 50% of the plots have been sold: The arrival pad is added to the list of the 3 closest racial cities (including the one it was already added to).
6. If 75% of the plots is sold: The arrival pad is added to Bristugo's list.
7. If 90% of the plots are sold: the arrival pad is added to all the Racial cities lists
8. If 100% of the plots are sold: it's added to Tazoon south and Tazoon West.
9. Whenever the portal gets added to a list it is still unattuned, you need to attune to actually port to the city. It would be like it is now that a destination is listed, but that you need to attune first.

Rules for gates.
What I think would be great is that you should be able to add an arrival pad to your personal destination list.
Ofcourse it wouldn't be a simple as this.
Everytime you want to add an arrival pad to your "personaly attuned" list you would need to perform a quest.
This quest shouldn't be easy and would need to be obtained at the gatekeeper of the arrival pad you want to attune to.
Furthermore you would need a clearance permit of a official in Tazoon. (You pose a security risk as you now the location, so you need clearance and ofcourse making the investigation costs coin. This would not be cheap)
Thirdly depending on the number of already attuned destinations the quests get harder and harder, longer and longer.
In this way, you can attune to every pad but it will take you a long time, and cost you a large amount of coins.

Proposal for quests to make them harder and harder.
Pad 1 - ...
Pay 5 silver as permit to attune
Per next pad you need to deliver 250 resources of a certain Tier I resource.
So for pad 3. You need to deliver 3 times 250 Tier 1 resources of the requested kind (these can be bought if you cannot harvest them)

Pad 6 - ...
Pay 10 silver as permit to attune
Per next pad you need to perform a quest for the Town Marchal you can perform quest for
So pad 7: Makes 7 times 250 Tier I resources of the requested kind and 2 completed Town Marchal quests.

Pad 10 - ...
Pay 15 silver as permit to attune
Per next pad you need to perform a quest for the Throphy hunter you can perform quests for
So pad 14 makes 14 * 250 Tier I resources, 9 Town Marchal quest, 4 Throphy hunter quests.

Pad 15 - ...
Pay 20 silver as permit to attune
Per next pad you need to deliver 250 resources of Tier II and Tier III

Pad 20 - ...
Pay 25 silver as permit to attune
Per next pad you need to deliver 250 Tier IV and Tier V resources

Pad 25 - ...
Pay 50 silver as permit to attune

Pad 50 - ...
Pay 100 silver as permit to attune

Pad 100 - ...
Pay 200 silver as permit to attune

...

So adding pad 29 on your list: you need to
Deliver 29 times 250 Tier I resources; perform 24 Town marchal quests; 19 Throphy hunter quests; 14 times 250 Tier II resources, 14 times 250 Tier III resources, 9 times 250 Tier IV resource, 9 times 250 Tier V resources.

(By this time you will also have paid 5 * 5 + 5 * 10 + 5 * 15 + 5 * 20 + 5 * 25 + 4 * 50 = 575 silver to be able to attune to all the 29 pads)

It is entirely possible to add all pads to your personal list but that will take a lot of time and money(motivation for some to keep playing).


I think in the above described way the rules for each community are known and also the same. May plan allows for a community to stay an near-ghost town, a rural community, a suburban community or a town ship.

[Cheopis]

Salis I love the idea of a structured teleportation system like you propose. I suspect it would be a lot of work though. Perhaps portals could be added to towns for now, then in a few months after the Devs have tome to work on a system like you have advocated, there could be a WA attack through the teleportation system that forces the empire to destroy all of it's teleporters and we would be forced to rebuild them in a more secure and sane manner?