Attempting to learn this game is a frustrating and disheartening endeavor...

[FoxFlame]

Is there a suitable reference I've been unable to find to answer questions for new players? The wiki at wikia.com is woefully inadequate.

I remember playing this game years ago (likely over half a decade ago) and having a much simpler time. With many of Crimson Dawn's links gone, a Wiki that works sometimes and many other links dead, I question the livelihood of this game in general.

Some examples of my frustration:

1. I can find no guidance on how to get to Chiconis, yet I'm told I should really try to get those crafting quests as soon as I can.
2. I can't find a single, complete map of the world that I can read.
3. I can't even find a list of travel gates and their links to other gates.
4. The draconic crafting quests supposedly available from Queriatia...aren't? (The Wiki states there are repeating crafting quests at level 10. I get nothing but two techniques from this NPC)
5. Any indication in any of my research where to find a mother lode (or motherload) of sandstone. (I finally just found it running around)

I'm not new to gaming. I try to do as much research as I can without bothering others; I prefer to be an autodidact. I just can't do that in this game. If a lack of references is supposed to be a 'feature' of this game, where you're intended to explore and find things for yourself...alright, I suppose.

To the educated observer, attempting to play this game feels like trying to piece together the history of a fallen empire: a civilization that was once powerful with a rich community and plenty of written records, yet now all the references either don't exist, or are no longer accurate.

Make no mistake--Those I've met in this game are extremely helpful and most are genuinely good people. However, this is much the kind of atmosphere you tend to expect from just that which I've explained. I've seen the kind of behavior from people within closed betas, where "everybody knows your name". It's cliche, but it's much the same way that the small bars do have the best crowds, so I suppose I'd need to take the good with the bad if such is the case.

There's something to be said about a wonderful and devoted player-base in a game; I just question if the revenue that could be generated by adopting a different plan, such as an item mall for example (the way many F2P games operate) wouldn't 'keep the bar from closing', or increase the quality of the environment without detracting from the atmosphere. I enjoy the concept of the game, but as a working professional I simply don't have the time to dedicate to grinding up my crafting, and would question spending my little free time in such a manner, let alone my money in a monthly subscription. The ability to purchase XP multipliers would be very attractive. With that, I'd be far more interested in subscribing to unlock the ability to play as a dragon.

I mean, really, short of that, I'd be happier paying someone to grind up my account for me, so that when I do play it's actually...you know, fun. The entire point of a game. Probably why the F2P & Item mall concepts are taking off the way they are. For example: I'd rather pay a quarter every time I die so I don't lose XP than spend any extra time of my life...well, doing something that is so mindless I'd typically be the one getting paid to do it, not paying for the 'privilege' of doing it.

But now, I'm rambling, and it's late. I suppose I'm just looking for my original question, and perhaps some confirmation of my suspicions.

Thank you all very much,
--Fox

[Velea]

Is there a suitable reference I've been unable to find to answer questions for new players? The wiki at wikia.com is woefully inadequate.

I remember playing this game years ago (likely over half a decade ago) and having a much simpler time. With many of Crimson Dawn's links gone, a Wiki that works sometimes and many other links dead, I question the livelihood of this game in general.

I am sorry that you are having such frustrations. From most of your questions, it is sounding as though you are not following the tutorials and quests from New Trismus and Kion, so this may be some of where the frustration comes from. If that is not the case and you have been doing the quests, please let me know because we are always trying to improve the new player experience. In answer to your questions:

1. I can find no guidance on how to get to Chiconis, yet I'm told I should really try to get those crafting quests as soon as I can.

The dragon crafting quests actually do not start in Chiconis. The first quests for dragons start in Kion now so that players will be able to do them once they reach level 10. This applies to both craft and adventure quests, actually. And one of the final quests in this series is a quest which "connects" dragons who have completed things in Kion to Chiconis and provides some basic directions to Chiconis.

2. I can't find a single, complete map of the world that I can read.

You should have an in game map which covers the whole of the world. I'm not aware of any that have existed outside of the game, though, because the in game map does immediately cover the whole of the world as well as allows a great deal of customization. If you do not have a map, please submit a support ticket so that we can work with you on why the map is bugged.

3. I can't even find a list of travel gates and their links to other gates.

The best and fastest way to get a list of travel gates and pads now is by looking in game, to be honest. With the portal system revamp, most locations are available from main cities, Bristugo and Genevia.

4. The draconic crafting quests supposedly available from Queriatia...aren't? (The Wiki states there are repeating crafting quests at level 10. I get nothing but two techniques from this NPC)

I'm not sure what the wikia lists, but there are no repeatable quests for crafting. The crafting ability quests begin with Xarinnis in Kion.

5. Any indication in any of my research where to find a mother lode (or motherload) of sandstone. (I finally just found it running around)

There are numerous locations for harvesting sandstone on the island of Lesser Aradoth.

To be honest, Istaria is different than many other games out there now in that the expectation is that you will learn what you need about the game by being in game, exploring, doing quests, and yes, talking to other players. As you've seen yourself from some of the mis-information you mentioned on the wikia, an ever changing world like Istaria does not lend itself well to out of game websites because they are difficult to maintain with correct information. But most of the time players in game have kept up with patch notes and will know "what's current" in the world.

I hope this answers your questions and thus relieves a bit of the frustration you've been experiencing. We want you to have fun exploring and learning about the world of Istaria, not have frustration.

[Frith-Rae]

Make no mistake--Those I've met in this game are extremely helpful and most are genuinely good people. However, this is much the kind of atmosphere you tend to expect from just that which I've explained. I've seen the kind of behavior from people within closed betas, where "everybody knows your name". It's cliche, but it's much the same way that the small bars do have the best crowds, so I suppose I'd need to take the good with the bad if such is the case.

This. This is why the game is still alive, and this is what keeps it alive.

There is no one resource for all things. You should utilize the people in game, these forums, any associated other addons you can find among these forums (like the mappack which is already filled out with where everything is, the crafting calculator if you're into that, etc.).

You're right - the wikki is not the best. The CD site is gone, (me personally never used it outside of the addon hosting for mappack, which is now hosted again and is posted up ont he forums somewhere...I forget where lol). Your resources are your other players.

If you wish to play autonomous you can - but you will have to explore everywhere on your own and figure things out that way. It really is, at that point, about figuring it all out yourself - or take advantage of the community . Threads here on the forums provide guides, as well as just asking questions as you did here. Asking those in game who are available - its what I still do after 7+ years of playign the game lol.

However, I can answer you on the motherlode nodes - they are random in the crafting field spawns. Allt he nodes pop randomly in their fields, and you can never tell if something's going to be regular size or motherlode unti you come upon them.

And yes, read through all the tutorial and starter quests and let them guide you - they've done a lot of work on that recently and it is pretty good as a standalone guide. If there is anything that is unclear, as Vel stated, please post and let the devs know!

And don't hold your breath for the f2p type of marketplace. That's just not part of this game's environment and probably won't be any time soon (if ever).

[Satinpod]

I have been playing Istaria a few months now and I've stayed so far because this game has some wonderful things to offer but I stopped paying the subscription and made a human (free to play) character after only one month. Here are my first impressions of the game:

Good things:

Crafting - better than any other game that I've played. It is an integral part of the game, not something that was tacked on at a later date. The fact that players can craft gear better than the stuff that the mobs drop is absolutely wonderful and gives a point to the crafting process.

Community - friendly and helpful to new players. There's a really warm feeling when you start playing this game, vet players will often stop what they're doing to help out newbies. The community atmosphere in this game is one of the best that I've come across in many years of gaming.

Variety of races - Istaria has a wide variety of races to choose to play and this is a real plus.
No other game has dragons as player characters. Although I didn't choose to play a dragon, I'm aware that this is a main attraction for many people.

Adventuring professions - the unique flexibility of multi-classing is another massive plus. It's obvious that a lot of thought has been put into the many classes and how their respective spells combine. Lots of fun.

Player construction - building your own plot/lair, what a wonderful idea and something that many people would want in their gaming life.

Sandbox not theme park - many people like a bit of freedom and there's lots of it in this game.


Not so good things:

I had to work hard to find this game. There's no marketing to speak of. The 6 things I've mentioned above are very high on my list of things that I want out of a game but it took me lots of Google searches and review sites before I saw any of these things mentioned in relation to Istaria. If people don't know about this game then they can't play it.

First impressions count for a lot. The website is horribly out of date - there are links to news for servers that no longer exist, the last post on the Chaos server link was in 2008 and on the in the news link it's 2005. It gives an impression that no one cares. The launcher and the loading screens need new graphics. The graphics of the actual game are fine, not new but still ok, but some of the splash screens make the game look very dated. Keeping the website up to date, re-skinning the launcher and adding some new static graphics would go a long way towards making a better first impression on new players.

The gaming world has changed a lot in the 8 years Istaria has been around. The average gamer now demands a very high level of service from even free to play games, keeping the community informed of basic things like announcing when and how long maintenance will be both on the forums and on the game launcher is a standard practice in other games now.

The game crashes a lot more than is acceptable. My drivers are up to date, my PC isn't steam-powered and is defragged regularly, my internet connection is fast but some days the game crashes over and over again, other days it only crashes once or twice. It's not just me, it's a regular occurance to see people complain about crashing back to desktop in the in-game chat.

Istaria has a general feeling of a game that is in decline. There is no vibrancy, no towns being built, no activity, no buzz. Organized events are normal occurrences in other online games especially around the holidays. An event needn't cost lots of money to implement - it could be as simple as the developers announcing/organizing a group boss mob killing with small rewards or a developer coming online in chat to talk to the community once a week for feedback.

The servers are sparsely populated which makes the thought of big crafting projects feel like a daunting, unrealistic task. The terrain is littered with unfinished and/or abandoned projects. I love the idea of my own plot but in reality I wonder if it's still viable to actually finish making one.

The economy - there isn't one to speak of. I think that a lot of the economy's problems wouldn't exist if the game's population were higher.

No shop - most games have a business model now that involves a shop. Not all of these shops imbalance games. A good game shop enables the players that are not time rich to enjoy the game while not impeding players who are on low funds but have more time to play.


The elephant in the room:

A few months ago when I started the free trial I had every intention of subscribing to Istaria as I was excited about finding a game with such a wonderful in-depth crafting system and such a friendly, warm community. Now I've sampled the game I'm aware that the game is (sadly) dying. I cancelled my subscription after one month because there is an overall feeling that the glory days are long past and all that's left is nostalgia and a slow decline towards the end.

I have no desire to see Istaria become WoW in fact I'd be appalled if that happened but if the game is to survive then it has to attract and retain new players and gamers expect a little more from a game now, especially if they are going to pay for a subscription.

It wasn't long after I came here that I realized that it's easier to just not mention Istaria's faults to either the community or the developers as the Istaria bubble is small and self-contained and many suggestions made by new players are shot down quickly or just ignored. This is a shame as new players often see glaring problems that the old players have become used to, even comfortable with. It seems a large number of people here don't/haven't played anything else for years and in short, no one here really wants any change.

Fiddling with in-game minutiae is irrelevant - there's no point in having new roads, new tiles and extra consignment time if only a few players (and all their alts) actually play the game and most of the cities are empty. Both the developers and veteran players either have to adapt to the effects on game play of a dwindling population, adjust the economy and become a niche game for crafters or change some fundamental things with the game play to attract and retain new players if they want this game to survive.

I hope that you will accept this constructive criticism in the spirit that it was intended, I wrote this post because I believe that Istaria is a unique game that contains some absolutely wonderful things and I'd be sad to see it disappear into the ether.

[FoxFlame]

Let me thank you all for your feedback; it is greatly appreciated.

Satinpod's elegant, articulate and profound statements have more than captured my range of feelings regarding Istaria--incorporating the awe and excitement, as well as the sorrow.

I very much hope this game finds a manner by which to increase its revenue so that it might survive.

Past that, I have nothing more to say. This is a remarkably rare occurrence.

[C`gan]

I'm glad you brought some of these things up. If I may, I'd like to counter a few of them.

>snip<
Not so good things:

I had to work hard to find this game. There's no marketing to speak of. The 6 things I've mentioned above are very high on my list of things that I want out of a game but it took me lots of Google searches and review sites before I saw any of these things mentioned in relation to Istaria. If people don't know about this game then they can't play it.

Yes, many of us agree that it's time once again to do more advertising to bring in more players. Part of this has been on the player-side with the Spread the Word program. However, more exposure in the mainstream is always appreciated. If you have any suggestions on how to go about this on a relatively small (current) budget, please send such suggestions in using the support.istaria.com page.

The gaming world has changed a lot in the 8 years Istaria has been around. The average gamer now demands a very high level of service from even free to play games, keeping the community informed of basic things like announcing when and how long maintenance will be both on the forums and on the game launcher is a standard practice in other games now.

Unfortunately, the devs figured out VERY early on that unlike many of the cookie-cutter games, this one takes odd amounts of time to do the updates. This is because of the numerous deltas that get applied to the live servers when updates are done. Unlike Blight, which is our test server and gets one delta at a time, Chaos and Order may get as many as 6 deltas applied in a single large maintenance. It all depends on how well the deltas are tested and when they're deemed ready for the live servers. Also, given the databases of the two live shards are vastly different in size, applying the deltas takes somewhat longer, particularly for Chaos than Order. And, if that's all not a headache enough, please consider that Virtrium is currently NOT all in one building. For that matter, Virtrium is currently NOT all in one state. So, if I may ask, please cut them some slack on the fact that they cannot and do not announce how long maintenances will be.

The game crashes a lot more than is acceptable. My drivers are up to date, my PC isn't steam-powered and is defragged regularly, my internet connection is fast but some days the game crashes over and over again, other days it only crashes once or twice. It's not just me, it's a regular occurance to see people complain about crashing back to desktop in the in-game chat.

Please turn your debug logs on and submit them at the support.istaria.com site if you are experiencing an inordinate number of game crashes. This problem is being looked into currently and the more debug logs they can get, the better chance of finding out what is causing them.

Istaria has a general feeling of a game that is in decline. There is no vibrancy, no towns being built, no activity, no buzz. Organized events are normal occurrences in other online games especially around the holidays. An event needn't cost lots of money to implement - it could be as simple as the developers announcing/organizing a group boss mob killing with small rewards or a developer coming online in chat to talk to the community once a week for feedback.

It is not rare to find Amon_Gwareth suddenly pop into a server and talk. It is also a nicety to have Velea show up from time to time as well. For that matter, it is a well-known fact that the dev team does have characters in Istaria. It is neither my right nor place to say to the public which characters are actually members of the dev team. However, I take comfort in knowing that I get to talk with them in-game, whether it be in Marketplace or if they show up as their dev characters and bring up a celery in Aughundell. They are around and I am certain they are always happy to talk with the player base about any issues and/or content coming out. Dev chats have always been a favorable experience during the Artifact Entertainment, Tulga Games, and Virtrium LLC eras and I am confident they will continue, very much unlike the bigger games.

[Satinpod]

Rather than replying with an extended quote fest I'll just reply to your main points

I haven't heard about the Spread the Word program until now, I'd be interested in hearing more.
I wonder if a discussion about how to publicise Istaria where newcomers and veterans alike could bounce around some ideas would be beneficial? Maybe a vet could help show some of us newbies the way?

I found this article by a former MMO community liaison to be an interesting read. The article contains lots of info and ideas that play to one of Istaria's greatest strengths; the wonderful community. The 'Common Community Management Tools' section contains some simple (and cheap) ideas: fan site kits, blogs, newsletters as well as podcasts, wikis, social networks and community videos are all mentioned. Not all of these media forms would be relevant to Istaria but a few of them may prove to be of some use.


This Tuesday's maintenance was announced on the launcher and I for one greatly appreciated this communication.

I'm sorry that you feel that I was harsh to suggest that the maintenance time and length should be communicated with the community.

I understand that it's impossible to state exactly when a server will be back online. But it's not impossible to make an informed estimate which can be updated on the forums as and when the situation changes. This would allow players to go about their lives and check back to see if the servers are up again at the expected time instead of constantly having to check by trying to log in, failing to do so and becoming frustrated.

When I stated that it's common practice to announce when and how long maintenance will be in other games I was trying to point out that many new players are used to this from other games and have come to expect this level of communication about server downtime.


Events can attract new people to games and provide a sense of cohesion within an expanding community.

I have been online when Amon_Gwareth has been in game and although this was a pleasant occurrence I would hesitate to describe it as an event as nothing was organised or announced. Had I logged into the game 10 minutes after he had left I wouldn't have known he had been there. It is however, comforting to know that the developers still play the game.


I haven't at any time while contributing to this thread meant to insult either the developers or the players of Istaria. My intention was to try to relay some of the things that stuck out to me as a new player when I first came to Istaria. I apologise if I have come across as aggressive in anyway as it really wasn't my intention to do so.

[LungTien Temeraire]

Community - friendly and helpful to new players. There's a really warm feeling when you start playing this game, vet players will often stop what they're doing to help out newbies. The community atmosphere in this game is one of the best that I've come across in many years of gaming.

I personally think the larger part of the community is warm, welcoming and helpful. I had the chance to meet awesome persons since I started playing this game, and have made a lot of good friends.

[C`gan]

The spread the word program thread is in the announcement sections, here. Essentially, anyone with a paid subscription that allows for a plot/lair slot may earn a second for blogging about your experiences in Istaria. These may be word posts, video, screen shots, or other such media to promote the game in public venues online.

As for your previous post, I didn't find it insulting, nor did I mean my reply to be insulting either, Satinpod. What you addressed I felt necessary to elucidate on, particularly about the crash problems. The devs really do want debug logs, dxdiag logs, and any pertinent info to try to solve this issue. As for giving estimates of time on maintenance, the devs have stated in the past that such for them in the current state of the business is just not feasible since they are not physically on-site down the hall from the servers anymore.

[Dragonboy]

Some examples of my frustration:

1. I can find no guidance on how to get to Chiconis, yet I'm told I should really try to get those crafting quests as soon as I can.
2. I can't find a single, complete map of the world that I can read.
3. I can't even find a list of travel gates and their links to other gates.
4. The draconic crafting quests supposedly available from Queriatia...aren't? (The Wiki states there are repeating crafting quests at level 10. I get nothing but two techniques from this NPC)
5. Any indication in any of my research where to find a mother lode (or motherload) of sandstone. (I finally just found it running around)

I mean, really, short of that, I'd be happier paying someone to grind up my account for me, so that when I do play it's actually...you know, fun. The entire point of a game. Probably why the F2P & Item mall concepts are taking off the way they are. For example: I'd rather pay a quarter every time I die so I don't lose XP than spend any extra time of my life...well, doing something that is so mindless I'd typically be the one getting paid to do it, not paying for the 'privilege' of doing it.

1. The Game should have a map with the road to follow which is by standard accessed by pressing the ‘m’ button, if that does not work for you check the keybindings and if it still does not work write a support ticket.
2. See 1.
3. The travel gates are under a revamp at the moment on the testing server, many things were and are strange about them until you through experience get to know their destinations.
4. As far as I know Dragon Adventure quests up to level 10 are given from an NPC on Kion Vault and Dragon Crafting quests up to level 10 are given from an NPC in Parsinia.
5. Motherlodes of nearly all T2+ resources can be found easily however when you need T1 motherlodes you will have to travel in some cases to mob-high area’s. Gems, Azulyte for example you must travel through large amounts of spiders and undead lieutenants to reach. Not sure if I have ever seen a Motherlode Sandstone ingame. New Trimus only has the regular tiny ones. (Copper and Tin ore atleast has 1 rich if you know were to look )
I am still hoping that one day:
- ALL regular and rich nodes are removed from game.
- Motherlodes increased in numbers and renamed to a regular node.
- Golems give the resources from a current Rich node instead of 50% from a regular node.
While I doubt it is happening soon, but it would make crafting quite less tedious when having to run from node to node.

As for F2P and Item Mall… I do not want that, this game has not a lot of potential to add huge amounts of fluff items. Under different circumstances I would say let plots/lairs have only the most basic buildings for storage purposes for free and for any fluff items (Murals/Fountains, ect.) or racial building payment is required. Only I doubt that the older players would like that very much depending on how it is implemented.
When I look at Startrek Online they work with a monthly subscription and Item Mall, while I have not bought a single payment token yet others seem to have a virtual pipeline with the token factory so to speak. I also doubt that this is going to work as well.

Horizons/Istaria is a small old school MMO which I doubt is ever going to survive the change to F2P + Item Mall or adding of an Item Mall. I think it has always been its strong point that while large patches are rare they are free unlike any new addition to for example SWG in a distant past or WoW up to Cataclysm.

[Kesqui]

4. As far as I know Dragon Adventure quests up to level 10 are given from an NPC on Kion Vault and Dragon Crafting quests up to level 10 are given from an NPC in Parsinia.

Xarinnis the crafting trainer has recently moved to Kion - she's on the roof of the big house on the hill.

Not sure if I have ever seen a Motherlode Sandstone ingame.

I regularly find them on the sandstone plain above "Sandstone Quarry" south of Parsinia, amongst the bronze golems.

[Shian]

Motherlodes are also in Sandstone Bluff in Genevia.

[Andaras]

Satinpod:
"When I stated that it's common practice to announce when and how long maintenance will be in other games I was trying to point out that many new players are used to this from other games and have come to expect this level of communication about server downtime."

I just feel the need to express my support for VI in their policy on
this issue, and explain their rationale for not following the "normal"
practices of other games.

Your point about other games and common practice are valid, but it
cannot apply with how this game engine handles Patching Deltas.
As C'gan stated, the times vary greatly for patching dependant
on the number of updates going to the Live servers.
On the average, Maint can be as little as 4 hours or as many as 24+
hours. VI does their best to warn the player base if the Maint time
will be more excessive than usual, and wisely does not give times of
when the game will be back.

IF Virtrium was to post Maint schedules and times the servers would
be back up - and that time wasn't met, what do you think happens?
Ta-Da!! Exactly the reason they don't.

Posting any estimate of "Servers will be back after 4 Hours" is tantamount
to a promise they must keep or risk angering the player base. Something
they just cannot do since many many things are beyond their control
during these Maintenance times. I think the Chaos players can tell
you first hand that estimates would rarely work for them. With the
size and complexity of the DB on their server, they usually take longer
for patching than does Order. (And that's if the DB doesn't blow up
during the patching process)

Suffice to say, Istaria is unlike any other Game out there. And THAT
statement applies to everything about it - Devs, Community, Dragons,
Unlimited Classing, and no ETA's for Maintenance.

Andaras

[Dragonboy]

Xarinnis the crafting trainer has recently moved to Kion - she's on the roof of the big house on the hill.

Hmmm... It would seem the Istaria Wiki needs an alteration then. Considering my current prolonged absence I double checked my info there...

[Raptress]

Hmmm... It would seem the Istaria Wiki needs an alteration then. Considering my current prolonged absence I double checked my info there...

Fix't. In the wiki anyway. I believe the quest(s) that direct you to her still tell you to go to Parsinia. >.>