It saddens me to state this, but istaria was more real to me before the merge than after, and it continues to get more artificial.

At one time resources types and monster levels were mixed instead of zoned. Monsters roamed the world and collected followers and attacked towns. Dragon's had to reduce themselves to Kutit form to enter buildings. This old world could have been so much more than it is today. And there are other things that I am sure I'm not mentioning.

Today we have level zones, resource zones, dragons are allowed to go places that their model should not allow, people using shrink commands that should have never been released to the public.

What is the blame for these changes? I blame lazy people that see the game as a group of objects to interact with rather than a fantasy world that is supposed to have logic rules, and behaviors that everyone has to abide by. Logic people. Not everyone is just sitting down and interacting with nodes, machines and mobs. Some of us are actually interacting with a malachite outcropping, deer, metal oar, or wolves that the graphic represents in our minds. They are supposed to act a sertain way, and if they don't it spoils the illusion. What is the point of playing an MMORPG if you turn it into an artificial game instead of a world with rules you have to follow? It seems that most want things a little easier instead of a little more real, so the world becomes more and more artificial until it's no longer a world, it's just a game that would make no logical sense as a world.

For instance, and this is an extreem case, why don't we just make it so you can run over a node, and it automatically jumps into your backpack? Why? Because ore is not a living creature that would do that without you getting it. It would make crafint life a whole lot easier wouldn't it?