Let new players taste the best of the game!

[Daulnay]

Decided to work this into a full-blown suggestion.

New players try out Istaria from time to time, but many of them move on. People focus on what's wrong - the stuff that drives new players away, like the loading screen. While that's important, new players don't experience much of the best parts of the game. Give them good reasons to stay around, a taste of what will come when they play.

There are a few things that really set this game apart:
1) Dragons! You can be one, and fly! Woohooo!

2) The flexible crafting, especially customization of gear and spells in useful ways, using techs.

3) Crafting community structures, or your own home plot.

4) The multischooling available to Naka (bi-peds). Most MMO games have very rigid classes, and not a lot of options for meaningful (non-cosmetic) customization.

(I originally put community in, as well, but good community is not unique to Istaria. )

5) A dynamic world, where the story events change the world.

How much of these things do new players really experience? These are the things that keep us here, or get us to come back. If new players get a good taste of these things, rather than just learning that they will come after many levels, they will be more likely to stay.

Here are some thoughts on each:

Dragons:
Every new subscriber can try out a Dragon, but hatchlings can only glide. Gliding is not terribly satisfying, unless you get a good long glide by finding a nice cliff, or a tower. How many new hatchlings get to the top of a tower and glide off before they quit trying the game?

I've played many MMOs, including Aion (flight is a big draw for that one). Istaria's flying stacks up well against Aion's. Here, flying is unrestricted, there, limited to the PvP zone and a few towns. Here, we encounter no borders, there people hit zone walls. Aion does have flying monsters, and flying resource nodes. That doesn't make up for the restriction, IMO.

Hatchlings don't get much experience at flight. Give new players the thrill of floating over the landscape! Put a tower on New Trismus, Genevia, or near Kion -- somewhere new players will get to. If it's useful to climb the tower to glide somewhere, all the better (Kion or NT).

Flexible Crafting:
New players learn a bit about the crafting system, enough to give a hint, but its beauty stays hidden. New players do not immediately get how great teching is, and perhaps don't understand for a long while (like maybe when they ask the question "why am I having such a hard time leveling in my 30s?"). New players struggle to do effective tech crafting, even if they sense something great, because techs are rare and getting the right tech bits as drops is very hard for them.

The crafting boons make it easier for crafters, because you don't need the tech bit drops. Can we get something like those for adventuring?!? (lesser, broader bonuses that do not require an ooky bit from some creature).

When I returned, finding that my obsolete ooky bits became 'wild cards' delighted me! Please make 'wild card' tech resources a permanent part of the game (but not as drops!). Put in a beginner crafting quest that gives a reward (say, eight tier 1 wild card tech resources) that the new crafter can exchange at Nadia in Bristugo (or better yet some new NPC like her in New Trismus or Kion). ( Putting them in as drops will just create a new kind of money, not a good thing).

Crafting structures
Players don't get to this 'till their 30s or so, and it's one of the most distinctive parts of the game. Please, please do something to make this wonderful activity something new players can participate in, at least a little!

Add a small 'town council' plot to each of the newbie towns (NT, Kion, Sslanis) with structures that new players can improve. Add a new structure to the plot from time to time as the old ones get built. Put in one (maybe two) journeyman crafting stations, to a)help with the levelling grind and b) give a hint of what players can find if they explore the Istarian player towns. For Dragons, make the hatchling gliding tower (see above) a player-buildable structure.

Multischooling
Playing an Istaria biped feels so free compared to the straight-jackets that most MMOs impose. However, it's complex and poorly documented. New players get baffled by it before they can figure out what will work well, or they wander down a path that bogs down their character. It's easy to make mistakes, like abandoning the Cleric school while planning to keep Druid, or adding so many classes that you grow at a snail's pace.

Some people enjoy a daunting challenge, but many will just avoid it or worse, quit in frustration. Provide more guidance.

1) A quest that requires new players to briefly multiclass. This should show new players that:
a) Magic and weapon skills can carry over from an old class. One of the Gift spells might be perfect for this, or Swift Feet.
b) More classes raise Adventure level, and slow down XP gain.
c) Mastered abilities stick around even after you switch schools.

2) Clear signposts to the quest in Dalimond bay that drops an adventuring class.

3) When players start their first intermediate or prestige school, the school trainer shows them the range of skills (weapons, spells) that its followers can use even though the school does not train them (e.g., Rangers and Storm Disciples can use Life, Blight and Spirit magic, not just Nature and Augmentation).

Dynamic World
How dynamic a world do new players get to see? Not much, and they're probably not aware the game provides (provided?) this kind of thing.

Dynamic world stuff seems a one-shot thing, which makes it hard to justify effort on it. A cycle of events might be justifiable - something that unfolds over a year. Something like an annual invasion (migration?) of Oastics or Ruxus that destroy some player-buildable structure(s), and the aftermath of dealing with it? A cyclic series of dynamic events could be tweaked and re-used, so that developers don't have to spend much extra time if any. And older players would anticipate and plan for it!

Dynamic world events thrilled me in Asheron's Call, and I still look for it in every new MMO. I know the resources for this kind of thing are small to nil, but please consider it.

Coda So much of the unique and interesting side of Istaria can only be experienced after a big time investment. New players will be more willing to stay if they get a bit of that experience. Those experiences foster the fun of the game, and chase away the feelings of old-school MMO grind.

--
Thorncloud Moonskimmer, Dragon, Order
Tamlis Askereth, Saris dabbler, Order

[Delite]

Hatchlings don't get much experience at flight. Give new players the thrill of floating over the landscape! Put a tower on New Trismus, Genevia, or near Kion -- somewhere new players will get to. If it's useful to climb the tower to glide somewhere, all the better (Kion or NT).

Any hatchie can step off the cliff by the Imperial Spell Vendor in NT and glide down to the dragon trainers.

[Shian]

Coda So much of the unique and interesting side of Istaria can only be experienced after a big time investment. New players will be more willing to stay if they get a bit of that experience. Those experiences foster the fun of the

So give people false hope by pretending that it's not an old school grind MMO so that when they buy the game they get disappointed at how much of a grind it is to get to the glorious point they tried out? No thanks. This IS an old school grind MMO that predates nearly every current MMO. Trying to paint it in 'new' colors is not a good idea and gives people a false impression of what the game is.

[Finkledbody]

I hate to say it. But I like none of your Ideas. They all sound great.. But making anything easier in this game will drive me away for sure.. Im still trying to get over how often hoard drops.. And how basically useless it is. I have a lvl 12 dragon with 2.5 million hoard. I remember when It was a challenge to get hoard... And the spells would use the hoard fairly rapidly making you have to craft things to replenish it.. That made me feel accomplished. I felt rewarded after working hard to get there.. Now I can go kill 5 maggots using 25 hoard.. MAYBE! And they will drop 5k worth of hoard in coffers and sceptors. Are you kidding me? Dragons are easy enough already.. Seriously.. Dragons are way to powerful.. And way to easy.. Any easier.. And you will be able to create a dragon, and it will already be a lvl 100 ancient with a complete lair.


Quests are exactly that.. A quest. It should take time and is suppose to be fairly challenging.. If you start putting signs up all over the place pointing arrows.. It wont be a quest anymore.. It will be a series of instructions to follow. Quests arn't even a necassary thing if you don't want to do them.. I don't... Nuff said.

I like buildable things within Istaria that is for the community.. But if the devs keep adding things constantly... It will get to the point when these buildings wont have a purpose anymore.. The player base is only so big.. How many buildings do we need? Now if the buildings were destroyed... Who would want to build em again? knowing in 6 months its just ganna get destroyed again? I know I wouldn't waste my time.

The game really isn't that difficult. There are many, many players that have maxed out lvls. If they can do it.. Anyone willing to put the time in can also.. I would only agree with you to make it easier If we were all still running around at lvl 20.. But we're not.

The only time I see players having trouble with this game, is when they are 12 years old or younger.. And are far to use to having everything handed to them by mommy and daddy. So keeping it difficult will keep these unwanted players away. We don't need anymore whiners in the chat channels.

[Daulnay]

Any hatchie can step off the cliff by the Imperial Spell Vendor in NT and glide down to the dragon trainers.

The view from the Imperial Spell Vendor cliff isn't as spectacular as one from a tower, and where you can go is pretty limited. Yes, newbies still get to see that flying is useful, but is it fun enough to do more than once or twice?

[Daulnay]

So give people false hope by pretending that it's not an old school grind MMO

Not so much to hide the grind, as to give new players a little experience of what makes the grind worthwhile. I agree, you don't want to mislead people, and my last sentence doesn't exactly imply what I intended (I'm not the most glib writer in the world). Encouraging new players to stick through the grind is closer to what I mean.

[Daulnay]

I hate to say it. But I like none of your Ideas. They all sound great.. But making anything easier in this game will drive me away for sure.. Im still trying to get over how often hoard drops.. And how basically useless it is.

Do you think these proposals will make the game significantly easier for new players than the consumable crystals that drop from maggots by the Ruined Homestead?

Quests are exactly that.. A quest. It should take time and is suppose to be fairly challenging.. If you start putting signs up all over the place pointing arrows.. It wont be a quest anymore..

Agreed. The 'drop an adventure school' quest isn't really a quest by that definition, just something built with the quest mechanism. The main difficulty new players run into with it is just not knowing it exists, and having to find out about it from the forums. A mechanic for unwinding frustrating mistakes shouldn't be hidden deeply away like it is, should it?

I like buildable things within Istaria that is for the community.. But if the devs keep adding things constantly... It will get to the point when these buildings wont have a purpose anymore.. The player base is only so big.. How many buildings do we need? Now if the buildings were destroyed... Who would want to build em again? knowing in 6 months its just ganna get destroyed again? I know I wouldn't waste my time.

Two points here. First, putting in a small plot of things for new players to build - I thought mainly decorative things, like clock towers and fountains. And one (only one) Journeyman crafting station, to show new players that they exist. Once the plot is full, cycle through the decorative stuff.

Second, I agree, don't destroy buildings. And I see that having a cycle of events where something needs to be repeatedly rebuilt would be pretty frustrating. Please ignore that part of the proposal, it's a bad idea.

--
Tamlis Askereth, Order
Thorncloud Moonskimmer, Order

[Veruliyam]

The mount just north of new Trismus is climbable and allows you to glide into New Trismus, letting you land on nearly every building there-in.

The mountain south is taller and also climbable. It also has an example dragon lair. Miniscule compared to what can actually be constructed by an accomplished 'lair-schlepper.'

And the first 20 levels of your first school seems to be the most challenging, from my experience.... No! I want all those alts!!! Want!! Do you hear!?

[phoxytwicks]

I recently joined the game (subscribed) and made a lizard. I had tried the game previously as a gnome (mage) several years ago, and quickly stopped playing.

Honestly, I can say the game has gotten a lot better since then. The whole Spirit Isle is well designed and a good ground to sink ones teeth into - though for me personally I dislike the island in it's design (mainly the cliff-paths part at the start), but again a personal opinion.

NT I think never had too much wrong with it, but I do appreciate the class specific quest chains, which give a large direction to new players.

**I found it infuriating at the skeletons on the way to the Deadlands that were neigh-on onsoloable, yet the monsters within the Deadlands were weaker** But I'm told that area and quests are designed for group players (not sure if that's stipulated enough?)**

However, my experience quickly declined at Kion / Sslanis / Parsinia where everything seems to get abit lost and misguided. Now having got to grips with it, I think it's alright, but i could have easily left the game at this point. I'm reliably informed that Sable Shore and onwards is alot better and easier to play on.

Sorry, I appear to have gone off on a tangent, and didn't focus on your suggestions.

--

Personally I'm that of the agreement as someone else said, this is indeed a grind MMO, akin to many I have played (and loved), however, in consideration of this, and not making the invested game of others a easy achievement for new players. I do think there has to be a midway point to make the game more appealing. It has it's own set of merits to be appealing in the first place, and I think the OP is simply saying those merits need to find a way of being even more glaringly obvious to those that try this out :-)