From a Builders perspective
I, as well of many of Istaria's gifted am not too happy about the vault shrinkage to pre-merge capacity. I was a builder before the merge and i will adapt to the recent changes. We all knew it was comeing and I have done my best to prepare for it.
What i would like to add though is the extreme difficult manner in which to performmy task as a contributeing member of Istarian life.
There are many of us that did not have the opportunity to have rebuilt our plots because of broken plot planning windows or unlevel plots that could'nt be worked on. In addition the crashes with construction applications or even opening a construction window would freeze you in your tracks.The current crashes porting to the fields and back to town then to the building sight. thats an average crash per units applied.
Now we are faced with a new threat from the WA and it has sent a ripple effect across all of Istaria. Crafters are faced with the blighted resource that need to be worked and cleansed, which takes a higher skill level for all trades yet yields very small amounts to work with.That is of course if you have enough defenders or are savy enough to work around your adversaries and still acquire your blighted resources. Not to mention there are'nt any forms available for the higher tiered blighted resources.
With a full compliment of shops and silos for storage a builder can still manage to do his job, he will also need a vault, house and guildhouse on his plot to be able to store his tools,armor and any comps he requires for a basic line of trade skills. No this would not allow you to store a whole lot but it will cover your basic needs.
Do to many setbacks within the workings of Horizons i dont have any of these options available so its a long hard road ahead just to be able to function as a contributeing member of Istaria again.
I rarely used the machines in the field anyway , pre-merge or not, my building style had always bypassed that option for a more efficient means of building and less impact upon my vault usage. Granted my style requires more running and more porting but with our limited vault space it is my best option.
Item stack is not the most damageing feature of our vaults its the lack of bulk that kills any usage for 150 bulk unititems. To store one of each left over from an odd number made could lock up your vault quick.
The Tarbash's marble disk is nice for my applications in that i can place it at the point of entry of the work site. recall to the vault or run to the nearest and fill it up. With full silk cargo, essence hide satchel and backpack thats 110 units being dragged to the sight. That is also port to drop the disc and what you are caryying on the first load and 3 more ports in to top off your load. Do that twice and you will get a hard freeze on your PC and have to Hardreboot your machine which by the way i have burned up two hardrives already from the stress it causes on my drives.
The Tarbash's disc doesnt work at all for makeing up the building components due to its one item limit, so i break out the deluxe disc to work in the field and while crafting in town. Now that the vaults are shrunk back the tarbash's usage as i described is no longer available because i cant transfer from one disc to another so the 150 bulk units need to be stored elsewhere which as far as an efficiency point of view is not an option. So the deluxe disc is the only way to go formy style of building.
Now lets throw in the gauntlet that has slapped us in the face. As of the last few weeks and especially tonight of this printing ,I recieved the information that most of the people i have built with ,hunted with and defended with have called it quits due to the recent turn of events. Im not talking about average players doing average things. These are the heavy hitters in both craft and warfare, they are the people that have helped us get to where we are today in Istarian life. They are the people that dropped everything and jumped in to fight the cause until it was seen through. They are the puzzle breakers, the savy riddlesolvers and the fighting leaders of our realm. They are also the very same people that have crafted for us the best that was available in tools , armor and weaponry.
The implementation of the T4 blight anchors before the T5 blight anchor bugs were resolved coupled with a health bar bug put both crafter and adventurer at a standstill. The unresolved issue of crashing after porting in repetition to do any craft or even fighting, is still a very sour note, added with the vault reduction before these were resolved did'nt help in the least.
So hereI amas a builder. the big hitters that have kept up the fight against the WA
that I have known for many months now are leaving in droves. With the onset of the new WA attacks and the blight spreading, without these heavy hitters we are at a huge loss of fighting manpower to drive the blight back. We are looking at a long hard road ahead of processing bligthed resources to do even the most basic of craft functions.
These people are fed up with the constant barrage of broken items that are being implemented to the game. There is virtually no customer service unless you have an issue with not being able to open an account, then you are put at the head of the line. IRC chat users are getting the, jump to the head of the line treatment which makes the average ticket poster put on hold even longer.
I am quite aware of the shortage of manpower and the lack of customer service resources, as well are many others. the bottom line is the customer has not been the forefront of the agenda. If it had,AE would have put a far better effort into working with its customer base, then to let them wait 8-10 days for each responce which could takes weeks if not months to resolve one issue amongst a very large list.
I will add as a final word. that the people that are leaving are the last of the people that have always told me, that they love Horizons and will be here until they turn out the lights.
I will still be here and i will continue the struggles that are laid before us, but alas i am amongst the members of a dieing breed.
Archebold Tearnon, Hermit builder at large.
