Developer's Desk: Looking Back, Looking Forward Discussion

[Amarie Ancalimon]

Please use this thread to discuss the Developer's Desk post subtitled "Looking Back, Looking Forward".

[awdz]

Excellent work by all involved! :-)

I am so grateful that you take such care with our fantasy homeworld. The new quests had some really interesting lore behind them and it was fun checking all of it out. I'm still working through some of that tier II revamp even now!

I'm excited at the prospect of new plot things; will we be getting gnome housing approved by the empire for home construction? I remember a thread full of really neat ideas for plot additions a while back but don't remember if that was one of the things planned from it. I'm sure I'll love whatever things come out. :-)

Thank you so much!

[Chasing]

What about completion of outstanding areas of content?

• Helian's Tomb
• Broken Weapons/Scales for Dragons
• Satyr Isles revamp
• AROP fix

What about addressing the other side of the Loot Revamp aka The Economy? They go hand in hand with each other (note. Changing the consigner listing time encourages trade, but doesnt address the money/moneysink issues)

Adding plot decorations etc is fine but I would rather see the fundamental issues with the game environment being tackled.

[lightning claw]

As many of you noticed in the past month or 2 my presents in the land that is forever my home has been 0 but my plot stays active. The main reason for this sabbatical is the world at present dose not need warriors like my self the game is getting geared heavily to crafting I Understand that that is a bench mark to the game and thats great for some, but i am a warrior If there are no battles to join no people to protect... there is nothing for me to really do in game

Ive said this to a few people that have me on im
What good is a true warrior when there are no battles to fight where do solders go afterwords. What happens to the remaining spirits to keep fighting.

Sure Pushing epion to its absolute limit took me a great while to do but once that level of tactics mastery has been achieved what then ? I have thought a few stray hatching's the ways of the lunus but most of my pupils never reach ancient status when i talk to them online they say they want the war to actually continue not in some far out reached town that dose not matter if we lose it or not but actually have the blight over take a meaning full area Like aug for example or have us free a race home world or drive back the blight + some like the glory days of old not as grand but something like that .

With the announcement that the war is going to continue in 2011 it looks a gundam dragon like my self will have a purpose in this world again and i will keep the sub updated

Also Huge Props on reinstatement of the seasonal events all i can say is what tycous said in star craft 2 opening trailer
Heck Ya its a bought freaken time !!! Superb move guys i look forward to them

So until the world needs me again I live amongst it people now hiding in plane sight but watching over it in secret waiting and protecting And i will spread this message to Istarians in other games we are still hear and we are waiting ...

[Balthizar]

I have to say that I am a long time player of on again off again. I have not looked at what was happening here in 1-2 years realy. But now that I have taken the time I am total loving the game again.

A ton of bugs and other stuff that drove me up a wall are gone and there is a ton of new content for me to work though and omost new world to check out and explore.

Great work Development Team/Bug smashers.

[Vahrokh]

Imho, revamping the houses is a Great Thing, but revamping the reason to play the game (war to defend our own existence) should have been done before anything else.

There's people who played for economy (like me) and interacting with other players (you know, it's a MMO) but everyone seems stuck and self sufficient. Only meta-game left is building plots for third parties, but then, you are alone doing that as well.

There's people who played to fight. After 7 years the WA have been beaten, people got complacent and bored. We won... OK. But the game lost.
Had it been an ongoing struggle, maybe people would bother to care to log in again.

[lightning claw]

Imho, revamping the houses is a Great Thing, but revamping the reason to play the game (war to defend our own existence) should have been done before anything else.

There's people who played for economy (like me) and interacting with other players (you know, it's a MMO) but everyone seems stuck and self sufficient. Only meta-game left is building plots for third parties, but then, you are alone doing that as well.

There's people who played to fight. After 7 years the WA have been beaten, people got complacent and bored. We won... OK. But the game lost.
Had it been an ongoing struggle, maybe people would bother to care to log in again.

I agree ...

[Shinkuu]

There's people who played for economy (like me) and interacting with other players (you know, it's a MMO) but everyone seems stuck and self sufficient. Only meta-game left is building plots for third parties, but then, you are alone doing that as well.

There's people who played to fight. After 7 years the WA have been beaten, people got complacent and bored. We won... OK. But the game lost.
Had it been an ongoing struggle, maybe people would bother to care to log in again.

It would be nice to breathe new life into the Aegis (... wait? Is that a contradiction in terms?) and allow us to actually defeat them in some spots for a change. It would require the world to change and maybe eventually a whole new villain to appear but that would make for an epic renewal of the world well worth seeing.

In RP I have actually created a more wicked Aegis simply because I cannot IMAGINE that in all this time they have just been sitting on their boney behinds and not accomplishing any breakthroughs.

As for interacting with other players though... I do that through RP... I must admit that I rarely do much of it otherwise. If I want something crafted it is my Guild or no one. Not because I would not ask anyone else but because there is A) Usually no one else to ask and B) No one willing to craft anything. I have seen a few disparate folks out in the field but not many. No one ever fights along my side except my mate and on rare occasions Niveus.

However, a big part of why there is next to nothing in the way of people fighting along side me is this problem: Most of my characters are in the Tier III-V range... However, the vast majority of active players (I am on Order now) are either I-II or VI with very little inbetween. I get the feeling that the I-II folks quit before reaching III-IV and of course the VI folks have already made it to the end.

I can say for my part, while I obviously have not quit yet, I am not really looking forward to much of the end game things. I mostly get the sense that there is a lot of drastically over complicated quests that will require me to perform tons of mind numbing grinding in order to finish them for some mild reward. Zarla faces her ARoP eventually which I am NOT looking forward to at ALL after the RoP. Many tell me it is easier which is good I guess but it still demands that I all but let others do it for me... Joy. Some of the others are looking towards spells. I must reiterate that Ice Bolt is NOT worthy of having a quest. I mean pfft Spirit Bolt is more powerful by a good margin as is Blood Bolt but you do not quest for those. What is so taboo about Ice?

Anyway, I think the game has a lot of potential and it lives up to a good bit of that potential. I think the Dev team is working hard and pushing the game along. Even if it can seem slow at times I am still awaiting the changes eagerly. I think this may be one of the most exciting times to play Istaria because not only can we watch it metamorphose into a new and better game but we can help in the process.

[Jorev1]

I am surprised there was no discussion on how to grow the player base.

Surely this must be a long term goal, yet no new ideas on what it would take?

[Milandra]

An interesting way would be to allow previous players to try back the game and use back their character for free, a few days or something like that.

It could be an ingame event also

Just my 2cc