Unknown2012-01-22 19:51:46
Every time we add a new skill or combat nuance, it has the potential of drawing other experienced players from other IRE games while at the same time making the game feel all the more hopeless to people who have never touched an IRE. It is ridiculously hard to get someone genuinely new functioning at all in Lusternia, and even people who've played other IREs attest to a major jump in all the stuff they feel like they need to learn and piece together.
The number one reason I hear from people who consider quitting is that they just don't feel useful, or like they can't contribute at all. It's very difficult to motivate them.
The number one reason I hear from people who consider quitting is that they just don't feel useful, or like they can't contribute at all. It's very difficult to motivate them.
Unknown2012-01-22 19:53:02
Sojiro:
I firmly believe that many people who have posted are looking at the wrong end (old player retention) compared to the actual issue (new player getting).
Retaining old player is a concern as well, though new players are arguable more important.
The biggest barrier to entry in Lusternia lies in the fact that a player barely gets enough lessons to trans a single skill from leveling up, nowhere near enough lessons to become viable in combat, or, for the non-coms, enough to supply the player with both a trade skill and the various utility abilities they may need, in addition to the proper bashing or influencing skills.
Futher, the need for an autosipper and system in order to bash or influence is a major barrier as well; FirstAid helped with the system situation, but introducing an auto-sipper skill would make bashing possible for payers on the nexus client, which people unfamiliar with MUDs will almost certainly use for a time.
Unknown2012-01-22 20:00:53
I suspected that the high school/college age was a factor. When I joined this game I was really surprised at how young the player base is, as I didn't see the MUD being that popular in the age of graphic games. But it makes sense--it's harder to either spend free time or money on this game if you graduated and/or have a family. One of the reasons I play my character as a quasi-NPC is that I can't get involved with the grind of typical MMO level up stuff--I also have a slightly compulsive personality and the only computer games I play are basically single RPGs that have a beginning/middle/end.
We had a thread for that. I was hoping to get more feedback as to why older people were leaving.
I think one of the biggest problems right now is F2P has become so prominent there's a lot more options for people on a budget, not to mention the rise of facebook and flash as a platform for games. Text games are fun, but text combat requires a certain mentality. Maybe its a case of too much competition. People keep talking of the rise of F2P gaming, but I think in a downturn economy people are gonna get sick of the concept of virtual goods. (What good is having a virtual house if you can't afford a real one), and we might see some of this shake out. I expect there to be a bubble in the whole on-line gaming market.
I guess the only big problem I see is--IRE is trying to market to newbies, but I fear sometimes they are focusing too much on what others do and not what they do best. I never see anything emphasizing the Role-play of these games, which I assume is a very big appeal, especially in a MMORPG world where role-play is very minimal. Things like get a credit or lesson for being logged in for X minutes just seems to encourage being idle. But I have some constructive criticism for IRE's marketing that I will start a new thread for. (Right now to make it short they are very unfocused and some of the last 12 months have been, rather...odd...)
(Speaking of other IRE Muds, Imperian's numbers are down in a similar trend towards Lusternia, Aetola's have been steady, Achaea had a huge spike this year but it was a temporary thing.)
I firmly believe that many people who have posted are looking at the wrong end (old player retention) compared to the actual issue (new player getting).
We had a thread for that. I was hoping to get more feedback as to why older people were leaving.
Play to play rather than pay to play is worse of an option than ever, and that during time of crisis. Similar situation in EVE Online. And while that game also ironically made some poor decisions around the time that IRE did, well, similar developments are seen.
I think one of the biggest problems right now is F2P has become so prominent there's a lot more options for people on a budget, not to mention the rise of facebook and flash as a platform for games. Text games are fun, but text combat requires a certain mentality. Maybe its a case of too much competition. People keep talking of the rise of F2P gaming, but I think in a downturn economy people are gonna get sick of the concept of virtual goods. (What good is having a virtual house if you can't afford a real one), and we might see some of this shake out. I expect there to be a bubble in the whole on-line gaming market.
I guess the only big problem I see is--IRE is trying to market to newbies, but I fear sometimes they are focusing too much on what others do and not what they do best. I never see anything emphasizing the Role-play of these games, which I assume is a very big appeal, especially in a MMORPG world where role-play is very minimal. Things like get a credit or lesson for being logged in for X minutes just seems to encourage being idle. But I have some constructive criticism for IRE's marketing that I will start a new thread for. (Right now to make it short they are very unfocused and some of the last 12 months have been, rather...odd...)
(Speaking of other IRE Muds, Imperian's numbers are down in a similar trend towards Lusternia, Aetola's have been steady, Achaea had a huge spike this year but it was a temporary thing.)
vorld2012-01-22 20:03:51
I wonder how many people have alts? that could be thing to keep in mind also
Ayisdra2012-01-22 20:05:19
foolofsound:
Futher, the need for an autosipper and system in order to bash or influence is a major barrier as well; FirstAid helped with the system situation, but introducing an auto-sipper skill would make bashing possible for payers on the nexus client, which people unfamiliar with MUDs will almost certainly use for a time.
There isn't a need for an autosipper for influence, you can easily manual it completely (given that your client uses a command history).
Same with bashing, but bashing does need a bit more in terms of macros for curing. But both bashing and influencing are not hard to manual, esp just starting out.
Unknown2012-01-22 20:15:17
Sojiro:
I am pretty sure it's because many older people have graduated from University and so have much less free time.
If you have to blame something, blame whatever is the cause for IRE games (Lusternia in particular) to be less of a draw for new players than anything else.
I firmly believe that many people who have posted are looking at the wrong end (old player retention) compared to the actual issue (new player getting).
I do think we need to find a good hook to get new blood flowing somehow...just hopefully not so desparately bad/base as Evony campaigns. FB still holds potential for outreach if its polished and done well. Heck, I was even musing over 'What if Lusternia and Gaia forums did one of those co sponsorship campaigns (from the Advertise with Us link) like the Big Boys (Coke, Mimzy etc) do?' That's a whole untapped rp community right there that's used to 'text gaming' - a new generation of teens, tweens and college folk.. of course maturity comes into play and we'd also have to hope it doesn't lower our quality of play, but build our community.
Online services, especially games, need to build up communities with shared interests whose members feel comfortable using the service. Once the product is running and its core community has been identified, all the online resources should be bent to building, sustaining and protecting this community.
Without such a community the product will have to rely on advertising bringing in 'passing trade' and one-off purchases, which while they may sustain the service for a while are inherently unstable. This instability will soon result in customers deserting the product for the 'next big thing', making consistent sustained usage very difficult. -Alan Lenton
Unknown2012-01-22 20:21:59
IRE should reach out the the tabletop RPG market; I find that the interests often overlap. Purchasing advertisement space on sites that sell tabletop products and forums for the same could attract the kind of people that would enjoy a RP MMO.
Unknown2012-01-22 20:32:57
I blame the new website.
Vadi2012-01-22 20:45:40
I disagree with the 'mix up alliances' argument. All it says to me is that people on the, well, clearly losing side want to see the winning side squabble with themselves, or get on the winning side without changing orgs. Thanks but no thanks.
As for player population - well, I could theorize all I want but it wouldn't change anything, and there's little actual evidence to back things. Lusternia, compared to Achaea, does have a reputation of having barely anyone around - people think that there's barely anyone to fight too, which is untrue for actual fighting numbers. That's a fact I know!
As for player population - well, I could theorize all I want but it wouldn't change anything, and there's little actual evidence to back things. Lusternia, compared to Achaea, does have a reputation of having barely anyone around - people think that there's barely anyone to fight too, which is untrue for actual fighting numbers. That's a fact I know!
Unknown2012-01-22 20:52:37
Okay so let's talk about group combat.
Do you want to know why group combat is king? Because Lusternia, more than any other IRE, encourages your nation to work together the most. They do this through village revolts, flares, domoths, wildnodes, and so on. We are very pro-nation, which, while not inherently bad, nudges people towards the "all for one, one for all mindset", which definitely does not help people lamenting about single/small group combat.
In fact, this problem isn't even unique to Lusternia, it happens in all IREs, here is Aetolia's thread about similar issues: http://forums.aetoli...he-state-of-pk/
Speaking of problems not unique to Lusternia (and is probably how things are meant to be), I feel like one org being top dog for x years is not what's Irrevocably Ruining Lusternia. Every IRE game has this, Achaea has Mhaldor or Ashtan, Aetolia has Bloodloch, Midkemia has Sar-sargoth, and so on. While I'm sure it's a matter of pride and so forth seeing the same guys win a majority of the time, I wouldn't waste my breath thinking that other's success ruins the game. After all, someone has to win in competitions. Though personally, I'd like to think that Glomdoring losing the last two Ascension events says a lot about their supposed dominance, but that's just me!
You know what's really depressing? The burning OOC hatred / lack of respect from both sides that overrides any sort of sportsmanship or sense of fun, which in turn leads to doing anything and everything to win and only acting when you're sure to win. I'm sure this didn't exist at one point in Lusternia and I feel that if you read back to threads during that time, you'd see more people commenting on 1v1 pvp and actually posting logs on the combat forums.
But hey, that's gone and there's not much you can do about except trudge on and try to make the best of what we have.
TL;DR:
1. Lusternia encourages group combat more than any other IRE game
2. Bitching about group combat isn't new.
3. Top dog orgs have nothing to do with destroying the game.
4. Burning hatred / lack of respect leads to win at all costs which leads to teaming.
Edit: Actually Xenthos has pointed out that 'win at all costs' has always existed. He's right, but it was way smaller.
Do you want to know why group combat is king? Because Lusternia, more than any other IRE, encourages your nation to work together the most. They do this through village revolts, flares, domoths, wildnodes, and so on. We are very pro-nation, which, while not inherently bad, nudges people towards the "all for one, one for all mindset", which definitely does not help people lamenting about single/small group combat.
In fact, this problem isn't even unique to Lusternia, it happens in all IREs, here is Aetolia's thread about similar issues: http://forums.aetoli...he-state-of-pk/
Speaking of problems not unique to Lusternia (and is probably how things are meant to be), I feel like one org being top dog for x years is not what's Irrevocably Ruining Lusternia. Every IRE game has this, Achaea has Mhaldor or Ashtan, Aetolia has Bloodloch, Midkemia has Sar-sargoth, and so on. While I'm sure it's a matter of pride and so forth seeing the same guys win a majority of the time, I wouldn't waste my breath thinking that other's success ruins the game. After all, someone has to win in competitions. Though personally, I'd like to think that Glomdoring losing the last two Ascension events says a lot about their supposed dominance, but that's just me!
You know what's really depressing? The burning OOC hatred / lack of respect from both sides that overrides any sort of sportsmanship or sense of fun, which in turn leads to doing anything and everything to win and only acting when you're sure to win. I'm sure this didn't exist at one point in Lusternia and I feel that if you read back to threads during that time, you'd see more people commenting on 1v1 pvp and actually posting logs on the combat forums.
But hey, that's gone and there's not much you can do about except trudge on and try to make the best of what we have.
TL;DR:
1. Lusternia encourages group combat more than any other IRE game
2. Bitching about group combat isn't new.
3. Top dog orgs have nothing to do with destroying the game.
4. Burning hatred / lack of respect leads to win at all costs which leads to teaming.
Edit: Actually Xenthos has pointed out that 'win at all costs' has always existed. He's right, but it was way smaller.
Xenthos2012-01-22 20:54:36
It's always existed in Lusternia.
At one time, it was more of an individual thing, instead of being so wide-spread, though.
At one time, it was more of an individual thing, instead of being so wide-spread, though.
Unknown2012-01-22 21:11:49
Sojiro:
1. Lusternia encourages group combat more than any other IRE game
Possibly. I have only minimal experience with the other games.
2. Bitching about group combat isn't new.
That doesn't mean that it is without flaw, nor does it mean that it was formulated well to begin with. I know that there are a number of people who feel that group combat isn't fun. Some do, but I don't, and I have spoken to a number of others who feel the same. I get the most enjoyment out of spars and wargames; they feel more tactical and make better use of my skills.
3. Top dog orgs have nothing to do with destroying the game.
I'm not saying that a winning faction is destroying the game, however, having a single nation control most of the conflict awards for extensive lengths of time starts making the losing side wonder why they bother to try. Further, jumbing up alliances every once in a while leads to less resentment between factions; working with different people makes everyone less bitter, as former enemies are now friends, and vice-versa.
4. Burning hatred / lack of respect leads to win at all costs which leads to teaming.
The hatred for each other is a result of resentment against enemies who you cannot defeat in any meaningful way, and further because enemies remain enemies for far too long. Occasionally jumbling up the alliances (not often, no more than once per RL year) would allow for a healthy respect between nations and their current enemies, because those same enemies were once friends.
Unknown2012-01-22 21:12:31
My thoughts?
1) Credit entry prices - this one has been repeated a lot
2) Lack of meaningful and significant methods of conflict both combat and non-combat
3) Credit entry prices - this one NEEDS to be repeated a lot
4) Mechanical discouragement of small tactics fighting
5) Player attrition due to apathy
6) Game environment stagnation (org alliances remain static and balance of power never shifts)
7) Credit entry prices - did I mention this? Because I think I really should. I pay over 100USD a month on average playing this game and -I- still constantly hurt for credits needed to compete.
1) Credit entry prices - this one has been repeated a lot
2) Lack of meaningful and significant methods of conflict both combat and non-combat
3) Credit entry prices - this one NEEDS to be repeated a lot
4) Mechanical discouragement of small tactics fighting
5) Player attrition due to apathy
6) Game environment stagnation (org alliances remain static and balance of power never shifts)
7) Credit entry prices - did I mention this? Because I think I really should. I pay over 100USD a month on average playing this game and -I- still constantly hurt for credits needed to compete.
Unknown2012-01-22 21:18:10
PhantasmalKiller:
6) Credit entry prices - did I mention this? Because I think I really should. I pay over 100USD a month on average playing this game and -I- still constantly hurt for credits needed to compete.
This is certainly a problem, but surely that is exaggerated. I get by with my Iron Realm membership, first as a mage, now as a bard, and I've managed to save a good stock of membership credits for returning to my Tae'dae warrior (pending special report). I'm even planning on spending a bit of that stock to create a basic monk, and try that out as well.
The big problem isn't the cost of artifacts. For the most part, each archetype only has a very limited number of artifacts that dramatically boost its power. The big problem is the insufficent lessons to bash effectively, much lesss enter combat.
Turnus2012-01-22 21:18:45
When I've tried to recruit players to lusternia (including mudders), the big complaint for why people give up that I've heard is that its too complex for them. For what that's worth.
Svorai2012-01-22 21:21:21
Greleag:
I blame the new website.
When I joined Lusternia (as a real newbie), what drew me in was the sheer size and depth of the game - there was so much to learn, so much to read. Before joining I spent a good amount of time reading what was available on the (old) website. It might have been an outdated layout, but finding information was easy and it made Lusternia feel like a game for creative and thoughtful people. I can definitely say that I would not have joined with the website as it is now. It appeals to the kind of people we don't want to play with and that would have turned me off.
Credit prices and the dismal amount of lessons that newbies start with and can gain through effort in game are a factor in retaining new players. I was one of a smaller minority who earned their own money and thought it worthwhile enough to fork out dollars for lessons and artifacts. Without them, I would find the game less enjoyable, and I think it really hurts newbies that in Lusternia there is a need for certain skills and items that you can't obtain reliably enough without real money. Sure, that's how the business runs - I get that - but if there are small concessions made at the start (giving newbies more lessons, i.e. 2000+ more than they get now, or more achievements to earn credits) then retaining them and profiting from their desire to play will benefit long-term.
Ayisdra2012-01-22 21:23:01
foolofsound:
The big problem isn't the cost of artifacts. For the most part, each archetype only has a very limited number of artifacts that dramatically boost its power. The big problem is the insufficent lessons to bash effectively, much lesss enter combat.
I disagree, the fact that combatants have the artifacts makes them a standard that you need them to be at their level. thus making the artifacts a needed cost.
Unknown2012-01-22 21:25:52
Ayisdra:
I disagree, the fact that combatants have the artifacts makes them a standard that you need them to be at their level. thus making the artifacts a needed cost.
Which artifacts are those? I own exactly two combat artifacts on my main, a Demense Rune (that I traded in for an Instrument rune when I went bard) and a Shield rune. I know that many combatants get by without a shield rune as well, certainly a good many mages do.
You have to judge the value of the artifact by how much it really increases your power. Would you say that a character with an infinite health vial is harder to kil than one with a full liquidrift? Many artifacts have relatively small impacts on combat, advantages that can easily be overcome by being a bit more clever.
Vadi2012-01-22 21:26:37
I'd like to point out that in Achaea, admins forcibly split the Mhaldor+Ashtan alliance. It was nothing of the sort that foolsofsound is advocating of "healthy respect" and generally good for the game and yadda yadda. All it did was piss people off, force some people to go rogue so they can still be with their friends on both sides, and made one side of the former alliance turn into more obscurity. There were Achaea-specific details to that, like forced class changes (thus forced $$$ spending), but the gist of it is that the proponents of that split were no more satisfied or better off after, and the people affected by it were pissed off and things did not improve.
So... once again, thanks but no thanks.
@What artefacts: It's all or none. There's a difference to an artie can tanking 2+ people beating on them indefinitely versus a non-artied person going down easily.
So... once again, thanks but no thanks.
@What artefacts: It's all or none. There's a difference to an artie can tanking 2+ people beating on them indefinitely versus a non-artied person going down easily.
Unknown2012-01-22 21:27:41
You need at minimum, dingbat nose, soap, 3 pipe runes, gem of cloaking, grip runes, shield rune, and a RoA, if you're not melee. Given the current spam-damage group combat meta, lvl 3 magic rune is important too, especially for bard/mage. If you're a warrior, add in 3Kcr worth of weapon runes instead of the grip and shield rune.
Then add in bixes. And your cameo. And lots and lots of other things that make a win-or-lose difference situationally. It's ridiculous.
And that's not even including skills. You need a minimum of trans 6 + green/gedulah + tumble to fight. That means you're looking at somewhere to the tune of 450-600USD (if you buy all at once in bulk), dependant on other bits that are essential to different groups (and ignoring that warriors -require- the 3Kcr (read 900USD) rune drop to fight, on an equal priority with getting their skills.
When -every- class needs to shell out half a grand to fight, and warriors need to shell out almost a grand and a half USD... just for the bare essentials...
YOU'VE GOT A SERIOUS :censor: PROBLEM
If getting credits in-game were remotely viable, it wouldn't be as absurd, but as is? :censor: that, man. If I didn't have plenty of money to just piss away in the wind, I wouldn't even bother playing.
Then add in bixes. And your cameo. And lots and lots of other things that make a win-or-lose difference situationally. It's ridiculous.
And that's not even including skills. You need a minimum of trans 6 + green/gedulah + tumble to fight. That means you're looking at somewhere to the tune of 450-600USD (if you buy all at once in bulk), dependant on other bits that are essential to different groups (and ignoring that warriors -require- the 3Kcr (read 900USD) rune drop to fight, on an equal priority with getting their skills.
When -every- class needs to shell out half a grand to fight, and warriors need to shell out almost a grand and a half USD... just for the bare essentials...
YOU'VE GOT A SERIOUS :censor: PROBLEM
If getting credits in-game were remotely viable, it wouldn't be as absurd, but as is? :censor: that, man. If I didn't have plenty of money to just piss away in the wind, I wouldn't even bother playing.
