plotbuilder /lairshaper wanted

[LOVWYRM]

Here is something I`ve experienced:

There are players who could and would affort a gifted or an additional gifted subscription,
if- yes if
there was someone to build /helps building the plot or lair.
That would mean more money for VI, and less deserted areas on the shards.

Atm I hear people say: " A base sub is good enough for me- cause there is noone to build my lair/plot "
or
" I`ll go for base sub next month, cause I am tired of that eternal field"

Putting money into the plots/lairs does not help.
We all know why (pls no discussion about Istarian economy here).

Lots of us are excited like I am about the new plot items, that will come with next patch. But not all are that lucky that I am- who have old friends, who patiently build up/rearrange my plots.

Any ideas / solutions for this prob?
Only thing I can think of is : Reward those who help build up plots/lairs that are not your own (on your account) with more xp.
If the effect is more plots => more money.. why not?

You might have better suggestions- I love to hear

[Lord Shinobai]

Here is something I`ve experienced:

There are players who could and would affort a gifted or an additional gifted subscription,
if- yes if
there was someone to build /helps building the plot or lair.
That would mean more money for VI, and less deserted areas on the shards.

Atm I hear people say: " A base sub is good enough for me- cause there is noone to build my lair/plot "
or
" I`ll go for base sub next month, cause I am tired of that eternal field"

Putting money into the plots/lairs does not help.
We all know why (pls no discussion about Istarian economy here).

Lots of us are excited like I am about the new plot items, that will come with next patch. But not all are that lucky that I am- who have old friends, who patiently build up/rearrange my plots.

Any ideas / solutions for this prob?
Only thing I can think of is : Reward those who help build up plots/lairs that are not your own (on your account) with more xp.
If the effect is more plots => more money.. why not?

You might have better suggestions- I love to hear

I have two responses to this.

I'll start first by saying that having some incentive, whether it be fluff, extra xp, whatever, could be a good way to give the long experienced players an incentive to break out that crafting gear and start working on other plots. Coin just doesn't cut it anymore. I mean, we all know there is a going rate, and yes there are new players as well as seasoned ones that either need the coin or just do it for fun but often enough I have heard people who have put 2-3x the "going rate" per unit and still watch it sit there. When increasing the coin per unit isn't the answer, what is?

But, playing devil's advocate against what I just said, is it really the existing player base that they/we should worry about trying to get additional/upgraded subs, or is the problem really the lower population in general? Instead of focusing on how to give existing a players an incentive to work on others plots, should the focus instead be attracting additional players to come to the game or upgrade from free to paying after 2week/1mo or however long it takes them to lose interest.

Additional players means more workforce. More workforce means higher demand for work, more demand for work means there really isn't a need to offer more incentives other than the coin so that they can save up to buy/fund their own plot.


I guess my points are that I see what you're saying about getting the existing player base more willing to work on each others plots so that people don't feel like upgrading to plot access/having a plot is more of a burden than fun, but at the same time, I don't know that the problem is the current set up as much as the simple fact that there really isn't a large enough workforce to sustain production of how much is out there. Even die hard crafters need a break here and now

[Ettanin]

Only thing I can think of is : Reward those who help build up plots/lairs that are not your own (on your account) with more xp.
If the effect is more plots => more money.. why not?

Let me counter this with:
Unless you can play Istaria 24/7 and have neither job nor life you'll not be able to build your own plot/lair and that of someone else at the same time.
It. Does. Not. Work.

I've worked for 6 months entirely on my lair, and am still not finished.

The demoralizing factor is the mass of resources needed for each segment/building plus the small community.

I can imagine that having a plot/lair was a very huge prestige in Istaria's prime days, but this is no longer the case as virtually anyone can afford a plot/lair with coin grinding (Thanks to the junk loot that is effectively possible) effortlessly and the community size shrinked massively (though i still like this community ).

The demotivator is not solely the lack of helpers - i would help if i had more time - it's the mass of resources needed + the brainless and repetitive farming and grinding involved in gathering them. You may need at least 3+ hours of nonstop, boring and mindless farming to finish a lair corridor segment in the beginning of your Lairshaping career (for example). This was measured with a lair near a dest pad.

Especially the start of your plot/lair is insanely hard as you have to micromanage your small space. Nope, no silos to cache your raw materials and if you are very far away from an unlockable destination pad, well, be ready for a long run/flight additionally. And the disc, while being a good relief regarding bulk management, is also a slowdown on transport.

A definately helping solution is reducing the required units to finish a building/lair segment or the required amount of components to create lairshaping/constructing unit resources. (both would reduce the number of raw materials needed and thus reduce farming time).

Hint for players starting a fresh lair (no experience on plots, sry):
Build T1 first, regardless of your LS level. Build at least 15 T1 silos (AND only T1 silos! You'll need more variable bulk than bulk for 1 item kind). You'll need them. Then work your way successively up with machine rooms. It's slow in the beginning but you'll soon see why i planned so many silos and successively the machine rooms (they grant good bonuses).
T1 is easy as you have basic public machines near your gathering spots (which you won't have at higher tiers). Look around in Parsinia especially.
Pregather the resources for the next tier before destroying the previous tier!

[Shian]

Let me counter this with:
Unless you can play Istaria 24/7 and have neither job nor life you'll not be able to build your own plot/lair and that of someone else at the same time.
It. Does. Not. Work.

I've worked for 6 months entirely on my lair, and am still not finished.

Echoing this, even the most dedicated crafters have little incentive to help others. Whether one opens a T1 corridor or simply makes all the resources at once, one must have 3-6 hours set aside for a full 'run' of laircrafting I've found.

It is very rare to be able to spend any less time on this unless one's goal is to put in *one* unit of flowstone for the day.

This is no small chunk of time and when one is faced with the 6 months to a year to build a single lair, I've found very few instances of those willing to help others due to the fact that not only does this take an insane amount of time, but it also involves mind numbing repetitiveness with very little excitement.

I remember telling myself that when I would be done with my lair, I would help others.

This was 5 lairs ago. The bitter truth of it is, when it is not your own you don't get the thrill lairshaping gives you and spurs one to keep going. Sacrificing that sort of time and sanity just isn't worth it when the rewards are that hollow even if it is for a dear friend.

[Dhalin]

I have to agree with Shian and Ettanin here.

Helping someone else with their lair is noble and all, but it is a HUGE timesink, and to be quite honest, I just don't have 3+ hours in a day to spend on someone else's lair, even if there were coin involved.

And if I did make said coin, what would I actually DO with it? I still need some vault upgrades, but to be honest, I can get a few hundred silver in half an hour's work once a day and eventually get said upgrades.

I work a full-time job now, I get 1 day off a week (which just happens to be Tuesday, so I can't even play on half of my day off anyways!), and every other week I get 2 days off in a row. When I have days off, I tend to be more focused on efforts on my own games/characters, or RL business. Either/or. I just don't have hours upon hours to spend crafting.

And even if I did, I find that Lairshaping, even T2 lairshaping, is mentally exhausting work. Sometimes I near fall asleep at the keyboard because I'm doing nothing but watching my dragon dig dig dig dig dig while occasionally moving him on to the next point, or I have him on Auto-Fly for 5 minutes because I have to drag a disk halfway across the continent.

These are the same reasons why my own lair hasn't moved anywhere in the better part of a year. If I had the time/patience to do Lairshaping, I'd likely do it on my own lair, let alone anyone else's.

No offense; I like helping out, but not when it requires several hours of some of the most mind-numbing work I've ever experienced in a game.

[Akrion]

Let me counter this with:
Unless you can play Istaria 24/7 and have neither job nor life you'll not be able to build your own plot/lair and that of someone else at the same time.
It. Does. Not. Work.

How is this a counter in any way to what you quoted from Lovwyrm? What you quoted from her is talking about a possible incentive to build on other peoples plots, which is a good incentive specifically for Bipeds, and what your countering with is that someone must have no job and no life in order to help anybody by building on their plots or lairs, and that it doesn't work.

I've seen people on Order help build other plots just fine. I helped with the building of some Scion plots while still in the process of building mine, because they would in turn help with the tiers I couldn't build on. The biggest hurt to incentive is the lack of use for money. It could just be me, but what you say just kind of comes off as insulting to people who actually do work on other people's plots because it suggests that they must have no life otherwise.
-----

I get the feeling that a year's worth of lairshaping comes from people filling their lairs largely with t6 rooms. Shian, you've got a master plot with 2 grand halls and just about every t6 room you could possibly cram in it, for example. I can't imagine a normal sized lair with rooms t3 and under taking anywhere close to a year unless it's constructed casually. If your personal lairs are filled with the highest end rooms, of course it's going to take forever.

With a bit of help on the t4 stuff, my 80x80 plot in Aiya consisting of a few t4 and t3 buildings, and a ton of t2/t1 fluff structures, took no more than a month. But that could just be the difference of building a biped plot vs a dragon lair. From what I've seen biped structures ultimately take less work than dragon structures, though a biped must level 8 craft classes (The 3 base classes and the 5 construction classes) in order to effectively build much of it. I spent more time on leveling than I did on plot building.

Lovwyrm is basically trying to discuss what incentives might increase ones willingness to build on other plots, and most of what you guys are talking about is how building on other peoples plots isn't worth your time, or just isn't possible unless you have no life, or that it's just not the same to build on other plots as it is to build on yours, and thus the entire point Lovwyrm is trying to discuss is ultimately being missed.
-----

And for a response to Lovwyrm, in hopes of furthering the discussion...
Possible incentives:
- Increasing XP gained by building on other plots could be a great incentive to new players so long as it could be made in a way that's not very exploitable.
- Providing more use for money would be another good incentive. (For everything money related, even.)
- Give a bonus to resource requirements for building on other plots (Imagine, for example, applying at 1 to 1 instead of 2 to 1 when you're doing so for another player).
- Give players credits for building on other plots which could then be traded for novians that you could use on your own plot.

[Starstilanxs]

Alright, to the above posts, aside from Akrion's and Lovwyrm's, this topic went -entirely- off track, it became a rant session between players about their experiences with the community and helping others out with their plots when the entire POINT of this thread was based around incentives for people to give them reason to help others. Suggestions, ideas, etc.. all count towards this thread.

Ranting does not. Go to the rant forum if you wish to rant about this.

With the topic going back on track (totally agreeing with Akrion on this one),
there are a few possibilities to give incentive to others with building plots/lairs, Akrion pointed out several great ones which would fix multiple areas in the game, not only plots.

Now, giving additional experience to players who build on anothers plot is a wonderful idea. Personally, I would be most willing to help out someone for the additional experience bonus, it gives you more for your work and also places players in a position where they -want- to help out the community more, it builds upon the aspect that I like about this game: the community

It would still take a lot of effort and time to build, but it still would be better than just working on it alone; especially stuff you can't actually work on yourself due to the teirs.

[Shian]

I've seen people on Order help build other plots just fine. I helped with the building of some Scion plots while still in the process of building mine, because they would in turn help with the tiers I couldn't build on.

Plots or lairs? Plots I've found do not have this issue. I've seen people helping each other with plots all the time.

I get the feeling that a year's worth of lairshaping comes from people filling their lairs largely with t6 rooms. Shian, you've got a master plot with 2 grand halls and just about every t6 room you could possibly cram in it, for example.

T6 is not the only issue. it's anyone wanting any hall, any T6 or any machine in their lair that this frustration comes from. Just a T1 hall takes a month or two and that's if you are building quickly.
The maze lair is filled with almost entirely T1 corridors and none of the above. It took four months to finish.

[Dhalin]

To clarify, my above post was not meant to be a rant, and was wholly an explanation of why I personally wouldn't build on anyone else's plot.

Alright, to the above posts, aside from Akrion's and Lovwyrm's, this topic went -entirely- off track, it became a rant session between players about their experiences with the community and helping others out with their plots when the entire POINT of this thread was based around incentives for people to give them reason to help others. Suggestions, ideas, etc.. all count towards this thread

The #1 thing that the devs could do to "encourage" people to work on other peoples' plots, is to solve the problem Shian, Ettanin, and I mentioned:

Make Lairshaping not take hours upon hours upon hours of grueling grinding.

Maybe if Lairshaping didn't take so long to get any noticeable amount of units completed, people might feel more of a desire to help with other peoples' plots.

That was the point I was trying to get across. Lairshaping is such an awesome thing, but yet, it kinda sucks that it takes so much time that it just isn't feasible for someone who has a near-fulltime job IRL.

Edit: To reply to suggestions:

- Increasing XP gained by building on other plots could be a great incentive to new players so long as it could be made in a way that's not very exploitable.

Meh. You already get huge XP from placing units in lairs. This wouldn't make a very good incentive TBH.

- Providing more use for money would be another good incentive. (For everything money related, even.)

Given that money is more easily obtained by just merely grinding mobs, or, pawning certain craftable goods, people'd just look elsewhere for money unless the pay was -really- good. If you go out and grind mobs, you might get that rare form, tech, or tech comp while getting your money... no chance of that while you're doing someone else's lair.

- Give a bonus to resource requirements for building on other plots (Imagine, for example, applying at 1 to 1 instead of 2 to 1 when you're doing so for another player).

Then you eliminate the need/want for you to work on your own plot. Why would I ever want to work on my own plot when I can grind my XP easier on someone else's plot, and someone else can do the same to my plot? That doesn't even make sense.

- Give players credits for building on other plots which could then be traded for novians that you could use on your own plot.

Now, This, could be a workable idea. Maybe.

Still, the #1 thing IMO they could do, is make it simply less grindy. *shrug* The grindiness and the "that would take hours/days/weeks!" is what drives more people away from doing their own (let alone someone else's) Lairs than anything else.

[Andaras]

I don't want to derail, and don't know that I have much to contribute.

Just thought I'd toss in that a few human factors need to be added into
the Equation/discussion regarding this topic.

- Does the Owner want the thrill of building it all themselves?
- Has the Owner asked for help with building?
- Has the Free help with building turned into the ONLY source of
progress in construction? (I.E. Owner is now Lazy and expecting
the free help to continue)
- Has the owner reorganized the planning more than once after you
started to help?
- Does the Owner just expect that "Once Planned - Built for free"?
- Most importantly: Will the Owner STAY in Istaria after you have
build up their plot?


See, these factors I have run into many times and play a big role for
incentives to help others. I like to help, LOVE to build, and like to see
Istaria populated with buildings. I have been guilty of a couple of the
above and burnt by others in the above list.

Lov said:
"That would mean more money for VI, and less deserted areas on the shards.
Atm I hear people say: " A base sub is good enough for me- cause there is
noone to build my lair/plot "
or
" I`ll go for base sub next month, cause I am tired of that eternal field"


At the risk of Angering the GODS - I say let them worry about making the
money and increasing the number of Subs. Players shouldn't be the
sole form of Advertisement.

Those excuses you hear are just that - excuses. If players can afford
it and really wanted a plot, they'd upgrade their subs. But in today's
economy many cannot afford the $15/mo sub. Another Human failure(?)
is "if I can get it for free, why pay for it?"

Just my .02 cents + 18.4 tax
Andaras

[LOVWYRM]

Andaras, I indeed was talking about players who
- hate to craft that much it needs to build a plot /lair
- can`t craft good enough
- do not want to craft at all

look at me: I pay for 4 plots, cause I love plots. I am dragon- do not have a biped. Only thing I could contribute was bringing some ressources.
Without my friends -
I would have none- no nice plots on Order- no money for VI.

Would not it be a win/win situation if we find a solution for those who want a plot /lair- but do not build up themselves- for their own individual reasons?

I like the idea of
giving back novians to the one who put it in
more xp for those who help (no cheating!)
and special things to buy- with the money, gained by helping others
(maybe token, the customer has to buy, and only the builders can use)

[Ettanin]

giving back novians to the one who put it in
more xp for those who help (no cheating!)
and special things to buy- with the money, gained by helping others
(maybe token, the customer has to buy, and only the builders can use)

This may sound like trolling but,

in fact there are even people who want to work on their own plot/lair by themselves. Incentives to help others will lead to a certain 'enforcement' to let others do the work. Which means that people who do not want help will be in a disadvantageous position regarding the bold and underline text in the quote.

This will even empower laziness among people regarding their own lair! (Meaning they'll abandon their own lair in favor of the bonuses)

[Necas]

Hi all,
Me and my wife both play the game in the Order shard, and we love to build plots to get a bit of money since we ain't much of a battle-seasoned style of players. But it has proven to be quite hard to actually find sizable work to do at plots, a bit cause of the low population issue but mostly cause most plots/lairs that ain't unfinished (dare i say even had any units tossed into the scafoldings...) just lay there, month after month. If people would add some coin to the plot maybe even a person that they never meet in game due to timezone differences or other factors could find it and contribute for the completion of the structures if they would receive some compensation back. Because this is the way i see it: person that dosen't has any money in the plot means either he/she wants to build it themselves OR have some other hired/loaned workforce (guildies, friends, children, grandma, etc.. ).
I ain't much of a forum person, but would help also if there was a specific place for ppl to ask for help in their plots/lairs, would make it easier to connect the ones that want help to build and the ones that are willing to work on others plots/lairs.
Anyways, i'm ranting and writting too much... probably i have more miss-typed words in this post than allowed but so what?
Cheers, and see you all online (when this extended maintenance ends at least... i hope... WAAAGGHHHHH!!!!)

[Snowflury]

Hi everyone,

I brought this up in marketplace but it didn't seem to get much traction -

The solution seems simple to me and I have yet to think of any real drawbacks.

Eliminate the need for the previous Tier materials from both Biped and Dragon plot / lair construction.

The effect is threefold.

One - you make lairshaping and plot building more accessible to the casual gamer.

Two - you don't alienate half the community - i.e. bipeds by doing something for dragons you don't do for them.

Three - you increase how frequently a leveling crafter will need to seek out work in order to get to the next tier of construction

what are the pitfalls I am not thinking of?

Snowfury

[Thicklesip]

Do you mean that a structure would take just as much materials but only have them be one tier? That's currently how T1 structures work, and I don't think it'd improve anything, as when you're leveling you have a narrower range of things to work on but when you're NOT leveling it becomes even more monotonous. If instead you mean to abolish half of the construction work per room: that could make a dent, but it's FIRMLY in the realm of "devs probably don't think construction needs that kind of timesink-nerf." Obviously it's up to them, but as I've never heard them discussing such a thing, I suspect they don't want to go that route right now.

To respond to various discussion up-thread: I don't think the rants about the penalties of construction work are completely off-topic. They're not the main thrust of this discussion, but they ARE the reasons this topic exists at all. Bipeds have their time investment "up front" as they browbeat at least 5 schools into working order; lairshapers level a single school, but then building anything is a complicated, tedious exercise in resource-juggling. Either route you go results in the same thing, approximately: you have to spend a mind-boggling amount of time crafting to reach your goals. Given how many people in this game find leveling a single school to be a pretty sizable feat, I'm not surprised in the slightest that there's a lot of people who say "well, I'd love to, but I cannot/will not poopsock that long or hard."

So! Specific incentive suggestions, to tempt more people into construction work and/or tempt those who already do it into helping others.

• Increasing XP gained by building on other plots: possible. This only tempts people who are leveling, and would thus favor getting more bipeds into construction, but it's not game-breakingly awful.
• Give a bonus to resource requirements for building on other plots: would have to be done carefully-- for instance, you cannot make it so working on other peoples' plots achieves 1:1, because that means you get twice as much for working someone else's plot and would have to be a total idiot to do your work yourself. I would suggest instead making it possible to achieve maximum efficiency faster, so you can work things earlier, if anything, but that would again mostly favor people working for levels, not people who are already done leveling.
• Give players novians for building on other plots: at first blush I like this best, but giving it some thought... it'd complicate stuff. If the ratio of placed work to novians is too generous we have another case of "don't do your own work, idiot." If it's not generous ENOUGH it can be pretty safely ignored, and won't tempt people. If it's specifically rewarding novians then it's useless for anyone who has finished their personal construction (which might be a lot of people, because suddenly we're all working someone else's plot for novians ourselves...). If anything, I'd say it should instead "refund" a little bit of placed work as normal construction pieces: say if I place 10 units of Maelstone, I recieve 1 Maelsone of the same type back. That would allow people to use the bonuses on themselves or whoever they're working on... but it still wouldn't cure the problem of finding a sweet spot between "never work your own property" and "who cares, ignore the bonus."
• Reduce the amount of resources required per building: would change the dynamics of who builds what the least, but again, I am under the impression that the devs are comfortable with how long everything takes right now. Would far and away be the easiest change to implement, though, especially compared to some of the crazy code juggling required for the previous ideas.

I think, now that I've given all of this some thought, that a little bit of a few approaches might be best. For instance, if the devs added a window in-game that made it easy to FIND work (cough cough Suggestions cough), and at the same time implemented some small to moderate incentive for players still leveling (such as an experience bonus), you'd both get more construction newbies doing some construction work in the first place as well as making it easier for construction oldies like Necas and his wife to work on other peoples' projects.

[AmonGwareth]

Actually, what I brought up in Chaos General chat yesterday was asking what people thought about reducing the quantity of intermediate resources required in Lairshaping. Currently, its 15-30 or 20-40 to make the final Lairshaping components. Lowering that to 10-20 and 15-30 would dramatically reduce the tedium by lowering the total number of raw resources required in making the construction pieces by 25%.

[Ettanin]

Actually, what I brought up in Chaos General chat yesterday was asking what people thought about reducing the quantity of intermediate resources required in Lairshaping. Currently, its 15-30 or 20-40 to make the final Lairshaping components. Lowering that to 10-20 and 15-30 would dramatically reduce the tedium by lowering the total number of raw resources required in making the construction pieces by 25%.

Reducing required raw resources would increase effective components per run as well as lowering farming times. This should do.

[Dhalin]

Actually, what I brought up in Chaos General chat yesterday was asking what people thought about reducing the quantity of intermediate resources required in Lairshaping. Currently, its 15-30 or 20-40 to make the final Lairshaping components. Lowering that to 10-20 and 15-30 would dramatically reduce the tedium by lowering the total number of raw resources required in making the construction pieces by 25%.

That would be very nice indeed. I've only gotten as far as T1 machines and a T2 library and I was feeling the "coming to a grinding halt" feeling even then.

But, if we shaved a good 25% of the work off of making the final product to place in lairs, it would still be grindy and require a good amount of work, but yet, it wouldn't feel so... "crushing" when you look at a 0.0% done machine room and go "UGH... maybe sometime next year"...

I think this is actually a very nice idea and I would like to very heartily thank you for considering this option.

[Thicklesip]

That sounds great, Amon! Please, put that in as soon as you find time (and I hope you find time soon ).